In order to escape the often unhealthy relationship that people have with their jobs, Poehler suggests you “treat your career like a bad boyfriend.” In other words, stop chasing your current career and get it to pursue you. If this doesn’t work, find a new career.
Poehler argues that trying not to care about your career goals may actually increase your chances of achieving what you want. “Pretending to not want something can work,” she says. “Your career will chase you if you act like other things (passion, friendship, family, longevity) are more important to you.”
Taking a step back from work is something millennials are notoriously bad at. Millennials are often characterized by researchers as “workaholics” because they are the most likely to forfeit vacation days and obsess over work more often than their Gen X and Baby Boomer colleagues.
If a strategy of stepping back does not help you get closer to your goals, Poehler suggests you cut and run. “If your career is a bad boyfriend, it is healthy to remember you can always leave and go sleep with somebody else,” she writes.
This is where Poehler’s advice most fits the millennial mold. Harvard Business review reports that six in 10 millennials say they are open to different job opportunities, the highest percentage among all generations in the workplace.
Of course, her metaphor has its limits. You do not need a relationship to survive the same way you need a job, and earnings, to survive. Breaking up with one job before you have another lined up can have real, and often damaging, effects.
But the beauty of Poehler’s argument is that it can mean something different for everyone. Millennials are the largest and most diverse generation in American history. Giving all millennials the same standard advice to go to school, become professionals, buy houses and retire at 65 simply doesn’t make sense.
Poehler’s advice provides space for individuals to make the career and life decisions that will ultimately make them most fulfilled, and what is more millennial than that?
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