Thoughts on people, teams, organizations, communities, effectiveness and success
As my 7 year-old son Traylor periodically reminds me, it’s tough to wait.
This morning’s challenge was one under-ripe mango: serving it for breakfast when he was ready but it wasn’t still meant it didn’t taste so hot.
It can be just as tough to wait in the employment constellation we call jobs and careers. Sometimes you’re ready, but the job is not – and sometimes you’re not ready, but the job is.… Read the rest
Like sprinters accelerating after the blast of a starter’s gun, this week marks for some a rush to get things going toward a new job, a new employer, and/or a new career. The New York Times, for example, has a piece yesterday called Getting Back in Shape for the Job Chase. There is a reason the we feel this way: it’s a New Year and that implies a new start.… Read the rest
I had lunch with Littler Mendelson’s Lindbergh Porter today, an early Thanksgiving of sorts.
Seeing him reminded me that career choices and life opportuniities come to us in all sorts of ways and at times both convenient and awkward. Each choice you make has some consequence, both foreseen and unknown.
Lindbergh and I had worked together in the ’90’s when I was his client as an SVP of Human Resources.… Read the rest
Signs of a slow recovery abound which should mean that some form of job uptick will occur. While it’s pretty clear that a rising economic tide will not lift all ships – some jobs, for example, are likely lost forever – the 18-month logjam in the job market appears to be breaking up.
The question for many, as people start to take new jobs with other companies, and their jobs and other jobs as well start to open up, is easy: Stay or go?… Read the rest
Some people plan all their lives to become a senior executive – and it never happens. Others, through talent, timing, hard work, and or luck, become one though it was not something they sought, or even to which they aspired.
What will be in your future?
I think of these latter types of folks as “accidental execs.” I should know – I’ve been one as a Senior Vice President of Human Resources with a US Fortune 15 corporation – and any career planning behind the occurrence is as precise as the path of a butterfly on a warm, windy San Francisco day.… Read the rest