Work, success, and meaning at every stage of your career
Steven L. Katz is the author of Lion Taming: Working Successfully with Leaders, Bosses and Other Tough Customers. Katz has worked as a corporate lion tamer for over 20 years; he’s been the executive assistant and right hand to many high-level executives and leaders, including a senior (unnamed in the book) U.S. senator. He intersperses real lion tamer advice from circus performers with advice on how to work with powerful leaders in business.
Since you’re making all those other New Year’s resolutions, why not add a couple to perk up your career prospects? Here are two suggestions that will add value to your resume and that can be accomplished in your spare time.
When asked the question “At work, do you have the opportunity to do what you do best every day?” only 20 percent answered yes; the other 80 percent felt that they were not using their strengths in their roles at work.
Buckingham starts out by defining “strength” as “near perfect, consistent performance.” Being pretty good at something is not enough. It starts with talent, which Buckingham describes as an innate ability – something you may have been a natural at all your life. In fact, being a natural is what keeps many of us from understanding true strengths; if it’s that easy for me, doesn’t everyone find it to be easy too?
Q: I’m unemployed right now, and I’ve heard that it’s a waste of time to conduct a job search during the holiday season. Should I just forget about it until January?
This week is the one we set aside to give thanks for our blessings. If you’ve been unemployed for a while, you may have trouble summoning a sense of gratitude for your experience over the past few months (or years.)
Gratitude, like most feelings, can be both an experience and a practice. Many people practice gratitude each day to remind themselves of the abundance of good things in life, even if (maybe especially if)they are going through a difficult period.
I meet people all the time who ask for advice about transitioning to a new field. In this occasional series, I’ll ask friends with cool jobs five questions about how they got to where they are today. This post features Melissa Ross, host of WJCT’s First Coast Connect.
You’ve been on the job market for a while now, and you’re starting to wonder if your only options lie in published postings for established positions. What if you really want a job that isn’t available? Or a job that doesn’t technically exist? What if you find yourself attracted to a certain organization, but the company website has no specific “careers” listing? What if a company has no positions to offer right now, but makes a claim like “We’re always looking for great people”?
According to a Yahoo! news article, researchers at the University of Kansas say that people can accurately judge 90 percent of a stranger’s personality simply by looking at the person’s shoes.
I meet people all the time who ask for advice about transitioning to a new field. In this occasional series, I’ll ask friends with cool jobs five questions about how they got to where they are today.
