4 Simple Telltale Signs To Help You Spot Bad Career Advice

By Michelle Wanjiku
There will come a time in your career when you will need to seek some sort of advice. This is because you don’t know everything and you need to learn from those who have been there and can give you tips on how to ensure you achieve your career goals.
However, not every piece of advice you get is good and to avoid running your career, you need to be able to tell the difference between good career advice and bad career advice.
In this article see some of the telltale signs that the advice you are getting is not worth taking.
1. The Person Giving Advice Has a Vested Interest in Your Decision
Your colleague might like you but they might advise you to take a job at a different company so that they can get your current job. Your parents want the best for you but they belong to a generation of people who stayed at one job forever, so they might not be objective when telling you not to find another job.
In some instances, the person giving you advice really does care about your well-being but they might have an uncurious or conscious bias.
This is why before you ask someone for advice, try and figure out if they have something to gain or lose depending on the decision you make, and if they do then try asking someone else instead.
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2. The Advice is Filled With Platitudes
There is nothing wrong with being told to ‘follow your passion’ and ‘do what makes you happy’ if it’s just meant to motivate you, but if you really think about such statements don’t count as solid career advice.
You have not gotten any real advice from anyone who tells you such clichés. A lot goes into achieving career success, and sometimes just following your passion is not enough.
You need to make informed career choices that will make it easier for you to achieve your goals. This can only happen if you receive good informative advice.
3. The Person Giving Advice Is Stuck In The Past
Like it or not, the job market in Kenya has changed, it is no longer the same as it was 20 years ago. This means that what worked for someone in the 90s will not necessarily work for you now.
Therefore, the person giving you advice needs to be aware of these changes and know what it takes to succeed in the workplace now.
Getting outdated advice and information will only serve to delay your career growth goals. So you have to ensure that whoever you ask for career advice understands the current job market and what it takes to succeed in it.
4. The “Expert” Doesn’t Have Much Relevant Background
Something you need to be aware of is not everyone who claims to be a career expert actually has the relevant background.
Take for example someone who claims to be a career coach but has no HR background as well as no formal training. Taking advice from such a person can be dangerous because they have no idea what they are talking about.
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You need to be very careful and ensure that when you talk to a professional, they are actually qualified. You can do this by looking at their LinkedIn profile, what positions they have held up to now and decide whether you trust them or not.
In Conclusion,
Taking bad advice can greatly derail your career growth plans, this is why it very important for you to be able to differentiate between the two and know how to avoid getting bad advice. Getting good career advice that actually works can be a big boost to your career success so you have to ensure you pick your source for advice very carefully.