How I Found My Niche at Work
Do you wake up each day excited to head into the office? Finding a career that marries your passion with your skillset can be a pretty magical experience. So, what’s next?
Doing something that excites you (and comes naturally) is important. But once you’re on a specific career track, how do you find your niche? Finding your niche within a given professional field allows you to build a specialized skillset that boosts your value to potential employers while giving you deep expertise on a subject or type of work that comes naturally.
Marketing, for example, is a pretty broad field. From content marketing, sales strategies and corporate branding to SEO and PPC, there’s a lot to learn. Building a specialized skillset in marketing has helped me find my niche, and I’m excited to see where my marketing career continues to grow.
At first glance, marketing may also seem like a pretty big departure from math and science, which are two of my passions having attended Georgia Tech. So how did I end up carving out a niche in marketing? My career has taken some interesting turns, and along the way I’ve learned that when it comes to finding your niche, it’s all about marrying your skillsets and owning what does (and doesn’t) work. Here’s what I mean by this:
Marry your skillsets.
Are you a great writer? Do you have an eye for design? Are you an expert at crunching numbers? Just because you have these skills doesn’t mean you have to be a writer, designer or accountant. However, bringing elements from these skills into your current job can help carve out your niche. For example, I majored in management in college and then went on to work in sales management at a global sports consulting company. Here at Lucas Group, I get to draw on my background in math, logic, business, management and sales as I further build my professional niche in corporate marketing.
Own what doesn’t work.
When it comes to defining your career, knowing what you’re NOT good at is as important as knowing what you ARE good at. While some skills can improve the more you practice them, other skills you either have or you don’t. Maybe you’re great with numbers but you just don’t have an eye for design. Managing a major branding overhaul for your business could be tricky if it involves selecting a new logo and corporate colors. Recognize the skills you lack and build a strong team to offset these weaknesses. Everyone has a niche to fill!
How did you find your niche within your current job or professional field? I’d love to hear more about how finding your niche has influence your career trajectory in the comments below.