Episode Transcript
As you’re wondering what you can do to further your engineering career, you consider your training and experience. Your teamwork and leadership.
These are good indicators of your abilities and how far you’ve come. Also what you need to work on next.
But you want to focus on something that has the greatest impact on moving you toward your career vision. For you – and for most women in engineering – that something is risk.
Taking risk is what propels your career so you can have the influence you wish to have.
So you can make the contribution you plan to make in your engineering dream career.
But it’s also what you lack.
Your risk tolerance is not what it could be. And your approach to risk-taking is timid at best.
Risk is a scary concept. And fear is what keeps you from taking more of it.
But you can change that perspective. You can reframe the concept of risk from a scary idea to a useful career tool.
Benefits of Taking Risk in Your Engineering Career
And the reason you want to do that is because taking risk benefits your career tremendously.
When you take risk, whether it’s successful or not, you learn from it. You learn new skills, of course. But you also learn more about yourself.
It gives you a sense of accomplishment. And builds your confidence and resilience. Which is refreshing and exhilarating.
And more than that, taking risk opens you to growth and new opportunities. It enables you to leap ahead in your career.
It keeps you on the path toward your vision while allowing you to explore wider vistas and deeper challenges.
This is what adds variety and significance to your career and life journey.
3 Ways Engineers Avoid Career Risk
As engineers we are analytical people. You know you need to take risk in your work. But it’s calculated risk.
You tend to stay on the safe side. And that carries into your life and career too.
Then what happens is you fall into risk aversion. Here are 3 common ways:
- You avoid career risk by staying in your box. Staying in that safe, comfort zone.
You have a plan for your career. But you want to be 100% ready before you make a move.
- You avoid career risk by striving for perfection. You don’t complete a task until it’s reached perfection.
Everything from sending an email to managing a large project. You spend way too much time working and reworking it.
And it holds you back. Sometimes gets you stuck.
- You avoid career risk because you buy into limiting beliefs and imposter syndrome.
You fall into a scarcity or unworthiness mindset. And it limits your vision and your career message.
So watch out for these 3 signs of risk-aversion. Be aware of how you’re playing it safe by staying in your box, being the perfectionist or buying into limited beliefs.
Strive to Be a Good Risk-Taker in Your Engineering Career
There are certain characteristics that good risk-takers have. Like:
- Not always having to be right.
- Being okay when things don’t go your way.
- Being honest with yourself.
- Being accountable.
- Having a sense of humor and an ability to laugh at yourself.
- Having an ability to speak up and advocate for yourself.
- Having determination and not giving up easily.
Looking at this list I know these are not all strong characteristics for me. But we all have some of them.
You already have some of these characteristics. I challenge you to leverage them, along with your strengths, and build your risk-taking skills.
I’d love to work with you to change your play-it-safe strategy and build your risk-taking skills. Sign up for a strategy session with me and let’s talk more about it.
How to Decide if a Career Risk is Worth Taking
It’s not always easy to know if taking a risk will be worth it. This is part of the skill you have to build.
But remember the benefits we talked about earlier. And how, whether or not your risk is successful, there’s still something to gain.
Here are a few tips for what to consider as you’re deciding to take a career risk:
- Think about the risk in the context of the rest of your life. The effect it will have beyond the here and now.
- Estimate what might happen, including the positive and negative results.
- Consider how the positives will change things for you. And consider how you might mitigate or ease any negative impacts.
- Ask yourself, even if it doesn’t pan out, can I still live with the result?
These considerations are helpful because they ease your mind about the potential outcomes. By getting you to think through some consequences it doesn’t feel so unknown and scary.
They’ll help you decide if a risk is worth it for you.
Risks often worth taking include doing something different, like taking a job abroad.
Or asking for more responsibilities so you can take on more challenge.
Or leaving a bad job. One that either doesn’t align with you or is a toxic situation.
Some risks are not worth taking. Like doing something unethical or illegal. This is obvious.
Like overstepping organizational boundaries. Meaning don’t do something out of mission scope or against company values.
Like avoiding the unknown. This is the opposite of taking any risk at all. It may be safe and comfortable, but it’s severely limiting your career success.
Venture to Take More Risk to Reach Your Engineering Career Vision
Create a vision for your engineering career. Revise and update it often. And then venture to take more risk to reach it.
To be committed to following your vision, aiming for your potential, and realizing your dream career means taking risk. You won’t get there if you don’t.
I invite you to up your career risk-taking strategy. Be bold. Decide to be a risk-taker.
The more risks you take, the more confident you’ll be.
And, succeed or fail, you’ll be a stronger and more influential engineer and leader.
Next time on Her Engineering Career Podcast we’ll discuss ideas for staying connected so your career continues to soar. I hope you’ll join me for Episode 130.
