Like many people, Berkshire Hathaway Chairman Warren Buffett followed in the career path of his parents. His father ran a stock brokerage firm and then began his career as a politician.
Needless to say, the young Buffett stuck with his investments and did very well. When he stepped down as CEO late last year, Berkshire Hathaway was worth more than $1 trillion. But importantly, Buffett was not pressured by his parents to follow that path.
“He said, and this is very important, he didn’t think I should follow in his footsteps,” Buffett said on CNBC’s Becky Quick’s “Warren Buffett: Life and Legacy.”
On the contrary, Mr. Buffett recalled his father paraphrasing a quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson’s “Self-Reliance.” “The power that resides within him is essentially new, and no one but him knows what he is capable of, and we won’t know until we try.”
In other words, you must find your calling. Buffett said he passed this advice on to the next generation of his family.
“I told my kids…if you don’t need a job, find a job,” Buffet said. “And that’s basically what my dad was telling me.”
Buffett’s best career advice
Buffett has frequently said that he had a lifelong obsession with making money, starting at an early age.
“I found the answer when I was five years old,” Buffett said. Mr. Buffett spent his youth working in businesses such as selling gum and delivering newspapers. He bought his first stock at the age of 11. “And it was just interesting to me. It was much more interesting to me than it was to my father.”
Buffett said that for people who need to graduate from kindergarten before finding their meaning, it may take some trial and error to find work they can do without pay, or they may need to take on several jobs to survive.
“We acknowledge that economic realities may preclude that type of exploration,” he said in a 2021 letter to shareholders. “Still, I encourage students to never give up on their quest, because once they find such a job, they are no longer ‘working’.”
Buffett says one good strategy is to be attracted to high-quality people you want to work with.
“Who you associate with is very important,” he said at Berkshire’s shareholder meeting in May. “Don’t expect to make all the right decisions about it, but your life will follow the direction of the people you work with, the people you respect, and the people you become friends with.”
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