Whether you’re starting in your 20s, 30s, or beyond, there are many things you can do to ensure you enjoy a successful career. One of the best things you can do is align your career with your personality, values, and beliefs.
Integrating your personality and beliefs into your career can strengthen the chances of it flourishing. Unfortunately, uniting what makes you unique with your career path isn’t encouraged or talked about enough despite the many benefits of doing so. Let’s explore four of them below.
Finding a Long-Term Home at the Right Company
Finding a career that suits your personality and beliefs has many benefits. One of those benefits is not settling for just any company to work for. Instead, you’ll be more inclined to take your time finding the right company, and that, in turn, results in you having a long-term home there.
A long-term home at a company that matches your unique personality and values helps you flourish and grow in your role.
Fortunately, many companies openly share their ideals, values, mission, and beliefs on their websites, social media pages, and other communication channels. The availability of this information makes choosing a career that aligns with your beliefs and a company to work for that shares those same values and beliefs easier.
Integrating your personality and beliefs into your career also helps you be more productive and happier in your role.
Performing and Feeling Better at Work
Many people struggle in their careers because of how much time they spend doing something they hate. When you love what you do and can be yourself doing it, you feel better about spending time at work. Feeling better at work leads to better productivity and performance.
Additionally, when you’re engaged in your job responsibilities, you’re more likely to create valuable relationships that last for years.
Creating Strong, Long Term Relationships
Creating your career around your values and personality helps you build genuine relationships that last for years. When you’re entrenched in a role that reflects who you are and what you value, you’re around other people with those same values and beliefs.
Additionally, you’re around people who appreciate your personality and encourage you to show it. That, in turn, allows you to open up and truly connect with the people you’re working with. When you create strong relationships in your career, they can help you achieve your professional goals and move forward in life.
Professional and personal growth are also great benefits of integrating your personality and beliefs into your career.
Cultivating Professional and Personal Growth
You want to build a thriving life and career around who you are and what you believe in. When you’re in a career that fosters the same belief system and values as you, you’re more open to accessing resources and support that can help you grow personally and professionally.
Now, once you’ve applied to companies that you feel align with your personality and beliefs, you’ll hopefully land a few interviews. The interview is your first opportunity to really showcase your personality and beliefs. Here are some tips on how to do so effectively.
Showcasing Your Personality and Beliefs in an Interview
When it’s time to interview for a company you’ve fallen in love with, you want to ensure you’re prepared to let your personality shine, communicate your values, and stand behind your beliefs. Here are a few tips for doing just that.
Bring a polished portfolio
The way you design your portfolio presents a huge opportunity to showcase your personality and core values.
For instance, let’s say you’re a graphic designer. You’ve identified creativity as one of your core values and believe that expressing it improves the quality of work you do. The previous work you choose for your portfolio, how you organize it and present it should all support this core value. Even if you aren’t asked to bring a portfolio of your previous work, you can create an elegant CV and reference sheet that reflect your personality and beliefs in small doses.
In addition to bringing a polished portfolio, putting together a polished look can help you showcase your personality and beliefs in an interview.
Dress the part
Dressing the part isn’t usually talked about as a way to showcase your personality in an interview. However, a massive part of integrating your personality and beliefs into your career has to do with how intentional you are about showcasing them whenever possible. That includes the way you dress and present yourself.
Not only does an outfit that is “you” give a glimpse into your personality, but it also helps you feel good, and that can make the interview less nerve-wracking and a lot smoother.
Lastly, you can showcase your personality and beliefs in your interview through the way you answer questions.
Showing your uniqueness through your answers
Although there are various tips and guidelines for answering common interview questions, you don’t want to follow them so closely that your answers become bland and robotic. Instead, the way you answer questions should be ridden with personality and be an authentic reflection of how you feel and think.
Furthermore, it’s almost a guarantee you’ll be asked what makes you unique. Answering this question thoroughly and with a punch of personality is crucial to the success of the interview. Ensure you’re looking at this question from the interviewer’s perspective. Your response should communicate how you can solve a pain point for this company’s customers, unlike any other candidate they’ll interview.
Conclusion
Ultimately, integrating your personality and beliefs into your career may seem like a long shot. But the benefits of doing so make the work worth it. So, ensure you’re considering them when you embark on your career search and the tips above when it’s time to interview with a company that matches you perfectly.
