Sachin H. Jain, President and CEO, Board Director at SCAN Health Plan, shared on LinkedIn:
“Many of us will face a defining choice in our careers.
We can be the principal investigator of our own metaphorical laboratory, asking the questions we care about, assembling the team, and taking responsibility for the outcomes. Or we can be a post-doc in someone else’s lab, lending our energy, expertise, and judgment to help advance someone else’s vision. Both roles matter. Both can be deeply meaningful.
The real work is self-knowledge.
Too often, talented people confuse their highest and best role. Some feel pressure, internal or external, to run their own lab (or company) even when they are most effective as collaborators who make someone else’s ideas stronger. Others stay too long as post-docs even when they are ready, and perhaps overdue, to lead.
And here is the part we do not talk about enough: these are not permanent identities. They come in phases. There are seasons when we are best cast as supporting actors, learning, refining our craft, and helping to build something important. And there are seasons when we are meant to be the lead actor, setting direction, carrying the weight of the decision, and living with the consequences.
Neither is more noble.
What is noble is being honest with yourself about where you are, what you want, and where you can have the greatest impact today. Some of us are meant to lead our own labs. Some of us can do our best work as post-docs. And many of us will play both roles over the course of a career.
The real question is simple: What phase are you in right now, and are you embracing it?”
More posts featuring Sachin H. Jain.