Leadership, Career Growth, and Evolution

“Life will give you whatever experience is most helpful for the evolution of your consciousness.”
-Eckhart Tolle

I was trying to think of a subject line and a starting point for my blog entry today and as I was listening to the Eckhart Tolle Audiobook, A New Earth, I stopped when I heard the above quote and decided to write today's blog entry.

A few days ago, I had written a post on being present, which was inspired by an employee orientation that I attended. One of the components of the new employee orientation was a presentation from one of the senior leaders in the company. The senior leader described her own evolution both personally and professionally here at Intuit. This was yet another thing that really amazed me about the culture here at Intuit. Employees at Intuit are empowered to succeed and build on what their strengths are and focus on what they are passionate about. Her own passion was building and leading teams. She also talked about how she had helped others become focused on areas they were passionate about. Finally, she concluded her presentation with some general career advice, and the one that stood out to me the most was to "Be Present."

Although I already wrote about it when I heard the quote at the beginning of the is blog post, it made me think about careers, personal growth and more. I look back at the earlier part of my career which was an unpleasant but character building experience, and realize that life was giving me the experience that was most helpful for the evolution of my consciousness. So my advice to MBA students, regardless of your situation, if you're at a top tier school with more jobs than you know what do with, or if you're at a second tier school struggling to find the right job, or if you are applied and didn't get into your dream school, is to keep the above words in mind.