Maybe you should think about NOT going with the flow

 
It�€™s very tempting to follow trends and fashions—after all, everyone else seems to be doing so and few of us like the feeling that we�€™re missing out on something big. But a little thought suggests that this isn�€™t always the best life and work strategy—or even a particularly useful one.

Take career choice, for example. From time to time, the media are full of stories about a shortage of some important skill; maybe there�€™s unmet demand in some area of computing, or project management abilities are in short supply, or whatever.

People start to move into the area of shortage. Schools change their curricula to meet the unsatisfied need. Sometimes governments shift resources around to encourage more people to enter those types of careers. But all this takes time. Several years pass and then a growing flood of people come on the market, all ready to supply the previously unmet demand.

When this happens, one of two outcomes is usual. Either the shortage quickly turns into a surplus, and only those first on the scene gain much benefit; or the demand has already evaporated, or been met in other ways. Either way, many of the those who jumped on that bandwagon find their shiny new skills and qualifications are no longer so fashionable, useful, or even so much desired.

Learning from the market

It�€™s worth considering also what happens in most markets. The businesses that create the market are often the ones that make most from it, not those who pile in later, when demand has peaked, the product has become a commodity, and competition is driving those who are left to cut prices and lay off staff. It�€™s the same in investing. Those who buy when others are selling get the bargains, just as those who sell when everyone else is buying get the highest prices.

Yet looking at the market also helps you to note that simply doing the opposite, or even the unexpected, isn�€™t some simple path to success. It�€™s not always the very first into a new field who makes money. Sometimes these pioneers create the market, yet their timing is off and they still fail. It�€™s the second or third business into that niche that really makes the money, just as it�€™s the second mouse at the trap who gets to eat the piece of cheese.

Novelty for its own sake can be a good way to fail. There are many creative people who don�€™t reap the rewards of their creativity because they are always too far ahead of the curve—or too far off from what others are ready to accept—that are therefore neither valued or listened to. They surely took a different path, but one that wasn�€™t viable yet. Being different and contrarian can itself become as much of a mindless course of action as jumping on the latest bandwagon.

Using your mind

The answer is neither to follow trends and fashions like a lemming, nor to be different for its own sake. What is needed is thought and time: time to consider the alternatives that others are in too much of a hurry to look at, and careful thought to work through the reasoning others skim over.

When everyone is rushing away from some traditional career area into the latest and most fashionable type of work, stop and think whether that �€œold-fashioned�€� career is truly going to disappear any time soon. Many types of job have been around for a long time precisely because they are always needed. If the supply of entrants falls because most people no longer see it as the �€œin�€� kind of work to choose, there may be some great opportunities open for those with more foresight and less willingness to be railroaded into a decision.

In the rest of life too, when—as today—it�€™s seen as �€œnormal�€� to focus on getting and spending, to the exclusion of almost everything else, it might be a good time to stop and consider what would happen if you restrained your current lifestyle and set money aside regularly. When most people are up to their necks in debt, and not a few are facing foreclosure on their mortgages, what would it be worth to be able to view the situation calmly, knowing that you are not affected? What might you have money for in the future, when most people have already spent theirs?

Five good reasons for following your own path in life

Over the years, I have noticed that the majority of people rarely, if ever, follow their own path and make their own choices in life. They do what is expected of them by others, they follow the fashion, they fit in with what they believe everyone else is doing, seeking a spurious safety in numbers. As a result, they prosper only when everyone else prospers, sharing just a small part of a reward that has to be split with millions of others, and suffer when everyone else suffers and the suffering is therefore at its greatest.

Slow down and consider these reasons for choosing to use your mind independently and follow your own track, fashionable or not:

• You can take advantage of opportunities others have missed.
• You can slip into small niches that will never accommodate the masses, but which can still prove both enjoyable and profitable.
• Because you know what you have chosen and why, you can learn as much or more from your mistakes as your successes.
• It�€™s very easy for you to be flexible and change direction when circumstances change. There are no huge groups of people to be turned around or retrained in some new area first.
• You can practice �€œstealth choices�€�: discovering some unmet demand or unseen opportunity and quietly stepping into it without alerting everyone else and spoiling your chances as a result.

Human beings have come to be the dominant animals on this planet by virtue of their ability to think and plan. If success were based on just on numbers and the herd instinct, every land mass would be dominated by buffalo, wildebeest, and lemmings instead of people.

[ratings]

Technorati Tags: trends, fashions, life and work strategy, career choice, doing the opposite, contrarian, following your own path, use your mind independently,