Honestly, don’t waste your time trying to make your talent card perfect. It’s not going to help you. You’d be smarter to use that time meeting people, making connections, and getting noticed by the folks who have power. Play the office politics game, be extra friendly to the bosses, and maybe—just maybe—you’ll get lucky and land a role.
Because let’s face it: being really good at your job doesn’t count for much here. There are many cases where people with strong skills get ignored. One of the worst examples? The GOA manager used their influence to get their husband into the Exploration Review Team—supposedly a team only for the top geoscience experts. So much for fairness, right?
It just goes to show that friends, family, and politics matter more than skill or hard work. For those of us who’ve spent years learning and doing the job well, it’s really discouraging. But hey… that’s the reality we’re dealing with.