You serve the notice, you transition, you work, you serve the notice and so on it continues
What drives us to shift our careers? Is it that we are dissatisfied with our present jobs or is it that we have suddenly adopted an adventurous streak in our otherwise monotonous lives? The answer to this question is often left unanswered by many transitioning employees. The process just seems to move on; you serve the notice, you transition, you work, you serve the notice and so on it continues. The most important thing for anyone to do, whether it be working or looking for work is to undertake Career Benefit Analysis.
The CBA is based on five basic questions;
- Why do you want to move?
- What are your present perceived obstacles?
- What do you expect from the move?
- What is your perception of the other side? and
- What is your desired end state?
These questions while appearing simple, answer very complex queries which are very basal to our needs and wants. While the Mazlow’s Hierarchy of needs may be nearing obsolescence, needs and wants still drive a human being to do things otherwise considered improbable, if not impossible.
The biggest question that looms large is “What If?”
CBA helps oneself to assess and verify the requirement of transition. This, becomes all the more relevant to transitioning military personnel owing to the little (or in some cases, NIL) contact and exposure to the corporate structure. Transitioning veterans bring to the table a plethora of experience and skill sets. These are accrued owing to the varied nature of posts that they are pushed to handle and the levels of stress they are able to successfully negotiate through their time in the uniform. Most personnel who I have spoken to, reveal a very basal requirement of recognition and upward mobility. While these are very strong decision drivers, basing a transition with only these as parameters often lead to disappointment, soon after the move. More often than not, I find veterans struggling with Transition Anxiety. The biggest question that looms large is “What If?” There are many factors that are out of your control and rightly so. Using CBA, you can overcome transition anxiety to a large extent. CBA focusses on the base values rather abstracted parameters. Analysing base values provides a more realistic understanding of transition thereby easing anxiety.
Life is an amazingly dirty golfer. It knows when you are down and will, without doubt stymie you
Rahul Sitaraman
Another surprising issue that I have come across is Decision Paralysis. Along the way, in my journey to gain understanding of varied things, I learnt a term called “Analysis Paralysis”. When I compared the characteristics of that to Decision Paralysis, it emerges that latter is the uglier cousin of Analysis Paralysis. An oft quoted saying (that I am tired of hearing) is “We will cross the bridge when it comes”. This is such an incorrect statement to believe in, especially if you are thinking about transitioning. Keeping with the same thought, what do you do if there is no bridge, when you finally arrive? Or what do you do if the bridge has been washed away? Life is an amazingly dirty golfer. It knows when you are down and will, without doubt stymie you.
While transitioning military veterans are experts at decision making, this expertise is unfortunately limited to the domains of their immediate work. As military personnel, we do multitudes of analyses and evaluations, that it amazes me, how we struggle with applying a fraction of that to our lives.
CBA is a very useful tool in helping you not only cross the bridge, but also visualise the bridge, anticipate failure situations and arrive at a logical conclusion of crossing it at all in the first place. CBA helps you to overcome decision paralysis and transition anxiety to large extent.
I will write more on this and may have a few interactive sessions, based on the traction gained by this article. I request all my connections to reach out to those they know and ask them, “Have you done a CBA?”
#transitioning #militarytransition #decisionparalysis #transitionanxiety#careerbenefitanalysis