Select the Right Company
The choice is yours. You hold the tiller. You can steer the course you choose in the direction of where you want to be—today, tomorrow, or in a distant time to come.
—W. CLEMENT STONE
In these times of continuous and accelerating change, some industries are growing and expanding and absorbing many thousands of people. These industries are offering incredible opportunities for men and women who want to get ahead faster than the average person.
In the meantime, many other industries have leveled off or are actually declining in economic importance and employment. These industries continue to hire people to replace the workers who quit or retire, but as a result of automation, new technology, changing consumer preferences, and competition, these industries are not likely to grow much in the years ahead. Your first job in the pursuit of great career success is to separate the high-growth industries from the low-growth industries.
You can make more progress toward getting paid more and promoted faster in a high-growth industry in a couple of years than you might in five or ten years in a slow-growth industry. Many people change their entire lives by simply walking across the street and taking a different job in a different company in a faster growing sector of the economy.
Look upon your special combination of talents and abilities as a precious resource, like money, and view the job market as a place where you are going to invest yourself to get the very highest return. Treat your mental, emotional, and physical energies as your “human capital,” to be allocated in such a way as to give you the maximum payoff. Be perfectly selfish when it comes to committing your life and your work to a particular company or a particular industry.
When you find the right job in the right company, you should then throw your whole heart into doing that job in an excellent fashion. Continually look for ways to increase your value. This strategy will put you in a perfect position to be paid more and promoted faster in the months and years ahead.
TAKE ACTION NOW!
Look around you in the marketplace of jobs and careers today. Identify the companies and industries that are getting the most attention in the news because of their new products, processes, and growth rates. Decide if any company or industry out there interests you, attracts you, draws you toward it.
Do your research. Check newspapers, magazines, and libraries. Surf the Internet. The power is on the side of the person with the best information. Then, start talking to people who work with or in the type of companies you are attracted to. Apply for a position and ask what skills or competencies a person would need to succeed in that business. This research process could change your whole life.