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Managing Emotions During Career Change and Job Search, Part OneHow can you manage your emotions during your career change or job search? To answer this practical and wise question, let's first define what emotions are. Emotions, also commonly referred to as feelings, are energy released in your body in response to perceived events, that is, to data received via your five senses. To build your skill in managing your emotions during your current or next career transition:
4.) Act on Your Emotions. Again, safety and appropriateness are key. Emotions are messengers from your internal reality prompting you to take some action. Discover what each emotion wants you to do, then do it, safely. Don't delay, or your emotions will act on you.
7.) Talk to a Safe Someone. Call a friend or family member; find a counselor; try a coach or spiritual director; meet with a priest, pastor or rabbi ? but call someone! You don't have to bear your burdens alone unless you choose to ? and why would you choose to? 8.) Use Art to Express Yourself. Paint your panic. Draw your dreams. Write poetry to express the inexpressible within you. Both verbal and nonverbal art forms can help you release what should not be trapped within you. 9.) Use Music to Match Your Mood. You can use music to match your mood and thereby express it, or you can use music to alter your mood when it's critical to do so. So, if you're down and need to pump it up, try some rousing rock or Latin music. If you're hyper and need to calm down and center, try baroque, New Age or soft jazz selections. Music can be a particularly powerful way to help yourself relax into sleep or get revved up for your day. 10.) Pray or Meditate Through Your Feelings. Both prayer and meditation are powerful ways to feel and express your emotions. Practice one or the other or both daily. Cheryl Lynch Simpson is a Spiritual Director and Solutions Coach who helps women discover and create the life they've always wanted to live. Cheryl is the author of over 30 print/Internet articles and the founder of Coaching Solutions For Women, a coaching website that produces and showcases career, business, and life solutions that improve the life balance of today's busy women. For a complimentary copy of her latest e-book, Ten-Minute Stress Zappers for Women Service Business Owners, visit http://www.coachingsolutionsforwomen.com. |  | | | RELATED ARTICLES 15 Tips for Writing Winning Resumes The thought of writing a resume intimidates almost anyone. It's difficult to know where to start or what to include. It can seem like an insurmountable task. Here are 15 tips to help you not only tackle the task, but also write a winning resume. 1. Determine your job search objective prior to writing the resume. Once you have determined your objective, you can structure the content of your resume around that objective. Think of your objective as the bull's-eye to focus your resume on hitting. If you write your resume without having a clear objective in mind, it will likely come across as unfocused to those that read it. Take the time before you start your resume to form a clear objective.   2. Think of your resume as a marketing tool. Think of yourself as a product, potential employers as your customers, and your resume as a brochure about you. Market yourself through your resume. What are your features and benefits? What makes you unique? Make sure to convey this information in your resume.  3. Use your resume to obtain an interview, not a job. You don't need to go into detail about every accomplishment. Strive to be clear and concise. The purpose of your resume is to generate enough interest in you to have an employer contact you for an interview. Use the interview to provide a more detailed explanation of your accomplishments and to land a job offer. 4. Use bulleted sentences. In the body of your resume, use bullets with short sentences rather than lengthy paragraphs. Resumes are read quickly. This bulleted sentence format makes it easier for someone to quickly scan your resume and still absorb it. 5. Use action words. Action words cause your resume to pop. To add life to your resume, use bulleted sentences that begin with action words like prepared, developed, monitored, and presented.   6. Use #'s, $'s and %'s. Numbers, dollars, and percentages stand out in the body of a resume. Use them. Here are two examples: Managed a department of 10 with a budget of $1,000,000.Increased sales by 25% in a 15-state territory. 7. Lead with your strengths. Since resumes are typically reviewed in 30 seconds, take the time to determine which bullets most strongly support your job search objective. Put those strong points first where they are more apt to be read. 8. Play Match Game. Review want ads for positions that interest you. Use the key words listed in these ads to match them to bullets in your resume. If you have missed any key words, add them to your resume. 9. Use buzzwords. If there are terms that show your competence in a particular field, use them in your resume. For marketing people, use "competitive analysis." For accounting types, use "reconciled accounts."  10. Accent the positive. Leave off negatives and irrelevant points. If you feel your date of graduation will subject you to age discrimination, leave the date off your resume. If you do some duties in your current job that don't support your job search objective, leave them off your resume. Focus on the duties that do support your objective. Leave off irrelevant personal information like your height and weight. 11. Show what you know. Rather than going into depth in one area, use your resume to highlight your breadth of knowledge. Use an interview to provide more detail.   12. Show who you know. If you have reported to someone important such as a vice president or department manager, say so in your resume. Having reported to someone important causes the reader to infer that you are important. 13. Construct your resume to read easily.  Leave white space. Use a font size no smaller than 10 point. Limit the length of your resume to 1-2 pages. Remember, resumes are reviewed quickly. Help the reader to scan your resume efficiently and effectively.  14. Have someone else review your resume. Since you are so close to your situation, it can be difficult for you to hit all your high points and clearly convey all your accomplishments.  Have someone review your job search objective, your resume, and listings of positions that interest you. Encourage them to ask questions. Their questions can help you to discover items you inadvertently left off your resume. Revise your resume to include these items. Their questions can also point to items on your resume that are confusing to the reader. Clarify your resume based on this input.  15. Submit your resume to potential employers. Have the courage to submit your resume. Think of it as a game where your odds of winning increase with every resume you submit. You really do increase your odds with every resume you submit. Use a three-tiered approach. Apply for some jobs that appear to be beneath you. Perhaps they will turn out to be more than they appeared to be once you interview for them. Or perhaps once you have your foot in the door you can learn of other opportunities. Apply for jobs that seem to be just at your level. You will get interviews for some of those jobs. See how each job stacks up. Try for some jobs that seem like a stretch. That's how you grow -- by taking risks. Don't rule yourself out. Trust the process. Good luck in your job search!  Copyright 1999 - 2004 Quest Career Services, LLC. All Rights Reserved. The Pros and Cons of Telecommuting - As Seen Through The Eyes of a Seasoned Telecommuter Janelle Delacorte has been happily answering calls for the Home Shopping Network and various infomercials since November 2004. How to Change Career Horses in Mid-Stream You'll get wet but the reward just might be a more fulfilling ride! Why Do Interviews Die: That Sinking Feeling and How to Prevent it! Interviews die because a mistake occurred. Sometimes, you've made a mistake; sometimes they die because someone who screened a resume did. Showing Appreciation to Workplace Un-Sung Heroes Millions of Un-Sung Heroes are born every minute! They are found everywhere-on street corners, in our homes, offices, and communities-wherever there are people in need of rescue. These special people, whose positive actions and initiatives are performed to benefit others, are not famous or in the news for what they are doing; but their efforts affect, enrich and touch countless lives. Seeking Knowledge Will Give You Power What are you interested in? We all have a passion for something. So, what is your passion? The Five Most Common - And Most Avoidable - Résumé Errors Writing an effective résumé can certainly be challenging. There are numerous rules and none of them apply 100% of the time. It is often much easier for people to craft their document if they understand the boundaries within which they will need to operate 100% of the time - the mistakes that should never be made and will brand a job-seeker as unprofessional. Eliminating all of these errors from your résumé will go a long way in improving your chances of securing an interview. Feedback: Take It or Leave It ... But Get It The expense was substantial. An immersion workshop with twelve participants sharing a common goal to hone their skills. With nervous eagerness like kindergarteners embracing school, we received input, critique, and suggestions about our work. Some of the feedback I used. Some of it I didn't. But all of it was helpful. How To Write A Resume Cover Letter That Will Get Your Resume Read A Resume Cover Letter has only one purpose - to stimulate the recipient of your resume to review your resume. This free resume cover letter tutorial assumes that you will be sending your resume and resume cover letter by email. How to Answer The Most Difficult Interview Questions The following 'difficult' questions are common to most tricky or adversarial interviews. In order to convince the interviewer that you are the best person for the job, you must prepare and rehearse your answers meticulously. Study the job description and the candidate profile; research the company; and match your skills and accomplishments to the employer's requirements. Resurrecting the Perfect Resume, Part Two Are you in denial about the lifelessness of your resume? If you are reasonably qualified for the type of work you seek, yet your resume is consistently failing to win you interviews, then you need to face the reality that your beloved document is dead. Tips for Handling On the Job Setbacks If you've chosen a business career, you will inevitably experience some type of setback. And whether your pet project is canceled, your performance review is a bust, you get turned down for a promotion, or you're asked to leave the company, setbacks hurt big time. Nevertheless, if you start thinking of yourself as a victim or allow yourself to lapse into prolonged negativity, you won't be hurting anyone except yourself. Worrying until you get sick, abusing drugs or denying that you've reached an impasse won't help either. The best strategy for making a comeback is to recognize the reality of the situation, acknowledge your feelings and find a way to cope productively. Here are some other tips you might find helpful: Resumes, Networking, Headhunters ? Useless Without Marketing Sweet Spot A career transition is no longer about getting your hands on a list of contacts, networking with headhunters, or going online to look for work. It's better than that. Career Change: From Suits & Sales to Boots & Rails Peter Humleker had it made. As the general manager of a successful car dealership, he was earning an impressive income. The only problem? He hated what he was doing. Building Your Army of Supporters: How to Build Strategic Relationships in the Work Place! Once you have accomplished your task of getting in the door and getting the job the real job of career advancement begins! Ten Resume Writing Tips You Can?t Live Without For some job opening, employers receivehundreds and even thousands of resumes.When you are looking for a job, howcan you best promote yourself? Howcan you convince a prospective employerto pick-up the phone and call you foran interview? Are You a Nice Person? What Companies are Looking for in Recruiting and Retaining Great People Hal Rosenbluth, author of The Customer Comes Second, states; "In our selection process, kindness, caring, compassion, and unselfishness carry more weight than years on the job, an impressive salary history, and stacks of degrees." Create a Network and Catapult Your Job Search Networking is still known as a great job-search strategy, yet it eludes some individuals simply because they don't know how to go about it. Individuals also tend to shy away from networking because it's time consuming. Unlike online résumé submission or folding a résumé, stuffing it in an envelope, and adhering a stamp, networking requires far more time and dedication. The results, however, can be quite different than those experienced from traditional résumé submission. Career Searching: A Vision Without A Plan is a Hallucination Success is not always something you necessarily find when you arrive. It may be the journey that gets you there. Four Important Questions to Ask Your Interviewer; Do You Really Want to Work for This Person? Many job seekers miss a golden opportunity when they are asked towards the end of an interview if they have any questions. If they feel the interviewer adequately explained the position, they make the mistake of answering "No" to this question. But this is the perfect time to find out if you really want to work for this person! After all, even a wonderful job can turn into a miserable experience if you don't get along with the person you work for. |
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