By Jeff Henderson
Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving. —Colossians 3:23-24
I’ve lost track of the number of conversations I’ve had with people who are unsatisfied with their job and looking to get out. Sometimes people are fine where they are but feel like something is missing. At the end of the conversation, I tell them I have a final suggestion, and it’s the very best one I can provide.
“Go back to where you work and do your very best.”
Cue the puzzled look. I can almost hear what they’re thinking. Jeff, have you not been paying attention? I’m trying to leave where I am.
I have been listening, and I understand. But from my experience, your day job (and those you’ve had in the past) provide distinct clues about your future. Here’s why: the path to your dream job often leads through your day job.
This is true even for those of us who don’t currently have a day job. Each place we’ve ever been teaches us and shows us a path.
Finding the Strongest You
One of my first “real” jobs was in the promotions department for the Atlanta Braves. As a lifelong Braves fan, it was a dream come true. (Not to mention that Hank Aaron, the home run king, worked two offices down from me.)
This was back in the old Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium days, way before Atlanta started naming ballparks after companies. (As a sidenote, we’ve built more stadiums than we’ve won championships in Atlanta. It’s a tough life.)
This job with the Braves was such a great opportunity because I had a chance to do all sorts of things:
- work with corporate sponsors
- manage pregame and postgame promotions
- create promotional ideas for sponsors and the Braves
- write television and radio scripts
- write player features for the team magazine
- sell program ads
One night, the person who was supposed to don the costume for our mascot failed to show up. So for one game I even got to be a major league mascot! I think I lost ten pounds from heat exhaustion in the costume.
Here’s why I bring this up. In that promotions job, I realized there were some things I was good at and some things I was really bad at, some tasks I enjoyed and others I didn’t. For example, I discovered I had some strong creative ideas that sponsors and the Braves organization not only liked but implemented. On the other hand, I was terrible at selling program ads. Not just terrible, but Charles Barkley “turrable.”
My hands would sweat while making the phone calls. I would stutter and talk too fast. I was convinced no one would buy an ad. It was an awful experience, and I felt like a failure. That is, until my dad told me that discovering what you’re not good at (let’s call it a weakness) is a huge win.
“You’re learning,” he said. “You’re learning what your strengths are and what your weaknesses are. Always play to your strengths. But you can’t play to your strengths until you know what they are, and where your weaknesses are.”
Okay, so I’m probably not going to be a professional program ad seller. But I learned to play to my strengths.
Fast-forward many years later to when I worked in the marketing department at Chick-fil-
A. I connected again with my friend Tommy Newberry, the founder of the 1% Club. He asked me to email seven friends and ask them this question: “What do you think I’m good at?”
Despite ending in a preposition, it’s a fantastic question.
The feedback gave me clues, some I saw and some I had taken for granted. That’s what we do with our strengths. They come naturally to us, more so than for others. And we assume since it’s easier for us, it’s easier for everyone. For example, there were employees with the Braves who crushed selling program ads. And they couldn’t figure out why it made my hands sweat. They were in their strengths. I was sweating.
Here’s what I believe about you. I’ll just be honest. You don’t have to believe this about yourself, but let me believe this about you: I believe God created you. God’s thumbprints are on you. And because I believe this about you, it leads me to a truth about you: God’s thumbprints on you are clues about his plans for you.
Let me point out that my new book What to Do Next isn’t a religious book. But I do believe you have been created and gifted by God. Those gifts aren’t just for you; they’re gifts for the world. And the more you recognize, understand, and leverage them, the better positioned you’ll be to find what’s next.
I discovered this one Sunday when an elderly woman confronted me at a church. At the time, I was working in marketing at a resort called Lake Lanier Islands in North Atlanta. One Friday afternoon, my dad called to tell me a pastor friend had reached out to him about a family emergency. He asked my dad if he could preach for him that Sunday. My dad wasn’t available, but he suggested me as a replacement.
Now it may seem odd for a resort marketing person to be a guest preacher, but my dad and I had gone around during my high school and college years speaking to church youth groups. It’s how I learned how to speak in front of groups.
Long story short, I ended up preaching that Sunday. It was a small church, and at the end of the service, the preacher typically stood at the back of the church and said goodbye to everyone. This was in the 1990s, long before preachers got feedback on their sermon via Twitter.
Everyone was kind—until she arrived. She looked relatively harmless, probably in her eighties. (I’m convinced Dana Carvey created his Saturday Night Live Church Lady character based on the woman standing in front of me that day.) We shook hands. She combined a smile with a frown—a hard thing to do, by the way—and said, “You’re wasting your gift.”
At first I thought she was complimenting me. She was telling me I had the gift of public speaking. But I quickly discovered she wasn’t there to encourage me; she was there to confront.
“Young man,” she said—the phrase young man convinced me I was in trouble—“ you have a gift. From what I understand, you work at a lake somewhere. You should be speaking. If not, someday you’ll have to give an account to God as to why you wasted your gift.”
And then she walked off. How’s that for a nice Sunday morning at church? And yet here I am, more than two decades later, remembering what she said.
A couple of years ago, Forbes magazine named me one of twenty speakers you shouldn’t miss. When I got word of that, I thought of her. I never knew her name, but I never forgot her advice. In essence what she was saying was, “Young man, pay attention to the thumbprints.”
The same is true for you. Spend time being curious about your past jobs and roles. What were you good at? What are you not so good at? What’s your version of selling program ads? Don’t beat yourself up over your weaknesses. You win when you see them, define them, and move toward your strengths. Your past work experience leaves all sorts of clues for what’s next.
My experience is that we overlook those clues. That’s why I think it’s true: the path to your dream job often leads through your day job.
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Adapted from What to Do Next: Taking Your Best Step When Life Is Uncertain by Jeff Henderson. Click here to learn more about this book.
If you want to change your career and circumstances but aren’t sure how, this practical guide from business leader Jeff Henderson will help you reevaluate your purpose and determine your next best step.
Navigating what’s next in life—whether in your career, personal life, or relationships—often brings a level of uncertainty and anxiety and presents more questions than answers. Entrepreneur, speaker, and pastor Jeff Henderson has experienced this firsthand—first when he left his marketing position at Chick-fil-A to start a church and nonprofit, and then again when he left that nonprofit in the middle of a global pandemic to … well, he didn’t know. He just knew he needed to make a move.
This insightful book outlines the process he used to determine the next best step for him and how you, too, can pursue more meaning and purpose in your life and work. Sharing personal stories and best practices he’s learned along the way, he eloquently and practically guides you through the minefield of knowing what’s next by helping you:
- Take the Career Risk Calculator and discover if you’re ready for change
- Plan for change—both the changes you want and the changes you can’t see coming
- Cultivate “optimal options” in your life that will guide you to better decision-making when the time comes
- Identify what to do and what not to do when making decisions about what’s next
- Exchange fear, confusion, and hopelessness for confidence, freedom, and purpose
The next chapter of your life starts today, with one simple step. And you’ll know how to take that step because you know What to Do Next.
Jeff Henderson is an entrepreneur, speaker, pastor, and business leader. For seventeen years, he has led three of North Point Ministries’ multisite locations in Atlanta, Georgia—Buckhead Church and two Gwinnett Church locations. He also helped launch North Point Online, which now reaches over 200,000 people.
His bestselling book, Know What You’re FOR, launched a movement in nonprofits around the world and has become a focal point for many businesses. As the founder of the FOR Company, Jeff’s aim is to help organizations build a good name where purpose and profit grow together.
Jeff was recently named by Forbes Magazine as one of twenty speakers you shouldn’t miss. Prior to working as a pastor, Jeff started his career in marketing with the Atlanta Braves, Callaway Gardens, Lake Lanier Islands, and Chick-fil-A, Inc., where he led the company’s regional and beverage marketing strategies.
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