If you are looking for a job. Don’t put up a facade and hope that you’ll eventually come to terms with what you have resigned yourself to do. Don’t do it. Just don’t.
If you are in a job that is not your ideal job. Don’t fake it. Your best work will not come through. Your best efforts will never be applied to this role. Don’t do it. Just don’t.
Don’t put up a facade to attempt doing a role that you are not passionate about. Don’t tell yourself a lie that you will eventually have to refute. Eventually you will need to come to terms with that facade.
If you tell the truth, you don’t have to remember anything.
~Mark Twain
This is especially true for the stories we tell ourselves. Be faithful to yourself. Be truthful to yourself.
Be real – you cannot keep up a façade for three years
I use 3 years to point out how long it might take for your facade to crack. By this time your facade will have consumed your energy and especially your time. You may be able to put up with a false front for a while, but over the course of time you will tire of putting on airs. You will tire of spending so much energy into supporting a fallacy.
What can you do about it?
Take charge. Own your career. Own your interviewing process. Own your facade.
Everyone puts on a facade at different times of their lives. Facades aren’t necessarily a bad thing. Facades are useful for different parts of you life. Just make sure the facade you commit to is the one that defines you, nourishes you, ands inspires you to be and do your best.
What’s the risk?
Career stultification. Settling for something you aren’t passionate about. Forcing yourself to accept a lie.
“I’m not upset that you lied to me, I’m upset that from now on I can’t believe you.”
~Friedrich Nietzsche
This is especially harsh when these are the lies we are telling ourselves. The risk is … We can never believe our own stories again.
Tell the Truth. Especially to yourself. Your career and livelihood depend on it.
Author:
Jeff is a veteran in the Enterprise Content Management industry. Over the past 20 years he has worked with customers and partners to design, develop and deploy solutions around the world. Jeff is currently the Director of Strategic Alliances at Winshuttle. He has worked for Microsoft, FileNet (IBM), K2, Captaris, Open Text, Kofax and Kodak. He speaks and blogs about ECM and the Intersection between Social, Mobile and Cloud Computing.
