Archives for Career Advice

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To call today’s economy tough is like calling Moby Dick a big fish. Let’s face it, with the threat of double digit unemployment looming ahead it is down right scary for the vast majority of people I hear from each day.

However, if you can stay focused, determined, upbeat and flexible these times offer opportunities for not only continuing but also advancing your career. Here is the straight scoop as I see it. While the number of jobs may be on the decline there is still work to be done. Doing more with less is a mantra I hear resonating with employers I speak to around the country.

So here are a few tips to help you get and stay employed:

• Be a “force multiplier”. Both in interviews or with your existing employer show that you will make a difference by giving 110% and being willing to wear more than one hat. Become that “go to” person in your department.
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Archives for Perfect Job

Until fairly recently the main measure of a company’s success was determined by its financial bottom line. Was it making a profit or was it sustaining losses? Although companies have been managing their activities by using their financial profits as their guiding light for a very long time, many stakeholders have sustained losses while the company’s shareholders have celebrated their wins.

Times are changing, and the way companies measure their success is too. Now in addition to watching financial outcomes, companies are assessing their impact on their physical surroundings and their community as well. When companies pay attention to the people they touch, the environment they impact, and the profits they make, leaders make more sustainable decisions overall. In fact, this way of doing business is causing companies to rethink how they produce their products and provide their services. In the process, the entire company system is becoming stronger.

Although the term triple bottom line may refer to specific reporting requirements, often it is used as shorthand for ventures that are socially responsible, green, and profitable.

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Archives for Career Advice

To be highly successful in your career requires that you engage in risk taking. But risk is accompanied by fear–fear that you’ll screw up, fear that others will judge you, and fear of the unknown. Confront your fear and use it as a motivator!

The benefits of being a courageous risk taker are many. If you make a mistake, you’ll become wiser. If you succeed, you’ll learn something about your capabilities and potential. Either way, being a risk taker at your job will position you as a leader and an innovator. The key is to learn how to be a smart risk taker. Here are six ways to do it.

Trust your instincts.

Don’t wait for complete certainty on an issue before making a decision; it often arrives too late if it arrives at all. Once you get a good idea, don’t incubate it–act on it and work to make it happen.

Don’t be afraid to ask for help.

If you’re in a job or doing a project for which you lack experience, have the courage to tough it out and ask for help. If you operate on fear instead–the fear that asking for help will diminish you in the eyes of your boss or coworkers–you’re setting yourself up for a disaster.

Unleash positive energy.

Fear, stress, and uncertainty can be friends, not enemies, as long as you use them as motivators rather than as energy or action blockers. Get used to tolerating these uncomfortable feelings. Remind yourself that progress won’t happen without taking a step forward, into the unknown.

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Archives for Coaching

One-half of US employees are dissatisfied with their jobs, up from two-fifths 10 years ago. Are you one of them?

If you are seriously dissatisfied, it’s going to affect your attitude. And that may show up in your performance. It could also put you at risk of losing out to others who are more satisfied with what they do.

But are you really in the wrong job or business? Or is it just a case of the grass being greener on the other side of the fence? Are you dissatisfied or unfulfilled for little or no reason? How can you tell?

Here are some steps to help you figure out if you’re in the right job and some recommendations on what to do about it.

Think of yourself as a business. Would you back yourself? Would you invest in You, Inc? If the answer is no, you’re in the wrong job. To invest in a business, or in this case, in yourself, you need to be comfortable on three main fronts: that market demand for your services is buoyant, that competition is not too tough, and that you are reasonably well placed to succeed.

Consider market demand for You, Inc. You need to be sure that demand for you is not about to fall off a cliff. If you worked as a travel agent before the dot-com era, long-term demand for your services would not have looked promising, given the looming threat from e-booking and e-ticketing. Is there something happening in your industry that could affect future demand for your services?

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Archives for Career Advice

The world economy is in flux but emerging economies continue to drive significant growth for global enterprises. Global companies recognize that their best chances for success lie with recruiting managerial talent with international experience – it’s the big resume differentiator.

For students who have studied abroad, this is good news, especially considering the contracting U.S. job market. However, many students with who have lived abroad don’t understand how to package this experience in a way that’s appealing to prospective global employers.

And what do companies value most in the study abroad experience? Based on my conversations with many large, multi-national companies, the general attraction stems from the inherent curiosity in these global-minded citizens. For some industries or companies, the benefit ends there as they need global thinkers not employees willing to go overseas.

For those global companies for which an international experience is a true hiring differentiator, however, the payoff can be huge. The vast majority of professionals I interviewed on this topic agreed that if two applicants have essentially the same resume credentials, they would choose the one who studied abroad or possessed other international experience. The following attributes were cited:

• Enhanced cross-cultural awareness critical to diverse, global teams
• Ability to bring global thinking skills to bear on problems across the board
• Multiple language skills, especially for non-American students who go abroad to English-speaking campuses
• Predisposition to and experience with global mobility

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Archives for Hot Skills

In our modern world, we’re moving at such a rapid pace we often miss seeing extraordinary signs and messages that pop up in our daily life. Whether you’re a soldier in Afghanistan, a corporate executive, a parent, spouse, or employee, when you can slow down enough to recognize and listen to your intuition, it can reveal truth, warn you of danger, uncover an ingenious idea, or help you understand people and situations in new ways.

In my new book, Second Sight, I show how to keep an eye out for intuitive experiences in everyday life, and what they can teach us. Drawing from my own experiences as an intuitive along with new scientific studies on the value of intuition in decision making, I include strategies anyone can use to develop their intuitive intelligence. In the book, you will learn how I came to be a pioneer in intuitive medicine, using my intuitive gift as a potent healing tool and incorporating it into my medical practice.

From Second Sight, here are five types of intuitive experiences you may encounter, and what they can teach you:

Body signals. Your body has many ways of getting your attention. It could be goosebumps when something feels right or strikes you as true. Or it might be your hair standing up on the back of your neck when you sense danger.

How to use it. Most commonly referred to as a “gut reaction,” your body’s response to the world around you is often instant–quicker, in fact, than your conscious thought. Next time you sense your body is trying to alert you to something, check in with it. Are your shoulders tense? Is there a knot in your stomach? Or do you feel energized and excited? When you learn to read your body signals, a whole new type of information will be available to you.

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