The things we want always come with a price, but not everything delivers results worth the cost. Accumulating stuff is easy. Creating the life we want isn’t. What’s on your list? It’s time to ask yourself if you’re where you want to be in your career.Are you: -Unemployed and looking for the right spot -Working at a job you hate -Yearning to be your own boss -Frustrated by slow growth in your business -Uncertain about your c...

There are a million ways to be self-defeating. Fretting about the impact of our age on our career is a popular one. I hear it all the time: -“I’m right out of college and stuck in an entry level job because I’m the only one who can show my older coworkers how to do stuff on their computers.” - “Because I’ve worked here my whole career, everyone thinks my ideas aren’t cutting edge enough.” -“No one takes my ideas seriously b...

It’s easy to feel lost in the crowd these days. We’re often smothered in a crush of candidates for jobs we want or sequestered among a sea of cubicles. The pace of the daily grind makes face-to-face contact with our bosses brief and infrequent. Feeling faceless is dispiriting. It’s important to be seen. Acting out, complaining, or decorating our cubicles like Mardi Gras take us down the wrong path. A better strategy is to...

Where we start isn’t always where we finish. At least that’s the case with many careers.It’s crazy to think that when we’re in high school we’d have a clear idea about what we want to do for a lifetime. Nevertheless, we go on to technical school or college choosing a trade or a major which declares, “This is my future.”The business world is a big place. There are tens of thousands of career paths in as many businesses. So c...

Sounds counter-intuitive, doesn’t it? After all, our careers will grow, we’re told, when we say “yes” to:-A new project or team leadership -A lateral move or promotion -Domestic or global relocation -Management’s requests When you’ve waited a long time for an opportunity, it would seem absurd not to snap it up. Right?Take stock. It’s flattering when management turns to us and says, “We think you’re the right person for thi...

“Be careful,” we’re told as kids. “You don’t want to make a mess.” “Double check your answers,” we’re told in school. “You don’t want a bad grade.” “Better achieve your performance goals,” we’re told at work. “You don’t want to get a poor rating or low raise, be demoted or lose your job.” Failure seems to come with negative consequences. Really? Always? The fallacy of playing it safe So much is written about success and how...

It’s no picnic running things, especially when dysfunction runs rampant or performance is tanking. All too often, we get promoted to leadership positions when things are in disarray. The lure, of course, is our chance to be heroic, a miracle worker, a superstar! So we say, “Yes, I relish the challenge.” They say, “Great! Good luck,” something we’ll desperately need. Classic mistakes As soon as we get tapped as the “leader,”...

Ever had that old sagging feeling? It’s when: -Nothing at work excites you. -Your motivation has flat-lined. -The signs that “you’re going nowhere” loom. -Your energy is drained. -Even a Red Bull can’t jolt us out of that. Wake up! When our careers are sagging, it’s because we’ve allowed it. After all, we own them.They’re a function of our choices—the education we pursued and the work experiences we’ve accepted. Each year...

It’s kind of an eerie label—“problem employee.” With supervisors it usually means, “I have someone working for me who isn’t with the program.”Then what they often fail to admit is: “I don’t know what to do to turn him/her around.” So, what’s the problem? In most cases, the problem is around employee behavior—their approach, conduct, interpersonal relationships, and way of communicating. It’s that dreaded “soft stuff” that...

Read the paper. Watch the news. Get an endless dose of pundit certainty about the uncertainty in the job market. If you have a job, the news makes you uneasy. If you don’t, it makes you sweat.You can let the job market control you or you can step up! Who’s making the rules? When times are tough, we can allow ourselves to be paralyzed or stoke ourselves to act. We can choose to see the options or imprison ourselves in old th...