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This article's objective is not the usual advice on getting your dream job. The Internet is loaded with ideas on how to do that. Rather, my goal is to emphasis to you how to identify that dream job, in the first place.
Whatever aptitudes, skills and work history you have is what it is. How you choose to market it is how you choose to do so. My question is, are you choosing to market yourself to the right companies? Elsewhere, I've give my list of the most elite of the best companies to work for . Knowing that though won't solve for you the question of the right fit.
Size Matters
Whether or not you've previously weighed it as a consideration, company size does make a big difference in both the quality of your work experience and the standard of success implicit in your employment.
Some people prefer small firms, with a heavy hands-on focus, which provides the opportunity for close, very personal working relationships. The opportunity to not only know your colleagues well, but possibly even to know them all well, constitutes a distinctive work environment. Plus, the ability to really see the fruit of your efforts is possible in a way it is not within large, more impersonal firms.
Though larger firms strive, and often succeed, in creating a team atmosphere within departments and divisions, the truth is that your team's success is ultimately always dependent upon the accomplishments of some other teams beyond your control and outside your shared group identity. At a small firm, the successes and the challenges are all much more immediate and tangible.
On the other hand, big companies offer advantages which the smaller ones simply cannot provide. Their greater size embodies more opportunity for organizational advancement, up the executive ladder, with all the benefits of increased responsibility, challenge and salary. Most large firms also offer options for more intensive specialization, should that be your preference. Yet, the same operational diversity of the large firm also allows you a better option to get out of a specialization which has grown stale for you, providing the option for lateral movement within the firm. This opens new career paths that don't cost you established seniority and tenure through changing employers.
And if you have any of the adventurer's spirit in you, nowadays it is common for very large companies to be involved in geographically dispersed business. Working at such a firm may offer the chance to travel and even to live in excitingly difference cultures and societies. This can be a once in a lifetime opportunity for your children to experience the world. It is common for such firms to provide language training, schooling and other forms of family support should you make such a move for the company. And of course let us not forget the bottom line: usually larger companies can provide larger salaries and almost always more extensive and valuable perks and benefits.
Structure Matters
In addition to the size of a potential employer, it is important to take into consideration its structure and how that will affect your own work experience. At one extreme end of the spectrum are highly regimented, hierarchical firms, with precisely delineated job descriptions and chain of command.
At the other end are those companies, such as the video game producer Valve, that emphasize fluid, adaptive working relationships, relying upon employee initiative and innovation. In those at the very far end of the spectrum, there may not even be chain of command hierarchy, relying instead upon a culture of collegial supervision and informal 360 degree accountability.
Don't be misled into passing moral judgments on those attracted to one form of structure or the other. The reason that both exist is because different people thrive better in different environments. You have to figure out which is right for you.
Do you thrive best when your tasks are clearly delineated? Do you dislike being sideswiped by problems which you had no idea would be part of your responsibility? Do you feel anxious at the prospect of vague instructions or unclear expectations? If that's a fair description of how you function at work, you're not going to thrive in the more fluid environment of the flatter hierarchies. You'd likely only find those work environments to be stressful. No number of basketball courts and massages are going to compensate for working in an environment in which you are unable to feel satisfied or successful.
The inverse set of considerations, though, are equally true: those who feel inhibited by authority, inspired by new challenges and revel in the roughshod work world of endless improvisation are not going to thrive in a button down firm of clearly delineated and firmly enforced processes and responsibilities. The increased security and stability that they may offer, likely isn't worth the price of the organizationally conservative culture. Such people will find their satisfaction and greatest success in the more fluid, flat structured organization, where they will be provoked into creative spontaneity adaptation. These are the companies most likely to encourage and reward such people's boundary defying style of intellectual curiosity.
Remember, this is not about what's right and wrong or good and bad here. It's about what's right or wrong and good or bad for you. Companies of different sizes and structures possess different characteristics. Your success and satisfaction at work is much enhanced by ensuring that you're working in an environment that gets the most from and gives back the most to you. This short review has been intended to aid you in making the better choice for your own dispositions and long term success.
Whatever aptitudes, skills and work history you have is what it is. How you choose to market it is how you choose to do so. My question is, are you choosing to market yourself to the right companies? Elsewhere, I've give my list of the most elite of the best companies to work for . Knowing that though won't solve for you the question of the right fit.
Size Matters
Whether or not you've previously weighed it as a consideration, company size does make a big difference in both the quality of your work experience and the standard of success implicit in your employment.
Some people prefer small firms, with a heavy hands-on focus, which provides the opportunity for close, very personal working relationships. The opportunity to not only know your colleagues well, but possibly even to know them all well, constitutes a distinctive work environment. Plus, the ability to really see the fruit of your efforts is possible in a way it is not within large, more impersonal firms.
Though larger firms strive, and often succeed, in creating a team atmosphere within departments and divisions, the truth is that your team's success is ultimately always dependent upon the accomplishments of some other teams beyond your control and outside your shared group identity. At a small firm, the successes and the challenges are all much more immediate and tangible.
On the other hand, big companies offer advantages which the smaller ones simply cannot provide. Their greater size embodies more opportunity for organizational advancement, up the executive ladder, with all the benefits of increased responsibility, challenge and salary. Most large firms also offer options for more intensive specialization, should that be your preference. Yet, the same operational diversity of the large firm also allows you a better option to get out of a specialization which has grown stale for you, providing the option for lateral movement within the firm. This opens new career paths that don't cost you established seniority and tenure through changing employers.
And if you have any of the adventurer's spirit in you, nowadays it is common for very large companies to be involved in geographically dispersed business. Working at such a firm may offer the chance to travel and even to live in excitingly difference cultures and societies. This can be a once in a lifetime opportunity for your children to experience the world. It is common for such firms to provide language training, schooling and other forms of family support should you make such a move for the company. And of course let us not forget the bottom line: usually larger companies can provide larger salaries and almost always more extensive and valuable perks and benefits.
Structure Matters
In addition to the size of a potential employer, it is important to take into consideration its structure and how that will affect your own work experience. At one extreme end of the spectrum are highly regimented, hierarchical firms, with precisely delineated job descriptions and chain of command.
At the other end are those companies, such as the video game producer Valve, that emphasize fluid, adaptive working relationships, relying upon employee initiative and innovation. In those at the very far end of the spectrum, there may not even be chain of command hierarchy, relying instead upon a culture of collegial supervision and informal 360 degree accountability.
Don't be misled into passing moral judgments on those attracted to one form of structure or the other. The reason that both exist is because different people thrive better in different environments. You have to figure out which is right for you.
Do you thrive best when your tasks are clearly delineated? Do you dislike being sideswiped by problems which you had no idea would be part of your responsibility? Do you feel anxious at the prospect of vague instructions or unclear expectations? If that's a fair description of how you function at work, you're not going to thrive in the more fluid environment of the flatter hierarchies. You'd likely only find those work environments to be stressful. No number of basketball courts and massages are going to compensate for working in an environment in which you are unable to feel satisfied or successful.
The inverse set of considerations, though, are equally true: those who feel inhibited by authority, inspired by new challenges and revel in the roughshod work world of endless improvisation are not going to thrive in a button down firm of clearly delineated and firmly enforced processes and responsibilities. The increased security and stability that they may offer, likely isn't worth the price of the organizationally conservative culture. Such people will find their satisfaction and greatest success in the more fluid, flat structured organization, where they will be provoked into creative spontaneity adaptation. These are the companies most likely to encourage and reward such people's boundary defying style of intellectual curiosity.
Remember, this is not about what's right and wrong or good and bad here. It's about what's right or wrong and good or bad for you. Companies of different sizes and structures possess different characteristics. Your success and satisfaction at work is much enhanced by ensuring that you're working in an environment that gets the most from and gives back the most to you. This short review has been intended to aid you in making the better choice for your own dispositions and long term success.
About the Author:
Thomas Ryerson's work at the Best Companies to Work For blog is a tremendous resource for job hunters and career changers. Also, for anyone considering a leave from work to pursue an MBA, his article "Is Getting an MBA the Right Decision for You" is a must read.
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