Category: 2021

Do you have a passion for engineering or just doing a job? —- A practical approach to Success! By Dilip G. Saraf

In Part-1 of this series, Dilip explained his observations having  worked with thousands of clients  about the distinction between having a passion for engineering versus just doing a job. In this part-2, he explains the model he has developed to explain how actualization drives passion.Once you embrace this notion, you’ll change how you look at your career and how you manage it! 

The starting point for this model or framework (shown in Figure here ) is identifying your aptitude (your genius or your uniqueness). A dictionary defines aptitude as both a natural or acquired capacity or ability. This definition in my mind addresses both aspects of someone’s aptitude. So, it is alright not to know what your natural ability is, but if you pursue something out of curiosity, interest, or mere serendipity and you acquire that ability by whatever means, then what you have acquired can be defined as your aptitude.

As this figure depicts, Aptitude directed with deliberate effort allows you to develop a skill that gets increasingly better with greater effort. To ratchet this effort further, Toil makes you achieve Mastery over what you are pursuing. Here Toil refers to what Malcolm Gladwell calls “putting in 10,000 hours of focused effort.” In Sanskrit it is called Tapasya, which requires 12 years’ highly concentrated effort on one pursuit (this  can far exceed Gladwell’s 10,000 hours’ requirement, which I view as typical). The result in this model is the Mastery of your subject (in Sanskrit it is called Sadhana). Thus, the work you put into your talent has a dual effect: First it helps you develop your Skill and then with Toil, you go on to Master it. (Each element in this figure is capitalized, for ease of identification in the accompanying Figure even though it is a noun in everyday usage.)

While Toil is a singular pursuit, just focusing on improving your technique, Effort entails a broader perspective: Developing new relationships with other professionals, researching different techniques, understanding how others are practicing their craft, going to events where other players showcase their craft, among other avenues. Thus, Effort and Focus result in Growth that comes, both from a broader perspective and from learning how true Growth requires a multi-dimensional effort. 

Creativity stems from working on your Skill to deepen it. Using trial-and-error, intuition, experimentation, and design one can engage in Creative pursuits to further their Skill and get incrementally better at how they manifest their Skill.

Similarly, a state of Flow is reached when Growth and Inspiration work together to propel your abilities to greater heights. The concept of Flow was proposed by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (Mihi Six-ent-mihi) a Hungarian-American psychologist. In his model of getting to a highly focused mental state one constantly elevates their Ability to the level of challenge they meet, and when this reaches a state of equilibrium, they reach the state of Flow, where things happen magically. Navigating through the elements on the left side of the center in this figure, Purpose and Focus play a strong role in how you develop your talent further. At the intersection of Focus and Purpose is what comes to you as your Inspiration. But mere Inspiration without Toil cannot allow that Inspiration to culminate into any meaningful Impact that others can see or feel. 

Thus, Toil plays a dual role: Once in transforming your Skill into Mastery of that Skill and then in transmuting your Inspiration into an outcome that creates Impact. Additionally, once you discover your Purpose, Toil results in actualizing that Purpose. At the center of all these intersecting circles in the Brand. A Brand is a culmination of all these factors that uniquely come together for the world to recognize you as a thought leader of a worthy stature to be reckoned with. It is apparent that passion is nowhere in this framework; it is because it plays no part in manifesting yourself as an actualized professional. Passion is defined in a dictionary as an object of desire or interest: something that commands one’s love or devotion. 

This implies that passion has a strong emotional component to it. Anyone can display passion about a topic, but that does not mean that they have an inherent aptitude to help them excel at it (the topic). As the model in Fig shows, anyone can work on their natural ability, build a Skill, and Master it through the many elements outlined in that model.

So, after reading this approach to career management, if you are still waiting to uncover your passion to get going on the right career path, you may want to rethink and start going with something you know you are good at and then applying yourself meaningfully with Effort, Toil, and Focus! It worked for me in all my five careers and for my clients working with them as their career coach; it can work for you, too! 

Good luck! 

About the author:

Dilip  Saraf is a highly sought after career coach who keynoted at ASEI’s 33rd Annual Convention last year and seeing the value ASEI provides, joined as  a professional member of  our SiliconValley chapter. An IIT and Stanford alum, he has leveraged his experience going through five di