Why Do We Worry About Career Ladders?

Career ladders are a relatively new thing for people to factor into their search for meaning in life. To help you see this, imagine yourself in the time of early humankind. Got the picture...

Now imagine the job postings back then: "Wanted: persons skilled at archery/spearing capable of downing a deer to feed a tribe. No English majors need apply." I imagine the career ladder for a caveperson was more like a step stool:
1) Learn how to sharpen sticks
2) Hunt, and
3) Die in a hunting accident.
I'm pretty sure the move toward an agrarian society was predicated on early man saying things like, "Have you seen , Og? Last time I saw him, he was going on a hunting trip."

Many a career has been spent on a stunted career ladder. Thus we have figured out that having more than one ladder to climb might be a good idea. As such, we have a lot more ladders, but also a lot more uncertainty about how to climb them or whether they are worth climbing.

I think it is time to do away with the ladder altogether. The catapult is a better metaphor for how modern careers tend to go. The catapult relies on preparing people to go far and fast which means that they must be prepared to do that through education, experiences, and rapid improvement.

With all the talk of increased AI and robotics to do things, this is likely lead to a type of career truncation where people retire sooner or, at the least, are doing jobs that are not good enough for robots. It makes sense to also consider whether career "chutes and ladders" is a possible future trend. Climb a little, slide a little, rinse, repeat.

The one thing that is likely to be true, the career ladder is dead, long live the career.

What Does Career Even Mean?

What does "career" even mean? I have been a career coach for awhile and even I have a problem with defining this. One definition: "an occupation undertaken for a significant period of a person's life and with opportunities for progress." A career in some cases is defined as a series of jobs that add up to the mystical something called a career. By that definition, as long as everything you do for a job is intentional, you pretty much have a career. But let's face it, how many of us really had a career in mind when we got started? In my case, I wanted to be an advertising copywriter, but because I had to pay bills, I became a retail store manager, comedian, furniture salesman, radio account executive, personal skills advisor, career counselor, research associate, and finally director of career coaching. Not a bad career in sum, but not at all intentional either. My career path and I suspect many others is a path of discovery; some good, some not so good.

Depending on who you ask, people generally change jobs between 7 to 10 times in their adult life. Career changes can vary between 1 to three on average. With the "new economy" all bets are off. In certain fields where "gigs" or contract work is common, you might have literally a hundred jobs in a career lifetime. With the advances in AI (artificial intelligence), it is possible that you may actually change career fields several times. The future is that uncertain. The thing that is not uncertain is that work will need to be done and your co-worker may be a Bot or a co-worker from half a world away.

So how about a new definition of a career? A career is a series of projects and/or jobs that allow you to use and build your skills in ways that are satisfying and sustaining to your life.  Or, if you want to really jazz it up: A career is a series of fun things that you get to do and people actually are excited to pay you for accomplishing on their behalf and makes you happy to perform which contributes to a rewarding life. 

Must your career consist of dream jobs? Can you take a vow of poverty and have a career? If you suffer daily in your work, is that still a good career?  I'll leave that to the philosophy majors of the world to sort out--like the one to which I'm married.