At McKinsey, when I was once in a really tight spot, a young woman at one of the Firm’s specialist groups came to my rescue. Under an impossible deadline, I had to geo-map hundreds of branches of a bank (our client). But this lady got it done.
So while thanking her, I asked how she landed up at the Firm. And this is the heartbreaking story she shared.
She was once doing a Ph.D. in Chinese literature at Stanford. It turned out to be impossibly hard because she had to learn Mandarin, and then a dialect which was almost like a new language, and so on.
She was struggling but her PhD was going nowhere. Finally, nine years later, after marriage and kids, she decided to quit the PhD.
Nine years of her life were totally wasted. She neither had a degree nor a job. So she learned some new skills and ended up at McKinsey’s specialist group for geo-mapping, a back-office job.
When she was telling this story on phone, I could sense that she was on the verge of crying.
I can’t even imagine what it must be like to see nine years of your life wasted. And she must have been so incredibly bright to get into Stanford.
Many of us make career mistakes. But even after we realize a mistake, we sometimes don’t course-correct because of our ego, inertia, or just the fear of the unknown.
I don’t know if that young woman could have quit her Ph.D. in the 3rd or 4th year but from her description, she probably did realize that the Ph.D. was unviable. But somehow, she could not pull the trigger.
When you realize that the path is wrong, don’t let your ego or shame come in the way. Quit and restart.
Life is full of opportunities. You just need to look around.
– Rajan