In the context of career choice, what does the term ‘making a difference’ mean to you? I find it a bit of a nebulous concept. After all, there are many ways to find meaning and make contributions in the work you do, regardless of the work you do.
Attitude and perspective also make a difference. Demonstrating kindness to your colleagues will mean you’re remembered for your impact on others long after you’ve left a role.
Having a clear vision of the overall aims of your organisation and where your values align with its overall purpose can also provide you with meaning and satisfaction.
If you’re wanting more though, it can be helpful to ask a series of specific questions. This can help you identify which jobs may provide you with a greater sense of meaning or purpose.
Ask yourself:
1. Why do you want to make a difference?
Ask yourself: ‘what makes me angry or upsets me?’ This will highlight your values and where you may be willing to invest your time and effort.
2. Who or what do you want to make a difference to?
Whose lives do you want to improve? For example, the young, the sick, the elderly, the marginalised? Perhaps you want to focus on animal welfare, the safety of others, on health, education or the environment?
3. What role do you see yourself playing?
When you imagine yourself making a difference, do you see yourself:
- As an educator
- Organising events or people
- Persuading decision makers to make investments
- Counselling and offering support
- Advocating for a marginalised group
- Mentoring those with less experience
- Giving advice
- Caring for others
- Undertaking research
4. What skills and strengths do you have?
If you can identify what you’re good at and enjoy, it will be easier to identify where you can apply your skills and strengths. Do you prefer to:
- Apply your skills and energy directly to the people you want to make a difference to? For example, front line delivery of aid in war-torn countries, applying medical or therapeutic skills
- Campaign through fundraising
- Use your practical skills to build sustainable housing or dig wells to provide water
- Use engineering or design skills to invent devices that make a difference to the lives of others
- Undertake research into the causes of poverty, conflict, unemployment
- Develop life-saving drugs
- Apply your professional skills to making a difference- an accountant working for a charity, a consultant working in the education sector, a teacher
- Develop strategies by working for a policy unit or think tank
- Analyse and interpret Big Data to shape the policy decisions of governments or NGOs?
5. Where do you want to work?
You may or may not be constrained in terms of geography. Visualise your work environment. Where do you see yourself working?
- At home
- Outdoors
- In an office
- Overseas
- On the move
6. How do you want to work?
- As part of a team
- In a professional setting
- In the public eye
- With a high degree of autonomy
- Regular or irregular hours
- Under pressure
- Project-based
- Working behind the scenes?
7. What are you willing to do to make your career more fulfilling?
You may feel the urge to reinvent yourself, engaging in a course of study or taking a job which will require a drop in salary.
Perhaps a sideways move would help you acquire the necessary skills needed to change direction.
You may not be in a position financially, geographically or timewise to make such a substantial move. A sideways move could help you acquire the necessary skills needed to change direction. Perhaps you could explore making changes within the job you have. Is there a project at work where you could contribute which would make you role more fulfilling?
Volunteering for a charity or worthwhile cause in your spare time can provide an opportunity to give back.
8. What do you talk about and read?
What subjects do you get drawn into heated conversations about? Look at your bookshelves. What kinds of books do you read? Which online articles hold your interest?
9. Who is doing a job you envy?
Talk to friends and colleagues and search on LinkedIn to identify others you could connect with to find out about their job and how they found their job. Many people will be happy to connect and have a conversation with you.
10. Where can I find out more?
Use resources such as Prospects to find out more about the jobs that interest you and how to get into them. Also this guide on 80000 Hours with articles and podcasts on this topic.
We all have a different perspective on what it means to make a difference. Use these questions to help identify how you might make your unique contribution.
What you do makes a difference, and you have to decide what kind of difference you want to make. Jane Goodall
