Job Independence

Job Independence simply stated comes from never having to be a slave to your work.  Whether that implies you are content being self-employed, not employed or a long timer at a job, your independence comes from calling your own shots and never having to feel restricted by anyone or anything.

You may think job freedom is a luxury for the rich or the famous and would not apply to you.  Think again.  Creating a career where you have the freedom to choose is your first step towards true emancipation.  Having the ability to decide what type of job you want and whether the one you have is good enough opens the gates to allow you to walk in or walk out of any job situation that may not be right for you.  Your career freedom comes from being able to pick and choose and from knowing that you can celebrate your job freedom by not working and going to school if that’s what you decide.

There are many people around the world who do not have the freedom of choice whether it’s in their job, their home or in their relationships. Realizing that you live in a time where flexibility, fluidity and the fact you can call your own shots is an honored tradition, gives you the courage and ability to take leaps where you may not have dared to jump before.

What does true Job Independence mean to you?  How do you value your ability to be free when it comes to your career choices and do you take full advantage of your options? As you move into 4th of July celebration mode, ask yourself a few questions to determine whether you truly possess job independence:

  1. Can I walk away at any time?:  Knowing that you are not trapped by your circumstances means you have a good sense of freedom when it comes to moving out  of a job that you no longer like or where you are not growing.  Most people stay at a job for financial reasons and because the fear in moving into a new position may be too overwhelming for them and they’d rather just stay where they are.  Nothing screams “prison” like being held hostage by your lack of career choices and to stay in a job you hate no matter how valid the reason.
  2. Can I say “no” to my work?   Complete freedom comes from being able to not only walk away from a situation that is not right for you but to be able to say “no” to work that is not to your liking.  How many people do you know that have that option?  You don’t need to rebel against the hierarchy in order to be heard, but being able to professionally assert yourself is the key to true job independence.
  3. Do I have true flexibility?  Choosing whether to stay with your job is one thing but do you have the freedom to come and go as you please at work and make your own schedule?  Having creative freedom in your work projects is as important to creating job independence as your ability to walk away from your job or to show up to work when you want.

Having job independence means you are not limited by your surroundings and you can make your way at any time and under any circumstances.  If you are lucky enough to have true job freedom, than you have much to celebrate this holiday!

Looking for a job?  Find us at www.greenlightjobs.com

Follow us on Twitter http://twitter.com/lisakayeglj

Follow greenlightjobs on Twitter http://twitter.com/greenlightjobs

And, on LinkedIn http://www.linkedin.com/pub/2/abb/50

 


Copyright © 2024 Lisa Kaye - HR & Business Consulting - The Career Rebel

Share This:

Creating Jobs Without Borders

One might think that if all else fails you might want to pack it up for another continent and look for a new job!  But what if it was you and not your job that needed new boundaries?  What if you were to decide just how far you needed to move in order to find the right opportunity?  We all get stuck from time to time thinking we can’t find a job outside of our chosen profession or an industry we’ve grown to love to hate. Not true for you or anyone else looking to make a radical career change.

You are able to set boundaries when it comes to your career choices.  Nothing needs to be where it is if it does not fit your needs or your future desires.  Setting borders around what you want and what you don’t when it comes to your career is as simple as making and sticking to your decisions.

Having a sense of what you want may be as easy as deciding what cities you’d like to consider living in from knowing that you are nor interested in a relocation or moving to another country.  Your career boundary is about picking and choosing situations and people that meet your career expectations.

You are who you want to be even if there are some days where you may feel like being someone else would be a whole lot easier.  Your career border provides you with some much needed guide posts to help you from veering too far off from your desired goal.  Figuring out your job desires means you are clear on what and where you want to be.

The road may be paved with many choices but setting the proper boundaries helps to eliminate any obstacles and distractions that might get in the way.  You are not supposed to panic every time a career obstacle pops up in your path.  Making the proper choices means you are ready and willing to take risks even when the borders are unclear.  Here are a few things to consider when establishing job border:

  1. Make a choice:  You may have lots of options available to you or you may be stuck on what to do next.  The first step in creating your job border is to define the boundaries of your desire and to make a decision on where you’d like to go.  Having a strong sense of self coupled with the desire to achieve certain goals will help you to establish the job borders you need in order to move ahead in your career.
  2. Pivot:   Knowing you will stumble on many distractions and lose your footing when it comes to staying the course is a given no matter how prepared you are when you venture out into the unknown job world. Having and maintaining your focus on your next career goal helps you to avoid unnecessary detours in an already crowded path.
  3. Charge to the Finish:  You may feel uncertain along the way about where you need to go when it comes to deciding and sticking to your career.  But when you have the end goal in site, there is nothing that should make you pause or hesitate when you are about to charge to the finish line.

When it comes to establishing your job border know that you are the only obstacle that can make or break your chances for success.

 Looking for a job?  Find us at www.greenlightjobs.com

Follow us on Twitter http://twitter.com/lisakayeglj

Follow greenlightjobs on Twitter http://twitter.com/greenlightjobs

And, on LinkedIn http://www.linkedin.com/pub/2/abb/50

 


Copyright © 2024 Lisa Kaye - HR & Business Consulting - The Career Rebel

Share This:

Job Purge

Like the movie of a similar name, wouldn’t it be great to have one night a year to purge your sins away without retribution?  What would it be like if you were to purge your job history in much the same way?  What if you were able to get rid of those job duties, internships, positions, you took because you had to not because you wanted to and you could erase them from your job history once and for all.  If you could get rid of some of the less flattering parts of  your job history what would you purge?

Proactively purging your job history is not meant to encourage you to lie or to misrepresent information on your resume.  You can “emphasize the positive and eliminate the negative” as the song states without recreating history. Learning how to spin your resume and eliminate the information that no longer helps promote your best skills and qualifications is part of your purge.  It’s not easy for some to weed out information from a resume, but learning how to determine what stands out from information that is repetitive will help make the process move more quickly.  You might need to engage the help of a professional or a friend to put a fresh perspective on what might seem like a given for you.  Emphasizing what is important from what is irrelevant helps you make sense out of an otherwise complicated mess of information.

Having the ability to objectively look at your self takes time and an honest point of view. Not everyone can decipher what is important from what is not when it comes to their job history.  Here are a few ways to look at your resume and help you purge what no longer tells the story you want everyone to hear:

  1. Wash, Rinse, Repeat:  Looking at your job history is like doing laundry, there is a cycle and process for everything. When you are unsure of what to include in your resume, make sure you are consistent in how you present your skills and accomplishments.  Keep in mind listing your accomplishments consistently means that you focus on only those goals, which are meaningful and measureable and you get rid of anything that is redundant or merely a “fun fact.”
  2. Simply Stated:  Including metrics such as revenue goals, staff size, departmental budget responsibility or how you may have increased or decreased key business measurements are important to include in your list of accomplishments.  By eliminating statements that are not supported by quantitative measures, you purge what is unnecessary and highlight what is important and meaningful to the business as a whole not just your specific job.
  3. Make It Pretty:  Formatting and layout of your resume is as important as the information that is contained within it.  Taking the time to eliminate unnecessary or inconsistent formatting signals that you are detail oriented and want to present your information in a clean and consistent way. No one likes to read a list of dates that don’t tie into position or company names.  If you have held more than one job in a company there is a right and a wrong way to list out the information to make it easy for the reader to follow.

When it comes to telling the story of how good you are, getting rid of irrelevant information, cleaning up your job progression or eliminating unrelated skills from your job history, helps you frame the story and makes the recruiter yearn for even more than the first page may hold.

Looking for a job?  Find us at www.greenlightjobs.com

Follow us on Twitter http://twitter.com/lisakayeglj

Follow greenlightjobs on Twitter http://twitter.com/greenlightjobs

And, on LinkedIn http://www.linkedin.com/pub/2/abb/50

 


Copyright © 2024 Lisa Kaye - HR & Business Consulting - The Career Rebel

Share This:

Career Baggage

Whether you are packing bags for a road trip or an overnight stay with a friend or rummaging through boxes you have stored in the garage from your past jobs, clearing away your career baggage is should not wait until spring cleaning!  We all keep things longer than we need or have to.  Maybe we think we’ll need something from our past one-day, or perhaps it’s just too hard to let go of items for sentimental reasons.  Hanging onto things including items from your past jobs, might seem like a nice idea at the time but can soon turn you into a career hoarder if you are not careful.

We all need to learn when it’s time to purge.  Cleaning out and clearing out are signs that you are making room for new experiences and opportunities to come into your life.  Whether you are giving up old ways of thinking or simply throwing out years of stored files that you will never use again, making room in your life for the new helps you eliminate career baggage and lighten the load for you to move forward freely.

Baggage comes in many forms not just the stuff that’s hidden away in storage or at the back of your desk drawer.  You may have stored away feelings of doubt and frustration over your career in a way that binds you to emotional baggage that weighs you down and makes it hard for you to move ahead.  Emotional baggage may be because you were turned down for a promotion, had a poor performance review or struggled with a co-worker or boss. You may have doubts about your communication skills or your ability to lead and manage and wonder whether you will ever get ahead in your career.

Career baggage can take many forms not just the physical stuff you hold onto but the emotional wounds that you won’t let heal.  Finding a way to let go of not only the material stuff but also the psychological stuff helps free you in ways you may not have imagined or even allowed.  Holding on prevents you from moving on when all you need to do is create some much needed space to allow you to see more clearly. Changing your perspective on things helps pave the way for new job opportunities that you can’t do when your view to the future is blocked with baggage from your past.  Knowing how to clear out the unnecessary from the necessary is your first step in managing to lighten the load and to make a clear path in the road ahead.

We all have stuff from our past we want to hold onto no matter how unrealistic it is for us and when it holds no purpose towards helping us towards our future growth.  Like a warm and worn security blanket with many tattered holes, we need to know when it’s time to lay down what has served its purpose and free ourselves towards a lighter, brighter road ahead.

Looking for a job?  Find us at www.greenlightjobs.com

Follow us on Twitter http://twitter.com/lisakayeglj

Follow greenlightjobs on Twitter http://twitter.com/greenlightjobs

And, on LinkedIn http://www.linkedin.com/pub/2/abb/50


Copyright © 2024 Lisa Kaye - HR & Business Consulting - The Career Rebel

Share This:

Just A Job…

Giving thought to what you were put here on earth to do in the long term might hurt your brain too much to think about.  Coasting through the ether however and landing on something you like vs. what you have to do might feel like a more fluid and natural process.  Not everyone loves his or her job.  Some people might actually be good at something that they are really not that into.  Just because you have an aptitude and are successful in a chosen career path, does not mean this is what you were born to do.  Just because you have a job does not mean you are either good at what you do or bad at what you do it really just means you have a job.

Your ability to apply your unique gifts and talents in a meaningful way sets you apart from just having a job to really excelling in your job to becoming successful in your job to really loving your job.  On some level whether you admit it to yourself or not, being good at a job does not mean you love what you are doing.  It may seem like an oxymoron but one does not necessarily equate to the other. There are many folks who do what they do well because they have found a pattern a rhythm a way to do something that suits them.  This does not necessarily mean they love what they are doing.  Being good at something and being in love with something can mean the difference between what floats your boat and what just floats.

Having just a job might be what most people feel they are doing when they drive the long way into work each morning.  Looking for a new challenge and finding a way to make it through the next pay period might be all you need in order to get motivated to get to work each day. But does that make it just a job or a job you love?

You can have your cake and eat it to when it comes to designing the career that suits you. It does not mean you have to settle for something that makes you miserable.  It does mean than you should be able to pick and choose from what makes you thrilled to go to work each day from what makes your stomach turn with anguish.  Your job should not be something you just do to pay the bills as it may be for most.  Your job is something that should make you feel good about your accomplishments, your interpersonal interactions and your ability to learn, grow and contribute as part of the greater good.  Whether you are part of a start up creating the next version of virtual reality or you are an owner of a confection shop, your job should be part of your DNA not motivated by paying your electric bill.

Looking for a job?  Find us at www.greenlightjobs.com

Follow us on Twitter http://twitter.com/lisakayeglj

Follow greenlightjobs on Twitter http://twitter.com/greenlightjobs

And, on LinkedIn http://www.linkedin.com/pub/2/abb/50

 


Copyright © 2024 Lisa Kaye - HR & Business Consulting - The Career Rebel

Share This: