Quantifying the return on investment when it comes to your career can be as straightforward as punching numbers into a calculator. But numbers are not enough, says Lisa Whaley, a former IBM vice president who turned her B.S. from the Hampton Institute (now Hampton University) into a lucrative 22-year career with the technology giant. She said she was successful, in part, because she made regular common sense assessments along the way.

“The original plan was to work for a few years then go to law school or get my MBA,” said Whaley, author of Reclaiming My Soul From The Lost and Found a story of her journey from a successful executive to a woman in despair trying to find happiness. “Every time I’d get to that point – where I thought I needed more training or such – I would get a promotion or I was working on some great project. So I never did it, but I still did well. I realized that had I stopped to get the MBA, it would not have brought me anything at the company.” Read the full story