With Gen Z facing an uphill battle in today’s job market, landing the right role—or even starting your own entrepreneurial venture—can feel overwhelming.
But instead of following the age-old advice of chasing your passions, it might be smarter to center yourself on one thing that you can’t get enough of. It’s advice that Shark Tank star Robert Herjavec said he learned from his former costar, billionaire investor Mark Cuban.
“Life doesn’t care about your passion, and I don’t care about your passion,” Herjavec recalled Cuban saying during a show taping one season.
“I don’t care that you love golf or basketball or AI or cyber, I don’t give a shit about any of that. What I want to know is, what are you obsessed with?” Herjavec added to Fortune. “Passion is easy, because passion is a wish, but obsession is an action. Passion doesn’t demand anything of you. Obsession requires everything of you.”
For Herjavec, that lesson was personal. Early in his career, he wasn’t sure what path to take. He considered roles ranging from becoming an FBI detective to working in film. But once he discovered cybersecurity, he found himself thinking about it constantly.
Even so, he said obsession isn’t something you can manufacture overnight, and it doesn’t have to come from your first job. Early work can simply pay the bills or build skills, but every experience should be a stepping stone toward something you can fully commit to—and wake up every morning energized to work on.
But obsession alone isn’t always enough. Herjavec urged young professionals to stay grounded and take a long-term view, even when uncertainty—from politics to AI—makes it tempting to panic or pivot too quickly.
“When you’re 21 or 22, you feel a desperation about tomorrow, and some of that’s good because it’s rocket fuel,” Herjavec said. “But too many people make short-term decisions in their twenties and don’t take the long view.”
The one interview question Robert Herjavec says you might want to prepare for
Even after finding the career path of your dreams, getting hired is another story.
Early in his career, Herjavec was interviewed by Warren Avis, the entrepreneur behind Avis Car Rentals. After asking a relatively standard question—“Tell me about a situation in which you had to overcome adversity”—Avis followed up with something unexpected: “Do you believe you are in control of your own destiny?”
For Herjavec, the question was a surprise, but he answered yes. However, Avis’s next question hit even harder: “Okay, you’re in a car accident. You lose the ability to walk. Are you still in control of your own destiny?”
That’s when Herjavec realized there was no true right or wrong answer, but the point was to get a window into candidates’ critical thinking and adaptability—skills the Shark Tank star said are arguably more important than ever in today’s unpredictable business world. Those abilities, he added, are often what set candidates apart and can ultimately tip the scales toward a job offer.
“Business is so hard and unpredictable that it’s your ability to adapt to situations on a constant basis to move the ball forward, so I love to find out how people think,” Herjavec said. “It’s great to be a critical thinker, but you have to be an adaptable thinker to the situation.”
