It’s Sunday, July 27, 2025, and in this week’s roundup, learn in 5 minutes or less:

Why “Follow Your Passion” is Misleading Career Advice

In a July 19, 2025 video interview with LinkedIn’s The Path, bestselling author and entrepreneur Scott Galloway called out what he believes to be the worst piece of career advice often offered, especially by billionaires:
“Follow your passion.” Galloway bluntly says: “Anyone who tells you to follow your passion is already rich.”

Passion Alone Is a Privilege

The challenge with “follow your passion” is that it ignores economic reality.
Most people cannot afford to pursue work that doesn’t also meet their financial goals or align with in-demand skills.

The advice works for those with significant financial runway. For the rest of us, especially early and mid-career professionals, it’s not enough to love what you do. You must also develop competence, create value, and solve real problems for real markets.

A More Sustainable Career Framework

As career professionals, the goal should not be to reject passion—but to integrate it within a more grounded framework:

Career Success is Built, Not Found

The professionals who thrive long-term aren’t blindly following passion.
They’re building careers at the intersection of value, growth, and meaning.

They earn the right to do what they love, because they’ve already proven they can do what’s needed.


Bottom Line:
Don’t follow your passion.

Follow your value.
Then bring your passion along for the ride, once you’ve built the road.

🔔 If you found this helpful, forward this to a colleague who needs the reminder. And if you’re not yet subscribed, join thousands of readers leveling up each Sunday at TheCareerguard.com

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A viral personal finance trend in July is the surge of “revenge saving” an ultra-focused effort to rebuild financial control after a period of overspending or uncertainty. Rather than simply slashing expenses, people are aggressively automating savings, setting short-term challenges, and treating saving as intentional empowerment. This isn’t deprivation, it’s clarity.

This strategy matters for early-career professionals facing global economic shifts and AI-driven disruption. Commit to building emergency funds, delaying small instant gratifications, and reinforcing financial freedom. As the economy remains unpredictable, revenge saving offers a mental buffer and margin to negotiate, pivot, or take risks wisely.

Get practical this week. Pick one financial goal: emergency fund, debt payoff, or long-term savings. Set up auto-withdrawals and implement a 30‑day saving sprint challenge. Track progress visually and build momentum.

This isn’t just saving, it’s reclaiming control over your financial future.

July is officially National Minority Mental Health Awareness Month, and state-of-the-art 2025 behavioral-health research is shining a new light on community care and stigma reduction.

For many professionals from underrepresented groups, the pressure to overperform intersects with systemic barriers, unique mental health burdens worth acknowledging.

This week, reflect on your emotional ecosystem.

Are there hidden stressors tied to identity, culture, or representation?

Wellness isn’t one size fits all.

Consider peer support networks, therapy, or micro‑communities that speak your language and lived experience.

If workplace mental health feels one-dimensional in your org, introduce inclusive, peer-led initiatives.

Even small steps like starting an affinity group, hosting check-ins, or inviting diverse colleagues for honest conversation can shift norms.

Wellness in 2025 is about belonging not just mindfulness apps.

New research from IWG and Arup shows that thoughtfully implemented hybrid work where employees split time between remote and local workspace environments, can boost productivity by 11% over the next five years.

The secret? Giving professionals choice while holding them accountable for outcomes, not just attendance.

This week, experiment with outcome-first planning.

Create a hybrid rhythm: work focused solo time remotely or in a café, then reserve in-person or coworking time for collaboration and high-energy work.

Measure the 11% boost by tracking results not hours spent.

Also guard against “productivity theater” the tendency to act busy without actual output (cue endless meetings, inactive tabs, and digital distraction).

Remove signal from noise: ask what needs to be done, and then eliminate everything that doesn’t directly move those outcomes forward.

The demand for generative AI skills is soaring in fact, AI-related job postings have jumped from 3,780 in 2010 to over 80,000 in 2025.

But across the U.S. and India, talent gaps persist: only 15–20% in some regions are trained adequately, prompting companies to rethink hiring and invest in training programs.

Top emerging skill clusters in demand this year are: AI & data science, creative and consulting roles, soft skills, tech literacy, and flexible multidisciplinary thinking.

Employers are prioritizing adaptability, coachability, and analytical thinking over rigid credentials

For early-career professionals, the takeaway is clear: build AI-adjacent skills like prompt engineering, AI tool orchestration, or data informed decision making.

Combine them with human centric strengths, communication, collaboration, strategic thinking to become the kind of candidate that tech and business can't replace.