Stop Worrying About Looking Like A Flake
Your career is yours, no one else’s. Here’s how to stop caring about looking like a flake
“You absolutely should not do this,” my boss told me.
I had just informed him that I was considering taking a year off from surgery to travel the world.
He was, to put it mildly, concerned.
“This is the absolute wrong time to make a decision like this,” he said, his busy eyebrows like hyperactive squirrels on his creased forehead. “No job will take you seriously. They’ll all think you just don’t have what it takes to be a serious surgeon.”
“Pat,” I said, “I’m exhausted,” I was coming up on 15 years of post-secondary education, including university, medical school, the hell of an every-other-night-on-call residency, and now the first of a two-year fellowship.
The last time I’d had a full night’s sleep, George Bush—the first one—was president.
“I know,” he replied, truly caring (Pat is one of my favorite people in the world). “That’s totally normal. Residency is tough, fellowship is tough. But if you stick it out, you know it gets better. Just finish fellowship,” he continued, “get your practice going, and then, once you’re established, you can take some time off. You don’t want to mess up your career before it’s even started!”
I didn’t listen. I took the year off anyway.
And, you know what? Pat was right. It messed up my career.
In the best way possible.
Early into my coaching business, a friend of mine shot me another look of concern over a plate of cheese we’d been sharing at my favorite little wine nook in New York City. It was the Look Of Concern™ I’d seen many times before from established doctors.
“This is, what, your fifth career or something?” he asked.
And I’ll admit. It still stung. Not because he was being malicious about it. He was—like Pat, like my med school dean before him, and like my dad and mom before her—concerned.
Were they right to be concerned? Was I just a flake? Would no one take me seriously because my career was as shape-shifting as a chamelion on acid?
It had been a fear from the very first time I made a nontraditional career decision—and, to be honest, it still is. A fear that I’d be viewed as a flake by all the Serious People in medicine and academia. That I was just someone who couldn’t cut it.
But…layered on the resurgent fear over cheese in NYC was a different realization, one I’ve become deeply content with.
Maybe the Serious People disagree. Maybe they think I’m a flake.
But also…My career is mine to live.
And it’s fine to have a protean one.
What Is A Protean Career?
Way back in 1976, Douglas T. Hall proposed a different approach to careers than what was dominant at the time. Back in the 1970s, careers were organization-focused and advancement-driven.
In other words, you started at IBM, and you retired from IBM. And in the three decades of work, you also advanced… within IBM.
What distinguished a successful traditional career was commitment—and commitment was rewarded with increasing salary and rising titles.
But Hall’s research suggested that, although this sort of career did lead to increasing salary and rising titles, it might not actually have led to satisfaction.
In fact, he suggested that more people would be satisfied with a different type of career, one he called “protean,” after the Greek sea god Proteus, who was known for being a shape-shifter.
Proteus, the Greek God
Source: Wikimedia
Unlike traditional careers, a protean career is individual-focused, not organization-focused. Freedom and growth, rather than commitment and advancement, form its primary core values.
Success in the protean career is measured psychologically, not necessarily monetarily. Work satisfaction and personal commitment are its key attributes.
And—this is crucial—where the traditional career emphasizes stability, the protean career does not.
It is emphatically, proudly, loudly not “stable”.
A few years ago, I worked as the Chief Medical Officer of a medical charity. In that role, I worked closely with the Chief Operating Officer, a man named Robert.
Robert epitomized the protean career. He started as a project manager in the mobile phone industry. He then moved on to aviation, porting his project management skills with him. Then he ended up as the COO of a medical charity.
At no point did anyone look at his career askance; at no point did they think he was “flaky” for having jumped specialties twice. Instead, he brought his marketable skills from one arena to the other, training them up along the way. In other words, he developed.
And in his world, it was normal—expected even—that someone who had transferrable skills would transfer them.
Another story: I spent last month operating on a hospital ship in Sierra Leone, where I met an American filmmaker.
Over beers one night, we got to talking about career paths, and, for about an hour, he walked me through the details of his. Reader, this man had the craziest career. He ran lights and sound for touring rock musicians in the 80s and 90s, he designed direct-mail flyers, he ran a printing company, he shot all the fund-raising videos for a big hospital system in the US, and, through it all, he wrote scripts for movies, which was his first love.
And now? This man helms a multi-million–dollar cinematic enterprise.
A flake? Absolutely not.
Traditional careers are still deified, 50 years after Hall’s original research.
This is especially true in some professions, where a career like Robert’s or my filmmaker friend’s would be unacceptable. In professions like medicine, education, the law, the clergy — professions which become identity, professions which are value-driven and purpose-focused — the protean career is not only uncommon. It’s even sometimes shamed.
It shouldn’t be.
The traditional career fundamentally serves no one except the organizations we work for. And they’ve proven, time and again, that loyalty only flows in one direction.
So, friend…If you’re looking for a sign that you don’t have to stay in a traditional career path here it is:
Since you started, medicine has changed.
Since you started, the legal world has changed.
Since you started, education has changed.
Since you started, YOU have changed.
What worked for you when you were 26 doesn’t have to work for you today.
Maybe it’s time to consider a career path that serves you. One that brings you to the end of your life personally fulfilled, one that lets you do the things that you wanted to do.
Maybe this is your sign that it’s time to figure out how to make that happen.
Maybe this is your sign that it’s time to stop being afraid of flaking.
Maybe this is your sign to embrace the possibility of being a flake.
Building a protean career is deeply satisfying—and absolutely terrifying.
I know, because I was there too. And I’m deeply passionate about getting people to careers they don’t constantly feel like quitting.
→ Did this post hit a nerve? Good news! You don’t have to stay on a path that doesn’t serve you any more. Learn more about working with me here.
→ Want more weekly content, free courses, and occasional deals on coaching? Join my mailing list!