Work, success, and meaning at every stage of your career
When you go through the interview process for a job, you go to great lengths to demonstrate that your skills are a great match for the position. Common sense, right? What if everything you thought about the hiring process was reversed? Rather than spend time talking to them about your experience, maybe you should spend time on how you think and feel.
My recent post on etiquette based on Laura Mathewson’s book Bottom Line: Manners Matter gave tips on how to make a great, mannerly impression. How much did you learn? Take the quiz and find out.
Along with cursive penmanship and letter writing, formal etiquette seems to be a lost art. Do manners still matter in the age of texting and flip flops at the White House?
A few generations ago, interview scripts for professional jobs followed a straightforward format. According to the logic of the times, either the candidate had the skills necessary to accept the position, or she didn’t. So to find out, interviewers would simply ask. In a 30-minute session, most questions resembled the ones below: “Have you done … Continue reading Curve Ball Interview Questions: What Your Answers Say About You
In a typical day of running errands in Jacksonville, I’ll encounter workers who have come from all over the world: Vietnam, Africa, Europe, India, and South America. I have enormous admiration for someone who chooses to locate to another country and master language, culture and new job skills. I spoke recently to an American who chose to work outside the U.S. and master those same skills.
Every day, someone somewhere loses a job. If you were told that you’d be laid off tomorrow, what would happen? You may never be ready emotionally, but you can take steps to be more prepared financially if you experience a layoff or other change that affects income.
Taleb likens people who don’t prepare for randomness to turkeys in mid-November; they’re happy, but not likely to survive.
Courtesy: MidAmerica Nazarene University The statistics are sobering. 7.9% of recent college graduates are unemployed, and 36.7% of recent grads are working in positions that don’t require a degree. As the US economy continues to recover, the class of 2014 faces a grim outlook when it comes to finding jobs and paying off student debt … Continue reading Infographic: How to Find Jobs in this Economy
Burkeman goes on to say that research shows that forced fun doesn’t work. “…researchers found that many experienced the party atmosphere as a burden, not a boon. Prêt a Manger, the British sandwich chain with branches in America, reportedly sends mystery shoppers to its cafes, withholding bonuses from insufficiently exuberant teams.”
You can do this. What you’re doing may feel completely novel, and you may see only a handful of people around you (or none at all) who are starting over in mid-life the way you are. But this is an illusion—thousands of others have come this way before you, and you’re by new means the first to blaze this trail. Even more important: if this is the best path to your next step, then it’s the best path.
