The famous singer Frank Sinatra was very candid when he made this insightful observation, he reportedly said that throughout the entire span of his career, if at all he had paid attention to something really well, it was paying rapt attention to each and every note, every single word, he sang, and the most remarkable thing he said was, if for some reason he was unable to project the same on to his listeners, he simply failed in his task.
Work Ethos This is the work ethic of one of the most popular as well as influential musical artists of his century. When you ponder over the things that make a workplace an ideal one, well a Google search does throw interesting ideas but they are more on the lines of what an organization is really looking for in a prospective candidate. The kind of questions that an interviewer throws up are indicative of the organization trying to gauge whether or not you are going to be the right fit with the organizational culture and their work ethos. Come to think of it, as a working professional, we do expect the best of benefits from the organization we work for; in fact we seek them solely on the basis of what they offer and their standing in the market place. Brand Value In fact lots of aspects pertaining to culture, compensation, benefits, and most of all the people are representative of the overall brand value of that place and are governed by the organization itself at its end. This does not mean the ball is in their court– all the time, a lot of responsibility for making a workplace great lies with the employees themselves, the environment they create, their interactions with each other. When one keenly observes the workings of the corporate world, and assesses situations, one finds that it always takes two to tango, this necessitates, keeping a keen eye and heeding our interactions, maintain our poise while we go about networking, these are sacrosanct. Larger Scheme of Things When you look at the larger scheme of things, these seemingly insignificant elements turn out to be of great import, they hold intrinsic value. Essentially these happen to be the pillars, the bedrock on which the edifice of the ideal workplace stands tall. Doing a good job, great work is all expected and part of the equation, there are other dimensions to it, they go on to augment your efforts. Final Thoughts Well none of the preceding things is rocket science in any respect. So the take home message is to take a holistic view and take a hard look at all of these factors as a singular entity, as a whole, in order to ensure our actions surely go ahead and culminate, into making the workplace, with which we associate ourselves wholeheartedly an ideal one. Sure there would be impediments in your way but they should not take you astray from your avowed goal of creating the workplace of your dreams, the ideal one, that you set out to create in the first place.
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Do you go weak in your knees each time you are required to speak in public and your knees tend to buckle as you head towards the podium. As a routine, during the course of discharging your professional responsibilities you are required to expand your network, especially if you are in the sales field.
Small Talk However if you happen to be swallowing your nails, when you got to be making small talk with strangers, things are going to turn difficult for you. It is very well recognized that proactively speaking up in meetings is a surefire way of furthering your reputation at the workplace, so what is it that possibly holds you back from taking up the initiative and speaking up, you might be afraid of uttering the wrong thing. Come to think of it situations as these are crucial for professional advancement but somehow they come across as really terrifying on a personal level, well it is not an one off situation, such examples abound, and unfortunately they happen to be ubiquitous. Knee Jerk Reaction A knee jerk reaction is the most easy and first line of response to such terrifying situations. Avoidance comes first and foremost to the mind, what could be easier, to excuse yourself out of the situation by avoiding it, nobody wants to experience anxiety, the best thing to do is not to seek unpleasant situations in the first place and when you do get entangled in one, avoid it to the best of your ability. To many a folks these tasks may appear to be highly unpleasant and obnoxious, but at the same time one must bear in mind they are really necessary. Keep Learning and Growing Imagine you are sitting in a senior recruitment panel, to fill in a vacancy for a particular job or multiple jobs for that matter, keeping mum is detrimental to all concerned, the job aspirant, the recruiter and the organization. This brings us to the fact that as we proceed ahead on our chosen career path, we need to keep on learning and growing and no matter what sort of situations we constantly face, we must assess the circumstances and adapt our behaviour accordingly. Career Leap This infact is the plain and simple reality of the world that we work in today. First and foremost we ought to have the requisite skills and the courage as well to take the much needed career leap, otherwise we are going to miss out on really important opportunities for professional advancement. As career oriented professionals, we cannot afford to slow down or stop building our career by circumventing these professionally sound and beneficial activities and tasks. Final Thoughts The change would only come by being thoroughly honest with yourself, ask yourself objectively, did you avoid going on stage and making that all important presentation at the highly important industry conference, due to paucity of time or was it that you felt sacred and experienced stage fright even before making a feeble attempt at it, when in all probability you should have taken the call in the best interest of all concerned. Be adept at recognizing opportunities and ensure you are able to take complete advantage in the broadest professional terms. You would find fear lurking around the corner, sooner or later you would fail at one thing or the other, that is not very significant, the important thing is how you go ahead and deal with the resultant failure.
The Preparation Level Irrespective of the kind of logic you employ, the arguments you furnish, regardless of how sound they may come across. The training regimen and the preparation level both for you and your team notwithstanding, no one can eliminate the potential and likelihood for eventual failure at certain tasks in the workplace. Seed of Doubt You may happen to be a world class athlete, even the reigning champion of both 100 and 200 meters sprint is not immune from the ravages of failure despite being successful since the fully automatic time measurements came in vogue in athletics. A seed of doubt is sown in the mind given the stumbling performances in recent times. Chills Down The Spine So what do you do when you come across that familiar feeling of the chill running down your spine, hits you hard. Well you are no hapless creature who cannot do anything and just sit and regret the whole situation. You can always redefine yourself. Rewrite Your Story You can go ahead and rewrite your story, it is not a tall order by any yardstick. Oftentimes the nagging fears that keep on plaguing us in a big way are unmistakably associated with stories or a bigger story, made up of many such smaller stories, which we happen to be continuously telling ourselves about the direction of our lives. The First Hurdle Given this backdrop, we need to draw inspirations from entrepreneurs who somehow fail at the very first hurdle of their entrepreneurial journey. They return back into the corporate fold and tread the corporate treadmill to continue doing the same things forever, that they have been doing all the while. Would you readily believe someone who told you that your story carries the potential of becoming your prison. Well it is quite possible, when you set it in stone, may be either in a negative way or a positive manner. Re-frame Failure In the event that you are able to rewrite your life story at any point in time, and the fact that there are many paths leading to the same destination, the fears would not stick around for a very long time. In addition to this you must be able to re-frame what failure exactly means to you and it really helps if you can visualize failure, well before it happens. Fear Is Going to Stay And remind you fear is not going to go anywhere, it is going to stay, now is just the right time for you to learn to effectively harness the most powerful of all emotions so that it does not become your weakness. Final Thoughts Someone very rightly pointed out, you should never ever prepare to fail, but you should always be prepared to fail. If you look at failure objectively, it is simply your inability to reach an objective. Just try to see beyond the perceived setback, you are going to notice positive incidental outcomes. At some point in time or the other we all come across the insecurities that abound in our life, whether it is the outcome of an interview that we undertook against a vacancy for a recruitment initiative or something similar.
Time on Earth Honestly speaking it is a very natural way of gauzing whether we would be successful in our ventures or they would end badly for us. In order to be fully able to enjoy your time on earth, you would need to take your fears, be it job insecurity or otherwise by its horns. Constantly Changing Kaleidoscope One must always bear in mind that life is a constantly changing kaleidoscope, and anything that seems to be stable as far as the present is concerned could well be broken or gone for good in the coming time. Make Yourself Powerful The Story however does not end here. You got to make yourself powerful, and when you are able to do that, you would always be able to overcome setbacks, rebuild, and you can keep moving forward all by your own free will and happiness is surely yours no matter wherever you go. Retrace Your Steps To begin with you need to make adjustments to your perspective by making necessary amendments. It helps to practice being objective, if you are overwhelmed by the feeling that you are unable to accomplish something, trace your steps back and distance from the self. Visualization The imagery and visualization of you being a completely and totally different person turns out to be quite helpful. There is great value in assuming the role of an advisor. Just think of the things that you would tell another person in such a situation. Feeling Nervous Say for example you are feeling nervous about going to an office party where you are just barely familiar with your departmental team; others turn out to be absolutely new faces. But here your presence is required and beneficial as well. A Cathartic Feeling Another instance could be, you are out and about interviewing for a job, what sort of advice you would be giving to a person who happens to be in a similar position. Being objective about things is a cathartic feeling. Heart and Soul If you look at things dispassionately, then there is nothing to be really scared about, and success is going to be yours if you put your heart and soul to something. Again it helps if you write down your fears. The Hurdles Just jot down every small thing that you happen to be worried about, along with all the attendant factors that according to you are hurdles in your way of being unable to accomplish things. Now do yourself a favor, read the list over and over again. Figment of Imagination While undertaking this exercise, ensure that you take the time out to ask yourself, how many of these fears are rational ones and how many of them are irrational ones. They may be a figment of your imagination. The Root They may even happen to be a product of negative thinking. You really need to take the time to think what lies at the root of all your fears. The fears could range from making a fool out of yourself in a given situation to under confidence at other times. Final Thoughts It could well be disappointing your parents or bosses, being unable to have the life you long for could be another cause for distress. Take the most appropriate course of action to allay your fears and grow as a professional. To come out of any interview with flying colors you need a bit of preparation beforehand and it goes without saying that some of the questions can be pretty much usual, while others may leave you perplexed and flummoxed. Let us examine some of them and the appropriate responses that would help you land the coveted job.
Skill Set Well the adequate response could go something like this. I see myself in senior role, managing an important portfolio within the organization. In any job interview your skills are tested first hand, you may be even asked to demonstrate it in practice. Break Into a Sweat It is not just the freshers, even experienced people at times break into a sweat just at the mention of an interview. You may find some of the questions, to be mundane, regular stuff, what matters is your confidence, poise, and the attitude that decides whether you land the job or not. Strengths and Weaknesses And within those responses there would be definitive clues pertaining to your strengths and weaknesses, with regards to your suitability for a particular job. Now, instead of frittering your time and energy regarding the outcomes of the job interview, you need to look for that one particular answer, even if it seemingly appears to be a personal one. Tricky Questions At times tricky questions would be thrown your way in order to flummox you. Whenever you are stuck in such a situation use your wit and grit to come out with flying colors. A question may go something like this, how do you see yourself 5 years down the line. Cross Question Be prepared to be cross questioned as an interview is basically a skill test. When applicants are unable to understand common interview questions, they get stumped, and keep on stumbling in the future as well. The standard questions are based on the premise that, they would be able to elicit an adequate response. The Verdict The only prerequisite from your side is that, while answering the same, you must appear confident and composed which would lend you the credibility as being the perfect option for the job. It is the way you go about answering, the sort of words you use and the level of confidence you display alongside your attitude conveys a whole lot about you to the recruiter and in turn helps them to arrive at a judgement. Career Experts You may still have your doubts, whether or not, you are a perfect match for the job in question. Don’t fret, just pay attention to the advice rendered by career experts and you would easily come out of the interview with flying colors. Some sample questions could go like this, why should we hire you? The most appropriate answer would be, you would get a great platform to showcase your talents, skills and knowledge. Final Words Again another question could arise like, what are the reasons behind leaving your previous job. The proper answer could be something on these lines, in order to be able to enhance my skill set I am looking for still better opportunities. Now that you have got a fair idea of the interview process you can approach the entire thing with confidence, keep following career specialists for outstanding inputs, that would help you advance your career at a fast pace. Someone aptly said, comfort zone is indeed a beautiful place, but nothing of consequence ever grows there, in essence life begins at the extreme end of your comfort zone, this is where the magic happens.
The Magic Till the time you are going to be staying within the cocooned safety of your comfort zone you are not going to improve. For your betterment you have to leave your comfort zone for good and the sooner the better. Soar Into the Stratosphere The Very act of stepping out of your comfort zone is a strong determinant of your success and well-being. It is quite interesting to know that our brains are wired in such a manner, that it becomes difficult to take any sort of action up until the time we sense some degree of stress and relative discomfort. Fact remains, performance always soars into the stratosphere and peaks sky high, when you are well out of your comfort zone. Inaction — The Greatest Mistake It is very rightly said, that when you happen to be too comfortable, your performance suffers gravely due to inaction, again the opposite is also not very palatable, on has got to strike a balance. If you happen to venture too far outside of your comfort zone, you are more likely to melt down from harsh stress. Peak Performance It is said that peak performance and stress do go hand in hand, stepping outside the comfort zone does make you a far better person, and you don’t need to be climbing mount Everest or something close to it. When you happen to pay attention you will find that, it is the everyday tasks and challenges that happen to push the boundaries the most. Exhilarating Experience All you need to do is step out of your comfort zone and readily accept these challenges by incorporating certain changes, like getting up earlier than your usual time. Accomplishing a seemingly impossible goal is an exhilarating experience. Brain Density It is indeed very good for your brain, in as much as it is quite soothing for the brain and is tranquilizing as well. Neuroscientists have found that meditation does create important as well as discernible physical changes in the practitioner’s brain. The brain density is perceptibly increased in those areas of your brain that are responsible for problem solving, focusing, flexibility, self control, resilience and the best part is these changes happen to be really long lasting. Proven Technique Again meditation is indeed a great and proven technique to help you slow down, when you are so busy and stuck in your comfort zone that you find it difficult to exactly do that, being hardly able to think what you are doing and why you are doing it. The process plays a crucial role in breaking this cycle. Final Thoughts It helps if you focus on one thing at a given point in time, try and volunteer purely for altruistic reasons, it is a powerful tool that will transform you beyond your wildest dreams, that too in a positive manner. If you have observed the phenomenon of job search closely, you would be able to distinctly recall, two types of people who would seemingly be struggling in their pursuit of a better life, which is indeed the ultimate goal, by landing a better job and building a better career.
The Two Extremes They happen to be under qualified and overqualified people. There is very good reason for this, the ones who are under qualified most certainly find themselves not being taken very seriously by the employers. And on the other hand the ones who are overqualified are woefully unable to convince their employers that the job is way beneath their capabilities. Debilitating Career Pain Both of them happen to be in serious and debilitating career pain. It really hurts when you find yourself in a quandary, feeling rather helpless, And are unable to sort things out for yourself and eventually unable to fix the problem. Well there is infact no reason to feel dejected and be despotic about making a headway, for there is always light at the end of the tunnel provided you look for it and trudge along the tricky career path with its attendant ups and downs. Typical Career Lifecycle To begin with, we need to take a deep and hard look on a typical career life-cycle, essentially it follows the experience curve without fail. Typically one starts out in his or her career with close to something of a zero experience, working year after year, and with multiple jobs under your belt, you tend to build your skill set, as well as the expertise working over a significant period of time, this invariably leads to you earning the respect, trust and the assistance of employers. Better Employment Opportunities This in turn leads you to better employment opportunities with higher salaries. Now it goes without saying , you need to devote your attention the most on continuous learning, and growing with time. It must be understood very clearly that one needs to keeps one’s skills to be extremely relevant by being extremely sensitive and attuned to the needs of the employers, for if you do the contrary you have set yourself up for a downward slide, falling down to the other side of the curve is a very real possibility. Demand and Supply All of a sudden you find yourself in a tricky situation, where you are deemed overqualified and no sooner this happens, the universal law of demand and supply suddenly kicks in. Try and understand, there is no company in the world ever willing to pay for the skills, it does not require or need at all in the first place. Never ever come across as a person who is jack of all trades and who costs way too much. Workplace Persona Rather focus on your specialities, come across as a person who has the right aptitude personality and experience to do the job in the best possible manner. Try and bring value to the organization by assuming the right workplace persona, this way it would be easier for you to convince them that you are the best person for the job. Final Words Do try to make up with enthusiasm for what you seemingly lack in experience in the event you come across as under qualified. When you come across as overqualified, try to simplify things for your prospective employers, this way you would be able to bolster your chances of employment despite the odds being against you. Don’t fret if you do not have time, money, energy or above all the willingness to pursue a bachelor’s degree or a masters for that matter. You are not doomed for failure as many would like you to believe.
Visualization If you look objectively at the entire educational setup, you would clearly be able to see that highly expensive degrees are not as paying, as they once used to be. Now that you have convinced yourself of relatively lesser importance of educational degrees or your lack of it, don’t lose heart. You are not going to face a tough time earning a livelihood or get under debt many times over. Whenever you find yourself on shaky ground just visualize some dropouts and see where they ended, with criminal gangs or engaging in nefarious activities, doing drugs, detested by the society, rendered unproductive. Dropouts by Choice Well this is one end of the spectrum, at the other end are people like Steve Jobs or Bill Gates, who were dropouts by choice and they made something out of their lives, gifted the world some new technological innovations and changed the way the world communicated, in short they heralded the computer revolution, in other words they were the harbinger of the technological era in the true sense. They became legends in their lifetimes and left a positive and highly powerful example for others to emulate. Unlike the dropouts who lacked focus, self discipline and direction hence they glided rudderless and made a mess of their lives. Burning Desire to Succeed All it takes is positive thinking, proper planning, perseverance, grit and determination and a burning desire to succeed. You would in fact be mighty amazed at the plethora of job options that happen to be the highest paying ones, without the need for you to pursue advanced degrees at the onset. The list happens to be a long one, but should not be construed to be limited to only these many options. The more popular ones are fitness trainers, radio jockey, voice over artists, freelance photographers, BPO professionals, network support personnels, gaming managers, web developers, multimedia artists, professional but ethical hackers, commercial driver’s, real estate brokers, commercial pilots, event managers and many more. Passport to Success So far so good, and till now you were thinking that a great degree with an awesome percentile was your passport to success, think again. For instance a professional freelance photographer makes good money, this profession hinges more on skills rather than your educational qualifications. The most important thing over and above everything else is your high degree of interest in the field and the ability to click outstanding pictures, you can work part time, to begin with and gradually move to full time engagement. These days almost every website or travel portal for that matter and media agencies, are always on the lookout for conceptual as well unique photographs. After your 12 standard, you may get trained online or become an apprentice for a renowned photographer. Final Words Sky is the limit, once you are able to pick up the ropes. Again, you don’t have to rack your brains a lot as the rapid acceptance, proliferation and expansion of internet has lead to emerging professions like ethical hackers, who secure the cyber-world and earn a lot, online courses are available and an inclination for tech is enough and the list goes on. We put in our best efforts to keep the trails of our professional life far from being rough as well as manage our personal affairs as smoothly as possible, despite our noble intentions chaos strikes back and throws everything into a state of disarray.
The Right Timing It is quite interesting to observe that on closer scrutiny you will find the chameleons and the mules to be at the opposite ends of the spectrum, however when you attempt a spectacular combination between the two, by employing the right timing, disruption gets minimized and amazing things happen. State of Flux An analogy with a pro mountain biker would bring some clarity. During such times, something of an inner suspension gives in, kicking us hard where it hurts the most. Then there are times when the rider has no choice left but to simply get off the bike, and figure out how to move forward, things begin to appear a bit scary and one is left at their wits end. When we are unable to understand the mechanics of a given situation, as the mechanics themselves happen to be in a state of flux, accomplishing job goals seems to be a daunting task, veritably impossible. Comfort Zone On the face of it one may find the situation to be frustrating and assume that nothing can be done about it. However the fact remains, managing such a chaotic situation is entirely possible. It calls you to step out of your regular routine, you have got to be a chameleon one minute and a stubborn mule the very next minute. Light at the End of the Tunnel Till such time you are unable to understand the nature of chaos, you would be unable to do anything credible and concrete to mitigate the situation. There comes a time, when you are able to see light at the end of the tunnel, so the moment you see a way out of the situation, take the lifeline, be it a vacancy for an employment in an ongoing recruitment process or something quite similar, you have to remain committed and absolutely true to your path, irrespective of what gets thrown in your way, a job or whole lot of challenging jobs, they should be unable to unsettle you. Put Your Best Foot Forward Adopting the chameleon and mule approach is the like putting your best foot forward, it will equip you not just with the required know how, but also enable you to take your folks alongside, all the way out of a chaotic situation no matter how rotten and desperate things seem to be. Initially it will help you to adapt and learn and then garner the required strength to effect necessary changes. Final Words You may be amazed to know that flexibility works wonders, when the situation is in charge of us rather than the other way round. Sometimes strength comes from taking in the blows that the situation mercilessly throws at you and the person or persons who emerge unscathed are no doubt much stronger than the they were in the first place. In an ever changing world, change is the only constant that we can relate to, same is true in the world of work as well. When humans started leading a settled life, as opposed to their hunter gatherer existence, helping hands were required in the agrarian societies, all was well until the first industrial revolution swept the world followed by a second industrial revolution.
Hit a Plateau Things had got staid and hit a plateau before the IT or the computer revolution took over the world by a storm. Having said that it is quite difficult to predict the future with any degree of certainty, especially when it comes to technological progress. The year was 1876 when the monopolist of the time, western union, engaged in delivering wire messages within the United States, communicated in an internal memo, the telephone has way too many shortcomings to be considered as a serious means of communication and a threat to its business. Bleak Prophecy Alexander Graham Bell might be squirming in his grave till this date. Tell the same to any smartphone user these days and you would be greeted by a perplexing, bewildered look, can one imagine life these days without a personal mobile computing device, so much so for the bleak prophecy of western union way back in the eighteenth century. A Holistic View In the year 1943 IBM had predicted a world market of just five computers, the reality in this day and age is a standard household has roughly five or more computers in most parts of the world, ranging from desktops to laptops, tablets and mobile devices. Well it was not always like this, mainframe computers used to occupy couple of rooms. Nevertheless the future pace of computerization and the adoption of emerging technologies like artificial intelligence, will decide the way the world views jobs. The Work Environment Given this scenario of a rapidly changing world, the business and work environment, the type of vacancy you come across in the ongoing recruitment scenario, and the employment opportunities that come your way, the job responsibilities are invariably changing both on an individual basis as well as member of an organization’s team. Each one of us needs to prepare ourselves for a rapidly shifting work environment. An Understanding of Change Some tips would be apt and helpful in helping us to deal with change in an effective manner, for the betterment of our careers and our organizations as well. The primary measures that can be taken to adapt to change could be on these lines. It all starts by becoming more aware of your situation, you ought to develop an understanding of change, building up skills as well as knowledge. Unexpected Forces of Change At the same time one needs to be aware of the current situation. As things stand you are in a prime position to be overwhelmed most likely by hitherto unexpected forces of certain change. People often tend to miss out on important information, when they go ahead and employ selective habits, perceptions and specializations in order to keep themselves from inadvertently getting exposed to fresh ideas they may not wish to hear as it is unpalatable to them. Final Words An ostrich mentality of assuming and pretending that no change is going to disrupt the status quo is wishful thinking. Change is going to be a part of our working lives, it is better we adopt ways and means to keep pace with it or get drowned in the deluge. We have got to make a choice, ride the wave of change or get overwhelmed by it and suffer in the process, there is no denying change is a reality and it is here to stay. |
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