What If You’re Just Trying the Wrong Flavour?

A story about why one job doesn’t define an entire career.

I usually start my sessions by asking clients about their day.

This particular client came in looking pretty glum, saying it had been the worst day, having no hope for a career, and being ready to leave the job tomorrow if that was an option. The problem was that there was no idea what else to do.

For a quick background, the client is a Pastry Chef in a 5-star hotel, enjoys being a pastry chef, but does not enjoy the hotel experience.

This person had been very sure about this career choice from the beginning, without any other backup options. The plan was simple: give it 3–4 years, gain industry exposure, and eventually open a café.

But after just one year of working experience, disappointment and hopelessness had already started setting in.

What started as a conversation about changing careers turned out to be something quite different.

After doing Hotel Management, the client’s idea of the industry had become limited to hotels.

The kind of guidance and mentorship this person was hoping for was missing in the current role, and YouTube tutorials and ChatGPT had become the new co-workers.

The long working hours had started affecting health and had given quite a scare.

(At one point, we jokingly discussed how everyone who doesn’t want a 9-to-5 job somehow ends up working 12-hour shifts or more. Maybe we all need to be a little more accurate with our manifesting, telling the universe what we want rather than what we don’t want.)

As we talked things through, there were actually quite a few options on the table.

One was to stay with the original plan and give themselves a little more time to gain industry experience and look beyond hotels.

We discussed baking studios that do a mix of workshops, pop-ups, events, gifting, custom orders, and community building.

Based on interests, aptitude, and personality, another possible backup could be moving towards operations and management roles within food and beverage companies or related organisations, while continuing to bake on the side. We also discussed exploring catering grazing tables or even hosting supper clubs.

Sometimes the best way to understand a career is to spend time with people already doing it. So we talked about connecting with professionals in these spaces, seeing if there were opportunities to learn from them, shadow them, or collaborate with them.

Teaching was another area of interest, but rather than deciding on it as a full-time career immediately, workshops, guest lectures, or short-term teaching engagements could be a good way to test the waters first.

“It’s like treating the first few years of your career like a flavour-tasting experience before getting that scoop of ice cream.”

You don’t have to commit to the first flavour you try. The idea is to sample different experiences, understand what you enjoy, and figure out what suits you before settling on something long-term.

By this point, the client felt much better about the options in front of them.

But one question still lingered.

“How will I know which one is the correct option for me out of all these shortlisted ones?”

And I think that’s where many of us get stuck.

We assume that before taking the next step, we need complete certainty about where the entire path will lead.

But you don’t need to have everything figured out all at once.

You just need to know the next few steps that align with you and see where they lead.

Those next steps will give you more experiences, more information, and more clarity about what’s best for you.

Also, there isn’t just one right option.

Something can be the right choice for you today and not be the right choice five years from now.

Today, you may have the time, energy, and risk-taking capacity to experiment. Tomorrow, you may want stability, predictability, and a slower pace.

Both are valid, no choice is a wrong choice.

The session didn’t end with every question answered.

But it did end with something that wasn’t there at the beginning.

A little hope.

And a little light back in the client’s eyes.

A small disclaimer: this is only a glimpse of the conversation. We spent time discussing how to evaluate options, the many routes that can lead to the same career destination, and several other interesting ideas that I may write about another day.