Optimizing your career: A minimization or maximization problem?

Reframing the productivity advice you usually hear

We use computers to save us time. Applying the same approach to our careers is not usually the best idea.

There are many approaches to career growth. Most people look into the shortcut that saves them the effort of doing hard skills. There are hundreds of “Learn x framework in 5 minutes” YouTube videos. They help on exploring topics, but you are not learning something to make an impact in your career. If you are reading this, you are out of that group. (Really, reading in the 21st century? You are already ahead in life).

There’s also the hardcore productivity tribe, looking into minimizing the time of each action. I’m one of them, I have so many shortcuts in my keyboard that I can’t type in a coworker’s keyboard without messing up.

When it comes to my career, my approach is not about finding the shortcut to skip a necessary step. Neither it’s about minimizing the time I have to spend until the next promotion. Instead, I think of my career as money.

In investment, this is known as the comp…