what is your worst mistake professionally?

If we are spiralling, let's spiral right 1. Focused solely on grades in colleges 2. Thought Campus placements were ultimate goal 3. Spent 3 years in a company with 5% increment (once), because it was comfortable 4. Scared to ask even minimum budget while negotiating salary 5. Overthinking every step, still not taking actions to correct or fuck up anything 6. Major major regret - not taking risk of starting own. It also has to do with parenting, but lets not blame. 7. Ran away from public sharing - speaking, athletics, all extracurricular activities for that matter. Kids grow up with zero confidence and looking fat & ugly. (I'm not fat shaming, some fat people look 🤌) I'll add more, there will be more for sure 😂

My worst mistake was to not have enough conviction. You need to bend reality to your will. Reality distortion is real and you can influence things. Steve Jobs once said, “Everything around you that you call life was created by people who were no smarter than you.”

Hubris. Not the smartest, not the most privileged, but got some stellar opportunities that I was too short sighted to appreciate. Got cocky and took unreasonable risks (in hindsight!) Lost a good career, family along the way and at a ripe old age, am starting at the bottom of the pile. Regrets? Yes. A whole lot! Hope? Also yes, conservatively. But the one lesson learnt is that profession is but one aspect of this myriad-hued thing called life. The day it encroaches upon everything else, step back and realise that you are definitely doing something wrong.

My biggest mistake was to let her go and pursue this career 💔

Ended up joining a large company way too early in my career. It was a dream company almost, but it slowed down my career in those two years and I realized that a large, comfortable company just isn't for me early in my career. That said, it did give me the confidence that I can work at a great brand, so it was helpful that way.

Homesickness during my college days. I used to go to home every weekend. I think I should have stayed little more at the hostel :P

Kitna bhi try kar lo bunny kuch na kuch to chootega hi.

Last 2 years have been a shit show, I quit a job for a good opportunity in a start up unfortunately the opportunity didn't turn out so great in reality and impacted my health, I took a break and couldn't find a good role when I restarted my job hunt, a friend referred me to a service based company for a project. By the time I was boarded, the client opted out and now stuck again with very limited projects in my role 🥲

Having 0 savings for the first 7 years of my career and not starting investing sooner. Now when I see my friends who started investing earlier, I feel this guilt always.

No point in crying about what could have been done 10 years back. Spending so much time overthinking about it is not going to help.

Running after perfection. I still sometimes find myself longing for perfection and that really hinders my ability to appreciate the hard work I do. Like STOP beating yourself up. No one has it figured out. Go make some memories with your family/friends. Oh and please step out and randomly talk to people. (I'm just starting to realise how rewarding this can be)

I'm a bit older, going by the comments here, but I'll share my worst professional mistake here and hopefully will help others as well. 1. Trusting your manager with your career. This is a very big mistake I've seen many people make. I used to just assume my manager knows all about the work i do and if i share my aspirations he/she will take care of my career. Never have such presumptions. Managers care only about one thing. Business! How your career develops is the least of their botheration. You are but a tool to get business done. Period! Without knowing this i did not put enough effort in to my self appraisals. 1-1 meetings were smooth sailing.. all hunky dory until one day when something stopped working or negative feedback was received. I was blamed for everything under the sun. Perceptions got built among the managers with word spreading like wildfire. Suddenly i became problematic and was not doing enough. I realised my work is only good, if it is presented well and im credited for it.. And also all the good work done by me must be recorded in meticulous detail in my self appraisal. Helped me take care of my career much more easily and with more clarity than any manager could provide. We're in charge of our careers. Don't give the steering wheel to a businessman who sees you as a tool.

Not spreading tea on Grapevine 🍿

Said no to some absolute golden opportunities. Never saying no to any opportunity ever again

I'm in my final year of enginnering right now and one mistake i regret is that i wasn't confident enough for a very decent organisation. People who were less technically qualified got in but I didn't! That interview and my mistakes still haunt me sometimes.

My worst mistakes were : 1. Trusting my manager for my career growth 2. Overthinking and lack of confidence to move forward out from the comfort zone 3. Not knowing negotiations. 4. Most major regret is the thought that loyalty to companies will be rewarded with growth and making company our identity.

There are many restrictions around demat in banks. So early in career I thought I could not even invest in Mutual Fund. I was wrong and realised it late.

Man this thread has to be one of the best out there. It's so hard to stay humble when things are going your way. A reminder to self to help everyone along the way and think of this yours as a journey. I still remember something my sister said - you work so hard, tag your identity to the places you worked as ex-<this> ex-<that> - give your whole life for it and become director/VP of this and that, only to get electrocuted to dust in under 5 seconds once your dead. Nothing matters after that. All your past work becomes dust. Want to do something really meaningful before that happens, can we change someone's life before it?

Did a dual degree course(B.E. + M.Sc.) of 5 years which led me to graduate in 2023. Had I done a 4 year B.E. like any sane person, I would have graduated in the best job market of a lifetime. Also both my degrees are completely useless anyway.

Not studying properly in IIT, should have focused on getting best possible package as money 💰 is the ultimate solution