I am. I just realized it a few days ago though. Don’t get me wrong, I have always thought very highly of my job in a rotational leadership program and there are definitely further career achievements I wish to attain but, I am doing the things that I dreamed of doing in college. I just hadn’t realized it yet. Here is how I came to realize my dream role and how it has helped me to continue to develop my career.

Complete Task Orientation Can Be A Distraction

I have always wanted to help determine IT strategy and help push an organization to the next level, from centralized systems to cloud computing, thin client to mobile technologies, etc. I am in the middle of my last rotation and have considerable knowledge about how the sales and marketing groups I work with want to use the system I am deploying. I have worked with them closely so, I was pulled into a strategy session for our entire business’s approach to Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems. Here is the crux, at first, I felt it was a burden, it was obvious our team needed the centralized solution I was providing, why did we have to have this strategy session? Regardless, I decided to just do it.

Realize Your Role

After some discussion, I realized, I was participating in exactly what I had hoped for! We were considering cloud computing (a Software as a Service variant) and many other solutions to long term business growth challenges! Once I saw things in this light, the task and the meeting became 100 times more exciting.

Appreciate (for your own sake) to Contribute More

After I came to the realization that I had an opportunity to participate in setting the strategy for our company, I not only contributed more, I worked harder on helping to compile repeatable processes on my current project that could be used to execute the strategy I helped to formulate. When I appreciated my role and realized it’s place in the big picture, I worked harder and contributed more, moving me even further towards my dream job.

How do you realize your dream job? Have you had an experience like this? Share it with us in the comments.