Having been laid off before myself, I can’t imagine reading some well-meaning blog with someone telling me to ’stop whining’ at the time. All it takes is being laid off to know that there’s nothing like looking for a job day after day, month after month, to get someone running for the medication and in a seriously homicidal kind of mood.Hopefully you haven’t had to endure this little test of sanity, but if you don’t believ...

Eight years ago, I had a career meltdown. Given that this also was the year of the September 11th terrorist attacks and a period of dramatic economic downturn in the United States, I suppose, in hindsight, that my career problems seem a tad unimportant by comparison. But if you’ve ever been in a situation where you find yourself wondering what happened to your career, how you’re going to hold on to the job you’ve got with...

Here’s a scenario I read about the other day in The New York Times: An article profiling several unemployed white-collar workers focused on one man, in his early forties, who wondered why his job search strategy wasn’t working. According to the piece, this job seeker, and many others featured in the story, had spend the greater part of a year submitting resumes to job postings online, to no avail. Sound familiar?No matte...

There's nothing quite like reading about your company going bankrupt on the front page of The Wall Street Journal to break out your resume and dust off your networking skills. For our friends at Lehman, AIG, Merrill Lynch and others, here's hoping that you manage to hold on to your jobs - and sanity - intact. But, on the off chance that the thought of looking for a job in the financial services sector might send you runnin...

Find me someone who has ever held a job, and I’ll find you someone who’s hated his boss. Call it karma, feng shui, or just the way of the world, but everyone seems to have had a boss they’ve disliked. Really disliked. Even bosses have hated their bosses. Why the hate? For starters, as you’ve read thus far, the little things can get in the way of love. I, for one, find it hard to love the boss who clips his toenails in...

Imagine that you’ve just purchased a new car. Your first “real” car, you’re proud of the time you spent reading up, really doing your homework, and taking to find the right model in the right price range for you. Now, imagine that you’ve just picked up your friend for a ride in your new car, and before you’ve barely pulled out of her driveway, she proceeds to tell you about the car she thinks you should have purchased. S...

Inside the office, most of us assume that the employees who work the hardest, are the smartest, or produce the best results are the same ones who wind up with the best projects, the most interesting opportunities – even the bigger raises and better promotions. After all, this kind of work-reward pattern makes sense; in school, the students who studied the most and worked the hardest usually got the ‘A’s – right?Right...som...

Whether you’re starting out in a career or transitioning into a new endeavor, one truth remains: If you think that hard work alone will move you up the company ladder, think again. It’s relationships –the ones you have with your manager and coworkers (present and past), clients and more – that will get you there.You’re nodding your head in agreement – and, really, why wouldn’t you be? Most of us have accepted the fact th...

If you’re reading this article at work right now, stop – at least, momentarily. Take a minute to stretch your legs, stroll around the office, and, oh-so-discreetly, check out what your coworkers have displayed in their respective work areas. Notice anything interesting? As you glance from cubicle to cubicle, chances are that if you work in a typical office, you’ve just seen more than your fair share of knickknacks, trinke...

Think back to childhood: Were you one of those kids that sat on your bed and secretly dreamed of being a rock star? As you got older, maybe you fantasized that you’d be walking down the street and someone would approach you and say, “You must star in my next film!” When you’re young, these little daydreams are harmless, fun thoughts. But now, you’re older and your ‘someone’s-going-to-discover-me’ thoughts aren’t so cute...