I was chatting with a friend today who is facing career decisions.  Specifically, she is considering going back to university for an advanced degree and wanted my opinions on various options in front of her.

We discussed the different possibilities – luckily for her they’re all great and they could all lead to fascinating, rewarding careers.  But they could also be career dead-ends.  We started listing pros and cons for each.  It got frustrating, with many pros and cons for each.

Soon though a framework started to emerge for me.  I think there are three big, broad professional goals that any person might have in a career – Lifestyle; Stability; or Impact.  For argument’s sake, here’s how I define these:

1. Start with the easiest, Stability.  This is simply predictability of future income.  Stability means that you’re confident you’ll have a job and an income next week, next month and probably next year.
2. Then, Lifestyle.  This is your happiness with your life *outside* of work.  A good lifestyle means you have plenty of time to pursue goals unrelated to income or professional status – these goals may be conquering personal hobbies, deepening family and social relationships, or even just ensuring you get enough sleep.
3. Finally, Impact.  My measure for Impact is the number of *strangers* who’ll remember you for your professional achievements after you’ve retired.  These are people who only know you by reputation – what you achieve through your work.

Here’s my hypothesis – when setting out on a career, you can prioritise two of these but never all three.  It looks like this:

Of course, a few people do manage to achieve all three, but I’m pretty sure I don’t know any of them personally.  Most people in the world achieve only one of these goals, and that is Stability. They’ve got a job, they work their arses off, they get paid and support a family.  They never achieve anything particularly memorable at work.  There’s nothing wrong with that, its an honourable life – they just don’t want to risk Stability to pursue Impact or Lifestyle.

Some people prioritise Lifestyle.  They get a job which just pays the bills, they work the minimum number of hours to get paid, and then they pursue rich and rewarding lives outside work.  Now you can’t have good Lifestyle without some sort of Stability – you at least need a basic wage which pays for the glorious Lifestyle you’ve chosen.  Some talented people are able to achieve both great Lifestyle and great Stability – they’ve got a job they love and they earn enough money for a comfortable lifestyle.  In my experience however most people who choose Lifestyle don’t have particularly comfortable lives, certainly not later in life – too much consumption today and not enough thought about tomorrow.

Others go for Impact.  They want to change the world, either to make it a better place or to earn a fortune, or both.  Its massively risky and most people who try this never achieve it.  Prioritising Impact means sacrificing Lifestyle and Stability, at least in the short term, but people pursuing Impact believe that these will come if you can achieve some Impact.

Meatloaf said two out of three ain’t bad – but for me, if you get two out of three of these in your career, that’s pretty damn good.

How did this relate to my friend?

My advice at the end of the day was that the actual choice of which degree to pursue matters much less than understanding and accepting this trade-off and deciding which two goals to pursue out of the three.  Choose the degree that interests you most, then use it as a platform to find the job which best achieves your goal.

Smart people work this out early.  They’re able to self-reflect and honestly answer which of these three goals motivates them.  If its Stability, take the corporate route.  If its Lifestyle, find something you enjoy that pays a decent wage.  If its Impact, start a business.  Then work towards incorporating one of the other goals.  But don’t expect that your career will deliver all three.