Career Sweet Spot: Find Work That Fits Your Strengths, Purpose, and Contribution Style

Lead From the Back
Written By Bernie Anderson

I Thought My Career Was Over at 48

This is a beast of a post. But it's an important one. So here are some shortcuts for navigating the whole thing.

TL;DR

  • If you’re good at your job but drained, the problem may not be effort — it’s alignment.
  • Your hint is the overlap of Purpose (meaning) + Strengths (wiring) + Contribution Mode (how you create value).
  • Take the 10-minute assessment:Quick Assessment

Jump to:

The Moment It Hit Me

It is generally comfortable to sit outside during the early summer mornings of South Carolina. The humidity hasn’t slapped you in the face like a hot towel yet.

This is where I was in 2014 when my brain concluded my career was over. I sat on the porch while house-sitting for a friend, watching the neighborhood get in their cars and drive to work. What was my job going to be now? I had no idea.

Nearly a decade in Central Asia, and over a decade before that as a pastor, made 20+ years of leadership experience: strategic planning, team development, cross-cultural communication, budget management, conflict resolution. I’d led teams, navigated complex organizational politics, coached leaders through crisis, built systems from scratch.

I’d also accomplished those things while working for organizations most hiring managers had never heard of.

For me, my résumé said: “I’ve built and accomplished something significant.”
To others: “Did church stuff and lived overseas for two decades.”

That ended up being my summer of interviews and applications. They all blurred together after a while—the same polite questions, the same subtle skepticism, the same inevitable letdown.

And sitting on the front porch that early summer morning, I started thinking through job possibilities, and all I could think was, I guess a stock clerk at Walmart it is. Anything else I could think of required experience I didn’t have. I felt it: the sinking realization that I was 48 years old, and the vocation I’d mostly thrived in for 25 years meant nothing in this marketplace.

The real question—the one that had my stomach in knots that morning—wasn’t “What job should I apply for?” or, worse, “Am I now completely unemployable?”

The deeper question was this:

What am I even made to do?

“As human beings, we certainly have an innate need for significance, but that's exactly why we must guard against making decisions based on our need to feel important.”
> You Have a Calling> — Karen Swallow Prior

The Résumé Translation Problem

The Wrong Turns I Took First

A few days later, I got this idea: I wanted to do something with my hands—something completely different from anything I’d ever done before. So, logically, I decided to investigate the ancient art of bookbinding.

Yes, I’m serious.

This would be great. Work with my hands, be creative, sell a product, have little contact with people (I was burned out from people in significant ways). After a day or two of researching, I was close to punching the “Order now” button on Amazon to start buying supplies—when my strategy brain kicked in and I realized I didn’t have a business plan for this.

I set aside my dreams of becoming an artisan bookbinder.

Stop the nonsense, Bernie—let’s be strategic: translate my experience into roles that make sense. At least on paper.

Nonprofit development director. I landed the job at the end of the summer. It fit perfectly, right? I’d rub shoulders with missions pastors and missions-minded donors. I understood the work and the mission. I knew how to lead others. I knew how to connect with people and win them to a cause.

I got the job.

I was drowning on day one. One year in, I was still unsatisfied. Not because I couldn’t do the job—I could. I managed the relationships, ran meetings, produced the reports. Most importantly, I raised the money. I met my KPIs. But it was a Sisyphean job. I faithfully pushed the boulder up the hill every day. The constant operational firefighting. The endless proposal building. The constant meetings where I had to sell the vision over and over to people who’d already bought in, but didn’t necessarily want to take action.

I was competent. I delivered results. But I finished my days exhausted in a way that had nothing to do with the hours.

Then: freelance copywriting and website construction. A friend made the introduction. “You’re creative, you’re a great wordsmith, you understand marketing. You’d be great at this.”

And I was fine at it. I had a couple of clients. I started to think about scaling. I built several interesting sites with decent web copy. I made a little money. Probably could have made more.

But “fine” isn’t the same as “thriving.” I was executing someone else’s strategy, managing details that felt disconnected from any larger purpose. The work itself didn’t energize me—it just… happened. Eight hours a day of tasks that needed doing, none of them particularly satisfying when done.

My little cottage business lasted six months.

I tried a couple of other things. I even played barista and ended up managing a local coffee shop for a brief time.

The pattern I couldn’t see yet:

I was capable.
I produced results.
Managers liked me.
Performance reviews were generally positive.

But something was still fundamentally off.

Every role felt like wearing a pair of jeans that were technically the right size, but cut for someone else’s body. I made them work, but they never quite fit.

I typically blamed myself.

“I should be better at this. More focused. More disciplined. More resilient.”

I’d spent a decade in challenging, cross-cultural environments. I’d navigated ambiguity, led through crisis, built teams from scratch. Surely I could handle a normal job in my home country?

Maybe I’d gotten soft. Maybe church work had made me unemployable. Maybe I was one of those people who could only succeed in the weird, unstructured world of nonprofits in foreign lands. Now, back in “the real world,” I just… couldn’t cut it.

In my mind, the problem was probably effort.

If I worked harder, adapted faster, pushed through the resistance, eventually everything would click.

I was wrong.

The real problem was alignment.

Reading was an important task during these years. I read 300+ books about careers and purpose, starting a business, and how to “find your passion.”

Here’s what I learned:

I didn’t feel like a failure because I lacked capability or commitment or potential. I was struggling because I was trying to excel in roles designed for someone else’s strengths—someone else’s wiring, someone else’s sweet spot.

I was trying to fit into someone else’s pair of jeans.

The question was never about ability: “What jobs am I qualified for?”

Until we stop asking that question, we will keep grinding through jobs that drain us, while wondering why everyone else seems to find work so much easier—energizing, even.

The Turning Point Conversation

This mindset shift doesn’t happen in a moment of inspiration.

For me, it happened during a conversation I didn’t really want to have.

A friend—someone who’d known me for years and watched me cycle through jobs—finally said what others were probably thinking: “You’re trying to fit yourself into roles instead of finding roles that fit you.”

I pushed back. “I’m being strategic. I’m looking at what’s available and where my experience translates.”

“Yeah,” he said. “But you’re unhappy.”

He was right.

And he asked me a question I hadn’t let myself ask: “When was the last time work actually energized you?”

I thought back—not to a job, but to moments.

Sitting across from a leader who was stuck, helping them see a path forward they hadn’t considered. Watching someone’s face change when a complex situation suddenly made sense. Taking a tangled mess of competing priorities and finding the throughline that made everything clear. Guiding teams through the strategic planning session they’d put off for months.

Need someone to execute a plan, manage details, or run operations? Turns out, I’m not your guy—in spite of the fact that I’m capable of all those things.

Creating clarity. Guiding decisions. Helping people move forward.

That’s what I do.

And that’s when it clicked.

I’d been asking the wrong question.

Wrong question:
“Of the millions of jobs available, which ones am I qualified for?”

Right questions:

  1. What gives my work meaning?
  2. What am I naturally, world-class good at?
  3. How do I create value?

The Three Questions That Changed Everything

1) What Gives My Work Meaning?

“Passion comes after you put in the hard work to become excellent at something valuable, not before. In other words, what you do for a living is much less important than how you do it.”
> So Good They Can’t Ignore You> — Cal Newport

This isn’t “follow your passion” advice. (Because that’s bad advice.) I’m not talking about finding work that makes you happy all the time or discovering some mystical calling perfectly aligned with your hobbies.

This is much more specific: what kind of impact makes work worth doing for you?

For some people, it’s building things—seeing something go from idea to execution. For others, it’s solving problems, or creating beauty, or connecting people, or optimizing systems.

For me? It was helping people get unstuck.

Helping smart, capable people who were stuck in complexity find clarity and move forward with confidence. It’s the unique value I bring into the room.

When I do this, my work matters. When I don’t—when I’m stuck managing operations or executing someone else’s plan—work is just… well… work.

This changes everything. Most jobs I’d been pursuing were fundamentally misaligned with what gives my work meaning.

I wasn’t built to run things. I was built to help leaders see what to run toward.

Can you define what gives your work meaning?

2) What Am I Naturally, World-Class Good At?

I assumed I knew my strengths: organization, communication, leadership, strategic thinking, to name a few.

And I was good at those things. But “good at” isn’t the same as “built for.”

What I mean by “built for” is this: what do you do that energizes you while exhausting others? What comes naturally to you that other people have to work hard to develop? Where do you create disproportionate impact without disproportionate effort?

I started paying attention to patterns—not just what I could do, but what felt effortless when I was doing it.

“What could happen in your life if the easy but pointless things became harder, and the essential things became easier?”
> Effortless> — Greg McKeown

Here are some things that feel effortless for me because they’re energizing:

  • Seeing connections between ideas that seem unrelated
  • Taking a complex situation with ten competing priorities and finding the one decision that unlocks everything else
  • Looking at where someone is and where they want to go—and designing a path between the two that will actually work

Here’s the key: none of this is exhausting for me. Other people may be completely drained doing this. But for me? It’s energizing.

But when I’m asked to execute someone else’s plan, manage details, run operations—those things drain me. Not because I can’t do them, but because they work against my wiring.

Your strengths aren’t just what you’re good at. They’re what you’re built to do.

When you spend your days doing what you’re merely “fine” at, instead of what you’re built for, you’re trading energy for competence. You might sustain it for a while. But eventually, you will burn out.

What kind of work energizes you? What drains you?

3) How Do I Create Value?

This is the piece most career advice completely misses.

It’s not what you do. It’s how you show up and add value.

Some people create value through execution—they take plans and make them happen. Others create value through innovation—they see what doesn’t exist yet and build it. Others create value through connection—they bring the right people together at the right time.

No single one of these is better than the others. They’re just fundamentally different ways of contributing.

And if you’re wired to contribute one way, but your role requires you to contribute a different way, you will struggle—even if you’re technically capable of doing the work.

I started paying attention to when I add the most value.

It’s never during the execution phase of a project. Not during daily management. Not during operational firefighting.

I add the most value when people are stuck.

When a leader can’t see the path forward. When a team is spinning in endless discussion without landing on a decision. When someone has all the pieces, but can’t figure out how the puzzle fits together.

This is when I show up differently.

I listen deeply, ask reframing questions, connect previously unseen dots, and help the team move from confusion to clarity.

I’m not building or managing the thing. I’m helping the team see what to build and how to move forward.

My contribution style is guide. Not executor. Not innovator. Not manager.

Guide.

And once I saw that, everything else made sense.

How would you describe yourself when you feel you’re contributing the most value?

When Alignment Finally Clicks

Here’s what I finally understood about myself:

  • Purpose: I do my best work when I’m helping others get unstuck and move forward with purpose and clarity.
  • Strengths: I’m built to see patterns, connect ideas, design pathways, and simplify complexity.
  • Contribution style: I create value as a guide—listening, clarifying, and helping people make decisions they feel confident about.

When all three aligned, I wasn’t trying to fit into someone else’s career path anymore. I could build toward my own.

I didn’t need to be managing operations. I needed to be a coach helping leaders and teams navigate complexity.

I didn’t need to be a project manager executing someone else’s strategy. I needed to be a strategic advisor helping leaders design their own.

I didn’t need more discipline or more effort or more adaptability.

I needed alignment.

When I found it, here’s what changed:

Instead of managing fifteen priorities adequately, I was coaching five leaders through strategic decisions—and the impact was exponential, not incremental.

Instead of coming home exhausted, I came home energized.

Instead of wondering if I was good enough, I knew I was operating in my sweet spot.

Not because I was suddenly more talented. Not because I worked harder.

Because I was finally working aligned.

And once you see the difference, you can’t unsee it.

The Career Sweet Spot Framework

The pattern is everywhere.

I meet a lot of talented people who are frustrated—grinding through a role that drains them. I’ve heard the same “I should be better at this by now” conversation I had with myself back in 2014.

Most people aren’t struggling at work because they lack capability. People struggle at work because they’re trying to thrive outside their Career Sweet Spot.

Your Career Sweet Spot isn’t a job title. It’s an intersection.

Think of it as three overlapping circles:

  • Circle 1: Purpose — the kind of impact that makes work worth doing for you
  • Circle 2: Strengths — what you’re naturally, exceptionally built to do
  • Circle 3: Contribution mode — how you show up and create value

Most people optimize for one, maybe two of these. They find work that matters but drains them. Or work that uses their strengths but feels meaningless. Or work that fits their contribution style but doesn’t tap into what they’re actually world-class at.

The sweet spot is where all three overlap.

Where you don’t just perform—you multiply impact. Where work energizes instead of exhausts. Where you’re not trying to fit into an Instagram influencer’s career path—you’re building something uniquely yours.

Why Most Career Tools Still Leave You Stuck

Career development is often a fragmented, piecemeal menu of advice:

Personality training. This comes in all forms with various levels of complexity. Myers-Briggs, DiSC, Enneagram—or all of the above—only go so far. Great. Now you know you’re a high I with steady S tendencies. Or an ENFJ. Or an 8 with a 7 wing. Knowledge is not wisdom. Most personality training doesn’t tell you where to use your personality or what roles actually leverage how you’re wired.

StrengthsFinder. This is a powerful tool. There’s a reason 90% of Fortune 500 companies use CliftonStrengths. Yet again—what do you do with the knowledge you’ve gained? You have Strategic, Learner, Relator, Adaptability, Input, etc. Excellent. But it doesn’t tell you which roles let you use those strengths—or how to position yourself for work that actually fits.

Career coaching asks what you want. This is a growing multi-billion dollar industry. We all need coaching—and a significant number of folks find it helpful. A coach will ask: What are your goals? What kind of work appeals to you? What’s your ideal job? None of these questions really show you how you’re wired to contribute or where you’ll naturally excel versus where you’ll constantly grind.

Each of these gives you pieces of the puzzle. But nobody’s showing us how the pieces fit together.

The Growability® Career Sweet Spot connects all three.

It takes your personality profile, your strengths, and your natural contribution style—and shows you exactly where they intersect.

It answers questions like:

  • Where will I perform versus where will I thrive?
  • What roles will energize me versus drain me?
  • How do I position myself so my impact multiplies instead of just increments?
  • What’s my actual competitive advantage in the marketplace?

When I finally mapped my own Career Sweet Spot, it explained everything.

Why the nonprofit program director role drained me: it required execution and operational management. My contribution style is guide, not executor. Misalignment.

Why the project management roles made me feel empty: they’re all about managing details and timelines. My strengths are seeing patterns and designing pathways. Misalignment.

What I actually needed: advisory work where I help leaders and teams clarify complexity and make strategic decisions. That’s where my purpose + strengths + contribution style align.

Once you see it, the path forward becomes obvious.

No more applying for jobs that look good on paper. Look for roles that fit your wiring.

Stop grinding. Start thriving.

I never changed who I was.

I finally understood who I was—and built my vocation accordingly.

The Test (Are You in Yours?)

So here’s the question: Are you working in your Career Sweet Spot?

To be fair, most people aren’t. And the signs are surprisingly consistent.

You’re probably outside your Career Sweet Spot if:

☐ You’re good at your job, but it exhausts you. You produce results. You meet expectations. But you go home drained in a way that doesn’t match the actual hours worked.
☐ People in similar roles seem to have more energy. Your colleagues are energized by work you find draining. What feels like a grind for you seems to come naturally for them.
☐ You’re producing results, but rarely enjoying the process. The outcomes are fine. The journey getting there feels like you’re constantly pushing against resistance.
☐ You find yourself thinking, “I should be better at this by now.” You’ve been doing this work for months or years, but it still doesn’t feel natural. You’re competent, but never quite comfortable.
☐ Your wins feel like relief, not celebration. When you complete something successfully, the dominant emotion is “thank God that’s over” rather than “that was satisfying.”
☐ You’re building skills for a career path that doesn’t excite you. You’re developing capabilities because they’re what the market wants or what advancement requires—not because they align with how you’re wired.
☐ You look at job postings and nothing feels quite right. Lots of roles you’re qualified for. None that make you think, “Yes—that’s exactly what I want to be doing.”
☐ You’re succeeding, but it feels like you’re pushing a boulder uphill. The results are there. The effort required to produce them is unsustainable.

If you checked three or more of these, you’re probably working outside your sweet spot.

And here’s what most people don’t realize: it’s costing you more than you think.

The Cost of Misalignment

When you’re working outside your Career Sweet Spot, you’re not just tired. You’re paying compound interest on a misalignment tax.

Time cost: years spent building skills and experience for roles you’ll never truly excel in. Every year of grinding in the wrong direction is a year you’re not building toward where you actually belong.

Energy cost: the exhaustion of constant misalignment. Coming home drained. Needing weekends to simply recover. Operating at 60% capacity because you’re spending 40% of your energy trying to fit into a role that wasn’t built for your wiring.

Opportunity cost: the impact you’re not creating. The compounding growth that happens when you’re in your sweet spot—where your results multiply instead of just increment—that’s the opportunity you’re missing every day you stay misaligned.

Financial cost: the raises, promotions, and opportunities that go to people operating in their sweet spots—people who make the work look easy because it aligns with how you’re wired. They’re not more talented than you—they’re just properly aligned.

Add it up over five years. Ten years. A career.

The cost of staying misaligned isn’t just burnout. It’s the life and impact you never get to build.

Start Here

If you’re in transition, feeling misaligned, or sensing there’s a better fit somewhere—start with the Quick Assessment.

It takes about 10 minutes. You’ll answer questions about:

  • What energizes versus drains you
  • Where you naturally create value
  • What kind of impact makes work meaningful
  • How you show up in teams and under pressure

At the end, you’ll get a preliminary read on where your sweet spot might be—and whether the Career Sweet Spot Assessment and coaching could help you find it.

No cost. No obligation. Just clarity on whether you’re working aligned or working against your wiring.

TAKE THE QUICK ASSESSMENT
Takes 10 minutes. Might save you 10 years.

Because you can spend another five years trying to fit into roles that weren’t built for you.

Or you can spend the next three to six months moving toward where you actually belong.

The choice is yours.

But if I could go back and talk to myself at 48 (or 35 or 18), sitting on the front porch wondering if my career was over, I’d say:

Your career isn’t over. It just needs to head in the right direction again.

And I’d hand myself this assessment.

You are doing better than you think.

Bernie Anderson

https://www.bernieanderson.com
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I Can See Clearly Now