DESTINY…A MATTER OF CHOICE
My career journey spanning more than 33 years made me wear many different hats. On completion of B.Tech in Mech Engg from MNNIT, Allahabad I started my career as an Air Force Short Service Commissioned Officer in 1985. After a short stint of 6 years in IAF I took the risky decision to quit IAF to join the private sector for the sake of knowledge & corporate culture. This was the turning point of my life which changed everything. The real struggle started thereafter. I lost my seniority, financially broke down due to low salary & family got disturbed. My first private industry job was shocking as no work culture existed. Still my family stood by me & I was confident that I will sail through all odds. Switching over & working in different fields like defense sector, steel sector, automobile sector, education sector made me more skilled & experienced but it reflected badly on my resume as a job hopper. I always loved challenges but hated toxic work culture. But I had no choice but to quit. I served in private industries as Manager, then subsequently served as a Professor in private Engineering Institutions. I worked hard towards my career development by upgrading my qualification to M.Tech from NIT, Jalandhar in 2013. I published research papers & authored technical publications. In order to keep myself abreast with the latest I got myself trained in the cutting edge technologies. All these achievements took me to HOD level but I wanted freedom of work & creativity.
On the other hand I worked for the organizations at different locations away from my family. This was very challenging and difficult for me as I missed my family. I stayed in rented rooms or in boys hostels as the case may be. I followed the old saying “While in Rome do as Romans do”. But I remained focused on my job while staying away from my family.
Now being at 50’s I felt to stop running after jobs and start my own venture to make difference in the lives of people & work towards betterment of society. So I started my own pre-school under the brand name ‘ Step One’ in year 2017. Even though I was not financially well but took the calculated risk with confidence. I never repent whatever happened in the past but learnt lessons
that one should assess pros& cons in depth before making/switching career choice/path. Even if by chance you land up in a wrong career choicethen still you have the options to switch over to correct career path irrespective of your age or economic conditions.
I am the recipient of Green TninkerZ Academic Leadership Award 2017. My technical publication “ Success using lean Six Sigma in terms of operations and business processes” is in market demand with 20 copies sold out.
Moral of Story: Never Give Up…You can start anytime.
Submitted by:
Flt Lt Dinesh Gupta (Retd)
www.steponeschool.in
