Here's the greatest piece of career advice I know:

You don't have to decide whether to take a job until it's offered to you.

Everything up to that point — the research, the due diligence, the application and interview process, the negotiation — is not a true commitment. You may spend time, energy, and money, but you are not entering into a binding contract until you actually sign a binding contract.

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It's a metaphor for a metaphor.

If the bottleneck is the part of the bottle that's the narrowest, then in a production setting like a factory, it refers to the stage or element of a system that limits the output.

Like traffic on an on-ramp, unable to flow onto the highway, the inputs get backed up. No matter how much you increase production in other areas of the system, the throughput (and ultimate productivity) will be limited by that bottleneck.

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There's a fear a lot of us have when we’re thinking about applying for a job, looking for potential romantic partners, or making a hire.

We are worried that we're going to get stuck with something or someone that is not a good fit.

Our concern is enough to prevent us from taking the necessary action to move forward.

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In school, effort for the sake of effort gets rewarded.

After all, what's an honors course but an opportunity to do more work in order to prove that you're a person who is willing to do more work simply for the sake of doing more work?

And once you show yourself to be the kind of person who puts in effort for effort's sake, you get more opportunities to demonstrate your work ethic at ever higher levels.

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Growing up, I was exposed to some very strong messaging for girls and women.

It showed up in books and magazines, TV and movie plots, and conversations with adults and peers.

The message was that you don't need a boyfriend (or husband) to be a complete person.

Since I hadn't been around during the days when marriage was a woman's top priority, I had no context for this message.

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