Three questions to unlock your authentic career | Ashley Stahl | TEDxBerkeley

This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at http://ted.com/tedx

Early in her career as a national security professional, Ashley Stahl felt stuck. After some serious soul-searching and risk-taking, she created a career she truly loves and is helping others do the same.
She urges people to ask themselves three questions about their career. What am I good at? What do other people think I'm good at? What's holding me back? Answers to these, she says, will unlock a passionate career.

Ashley Stahl is an award-winning advocate for women in security, named in 2013 by the Diplomatic Courier magazine and Young Professionals in Foreign Policy as a "Top 99 Under 33 Foreign Policy Leader." Ashley currently runs her own business as a career coach to college students and fresh graduates seeking to unlock their career goals and land the jobs that they deserve. She also contributes to Forbes on issues of national security and serves as Manager of the Enterprise Risk Management Center at Control Risks, a global political risk consultancy. In this position, Ashley leads a team of intelligence analysts who advise a Fortune 100 client on how to protect its personnel and assets from security threats in hostile environments around the world. Previously, Ashley was the Operations Lead for the Pentagon's Ministry of Defense Advisors (MoDA) training program, which prepares senior Department of Defense officials for their deployments to Afghanistan, where they would serve as advisors to foreign counterparts in the Afghan Ministries of Defense and Interior.

At age 22, I was completely immersed

in this world of spying the Pentagon

and counter-terrorism.

Everything that I did
in my adolescent life

was to prepare me for my fantasy career.

But I'm here, just a few years later,

as a career coach
to hundreds of millennials.

So how and why does this happen?

That's exactly what people asked me

when I quit my job in Washington, DC,

and booked a one-way trip
home to Los Angeles.

And I tell people
that my answer is simple:

political science is what I love,

but career coaching is what I am.

This dance that we all do
between finding work that we love

and finding work
that aligns with who we are

is what I want to talk about today.

So I remember, four years ago living in DC
and going through my quarter life crisis,

and I was just chaotic,
desperate for answers,

lots of pints of ice cream;

and I [also] remember
hiring a career coach,

and this fundamentally changed my life.

And in the process, I realized

that there were three key questions
that helped me unlock my authentic career.

And I want to share them with you today.

The first question is: what am I good at?

Second question is:
what do people tell me I'm good at?

And the final question: ask yourself,
"What's holding me back?"

These three questions sit

at the foundation
of my career coaching practice.

So, let's start with what am I good at.

We're told early
that we need to find our passion.

When we get to college,
we need to pick a major or a passion,

way before we've given much thought

to who we want to be
in our careers and in our lives.

As a result, some of you here
have majors that fascinate you.

But there are others
who simply picked the topics

so you could get your bachelor's degree
out of the way and move on with your life.

But here's the problem.

Your interest in a subject
does not guarantee

your success in a career with it.

And that's why I'm here to remind you

to do something that you are
not just what you love.

I remember four years ago getting
a phone call from a defense contractor

that I was hired to run a program
for the Pentagon.

I was ecstatic, and then I panicked.

I just remember, you know,
reading about this program

that prepared senior government officials
to deploy to Afghanistan

where they would then serve as advisers

to high-level officials
in the Afghan government.

As the only woman in the room,

and definitely the youngest
employee in my firm,

I fell like I had the world to prove.

So, like many of you probably understand,
my job took over my life.

I spent ten-to-15-hour days
in Washington, DC,

and a lot of my weekends ended up
on military bases in the Midwest,

where I would oversee

these training programs
and weapons qualifications.

And I'll never forget
one particular Sunday:

one of the advisers called me over,

and in the midst of our discussion,

he asked me if I could hold his gun,
so he could tie a shoe.

I realized without hesitation
as I threw my hand out

that this was going to be
the first time I ever held a gun!

This gun just dropped cold in my hand,

and I just remember these chills
going down my spine.

I felt like I was holding
death in my hands.

So here is the great question.

How was I going to be a spy
if I couldn't really hold a gun?

That set me into a tailspin,

because I remember feeling
like my career, my passion, my identity

were all in conflict with one another.

And I felt so alone, but guess what?

I wasn't!

Seventy five percent of the US population,
according to Reuters,

is hiding some part
of their identity at work.

I wasn't the exception, I was the rule.

In order for me to succeed

in these National Security niche
that I cared so much about,

I had to hide

my feelings, my fears, my insecurities,
and probably my identity itself

a lot of the time.

I'd say ten pints of ice cream

and at least 30 episodes
of "Sex in the City" later,

I got off the couch, and I realized
it's time to ask for help.

And that was when I hired my career coach.

And in our work together, I realized
how important it is for all of us

to tune out the social pressure
to find what we love

and tune in to something more significant
for your career and your life:

who you are.

It's never too late,
and it's never too early

for you to ask for help.

My second question for you to ask yourself

is: what do people tell me I'm good at?

So some of you here may be thinking,

"OK, Ashley, I don't really know
what I'm good at,

I don't know what my values are,"

and that's OK.

But take an inventory
of what people tell you you're good at.

Do friends turn to you
for some sort of advice

that you seem to have down?

Or do your professors
and colleagues praise

something special about your work?

Or how about this?

Do people ever ask you to teach them
something that you seem to know well?

These are the moments
that shed light on your natural talents,

and the work force needs them.

Often, I get clients ages 18 to 30,

and they are all so worried
about finding their passion

that they completely overlooked
their natural skills.

I, for one, was so focused
on finding my passion

that I completely overlooked
my natural talent for the job hunt.

In the span of six weeks,
I went to 90 events,

I had coffee with 200 people,
and I got three job offers.

So, other than being
completely wired from all that coffee,

I got phone calls from all these friends
who wanted advice on their careers,

and it was amazing

what our conversations
did for their lives.

Shortly after our conversations,

I had friends calling me telling me
that they figured out

what they want to do
with their career path and their life.

And a lot of them ended up
quitting their jobs,

which isn't my fault, I'm just saying.

(Laughter)

But I was honored,

and I was loving the fact
that they would call me and tell me

that my techniques
or our conversations empowered them

to get raises at work
or get job offers after a stale job hunt.

But more than being
empowered, I was clear.

I'm a coach. I'm a career coach.

I'm often the only person I know in a room

who literally cannot get enough
of a good job hunt.

On the way to finding my passion,
or job in my passion,

I found something
so much more significant: who I am.

Don't be so blinded by your passion
that you overlook who you are.

Those who pay attention will find it.

My final question for you to ask yourself
is, "What's holding me back?"

So this is the one that a lot of clients
come to me and go,

"Don't want to talk about that one!"

And I'm just like,
"You know? Here's the thing.

We have up to 70,000 thoughts each day

and up to 98% of your thoughts
are repeat offenders,

according to UCLA.

Looks like we're all sitting
together on a thought carousel

just going around and around and around

with the exact same thoughts.

And so many of these thoughts
may be holding you back in your career,"

and that's why I ask a lot of my clients
to keep a journal for two weeks,

where they share with me
their fear-based thoughts.

And guess what?
Everyone's thoughts are the same!

"I'm not good enough."

These words keep your career bar low,

and they keep you
for striving less in your life,

and if you simply pay attention
to these words, or your fears,

you will rise above them.

Because it's one thing

for you to hang out with your fears,
or hang out with the crazy,

it's a whole another thing to live in it.

And you're not your thoughts.

If you open your emotional backpack,
and you question yourself,

you will unlock your authentic career.

Standing here with you at Berkeley today,

I remember that voice in my head
at the Pentagon saying,

"OK, Ashley, this is not you."

And that's when these three questions
can save you when you're stuck,

and you don't know where else to go,

"What am I good at?",

"What do people tell me I'm good at?,"

and "What's holding me back?".

If you ask yourself these three questions,

you will be able to do more
of what you are not just what you love.

Talk to people, talk to your friends,

talk to your professors,
hire a career coach.

But don't be afraid to ask questions,

because when you do,

you will be able to embrace
a career that waits for you.

Thank you.

(Applause)