As the global economy and the job marketplace get very competitive, the topic is quickly gaining our attention. Some of the popular strategies are: work for a successful organization, or self-develop and offer additional skills, or work hard and hope for recognition, or constantly increase your professional network of referrals, or just be obedient and nice to your boss.
My guess, it’s nothing you haven’t thought or heard before. Logically speaking, these suggestions have the potential to contribute in keeping your resume free of any gaps. But it seems to me that all of them deal with relinquishing the control of your job security to others, to the unpredictable world outside yourself, which in my opinion, just like playing a Russian Roulette, very dangerous.
To maintain control and fully in-charge of your career destiny, it is my suggestion to adapt and implement a one word strategy: specialization. Regardless of the field or an industry you are in, find a niche that challenges you and makes you enthusiastic to learn everything about it, and then, become a true Guru of that narrow space of knowledge, committing yourself to be a career-long student and practitioner of it.
By positioning yourself as a true authority in that niche of expertise, will make you a high in-demand professional and therefore never obsolete. Within the grand scheme of things, there could be few colleagues out there with whom you will share that chair of realization, but regardless of them, there is only one of you who has your take on things. The days of “jack of all trades” are long gone and following this type of thinking is a recipe for finding yourself at the unemployment line.
Developing and continuously nurturing your niche focused skills is the ultimate strategy to make sure that you achieve a lasting job stability, fulfillment and recognition. And, if it happened to be something you love doing and gets you up in the morning with a big smile, looking forward to the day ahead, then my friend, you are one lucky individual.
