156. The danger of typecasting in the workplace

You may not often feel like a Hollywood star in the workplace, but your career is at the same risk as theirs of the phenomenon called typecasting. From your early working life, the system, through its actors (your employers, other employers who might interview you, etc.), tries to put you in a box. You become an accountant specialised in budgeting, a speciality chemicals sales manager or a business manager for medium size businesses with a manufacturing focus, just as Bela Lugosi became a vampire or Errol Flynn a leotarded hero. This is, most importantly, liable to be very boring for you. It is not intentional, the system does not do it to you on purpose. But it does do it, because most of its actors dislike risk and don’t want to try you out at something completely different. This limits your choices to experiment and try and learn new things. But ultimately, you don’t have to accept typecasting. Instead of Lugosi, you could choose to be Oldman, instead of Flynn, Di Caprio 

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