The second form of golden handcuffs is what i would call the
promotion slash position dash status trap and here's what i mean by
having a high level position in a company
and getting these promotions that is something that
gives people a sense of status let's say that you are a manager at a big
corporation or let's say you're even the svp or head
of a certain department having this position gives you a certain
status it makes you feel like you're someone in society you're
contributing you're useful and you're being respected
and i don't mean at all that having a high position is something that's
superficial it's not the case at all i believe that
most people who are in a high level position are people who are truly
extraordinary skilled and capable and i don't think at all that it is a problem
to have status in society or to have that longing for status because contrary
to what many people say or appear to think
i believe that most or almost all people want to have some status in society as i
said in one of my other videos previously
it's only the way that someone attains that status that is different
some people feel that they attain that needed status in society by being a ceo
while some other people mostly among the millennial generation
and gen z especially feel that status comes from
independence and freedom someone who is for example working while traveling
around the world might feel that they have status because they can
afford themselves this freedom and independence anyway what i wanted to say
is that having a high level position in a company
can become a trap to some people they get a sense that the only way that they
can have status or importance in society is by
staying in this high level position and for these types of people it can
only go up so you work yourself up from junior manager
manager vp svp head and so on you climb the ladder and each time you
climb up one flight you have the feeling that you cannot
return because if you return you feel that it will hurt your image
and here it can become a trap for some people perhaps they
do not want to climb up that high perhaps they're already perfectly
happy to be the manager of the department and they don't really
have the ambition to become ahead and go further up there are indeed some people
who do not want to be promoted they want to for example stay at a manager or vp
level or wherever they are because they know that by doing
that they will be able to do other things in life or perhaps spend
more time with their family but the problem is that once a person is
in this position promotion status trap they feel
like the only way that they can attain status and importance in society
is by taking on the next rule and climbing up further
and again like i said earlier there's nothing wrong with this
because for many people this is the way to go
but it's really important to know for yourself
what type of person you are so that instead of going with the flow
and getting trapped in a cycle that you do not want to be
in you can proactively make a decision about your career that is best for your
life one of the difficulties that i see for those people who are in this
kind of trap is that in some cases there are people
who are intending to change careers they want to work
in a different field or industry but they don't do it because they're
thinking that if they move they will either need to
start from the bottom again or they will need to downgrade in terms
of their position so if previously at a big corporation
let's say in in banking or in finance in general
they were the head of the department if now they would switch over and
go for example into digital marketing and perhaps to do that they would need
to downgrade to become a manager and i
don't think that there's anything wrong with it
going up or down is not the only kind of mobility that
exists in career change you can also go sideways
meaning that you expand your horizon by going in different fields
and gaining different kinds of experiences and you can also specialize
meaning that you go deeper into something and you become
more of an expert in something i really think that it is time for a
paradigm change when looking at careers going up
is not the only way there are so many different
ways especially nowadays for someone to carve out their own
specific niche to acquire their own unique set of
skills and experiences that not many other people in the market
have