There is an old saying, “For love of the game” made famous by a novel and film. For me, the phrase is an excellent summary of the struggle between motivations on opposite sides of the spectrum; for money or for love. This is highlighted in sports because the megabucks that professional athletes are paid stand in stark contrast to the ideal we hold for children regarding the passion and pure joy of playing sports “games”. But this same concept is a regular struggle for many of us in business during our career. If there is one thing I say over and over again to students and early career professionals it is (not unlike many career advisors); find something you love to do. Of course this is a common theme everywhere (“Find a job you love and you will never have to work a day in your life” or “Find something you love to do and then figure out how to get paid for it”). A recent Blog Posting by Mitch Ditkoff (The Heart of Innovation) entitled “The Cult of Monetization“ (http://www.ideachampions.com/weblogs/archives/2015/06/the_m_word.shtml) is a wonderful perspective on this. It puts the issue in today’s business vernacular and we should all take heed.
For the love of the game
June 23, 2015 by Jeff Glass
"Engineering Management Thought of the Week" Jeff Glass 
Dr. Glass,
Hope you are doing well! I’m writing to express an issue which I have found to be more and more important in my life over the recent past.
Over the last year, I have asked a lot of people for advice in terms of figuring out what I want to do. I’ve also been asked to give advice to current or future MEMs who came in after me.
The one thing I have noticed is that: people give great advice. In fact people give absolutely fabulous advice based on their experiences and learning. BUT, that advice often filtered based on personal interests/passions/goals. And while that advice is very relevant for the ‘advisor’, it may not be relevant for the ‘advisee’ due to differing interests or goals. I learned that the hard way over the last one year. Do you think the point of ‘filtering’ advice from advisor to advisee based on differing personal interests, passions and goals is important? And if so, do you have any material or advice on how one can do this? Is it the onus of the advisor, the advisee or both to understand and account for differing personal goals? Or do you feel this is an irrelevant or useless topic?
Thanks, Maahir
On Tuesday, June 23, 2015, Engineering Management Thought of the Week Jeff
Hi Maahir,
Good to hear from you! I agree 100% that it is very important to tailor advice (or filter it as you said) to make it valuable. That is one of the many reasons why self-awareness is so important! No one else has your DNA and you need to understand what you are good at, what you like, what your personal goals are, etc. (I am using “you” in the general sense, i.e., everyone needs to know this about themselves). Although mentors or advisors should be sensitive to this issue (filtering), there is no way they can know you well enough to do a complete job of it. It is even hard for you to know yourself well enough to do it well! It is primarily the responsibility of the advisee. In fact, as an advisee, you really don’t want the advisor to filter too much because you want to know the complete picture from numerous people and thus want to know their experience even if it might not be relevant for you, because you might discover things that you had not considered at all and that you at first thought may not be applicable to you. I always tell advisees that they need to talk to many people, not just me, about their interests because the more they learn, the better position they are in to make a decision. I think one of the best things the advisor can do besides relating their own experience and decisions is to ask the advisee good questions that cause the advisee to think about their own circumstances and get them to know themselves better so they can apply their own filter. Of course, if the advisor happens to be experienced at placing and managing many types of people, then one of their skills might be to fit the right personality with the right career path but I think that is not too common or at least it is only a partial solution (it can provide general direction but not very specific direction).
Thanks for the comment!
Jeff
Jeffrey T. Glass
Professor, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Hogg Family Director of Engineering Management and Entrepreneurship
Pratt School of Engineering, Box 90291
Duke University
Durham, North Carolina 27708
http://jtglass-nano.pratt.duke.edu/
http://memp.pratt.duke.edu/
http://www.ee.duke.edu/
jeff.glass@duke.edu