Talent vs career

There's much talk about the War for Talent.

But what is talent? It dawned on me only recently that a talent is the beginning of a career, whereas a career is the exploitation (by both the employee and the employer) of that talent throughout the course of a human life.

The talent is the Yang, the career is the Yin -- the receptive environment that enables the talent to grow.

From the above, I conclude that it is not enough to have talent. One must have the courage to persevere through much hardship in order to convert that talent into a career.

On the other hand -- and this is quite tragic -- many people have the courage to persevere and go to work every day and work hard, however they have not yet clearly identified their talent. While they think they have a career, they merely have a job.

There's nothing wrong, of course, with having a job. It's the responsible thing to do. But I tend to think that we are all born for a worthwhile career that provides opportunities for self-actualization. One's work life, after all, occupies the single largest block of time in any human life.