We all know the story .. the slow but steady tortoise beats the more talented but flaky hare. One of the more obvious lessons for careers is that you can’t take your foot off the gas - no matter how talented you are because someone will always be biting on your heels. I’m not suggesting you can’t take any holidays though!
Today I want to say something positive about the tortoises. I’ve got a couple of mates who are “tortoises”. They’re methodical, slow to make decisions (but they make good quality decisions), predictable, stable. You know what you’re going to get with them. Often, in their careers, the tortoises won’t make major waves and won’t hit the headlines, but they stick at it. They’re happy to really work at it and don’t feel that they should be promoted every 24 months.
Firstly, these people are often great employees. They really know their jobs and they’re not coming to you with unreasonable demands. Often, as their more flashy colleagues move on to supposedly greener pastures, the tortoise moves up and over time, they’re doing their thing at a senior level. There’s a lot to be said for committing yourself to a career path and then staying the course.
My only word of caution for the tortoises of tomorrow is that the world of work is calling for ever increasing flexibility in approaches to work and that’s not going to suit many tortoises. But that’s the subject of another post.
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