How can one determine their ideal career path?

Many of the professional development events that I regularly organize revolve around this core question.  The topic was also a recurring theme in many of the 100+ alumni interviews I led while serving as a Research Associate at Harvard Business School to design a second-year elective course called “Crafting Your Life: The Tactics and Practices of the First 10 Years Post MBA.”

Although this question is top of mind for many college students and young professionals, through my research I have found it to be a topic that weighs heavily on the minds of more seasoned professionals as well.

As this deeply personal self-examination is connected to one’s sense of purpose and fulfillment, the question of what to do with our time never fully subsides.  And while clearly this inquiry continually evolves over time, I’d like to share these five guiding principles that have helped me with this question at various stages of my career:

• Experiment by trying many different roles, especially early on in your career
• Be intentional about the institutions you join
• Embrace the work of your organization beyond your specific division, ideally taking advantage of opportunities to transition internally
• Identify exceptional people and learn as much as you can from them
• Establish a guiding set of questions that you will use to navigate your career selection process

These principles have manifested differently at various stages in my career.  With each chapter of my life, I have begun to dive deeper into this question with greater clarity regarding my professional strengths/weaknesses as well as what I hope to gain from my career. 

Tackling this question while in college

As a first-generation college student, I arrived at the University of Pennsylvania with no idea of what I wanted to do after graduating from college.  I eagerly pursued internships as a way of test-driving potential career options prior to committing several years towards a particular path.

Using each summer as an opportunity to try something different, I traversed a Sales role at Google, Private Wealth Management at Goldman Sachs, and Investment Banking at Morgan Stanley.  Each of these roles and companies had elements that I loved and also offered me a new perspective on my career.  They tested different aspects of my working style and preferences, slowly but surely inching me toward a greater understanding of the areas where I excelled and where there was room for improvement.  Equally important,  I walked away with a better understanding of the skills that gave me the most satisfaction when I was able to deploy them towards my work.

Deciding on my first full-time job

My internships provided me with great exposure; however, even after these three distinct experiences, I remained unsure which path would be right for me.  Furthermore, I was not yet even convinced whether the private sector was the right path for me.

With an offer to return to Morgan Stanley full-time in hand, I contemplated instead joining Teach for America.  Grateful for the tremendous impact that education had on my life, I wanted to be able to pay it forward.  That being said, I was torn because I also wanted to be able to lay a financial foundation for myself, and becoming a teacher was unfortunately a path not lucrative enough to provide for myself and also support family members who had not had the same life and career opportunities from which I had benefited.

I ultimately decided that my job title did not define the impact that I could have with my life. With that in mind, I started out at Morgan Stanley, eager to learn and lay a financial foundation for myself while committed to simultaneously giving back in the form of deep involvement with two nonprofit organizations — Management Leadership for Tomorrow and Sponsors for Educational Opportunity — which help college students and young professionals navigate the early years of their career.

Internal mobility – seeing all that your company has to offer

At Wharton, I was surrounded by many classmates who were clamoring for jobs within Investment Banking.  I therefore began to think that surely this must be something that I was interested in as well.  When I first arrived at Morgan Stanley, I was working in Investment Banking covering Consumer/Retail companies.  Although Morgan Stanley has 70,000+ employees with different roles that are integral to their business, I mistakenly assumed that Morgan Stanley and Investment Banking were synonymous.

Once at Morgan Stanley, I developed a deeper appreciation of the various roles that existed at the firm.  Over time, I began to realize that, although Investment Banking wasn’t matching what I wanted with my life, there was a lot that I deeply appreciated about Morgan Stanley and much that I still had to learn.

Rather than leaving solely because I didn’t feel Investment Banking was right for me, I began to explore various opportunities within Morgan Stanley.  I transitioned from Investment Banking to Sales & Trading, then to a Strategy role focused on increasing business with Asian, Black, and Hispanic clients, and ultimately into a seat within Talent Management.

Each of these roles gave me a deeper understanding of the breadth of opportunities within financial services.  Given that I was planning to go to business school, I decided that experiencing multiple divisions would provide me with a more holistic view of the industry.

Leaving Wall Street – knowing when it was time to start the next chapter of your career

After a few years at Morgan Stanley, I was grateful for the tremendous amount of knowledge and experience that I had gained. Furthermore, the generous compensation enabled me to purchase a home for myself at the age of 25 as well as a second home for my eldest brother at the age of 26.

Although far from being at a point in my life where I could make decisions without needing to consider the financial implications, I had reached a point where I started to ask myself: “Would I still be in this seat if money were no object?”

This line of thinking helped me realize that financial services was not an ideal fit for me in the long term.  Although it is a phenomenal, rewarding career path, the work was not aligned closely enough with what I wanted to be doing with my life.

Business School – making career decisions with intentionality

All the career exploration I had done up to this point provided me with greater clarity around what I was hoping to accomplish with my career. This greater sense of clarity allowed me to maximize my time in business school with greater focus around the courses and topics where I was most excited to engage.

I was able to boil down my career interests into two core questions that I want to address throughout my life moving forward:

1. How can one help people reach their full potential?  I want to understand what individuals can do to enable others (peers, direct reports, and managers) to achieve their best outcomes. Beyond understanding this at a theoretical level, I want to design and deploy programs that accomplish this in a scalable manner.
2. How can organizations develop a culture such that people feel included and engaged within the workplace?  Gallup’s research revealing that most people are disengaged by their work is alarming to me because it represents a major loss of human potential as well as an ineffective allocation of corporate resources. I want to help design a workplace culture that has employees excited about their daily work, positioning both the individual as well as the organization for sustainable success.

From Business School to Management Consulting

While searching for post-MBA positions, I was drawn to the Boston Consulting Group (BCG) as a great place to focus on organizational culture.  BCG is globally recognized for its world-class people operations. We consistently rank among the best places to work—and we apply the same proven people strategies to our clients. We bring deep expertise in engaging employees and creating a diverse, inclusive culture that enables organizations to thrive.  I felt as though this would make for an ideal training ground as I sought to address my two core questions moving forward.

Beyond the consulting job, I actively seek ways outside of work that I can help organizations develop their culture.  This led to me taking on leadership roles such as serving as the elected consultant rep for BCG’s Singapore office as well as serving as the emcee for our monthly all-office gatherings.  Through these engagements, I strive to take an active role in shaping my company’s culture.

Beyond work, I focus on the core question of how to help people reach their full potential through mentorship and professional development events.  I organize open invite Zoom events every 2-3 weeks in hopes of passing along the knowledge which I have been grateful to receive throughout my career.  For a list of upcoming events, please visit https://www.tristonfrancis.com/events

Additionally, I am active with the Harvard Business School Club of Singapore’s Flagship Mentorship Program, which pairs up two Harvard Business School and London School of Economics alumni with a group of six Polytechnic students in Singapore.  These mentorship experiences allow me to hone my coaching skills and remain committed to my goal of helping others achieve their full potential. 

My future career plans

Throughout my career, I will keep the two core questions mentioned above as my compass in finding the right home for myself. These guiding questions are specific enough that they provide direction in assessing potential opportunities yet broad enough that they are applicable within many contexts, keeping the potential slate of paths that I can pursue open.

As I continue to navigate my journey, I will also continue to pay forward the advancement that I have received through sharing perspectives via articles such as this one as well as organizing open invite Zoom events. 

If interested in collaborating on an event to serve college students or young professionals, please shoot me a message. If you are a student interested in a particular topic, please reach out and I’ll do my best to provide guidance and/or share my perspectives via an article similar to this one.

I’d welcome and appreciate any questions you are facing as you determine your ideal career fit.  It would also be great to hear from others in terms of how you have thought through navigating your career.  Thank you for taking time to read this article.

If you are interested in watching the recent open-invite Zoom discussion on determining your ideal career path, please visit this link.

Until next time, take care!