Today, we are going to discuss some minor and major mistakes that can disturb and destroy your professional career. You must take a look at them.

1. Choosing a Career without any Interest:

If anyone is going to choose a career option then what should be the first point in his decision of career choices? The answer is his or her interest in that particular field. So, the basic is first to find out your interest in which you want to make your career. Don’t choose a career without doing your homework properly. At the initial stage of career, many people choose a field as their career option without having any knowledge or interest in that field. They do this because they generally depend on trending career list; they listen to their parents and friends and follow their opinions without knowing their own interest. They don’t go in depth and learn new skills in a particular field. And after some years later they realise themselves in careers that don’t fulfil them. So, first, find out your interest and then choose a career according to that otherwise, this big mistake can destroy your career.

2. Telling Lie/Giving Wrong Data:

If you are going for a new job and telling lie about your qualifications or experience in a job interview or you are giving wrong data in your resume, then it will put you in trouble and can destroy your career when the organization will find out about it. And there is a high probability of happening this. If it happens before your hiring then it will good for you as not getting a job is much better than getting a job on behalf of wrong information. You will spend most of the time in that office and always keep thinking that if the boss gets to know about the truth then what will happen? If it does not happen till that it is okay but when it finally happened, you will get fired immediately and forced into another job search with a bad reference of your current employer where you have spent your precious time to make your career. So, always speak the truth, represent correct data before getting hired otherwise this blunder will spoil your career completely.

3. Hiding Achievements and Abilities:

Many people hide their achievements and abilities. Some of them are fresher and don’t know the value of their achievements and abilities. And on the other side, some of them think that telling more about it would be like bragging. But in reality, it’s not. Tell about yourself, your achievements and abilities proudly. If you do not tell the employer about it then who will tell?

4. Emotionally Weak (Low Emotional Intelligence) or Low Emotional Quotient (EQ):

According to Drs. Travis Bradberry and Jean Greaves, Emotional intelligence 2.0

“Emotional intelligence is your ability to recognize and understand emotions in yourself and others, and your ability to use this awareness to manage your behaviour and relationships.”

Ref: http://www.talentsmart.com/about/emotional-intelligence.php

How much of an impact does emotional intelligence have on your professional success? The short answer is a lot! It’s a powerful way to focus your energy in one direction with a tremendous result. Research shows that emotional intelligence is the strongest predictor of performance, explaining a full 58% of success in all types of jobs. Your emotional intelligence is the foundation for a host of critical skills—it impacts most everything you say and do each day.

So, a lack of emotional intelligence will damage your career.

5. Backbiting Your Manager or Co-workers Publicly:

If you have any bad experience with your manager/co-workers or you don’t like someone then you don’t badmouth publicly about them at your workplace. You don’t know who is listening, and keep in mind that every workplace has a detective who sends the words to the big boss what you speak behind him. And this bad habit can destroy your career. So never ever do this.

6. Spreading Negativity:

There are both good and bad days in the job, sometimes you feel good and sometimes bad. When you feel bad and get down, you become negative and negativity come inside yourself. This disturbs your mood and affects other people also even if you don’t intend it to. This damages the company’s environment and makes things complex. You were hired to make your boss’s and your team’s jobs easier, not harder. Due to this bad habit, you can be fired from the company and your career may get spoiled. So always be positive and do not let negativity come inside yourself.

7. Not Being Punctual of Time:

If you are not punctual in your professional life then it can create obstacles in your efforts to succeed. It may destroy your career also. If you reach your workplace after the scheduled time or leave office before the scheduled time then this habit will impact your positive efforts also even if you do hard work or achieve results consistently. So be punctual professionally and make your career safer.

8. Leaving Job with Noisy Fight:

When you leave your job or you have to leave, at that time the emotions are very high. You may think it would be better to steal or damage something so that you can take revenge what happened to you. But, you should always keep in mind that your current company’s manager or colleague may be the manager or co-worker of the upcoming company. So, leaving a job with a noisy fight is a bad idea, it can destroy your career in future. It’s much better to leave the job without destroying your reputation.

9. Not Getting Proper Sleep:

If you think that taking less sleep than average will give you more time to be active and you can work more hours to achieve your career goals and targets, then your assumption is wrong. This habit is very dangerous. Research shows that getting less sleep leads to the same effect as being drunk. It can decrease your performance and reduce your intellectual abilities. So, if sleeping less is in your pre-plan for better results and achievements then you need to rethink about it as it could damage your career.

10. Constantly Working:

Are you working constantly? If yes then don’t work constantly as it reduces your productivity rate. And your professional career could damage. You like to do your work continuously or not it doesn’t matter. It is necessary that take some spare time to relax and come back refreshed with new energy. You will fill better at your work station and it will improve your productivity as you took some free time for yourself. Doing this will secure your career by maintaining your productivity rate at your work station.

11. Limiting Your Professional Network:

In your professional life, if you want to grow then you need to increase your professional contacts, your network should grow and this is called networking. Networking gives you a general idea about your industry market, job opportunities and career scope. You get an opportunity to connect with more people in your industry and to know how things work beyond your workplace.

If you are still not part of the networking then you are very far behind. Due to a limited professional network, your growth potential will be limited. It can negatively affect your career prospects. So, never ever limit yourself by not doing networking.

12. Careless on Social Media:

In the era of today’s social media and information technology, the uses of social media are very common. Everybody uses Google, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and so many other social platforms. People post review, express feelings, share experiences, give ratings and feedback, and much more activities on social media. But the problem is that if you post related to your professional life on social media then it can put you in trouble, your social activities can badly affect your professional life, this could do problems with your current job as well as on future jobs also, it can prevent you from moving forward in your career.

So, keep this in mind before posting anything about professional life on social media, it can spoil your career.

13. Overcommit and Under-Deliver:

Do you consistently fail to meet deadlines? Does your job stand low in the audit? There can be two reasons for this. Either you are taking tasks more than your capability or not putting the required effort in the assigned work. You are over-committing and building false expectations.

If you commit to doing your job quickly with a pre-planned deadline and you miss the deadline by a little bit, then you feel that you have done a good job because you still have delivered the results. But the moment you promise something to someone, they expect nothing to be less. If you set realistic expectations from the beginning, then you can do the same quality work at the same time. Do not deliberately undermine your goals; be realistic about the results that you can deliver so that you can make such hopes that you can fulfil otherwise making over-committing can destroy your career.

14. Keeping only Salary Focused Mind:

There is an important role of salary in the job. Increasing salary is one of from all measure of your career success. But when you switch from one job to another just for salaries, then your this habit can put you in trouble. This can reduce the importance of skills, responsibility and role from within you. This can damage your career.

To create a successful career, the Salary, Skills, Responsibilities, Roles, Experience all have their own importance. Therefore you should pay equal attention to every aspect rather than a salary.

15. Fear of Change:

Do you really want to continue doing something that you don’t like or still is not working? how do you want to spend your remaining professional life? Research shows that most successful employees are those who can adapt to the changing workplace. Change is a continuous part of our lives, both personally and professionally. It does not matter whether you think things should change or not and should work as old methods. You have to start following it. Knowing every thought with an open mind that, there are alternative approaches to every task and problem. You need to apply them to those places where it can replace the old ways with better results. You have to learn new skills, and you may have to start from the bottom. Keep your fears away and find out know what changes are needed. Otherwise, the fear of change can destroy your career.

16. Playing Office Politics/ Ignore Relationships for Tasks:

Building strong professional relationships is very difficult. And getting success is a more difficult job. It takes huge efforts and long time. There is no shortcut to becoming a successful professional. Some professionals make shortcuts to achieve success, they ignore professional relationships for tasks and do politics like conflicting by misleading or misguiding, taking sides, undermining colleagues, spreading rumours etc. All these things make them happy for some time, but later they have to bear the brunt. So, always follow the right strategies to make your career successful. Shortcuts like playing office politics will surely destroy your career.

17. The Ego of Success:

Success is great. It definitely strengthens you, promotes your career, secures your future and it makes you feel good. But the problem starts when you put it on your head; start to think that now the success will remain forever with you without continuing hard work. Never, it never stays forever without effort.

The time, when you start thinking this, you are forwarding yourself for painful failure. Your ego will surely destroy your career.

So, be aware of all these mistakes and secure your career.