The Solitude of Navigating Your Career

In another life, quite some time ago, I made a professional decision based on a handful of factors, unrelated to me or my family, yet based on what I perceived to be the potential needs of a close colleague. I haven’t looked back, nor regretted the decision. I made the best decision I could make at the time with all the information I had available to me. We all arrive at the present moment based on decisions and actions only we are responsible for. I am a huge believer in a form of professional existentialism. Your internal voice, the ability to envision the success of your future and sheer determination are the main components of the vehicle that will take you to whatever it is you choose to describe as personal success. Everything you want is available to you; if you are willing to do the work.

With all of this in mind it is clear that each of you remains the captain of your own destiny. That’s why you should never feel unnecessary pressure to make professional decisions based on others' needs, especially when it comes to moving on. When professionals arrive at the decision to begin seeking other opportunities they are likely only a few small factors contributing to the need to move on:

• Poor leadership - This should come as no surprise. People can only stomach poor leadership for a limited period of time. The daily missteps and overall inability to lead can really create friction in any environment and especially clear in the professional setting. Oftentimes people go seeking new opportunities, but rarely examine the role both they and the leader played in creating the friction filled environment. Lots to learn on both sides, but when the leader just doesn't understand the basic principles it can make your work life unbearable.
• No apparent growth opportunities in the current position - Most professionals desperately want to grow. Increasing levels of responsibility; the opportunity to impact and support major projects is a huge component in the satisfaction we get out of working so hard. If you allow people to stagnate, expect them to start wandering around for something else.
• Not Fitting into the team environment - They just have not clicked with the team and feel like outsiders continuously in a supposed “team” environment. This works both ways and sometimes it's the cliquishness of the team that prevents the new team members from fitting in. Sometimes the team has to take a step towards the new member, instead of expecting them to prove their worthiness. Other times it’s the new member who needs to be open to the newness of the environment. People want to be themselves and still fit in.
• Employee and manager just cannot get on the same page - This last one could be a study in psychology. Clearly it takes “two to tango” and both parties could likely learn how to fix this scenario with some help. Every once in a while there’s just two good people who happen to be unable to sync up on the needs of the situation. One or both parties walks away thinking it was the other person's shortcomings. Remember, it's a two way street.

Sometimes it takes the presence of external facilitators to help teams clearly see the friction and to help them to understand how to work together for their common objectives. If team synergy and development of leaders is important to your organization, you may seek outside help to figure out what optimization looks like. Sometimes, even the leaders need coaches to bring out the best in them.

MK Palmore is a veteran of the U.S. Marine Corps, a Silicon Valley executive and strategy advisor to business enterprises.