The Shopping Cart Test for Your Career
Next time you’re pulling into the grocery store parking lot, take a look around. Almost every single time, you’ll see a stray shopping cart abandoned in a parking space or propped up on a curb just a few feet away from the cart return area.
Someone took the time to wheel it all the way out to their car, unload their groceries, and then, at the very last second, decided that walking it ten extra feet was asking too much. So they popped the front wheels up into the mulch bed and drove off.
The underlying logic with this is: Someone who works here gets paid to round up the carts. Not my job to put it back where it belongs, they'll handle it.
Now, you might be reading this thinking, Well, I’m not that guy. I always return my shopping cart.
Fair enough. But let’s bring that exact same scenario into the office.
Think about the last big meeting you attended. People brought in coffee cups, water bottles, maybe even breakfast sandwiches or lunch containers. The meeting finishes, everyone stands up, grabs their laptops, and walks out.
The conference room table is scattered with empty cans, crumpled napkins, and half-filled coffee cups. The chairs are spun around at awkward angles. Nobody cleans it up because everyone is "busy," and besides, the office manager or janitorial staff comes through anyway, right? That’s their job.
It’s the exact same arms-folded entitlement. It’s the belief that once a task falls one inch outside our immediate job title, it’s beneath our time to handle it.
Staying In Your Lane
Look, I get the appeal of 'that's not my job.' It feels like you're taking the high road, like you're just setting smart boundaries, staying focused on your own tasks, and protecting your sanity from other people's chaos.
After all, nobody wants to be the office doormat who gets dumped on with every single low-value task no one else wants to touch. There is a legitimate time and place to manage your workload. Your time is valuable just like everyone else's.
But there’s a massive difference between protecting your capacity and refusing to step outside your box.
When "That's not my job" becomes your automatic reflex whenever a messy problem lands in front of you, you aren't protecting yourself. You’re signaling to everyone around you that you’ve hit your ceiling.
And here’s the kicker: we do this exact same thing at home.
We carry "job descriptions" into our relationships. "Taking out the trash is his job." "She handles the bills." "That’s your chore, not mine." We set up arbitrary rules that nobody ever actually agreed to, and then we get resentful when someone steps over a line that was never drawn in the first place.
Whether it’s in a relationship or on a team, splitting everything into "yours" and "mine" creates drama. Reducing that drama and making real progress happens when you realize it’s just our house, our project, or our problem.
Unowned Problems
Here’s something I’ve noticed about how companies actually work: the best opportunities are almost never sitting neatly inside a job description.
When everything is running smoothly and everyone knows their role, you’re basically just keeping the machine running. You’re doing the work, but nobody's stopping to notice. Real career growth (and new opportunities) happens in the gray areas, when a cross-functional mess breaks down, a project drops between teams, or a problem is sitting right out in the open and nobody knows who's supposed to fix it.
When you walk past a problem just because it’s not on your official task list, you’re stepping right over the thing that builds your reputation. Everyone knows the old advice to 'dress for the job you want,' but doing the job you want works a lot better. The people who get promoted don't wait around for a new title before they start tackling bigger problems. They just see a gap, step up, and help figure it out.
Simple Ways to Move Past "Not My Job"
If you want to protect your time without building a reputation as someone who refuses to step up, try these three changes:
Focus on the gap: The next time a problem drops into a meeting and everyone starts stepping back, ask yourself: "Is this an opportunity to learn something or help the team win?" Even if you aren't the primary owner, offering to help triage or connect the dots builds massive credibility.
Protect your time without shutting people down: Instead of shutting down a request with "That's not my area," try saying: "That usually sits with another team, but let me help you find the right person so we don't get stuck." You’re maintaining your boundary while still being a facilitator.
Look for the unowned problems: Look around your team or department this week. What’s one persistent headache or inefficient process that everyone complains about but no one owns? Step toward it. That could be where your next big breakthrough happens.
Go Deeper Into This Persona
This is the seventh installment in our series on the Eight Excuse Personas, the subtle stories we tell ourselves to stay safe, comfortable, and ultimately stuck in our professional lives. I made a quick 3-minute video of this persona if you'd rather watch than read.
This persona is tricky because it's so easy to justify. It lets us pretend we're just being disciplined and sticking to our lane. I break down all eight of these traps, along with a concrete 30-day action plan for stepping into ownership and expanding your influence, in my book The Excuse Index.
If you're ready to stop hiding behind your job description and start building real momentum in your career, grab your copy here: 👉 Get Your Copy of The Excuse Index on Amazon
