Where will you be?
Apart from ‘Tell us a bit about yourself’, the most common interview question is ‘Where do you see yourself in five years?’
As a personnel manager, I used to eschew these queries for sharper, more targeted tools*.
But last week I was forced to ask myself where I’d be in five years.
It took a while.
Domain game
I’d just received the annual notice to renew my www.thefeistyempire.com and www.liferal.com domains.
It felt like merely six weeks since I’d last done this, so I consulted the Empire Archives.
Sure enough, yet another year had almost blown by.
I expressed amazement to my primary IT guy, who concurred that time indeed keeps on slipping slipping into the future.
I asked if I could slow time and save money by bulk-buying five years of domain registration and hosting in advance.
He’s a flexible chap, so he adjusted his service offering on the spot [!] and offered a neat discount.
I thanked him.
But as I went to pay for the next half decade, I wondered:
Will I and/or the Empire actually be here in five years?
Eternal questions
The first question is a bit morbid.
But as you get older, and mortality manifests with deeper and closer blows, it’s hard to avoid.
The second question is more to our theme:
Do I still want to be running my business five years hence?
At the (considerable) risk of citing Michael E. Gerber again, I believe he believes you should build a business to sell it.
If you don’t sell it, you don’t have a business; you have a job.
As I’ve failed to systemise my business sufficiently to sell it, I definitely have a job.
So, will I still be doing this job in five years?
I told a client the other day that if I were still hanging round waiting to write job ads for newspapers, I’d starve.
My move to producing online content is paying off.
As I suspect this interesting income stream will run deep, I’m keen to pursue it.
So I think I’ll still be at my desk.
Half-way house
What’s far more interesting is where you’ll be:
- Do you have a business or a job?
- Do you plan to be in it in five years?
- If not, where would you like to be in 2017?
Empowerment gurus say writing your goals improves your chance of reaching them.
So do yourself a favour and share yours with us.
It could shave years off your quest and
add years to your life.
In other words …
It’s time!
* I’ll detail these in another post.
Paul Hassing | Founder & Senior Writer – The Feisty Empire
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