‘Follow your passion’ could be a tired line

Many people have had passion to work in either the army or police but the pay associated with such jobs makes it difficult for one to live a self sustaining life. File Photo

What you need to know:

The belief. Many people are convinced that it is passion that will deliver better value. However, it could be useless to hold onto something that is not productive.

What if you got a job offer with a description entirely different from what you thought is your passion, would you turn it down?
You have heard people advising you or others how you should to build your career around a certain path or passion. This, however, is becoming a tired line, especially at a time when most things seem to be going in the wrong direction characterised by alarming unemployment rates.
The “follow your passion” line seem not to be working anymore because it limits room for growth, according to Flavia Zzimula, an accounts assistant at WMC Africa. To succeed in your career, Zzimula says, you need to try out new things that are challenging and will push you into learning new skills.
This, she says, should totally be out of your passions, which may not be necessarily productive because following your passion could at times point under rate your ability.
Sometimes people get better when they decide to move out of their comfort zones and try out things that are a bit challenging.
Passion can be developed and should not be an anchor of one’s career. Therefore, Zzimula advises that one needs to just develop the passion for the work that they find themselves in.
It is important that you create desired happiness out of the job as well as developing the trust that you are better than what your inner self believes.
To some, passion could be unrealistic and could fail to fit into reality which could exert unnecessary pressure on one’s career.
Many times people decide on their career paths as a result of passion, but the decision could fail to correlate with the realities and feasibilities of life.
Therefore in your career consider passion as something that:

Varies over time
The ‘follow your passion’ advice has the potential to breed confusion, especially that passion changes over time.
“Personally, I have passion for advocacy, fashion, and marketing. Actually I believe I am a victim of the ‘follow your passion career mix-up’, Zzimula shares.

Passion can be built
Alice Khanakwa, she chose not to go into law practice but something close to it which she always had passion for.
To her passion is an interminable cycle of self-discovery and self-creation. Therefore it is important that when you get a job outside your passion, you develop the passion, gradually.
“It is pretty much excusable to advice one to follow their heart when it comes to relationships but for career, following one’s passion alone is a no,” she says.

Does it pay?
Arnold Kwesiga, the coordinator of Uganda Consortium on Corporate Accountability says many times the internet and those close to you will tell you to follow your passion, but passion alone is not reason enough for taking decisions that are not productive.
If passion doesn’t pay, he says, find an alternative because at the end of the day it gets difficult to hold onto something that isn’t paying.
Therefore, before one heeds to the advice, Kwesiga says, ensure that the job meets two vital aspects and earning a living income must be top on the list as well as whether it would still be a passion if you had to do something day-in-day-out.
“Before you even get started, these questions must be answered because we are living in a world where bills must be paid, tuition is required and other needs catered for,” he says.
In circumstance where the two aspects are not met, Kwesiga advises that one should allow the room to grow new skills including perfecting your current responsibilities because they help in shaping your future.

Passion is a good bet
However, on the other side many people maintain that the ‘fall your passion’ line is still an important aspect because “once you have something to build on, it is easy to succeed at it”, according to Godfrey Ssempungu, an associate dean at the Faculty of Business at Uganda Christian University.
“A man without ambition is like a woman without beauty. At times passion makes one to stick to a particular job and grow on it. Although it requires a lot of patience,” he says.
Julianna Kayaga, the head of human resource at Entrepreneurs Financial Centre believes in having a passion for something “because it drives most of what workers do”.

Passion
The good in being passionate. Those who are not passionate about anything, according to Julianna Kayaga, the head of human resource at Entrepreneurs Financial Centre, incidentally could fall off the lane or might turn out to be unhappy and less productive at their workplace.
However, emotions can never entirely be a basis for good advice since passion is never rational.