Switch Mindset — The new age trend!

Anureet Kaur, YUJ Designs

The modern industry of design is dominated by millennials these days. Their habits, behaviors, and thoughts are very different from other generations that have created a major gap in the supply and demand of jobs. It’s not about the year of birth but about the mindset which is being categorized as millennial. A new study has found that the millennial generation is also being called as the job-hopping generation.

Why people do it?

The Psychology behind

We can’t change this mindset of people but we can learn a bit more about the psychology behind their choices. There is no right or wrong here, it's just about one’s perception. An important question that arises here is ‘whether it’s a trick or a treat and where are we heading with this?’

Surface level reasons observed behind this mindset are impatience, boredom, indecisiveness and negative influence. However, according to clinical psychologists, there are various underlying reasons that can affect thoughts, feelings which then influence behaviors. Some of them are-

1. Individual’s past experiences
2. Circumstances at work
3. Work environment/culture
4. Inability to fit the equation
5. Impatience and desire for fast results
6. The need to compare and keep up with peers ( salary and growth)
7. Entitlement mindset (people feel they deserve more money)

Numbers speak for themselves

Some Statistics on Job-hopping

We have discussed quite a bit about the mindset, so we should now look at some facts floating around in the market. According to stats, 44% of companies don’t want to hire people with a job hop attitude and are perceived as flight risks. This can hamper their job profile in the long run.

Looking at the stats, the experts in this field have come to the conclusion that 5 job changes in 10 years can raise red flags with companies.

Who do they want to hire?

Some traits they are looking for

• Candidates who have a diverse work portfolio
• Who have the right Intra-personal skills like loyalty, optimism, attitude, empathy, etc
• ‘T shaped designers’ (Ones who are strong in one area and have decent adjacent skills in other areas)
• Who has a portfolio which covers the depth more than the breadth of things
• Who have handled challenges and are familiar with their strengths and weaknesses
• Who are active listeners and are receptive to feedback

While working in a company, we should always think about our long-term plans and personal growth. When we start focusing on short term plans like day-wise or month-wise tasks, that is where the thought of switch arises. Similar to the principles of investment, short time will gain X-results, while investing for a long period of time will give Y-results. If we have a clear focus and future vision, the small day to day hurdles will start to evaporate.

Trick or Treat

Let’s analyze

In a healthy discussion, we should look at the pros and cons and then decide for ourselves which side is heavier on the scale.

Pros

• Opportunity to try new things, new learnings, meet with new people
• Job hopping people are risk-takers and are more adaptive
• Most job hoppers gain quite a lot on the salary scale

Cons

• Difficulty in adjusting with new people, new processes, new culture
• Starting everything from scratch
• Impacts daily life schedule
• Will impact in the long run

Some things to think over

Try clearing your mind for a few days and ask yourself these questions. It will help you make that final decision. Being designers, it is very important for us to think through everything. For work-related projects, we use different techniques to gain insights from the requirements but sometimes we miss to apply those principles to our own lives. Whats and whys to ask are-

1. What are the benefits and negatives of my current job?

2. What options do I have?

3. Am I able to take the risk? Analyze cost vs benefit

4. Why am I changing the job?

5. Where do I see myself in 5 years?

6. Is this place helping me achieve or go near to the goal?

7. Is this what I want?

Once you answer these questions and everything seems right in your head then only make the move.

From my Journal

My personal opinion on this topic is that don’t switch for the sake of switching or if others are doing it. Others are not living the fears, the motivations, the learnings and the failures which you are experiencing or want to experience.

Because someone once said — ‘The dream job does not exist, we need to create it’

So choose wisely.