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On a personal level, most skills you need for jobs can be taught pretty easily. With so many people going to reputable colleges, your skills aren’t going to set you apart from anyone. What you need to have to stand out is passion. This passion will bleed into all aspects of your job.
“Skills are cheap, passion is priceless.” – Gary Vaynerchuck
The woman with very tiny hands and very humongous ideas, Grace Boyle, is doing a little contest over at her blog and, seeing as it is 1. A good idea and 2. from Grace who is the bomb diggity, I’ve decided to take a whack at it. So, here we go.
When I started blogging, a little less than a year ago, I used it as a medium for me to showcase my skills. I was a senior who needed a job in a time where not many jobs were out there. I needed to set myself apart from everyone else, so, I figured a blog that I could slap on my resume and put in email signatures would surely prove I knew my stuff.
Fast forward to now. I still blog (duh), but not at all for the same reason. Now it’s simply because I’m passionate about marketing and I love talking about it with other people. I never claim to be an expert and love learning from others just as much as I enjoy teaching others.
So, why is this important? On a personal level, most skills you need for jobs can be taught pretty easily. With so many people going to reputable colleges, your skills aren’t going to set you apart from anyone. What you need to have to stand out is passion. This passion will bleed into all aspects of your job. Your interactions with coworkers, your interaction with clients, and most importantly, the work that you produce.
So, how am I “crushing it?” First of all I thoroughly enjoy what I do in my job. With one responsibility I’m able to help brands monitor online conversation around them, something they likely would not have the tools or resources to do on their own. On the other hand, I’m also able to help them plan and execute social media strategies, an area which most are largely oblivious to how to do correctly.
But how do I know I’m passionate about this? Because it doesn’t stop at work. I talk about social media and marketing here at my blog. I read about it in magazines. I’m helping a community organization build a marketing campaign around a Christmas event. Sure, I have the skills needed for this, but what makes my work meaningful to me is the passion I’ve developed for it.
What does the future hold and how am I going to “Crush It” on down the road? Good question. One I’ve thought deeply about and still am not sure of the answer. Maybe it’s my own agency or one with some of my closest friends. Maybe it’s leading marketing or social media for a company. There’s one thing I do know though. I want it to be something I’m passionate about. I truly believe that your passion will show up in all aspects of a company. Everywhere from customer service, to the product, to corporate culture. So wherever I end up, I don’t want it to be a place for me to use the skills I’ve learned. I want it to be a place for me to use the passion I’ve developed.
So that leaves the question. How are you crushing it?
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Comments
10.09.09
Passion is an absolute key ingredient to success in life. If you have amazing skills yet find what you do to be absolute drudgery, yet you still make a ton of dough... are you really successful? If you spend your entire life working and you hate it, whether you're rich or not, I don't think that can be measured as success.
You can't teach passion and it doesn't come complimentary with any number of academic degrees.
Passion = Priceless
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