When your application for that dream job tells you to jog on

Earlier this year I applied for what I considered to be my dream job - a professional cricket coach. I held that dream up on a pedestal for a long time and thought it was everything I wanted. The result was deflating to say the very least. After 12 seasons of coaching premier club cricket I not only didn’t get the job, I didn’t even get an interview. In fact, all I got was an automated rejection email. At the time I was angry, hurt, and frustrated because I believed I had (and still do) the necessary skills to coach at that level and I didn’t feel I was even given a chance to put that across.

However, I'm a big believer that life is happening for you, not to you. Having that bubble burst has actually been a really liberating experience. It's helped me realise that I don't actually care about the level I'm coaching at, what gets me motivated is helping others and seeing them progress - what do I care if they play for Auckland or some club team – people are people and everyone is deserving of coaching help. That realisation allowed me to get clarity on what I truly wanted from my career at a point when it was at a cross roads. After 15 years of being a recruiter I was over it! Same shit different day! The truth is I had been over it for some time as I felt it was no longer using some of the other skills I had developed around leadership, coaching, and high performance.

The rejection I experienced was actually a blessing. It helped give me clarity and motivation to make a career move in a different direction which helped uncover the role I’m currently in at Recruit.IT. Initially, when I was approached about the role I said no straight away. Whenever agency recruitment was brought up to me it was always as a recruiter with the obvious allure of money but that just doesn’t mean as much to me anymore. I wanted a role that I could focus on developing people that would allow me to get alongside them and grow performance through culture and mentoring. The opportunity to lead the team at Recruit.IT is just that. I run the business the same way I run my cricket team. We focus on cultivating a growth mindset through a reflective lens to ensure we are constantly growing and challenging our thought processes and approach to recruitment. I want this to be a truly rewarding experience for the people I manage that they can look back on and say that was a real critical point in my life not just my career.

Life can deliver some real kicks to the guts, there is no escaping that. But often we make those blows feel bigger than they are due to our perception or attachments. It was a good thing I got rejected for that job and it was life’s way of teaching me another valuable lesson. Life is happening for you not to you.