How To Create Your Own Luck
Like John, I’d consider myself on the not particularly lucky side of the spectrum.
However, my career has been on a steady upwards trajectory. A lot of that growth has been down to a couple of really clear moments.
- As an engineer or lead engineer I was one of a small number (often less than 3) to volunteer for initiatives or work efforts. Every single one of them that my leadership team or my engineering team were asking about my hand would go up. This gave me a broad range of experiences but also where I was not selected some feedback as to why and where I had a gap in my skill set.
- Trying; I try things e.g., applying for jobs that maybe I was not ready for (I was) or not ticking off every item on the job spec (does anyone?)
Do these two things make me lucky or fortunate maybe in the eyes of others buy you make your own luck.
You don’t score the shots you don’t take.
When I started my career as a software engineer I was lucky enough to get to work on the most interesting project the company had.
Then when that project was done, I moved on to the next, new and very interesting project. Weirdly, when that project was over I moved to a third really interesting project. At this point people around me started commenting on it: “Hey, John, you’re so lucky, you get to work on the best projects and you’re just a junior developer. I wish I could work those projects instead of what I’m doing!”
Fast forward eighteen months, I’ve started my own business and it’s going well. I’ve managed to land a couple of good clients and we’re making a reasonable profit. I start to hear the same thing again: “Hey, John, you’re so lucky, you started a business and a couple of good clients just fell in your lap. I’ve struggled to grow my business for two years and never got such good clients”.