Daily Leap Career Video of the Week: 2 Habits of Successful People

Each week we present our Daily Leap Career Video of the Week. The video we share presents news or advice related to career development, searching for a job, the economy and employment, and other career-related topics.

In the video below, author and coach Brian Tracy discusses two important habits of successful people and how developing these habits can set you apart in your career and workplace.

High 5 Weekly Career Transitions Roundup: Stop Sabotaging Your Success!

This is our weekly roundup of some of the best career-related articles, interviews, blogs, etc., we've read during the week. We share them so you have some great resources to prepare you for the coming week. Enjoy!

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• 4 Ways to Stop Sabotaging Your Success: "No matter how skilled you think you are at dividing your attention, you really are more effective when you focus. Don’t jump ahead or try to do it all at once in an effort to save time. You’ll feel more accomplished, building momentum you need to go onto the next task, if you complete just one task at a time."


• Tips for Being Super-Productive When Working from Home: "Set limits and focus on time sensitive projects first. It is also important to schedule more important tasks at the time of day when you are most productive. Tune into your body and learn when you are most alert and concentrated."


• Empathy is Key to a Great Meeting: "Empathy is a competency that allows you to read people. Who is supporting whom? Who is pissed off and who is coasting? Where is the resistance? This isn’t as easy as it seems."


• Keys to Overcome Fear and Do Better at Work: "To dare risk jumping out of your comfort zone changes the way people respond to you ... That changes the way you see yourself."


• When a Co-worker Becomes Your New Boss: "Use this as an opportunity to clean up your behavior. Ditch the jealousy, and look to your new manager as a role model. How is she delivering on what the company values?"

5 Keys to Career Happiness

Are you happy with your career? Unfortunately, many of us spend a great deal of time and energy

complaining about our job or our boss to anyone who will listen.

Instead of complaining let's consider 5 keys to job satisfaction and career happiness.

1. Your work is meaningful. The company you work for and the position you fill helps to bring value to the world. In other words, your work is not unethical or promotes products or services that do harm.

2. You have work-life balance. The job you do allows you time to relax with family, engage with your hobbies, and does not cause you to be in a constant state of stress.

3. You are fairly compensated. This is obvious but you'll feel better about your work if you feel that you are valued and paid appropriately for the value you bring to your job.

4. You have valuable relationships at work. Many long-lasting friendships start as co-worker relationships. It's much easier to enjoy your job if you enjoy those you work with.

5. You have opportunities to advance and develop your skills. It's easy to feel stuck in a job or career if we see no opportunity to advance or move up. A satisfying job allows you to continually grow, learn, and develop.

Consider these keys to help evaluate your current situation and determine whether it's time to change your job or change your attitude.

Daily Leap Career Video of the Week: Entering the Job Market or Looking for Something New?

Each week we present our Daily Leap Career Video of the Week. The video we share presents news or advice related to career development, searching for a job, the economy and employment, and other career-related topics.

In the following video, OWN TV co-president Erik Logan offers guidance for those entering the job market for the first time or anyone looking for something new.

“Be passionate about what it is you’re doing and really embrace it,” Logan says. Watch the video below for more.
 

High 5 Weekly Career Transitions Roundup: 7 Myths about Success

This is our weekly roundup of some of the best career-related articles, interviews, blogs, etc., we've read during the week. We share them so you have some great resources to prepare you for the coming week. Enjoy!

© Bellemedia | Stock Free Images & Dreamstime Stock Photos

• 7 Myths about Success: "Success can be experienced every day in sharing a smile, completing a project, and serving someone. It's about thinking differently every day about life."


• Who Chose Your Career Path for You?: "You get to choose your career path and you also must choose. It’s your life, your path and your career. Who cares what your guidance counselor told you years ago or what your mom always wanted you to be?"


• 9 Tips for Making College and Career Choices: "If you've been working for just a few years and feel really relaxed and comfortable, then it’s time to shake it up. You should be in a constant state of learning—especially this early in your career."


• How to Stay Motivated While Working from Home: "While you should take advantage of professional networking websites, the important thing is to take these connections offline – especially when you don't have a regular routine that allows you to bump into colleagues in the elevator or chat up a potential new client while waiting in line to grab coffee."


• Are You Setting Your Sights Too Low?: "You need to keep in mind that a company often doesn't know exactly what kind of person it's looking for until it finds him or her."

6 Resources to Learn Something New

If your are looking to advance in your career, develop new skills, or learn something new

you are living in the golden age of free, online educational resources. You can learn just about anything for free online through many great resources or MOOCs (massive open online course). 

Below are 6 resources to get you started with enhancing your skills and knowledge for fun or to help you get that promotion.

1. The School of Life is "devoted to developing emotional intelligence through the help of culture." 

2. Coursera is an "education platform that partners with top universities and organizations worldwide, to offer courses online for anyone to take, for free." 

3. Codecademy is "teaching the world how to code." 

4. MIT OpenCourseWare is "a web-based publication of virtually all MIT course content."

5. Khan Academy"offers practice exercises, instructional videos, and a personalized learning dashboard that empower learners to study at their own pace in and outside of the classroom." 

6. Open Culture offers "high-quality cultural & educational media for the worldwide lifelong learning community." 

Do you have a resource to recommend?

Daily Leap Career Video of the Week: How to Find Fulfilling Work

Each week we present our Daily Leap Career Video of the Week. The video we share presents news or advice related to career development, searching for a job, the economy and employment, and other career-related topics.

In the following video, the School of Life suggests several keys to help one find meaningful and fulfilling work. The first step if to realize that anxiety and confusion about career choices is perfectly normal. Enjoy the video below and start on the path to a more fulfilling career.

High 5 Weekly Career Transitions Roundup: Standing Out in a Job Interview

This is our weekly roundup of some of the best career-related articles, interviews, blogs, etc., we've read during the week. We share them so you have some great resources to prepare you for the coming week. Enjoy!

© Bellemedia | Stock Free Images & Dreamstime Stock Photos

• Career Advice from Bill Murray: "You have to remind yourself that you can do the very best you can when you’re very, very relaxed. No matter what it is, no matter what your job is, the more relaxed you are, the better you are."


• 10 Ways to Make Career and Motherhood Work: "Rather than define success by external standards, look at your family. How are they doing? If they are happy and well adjusted, don’t get caught up in what you are supposed to do. And, in case you forgot, stop comparing."


• Standing Out in a Job Interview: "Note down before the interview two to three outcomes that will make the job successful. Select stories and experiences from your background that demonstrate you can deliver those characteristics."


• Tools for More Productive Meetings: "Taking good, searchable notes makes meetings much more valuable, and the right note-taking tool will make it easy for you to file your meeting notes with the project or topics they relate to."


• 4 Tips to Start Strong at Your New Job: "You should deliberately seek out company knowledge and your boss’s expectations in order to understand how things work and how you can add value."

4 Tips for Spring Cleaning Your Career

It's nearly spring and traditionally that is a time when some give their house a thorough cleaning and remove items that are no longer needed or require updating.

Here are 4 tips for spring cleaning your career:

1. Update your resume. Take a new, fresh look at your resume and remove anything unnecessary or outdated.

2. Update your skills. Perhaps your technology skills have fallen behind or you could benefit from some additional knowledge of your industry, now is a good time to evaluate this and find way for a skill or knowledge upgrade.

3. Refresh your contacts. Identify three to five professional contacts that you haven't spoken with in
a few months and reach out to them. In addition to providing an update on your work be sure to take a genuine interest in their activities.

4. Update your wardrobe. Be sure to dress the part and if that means some of your wardrobe has become outdated spend some time and money to upgrade your look. This can also help you feel more confident on the job or in a job search.

What suggestions do you have for spring cleaning your career?

 

Daily Leap Career Video of the Week: What Would You Do if You Weren't Afraid?

Each week we present our Daily Leap Career Video of the Week. The video we share presents news or advice related to career development, searching for a job, the economy and employment, and other career-related topics.

In the video below Sheryl Sandberg, COO of Facebook and author of Lean In, speaks with Oprah Winfrey about the three mistakes of working women, and urges everyone to ask: "what would you do if you weren't afraid?"

Check out the video below:

High 5 Weekly Career Transitions Roundup: How to Ask for a Raise

This is our weekly roundup of some of the best career-related articles, interviews, blogs, etc., we've read during the week. We share them so you have some great resources to prepare you for the coming week. Enjoy!

© Bellemedia | Stock Free Images & Dreamstime Stock Photos

• 5 Lessons to Make a Partnership Work: "Having a sense of shared community made us feel less lonely and uncertain about our choices."


• How to Cultivate Your Professional Relationships: "Make 'reconnect' files on your calendar that recur on a monthly basis. These remind you to reach out in a way as small as a call or email to say hello, see how they’re doing, send a pertinent article or ask how you can help them."


• Things You Must Never Reveal About Yourself at Work: "The last thing anyone wants to hear at work is someone complaining about how much they hate their job. Doing so labels you as a negative person, who is not a team player."


• How to Ask for a Raise: "First, and most important, are facts about your own unique contributions that bolster your case: money-saving efficiencies you implemented, results from a project you’ve just overseen, positive customer testimonials, or praise from higher ups."


• 11 Tips for Job Seekers on Twitter: "You can and should include a link to a personal website, social landing page or LinkedIn profile. Think about where you want people to learn more about you, and use the right link to send them there."

3 Tips for Building Up Your Resume

There is a lot of competition out there for jobs and job seekers need to find ways to stand out from the crowded field.

One important way to stand out is with a compelling resume highlighting skills, abilities, and experience that might be unique to you and particularly suited to the positions you are applying for.

Here are 3 tips to developing that "stand out" resume:

1. Learn a language. Many companies today are looking for employees that speak additional languages as they compete in a global marketplace. Take a class at a local community college, find a tutor, or learn a language through your library. Many community libraries offer free language-learning resources.

2. Start a blog. If you don't already blog you might consider starting one. You can set up one easily and inexpensively with wordpress, blogger, or tumblr. Pick a subject of particular interest to you or blog about one of your hobbies. Employers are interested in hiring people with good communication skills and blogging is one way for you to demonstrate these skills.

3. Teach a class. Another way to demonstrate your communication and leadership skills is to teach a class. You do not need to be affiliated with a school or have a specific degree to teach a class or a seminar. You simply need to be knowledgeable about a subject of interest to others. Many libraries, city recreation departments, churches, and continuing education programs at community colleges welcome community members to propose and lead a class.

These are just three ways to build up your resume. What other ideas do you have?

Daily Leap Career Video of the Week: 6 Ingredients to a Great Life

Each week we present our Daily Leap Career Video of the Week. The video we share presents news or advice related to career development, searching for a job, the economy and employment, and other career-related topics.

In the video below life coach Marshall Goldsmith presents six factors that contribute to having a great life, starting with maintaining good health. Check out the video for the other 5 ingredients.