Sunday, October 12, 2008

Money & Business

The Inside Job by Liz Wolgemuth

The Worst Advice Ever

June 25, 2008 05:35 PM ET | Liz Wolgemuth | Permanent Link | Print

If you've ever offered someone your great career insight only to realize weeks (months, years) later how totally awful it was—welcome to the club.

This from Penelope Trunk:

The worst career advice I ever gave was to my brother's college roommate, Robert Buckley. He was one year out of college when he asked me if he should quit healthcare consulting to become an actor.

I said, 'No, that's the dumbest idea I ever heard.'

That Robert Buckley would be the Robert Buckley now starring in NBC's Lipstick Jungle.

So go praise Penelope for her mea culpa, and get her advice on defending your own dream career track from would-be advisers. Just remember, we're all lousy sages sometimes, and the bad advice you sometimes get is no doubt as bad as the advice you sometimes give. I should know. I tried to shake a close friend of his focus on a single, far-fetched dream job. Until he got it. He now splits his days between a Major League Baseball press box and dugout.

Tags: careers

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Reader Comments

career advice

some of the best career advice i ever received was from my dad- but it wasn't really advice per se. i told him i was tempted to venture off into a new field and wasn't sure about it (in other words i was doubting whether i could succeed at it)....and he said "of course you can do it!...you'll be terrific" he gave me wings and actually made me believe in myself...hopefully, someday i'll be able to pass along encouraging words like that to my own kids.

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You're taking a break from your job-hunting and job-hopping ways and have decided to stay put in your current position. Liz Wolgemuth’s careers blog will show you how to make the very best of your job, each day. You can send her your career questions: theinsidejob@usnews.com.

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