Having suggested the importance and usefulness of a "reading regimen" in my last blog posting, I've continued to try and walk my own talk -- and am constantly monitoring a wide variety of sources on career-related topics from all across the web, hunting for useful takes and nuggets of wisdom I haven't seen elsewhere. Here's the latest batch of links/articles I've come across that I thought really stood out for those who might want to [...]
While I've got a bunch of "original" topics teed up that I'm hoping to write about in the near future, as always, I keep my eyes out for posts by other career-focused authors who I feel have recently addressed key issues that might be relevant to the Career Horizons community. Here's the crop of articles I've flagged over the past month or two, if you want to give any of them a look! • How [...]
In any professional career, one of the obligations of "being a professional" is to stay extremely current in the trends, developments, skills, keywords, and methodologies that are impacting your occupational field. Not only will this help you maintain peak marketability for available jobs, but it also helps guards against factors like age bias and obsolescence -- and having a regular reading regimen can also be downright enjoyable, if you're the kind of person who enjoys [...]
While historically, the majority of my coaching work has been delivered to mid-career professionals with 10-20 years or more of experience under their belt, I'm getting an increasing number of inquiries from young professionals and recent graduates who are just kicking off their occupational adventure. Or perhaps more accurately, I'm getting contacted by the parents of said professionals, asking whether they can send their kids along to get some help in finding an initial opportunity. [...]
Sick of your current occupational path? Looking to make a change? Racking your brain trying to figure out what you're passionate about, so you can build a successful career around it? If so, I've got news for you -- Georgetown University professor Cal Newport, author of So Good They Can't Ignore You, thinks you're going about things totally backwards. And aside from one or two small caveats, I must confess I totally agree with him. [...]
Do you consider yourself proactive? A self-starter? Good at taking initiative? Most importantly, can you prove it? In today's marketplace, where many companies (by choice or economic necessity) seem hell-bent on getting more things done with fewer resources, they tend to prize people with "can-do" personalities and will often ask candidates to demonstrate these traits, clearly and convincingly, during a job interview. So if you're a professional in transition, make sure you have a well-developed [...]
This book, in a word, rocks. In fact, I might even say it's the most interesting and important business book I've read in the last 10 years -- which would be an appropriate characterization, given that its primary agenda seems to be to help people catch up to speed with how the whole notion of career success has evolved over the past decade. Recognize the name of the first author, Reid Hoffman? If so, it's [...]
In my last blog article, I outlined what I felt were the "5 core competencies" of self-promotion and made the case as to why I feel these skill sets are no longer optional for career-minded professionals today to learn -- or better yet, master. Time and time again, in fact, as I work with people looking for new assignments, I explain that it's not likely their talents and qualifications that are holding them back -- [...]
Most of my readers, I suspect, are far more interested in "micro" economic topics these days than "macro" ones. In other words, I don't tend to write much about big-picture issues and what the job market might look like 10-20 years from now, given my hunch that most of my blog followers are more concerned about the present moment -- and what they might be able to do to get ahead -- versus contemplating how [...]
As many of you know, I'm not a terribly huge fan of most personality assessments -- at least not for "career planning" purposes -- since I find that many of them are either 1) extremely out of date, in terms of the career options they suggest or b) ridiculously boxy, in terms of suggesting that only certain personality types tend to fit well with certain jobs. This being said, I've always loved the StrengthsFinder assessment [...]