Why you should stop overthinking and start taking risks, according to this CEO

There are a lot of factors to consider when making choices in your career.

What if it’s the wrong decision? What if something better comes along? What if I regret not taking this chance?

It can lead to what Patrick Reid, CEO of creative agency Imagination, calls “analysis paralysis.”

“Young people, particularly now, are very focused on getting things right and not making a mistake,” Patrick Reid told CNBC Make It. “Whilst that’s very admirable, I do think when you’re young, you really do have to take opportunities as, even if things don’t work out, often it leads to other opportunities.”

It’s something that Reid has experienced more than once over his career.

“After I left university, I was sort of pressured into going into accountancy,” he explained. “And whilst it wasn’t a wasted experience, because I learned a lot about how companies work, I knew that I wanted to be part of a creative company and create products and services.”

Instead of waiting for the opportunity, Reid took a gamble and left his job to move to London.

“I started an unpaid role at Imagination and I’ve never looked back. I really saw the value in taking a chance,” he said.

It wasn’t the only time he took a leap of faith. When he was 24, Reid was offered the opportunity to set up Imagination’s office in Hong Kong.

“I had no experience of setting up an office or running one,” he explained.

But he thought the opportunity was too great to pass up.

“It was a very sink or swim situation. But it gave me fantastic experiences in terms of living in a different culture, working in different environments and it was a really fantastic supercharging of my experience and knowledge,” Reid said.

This is just one of five of Patrick Reid’s biggest lessons. Watch the video above for more.