Career friction
Career Friction Is the Signal Before the Exit
The mismatch between your work and your energy, values, and growth. Name it before you label it “burnout” or a “bad quarter”.
“Career friction” is a work mismatch, not a personality type
Career friction is the drag you feel when your role, environment, or trajectory no longer matches who you are and what you need from work. It is structural: not a character flaw, and not always a signal to resign tomorrow.
It often shows up as Sunday dread before Monday, recovery-mode weekends, coasting on autopilot, goals that need more time or savings than are available, or a title that still looks fine with misalignment underneath. Any one of those can be noise. Several together usually are not.
RĒSONA diagnoses friction across pillars you can act on: energy, competence (autopilot vs growth), autonomy, identity fit, and runway. That is different from a personality quiz that sorts you into a type and stops there.
Which signals show up in your life right now?
One signal is worth naming. Two or more often point to a pattern, not a mood.
Tap what fits right now. Select all that apply.
Select one or more signals. Feedback appears here.
Why friction gets expensive quietly
Friction rarely arrives as a single crisis. It accumulates: energy spent recovering instead of living, skills that stop compounding, identity tied to a role you have already outgrown, and decisions deferred because the picture stays foggy.
Over twelve months that stack shows up as option value lost, confidence eroded, and a narrower set of credible next moves. Naming the pattern early is cheaper than waiting until exit feels like the only language left.
Stuck but not ready to leap? See stuck at work. Want a rough sense of the scale over twelve months? Use the cost of inaction calculator.
Name the pattern, not just the mood
The short preview surfaces one tension from your intro answers. The in-depth analysis cross-references contradictions, scores six dimensions with receipts, and ranks your energy drains so you can see what is driving the weight, not only how heavy it feels.
Related reads: growth ceiling when competence outpaces challenge, and ambition vs runway when the move feels right but timing feels wrong, and career change fear when you already know the move but keep negotiating with fear.
Two useful next steps
Use the free “Cost of Inaction” calculator to see a rough 12-month picture, or start the in-depth analysis and get one tension named from your answers.
Free 4–5 minute preview · No card required
Full report £49, refunded if not useful