I've been learning a hell of a lot about myself through the career counselling process I'm going through. During the last week, I made a few particularly important discoveries. There's a personality test called the "Myers-Briggs", which is one of the most widely known and respected tests of its kind: I took it a few years ago, and learned that my personality-type was INTJ. The main thing I got it out it back then was the realization that I'm an introvert. You might think I'd have known that without taking any test! And I suppose you're right, but it helped me to understand things better.

Anyway, while I was browsing through the career section of Borders Books in Union Square, I came across a book based on the test which elaborated on the Myers-Briggs types, and, in particular, what job qualities tend to appeal to each type. I was completely floored when I read the ten qualities likely to appeal to INTJs - they completely described the qualities of jobs which I've enjoyed. I'm not just saying it was a close fit! It felt more like someone had been analyzing me at work over the years, and drawn a set of conclusions based on what they'd seen! (How's about that for imagining yourself to be the center of the Universe!)

I have a pet hatred of business jargon, but to borrow from the phrase-book for a second, my key "take away" from the book was that the most important common factors about the jobs I've loved have been that I've had the opportunity to improve things, and then stick around to see things improve - in other words, process improvement. Now, not surprisingly, that's a quality somewhat missing from my current job. It's a large, well-established company for a start, with many processes and structures already in place. And for another, my job as a consultant entails fixing things for other companies: we don't stick around long enough to witness the beneficial results of any improvements we make.

Another thing I realized is that I want to be working in a field where the company I'm working for is itself making an important difference in the World. As a kid, I always visualized myself working at NASA. Now I'm working for a company whose most important clients are using our software to better target direct marketing! That's not exactly the kind of "difference" I envisioned contributing to!

One of the things I like about my career counsellor is that she's very pragmatic - she gives me concrete things I can try out. She's suggested I look at websites, read scientific journals, and talk to friends and strangers who work for the kind of companies and organizations that intrigue me: scientific organizations, government think-tanks, international policy groups, and so on. To try to make contact with people in those fields and ask them about their jobs - why they enjoy them, what kind of fulfilment they get. And then to find jobs in those fields that intrigue me, and match the kind of work that motivates me. Of course, the next task after that would be to figure out what qualifications and experience I need to be hired, and that could take a while. But since I'm looking for a job that really fulfils me, why not think big!

(By the way, if you work in any of those fields I mentioned, in a professional capacity, feel free to write me - I'd love to hear about your job, why you enjoy it, what you get out of it.)

Since I came to these conclusions, things have gotten way better at work. I contacted the group in our company who build and maintain some of our internal processes, told them I was a little underemployed right now - could I do anything to help them out? And I got some work out of them - building interactive, web-based reports for the management team. It's the kind of work I like - making something that other people will get some utility out of.

Simultaneously, I began to realize that we're finally building up critical mass in my office: there are five of us consultants now, and a camaraderie is beginning to develop. We're forming our own little, self-understanding island that sets us just enough apart from the sea of sales people (my office is mostly a sales and consulting satellite office). So heck, things ain't so bad right now. For the moment, anyway :)

Speaking of work, I had lunch yesterday with friends from the job I left last year - Wendy, and James are nearest to me, then Mark (who's now one of the consultants in my current office), and finally Elizabeth at the far end.

In exploring another strand, I attended my first screen-writing class on Wednesday, at UC Berkeley Extension. It's the first time in a long, long while where I've been in a non-technical class. I'd feared that the class might have been made up of people whose motivation for taking the class was to learn how to write screenplays for "Friends"! But I needn't have worried: it was a wonderfully diverse group - more like the kind of people you'd expect to see in a screenwriting class on the show "Felicity" :) They seemed like mostly sensitive people, of all ages and backgrounds - all with a searching side to them.

Strangely enough, unlike what invariably happens in other classes, I didn't fall asleep even once!

The night before last, I was startled when fireworks suddenly started to go off on a barge just off the Embarcadero. I could hear cheering too, along the Embaracadero, and car-horns honking. I gathered that the San Francisco Giants (whom I believe are a baseball team? :) must have won something. Perhaps a game? :) It's not a very good photo - didn't have my tripod handy.