How to Figure Out What to Do with Your Life by Jennifer Turliuk
My rating: 0 of 5 stars
I am most definitely not the target audience for this book and really should have done more of my due diligence on the author before I requested it. Even reading the introduction would have been enough to see that the author is personally interested in a start-up/VC culture and even though she often says the book is meant to be used for any kind of career journey, as a person who lives and works in Silicon Valley, there’s a lot of the jargon and mentality of that culture in this book. Which I certainly am exposed to plenty and didn’t really need more of.
While I liked the idea of the framework the author puts on the process of figuring out the next steps for your career, so much of this book is just not viable for you unless you’re in your twenties or single. Or at least not viable if you have responsibilities like kids and a mortgage and cannot leave your day job to “shadow” other jobs.
There’s nothing wrong with this book. I think the framework the author lays out might be totally viable for others but just not the right thing for me with where I am in my life/career.
I do want to highlight one major caveat however. There are a lot of references to people who “made it” despite not finishing a degree, or not starting out in a job with secure paycheck, etc etc in this book. Oprah and Steve Jobs, and Zuckerberg are exceptions. There are way more people who drop out of school and don’t become billionaires or people who take risks that derail their lives in ways that aren’t easily recoverable. I do think taking calculated/thoughtful risks, especially early in your life, is a good thing, but I am weary when all the examples all the time are the exceptions and not a full picture.
But then again I’m a parent so maybe I am optimizing on being safe.
with gratitude to netgalley and Dundurn Press for an advanced copy in return for an honest review.
Ps: I will not rate this book on goodreads because I don’t want to skew the rating since I am the first review and it’s not the author’s fault that I am not the target audience for this book.
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