Why Career Planning Is Time Wasted
Our culture worships planning. Everything must be planned in advance. Our days, week, years, our entire lives. We have diaries, schedules, checklists, targets, goals, aims, strategies, visions even. Career planning is the most insidious of these cults precisely because it encourages a feeling of control over your reactions to future events. As that interview question goes: where do you see yourself in five years time? This invites the beginning of what starts as a little game and finishes as a belief built on sand. You guess what employers want to hear, and then you give it to them. Sometimes this batting back and forth of imagined futures becomes a necessary little game you play in order to ‘get ahead’.
“We want to make a decision all of our own, based on our own values and preferences.”
In reality, people frequently don’t know what they want and psychology has proved it. That’s why career planning, or at the very least just deciding what you’re going to do next, is so unpleasant. It’s no fun at 18 years old when people ask what you want to do. There seem to be so many different options, each with myriad branching possibilities, many of which lead in opposite directions, but all equally tempting. Surrounded by these endless spiralling futures, it is no wonder that many a school-leaver sticks with what they know and follows in parental footsteps. But we don’t all want to trust the tried and tested, whether for good reasons or bad. We want to make a decision all of our own, based on our own values and preferences.
Midlife crisis
If it’s hard at 18, it’s even harder in midlife when people are theoretically better equipped to make their choice. In reality by your 30s wide-eyed optimism has normally been replaced by a more cynical outlook on jobs and the workplace. Now it’s more clear what the downsides of certain jobs are. There’s not only our own experiences of work but we also have friends at work, all of whom colour our perception of their careers.
Everyone has their own internal trade-offs. How much routine do you like: boring but safe)? How much do you like travel: exciting but you’ll be away from loved ones? How much do you care about earning more money: and taking a more boring/stressful/less fulfilling job? Whatever the outcome of all these swings and roundabouts along with many more, the reason that deciding what to do with your life is so difficult is that it involves predicting the future.
There’s many reasons why it seems we should be good at prediction what we want. If I know that I’m enjoying what I’m doing now, then I should enjoy it in the future shouldn’t I? On top of this I’ve got years of experience building up a set of things I like – cinema, books, sitcoms – and things I don’t like – trips to the dentist, severe embarrassment and flu, especially not all at the same time. If I’ve got this huge bank of likes and dislikes it should be easy to predict my wants in the future. And yet, it seems we are often surprised by what the future throws at us.
Miswanting
“We are poor at predicting what will make us happy in the future.”
The idea of making mistakes about what we might want in the future has been termed ‘miswanting’ by Gilbert and Wilson (2000). They point to a range of studies finding we are poor at predicting what will make us happy in the future. My favourite is a simple experiment in which two groups of participants get free sandwiches if they participate in the experiment – a doozie for any undergraduate.
One group has to choose which sandwiches they want for an entire week in advance. The other group gets to choose which they want each day. A fascinating thing happens. People who choose their favourite sandwich each day at lunchtime also often choose the same sandwich. This group turns out to be reasonably happy with its choice.
Amazingly, though, people choosing in advance assume that what they’ll want for lunch next week is a variety. And so they choose a turkey sandwich Monday, tuna on Tuesday, egg on Wednesday and so on. It turn out that when next week rolls around they generally don’t like the variety they thought they would. In fact they are significantly less happy with their choices than the group who chose their sandwiches on the day.
Prediction failure
This variety versus sameness is only one particular bias that people display in making predictions about their future emotional states. There is another counter-intuitive bias emerging from the work being done in positive psychology. This looks at how people predict they will feel after both catastrophically bad, and, conversely, fantastically positive occurrences in their life. For example, how good would you feel if you won the lottery? Most people predict their lives will be completely changed and they’ll be much happier. What does the research find? Yes, people are measurably happier after they’ve just won, but six months down the line they’re back to their individual ‘baseline’ level of happiness.
So, in the journey from the sublime – predicting how we’ll feel about winning the lottery – to the ridiculous – predicting which sandwiches we’ll want for lunch – we are incredibly bad at knowing our future selves. And if we can’t even decide what type of sandwich we might like next week, how can we possibly decide what type of job we’d like to be doing in twenty years?
With age occasionally comes wisdom. Over time we learn, whether implicitly or explicitly, that we are not that good at predicting the future. At the very least we begin to recognise it is a much less precise science than we once thought.
A stranger future
This means your future self is probably a stranger to you. And, on some level, you know it. That’s why it might be hard for an 18 year old to choose their career, but it’s a damn sight harder for someone in midlife when limitations have been learnt.
“People begin to understand that the future holds vanishingly few certainties…”
This might seem like just another way of saying that people get more cautious as they get older, but it is more than that. It’s actually saying that it’s not caution that’s increasing with age, but implicit self-knowledge. People begin to understand that the future holds vanishingly few certainties, even for those things that would seem to be under our most direct control, like our sandwich preferences.
Best guess beats careful planning
The argument about miswanting applies to any area of our lives which involves making a prediction about what we might like in the future. Career planning becomes painful precisely because it’s such an important decision and we come to understand that we have only very limited useful information.
The best strategy for career planning is this: make your best guess, try it out and don’t be surprised if you don’t like it. But for heaven’s sake don’t mention this in your interviews.
Guest: 最后一句，查dictionary了么
牛津高阶上写着
f...
satcfj: 爱丽丝想，就继续说了：“请你告诉我，离开
这里应该走哪条路...
上善: 我哥哥现在经常叫我搞什么未来规划，头痛啊！现在每次跟他说不上...
胡言乱语: 呵呵有趣的文章
事情是这样的,前辈中没有规划的人看到有规划...
luopu: 最后一句应该是：
但是为了天堂的缘故，请不要在面试的时候提...
Guest: 请问哪里有英文版么？
随风飘飘: 其实人的一生只有一个方向
就是从出生到死亡
像鲁迅先生说...
最后一句应该是：
但是为了天堂的缘故，请不要在面试的时候提到这些。
Aeghilnz:2007-02-06 14:54 PM
中文翻译的最后一句话有点错误。
最好翻译成：But for heaven’s sake don’t mention this in your interviews.
但是，请无论如何不要在面试中提及这些。
油茶研究会:2007-02-06 15:06 PM
roger:2007-02-06 15:48 PM
谢谢指正。
最后一句，查dictionary了么
牛津高阶上写着
for God’s sake
用作感叹语，可置于表示命令或要求的词语之前或之后，或表示愤怒
可译为，天哪，看在上帝的面上
这译文很难理解，
英文的文章也是
但要有认真的态度才行
dxxesong:2007-02-06 20:02 PM
“我们其实无非预测未来是什么使得我们幸福”
Guest:2007-02-06 21:00 PM
我们无法预料的未来。。。顶！！！！
请问哪里有英文版么？
Guest:2007-02-06 21:13 PM
哦知道了．．
roger:2007-02-07 8:52 AM
有这么一个交流的平台真好，谢谢各位的指正，希望以后的翻译不再让大家找出这么多错来。
最后一句确实错大了。对不住大家了哈。
Microwind:2007-02-08 14:16 PM
计划赶不上变化。可以这么概括么？
当然，职业规划中有其可取之处，起码告诉你行动的某种方向，不浪费时光（前提是你有所行动）
Guest:2007-02-09 18:44 PM
我喜欢这篇文字,由于这个也更确定了我的想法
谢谢
Guest:2007-02-09 18:47 PM
职业规划如此，人生规划何尝不是呢
如果不能变的更好，起码应该变的聪明一点或者说快乐一点
我哥哥现在经常叫我搞什么未来规划，头痛啊！现在每次跟他说不上几句就开始~PK~
哎~~好烦，我觉得什么规划不规划的只要自己开心就好了……
希望Psytopic给我点开解，建议也好的~先谢谢~
kim:2007-02-10 22:10 PM
这篇文章给了我的人生一个小出口
宝宝:2007-02-12 16:01 PM
我觉得人生是需要规划一下的，特别是在几个重要的阶段。然而规划和现实也许会有差距，有了计划，努力去争取实现目标就好。在个人选择的道路上，动力也许会更足一些，成效相应的会更明显一些。
年轻时选择的职业不是要自己无论如何都要坚持一辈子的职业，只是在一个相对时期内比较适合自己的职业。在工作的过程中，在新的社会经历的影响下，我们势必会面临新的挑战，时机成熟的时候就让我们再一次的选择新的职业吧
abeary:2007-02-13 13:31 PM
规划的同时给自己留出改变的空间
会出现意想不到的结果
不管有怎样的变化你都会觉得，所有的事情都是预先想到的，都在自己的掌控之中
呵呵有趣的文章
事情是这样的,前辈中没有规划的人看到有规划的人的成功之处,觉得自己若是也规划一下一定比现在状态好多了,所以号召大家来规划吧;有规划的人看到自己走的还不错,也号召大家来规划吧.
但是谁敢包票这就是我最好的规划?太少了吧?只有谁敢说这是我无悔的规划
那么我想,有明确志向和特殊天赋的,规划吧,不走这条路大概就亏啦;有很多志向有很多天赋的,不想规划就拉倒吧,说不定在你想法之外有更精彩的等着你;但是千万要珍惜时间,因为那些多么精彩不会只等一个谁,是给有更多准备的人的
木桃慕陶:2007-02-27 14:16 PM
胡言乱语 倒也不是胡言乱语
Lemon:2007-03-08 21:14 PM
用别人的马甲胡言乱语是不是浪费时间？
其实人的一生只有一个方向
就是从出生到死亡
像鲁迅先生说的那样:世界上本没有路,走的人多了,也便有了路
所谓的规划也一样
只是给自己一个方向
不至于在人生的旅途中,如同无头苍蝇一般盲目的乱撞
让自己能在人生旅途中,沿着属于自己的方向前进
而不是漫无目的甚至在原地打转
爱丽丝想，就继续说了：“请你告诉我，离开
这里应该走哪条路？”
“这要看你想上哪儿去，”猫说。
“去哪里，我不大在乎。”爱丽丝说。
“那你走哪条路都没关系。”猫说。
“只要．能走到一个地方。”爱丽丝又补充说了一句。
“哦，那行，”猫说，“只要你走得很远的话。”
wangami:2007-03-23 11:47 AM
目标明确，就该规划；否则还是那句话：知足者常乐！
Guest:2007-04-15 23:26 PM
你可以不规划你的人生,你可以满足于”只要我当下是快乐的”,不过你的人生是否总是一帆风顺?环境在不断变化,变化总在人不注意的时候缓慢的进行着,而我们谁能确定在每个年龄阶段都能够适应周遭环境的变化呢?
职业规划的目的就是:一、居安思危,让自己有应对未来风险的能力二、给自己的人生确立奋斗目标,让自己的人生过得更有意义
三、时间不可逆，人生有限，时间成本对每个人来说是最大的成本，规划人生就是珍惜时间
自己的想法之外可能有更好的想法或者规划有无数多种方案就不去做人生规划，这就像解决一个问题时，一直在思考解题有无数多种方案或者自己的解法可能并非最佳答案，而不去解决这个问题。
babyfish:2007-04-23 22:21 PM
只有去听听心底的声音。关乎一个自由选择的问题。
还有，基本目的都是想过得更加快乐。
规划大可不用太过具体，具体太过死板，但规划还是应该有的。
无书香:2007-05-08 12:57 PM
我经常在被问到未来的规划时都无从回答
Guest:2007-05-18 14:58 PM
这让那些在multinational companies里面整天埋头于performance review, career planing, individual development plan, succession plan, management development的HR们还怎么活那
Iva:2007-05-23 7:57 AM
哈哈,符合胃口.
快乐鱼:2007-05-28 9:41 AM
正在为自己的未来发愁……
该向何处走呢?
人生的十字路口……
快乐鱼:2007-05-28 9:43 AM
正在为自己的未来发愁….
人生的十字路口…..
该做什么样的选择呢?
呵呵,随心?
OK.
jian:2007-06-03 14:36 PM
最近被长远职业规划和一个临时愿望相冲突的问题困扰得不行,感谢!!!!
终于找到支持选择后者的理由了,
人要获得幸福最重要的是听听内心的意愿,而不是一辈子被一些条条框框牵绊.
昊昊:2007-08-16 12:36 PM
嗯，人生也不可强求，还是随缘的好。
当机会出现时，抓住它，拼搏一下。
yanli9119:2007-08-28 4:54 AM
人生还是要规划的，没了目标就没了动力，要成为成功的人没目标不可能，可能不符合我的人生观，但还是谢谢翻译，辛苦了！
哈哈:2007-09-26 16:15 PM
看看!
Guest:2007-10-02 16:35 PM
唉声叹气
无聊的文章:2007-10-04 14:10 PM
这篇文章一点都不好,随意论,根本不知道什么叫职业规划,就好比做任何事情,是做准备的做的好还是不做准备的好呢?这是不言自明的道理.
lily:2007-10-07 0:36 AM
我觉得 有所求就应该有所准备
规划不规划的要看自己了 有远大的目标 有野心 就该有所规划
喜欢随性的生活 为心灵安静而生活 没有规划也无所谓
以上.
yoku:2007-10-19 14:09 PM
24楼和36楼 我觉得你们没有看懂文章的意思
如果一意坚持自己的想法的话 那这篇文章看了等于没看
清灵:2007-11-30 7:27 AM
我刚好给自己规划了一个目标.没什么具体的计划.但总算没在浪费时间.
大黄哦:2008-01-01 11:38 AM
爱丽丝想，就继续说了：“请你告诉我，离开
这里应该走哪条路？”
“这要看你想上哪儿去，”猫说。
“去哪里，我不大在乎。”爱丽丝说。
“那你走哪条路都没关系。”猫说。
“只要．能走到一个地方。”爱丽丝又补充说了一句。
“哦，那行，”猫说，“只要你走得很远的话。”
这个相当不错。恩恩，这才是这篇帖子里最有价值的。我喜欢庄子。
Jan:2008-01-12 16:38 PM
我们可以做职业规划,但是不一定须要做人生规划. 工作占了我们人生大部分时间, 也是我们的生存工具. 人生有太多的不确定因素存在,所以不必把自己绑死在所为的人生规划.有个大概的概念就可.
小土自:2008-01-18 15:08 PM
想规划就规划，不想规划就不规划，即便浪费时间，也是浪费自己的时间。一切都在于自己的选择，“根据自己的价值观和特质，我们自己做决定”。
paul:2008-02-29 21:28 PM
不错的文章！
适当规划是有好处的，不过规划毕竟是达到目标的工具而已，而人生真正的目的是快乐，如果为了规划而丧失了快乐，那就得不偿失了。呵呵
看到你头大的文章:2008-03-12 22:40 PM
若隐若现，似是而非，这篇文章给人的感觉就是如此。难道中文与英文的距离是无限远？
Tummler:2008-03-19 17:15 PM
这是个不错的交流平台,谢谢
tian:2008-03-25 8:46 AM
终于证实自己的想法` 当所有人熱衷于職業規劃的時候 我却對它毫無激情
Mosted:2008-04-02 0:07 AM
想说的东西很多.但说多了很容易会偏离自己的最初想说的.
小海狸:2008-04-04 12:21 PM
职业规划还是要做的，但目标不一定一成不变，在奋斗的过程中可以修正。
look for soul:2008-04-04 13:28 PM
十字路口确实很难选择，毕竟阅历太少，正的很无奈
我来说两句