Career Compass: Finding Your Career North by  Douglas E. Welch This career booklet (5100 words) can help you to find the true direction of your career and guide you on that journey. Topics: How do you discover which job and career is right for you? How do your desires point you in the right direction? How to discover and stop your from moving “Due South” — exactly the wrong direction in your career? How can you use the Career Compass to evaluate new opportunities? From the introduction… “Imagine if when you were born you were given a magical compass to lead you through your life. It would always show you the way. It would show you the right answers on tests, lead you to the right college and to the right course of study at that college. It would lead to your first job, your first (and maybe last) love and always show the path ahead. This isn’t some idle fantasy. We each have a compass to show us the way, if only we would take it out of our pocket and use it. This compass, of course, is our desire. Instead of a needle, it is a feeling, a pull, a tension — in some cases, an overwhelming flood of feeling that says “Yes, this is the way — this is the one — this is where you need to go!” Douglas E. Welch

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How do you see the world? Do you see it like everyone else, or are your friends and family constantly telling you that you see the world in odd, different or even weird ways? Can you see danger where others see none — opportunity where others see only risk — something new where others see only the usual? If so, you have a big advantage in your life and your career.

Social Media Self Preservation: Taking advantage of social media without losing your mind

Audio Book – MP3 – 42 mins

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The ability to see in new and different ways has many advantages. First, it allows you to break out of any rut you might find yourself in. Where others might plod along in the same job year after year, once you sense your dissatisfaction, you’ll start looking for new opportunities right away. Others might feel trapped in their jobs, but you can see that there are always new opportunities out there just waiting to be discovered. While others might think that this is all there is to their lives, you can see that it can, and should be, better.

So why don’t others see the world as you do? What has happened in their lives to convince them that life is “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short” as Thomas Hobbes wrote? For me, I see one overriding factor — cynicism.

While the original meaning of cynicism had many good traits, according to Dictionary.com, it’s curren  meanings include:like or characteristic of a cynic;  distrusting or disparaging the motives of others.showing contempt for accepted standards of honesty or morality by one’s actions, especially by actions that exploit the scruples of others.bitterly or sneeringly distrustful, contemptuous, or pessimistic.

It is this distrust, this pessimism, this disbelief that leads others to stop looking for new opportunities. They start to see the world only as a dangerous place where everyone is out for their own good and nothing else. Since they have difficulty trusting others, they also have difficulty working with others, either one on one or in groups. This further isolates them and deepens their cynicism. Eventually, they have dug themselves such a deep hole they might not ever climb out.

For your own self preservation, learn to identify deep cynicism and, more importantly, learn how to avoid it. It is a trap in every sense of the word. It deludes us and traps us in a dark world of our own design. If you begin to feel trapped, you are . If you start to feel fearful and distrustful of others, it will only grow, if you let it. If you think that everyone is out to take direct and purposeful advantage of you, you will find those that will.

Cynicism is a large and important sign that you need to do something new, something active, something — else. Use this red flag of warning as a sign that you need to do some deep and hard thinking. You may need to get away for a while. You may need to find new people to engage with. You might need to change your location, your job, some of your friends. You need to do anything that shakes off cynicism and lets you see the world in new ways again.

If you are struggling with cynicism, it might seem hard to escape its grip, but we all have the power to do it. All we need is to see the light that surrounds us and focus less of the dark. There are people out there willing to help you. There are new opportunities waiting to be found. You are not trapped unless you believe you are. Remember what it is like to see the world differently and then see it that way again.You owe it to yourself and everyone around you to see, and be, the very best person that you can be. Imagine how the world would change if more people had the strength and support to stand up, break free of cynicism and do what they most desire.

Starting tomorrow morning, wake up and ask yourself “What does the world look like today?” Does it look the same as it always has or do you see something new on the horizon. Is it  another in the salt mines like the donkey boys from Pinocchio or is it “the beginning of a beautiful friendship?” Greet tomorrow like a good friend, and seek out the best friends you have around you. Sure, there are troubles in the world, but it is also filled with many who are eager to help you and work with you to make the world a better place.

***

Cynicism is a trap in your life and career – Podcast is a post from Career Opportunities

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Last week I wrote a column about lifetime learning. It seems to be gaining attention in the general world and I think that is a great thing. I saw a blog post today that highlighted some great resources but then mentioned how their own children, 3-4-years-old couldn’t really benefit from these resources.

Yes, that can! The best way that children, even very young children, can benefit from lifetime learning is by watching YOU! Children are sponges that soak up everything around you — your speech patterns, your attitudes, your likes and dislikes. even if you don’t realize it, children are also closely observing what you find important. When they see you learning — in its many forms — it establishes a norm in their minds. They begin to see that learning is something you always do. They see learning as something everyone does, no matter what their age. They see that learning isn’t simply something that happens in grade school or university.

As an example, my son finds it quite normal to visit the library on a nearly weekly basis. My wife and I are big readers and he has gone to the library with us since he was born. He has friends who never visit the library, or only do so when absolutely necessary for schoolwork. It wasn’t that we conciously  modeled this behavior, but model it we did.

You can and should be the same with lifetime learning. Show your children interesting videos, articles and, eventually, books. Show them that experiments are something that are just done in a companies lab. Teach them that every moment of every day can teach us something, if we only pay attention.

No matter how young your children — and I say the younger you start the better — show them that lifetime learning is an integral part of your life and theirs. This simple step could have enormous benefits to them as they grow older. Someone who is constantly learning has great advantage to those who don’t. Beyond the personal benefits, lifetime learning has the potential to create a society of amazing citizens, all dedicated to learning and then putting that learning to use through great creations, organizations and projects.

Photo: My son, Joseph, watching the scientists dig at the La Brea Tar Pits in Los Angeles, CA

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“Alice laughed: “There’s no use trying,” she said; “one can’t believe impossible things.”

“I daresay you haven’t had much practice,” said the Queen. “When I was younger, I always did it for half an hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.” – Alice in Wonderland.

The truth is, as Lewis Carol seemed to know, we often need to believe a great many impossible things every day of our life. Doctors once thought that disease was caused by “bad air” or lack of morality – astronomers thought the Earth was the center of the universe and scientists thought heavier objects fell faster than lighter ones. Knowledge is never static, but always in a state of becoming. Once you understand that, you can begin to explore what “impossible things” you need to be believing today.

Listen to this Podcast

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Cultivating Your Career Reputations

11,000 Words

While we often talk about one, monolithic, Reputation – with a capital R — I believe that there are a series of reputations that make up the whole. This book will focus on the combination of reputations that make up your one, overarching, Reputation. By examining each of these reputations in detail, I hope you will find specific areas where you can improve your work, your actions and your thoughts so that your overall professional reputation grows.

Why break your Reputation down into its constituent parts? It is often said that you can’t “do” projects, you can only do the individual tasks that make up the project and achieve the desired result. The same can be said for reputation. You don’t build your reputation as a whole, you cultivate the smaller reputations that create it. Each individual action builds your reputation in unique ways and each requires some thought as to how they relate to the whole.

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Question everything

If you really want to get your thought processes moving, questioning the “truths” of our time is a great way to start. Maybe viruses and spyware are a good thing. Perhaps managing spam email isn’t the best idea. Maybe faster isn’t better. The mind reels at the possibilities. The truth is, you never know what wrongheaded ideas you might be carrying around until someone points them out. Why not discover them yourself?

Start boosting your thinking today by questioning everything. Question whether the sky is blue or the Intel Core Duo chip is really what companies need. Question whether a GUI is really an improvement over a command-line interface. Question whether technology helps or hurts society. The more sacred the idea, the more profane your thoughts should be.

The goal of this exercise is to get you thinking beyond your average, everyday thoughts. Too often, we simply accept the “truths” of life without ever wondering if they really are true anymore. It can be mind-bending, but in an incredible useful way. Imagine how doctors felt when presented with the microbial theory of disease after hundreds of years controlling the bodily “humors.” What might have astronomers been thinking when a solar-centered universe solved all the problems of how the heaven’s moved? Remember, someone once thought that 64KB would be more than enough memory for any computer.

Maybe, maybe not

There are several ways of applying the concept of “impossible” things to your work and career. Do you often hear management or your co-workers explaining, “it has to be that way” or “we’ve always done it like that.” This is a clear sign that some deeper thinking needs to be done. Is there a form that everyone hates, but can’t seem to stop using? Why? Would the company fall apart? Dig deeper. Is this form still necessary or is it only an unconscious ritual from a long gone process?

Is your company expending tens of thousands of dollars on technology that really isn’t needed? Could entire servers be replaced by a simple, new procedure? Are you trying to automate your way out of a problem when human nature is really the culprit? You may laugh, but I can imagine that every one of you has faced just such a problem in your career. As high-tech workers we often believe in the ability of technology to solve any problem. We throw hardware and software at a problem when training, hiring and firing would be a better response. Perhaps we should be questioning this concept most of all.

If you want your career to flourish, you need to engage in a little impossible thinking. Too many ideas we carry with us today are out-dated, unconscious beliefs that may have served us well in the past, but now limit our thinking, our creativity and our productivity. Be like the Red Queen and start each morning by believing a few impossible things, or, at least, thinking about them. I am sure you will find that what you might think a fanciful exercise will become one of the most important aspects of your work. The greatest leaps in human history have come from those who dare to think the impossible and then find out they were true all along. What new horizons might you discover in your life and your career?

Question of the Week: What impossible things can you believe today about your life and your career?

***

Archive: Believing impossible things is a post from Career Opportunities

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I believe that entrepreneurship is one of the driving factors of careers today, regardless of whether you are working for yourself or within a traditional corporate environment. You have to DO for yourself as much as you DO for your company or you risk being left out in the cold when the company no longer needs you or your skills. Don’t be caught off-guard. Start thinking like and entrepreneur today!

The new entrepreneurs by The Open University

Course Description

Whether you’re thinking of starting your own business, looking to improve one you already own, or are simply interested in understanding more about how the business world works, this learning pathway is a storehouse of ideas, techniques and real-life stories to inspire and inform.

It includes resources to help you assess and evaluate an idea using comprehensive, practical techniques, and explore a range of business types – from home-workers and ‘mompreneurs’, to family businesses, social enterprises and ‘lifestyle’ entrepreneurs. It also looks at entrepreneurial psychology. What are the qualities you need to succeed? What are the downsides to being your own boss, and how can you prepare for them?

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“Where can I learn about X?” “How to do I do this in Word/Excel/Powerpoint?” “Can I find out more about Y?” These are questions I hear from people almost everyday. There is a great need for learning, for education, even if the current educational system is under attack from all sides. Blame it on the bad economy and the need to re-learn, re-train, re-invigorate your career, but learning — and its more formal cousin — education have never been more important to you, your life and your career.

Listen to this Podcast

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Cultivating Your Career Reputations

11,000 Words

While we often talk about one, monolithic, Reputation – with a capital R — I believe that there are a series of reputations that make up the whole. This book will focus on the combination of reputations that make up your one, overarching, Reputation. By examining each of these reputations in detail, I hope you will find specific areas where you can improve your work, your actions and your thoughts so that your overall professional reputation grows.

Why break your Reputation down into its constituent parts? It is often said that you can’t “do” projects, you can only do the individual tasks that make up the project and achieve the desired result. The same can be said for reputation. You don’t build your reputation as a whole, you cultivate the smaller reputations that create it. Each individual action builds your reputation in unique ways and each requires some thought as to how they relate to the whole.

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When I talk about learning and education, I am not necessarily telling you to go back to school or college. In my own life, I see education as something I do every day in every way. In recent years, I have watched my wife return to college and achieve her Masters and Doctorate degrees. I am amazed at how much work and dedication she put into the process, but I also realized that that path was not for me.

Instead, I am a self-directed learner. I follow whatever topic strikes my interest, often going “down the rabbit hole” on a particular topic and totally immersing myself in it. This works for me. It keeps me learning and allows me to see connections between what may otherwise seem to be totally unrelated areas of knowledge. The best part, though, is that it has never been easier in the history of man to be a self-directed learner. The Internet has brought  a wealth of information directly to our homes, computers and hands. Never before have we been able to access so much information so quickly and easily.

My Method

One important method I use to engage in lifetime learning is stopping. Whenever I am confronted with a word or topic I do not know, I stop, immediately and look it up. Maybe the word bifurcation pops up in a newspaper story or I see mention of the Teapot Dome scandal in something I am reading. For me, it is important that I stop and take a moment to learn a bit more before I move on with my reading or work. It may sound like an interruption in your work or day, but this style of “just-in-time” learning has helped me greatly over the years.

A few resources

So, where do I turn when I want to learn something new? Below are a few resources to start your own journey. These are my “go to” sources whenever any topic piques my interest.

Wikipedia

I know, I know. You hear all sorts of disparaging things about Wikipedia, but the truth is that it is a great source to start your learning. Wikipedia offers an overview of nearly any particular topic or area and might even include enough detail to answer your question. Sure, the more controversial topics can be a little contentious, but for your average areas of interest, it is a great place to start.

YouTube

I often hear that the joke that “everything is on YouTube” , but in some ways this is almost true. Want to learn how to format columns in MS Word? Done. See an old silent movie that is difficult to find otherwise? Done. Want to see a lecture on DNA/RNA replication? Done! Sure, the quality may vary from video to video and you might have to search for a while until you find the exact information you are looking for, but there is a host of great information to be found there.

New Learning Sites

Lately there have been an explosion of web sites dedicated to learning. Recently I was using Khan Academey’s algebra lessons to help my son, and I have watched videos on many topics there as well. Even established colleges are getting into the act including computer science classes  and more from Stanford University and MIT. Sites like Code Academy are enticing everyone to learn a little bit about the programming that surrounds our lives today. Finally, iTunes U is back in the news after Apple’s recent announcement about electronic textbooks. Revisiting iTunes U recently, I was amazed at the breadth of content available there. It isn’t all just computer science. There are classes on creative writing, art, history and just about any topic you can imagine.

In 2012 you truly have no reason or excuse to avoid learning something new every day. Sometimes you will be learning it for your career and sometimes you will be learning just because you want to learn. Regardless of the reason, lifetime learning will continue to be one of the largest factors in your success. Keep learning. Keep growing. Keep applying what you learn and your are on a clear path to the career you deserve.

***

Lifetime learning enhances your life and career – Podcast is a post from Career Opportunities

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Writing creatively: plays
by The Open University

Course Description

For those interested in English language or literature, or with ambitions to write plays, the creative activities throughout this learning pathway provide an overview of the process of playwriting – from capturing ideas through to character, structure, dialogue, stage directions and editing.

Leading contemporary British playwrights, including Alan Ayckbourn (the most performed living English language playwright), Bryony Lavery (also author of ‘The Woman Writer’s Handbook’), and Willy Russell (‘Educating Rita’) give tips and practical advice on how to write plays. Their tips include how to read, watch and understand plays – using examples from Shakespeare, Ibsen’s ‘A Doll’s House’ and Caryl Churchill’s ‘Top Girls’.

This pathway encourages experimentation as well as learning by reading and questioning. You will also be able to listen to linguistics professor David Crystal at the London Globe Theatre re-evaluating Shakespeare by exploring the original pronunciation.

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I’ll be highlighted other educational opportunities to build your career in the coming weeks.

iPad and iPhone App Development (Fall 2011)

Course Description

Updated for iOS 5. Tools and APIs required to build applications for the iPhone and iPad platform using the iOS SDK. User interface designs for mobile devices and unique user interactions using multi-touch technologies. Object-oriented design using model-view-controller paradigm, memory management, Objective-C programming language. Other topics include: object-oriented database API, animation, multi-threading and performance considerations.

Prerequisites: C language and programming experience at the level of 106B (Programming Abstractions) or X. Recommended: UNIX, object-oriented programming, graphical toolkits

Offered by Stanford’s School of Engineering, the course will last ten weeks and include both the lecture videos and PDF documents. Released with a Creative Commons BY-NC-SA license.

This is a series of video lectures and accompanying materials in PDF format.

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I am thinking about a regularly scheduled G+ Hangout office hour to discuss career issues, questions and trends.

Would you be interested in such a thing? I am trying to gauge the interest before blocking out the time each week.

I am thinking of scheduling them for 6pm PST Tuesday, as this is a time I am required to be in my office. I figured I might as well try to make it as productive a time as possible.

Add your comments and thoughts here. I am ready to start as soon as tomorrow night.

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Action — any action — can help us to get our careers and lives moving forward. Douglas presents a few “action items” you might want to explore or use as jumpstart points for your own ideas.

Learn how action benefits you no matter what your job, current job status or career!

60 mins

Listen to this Podcast

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Cultivating Your Career Reputations

11,000 Words

While we often talk about one, monolithic, Reputation – with a capital R — I believe that there are a series of reputations that make up the whole. This book will focus on the combination of reputations that make up your one, overarching, Reputation. By examining each of these reputations in detail, I hope you will find specific areas where you can improve your work, your actions and your thoughts so that your overall professional reputation grows.

Why break your Reputation down into its constituent parts? It is often said that you can’t “do” projects, you can only do the individual tasks that make up the project and achieve the desired result. The same can be said for reputation. You don’t build your reputation as a whole, you cultivate the smaller reputations that create it. Each individual action builds your reputation in unique ways and each requires some thought as to how they relate to the whole.

---

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SAVE THE DATE!

CareerCampSFV 2012

Saturday, October 13, 2012 9a-3p

Congregational Church of Northridge
9659 Balboa Blvd, Northridge, CA

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Description from Amazon.com…

Best-selling author and popular speaker Garr Reynolds is back in this newly revised edition of his classic, best-selling book, Presentation Zen, in which he showed readers there is a better way to reach the audience through simplicity and storytelling, and gave them the tools to confidently design and deliver successful presentations.

In this new edition, Garr gives his readers new, fresh examples to draw inspiration from, with a whole new chapter for those who present on more technical and educational topics based on techniques used by many presenters who give high-level talks at TED and other powerhouse events. Whether the reader is in research, technology, business, or education–this book will show them how to take what could look like a really dry presenation and reinvigorate the material in totally fresh (and sometimes interactive!) ways that will make it memorable and resonate with the audience.

Staying true to the mission of the first), Garr combines solid principles of design with the tenets of Zen simplicity to help readers along the path to simpler, more effective presentations that will be appreciated, remembered, and best of all, acted upon.

More information from Amazon.com

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Due to personal family issues with the scheduled speaker, I will be speaking at this weeks’s Tuesday’s with Transitioners meeting on the topic of “A Year of Action!”.

Action — any action — can help us to get our careers and lives moving forward. Douglas presents a few “action items” you might want to explore or use as jumpstart points for your own ideas.

Learn how action benefits you no matter what your job, current job status or career!

Please share this event with anyone you know who might be interested. All are welcome!

RSVP via Facebook

What: Douglas speaks on “A Year of Action” at Tuesdays with Transitioners

When: Tuesday, January 17, 2012 – Noon-2pm

Where: Congregational Church of Northridge, 9659 Balboa Blvd, Northridge, CA 91325-1902

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Two week’s ago I called for “A Year of Action!” So now, what… I am guessing that is what many of you are thinking. You understand that action is important, but you are having trouble figuring out your next (or first) step. No need to fear. I have a host of action items for you. Hopefully one or more of them will spur you into action. As you might imagine, these have been my own action items over the last several years.

Listen to this Podcast

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Cultivating Your Career Reputations

11,000 Words

While we often talk about one, monolithic, Reputation – with a capital R — I believe that there are a series of reputations that make up the whole. This book will focus on the combination of reputations that make up your one, overarching, Reputation. By examining each of these reputations in detail, I hope you will find specific areas where you can improve your work, your actions and your thoughts so that your overall professional reputation grows.

Why break your Reputation down into its constituent parts? It is often said that you can’t “do” projects, you can only do the individual tasks that make up the project and achieve the desired result. The same can be said for reputation. You don’t build your reputation as a whole, you cultivate the smaller reputations that create it. Each individual action builds your reputation in unique ways and each requires some thought as to how they relate to the whole.

---

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Start a blog

We all have something unique to say. We all have unique experiences that make us an expert in something – cooking, computing, crafting, cars. You have heard me say before that an important part of any career is telling people “what you do and how well you do it.” Guess what? A blog is the #1 best way to share that expertise with others. Using Blogger.com or WordPress.com, you can have your blog online in about 5 minutes. Then you have a place to start showing people what you have to offer. Post your special ideas, your special knowledge, your special experiences and people will find you.

Publish a book!

Write a blog long enough and you are sure to have enough content for a book.   Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing makes it easy for anyone to produce an ebook that can be read on nearly any device – Kindle, Mac, PC, Android, iPhone, iPad and more. Why not take advantage of that? Do you have a piece of writing, long or short that you would like to share with the world? Get it into the Kindle Store and then start telling your friends, family and whoever else will listen. You don’t have to charge for the book. You can give it away as a freebie to introduce your writing to people, as a reward for reading your blog or as an incentive to sign up for your mailing list. You can also just do it for the fun of it. Heck, you never know, you might even make some money at it.

Take Photographs

Ever been on a photowalk? Think of it as a hike where the object is not miles travelled, but images captured. You, your friends, or even strangers, gather somewhere and start taking pictures. This can be an urban setting or out in the country, something traditionally picturesque or gritty, it doesn’t really matter.

The goal of a photowalk is to set aside an hour or so to “see” again. Photography forces us to slow down and pay attention to what is right in front of us. The    effects of this “seeing” spill over into other aspects of our lives. It shows how we can can pay more attention to everything we do — how to be present in the moment — instead of letting our mind dance over all the coulda, woulda, shoulda, thoughts in our heads.  And you can post your photos on your new blog!

Make Music

Over the years, music has become a passive activity. We sit and listen to others make music or their recordings instead of making music ourselves. A century ago, most everyone could play an instrument, sing a song or play the spoons along with others. I think that this is something that is greatly missing in today’s world. Making music feeds our analytical mind through the skill of reading music and discovering the mathematical patterns within, but it also feeds the soul. Making music is as different from listening to music as cooking is to watching a cooking show. Find a way to play music, by yourself or, even better, with others. It can open your mind in some amazing ways.

Make Money

Money is not the root of all evil. The actual quote is “The Love of Money is the root of all evil.” Money is important, but you may be ignoring ways of making money outside your regular job. I mentioned publishing a book above, but there are other ways, too. Maybe there is a product you can make and sell on eBay or Etsy.com? How about consulting with others about an area of your expertise? Maybe you could hold a class for your co-workers or the interested parents at your child’s school. There is a host of ways to make  some money and you might even find these tasks more rewarding, both personally and financially, than your current job. It doesn’t happen for everyone, but it is a possibility worth pursuing in the new year.
These are but a few action items that can jumpstart your year. Choose one of them, or any that jumped to mind while you read or listened to this column. Remember, the point is to take action — any action — to get you moving and keep you moving towards your career and life goals. Even the smallest step can get you started.

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Action Items – Podcast is a post from Career Opportunities

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CareerCampLA 2012 is in the planning stages.

For more information, visit the CareerCamp blogs CareerCampLA or CareerCamp International.

Are you interested in helping us organize CareerCampLA, speaking or attending? Watch these blogs for further information.

Join us for our next career unconference and Build the Career the You Deserve!

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Join me for the Career Opportunities Office Hour Google+ Hangout on Wednesday, January 11, 2011 at 9pm EST/6pm PST.

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CareerCamp International in 2012 Thank you for joining us for CareerCamp in the past. We hope your career is thriving and we greatly appreciate your interest and support! The New Year 2012 is shaping up to be a big year for CareerCamp. We now have 3 annual CareerCamps on the schedule for 2012. These include our original CareerCamp — CareerCampLA– CareerCampSCV (Santa Clarita Valley) and CareerCampSFV (San Fernando Valley) CareerCamp organizers are working hard to spread the CareerCamp message around the world. CareerCamps are in the planning process in Virginia and we are also examining the possibility of a CareerCamp for Veterans and other niche-based events. Organize a CareerCamp If you would like to host a CareerCamp in your area, we are developing a handbook to assist you in planning, approaching sponsors, and facilitating the conversation on the day of your event.  Visit the CareerCamp International web site for more information. Tentative CareerCamp Dates for 2012 CareerCampLA – April 2012 CareerCampSCV (Santa Clarita Valley) – Saturday, July 14, 2012 CareerCampSFV (San Fernando Valley) – October 2012 More information will be available as we get closer to these tentative dates. We will also announce newly organized CareerCamps on this mailing list and via the CareerCamp International blog as they are scheduled. All the CareerCamp organizers look forward to seeing you at a CareerCamp in 2012. Please invite your friends, family and co-workers to join you in “Building the Career You Deserve.” Please spread the word about CareerCamp by forwarding this email and directing others to the web sites linked above for more information. Douglas E. Welch Founder, CareerCamp International WHAT ARE PEOPLE SAYING ABOUT CAREERCAMP? “I learned more how to refine my resume, my cover letter — more about what recruiters are looking for — to help me be recognized more in the job market. This was the greatest experience. It was amazing!” – Kellie H. “I had a great time today. It was a lot of fun and I learned a lot. Somebody mentioned that one of the goals here today was to motivate you to get out there and I think they definitely succeeded. I feel real confident and I am really happy I came today.” – Justin B. “I think the concept of this event was phenomenal. I have attended conferences and workshops and entrepreneurial sessions and I would say, by far, this was probably one of the best I have ever attended.” – Donna J. “Being out of work seems to be part of modern life that we are experiencing. What I heard today form several people being outside of ourselves helps us to see the positive side of living. When we help others, we are actually, in the end, helping ourselves. The energy that I have witnessed today convinces me that there is greatness in the group of people who came her to learn the tools to overcome.” – Dick C.

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As I have over the last several years, I am choosing a theme for this year. In the past I have selected the words Visibility and Leadership as my annual watchwords. This year, though, it is time for a Year of Action. If you want to build the career you deserve, it is going to require a lot of action on your part — probably more action than you have ever accomplished previously in your life. For all of us, this should make for a very exciting 2012.

Listen to this Podcast

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Cultivating Your Career Reputations

11,000 Words

While we often talk about one, monolithic, Reputation – with a capital R — I believe that there are a series of reputations that make up the whole. This book will focus on the combination of reputations that make up your one, overarching, Reputation. By examining each of these reputations in detail, I hope you will find specific areas where you can improve your work, your actions and your thoughts so that your overall professional reputation grows.

Why break your Reputation down into its constituent parts? It is often said that you can’t “do” projects, you can only do the individual tasks that make up the project and achieve the desired result. The same can be said for reputation. You don’t build your reputation as a whole, you cultivate the smaller reputations that create it. Each individual action builds your reputation in unique ways and each requires some thought as to how they relate to the whole.

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Why is action so important? Action breaks through the inertia that often holds us back – “objects at rest will stay at rest unless acted upon by an outside force”. This inertia freezes us in place, stuck, while the world speeds by us. Even worse, it is far too easy not to take action. All we have to do is sit there and the world will gladly move around us. Still, we can break free if we take even one, small, seemingly unimportant action. This movement frees us from the mire and gives us the advantage of the other side of inertia — “objects in motion will remain in motion.” Allowing even the smallest action to get the ball rolling and get us moving again.

Am I suggesting that you act out, on anything, without thinking about it or planning it? Yes!. The fact is, over-planning, over-thinking, over-fearing are just a symptom of inertia and therefore some of our biggest enemies. It is far more likely for us to be stuck in inertia than stuck by taking too many actions. Sure, you can move into an area where you are taking too many wild actions, but I have found this to be very, very rare. More often I see people stuck by the side of the road thinking about what their next action might be.

Standing still is easy. We can find hundreds of reasons why we shouldn’t do something with very little effort. What we need, though, is the one reason FOR doing something that allows us to take action and move forward. There is another name for this syndrome — analysis paralysis. We are figuratively paralyzed by the number of choices we have or, we are too afraid to act because we never think we have enough information to make a decision. For someone like you or I, this is career death. The world will speed by us and we will find ourselves so far behind we might never catch up.

What I suggest, as I often do, is a sense of balance. Balance your actions with your planning. Taking a lot of action requires a lot of planning, too. If you balance your action with your planning you will be much less likely to get stuck. You will always have the ball rolling even if you are not exactly sure which way it is headed. This can mean that you will sometimes be acting on an idea, a hunch, a gut feeling. You might feel you haven’t planned enough. That is okay. It is often in these unplanned actions that we find our greatest triumphs. We can’t always predict where our lives and careers are headed, so throwing in a bit of randomness might just expose us to something amazing and beyond our dreams.

How do you see if you are truly stuck? One easy method is to note how much you talk about actions and compare that to how often you actually take action? The Texans have a phrase for someone who talks big but doesn’t have much to show for it — “all hat and no cattle.” These people are pretending to be cowboys without the requisite cows. If you are honest with yourself, it is pretty easy to see when you are stuck in this cycle. It is just as easy to see when you are moving out of it. Make something happen, anything, and other things will begin to happen for you. Even a small movement from you can get the world turning again in your favor, if you let it.

Finally, your worst enemy in your action battle, other than yourself, are those people around you who are stuck themselves. Writers who are stuck hate writers who are working. Artists who are stuck hate other artists who are being productive. Even worse, they will do anything to make those writers and artists as unproductive as they are. They will attack you, your work and your actions. They will spread their pessimism and try to control you. Put as much distance between them and yourself as possible. Take your actions no matter what anyone might say and carefully consider the source of demeaning and angry words. They might just be jealous that they can’t be as productive as you are.

Starting today, think of ways of taking action this year. It doesn’t matter if these actions are big, small or in-between. It is the ACT OF TAKING ACTION that is most important. Some days you will find that taking the simple action of going for a walk might be the most productive, and healthful, thing you do all day. In that small action, though, are the seeds for more action, more movement, more opportunity and more success. Embrace action and all that it can do for you this year.

***

A Year of Action – Podcast is a post from Career Opportunities

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Join me for the Career Opportunities Office Hour Google+ Hangout on Wednesday, January 4, 2011 at 9pm EST/6pm PST.

This is an open discussion of whatever career topics are on your mind. Bring you questions and discussion topics.

Circle my personal Google+ account or the Career Opportunities G+ page to see the link to the hangout on Wednesday.

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Career-Op Office Hours on Google+ – Wed, January 4, 2012 @ 9pm EST/6pm PST is a post from Career Opportunities

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