Yaicha

Remember when you were young and thought you got to decide what you would do when you grew up?

My earliest memory of a career ambition was my wish to be a milkman. Yes, we still had milkmen when I was very little, driving around in their trucks before dawn and leaving glass bottles with the foil top in an insulated box outside the door. I wasn’t so fond of school at that age, and I found out that college (more school) was not required for a career as a milkman, so that sounded good to me.

Even when I was in college, I was under the impression that I got to make a choice about my career. I simply had to decide what it was I wanted to do and then go about making it happen. In fact, that is what happened, and I embarked on my first career, as a teacher. And when I wanted to try something else, I went to grad school, thinking I would get to choose once again.

And perhaps I could have chosen, if I had been truly determined to do so. But that’s when things really began to shift. Since that point, what I have done, the jobs that I have held, have been much more determined by circumstances than by my careful planning.

I’ll date myself again: remember the video game, Frogger? A frog attempts to cross a busy highway by jumping from one moving car to another. If you fail to land him on a car he gets flattened, instead. Well, since graduate school my career path feels like a game of Frogger. And I suspect for many other people that is the case, too.

As an adult with a family to support, I did not have the luxury of choosing exactly the job I wanted after graduate school. I leapt on the least worst option and was happy to have a paycheck. In that position, I kept my eye out for other opportunities in the organization, and hopped around a bit to roles that looked interesting or promising, but constrained by the chance of openings and availability.

At one point, my prospects looked bleak due to factors completely beyond my control, so I looked around for a safe place to jump. The call center looked like a possibility, although I didn’t have any experience there and wasn’t sure what I would have to offer in that environment. Certainly not the place I ever planned to land when I was in college or even graduate school, but I hopped in.

Luckily, I landed in an analyst role and fit right in. I ended up with a great boss (Jay Minnucci), who taught me just about everything I know about running call centers. And I had no idea where my career would go after that — I tried to plot it out, but there did not seem to be very many options, so it was looking like I had hit a career dead-end. I liked my role, but I didn’t want to do it forever.

But the Frogger career path came into play, again. My boss left to become a consultant and my career situation deteriorated without his support. When he called to tell me there was an opportunity at ICMI (my current employer), I leapt once again into the unknown. And just in time — within a year my old analyst team was disbanded and half were let go.

I truly enjoy my current role as ICMI’s Membership Director, but just like anyone else, I wonder what the future holds and what I might like to do next, since it’s hard to imagine I’ll have this exact position for the rest of my life. But at this point in my career I’ve realized that I don’t really get to plan everything out. It’s not as simple as deciding to be a milkman and then driving that truck for the rest of my life. For one thing, the job of milkman has long ago disappeared, so all of them had to leap into something else whether they liked it or not.

Wonder where the next car that I land on will be going? Sure hope I don’t miss and get smushed!