Personal Growth I've Learned From A Career In Consulting
- Jun 18, 2023
- 4 min read
Updated: Jun 20, 2023
Written by: Wayne Keinick, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
For a long time, I assessed my career in terms of roles/titles I’ve held, companies I’ve worked for, technical knowledge gained, increasing level of responsibility, and all the other metrics that one often turns to. Outside of work, I’ve always been interested in more philosophical topics of life. I’ve looked at Personal Growth as something that I work on/learn about on my own that is independent of work. I would generally only be applying learnings to work where and if it made sense. But as I spend more time reflecting, I realize that personal growth can come from anywhere, especially in our working lives. By making a career shift to consulting, my personal growth journey has been accelerated. Here are a few of the highlights.
You are not your job, your title, your achievements, your successes or failures, and on and on… I’ve learned to disassociate ‘me’ from the job. My work journey has been filled with roles where I’ve received praise and criticism, I’ve been thanked and tolerated, been in the spotlight, on the hot seat, and even completely forgotten about after a project. As a consultant, I constantly redefine my work identification with each new project. This lack of a lasting connection often leaves me with an extreme case of identity crisis. But as time went on, I came to recognize this as a gift. A gift that has revealed that ‘I’ can Do lots of things, but ‘I’ is Not Defined by any of them.
Letting go of Office Politics destroys work-related stress. If you look at the job description of your role, it is likely that the issues causing you stress at work were not in the original description. As a consultant, I don’t worry if a colleague is trying to impress the boss at my expense, or whom I go for a coffee break with, or if my co-worker was invited to lunch with managers and I wasn't. I'm not there to climb the corporate ladder. I’m there to meet some specific/ defined goals, complete a project, and move on. The work-related things that I allow to occupy my thoughts become clearer and everything else falls by the wayside. When I let go of politics, it’s not personal anymore, and the stress falls away.
Corporate Hierarchy does not reflect a person's value, importance, or worth. A corporation requires or rather is composed of, many different roles. Roles that require differing skill sets, responsibilities, and tasks. The corporate hierarchy helps to visualize those different roles, and how the organization functions and makes decisions. Unfortunately, this hierarchy is erroneously used to rank roles and by extension the people in them. Those higher in the hierarchy are viewed as better, superior, and more developed human beings than others in lesser (again a misnomer) roles. I no longer see it that way. As a consultant, I often need to leverage different roles within an organization to get a job done. And each role, the person, is needed to get a job done. No role is valued above others, all are required.
Decisions are defended by logic but directed by emotion as personal growth. Within a corporation, the initiative to build a budget, acquire/divest/invest, or generically start any project begins with a structured framework. This framework will outline tasks to be done, criteria to be met, and decisions that must be made. Ideally, the decision criteria are based on unbiased and analytical evidence to support the decision. As the initiative proceeds the evidence may not be as clear as anticipated, rendered as qualitative rather than quantitative, or the evidence may simply not be available. Nonetheless, a decision will be made without a rock-solid foundation of logic. The decision maker decides using a combination of evidence tempered with their judgment or gut as a guide. And when that decision is presented back to others, the justification will be tied to the evidence in a reverse-engineering approach.
Control and Security are Illusions. Having a job and source of income is a significant stress everyone has experienced. Looking for work can be extremely taxing when you need income. And then when you get the job, a brief sigh of relief is quickly replaced with the anxiety to keep it. This stress weighs heavily on our internal sense of security. When I first stepped out into the world of consulting, (no more regular paycheck) it felt like I had just willingly given up my security. But I’ve come to see things differently. Whether I am an employee, own my own business, or consult, I only control my actions. I can take steps to move toward a job, and I can choose to put my best self forward while doing a job, but I don't ultimately control the outcome. Job security is always beyond my control. Acknowledging that I don’t control the outcomes provides a feeling of relief.
These learnings and others were accelerated for me when I first became a consultant. Admittedly, I first thought they were only available because I had ‘removed’ myself from the role of employee. But looking back I do believe they are available for anyone to learn. And I am confident that when one can let go of work-related baggage, personal growth will blossom.
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Wayne Keinick, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
Wayne Keinick is a management consultant with a strong focus on personal growth and awareness. He is passionate about exploring what it means to be mindfully aware, and he believes that all challenges and issues are best addressed in first becoming the best version of ourselves. As a consultant, Wayne works closely with his clients to help them achieve corporate or work related goals, but his true passion lies in helping them grow and develop as individuals. He is known for his ability to ensure that everyone is included and feels valued within working groups, teams, and relationships, and he excels at reframing complex concepts for greater understanding.
