Here are a few nuggets of wisdom to cling to when the going gets tough. Wolf J. Rinke, author of The 6 Success Strategies for Winning at Life, Love 7 Business, recommends keeping these points in mind:

• Energy and positive self-motivation come from seeking your dreams and doing things you love.
• All people are a composite of strengths and weaknesses.
• If you want to experience your maximum energy, you will need to build your strengths and get rid of your weaknesses.
• To be successful, you must find a job or career that lets you build your strengths.
• Successful people love what they do.
• Figure out which of your weakness keep you from reaching your lifetime goals. Get rid of them—and don’t worry about the rest.
• When you pursue what you want to do, you’ll have fun and you’ll feel naturally high.

As a nationally Credentialed Career Manager, Coach Kevin Tucker has been partnering with individuals like you for the last 25 years. Through the military, as a minister, a human resources executive, and finally as a career and life transition coach; he has continually been able to help motivated individuals find their calling in life! Check out more at http://ccubedcareer.com.

Technorati Tags: attitude, career change, career coach, career coaching, career consulting, career inventory, career passion, Career Transition, disc assessment, interview coaching, job, job fair, job search, kevin tucker, life balance, life coach, life coaching, Passion and Job Satisfaction, self improvement, success, transition coach

I was channel surfing on the radio the other day when a conversation caught my attention. The speaker said, “I was misunderstood. But I was misunderstood because I misspoke.” He then continued on about taking responsibility for your words. Wow.

We’re all guilty of putting our mouths in gear before the brain is fully engaged. This quite often happens during the job interview process. We get excited or nervous and then let our tongues take over in the passion of the moment. Sometimes with great results; sometimes not.

So how do you avoid the runaway mouth during an interview? By far—no guarantees, now— the best way is preparation. Do your homework. Research the company you’re going to interview for and, if possible, the different departments. Make sure you understand the job description and the direction the company is taking so you can address the company’s strategy, successes and challenges.

Also, practice, practice, practice! Although you probably won’t receive the interview questions ahead of time, there are some pretty standard questions and variations! Answers to how you think you will contribute to the company, your past work experiences and others can be thought out in advance. Practice in front of a mirror, out loud. Consider doing interview prep with a career coach who can give you objective feedback and tips for various interview scenarios.

Most importantly, be yourself and be sincere. Answer the questions honestly and be sure that you’re not misunderstood because you misspoke.

As a nationally Credentialed Career Manager, Coach Kevin Tucker has been partnering with individuals like you for the last 25 years. Through the military, as a minister, a human resources executive, and finally as a career and life transition coach; he has continually been able to help motivated individuals find their calling in life! Check out more at http://ccubedcareer.com.

We had an almost total technological crisis here at C-Cubed last week. In addition to getting the black screen of death on one of the computers(I wrote about this last week), our main printer decided it would be a good time to take a permanent vacation—without the traditional two week notice. I could see things grinding to a halt and dollar signs floating in front of my eyes. How in the world did we ever function WITHOUT a personal computer its friend the printer? Repair or replace? Replace or repair? Replace or replace…I think you get the idea. Those were the questions of the week—all week. At first thought, emotion told me to bite the bullet and replace both. But was it necessary and did it really make sense?

Often career transition is guided by emotion—good or bad. You’re approached by a new company or department within your company to come work for them; a good dilemma for you! Or, on the flip side, you’re released or laid-off. Not so good. However, both developments are dominated by strong emotional pulls demanding that you make a decision, NOW.

Before you make a decision, you need to make sure it makes sense for you and your current (and future) situation. Step back for a moment or two and think through possible scenarios and likely outcomes. Sure, that invitation to work with a new department is flattering and gives you a boost; but is it in alignment with your career goals? Are you a good fit with that department’s culture?  Or now that you’re forced to find a new job; do you take the first one that makes an offer (any offer), or do you wait for one that fulfills all of your dreams? Do you accept something somewhere in between?

Whatever you do, don’t make the decision alone. Confide in close friends and family members. They often have insight that you may overlook in the passion of the moment.  Seek the advice of a career coach if you still need direction. A career coach can help you objectively see the big picture and give you a solid course of action to achieve your goals. Whatever you do, it needs to make sense for YOU!

As for my office machine meltdown; I was able to resurrect the computer. It now has four of its nine lives left. Knowing that I want to upgrade to a Mac in the future, it made sense to hold off on getting a new pc now. As far as the printer goes, we’re quite smitten with the new printer and the smok’n deal we got on it.

As a nationally Credentialed Career Manager, Coach Kevin Tucker has been partnering with individuals like you for the last 25 years. Through the military, as a minister, a human resources executive, and finally as a career and life transition coach; he has continually been able to help motivated individuals find their calling in life! Check out more at http://ccubedcareer.com.

Technorati Tags: career coach, career coaching, career consulting, Career Transition, change, job search, kevin tucker, life coach, military transition, Networking, Passion and Job Satisfaction, transition coach

I got a picture text from my wife yesterday showing me the black screen of death on her computer. She didn’t seem too upset, so I knew she had a contingency plan and everything was okie dokie. I preach the mantra of save frequently and back-up often, so I text her back, gave her some reassuring words and continued with my day. I didn’t hear anymore, so I figured “no news is good news”.

That was until I got home. She did manage to bring the beast back to life—briefly. Actually long enough to get a current back-up copy of her files. (Notice how I’ve highlighted current.) Now, although the black screen of death showed up unexpectedly yesterday morning, she knew that her system was running on borrowed time. It had done this once before, about six months ago, and to her, every day that the computer was working was a gift from God. Although she knew the computer was’t quite right, she didn’t have a current back-up of her data.

This incident got me thinking, how often do we put off or wait until the last possible moment to do things that need to be done—especially in a work situation? You can usually read the writing on the wall for down-sizings, RIFs, lay-offs, and firings. How prepared are you if the black screen of death comes to visit you at work? I’d like to pose a few questions to you if you don’t mind:

1. How current is your resume? Your resume should have your most recent information on it. If you don’t have a resume—NOW is the time to get one put together!
2. Do you have a network of people—both professional and personal—that you can turn to for advice and for references?
3. What would your next move be if you were to find yourself out of work?

Consider these three items to be a start to your “back-up” plan. I realize that I’ve over-simplified this a bit—I just wanted to get you thinking; to get you started on your plan. If you need help developing your plan, I’m just a phone call or e-mail away.

As a nationally Credentialed Career Manager, Coach Kevin Tucker has been partnering with individuals like you for the last 25 years. Through the military, as a minister, a human resources executive, and finally as a career and life transition coach; he has continually been able to help motivated individuals find their calling in life! Check out more at http://ccubedcareer.com.

Technorati Tags: career, career change, career coach, career coaching, kevin tucker, Networking, resume, resume writing, resumes, transition, transition coach