Success Tweet: Focus on what you are becoming. This helps you believe in yourself and builds your confidence. Confidence is important to your success.
I love the idea of “becoming.”
It’s really a positive concept, and it’s similar to a couple of the ideas in The Optimist Creed. The sixth point of The Optimist Creed says, “Forget the mistakes of the past and press on to the greater achievements of the future.” The ninth point says, “Give so much time to the improvement of yourself that you have no time to criticize others.”
Tweet 41 in Success Tweets and points six and nine in The Optimist Creed reinforce one of my career success coach points – success is a journey, not a destination. Keep moving forward in your life and you’ll succeed.
I’m going to be 60 this year and I keep learning, growing, and moving forward. To celebrate my 60th birthday, I will be releasing three new books and a home study course on life and career success this year. I am becoming a better career success coach because of my writing and my blogging. But I’m nothing compared to Peter Drucker. He wrote 39 books in his long and distinguished life and career – two thirds of them were written after he was 65 years old.
“Becoming” is not a function of age. It’s a function of your willingness to look ahead and see the opportunities life brings your way – and then to act on them. Take it from a career success coach. When you focus on what you are becoming, you will be building the life and career success you want and deserve. Keep becoming and you will succeed. I guarantee it.
I like the idea of “becoming” so much because it gets at the idea all of us can always become something more, no matter our age, or our previous successes or failures. There is always more to do, more to accomplish, a way to become more remarkable.
Becoming and thinking go hand in hand. Your thoughts determine what you will become. It’s true -- you become what you think about most. That means that the quantity and quality of the life and career success you will achieve will be in direct proportion to the size of your thoughts. If you allow your mind to be dominated by trivial matters, your achievements are likely to be unimportant.
If you discipline yourself to think about things important to your life and career success, you will achieve great things. Take my career advice; keep up with what’s new in your field and with what’s going on in the world.
Create a list of good ideas that you can use anytime you are searching for a creative solution to a problem. Remember, people with small minds think and talk about other people. People with medium sized minds think and talk about things. People with great minds think and talk about ideas.
The common sense career success coach point here is simple. Build your life and career success by focusing on what you are becoming. Career success is a journey, not a destination. Treat it that way.
Use the career advice in Tweet 41 in Success Tweets, “Focus on what you are becoming. This helps you believe in yourself and builds your confidence. Confidence is important to your success.”
Commit to taking personal responsibility for your life and career. Set high goals, then do whatever it takes to meet or exceed them. React positively to the setbacks, problems and negative people and events in your life. Keep at it. Don’t let a day when you come back empty handed in your quest for building a remarkable life and career get you down. Get up the next day with optimism in your heart, focused on what you are becoming and keep working.
If you would like a copy of The Optimist Creed to frame and hang in your office, go here and enter your name and e-mail address.
Building career success image from Shutterstock
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Is your job search turning into a grind with no end in sight? It may be time to take a step back and reevaluate your entire approach.
In cold weather climates, the beginning of spring is a time to clean the house and get organized—a practice known as spring cleaning. Through the years, spring cleaning has taken on a larger meaning with people using the time to organize and declutter things in their lives.
For professionals on the job hunt, a little spring cleaning (metaphorically speaking) could be a great way to reinvigorate your job search. Here are a few strategies your job search spring cleaning should include.
Reevaluate Your Job Search Approach
BigstockMake a list of the last handful of jobs you applied for and see if you can identify any positive or negative trends. Consider things like:
- How did I learn about this job?
- How did I apply for the job?
- Did I earn an interview?
- What was the ultimate result?
A lot can be learned about your job search approach just by answering these questions and identifying patterns. For example:
Negative Trends
You discovered five jobs through job boards, applied to all of them via the job boards, and never heard back from any of them.
The common pattern here is applying through job boards. This isn't to say that job boards don't serve a purpose in the job search process, but they have their limitations, and you can't run your job search entirely off of them. When you apply through a job board, there's a good chance that your materials will never get past the applicant tracking system (ATS) and never be seen by an actual person.
One simple fix is to research who the hiring manager or recruiter is that posted the position and email your materials to them directly.
The more efficient fix would be to take a proactive approach by putting together a bucket list of companies that you want to work for and start making connections on LinkedIn with people who work at those companies. You may already know some people who work there or have connections that can refer you to some individuals.
This is a great way to network your way onto a company's radar.
Positive Trends
You applied to three jobs via referral, were invited to two job interviews, and made it through multiple rounds of interviews for one of the jobs before being passed over for someone with a little more experience.
The pattern here is that getting referred to a job by a professional acquaintance is a great way to land a job interview. This indicates that you're leveraging your network well and you should continue to focus on your networking efforts.
The next step is to review the interview process and determine what went well and what needs to be improved. Sometimes the interviewer will provide feedback, and that feedback can be valuable. However, not everyone is comfortable with giving feedback.
Chances are you probably have a good idea about areas of improvement and the skills you need to gain. Put together a plan for addressing those shortfalls.
The good news in making it deep into any interview process is that it indicates that the company likes you as a potential employee (even if the timing just wasn't right) and the experience could be a roadmap to a job with that company at a later date, or another similar opportunity elsewhere.
Give Your Resume & Cover Letter Some Much-Needed Attention
BigstockAre you continuously sending similar resumes and cover letters to each job opening with only minor adjustments? If so, your strategy needs some serious spring cleaning.
Let's start with resumes!
Every resume should be tailored to the position in order for it to stand out to recruiters and hiring managers. It may seem like a lot of work, but it's actually less work than submitting the same resume over and over again and never hearing back.
The reason why it's so important to tailor your resume is that throughout your career, you acquire numerous skills, but the job you're applying for may only be focusing on 6-8 of those skills. In that case, those skills must rise to the top of the resume with quantifiable examples of how you successfully used those skills at previous jobs.
Remember, recruiters go through hundreds of resumes. They need to be able to tell from a quick glance whether or not you're a potential candidate for the position.
While updating your resume, you could also spruce up your LinkedIn profile by highlighting the skill sets that you want to be noticed for by recruiters.
As for writing a good cover letter, the key to success is writing a disruptive cover letter. When you write a disruptive cover letter, you're basically telling a story. The story should focus on how you connect with the particular company and job position. The story could also focus on your personal journey, and how you got to where you currently are in your career.
If your resumes and cover letters aren't unique, now is the time to clean things up and get on track.
Build Your Personal Brand
Just because you're looking for work doesn't mean that you don't have anything to offer. Use previous career experiences and passions to build your personal brand.
Ask yourself, "How do I want other professionals to view me?"
Pick an area of expertise and start sharing your knowledge and experience with your professional network by pushing out content on your LinkedIn and social media accounts. Good content can include blogs, social media posts, and videos.
By sharing content about your experiences and passions, you slowly build your personal brand, and others will start to notice. The content could lead to good discussions with others in your network. It could also lead to reconnecting with connections that you haven't spoken to in years, or making new connections.
You never know when one of these connections could turn into a job lead or referral. The trick is to get on people's radars. So, when you're cleaning up your job search, be sure to build a plan for personal branding.
Maintain Healthy Habits During Your Job Search
BigstockYour job search is important, but it's even more important to know when to pull back and focus on personal health and spending time with family and friends.
There are actually things that you can do for your own enjoyment that could help your job search in the long run, such as:
- Grab coffee with a friend - It's good to engage in light conversation with friends during challenging times. And if your job search does come up, remember that most people have been through it themselves and you never know when a friend may provide you with a good idea or lead on a job.
- Volunteer - Volunteering is a great way to get involved in the community and help others. In addition, if you develop a little bit of a career gap while looking for a job, you can always talk about how you filled that time volunteering, if you're asked about it during a job interview.
- Continue to focus on other passions - Are you a fitness nut? Blogger? Crafter? Continue to do the things that bring you happiness. And if you're in a position to profit from your passion through a freelance job or side hustle, even better!
Spring is the perfect time to clean up and improve your job search so you can land the job you want. If you're struggling to find a job, follow the tips above to reinvigorate your job search—and watch your career blossom!
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This article was originally published at an earlier date.
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