Attract money and everything else you want in the New Year

There is something miraculous about demarcation points, where some things are left behind and new things are on the horizon. 2010 is one of those years where fantastic things are now in the process of becoming a reality – provided you believe they are. This notion may run counter to what we read and hear about in the news. But as the saying goes, what you dwell upon expands. Consequently, if you dwell upon the bad, it becomes larger just as when dwelling upon the good also enlarges. So, if what you think about is your lack of love, money, or a great career, guess what? You will continue to attract more lack of love, money, or a great career. Want to attract love, money, or a great career? Then you must think about how one or all of the things you want are currently being drawn to you. Keep that thought in your mind. Banish, completely, any thoughts that bad things will happen or that something stands in the way of you getting what you want.

In 1963, Dr. Joseph Murphy’s groundbreaking book, The Power of Your Subconscious Mind, offered the timeless secret of how to attract everything you want into your life. Today, this secret still holds true. He wrote:

Whatever thoughts, beliefs, opinions, theories, or dogmas you write, engrave, or impress on your subconscious mind, you shall experience them as objective manifestation of circumstances, conditions, and events. What you write on the inside, you will experience on the outside.

Like me, I am sure you know people who have it all – health, wealth, and happiness. Are they really that much different than you? The answer is: likely not. The only difference, then, is that they expect the best to happen and it does. Remember always: What is written on the inside will be experienced on the outside. You have a choice of what you write on the inside and once you do, your subconscious takes over and makes certain that what you ask for appears. I wrote about this in my last blog but as we enter a new period, it needs to be stressed now more than ever. As you think about what you want, not what you don’t have, you will begin to see miracles. People and things will show up exactly when you need them to have them realize what you envision. It is then especially important that you are careful for what you wish because as you dwell upon something, it will come into realization. Here are some helpful tips for guiding your subconscious mind to attract what you want:

1. Be specific in what you want. If you want a new job, write out exactly what you expect from the new job. The act of writing will help you better formulate the work you want to do and the things you do best. Review it, amend it, and when it reads exactly how you want, spend 3-5 minutes a day envisioning how you feel in your new job (or a living in a new city or home, or being handed that award). Feel it as it is happening.

2. Concern yourself only with the fact that everything is currently coming into alignment to produce the results you want. Do not worry about the details as to how it will come to be but dwell only on the fact that what you want will be.

3. Pay close attention to chance meetings, a statement someone makes, or something you read or hear about. These are opportunities that are leading you in the direction of your desires.

We are the brink of a new year and a new era. You have, at this very moment, the power to attract what you want into your life. When you allow your subconscious mind to do the heavy lifting in your life, you will begin to see the miracle that is your life.

Happy New Year, everyone!

Mind your thoughts: You’ll get what you think

I’m often struck by how much energy one person will put into their thoughts of doom and gloom and then watch how doom and gloom are repeatedly manifested in their lives. At the same time, and under the same life conditions, another person will see only the best that life has to offer and those expressions are realized and without any other rationale as to why these things should come to pass except they believe they should; no evidence to support their thoughts, just the belief that good things will happen to them.

Why, then, if the key to getting what you want is rooted only in your belief you should have what you want, more people don’t believe?

One reason is likely that many of us live with falsehoods told to us by others; falsehoods told not out of maliciousness but of beliefs ingrained by others. When the bad invariably happens because we have always believed they will, we then have the evidence to support that the belief was, in fact, true and, since it happened to us, we can now confidently pass this “truth” onto others. However, the counter is also true.

Many years ago, I took a commission-only sales job with a company that just felt right despite there not being a set salary. I asked a new colleague what I could reasonably expect to earn in my first year. She said I would earn $80,000/year without breaking a sweat as she had done in her first year. In less than 6 months, I was earning more than $9,000/month and having a fabulous time. At my former employer, I was earning $36,000/year and everyday was a struggle.

Did I learn some new sales techniques, have a better product to sell, or did the company do a better job of promoting itself than my former employer? Nope. We sold the same products, I managed customers in the same way, and the company did not do any more or any less promoting than my former employer. The difference was that $80,000 per year was the new starting point. I could no longer see $36,000/year as being realistic earnings and from that, everything flowed. Whatever was needed – contacts, introductions, meetings – to produce this outcome was materialized. I can offer no other explanation as to why this happened except that I was told I would earn a minimum of $80,000 per year and to do that, other things had to happen and they did. It was pure belief the goal would be achieved.

We are shackled by the falsehoods of others. Their limitations, their beliefs, and their worries are passed onto others as “truths” with their poor outcomes proof of what is not possible. Often this is because they don’t feel they are worthy of what they want. This unworthiness, however, is created by another person’s belief they they, themselves, are not worthy so that this must be the state for most humans. Do you see the pattern? But worth is not founded in some universal lottery where there are winners and losers. Everyone is worthy of achieving whatever they dream possible. The “trick" is in believing whatever you want is already yours. There is nothing more you need to do.

You can learn a lot from a cathedral in Barcelona

On a trip to Barcelona last year, we visited La Sagrada Familiá, a cathedral 127 years in the making. Work on the cathedral began in 1882 and continues to this day. I saw a connection in this for those who are looking to ramp up, change, or otherwise begin a career and are probably wondering – when is it ever going to happen? Consider that if it takes 127 years and counting to build one cathedral, the 6, 8, 12 or even more months it may take to create or refashion your career is a mere drop in the time bucket. But, hey, building something spectacular and meant to last takes time. There’s just no getting around it.

This is difficult for those who are supremely cognizant of time and see every minute of not doing something we love or fulfilling our needs as just wasting time even while busy doing the very things you need in order to move in exactly that direction. If you were building a house, you wouldn’t chide yourself for taking time to prepare the land, pour the foundation, construct the walls, and so on. If you didn’t do anything of these things you wouldn’t have a house.

These, then, are the days in which you are laying the foundation for your La Sagrada Familiá.

What is Your One-Hundredth Second Advantage?

Only a mere one-hundredth of a second produced Michael Phelps’ win over Serbia’s Milorad Cavic at the 2008 Olympics in Beijing. Phelps came in at 50.58 seconds and Cavic at 50.59 seconds. Phelps was later quoted as saying he started to hurt during the final ten meters but pushed himself just that tiniest bit more to victory.

This got me thinking about the close wins that happen when people compete for a job, a promotion, or anything else where a decision must be made as to who will be the winner based upon a personal advantage. For job candidates, this is something everyone fears – that an opponent has one teeny, tiny advantage that allows them to be the first to “touch the wall” and you only a breath away. The question then becomes:

What one-hundredth second advantage do you have?

I recall when I competed for a job against 57 candidates; all of them from inside the organization. Before my interview, their one-hundredth second advantage was that they were already “in”. However, in my pre-interview research, I learned the company had a new CEO who believed they were under-utilizing their resources to reach out to more customers. Realizing that if those current candidates knew how to maximize their resources, they already would have, this knowledge gave me the one-hundredth second advantage when providing examples of how I turned minimal resources into amazing feats of sales success. Game over for the 57.

In the case of interviewing for a new job, it is likely you won’t know, going in, what your competition has to offer or the company’s pain so you won’t know if you have a miles-long or one-hundredth of a second advantage. Pre-interview research can help in some instances but, failing that, ask the interviewer. Consider that Michael Phelps knows his competition for each race. He has the ability to study his competition and prepare accordingly. He knows his competitors’ strengths and weaknesses, the lay of the land (pool), and, as a side note, takes care with what he wears into the pool.

You can do the same thing. Ask the interviewer how many people are competing for the job. Of those competitors, what are the things they like best and the things they like least about that person or persons? In addition to learning how you need to position yourself to take that one-hundredth second advantage, you will also learn what the company values in its employees. If, for example, the interviewer tells you that your competition will bring their former employer’s customer list to the new job and you find this to be unethical, you may want to save your time and energy for a race that really matters to you.

Want to achieve a goal? Set a date.

People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are. I don't believe in circumstances. The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and if they can't find them, make them.

~ George Bernard Shaw

Relying upon the old stories you tell yourself as the reasons why you are not able to get what you want may give you some comfort but it will never get you to where you want to go. While it may be difficult, at first, to give up those stories, it is entirely possible and people do it every day.

One very powerful way is to set a target date for achieving your goal. Companies, for example, know that sales goals are what often drive committed salespeople. They set their target numbers each month and the salespeople go about working toward that goal. How people achieve their goals by the target date is part mystery but also part common sense. Personally, I like the mystery because it means something larger than me is out there working on my behalf whenever I become crystal clear in my goals and set a target date to achieve goals. I don't need to understand it, I just need to accept it.

I can’t explain the ethereal forces behind this process but only know that the more I focus on achieving a specific goal within a specified timeframe, things begin to happen to move me in that direction. It happens every time without fail.

At first, the things that happen, the doors that open, seem to be nothing more than coincidences; and, perhaps, they are but there is a synchronicity to these events whenever my goals are aligned with my real purpose. Quite suddenly, the things I focus upon enlarge and offer opportunities to help me reach my goals. It is not without hard work, mind you, but, somehow, it doesn’t feel like hard work.

What happens on the common sense side is that once a goal is established and a target date set, you begin making decisions that steer you toward those goals. Often, when goals are fuzzy or you don’t have a hard timeframe to accomplish, poor time management occurs or you may pursue something that makes you feel like Sisyphus, of Greek mythology, eternally pushing a boulder up the hill only to have it roll back down and have to start all over.

So, the formula is pretty simple by starting with the end (goal) in mind:

1. Become really clear on what you want to achieve. If looking for that right career, state it, in writing. Writing it down is very important. But, make sure it is something you really want to do. Don’t worry that it may seem out of reach or is in an industry in which you don't have experience. The forces at work in the universe don’t care about any of that and will produce opportunities and deliver information to you for achieving that goal.

2. Set an “achieve by” date. This gives structure and a sense of urgency to reaching that goal so that, again, the universe aligns what you need to deliver by that date.

Do these two things consistently and your life will change.

The shotgun approach may hit a few ducks but it won’t land you the best career

OK, so you’re firmly entrenched in a work transition and might even be considering the fact that you will never, ever have another job. So, you take another stab at the job hunt, pull out the 20-gauge, and begin shooting at any job that moves. Interestingly, you might actually hit something and, if the stars and planets align, it could be even be your dream spot. More likely, however, is that you’ll be blasting your résumé off into thin air without so much as even nicking an employer. This is when your critic appears and begins telling you the reason you haven’t bagged anything is, quite simply, because you’re a lousy shot.

Don’t listen yourself!

Great careers don’t just happen by … well, happenstance. Great careers are crafted, molded, and designed. First and foremost, however, they require planning. And lots of it. If you find you’re not making the headway you want in finding the right spot for your unique talents, you will want to check out the The Five O'Clock Club.

Established in 1883, The Five O'Clock Club offers job seekers the tools they really need to source and land the job they want. But understand that landing your best-fit career requires, first and foremost, aiming at the right opportunities before pulling the trigger.

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving.

Job or Career: Before You Can Get Either, You Have to Know the Difference

There’s a job crisis going on alright but, for many, not for the reasons you may think.

No doubt there are fewer jobs today and if you are looking for a “job”, you could certainly run into roadblocks. Yes, it is frustrating to spend hours writing cover letters, revamping your resume, and sending it all to recruiters and companies, often receiving little more than a cursory acknowledgment via email. I do believe this is happening and empathize.

I then read Stephen Viscusi’s online article (posted on The Ladders), Why You're Still Unemployed One Year Later and a Q & A on LinkedIn for the question: Are Recruiters still getting 100s of resumes for job openings? Viscusi’s article is an in-your-face dose of reality about why he believes someone may be unemployed for an extended period while the people posting to LinkedIn’s Q & A offer a different take.

Viscusi’s view: If you’re unemployed it is because your attitude stinks.

General consensus from LinkedIn’s Q & A: Many people are applying for jobs for which the HR person or recruiter has deemed you wholly unqualified to perform.

Though, for the latter, and as a contributor to LinkedIn’s Q & A, Jonathan Lome, from Human Capital Management - ACA Talent put it quite succinctly:

I have definitely seen an increase in people applying for open positions, and I have also noticed more and more people applying to positions who completely lack the skills sets the position requires. I think that these days, people are not necessarily looking for a career (although many claim they are), instead they are looking simply for a job to pay the bills, so they apply to whatever they see open.

Pay attention to Jonathan, people, because he hit the nail on the head when stating that many people are looking for a job instead of a career; which may also explain Viscusi’s argument that after a long time looking for a job instead of career your attitude can begin to rot when you can’t find a “job”. The problem, however, is that “a job” and “a career” are frequently considered the same thing. They aren’t. But, if you don’t know the difference, how do you go about finding either one?

Well, for starters, get educated on the differences. Are you looking for something, as Jonathan wrote, just to “pay the bills”, or do you want to become part of an organization where your interests, skills, and talents are exactly what are needed by very specific employers? (Note: No matter how brilliant you may be in one arena, this does not mean you can automatically perform any arena.) This is where understanding a key difference between a job and a career can really help: For a job, you can learn the skills, on-the-job, to perform the work. Depending on the complexity of the job, it may take you days or weeks before you learn enough to make an impact on the company. For a career, it is years of prior learning and honing your skills that will make a near-immediate impact on the hiring company. (For beginning careerists, of course, you often have to take a lot of 'jobs' before your work-life shapes up as a career.)

The second and, perhaps, most difficult thing to get past in finding your right work-life, be it job or career, is trusting that you can get exactly what you want; even in this economy. But you need laser-like focus to achieve this. You must shut-down the internal chatter that tells you all the reasons why you can’t get what you want and trust, simply trust, that what you put your attention on will grow. Don’t believe me? Well, consider the more you fret about not finding the right work, the more you don’t find it. This principle also works in the reverse, in a positive way.

What do you have to lose?

Your resume stinks and other things that keep you from getting what you want.

We’ve all heard the cliché, competition is fierce. When it comes to this job market, it may feel as though this really is true. But is it really that competitive out there or are you not stepping up to you’re A-game when going after what you want?

Try this cliché on for size: Cream always rises to the top.

I can’t tell you the number of cover letters and resumes I’ve received over the years that did nothing to compel me to read beyond their “objective”. Quite frankly, I already knew their objective was to get a job when they sent me the resume in the first place so reiterating this at the start is just a time waster. Beyond this, it was the tedious and painful reliving of every copy they ever made, phone call they ever placed, or report they ever wrote (three to five times over when working at multiple companies) that had me toss their resume aside in favor of a resume that would tell me what its author could do for my organization. Sometimes I was successful in my search and other times, not.

Competition will always exist – in good times as well as bad. That’s not the issue. The problem is that too many people believe that what worked for them when companies needed to hire warm bodies is the same thing that will work when real competition exists. A Google search of the term “resumes” produced more 5 million sites. It is not that information on how to write a resume is scarce; it’s that, for the most part, many job hunters simply don’t want to do what it takes to rise above the crowd. In plain English, their resumes stink. They are poorly planned and executed. Their cover letters, if they bother to write one at all, is littered with irrelevant verbiage. It tells the hiring company nothing about why they are the best person for the job. When you commit these job hunting sins, do you really have the right to complain about the employment situation?

The underlying issue is that some people just don’t want to do the work it takes to get what they want because it is hard. Spending several hours, days, weeks, and months writing, editing, and rewriting a resume for a specific job is tiresome; so it is with cover letters. But the people who invest – yes, ‘invest’ – the time it takes to write a moving resume and cover letters are often the ones who receive the call back for an interview. Not so coincidentally, they are also the ones who receive the job offers – even in bad times.

Can’t string together a sentence? Then get professional help. Just as you might not change out a carburetor on your car without the requisite knowledge, if you don’t know what you’re doing with your resume, hire someone who does. Forgo the movies, dinner out, or whatever it takes to hire the people necessary to whip that document into shape.

And, while we’re at it, take a course to brush up on skills that are non-existent or may be rusty. I believe it is de rigueur these days for hiring companies to ask that candidates have computer skills. You may think you are beyond this, what with your plethora of other skills and experience, but if they want Excel experience, give them Excel experience. Take a class.

I have seen some downright bad resumes in my time. I often wondered if the candidate would have had a better chance at getting an interview if just sending their name and phone number. A poorly written resume told me about their lack of attention to detail, that they were unable to effectively communicate, and, most importantly, they didn’t care enough about the opportunity to go the extra mile to get it. They would almost certainly bring that same attitude to the workplace.

This is not a job hunt tactic but a life philosophy. Do what you do better and more consistently than anyone else and you will find success.

Get the most out of your life: Understanding your time orientation

At a recent business mixer, I met a man who is in the business of meditation. An interesting discussion ensued, with the man demonstrating the power of simply being present. You know, the kind of activity where your focus is squarely on what is happening at that moment. All senses are engaged if only for just a few moments. I tried out this technique a couple of days later, and each day thereafter, floating in a bay in the Dominican Republic. It was, to say the least, restorative. Where my mind usually is running at full tilt 99% of the time, the act of just feeling the water, listening to the birds overhead, other tourists chattering and playing on the beach and in the water, the feel of the ocean against my skin, and the sun on my face, I was blissfully devoid of thoughts on how to fix every problem or change the world. I was just, for the lack of a better word, there.

Returning to reality, and getting the mind into full gear again, I wondered if there was a formula for balancing living in the now and thinking about the future. The daily news is enough to compel anyone to plan for the worse so that all actions taken today are to secure against doom and gloom tomorrow. On the other hand, there are those where the future is something that will take care of itself with little or no effort on their part. (Whether that will actually happen or not, of course, remains to be seen.) Still, a third type of individual exists, the kind who appears to be living a rich and full present while feeling comfortable about their plan for the future. As I have a tendency to deny fun today in lieu of a more secure future – even without guarantee – I wanted to know more about this third type of person.

Your time orientation time may provide the understanding.

Those who have a future time orientation are less likely to engage in risky behaviors (e.g., gambling, aggressive investing, etc.). Their focus is on the future so that decisions today are for the benefit of the future. This sounds responsible, but if exclusively focused on the future, you’re gonna’ miss out on a lot of today. Then there is the person with a present time orientation. This is the one who lives for today, enjoying whatever comes along. While I envy this sort at certain times, making all decisions based on what feels good today could have some repercussions tomorrow.

Alright, so how to blend the two?

I’ll be honest here that there isn’t a lot out there on the perfect recipe. One article, Past, Present, Future - Does Time Orientation Influence Procrastination?, in Psychology Today, by Timothy A. Pychyl, Ph.D., an associate professor of psychology at Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada, offers an interesting examination of this under the topic of procrastination. He writes:

To the extent that we find ourselves thinking things like, "My life path is controlled by forces I cannot influence," we are now aware that this thinking may contribute to our task avoidance. Similarly, if we find ourselves thinking things like, "I am not able to resist temptations when I know that there is work to be done," or even, "Taking risk keeps my life from becoming boring," we should recognize that we're vulnerable to impulsive decisions to delay now and pay later. I think of these sorts of thoughts as "flags." They should serve to signal us that we're about to undermine our own plans and goals. They should be signals that we need to bring our conscious awareness to the choices at hand so that we are not simply victims of our habits.

I think I will start by noticing these flags.

Get a job or manage your career?

A job is job but a career … well, a career is different. When jobs in your career field are few, however, some may feel no other option but to accept any job offer. After all, will another come along? If so, when? But is taking any job, even in your field, the right career strategy or is sacrificing in the short-term a far better option; regardless of the difficulties encountered?

While most know their personal circumstances and how far they can stretch the ole’ budget before succumbing to any job offer, I wondered how many really take the time to evaluate the long-term effect of satisfying a relatively short-term need. Money-guru, Suze Orman, and others slap the hands of people who squander their earnings without squirreling away something for emergencies but, if you haven’t, crying over spilled milk is not going to change the situation.

Still, this raises an interesting question: Are you compelled to take “any” job just to support a lifestyle as a result from previous employment? Is this enough or do you want a career that can help you fulfill your aspirations? If the latter, a job transition period maybe just the opportunity you need to get yourself on track to what you really want to do.

Career coach, Stacy Harshman, has some important advice for the question of whether or not to take any job. Quite simply: “You should do everything you can to avoid it.” Click here for Stacy's blog. According to Stacy, there are a number of reasons why you should avoid doing this but, most importantly, you need to remember that “you are the CEO of your career; therefore, you must be strategic in planning your future.” This is a large concept but one that many people fail to remember especially when panic about paying next month’s rent sets in.

Now, for the interesting and near mystical part: Just worrying about a situation isn’t going to change things just as applying for any job isn’t going to do much for your career. To bring about what you really want, laser-like focus is necessary. Think of it as shooting wildly at anything that moves. You’re sure to hit something but it just may not be what you intended. However, if you take a step back, even if for just a few minutes, and think through the process of what you are intending to accomplish, it will be easier and faster to zero in on the target and begin making a concerted effort to hit that target.

How to know what you want

In response to my last blog, Two secrets to getting what you want, a very dear friend asked: “How do you know what you want?”

Two possible answers:

1. People really do know what they want but out of fear or some other emotion, they do not follow their heart and, instead, engage in other activities (you’ve got to be doing something, right?) but none of those ever feel quite right. When this occurs, the ensuing frustration is viewed as indecisiveness.

2. A person may actually be doing what they want but think they should be doing more or something different. The perceived expectations of others (e.g., family, friends, society) is what is clouding a person’s vision of what they want or how they want to live.

For this final point, I recall the very old, very bad movie, Lifeguard. It was about an aging lifeguard on the beaches of Southern California. He attended a high school reunion, hooked up with an old girlfriend, and she convinced him that, at his age, he really should be doing more serious work and, certainly, making more money. He took a job as a salesman at a car dealership. He was miserable. He returned to being a lifeguard. The movie ended with a glorious sunset, of course, signifying all is right in his world; this last sentence being a really important point. It was right in his specific world; not Susie’s, Jimmy's, or Harry's world, but all was right in the lifeguard’s world.

It’s not that people don’t know what they want, they just the need the courage to live what they want.

Two secrets to getting what you want

Some years ago, I started AdQuick, a printing and advertising company in Franklin, TN. In the production area was a white board where I had listed each month’s sales goals. As the month progressed, I marked where we were in relation to the goal.

A funny thing happened each month – we hit or exceeded each sales goal. There wasn’t a single month when this did not happen. Reflecting upon this and other similar situations that involved goal setting, each time I set a goal, the goal was achieved. Dissecting these occurrences, I found a couple of things:

1. At their foundation was a plan.
2. When focusing on a goal, actions, thoughts, and behavior align to make for better decisions and greater creativity that move you toward your goal.

For the first discovery, people who achieve what they want usually have a plan. As a sales professional, over the years I have worked with really good, really bad, and mediocre reps. Aside from the expected personality traits of a good sales rep, such as charisma, diligence, and having a real interest and understanding of what they were selling, the really good sales rep also did a lot of planning. Each day, at the start, they knew exactly what they hoped to accomplish and structured their time so they would accomplish their goals. Thus, superstar sales reps are never surprised by their success.

Conversely, mediocre and not so good reps usually do not invest much time in planning. Time is their enemy and they float through the day reacting instead of acting. For me, there is not a day I do not conclude with a to-do list for the following day. This helps me prioritize and focus my efforts so I can keep moving forward. And I am not exempt from crisis. But once the crisis has passed, I return to my plan. Think of it as taking a car trip from New York to California. Half-way to your destination, along your charted path, your car breaks down in Nebraska. You wouldn’t put down roots in Nebraska, would you?

The second discovery is a little bit more mystical in how it happens but is, nonetheless, very real. It works much as a laser does, in that a single-minded focus on achieving a goal channels your energy so that you plan more effectively, come up with brilliant solutions, or has you say just the right thing at just the right time, among a bunch of other amazing things. It is also infectious and rallies others in your life or organization that, in turns, has them coming up with just the right solution to help in attaining the goal. Great salespeople and sales teams know these two secrets and you can put this same magic to work for you in crafting the exact career you want.

Why you should have a 4-hour workweek

We live in a world where we are measured by the hours and years we put in at a conventional company but, strangely, we admire, model, and study individuals who have “made it” by not following that same path. WHAT IS UP WITH THAT?

Take Sir Richard Branson of Virgin-everything fame. Sir Richard never held a Monday-Friday, 8-5 job working for anyone other than himself. Now, I am not knocking conventional work schedules but it makes me wonder why we humans are so eager to adopt the 40-hour work week, sometimes in environments that absolutely stifle ingenuity, and then chalk that up as being a measure of success. We’ve got people being catapulted head-long toward retirement, without so much as giving a sideways glance to what’s going on around them, and not even really remembering the trip. It’s a lot like taking the bullet train in Japan. You’ll get where you’re going in a hurry but chances are you ain’t gonna’ remember anything you saw en route. Is this what we’ve become?

However, there is a bright spot here even if it seems its all doom and gloom. I once heard that whenever there is a crisis, money changes hands. I mentioned this before in another blog but I think now, more than ever, the present state of unemployment, etc. can actually result in some ingenious people turning this to their advantage. Timothy Ferris has a whole new take on this. For those of you not familiar with Timothy Ferris, he wrote the interesting book, The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich. A quick perusal of the back jacket cover claims: “Forget the old concept of retirement and the rest of the deferred-life plan – there is no need to wait and every reason not to” and “How Tim went from $40,000 per year and 80 hours per week to $40,000 per month and 4 hours per week.”

I once worked for a company where my boss told another VP (actual conversation): “If Kathy never worked another day this year (it was April or May), she would still have exceeded her annual quota.” At the time, I felt pleased with myself, but then I started thinking. However, instead of thinking, if I had already earned more than what was expected or needed, why couldn’t I take off the rest of the year and travel, write a book, sleep in … no, the thoughts went to, I can do more work and then once or twice a year take a week off to recover from all the hard work. If I can accomplish more in ¼ of the time it takes some people to accomplish, and if I am satisfied with those earnings, why not take off? But that old Puritanical work ethic thing keeps getting in the way of taking time in life to enjoy, well … life.

I think the big question here is: Is there a real reason you, specifically, need to be working in a structured environment with set days and hours? I emphasize the word “real” because for those who have “made it”, they don’t seem to view ‘work’ the way most of us do.

"Perfection is not when there is more to add, but no more to take away."
- Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, author of Le Petit Prince (The Little Prince)

One simple strategy to achieve what you want

What if I told you that you could accomplish anything you wanted? Would you believe me?

OK, here’s a challenge for you: Think of something you want to accomplish. For the next five minutes, think of all the ways you can accomplish it and write them down. Not a single solution is off-limits.

For example, say you want a different career. Start by writing:

1. Research what it takes to have that career.
2. Assess current skills and knowledge to determine if a starting point already exists.
3. If so, re-write resume to reflect skills and knowledge to pursue that career.
4. If there are no required skills and knowledge, acquire necessary education.
5. Research schools or programs to get that education.
6. Ask people who already have that career what they did to achieve it.
7. Peruse job listings in that field.
8. Hire a coach to keep you focused on your goal.
9. Apply for jobs in that field.
10. Ask an organization to allow you to spend a “day-in-the-life” in that career.
11. Get up 30 minutes earlier each day to spend time researching.
12. Become an intern in the desired field.
13. Email everyone you know and ask for advice on how to get where you want to go.

I admit I only spent 3 minutes coming up with these action items but even at that, I came up with 13 ways to start moving in the direction of obtaining a new career. And none of them appear impossible to do, do they? Notice, too, there isn’t a single obstacle. This is a major point and I will let you in on a little but incredibly powerful secret as to why not a single roadblock was introduced in this list:

Your mind cannot hold opposing thoughts at the same time.

If you’re busy focusing on how to accomplish something, you cannot simultaneously be focusing on how not to accomplish something. Put another way, if I am thinking about how to prepare chicken for dinner, I cannot, at the same time, be thinking of how to barbeque ribs. Therein lies the difference between people who get what they want and those who do not. They simply program their minds to think of solutions instead of obstacles.

Now, go write your list.

Is a ‘safe’ career choice preventing your miracles?

These tumultuous times have everyone on edge. High unemployment, companies having to restrict their growth, and fewer opportunities may have a career seeker looking for safe passage to their retirement. That job offer that comes along in the nick of time may convince us we are making the right choice because, quite frankly, it is the only choice at that moment. Hey, we’ve all gotta’ eat and sometimes have to do what we have to but making a habit of choosing careers based solely on being ‘safe’ means you could miss out on the real miracles.

This point was driven home again last night after catching the last 30 minutes of Spike Lee’s 2008 movie, Miracle at St. Anna. I’ve seen the movie before but am always moved by one line that occurs toward the very end and wait for it every time. And here it is:

“Safety is the greatest risk of all, because safety leaves no room for miracles and miracles are the only sure thing in life.”

What could I possibly add to this?

Get prospective employers to see what you’re all about in one click

Half the battle in finding the right employer is cutting through the clutter of other job candidates so hiring companies can see what makes you so darn amazing.

But first you must understand human nature. You know those emails your friends and colleagues send you with a link to a funny video, joke, or something altogether different? The first thing most of us do is -- click on the link. Why? Well, for a few reasons but mostly because we’re curious about what is behind the “curtain”. Want to see for yourself? Then CLICK HERE SO I CAN PROVE IT.

For those of you who were not all that curious or concerned where the link leads, I will just go ahead and make my point. After reading what follows here you’ll be hitting that link in no time.

Consider you are the perfect candidate for a job. You send an email to the hiring company and attach your resume and write something powerful in the text area of the email to compel the hiring manager/human resources to go one step further and open your resume file. They’re busy, distracted, or annoyed they have to go through this process in the first place and are getting pretty tired of reading resumes. How do you spark their interest to read about you?

Imagine that you embed a link, like the one I encouraged you to click on, in your opening line, inviting the recipient to view your profile where, not so coincidentally, your resume is also parked for viewing (at some point you will have to have one of these things). Do candidates get any savvier than you? But more importantly, LinkedIn allows you to showcase what makes you special right from the start.

How do you do it? First thing is to set-up a LinkedIn account. Complete the profile, write about the amazing things you have accomplished, who you’ve worked for in the past, how well-educated you are, and, basically, take advantage of all that LinkedIn has to offer. Now, to get to your personal web link, on your ‘Profile’ page you are assigned a “public URL”. That’s the web address to your personal profile. Copy that URL into a Word document. For example, type: www.linkedin.com. Right click on the link and then select ‘Edit Hyperlink’. At the top of the pop-up box, it says: ‘Text to display’. Type in whatever you want. So, www.linkedin.com becomes LinkedIn.

Why you should do this or the problem with resumes.

It’s funny how there are professional resume writers – as a bona fide profession, where skill, talent, and know-how is required – yet the majority of us think we are adept at writing our own resumes without any of the training or skills possessed by, you guessed it, professional resume writers. And that would be OK and perfectly sensible to accept the premise that you may not be the most appropriate person to write your resume except, and here is the problem, many prospective employers expect you to be or, at the minimum, will evaluate you on the quality of your resume when your special skill set may be capping bottles, selling airplanes, or paving driveways. However, having a LinkedIn profile gives you the opportunity to tell someone right upfront that you are the Midwest’s 2009 bottle capping champion or are the person responsible for having sold all of Boeing’s 747 inventory without them even thinking about how well you can write a resume. You can even put your smiling face right there at the top.

Does it get any better or easier than that?

1 simple thought that will change your life

Something strange happened on the way to giving a motivational talk. I was back in my hometown of Southern California and getting ready to deliver a talk to a group of de-motivated salespeople. Their company had suffered some bad press and the sales staff was, to say the least, devastated. And it showed in their performance.

So, there I was, in my hotel room, with the television on in the background as I went over the talk in my head. Something on TV caught my attention. It was a commercial for the annual fair at the Pomona, California fairgrounds. As a kid in elementary school, at the start of each school year, the children were given a free ticket to the fair. Listening to the commercial took me back to that time and I recalled how I couldn't contain my excitement. It then struck me how, from just the mere mention of the fair, my body was actually responding as though I was, once again, 7 or 8 years old and anticipating going to the fair.

By the time I got to where I was delivering the talk, I realized I needed to take a different approach other than what I had originally planned. I began the talk by asking everyone to close their eyes and recall the first time they had fallen in love; be it with another person, puppy, or goldfish. For the following few minutes, the faces of the people in the audience began to soften and lighten. Some even smiled. The point of the exercise was to demonstrate that their minds could not tell the difference between something that happened at another time or the present moment. Their entire physiology changed just at the thought of something wonderful.

This can go another way as well. Think of when something terrible happened and it will be as though you are experiencing that all over again.

We all have memories of when we were completely brilliant, such as writing a flawless report, giving an inspiring presentation, or making something with our own two hands that was sheer perfection. Admittedly, for some (a lot?) of us, these moments may be few and far between. I think what happens though, especially when we are uncertain about what we want or feel there is strong competition, we conjure those memories from the past where things did not go well. This is a real problem because then your mind and body will start mimicking the past. The body language, the searching for the right words, the mind-freeze, or whatever else that took place that made things turn out not so great reemerges.

If you had the choice, and you do, to cement in your mind those moments where everything you did as though they had been written in the stars or the times when you struggled, stumbled, or even fell, as a way to produce the feelings you need to take hold of your career or do your best work, is there any reason to choose the latter?

The following year after that talk in So Cal, I ran into one of the people who had been in attendance. She told me that prior to the session, she had perceived that prospective customers were aware of the troubles of her company. Her sales presentations had been full of apologies and offering things she wouldn’t ordinarily give away just to get the sale but even that wasn’t working. After the talk, she realized she was projecting insecurity to prospects that she felt as a result of the company’s rather public troubles. She learned that in the majority of cases, many prospects weren’t even aware of the company troubles. She told me that applying what I taught her had changed her life.

Though that particular company's sales staff was contending with real some hurdles, it is not unlike what many people go through on a regular basis. We tell ourselves we can’t possibly get the career we want because we don’t have enough education, the right skill set, connections, too old, too young, too experienced, not enough experience, it’s too hard … a million things that chatter on endlessly in our heads but – and this is a biggie – when you do this, your body, in response, will not disappoint and will put each and every one of your felt emotions on display for the entire world to see.

So, do yourself a favor and choose only the good thoughts.

Just how many lives do you think you have?

A neighbor and her husband are planning on sailing across the Atlantic next year. Her husband had recently made the trip, going first to Bermuda, then the Azores, before docking in Gibraltar. I asked her if she was afraid of being out in the vast Atlantic, all alone, in a, by comparison, tiny catamaran. She replied, “Heck no. I see people die all the time. I want to live.”

My friend and neighbor is a nurse in the oncology department at a local hospital. She does see people die all the time.

It made me wonder about the difference between people who choose their work as though they will always have another shot at doing what they really want to do and people who live life by their own rules, doing work that is completely satisfying. And making certain they do it before they die. Considering a person will work 40 to 55 years of their life, why would someone choose work they didn’t really enjoy? Especially if there is something else they prefer doing or are destined to do.

There are probably numerous answers to this question but the overriding one I believe is: Fear. People are afraid if they don’t take the job offered another won’t come along and they will be destitute. They fear that following their dreams is indulgent and selfish. They fear if they don’t earn a lot of money, whether they like the job or not, others will judge them, their family will suffer, and they will be living in the streets in their old age. They fear their calling is the wrong calling. Regardless, it boils down to the same thing: They are afraid of what could happen if not taking the “safe” route. Personally, I am more afraid of dying and not doing the work I was intended to do.

Even if you can get past these fears, you may be wondering where to start. This insightful article, Career Assessment: Finding Satisfying Work is a great guide. According to the article, key to alignment is:

1. Discover what you are designed to do.
2. Do it.
3. Minimize everything else.

I don’t believe the issue so much is that we don’t know what we’re designed to do but that we enlarge everything else in our lives so that our purpose becomes inconsequential or worse, forgotten. I recall a friend from high school who had the most beautiful singing voice. Her performance in the school’s version of Fiddler on the Roof made me gasp at its perfection. Today, I understand she is a hospital administrator. Great job, no doubt, but I am saddened to think what the world has lost in not being able to hear her sing.

How to test a hiring company’s ability to meet your goals and expectations.

Nowadays, it seems a lot of companies are incorporating pre-hiring assessments into their hiring strategy. Personally, I like assessments even though no one assessment or program can really get inside a candidate’s brain matter to see what makes them tick, motivates them to do a great job, or predict how long they will stay around. I think they like to think they can but formal assessments leave out one critical component in determining a successful match – how well a company measures up in meeting candidates’ goals and expectations.

Hiring companies can rely upon validity measurements and test scores to determine if the candidate can perform the job and, hopefully, predict how well they will succeed in that job. And that is great but, like any other relationship, things can become stale when one party wants the other to rev things up a bit. While a good pre-hire assessment will be able to predict if the candidate will be adequately challenged at the time of hire, how does a job candidate measure how well a company evolves to continually challenge employees 5, 10, or 15 years down the road? Without this, it is a bit of a lopsided process.

In the beginning of any relationship, tension exists as to acceptance. Will the company offer the job and/or will the job candidate accept the job? This uncertainty and wanting can cloud the issue of whether or not the company and the employee are the best fit for each other for the long haul. Like personal relationships, there is a honeymoon period but this doesn’t occur until after the deal has been sealed. While everyone hopes the big questions are answered during the courting phase, unlike personal relationships, the courting phase for job hunters and hiring companies is short, by comparison. It is also highly subjective, depending upon the individual representing the company. A hiring manager to whom the employee will report is markedly different than a human resources professional who has likely not performed the work the employee is about to do and may not be aware of what it takes for the employee to get ahead in the job for which they are hiring. I know, long sentence, but I need to make a point.

So, how do you go about measuring how well a company will match your expectations for a long and successful relationship? The tried-and-true method of asking questions about what the company foresees for you in 5, 10, 15 years or more down the road and their plans and ability to get you there.

Who said finding your calling would be easy?

I was struck by Daniel Seddiqui's 50 jobs in 50 states adventure. If you don’t know Daniel’s story, he is the University of Southern California graduate who, unable to find a job in his field, set out to do something remarkable – get a job in each of the 50 states and chronicle his experiences. Daniel wrote:

Ever since I graduated from the University of Southern California, I have experienced uncertainty regarding my career path. Interviewing for a position was a full-time job and I wasn't having any luck; failing 40+ interviews. I never received feedback from any employers, so when I was offered a position no matter how irrelevant it was to my field of study, I accepted. I took my first position tutoring elementary students part-time. I knew right off the bat tutoring wasn't for me. I was realizing that I had to find a position that motivated me to wake up every morning.

What were hiring managers thinking?

Daniel lists on his resume, lobsterman in Maine, a surf instructor in Hawaii, a roustabout in Oklahoma, and archaeologist in Arkansas, among 45 other professions, and only one to go. When Daniel first started looking for a job in his hometown, how did hiring managers overlook this kind of initiative, enthusiasm, and creativity? Or, is it, perhaps, that the best of the best actually require adversity, need that testing, to have them find their true calling? What is Daniel’s mission now?

“My goal is to help Americans understand each other’s lives, respect each other’s hard work and stimulate peoples’ curiosity about different lifestyles.”

It appears Daniel has discovered what he had hoped to find at the beginning of his journey, namely, to find work that motivates him to wake up every morning.

Be a Difference Maker.

Standing on the precipice of greatness is a little terrifying because, typically, you’re up there alone. Not many care to venture that far or up. It’s scary and exhilarating all at once. If successful, you can stay perched up there for quite awhile, enjoying the view. If you fall, well, it can be one heck of a drop.

Before your climb, you’re going to meet a lot of naysayers. They’ll tell you that your chances of reaching the peak are slim and that the road is difficult. This I always find interesting because the majority of naysayers have never traveled that road to the top. This makes their predictions of road conditions suspect. Even if we tune them out, we still have ourselves to contend with. Being our toughest critics and prophets of doom and destruction, we can make a pretty compelling case for taking the road around the base of the mountain. It may be slower, less scenic, and you’ll have lots of company but, provided you don’t encounter any pile ups (like, the recession, perhaps?), you may get to your destination. And if you do take that route, you may glance up a time or two or ten to the top of the mountain and see a handful of hearty souls ascending the mountain. You may even watch them stop and play a bit, enjoying the sunshine, or taking a nice long nap. It may make you wonder if you hadn’t chosen the wrong path. After all, you had the tools and aspirations to make that climb. What makes them so different from you?

The difference might be courage.

Zig Ziglar, sales master, writes that people with courage are Difference Makers. I like this because it gives purpose to what you’re trying to achieve. When you have purpose, your sites are set on something altogether different than the pitfalls that could be encountered en route to the top. And you know what? There will be obstacles. You’ll hit a spot that doesn’t seem to give way to going farther. You may even backslide. But if making a difference is the goal, even if you stumble, how is that failing? The real failure comes when you stop trying to make a difference. As Zig Ziglar writes, “you will never be really happy until you do something for someone else.”

That voice inside your head knows what it’s talkin’ about.

In the face of adversity, do you dig in your heels or crumble? Does that little voice inside your head tell you to keep going or to give in or up?

The other day, I caught a few minutes of a television show in which a couple was trying to sell a house. Their realtor urged them to lower their price, citing the property’s numerous disadvantages. The owners were enamored with their house, saw the “disadvantages” as a benefit to the “right buyer”, fired the realtor, and proceeded to sell it themselves for far more than the realtor had recommended. Life is a lot like this. You will always find someone who will gladly shoot holes in your plans or recommend a different course of action. How do you tell if you’re making the right decision? Listen to that little voice inside your head.

Many years ago, I had the opportunity to partner with a local businesswoman to purchase some land. Our plan was to develop the land, relocate each of our businesses to the new building, and rent out the rest. It was going to cost me hundreds of thousands of dollars, of which I would take out a loan, but everything about this deal flowed so there was no concern. The day we were to furnish the attorney with information to establish the new corporation, I sat in the early morning hours, sipping my coffee, excited about this new venture. From out of nowhere, that little voice inside my head awoke, telling me not to proceed. It was so strong and powerful that I could not ignore it. I called off the deal. Everyone involved asked, incredulously, ‘why’? I couldn’t explain it. I just couldn’t go through with it.

Some six months later, I learned the answer.

The woman who would have been my partner went ahead with the purchase. Because of new homes that had been built on the bluff above this land, she had been unable to clear the land for development. The property sat idle as she tried to find a way around the problem.

I think of the numerous times I heeded the advice of others. As I took different paths other than the ones the voice inside my head instructed, I cannot tell the opportunities missed. But living in fear of what our instincts tell us to do is no way to live. Will listening to the voice always have you avert disaster or, at the minimum, discomfort? It is likely, provided you fine tune your ability to listen. It is sometimes not easy to decipher the messages you receive. Sometimes they are as strong as the voice I heard on that fateful morning; other times, it is only a feeling that something isn’t quite right. Sometimes, it is futuristic. The outcome of the decision you make today may not reveal itself for years to come. Either way, the voice inside your head is a navigation system that has been refined over the evolution of humankind. You would be wise to pay attention.

Getting past your Upper Limit Problem

Have you ever wondered why, after working very hard, you just can’t seem to break through a certain level of success? Do you self-sabotage or are you just plain mean to yourself? Have you ever looked at someone who is successful and thought they weren’t any smarter or more talented than you, and wondered how they did it? The problem may not be your IQ, EQ, work ethic, or talent but something entirely different.

Gay Hendricks, author of The Big Leap: Conquer Your Hidden Fear and Take Life to the Next Level, offers some real insight. He calls it: The Upper Limit Problem. According to Hendricks, the Upper Limit Problem is having “a limited tolerance for feeling good … (you) do something that stops (your) positive forward trajectory … or do something else that brings (you) back down within the bounds of (your) limited trajectory.”

Perhaps your Upper Limit Problem is manifested when staying out late so you can’t focus on your work the next day, spending too much money, despite a resolution to save, wasting time watching television instead of taking a course that would help your career, or any other non-productive behavior that stops you from advancing. In the throes of feeling gloomy about your prospects, it’s easy to assure yourself that, even had you tried, you didn’t have the education, know-how, contacts, talent, or fortitude to succeed anyway, so why bother? This is where understanding your Upper Limit Problem helps.

If you can identify the behaviors that stop you from achieving what you want, you’re halfway there to getting it.

The single best way to increase your productivity.

It requires more effort and elbow grease to get a job done when using a dull knife, scissors, or saw. We recognize facts like that and, if we’re smart, we’ll stop and do a little a sharpening. People work a lot like this as well. When we’re rested and recharged, we get more done. It is such a simple concept and yet many of us push on with our work as though our attention and energy will remain as sharp as it was the first day back from a restful vacation. What are we thinking?

We Americans are no slackers, however, so the notion of stopping to smell the roses – and not pruning them in the process – is, well, a bit akin to anarchy. We have sayings like, ‘work hard and play hard’ or ‘working vacation’, as though our playtime has to be difficult or contain an element of work or we can’t enjoy it. There are lots of articles out there on why this is a bad thing and I won’t reiterate them here because you also know it is a bad thing. The problem is, you probably just can’t stop yourself.

Years ago, I lived in Switzerland. The country shut down for one month in summer. Literally; one entire month. In addition to businesses closing, many shops also closed. You had to be patient or clever to be able to buy something you wanted if you remained in the country during that summer month. But it didn’t matter for the majority of Swiss because they were off somewhere delightful like Spain lying on a beach. When they returned, they were rested, pleasant, and ready to go to work. How did they do it? They had sharpened their most important tool – self.

Become the job candidate with a 100% money-back guarantee

If you’ve been in the work world awhile, you begin to realize a thing or two. After an even longer time, you know even that much more. Who would have ever thought that would be a bad thing?

I remember when looking for my first jobs and, on more than one occasion, hearing the words, “You don’t have any experience”. Of course, to get the experience, you had to get a job. But, somehow, you got your foot in a door and, well, you know what you got. Fast forward to 2009 where there are more people than there are jobs. If you’re one of the unfortunate who is presently dislocated from a career spot, you may enter this phase thinking, no sweat, I’ve got experience, only to find that you are now woefully over-experienced. What’s a body to do?

When a huge earthquake hit San Francisco in 1906, San Francisco was cut-off from its East Bay neighborhoods. Those who owned boats began ferrying passengers across the bay – for a price. Some people went from being a simple boat owner to wealth, almost overnight. As the saying goes, when there is a crisis, money changes hands.

It is not that companies suddenly don’t need CFOs, customer service reps, or salespeople. They need ‘em, they just can’t afford ‘em as a regular employee. This shouldn’t stop you from approaching them with a proposal on how you can make or save them money (the only two things they’re really interested in doing). Instead of trying to jam your square peg into an exceedingly small round hole, exploit your knowledge and expertise by proposing to a company that they let you do for them what you’ve done well for others – on a contract basis. And treat the transaction as would any contractor. Give them a money-back guarantee or suggest a pay-for-performance deal. While competing candidates may be looking to pare down their resumes, you will want to showcase yours.

Do you do what you do because others think you should?

I am fond of Fred Smith, the CEO of FedEx. As most know, when Smith attended Yale, he wrote a paper about an overnight delivery service for which his professor gave him an average grade. The reason I like Fred Smith is that in spite of what someone of stature thought would not fly – no pun intended – he did it anyway.

Great ideas almost always suffer great criticism. You will always find someone, somewhere, who will tell you that your notion is not viable or worth the risk. This criticism isn’t restricted to launching unheard of products or services. You will also find it when moving from a well-seeded career to something you’ve never done before; like quitting your law practice to become a windsurfer instructor in Tahiti. Everyone will think you are crazy.

This makes me think of Ray Kroc, former CEO of McDonald’s. As a milkshake machine salesman in his early fifties, Kroc discovered McDonald’s, an efficiently run outfit on “E” Street in San Bernardino, California. He gave up his job and bought the restaurant from the McDonald brothers for a comparative pittance. I have no doubt many thought Kroc to be nuts. And, when McDonald’s struggled in the early days, I am certain those naysayers were smug in their critique of Kroc’s life choice.

However, there is some real wisdom to be taken away from people who take great risks – even if that risk, by conventional definition, was a failure. Look closely. These people are not satisfied with simply getting from Point A to Point B with the most security or toys. Life is for the livin’, man. Choosing a career because others think it is great is one seriously lousy way to live – especially if your heart is on the tip of a wave in Tahiti.

The important thing to remember is, at the end of the day, you’re the one who lives with your choices. Don’t you want to do what you do because you think you should?

Career luck: Depends on who you ask.

Waiting out another (delayed) flight at Chicago’s O’Hare airport last night, my husband introduced me to me a vendor he deals with who also lives in our home city. The man was the President of a small, global organization his father had built in Australia before expanding across the world. Now, with his father reaping his rewards of the business in his retirement, the son was running the business. In our brief discussion, he told me about spending 5 weeks per year in his home country of Australia, where his corporate office was located, and one week per year at a lake house he and his wife owned in Wisconsin where, he said, he “kept all of his toys”. He had to be about 35. Sounded idyllic.

For a moment I envied him, thinking how nice that he had a lucrative career already planned for him by his father. All he had to do was step into it. No worries, mate. The rest of us, well, the rest of us have to figure out how to write the most compelling cover letters, craft the perfectly composed resume, spit shine our shoes, and not make a single gaffe during an interview in order to make our way into our little spot of career heaven. And, after we’ve done all that, we get to spend years proving that we’re OK and hope we get to reap some great financial reward for our efforts. Seems kind of unfair, doesn’t it?

So, as we climb to 34,000 feet, I began to wonder if people like him feel they didn’t have any choice when entering the family biz. For all we know, this guy could have wanted to be a professional surfer, house painter, or chimney sweep. Maybe Dad is one of those forceful patriarch types that what is said goes. I then couldn’t think of anything more dismal than feeling as if you didn’t have a choice about your work.

I then remembered friends who felt obligated to join the family biz and despised it. They spent their time dreaming of the day they would get up the cohunes or chutzpa to tell their parent(s) that it just wasn’t for them because they wanted to be a professional surfer, house painter, or chimney sweep. Each day spent in a job that had been fashioned for someone else stole that much more time from their lives.

Even if your road may be long and difficult, and no shortcuts provided by family, know that the direction you take is entirely your own. You can’t put a price on that.

Do you have a career blindspot?

I love car analogies when it comes to discussing personal competencies and career planning; the Formula One race car driver versus the driver of a Buick is one of my all-time favorites. We’ll discuss that some other time, but today, and seemingly more apropos for what’s going on out there, is a look at blindspots and, more importantly, how to avoid them.

You’re driving along, everything is just swell, but something going on up ahead alerts you to the need to change lanes. You cautiously check the left and right mirrors, even look over your shoulders, and hit your change signal (we hope) before making your move. Your car glides over. A screeching blare of a horn snaps you back into your lane. Where did they come from?, you demand to know. You calm yourself as you retreat, waiting for your next opportunity to make a move.

You’ve just experienced a blindspot, an area that was occupied by something you just did not see and prevented you from making your move. Careers are also fraught with blindspots though, in many cases, they are self-created, producing obstacles that prevent us from moving over or getting ahead. How do you decrease blindspots? The short answer: Better self-awareness.

The Johari Window Model is a good place to start in learning how to illuminate your blindspots. From, Businessballs.com, like a four-paned “window”, the Johari Window Model is comprised of the following:

1. What is known by the person about him/herself and is also known by others - open area, open self, free area, free self, or 'the arena'
2. What is unknown by the person about him/herself but which others know - blind area, blind self, or 'blindspot'
3. What the person knows about him/herself that others do not know - hidden area, hidden self, avoided area, avoided self or 'facade'
4. What is unknown by the person about him/herself and is also unknown by others - unknown area or unknown self

Let’s say you have not been very successful in landing the right job. You’ve been on a few interviews, the interviewers were pleasant and encouraging, you possess all the necessary skills, yet there’s not been any offer. You might just be operating in a blindspot, where the interviewers are seeing something you don’t. A good way to uncover your blindspots is to ask a friend or relative for an objective assessment of your interviewing style. Role-play. Behave as you would in an interview. Attempt to break the ice, establish rapport, or not, present your qualifications, ask questions about the job … anything you would ordinarily do in an interview. You may come to find that your nervousness overshadows your ability to discuss your accomplishments, perhaps you laugh at inappropriate times, or your questions reveal you have not done much research on the hiring organization. I once interviewed a young woman who, upon entering my office, plopped her handbag directly on top of my desk, followed by an attitude of arrogance. I don’t recall the specifics of her work capabilities but I certainly remember that handbag on my desk; that, and that she was not offered the job.

If you’re not hiring a resume writer, why judge a candidate based on how well their resume is written?

Let’s say you have an opening for a salesperson. You post an ad detailing the duties, responsibilities, and necessary qualifications. Candidates respond and you review resumes in anticipation of finding that right-fit person. As you begin sifting through the resumes you begin to get discouraged. The words on the paper are flat, uninspiring, and dull. One candidate writes:

“Responsible for generating $2 million per year in sales for the past five years. Exceeded quota by 5% for 4 out of 5 years. Awarded top salesperson.”

Ugh. “Responsible for” is so 20th century. There’s just not much energy behind these words. Then you come across another candidate’s resume. It reads:

“Catapulted sales to more than $2 million per year for four straight years, knocking out competition, and consistently surpassing peers”.

Wow. Catapulted? Knocking-out competition? Consistently surpassing? Power words. This person obviously has the joie de vivre your company has been looking for. Quick. Grab a phone and set up an interview before this person is off the market.

I am shaking my head in disbelief as I think and write about this. The accomplishments of the two “candidates” are very nearly identical. However, and this is a BIG however, the first “candidate” could likely be the better bet for the organization. Why, you may ask? Because the first candidate is specific in the percentage over quota attained with that percentage a quantifiable number: 5% of $2 million = $100,000. This ain’t chicken feed. It also signals to the hiring company the candidate’s understanding of the necessity of providing concrete sales numbers. Ask any sales manager or CFO.

The plethora of blogs and websites out there on resume writing, while they offer good formatting tips and remind job hunters of the importance of a resume being error free, are placing way too much importance on job candidates choosing one word over the other to attain maximum readability impact for human resources staff or hiring managers. Are the resumes intended to inform or entertain?

Companies would be wise to start looking past resume hyperbole and at a candidate’s ability to deliver to company goals. After all, isn’t that the whole point in hiring? If you don’t believe me, ask yourself just how many of the top performing people in your company are great writers? My bet would be few. The fact of the matter is, if you aren’t looking to hire a writer, why are you deciding who gets the interview based on who has the most well written resume?

When the going gets tough, the intention needs to get harder

At a store the other day, I saw a commercially packaged St. Joseph’s statue that promises to have property sell fast when the statue is buried in the ground outside. Having a (lovely, like brand-new) townhouse for sale at the moment, in another state, and with ‘nary a bite, seeing the statue at the store had me considering if its power is real (and if I should buy it). I’d heard the tales but have never seen any proof. It didn’t escape me, however, to think how the planting of a St. Joseph’s statue in the yard is a lot like intention but with a dose of divine intervention.

We’ve all been there, when what we’re sellin', just ain’t movin’and divine intervention is about the only thing that will help. So, we hustle a little bit more, convinced that if we just keep putting “it” out there, “it” will finally arrive. Still, nada. At that point, I think a lot of people give up. They take jobs that aren’t right for them, they drop out of school convinced a degree won’t make any difference … they flat out stop intending.

If you aren’t aware of the story behind the discovery of King Tut’s tomb, pay close attention. Five years of work in the Valley of Kings in Egypt had netted archeologist, Howard Carter, absolutely nothing despite his unwavering belief that he was close to finding the tomb. It was not until his final season that he happened upon one of the world’s greatest archeological treasures – the intact tomb of King Tutankhamun. The moral of the story here, of course, is that if you stay on track and keep your intentions focused, while understanding that not everything happens when you want, the pay-off may be much greater than even you had expected. Perhaps I shouldn’t lower the price on that townhouse just yet.

Is the employee high potential, high maintenance, or both?

Yesterday, at a local chapter meeting of the American Society for Training and Development in Ft. Lauderdale, a panel speaker discussed the importance of organizations nurturing their high potential employees. Certainly, most would agree. Where there may be some confusion, however, is in how an organization goes about identifying a high potential employee.

Many of us are familiar with the “halo effect” in which favorable performance-related characteristics – ambitious, honest, savvy, to name a few – are attributed to an employee because the person is nice or likes us. Perhaps, in some instances, these are accurate assessments. When they are not, a manager may succumb to categorizing a “nice” employee as being high potential while the employee who is demanding, forthright, and exacting, but who adds considerable value to an organization, is considered high maintenance and, thus, having low potential. While the former evokes warm and fuzzy feelings toward the employee, the latter is typically a love-hate relationship because organizations love what this employee produces but hates having to deal with their personality or demands.

Don’t despair if you’re trying to decide if an employee has potential, is a pain, or both. Read Katherine Graham Leviss’ article, High-Maintenance Employee: Why Your Best People Will Also Be Your Most Difficult ... and What You Can Do About It.

The Power of Your Intentions: Creating an Intention Statement

Companies have mission statements to guide directors, managers, and employees in making decisions, interacting with employees, customers, and vendors, producing quality goods and services, and their involvement and contributions to the communities in which they operate. The mission statement is representative of the values an organization’s leadership hopes all of its stakeholders will adopt. Popular theory suggests that people should also develop their own mission statement as a guide in conducting their lives. While this is a good idea, in crafting your career, an Intention Statement is more powerful.

Scholars, scientists, clergy, and coaches all know the power of intention. Plain and simple, intention is an energy force that puts into action the events necessary to achieve a goal. Most of us have personal experience with intention and goal attainment and yet we don’t hesitate to dismiss intention whenever we feel blocked. Enter the Intention Statement. By writing down (this is a very important step in the process) what you intend to have happen, that energy is transmitted outside of yourself to begin attracting the circumstances you need to realize what you want to accomplish. Where intentions fail an individual is if the person is hazy on what they want. Think of intention as a radio signal. Muddled transmission equals muddled reception.

Below are some intention statements to help you in developing your own roadmap to the career you desire:

1. To employ my skills, talents, ability, and passion in a position that facilitates developing others to achieve their goals.

2. To work with an organization that respects, encourages, and develops its employees to their fullest.

3. To engage in challenging work that is always pushing me to the next level.

4. To be inspired by the product or service my organization produces.

5. To be able to engage with others around the world to acquire new ways of thinking and acting so I may pass this new knowledge along to others.

6. To work with an organization that is above-board and forthright in their dealings with employees, clients, and vendors.

7. To be fairly compensated for my experience, knowledge, and performance.

Read a great article here on the power of making statements of intention.

Pay now, pay later. Either way, you're going to pay.

The other day, I was listening to money guru, Jean Chatzky, on XM radio, talking with Ben Sherwood, and author of, The Survivors Club: The Secrets and Science That Could Save Your Life. Sherwood’s book is about human longevity and the behaviors people engage in to lengthen or cut short their lives.

One interesting concept of his: Low cost/high impact behaviors. In an era of buy low, sell high, at first glance this would appear to be a good strategy. As it turns out, this is only good when buying stock or real estate; not the way one should conduct their career.

An example of a low cost/high impact behavior is not buying life insurance. Not buying life insurance – even though you know you’re gonna’ die – has a high impact consequence; the same for not saving money, eating lots of fried food … even lying. All the stuff that one day might come back to haunt you.

How to tell if you have a low cost/high impact career?

Investing time in a job for the here and now is a lot like buying new shoes instead of putting that money in the bank. You can enjoy the shoes today, but the money you spent is gone forever while, eventually, the shoes wear out. To reduce your upfront costs in your career, you can skip the school route, take any job offered just to pay the bills, and remain unchallenged, but if this is not the job that literally catapults you out of bed each morning, you are risking paying an even bigger price later on. Low cost/high impact.

As I repeatedly remind my youngest stepson, and he will attest to this, the mantra I like to live by is: You can pay today or pay tomorrow, but either way you’re going to pay. It works with your health, savings, and your career. Like Benjamin Franklin’s fascination with accrued interest on savings, I am equally fascinated by the concept of how everything in life adds up.

By not investing in your career in obtaining the necessary education, attending helpful seminars, or waiting for that right opportunity to come along, even if it means there are sacrifices to be made in the process, you miss out on having the opportunity to fully realize what you are capable of doing.

Marianne Williamson's 'Our Deepest Fear'

There are certain people in your life who have the capacity to instill hope, or reaffirm belief, that each of us has the ability to live an intentional life. These are the people most important to pay attention to for their personal power is not superficial or vain but comes from a place, seemingly, outside of them.

In a moving conversation yesterday with one of those people, I had occasion to recall Marianne Williamson's , Our Deepest Fear. Today, it is appropriate that it be her words that speak the sentiment of intent:

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”

Do you know the times of day you are at your best?

When we talk about a biological clock, we often think in terms of a woman’s limited time to reproduce. This definition is not so far afield when we compare this to the hours in the day when we are most apt to produce our best work.

I hadn’t given this topic much thought until a former boss asked me for my assistance on a project. He prefaced the request by asking what hours of the day I felt I was most creative. It didn’t take much time for me to answer as I know my optimum performance occurs from early morning to noon, subsides for approximately 3 hours, and is followed by another peak period that runs through 10-11 PM. During these times, I am at my best, with clarity of thought and vision, able to produce solutions to complex problems, am more optimistic, and, though some may disagree, feel I write better. Lest you think I may be napping during my lower performance period, in actuality, this is when I try to do other activities that still need to be done (i.e., make/return phone calls, drive, file, lunch, etc.) but don’t require maximum brain power to accomplish. Think of this in terms of best managing your time.

A number of employers are beginning to recognize the importance of crafting work schedules to take advantage of the timeframes in which employees do their best work. Researchers conducting studies on links between employee behavior and flexible work hours resulted in an employee’s greater commitment to their employer and higher job satisfaction. Read more on this subject. While there is discussion as to who is behind the 8 am – 5pm workday and why it was set-up that way, employers – and their employees – may actually reap greater benefits when employees are encouraged to work when they are most productive.

Mind your thoughts

Do you think that what you think is nothing more than just thoughts, that once thought, the thoughts vanish into nothingness? If so, think again.

Researchers are now discovering what Deepak Chopra and other notables have been saying all along: Thoughts are energy. And, as any energy source, it prompts a reaction. Mind you, the body makes no distinction between good and bad thoughts but merely processes thought. Just think about the last time you really wanted to achieve something. I venture that if you had invested your thoughts on how to get what you thought about, it likely appeared. On the other hand, if you thought about all the reasons why you could not achieve your goal, did not deserve it, or that it was merely impossible to achieve, it probably didn’t show up.

How can this help you in intending a career? Spend time thinking about the kind of work that makes you happy. What does a day-in-the-life-of-you look like when doing this work? Do you work at a big or small organization? Do you get to be creative? Are your co-workers formal or relaxed? Suits or jeans? Get specific. Only when your thoughts are really specific are you able to channel that energy (your thoughts) into a career that is perfect for you.

Know that there’s science behind the energy of our thoughts. Read Alexander Lee’s article, Mind-Body Connection Part I: Our Thoughts Can Affect our Health.

Employee offboarding just as important as onboarding

There is a lot of discussion these days about new hire onboarding. Most managers and HR personnel agree that how an employee is brought into the organization determines the employee’s success with the organization. If the employee is warmly welcomed, instructed, and guided, the organization will likely get a glowing review. If not, word can spread quickly and, perhaps, jeopardize chances with future prospective employees. But just as a company’s onboarding practices can elevate or diminish organizational reputations, so can their offboarding practices.

Of course, there are tales of wild employee firings and resignations in which HR staff and managers are caught off-guard and have little time to react but those separations are the exception. In today’s mobile workforce, employees leaving a company are commonplace so that companies have no excuse for not being prepared when an employee leaves.

While many employers understand that offboarding an employee generally entails retrieving company property and issuing COBRA and HIPPA forms, few take this as an opportunity for the company to learn why an employee wants to leave. After all, if an employee is satisfied with their company, they wouldn’t leave. This means there is a deficiency somewhere in the organization and a carefully executed offboarding plan can help uncover this information.

There will be times that no matter how fantastic an organization, an employee wants or needs another challenge, more money, or to just try something new. These situations cannot always be remedied. It is when an employee is leaving because they are dissatisfied – with management, conditions, lack of opportunity – that a good offboarding plan can help the organization learn.

To learn more about effective offboarding practices, read Elizabeth Galatine’s, Off-boarding market opportunities grow as more employees are let go.

What your boredom tolerance may be telling you - and employers

A friend who runs his own hair salon tells me that he now wants to be a t-shirt vendor on the island of St. Maarten in the Caribbean during the months his business is slow. Aside from posing problems for his year-round salon customers – after all, who will be taking care of them of them while he is off hawking souvenir shirts to tourists? – this raises another question: Are we only supposed to have one career?

In an earlier post, I wrote about the need to specialize in something if you are to be successful. Orville Redenbacher, of popcorn fame, once said the same thing. But, what happens when you have a number of interests and abilities? If exploring each of them, does this pigeonhole you as a jack-of-all-trades and master of none? Can that limit your career opportunities? Jack Ferris’ article, The Top 5 Reasons to be a Jack of all Trades, gives strong support for not honing in on one specific career – boredom being chief among them. I am not yet ready to reverse my stance on specialization but it seems that if boredom is what drives employees to seek other career adventures, then should organizations do something to keep things revved up a bit – especially if they value that employee who likely will become bored?

Corporate types may view people who are easily bored as not being able to focus on the task at hand. Like elementary schools, however, organizations are often operated to support the weakest student, not the highest performing. High performers who can rapidly process information, quickly arrive at sound decisions, and are always future thinking, are seen as agitators, troublemakers, and high maintenance. I can say, unequivocally, that this is probably true. (OK, so I give myself a little latitude here.) Ironically, though, these personal attributes are what companies typically look for when hiring but are aghast when the employee actually fulfills the prophecy.

There may not be a happy medium in this case, with organizations trying to keep things running on an even keel while employees are looking to broaden their horizons. (Perhaps I could have fit in one more cliché?) If you find you are one of those people who becomes easily bored, take heart. As Ferris reminds, “Lack of intellectual stimulation, not superlative material wealth, is what drives us to depression and emotional bankruptcy. Generalizing and experimenting prevents this, while over-specialization guarantees it”.

The significance of Gianni: A reminder of the power of flow.

Gianni is my beautiful and intelligent niece. Currently finishing up an undergrad degree before going onto her doctorate work in Psychology/Criminal Justice, Gianni reminds me that, sometimes, we all, even the ones making claims, need to be reminded of our own messages. In a recent email from my lovely niece, she recalled something I said to her many years ago …

She writes, “… you always told me that whatever I do in life, to make sure that I absolutely love it!! I think you called it something, anyway, you said I would know what it is when I get so wrapped up in it, that time seems to disappear, and I become transformed into this tunnel-vision that puts me on this whole other level. You told me that was my passion and I should follow it”.

She is writing about being in the state of flow. Author Mihaly Csikzentmihalyi defines and elaborates on this concept in his book, Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience. In flow, time is suspended and work is seemingly effortless. It also signifies that we are on the right track in doing what we are intended to do. Unfortunately, we sometimes find that our circumstances – or fears – keep driving us to work that we will never, ever be immersed in or committed to. This is a cautionary tale, then, for those who wish to jam square pegs into round holes as a means to simply make a living. If this is the case, optimal experiences will be few and far between and that certainly isn’t a life.

Why do so many avoid living in a flow state? It may be because of the perceived sacrifices this conjures, especially if the career you truly need produces a different lifestyle than you now enjoy. This is how the term, golden handcuffs, came about; people locked into jobs they dislike but do it because it generates a nice lifestyle. That’s fine if attaining a particular lifestyle is your only goal. I prefer, however, to believe people are looking for that right fit career where flow is not just an occasional experience but a lifetime of total immersion and governed by their own standards. As Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (1990) wrote:

The solution is to gradually become free of societal rewards and learn how to substitute for them rewards that are under one's own powers. This is not to say that we should abandon every goal endorsed by society; rather, it means that, in addition to or instead of the goals others use to bribe us with, we develop a set of our own.

Who is responsible for your learning?

You may be thinking the obvious – you, right? As much as I believe everyone is accountable for their on-going learning, there is another dimension to the learning process when it comes to learning within an organization.

When working at Security Associates International, one of my chief requirements for new salespeople was for them to attend the same training as the company’s alarm monitoring staff. This training was for front-line personnel who answered and dispatched on alarm calls. It was also the very essence of the service that was sold. After salespeople completed training, I would administer a test to see what they retained as well as what they did not. This ensured that, once out there on their own, they would not be misrepresenting the services sold. To me, conducting the training this way seemed pretty elementary. Test to verify and make corrections where needed. Not all managers agree with this process. I think of the number of times I have received training or was availed of online learning tools and no one checked my comprehension or, in some cases, if I had even accessed the online learning tools that were available.

According to the American Society for Training and Development, in 2008, companies spent $58.5 billion on training. These are not small potatoes. Managers who hope for the best in training without verifying are missing some real opportunities for engaging employees and seeing them through to success. Read Jeffrey Berks’ article, The Manager's Responsibility for Employee Learning, to learn why it is essential that managers pay close attention to employee learning.

What does Doctors Without Borders have to do with career intentions?

In a blog about career intent, it may seem out-of-place to discuss an organization such as Doctors Without Borders. It is not that DWB isn’t a good and admirable place to have a career (not to mention, my favorite organization) but I am writing about them today because of the people they serve.

Be thankful for choices.

No doubt, in the U.S., there is higher than usual unemployment, many companies have all but stopped hiring, and everyone who is looking for work has even lots more to contend with than they did only a short time ago. But, if you put it all into perspective, you may realize just how far ahead of the game you actually are.

In perusing the Doctors Without Borders' website recently, I was overwhelmed by the catastrophes, civil unrest, disease, and maltreatment that citizens throughout the world endure and DWB staff and volunteers confront on a daily basis. One of the chief reasons I support DWB is because, unlike us, the people they serve don’t have choices. These people aren’t just out of work or looking for a fulfilling career. For many, they are stuck in Maslow’s first hierarchal need – basic survival – and they will likely be at this level until the day they die. They are born into war, violence, and poverty, living their lives under dictators and murderers. Getting a new job will not be the answer to their problems.

All of this got me thinking about the stress and frustration any one of us may feel when finding ourselves working for the wrong company, our work is dull, or we don’t feel fulfilled. When considering moving out or on, you may experience trepidation even though you know you must if you are ever to realize your career aspirations. If this is ever the case, that you feel fear in the face of pursuing the career that is right for you, I invite you to spend a few minutes reading some of the stories on the web pages at Doctors Without Borders. I promise that your perspective on the choices you have and the ability to do something about making those changes will not feel so insurmountable after all.