Blog Archives

10 Must Have Networking Tips

27/2/2015

As we know that one of the keys to a successful career change is the willingness to create new connections, then consider these networking strategies.

Networking Protocol Tips

Don’t waste people’s time, make time with people when you have some clarity about what you want to know.
Know why you are meeting them, don’t rush to set up a meeting before you are clear what you want to talk about. If it’s an open ended fishing session be clear that they understand this too.
Be informed about who you are meeting (use LinkedIn, a great resource, and do an internet search)..... but don’t stalk them!
If you’re nervous about meeting new people, start small and practice with people who don’t intimidate you or you know from another context.
Ask for introductions to avoid cold calls, use your common connections as well as weak links.
Don’t assume your request is a burden for them. Most people are happy to help and talk about how they started and recommend who else to talk to.
Do a follow up and thank you and leave something such as a business card for future contact.
Pick up the coffee tab.
Consider the value of karma… help others along the way.
Remember it’s not just about you!

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“Connecting with people who share the same passions affirms you are not alone; that there are others like you and that, while many may not understand your passion, some do ... What matters … is having validation for the passion you have in common.”

A tribe is a safe place to share aspirations and anxieties, share ideas and encourage us to make the bold steps.

Test the waters to find your tribe and seek out the following:

Create collaborative communities through associations, co-working spaces, meet-ups
Work with mentors and coaches both in a formal and informal way
Create an informal advisory group and increase your networking through social media
Join LinkedIn, look at groups/forums and engage in discussions
Sign up for courses
The low entry cost of technology makes it much easier to start an idea and see its attraction with others, so use the medium to test ideas
Volunteer and assess your interest
Be an intern
Job shadow or temp in the job or role
Start a blog on a subject area and see what interest it creates, write for other blogs that are interested in those areas.

Time To Expand Your Network

Networking is the ability and willingness to build and maintain mutually beneficial relationships that support your goals. Resist the urge to do all your research online. Get out and talk to people in person.
Don’t assume you are being pushy or that networking will make you look desperate. Networks are personal webs and connections of people.

While it may be out of your comfort zone, we do recognise that for some people, networking does not come naturally. But remember networking is something you do now casually in many aspects of your life. From talking to your children’s friends parents, to meeting people at extended family gatherings.

Making connections is not about getting a job, (although it can be). It’s about extending the range and creating new possibilities, learning about new roles and other fields and identifying key people of influence.

Steps:

Identify the career areas that interest you,
Approach people in your network and ask for introductions to people who might be helpful in this search,
Set up phone calls and meet ups,
Aim of discussions is to learn as much as possible about the person’s experience in the role/sector and to get more names to talk to,
Learn and immerse yourself in the industry. Build up a new network, get future job leads, and make a decision about whether this is the area you want to move into.

Remember ‘your element or the zone’- that place where the noise is reduced, your confidence is high and the sprit to explore is evident. The aim is to find work that gives us flow, or where you are in your element. When talking to people about their jobs or careers that are of interest to you, ask them how they connected to their ‘inner zone’ to find meaning in their careers.

Want to read more?
There are also a number of references that you might be interested in following up as additional reading:

Marci Alboher The Encore Career Handbook: How to Make a Difference in the Second Half of Life

Herminia Ibarra Working Identity : Unconventional Strategies for Reinventing Your Career

Dr Ken Robinson The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything Penguin 2009

Dr Ken Robinson Finding Your Element: How to Discover Your Talents and Passions and Transform Your Life

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You're thinking of a career change..but not ready to jump?

26/2/2015

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Still not ready to jump? Try this interim approach from one of my favourite authors

Happiness Advantage or “Love The One You’re With”

Another myth that we often believe to be true: if you work hard, you will become successful and once you are successful, you’ll be happy. The only problem is that this formula is broken.

“The Happiness Advantage asks us to be realistic about the present while maximizing our potential for the future. It is about learning how to cultivate the mindset and behaviors that have been empirically proven to fuel greater success and fulfilment. It is a work ethic”.

The excellent reference by Shawn Achor builds an argument backed by ground-breaking research, that happiness and optimism actually fuel performance and achievement.

From the perspective of career transition is it applicable in a number of ways:

When you find yourself in a job or role that is not fulfilling, you need more than an escape plan. The ‘happiness advantage’ assists you to get valuable experience while still in these roles. Rather than grin and bear it, it’s about using these roles as a stepping stone to your next one. It builds on the work of Martin Seligman and helps us to consider our current roles in a new light.

It’s also a safety net. The financial risks of transitioning can be overwhelming and, for some, can result in inaction. It can also be a ready made network, a place to discuss and test ideas in an informal way.

The following seven principles help focus on values that can overcome obstacles, reverse bad habits and make the most of opportunities to reach our fullest potential, and are directly applicable to how we can transition across careers.

The Seven Principles

Shawn Achor has developed seven principles that are specific, actionable and proven patterns that predict success and achievement:

1.   The Happiness Advantage

Because positive brains have a biological advantage over brains that are neutral or negative, this principle teaches us how to retrain our brains to capitalize on positivity and improve our productivity and performance.

2.   The Fulcrum and the Lever

How we experience the world, and our ability to succeed within it, constantly changes based on our mindset. This principle teaches us how we can adjust our mindset (our fulcrum) in a way that gives us the power (the lever) to be more fulfilled and successful.

3.   The Tetris Effect

When our brains get stuck in a pattern that focuses on stress, negativity and failure, we set ourselves up to fail. The principle teaches us to retrain our brains to spot patterns of possibility, so we can see and seize opportunity wherever we look.

4.   Falling Up

In the midst of defeat, stress and crisis, our brains map different paths to help us cope. This principle is about finding the mental path that not only leads us up out of failure or suffering, but teaches us to be happier and more successful because of it.

5.   The Zorro Circle

When challenges loom and we get overwhelmed, our rational brains can get hijacked by motions. This principle teaches us how to regain control by focusing first on small, manageable goals, and then gradually expanding our circle to achieve bigger and bigger ones.

6.   The 20 Second Rule

Sustaining lasting change often feels impossible because our willpower is limited. And when willpower fails, we fall back on our old habits and succumb to the path of least resistance. This principle shows how, by making small energy adjustments, we can re-route the path of least resistance and replace bad habits with good ones.

7.   Social Investment

In the midst of challenges and stress, some people choose to bunker down and retreat within themselves. But the most successful people invest in their friends, peers and family members to propel themselves forward. This principle teaches us how to invest more in one of the greatest predictors of success and excellence – our social support network.

The Science of Happiness

So what is happiness? Shawn Achor says talk to a scientist and they’ll refer to it as ‘subjective well-being’, essentially the experience of positive emotions combined with deeper feelings of meaning and purpose.

So it makes sense if we apply this to happiness at work. As the data shows, happy workers have higher levels of productivity and overall perform better in leadership roles, taking less sick days and basically enjoying higher job security.

For those skeptics out there who are thinking ‘correlation is not causation’, just hold on for a few paragraphs.

Thanks to strides in positive psychology research, authors say conclusively that “study after study shows that happiness precedes important outcomes and indicators of thriving … In short, based on the wealth of data they compiled, they found that happiness causes success and achievement, not the opposite”.

Further, Shawn Achor believes happiness can improve our physical health, which in turn assists us to work faster and longer and hopefully this translates to being more productive. Research shows that unhappy employees take more sick days, staying home on average 1.25 days more per month or an extra 15 sick days per year.

Recent research has also indicated that happiness gives us a chemical edge. Positive emotions flood our brains with the feel good chemicals dopamine and serotonins. It also assists with our learning by organising new information and keeping the information accessible longer, enabling us to retrieve it later on.

This clearly translates into the workplace. Is this why Yahoo has an in-house masseur and Google engineers are encouraged to bring their dogs to work? Are these PR gimmicks or have these smart companies determined that cultivating this type of working environment helps give small bursts of worker happiness, resulting in creativity and innovation and, of course, a better bottom line?

Tips to capitalize on the happiness advantage

Shawn Achor has outlined a number of ways we can improve our mood and raise our happiness levels at work each day.

Lift your spirits by

Meditating – Monks who spend years meditating actually grow their left prefrontal cortex, the part most responsible for feeling happy.
Finding something to look forward to – just thinking about your favorite stuff and anticipating future rewards can increase your endorphin levels.

Finding something to look forward to – just thinking about your favorite stuff and anticipating future rewards can increase your endorphin levels.
Infusing positivity into your surroundings - think about surrounding your office with things that you know if you glance at them will give you a positive emotional hit. Or get 20 minutes outside in good weather to boost a mood. Similarly decrease the negative cues, watch less TV and avoid the news if this causes you distress.

Exercising - you did not hear it here first! Endorphins are released with any form of exercise, so just do it!

Spending money – on other people not on stuff. Really think about your spending habits, do you spend money on experiences with other people or just more stuff

Using your strengths – this book has explored at length the value of reconnecting with your natural or acquired strengths. Now it’s time to share them, giving you a burst of positivity.

Check out Shaun Achor on Ted talks at www.ted.com

Reference
Shawn Achor The Happiness Advantage: The Seven Principles that Fuel Success and Performance at Work, Virgin books 2010

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How do you know you're ready for a career change?

26/2/2015

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What are the signs that you're ready for a change?

Usually there’s a combination of signs and a set of reflections, challenges and frustrations that signal it’s time for change.

Do any of these resonate for you?

Burning Out
This group is categorised by feeling burnt out and feeling like you can’t keep up with the pace of life anymore. You want to get off the treadmill and catch your breath but you can’t work out what’s next until you figure out a way to slow down.

A Nagging Feeling
The group is categorised by having no idea what to do next but having a real sense that something has to change. You want to leap into something new but are fearful of making the wrong move and giving up a job that pays the bills and is adequate, even though you don’t love it.

A Dream Deferred
This group is categorised by always wanting to do something else - return to school, live in another country, work with animals, tap into your creative side. You’ve hit a time in your life where it begins to feel possible. It’s a second chance.

The End of the Line
This group is categorised by having been laid off, the business has dried up, and the field or technology has changed so significantly that now you can see you could become obsolete. At this point it’s just as hard to keep doing what you’ve always done than it would be to try something new. This is very common as recession and the GFC have decimated entire industries and we are witnessing a shift from manufacturing to a knowledge-based economy.

A Loss
This group is often categorised by a loss, a death of someone dear, a divorce, or by children leaving home (an empty nest). These kinds of events can be a catalyst for a change.

A Crisis of Conscience
This group is categorised by the feeling that you can’t continue what you’ve been doing any longer. It could come to a head and hit you suddenly or be like a slow burn over an extended period. You know there must be a better way to use your talents and earn a living.

Too Long in the Same Job
This group is categorised by being in the same job for over 20 years, and while you’re okay with the familiarity of being in the same job or one organisation, you are demotivated when your job becomes repetitive and you are not learning or growing.

The Side Benefits are Too Good
This group is categorised by staying in an unsatisfying job by finding excuses for avoiding the real issues and relying on the side benefits to keep you in the job. The side benefits could range from the salary package, to access to a gym, to the nice morning teas.

So how do you know you’re ready?

Do any of these scenarios resonate for you? Acknowledge this and let it help and drive you to the next stage.

You may find that while any or all of the drivers may be relevant for you, in the end:
You are just in the wrong place, e.g. the management /culture has changed in your place of employment and you need a new role in the same industry;
The industry has changed and you need to think about a change out of it but still use the same skill set;
You want to do something very different using different skills, talents and abilities; You want to reinvent yourself;
You may want to explore a number of interests simultaneously.

Want more reading?
How do you know when its time to change?
There are also a number of references that you might be interested in following up as additional reading.
- Marci Alboher The Encore Career Handbook: How to Make a Difference in the Second Half of Life
- Talane Miedaner Coach Yourself to a New Career , 7 Steps to Reinventing Your Professional
- Dr Ken Robinson The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything
- and of course... my book Sweet Spot Careers

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Digital technology empowering career change: A personal journey

13/2/2015

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I’m so old that I can remember typing pools.... No that’s not the tag line to my new stand up comedy routine. It’s a genuine reflection when asked to write about my experiences in digital technology over the past few years and the realisation of how far we have all come in such a short time.

Digital technology has changed the way we live and work. For me, the last ten years has been a time of empowerment facilitating many new career opportunities.

The article has been published in Australian Career Practitioner, Summer edition and is available through the generous support of the Career Development Association of Australia.

For your free copy click here

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Redesign Your Career Checklist

7/2/2015

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I'm interested in how we find ways to bring passion and curiosity into everyday lives. Embrace being restless, be inspired by others journeys and just have a go.

Above all I value the awake, curious and creative mind that cross pollinates ideas to join the dots and build new ideas.

10 Must Have Networking Tips

Find Your Tribe

You're thinking of a career change..but not ready to jump?

How do you know you're ready for a career change?

Digital technology empowering career change: A personal journey

Redesign Your Career Checklist

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