Komisar, Kartikey and Bagchi: Visualizing three different (but connected) dimensions.

Komisar vouches for a go-getter who makes a career (or no-career) by cruising into the corporate world in full throttle, one racing track at a time. It works for him, so for few others. Some people like it stationary, some like it constantly changing. There are CEOs who pick up an ailing company every third year to turn its fortune around, and do it with style. And there were CEOs who joined the organization as mere foreman and retired as CEO. Both have different taste, both justify their career.
Kartikey wants thinks enough-is-enough! He clearly is an idealistic mind who manages to measure what he is losing in return of what he is gaining. With due respect to motivational speeches, sayings and quotes, after all we are (well, a majority of us) are mere humans; with real emotion and real stretching-limits. There are times when, if you don’t enjoy it here, you will not enjoy elsewhere. Kartikey’s marketing career is in such a juncture, where he had to think about a radical change. To make peace with his inner voice, his conscience. It did not click in marketing for him. But it may in social service. Why not? After all, it’s all there in the mind. Stupid!
Bagchi’s voice to me looks like an appeal to employees from an employer. Especially to those employees who are bitten by the career bug. While his attempt to shed the ‘Over’ expectation of employees from company is crisp in this article, his attempt to discourage employees from dreaming has bitten the dust completely. While I appreciate the service of our apartment cleaner, I would definitely not teach my kid to be satisfied with a mediocre job like the apartment cleaning guy. I think nobody would.
Of these, the one appeals to me the most is Kartikey’s angle. Work should be a celebration. Despite its providing me a luxury car and posh lifestyle, if it’s taking a toll on every moment of my LIFE, I would rather settle for less and try enjoying more. It really takes so much of suffering that a successful (?) guy like Kartikey decides to give up everything and start living. A prison is a prison, who cares what is it made of!

“If you tend to stay with one company for more than two to three years, you are seen as incompetent”. Do you agree?

I think it’s all about a fine balance. Apart from few exceptions (or exceptional people), does anyone decide before joining a job, when he is going to quit? Nobody likes to quit but forced to by circumstances. Few planned transitions (for a raised bar of remuneration, higher grade, intermediate jobs) are necessary in a career, but a job has to be of full cycle. It has set of phases. Joining, Learning, Performing, Transforming and Saturating. While time for these phase are not fix, phases are inevitable. Quitting in between is always dangerous. Changing or Switching of jobs should not be planned, but be forced (by internal or external stimuli). Manager, Role, Saturation, Growth (or more precisely not of it) are such stimuli. We are not in a race of maximum number of jobs we switch in our career, but the sense of achievement we carry home day in and day out.

Changing jobs, that too very often in unrelated domains, is it good for one’s career? How do you see them?

Reiterating the similar sentiment as of last response, a job has a full cycle. Domain is incidental, professionalism is perpetual. A professional can switch to any domain, any role with proper grooming and in sufficient span of time.

“People don’t leave organizations, they leave only Managers”. What is your experience / opinion?

At home we are son, spouse, brother and dad. But at office we wear a mask that’s stuck to our face even after we come home. Although we promise to leave our file at office while driving home, we hardly manage to overcome office trauma at home. We are highly influenced (sometimes intoxicated) by job demand. Especially when time is not-so-good, it shows in the face and it becomes a necessity to change the tag. Occasionally thanks to the Manager.