Reframe Career Compromises as Success

Nov 18

Episode 529 | Author: Emilie Aries

How do you find contentment in the face of career compromise?

You can do it all, just like Barbie! The only thing stopping you from being the perfect wife, friend, mother, girl boss, and philanthropist is you!

Sound familiar? That was the gist of the ‘90’s-era feminism (which Sophie Gilbert and I talk all about in episode 504, Girl Power and the Faux Feminism of the 1990s). The thing is, there’s way more keeping us from doing it all, such as actual hours in the day. But while we know it’s an impossible juggling act, it doesn’t stop many of us from trying to “have it all,” all the time. So in the face of those unrealistic self-imposed expectations, we might find ourselves having to compromise. Career compromises are a common reality, so let’s talk about how to come to terms with them.

Trade-offs are unavoidable

When I was reviewing the recent Bossed Up reader survey, an interesting trend became apparent: we women want a lot of different things. We want more money and more purpose-driven careers, more work–life balance and more flexible hours. All this makes sense, but it’s a rare unicorn of a job that actually manages to align all these goals at once.

I know this from experience: when I’m most aligned with my purpose-fueled work, I’m not usually winning on the work–life balance front—I’m working long hours, devoting myself to the cause.

But if we wait to feel content until our laundry list of wants and needs are all achieved, there’s a good chance we’ll be waiting forever. I often encourage my job seeker clients to anticipate the trade-offs they’ll have to make before they head toward a new job or career trajectory—trade-offs like less work–life balance for a higher-earning position, or having to contend with a higher cost-of-living for a job that better aligns with your salary goals. I’m not saying it’ll roll out in exactly this form or fashion, but trade-offs of some kind are inevitable when navigating the modern job market. Pre-empt them, and you’ll have an easier time accepting the inevitable compromises, and they’ll be less likely to derail your happiness.

Stop phoning it in for less-than-perfect opportunities

While wanting it all is perfectly valid - I mean, who doesn’t want a higher salary paired with work-life balance and purpose-aligned work?! - it can sometimes manifest as entitlement in the job search. And this backfires, big time.

When you land an interview for a position that’s less than ideal in every way, don’t dial it in. I’ve seen many a job-seeker give half-baked interview performances simply because the job seems less than ideal. But that helps no one and is a waste of time for everyone!

Don’t sell yourself short by giving a sub-par interview just because it’s an imperfect opportunity. Instead, give it your all and try to negotiate things to your liking once an offer has been made.

The only way you’ll get the leverage you need to negotiate for those great hours and working conditions you want is to first have a job offer in hand. That’s how you set yourself up with realoptions.

Create a container for the compromise

I’ve been getting a lot of insights from my new therapist, and she recently shared another that helps contextualize this existential crisis so many of us seem to be facing.

In order to deal with the discontent you feel about your current career situation (whether it’s a constant undercurrent or it comes and goes), try creating a containe, of sorts, so you can remain clear-eyed about the compromise.

Start by writing down your ultimate destination, the ideal job or career situation that checks most or all of those work–life balance and purpose-aligned goals. Then, make note of the compromises you’re currently making. Are you making more money in an industry that doesn’t fit your dream? Are you saving less because you’re embroiled in work that is fulfilling but maybe not financially as fruitful? Whatever your trade-offs, writing them down makes them crystal clear and can help you identify the source of your discontent

From there, you can map out how to incrementally move toward your ultimate destination. It’s a long-term career strategy that frames your compromises as steps on that journey, not setbacks or failures.

The realities of capitalism re what they are, and your current career or financial situation is not a reflection of your self-worth or your market value. What I want most of all is for you to find happiness and contentment where you are, even if all those stars don’t quite align.

What kind of career compromises have you made? Do you find yourself accepting of them, or do you feel guilt or shame for not “having it all” already? Join the conversation in the Courage Community on Facebook or our group on LinkedIn to share your take and find out how other women are managing trade-offs day by day.

Related Links From Today’s Episode:

Lead the negotiation for your compensation package
with my LinkedIn Learning Course:

[INTRO MUSIC IN]
EMILIE: Hey, and welcome to Bossed Up podcast, episode 529. I'm your host, Emilie Aries, and today I want to talk about making career compromises.
[INTOR MUSIC ENDS]
So many of us, particularly as products of the 1990s girl power era version of feminism, we're taught that we can have it all, right? We can have it all. We can be anything you want to be. We can be like Barbie and have 17 different careers, and be caretakers, and be all of these things to all the people in our lives. And to be clear, I mean, this is well-worn feminist territory in terms of having it all is not that simple, right?
In fact, having it all at once is next to impossible. Like there are always compromises involved when it comes to navigating our many identities. Like being a boss, being an employee, being a mother, being an advocate. Like, these things are powerfully combined and sometimes at odds with one another in competition for our limited time, energy and resources.
And what I want to underscore today is that having it all, or like being all of these things at once is not the only form of success and certainly shouldn't be the only bar that we would feel good about clearing. Like it's too d*** high a bar. So if we're waiting to feel content, if we're waiting to feel successful until we have mastered having it all, like, we're going to be waiting potentially forever.
And so I'm trying to really think lately about how to be more gentle with myself, how to be more tolerant with those trade-offs and how to make those trade-offs consciously. Because according to our recent listener survey. Thank you all for participating in that, by the way. We broke down the research and the results of that survey. Back on episode 523, we saw some interesting results. Irene and I, our programs manager at Bossed Up, were kind of looking it over and reflecting on how what we want is a lot of different things. We want more money, we want more purpose-driven careers, and we want more work-life balance, more time to ourselves, more flexibility.
And we kind of looked at those results and said, yeah, I can understand that. I want more money, I want more flexibility, I want more work-life balance. I want more of a purpose-aligned career. And those things don't usually come in the same package. Those things don't always align. Like, when I'm most aligned with my purpose-fueled work, I'm working my tail off. I am not chilling, I am not checking out at 5 o'clock every day and when I'm potentially making more money and driving myself really hard. I'm also not exactly killing it on the work-life balance front.
I'm not saying it's impossible, but what I tell all my job seekers is to aim high and compromise later. Aim for what you want. I want more money, more work-life balance, more passion and purpose in my career. Sure. And I anticipate that I'm going to have to make some compromises down the road because if I don't find that unicorn of a job that gives me all of those things, I cannot allow that to make me feel like a failure, right? I'm going to be clear-eyed about the inevitability of compromise when you're not.
I'll tell you, I've seen a lot of job seekers struggle with this kind of like fixed mindset, to borrow a term from Carol Dweck and her researchers. I've seen job seekers who, who kind of feel entitled to having it all. And the job market is not a kind place to those people. They go, look, I want more money. I want to make more than I made at my last job. Yes, I've been unemployed for, you know, three months. I got laid off. But I deserve this much pay and more. And I want to work 100% remote. I refuse to go back to the office. And I want to work in an industry that I really care deeply about. A company that really aligns with my purpose and passion. And we strategize and we work on the resume and we target the companies that would be great for that person and we advocate to get our foot in the door. And it's really hard. It's very competitive.
The job search today is hyper competitive. And when this person gets an interview at a company they don't love, they blow it because it only ticks three out of the four boxes that they were going for. And you can tell based on how little they prepare for that interview, how little their heart is in it. And they end up not having any choice in making compromises.
I always say, look, if you're going for a job, you go all out, right? You want an offer in hand so that you actually have some power and agency in making the choice as to whether or not to take it, right? You get an offer in hand and you can say, you know, I really want to think long and hard about this. It's not the right offer for me. I'm going to back away or I'm going to negotiate really hard. That's an empowered place. That's an empowered position to come from.
When it comes to navigating trade offs like if you're not feeling very aligned in terms of values and purpose with this job offer, but you have a job offer in writing in your hand, you can negotiate the hell out of that offer to try to maximize earnings and see if those levers, adjusting those levers. I'm almost like envisioning a DJ board, a soundboard, you know? Where you're pull, you're pushing one of those levers up even as one of those levers falls. Like, then you can actually make some trade offs and make some conscious choices there.
But you don't have any choice if you're holding out for perfect. You're not coming from a position of power and agency if you're only holding so high a bar that you end up having no options at all. And so I think there's something to be said here about again. I've said this before on the podcast. The survey results kind of feel like we're having an existential crisis. Who am I? What do I stand for? What is it that I want? How do I want to spend my one and true, precious life?
And I can sound cynical. I hear myself sounding cynical here, saying like, look, you got to make some trade offs sometimes. But I want to provide some cover to people who are listening, who are craving something better, but who have something good enough right now. I think I did an episode on this called the Good Enough Job a couple years ago. It's like there's an argument there to say, look, I am still aiming for better, I am still pursuing progress, but I will not withhold my own sense of satisfaction and contentment. I will not refuse to be grateful for what I have until I have the perfect career setup. It's too d*** high a bar.
And I don't want us to be waiting to be happy. I don't want us to be withholding our own sense of satisfaction. You know, things are not perfect and that's okay. This economy sure as h*** is not perfect. Capitalism is not perfect. Now don't be confused here with the fact that our society has failed to create a living wage for some people, right? That's not really what I'm talking about. I'm not talking about being content with working full time and not being able to make ends meet, which is the reality of millions of Americans in this country right now, which is a systemic failure, a failure of our capitalist democracy, full stop. It is corporate welfare.
The fact that companies like Walmart, and McDonald's, and a lot of other companies, a lot of other major real retailers have full time workers who are on government subsidies because they don't pay their full time workers enough. And it's not like those companies are hurting. Their profits are in the millions and billions and they are getting tax subsidies that we, the taxpayer are funding for them to not pay their workers a living wage. That's different than what I'm talking about, okay? I'm talking about the reality of making trade-offs over the course of your career and being okay and being clear-eyed about it.
Don't feel bad if you are faced with career compromises that you have to make day in, day out to decide and am I going to maximize my earnings or maximize my purpose? Because if you choose purpose, if you choose maximizing work-life balance, it often, not always, but often comes with the reality of not maximizing your earnings. And that's okay. That is okay. That is not a reflection of your worth, your self worth, your worthiness or your market worth. You could probably maximize your earnings, but at what cost? At what cost to your life, to your values, to your alignment, which are big, right? Those things can eat away at you over time. Our life comes in seasons, our careers come in seasons. And those seasons require compromise.
Otherwise you can get stuck, you can get stuck in perfectionistic paralysis. I have seen job seekers who just cannot seem to move forward, who cannot seem to get an offer because they're holding out for something perfect that they think they're entitled to. No one's entitled to anything in this economy. Like, we all have to hustle. Let me be clear. And although I would say workers are all entitled to a living wage and basic human rights and safety and security, and those are failings of our systemic democracy that's crumbling beneath our feet. So that's side note, you're entitled to all of those things, but in terms of pay or flexibility or remote work, none of us are entitled to any of that. That's the sad reality.
And if you can get yourself out of that stuckness, out of that paralysis, and into actively advocating to get some choice in your life, including the job you have now, crafting it into the job you might want, to me, that's a radical act of retaking ownership over your career, even knowing you have to make career compromises along the way.
I just received some really interesting advice on this from my therapist who seems to be making quite a few impressions on me lately. I have a new therapist who's great and I feel like I've mentioned her on the podcast twice now, which is funny because I just started working with her, but she and I were discussing something similar recently and she gave me the advice of creating a container for the compromise. Write down the trade offs that you're making, make them black and white, make them crystal clear so that, you know, if you're feeling this kind of like, bubbling up of discontent, or in my case it was starting to manifest as like this emotional whiplash of some days being really fired up and energized and excited and some days feeling like I could not drag myself out of bed, or feeling really distracted, or what does this even mean? Why does this even matter? Like that kind of volatility, that emotional volatility is how this was manifesting for me recently.
She said, write down your plan, write down your ultimate destination. What would it look like to aim for something more aligned and more perfect, right? And then make clear what the compromises you were making today are, but what your ultimate goal is. And then write the plan down for how you will incrementally take action that is within your control to move towards that plan. And it made me realize, oh my gosh, I didn't have like, a container for this. Even a document I didn't have because I was just having these thoughts pop up in the middle of the workday or right before my head hits the pillow at night, oh, I got to call that person if I want to make this long term strategy come to fruition. Oh, I should really have lunch with that person. Or oh, I should really read that book. I should really take that course.
And I didn't have a container for that strategy. And just writing it down, oh my god, what relief that provided me with. And oh my god, you guys, as I was preparing for this episode, you know what occurred to me? The OGs will appreciate this. Everything she was describing to me is what we used to call the Life Tracker planner. This beautiful proprietary annual planner that we used to make that was so lovely but never once profitable, really. It was such a labor of love. It was such a pain in the a** frankly to produce and very expensive to produce and not lucrative at all from a financial standpoint.
But man, that thing was beloved because that process of keeping at the forefront of your week and month a clear picture of where you were aiming and small actions you could take to move towards that bigger picture every single month was such a good thing. I need to print out my own version of that planner because the one I got for 2025 was horrible and it really bummed me out I got some flimsy little planner from Target that I hate. So I'll take any and all planner recommendations if you have them, as we are coming up against the start of a new year.
But it's this idea of somewhere in your email folder, in your Google Docs, in your planner, we need a long term career strategy, a roadmap so that you can keep your ultimate destination in mind and make incremental progress towards making it happen. Because we have to have patience with ourselves. We have to be clear-eyed about the compromises that we're all making. Because we have myriad identities, we have a ton of responsibilities, and things that we've gotta juggle.
And sometimes paycheck, and purpose, and passion, and work-life balance. Those things don't all come in the same employment package. They don't all come in the same compensation package. And that's okay. It's not a failure. It's the reality of capitalism. And I want all of those things and more for each of us. And I don't want us to wait to be happy. I don't want us to withhold our own sense of happiness only until we get all of that in one package.
So I'd be curious to hear what you make of this conversation. What kinds of career compromises have you had to make? How can you be accepting of the realities behind those trade-offs? And how can you not lose sight of your ultimate goal while still navigating compromise in your day to day?
[OUTRO MUSIC IN]
Let's keep the conversation going after the episode. As always in the Bossed Up Courage Community on Facebook or in the Bossed Up Group on LinkedIn. And until next time, let's keep bossin’ in pursuit of our purpose and together let's lift as we climb.
[OUTRO MUSIC ENDS]