Hello, 2022 💛

This week was my first official week back working after four weeks of the holiday break.

I truly enjoyed visiting Poland, seeing the family I hadn’t seen for almost three years. Being able to switch from work and spend time together was precious ( I probably realised how much I needed a break during the holiday). 👪

This time of the year, I should be posting something on setting up the goals and building new ideas for 2022 (not happening in the post).

But instead, the picture of a snowman that we’ve built together with the family (it took us nearly 3 hours to do it) during our holiday break.

💖Appreciate the little things, for one day, you may look back and find they were big things💖

Everyone has heard the word CAREER in their life. Traditionally (at least that has been my experience), the word career has been usually associated with climbing up the corporate ladder, moving into a management or leadership position and earning more money. 

But the word’s meaning has changed, is constantly evolving, and, in reality, we have all created our definition of it. 

When I interview candidates or speak to people who come for career coaching, I often ask them: What career means to you? And  I hear lots of different answers:

“Having impact”

“Being a part of something bigger that has a meaning.” 

“Doing something new that will help me to grow.”

“Becoming a manager.”

“Doing something meaningful.”

What does the research say? 

According to the research, there are four main career concepts:

• Linear– moving up the corporate ladder towards line manager/ project manager/leadership roles. 
• Expert–  becoming an expert in the specific area, specialising and developing a skillset, “grow up to be good at something.”
• Spiral– moving from one position to another related to prior work, adding on additional skills, becoming more “well rounded.” 
• Roamer– changing jobs regularly, moving into roles and assignments unrelated to each other.

As the research indicates, there are motives behind each concept. Some people enjoy power and authority (linear concept). In contrast, others prefer to change, creativity (spirals), or diversity of the experience (roamers) or want to specialise in a particular area (expert).

According to Gallup (2018), 87 % of employees worldwide are not engaged at work. 

Why is the number so high? In the past, we didn’t have a chance to pick the career that we liked; we usually inherited the occupation after our parents or observed our parents in their career journey. But the perception of how a successful career should look is often rooted in our beliefs (about ourselves and life), previous experiences, parents, and society where we grew up. We usually don’t know what is the best career for us (incredibly shortly after graduating from college, when the expectation from society is to make that decision straight away) as we don’t spend enough time reflecting on what it means to us, personally. We pick the jobs for the wrong reasons, and as a result, we lack satisfaction, fulfilment, engagement, and purpose at work. 

How to find out what a career means to me?

We all have a career (we do!).  Sometimes even more than one!  But our career is evolving! You are evolving! With the experience, our career is changing and developing to something different all the time! Our priorities and needs are changing during our life. The most important thing is to be in a place that allows you to be yourself. 

Self-awareness and understanding what we want from our life and job are essential.

Most of us don’t spend enough time reflecting on what we want before making decisions. Fear of change, society, opinion of other people stops us from understanding who we are and discovering our passions and needs.  As a career and life planning coach, I recognise how difficult it is to drive your career decisions when you face those barriers. To help people navigate their life and career decisions, I let them self reflect, brainstorm, visualise and open the door for the decision making process.  It’s essential to understand who you are, reflect on your work, and model a way forward. 

Here is how you can start, ask yourself those questions:

Is your job aligned with your interests, real passions and personal life vision?

What is your motive behind picking your current profession?

What dreams do you have?

How do you want to live and work?

It feels like that it was only yesterday. One year ago, I launched CareerTips.  I started writing a blog, and a few months later, it moved into something much bigger than that.

Thank you for every like, comment, feedback, following me on LinkedIn. The support and encouragement from many people allowed me to start my dream and be more creative in every aspect of my life.

I am very proud of what the first year has brought; I’m even more excited about what the next year will bring!

💖Thank you to all my fantastic clients that I had a chance to work with, and I see them growing in the past months.💖

Meet Carolina Custoias, International Psychologist, Coach and Career Consultant and read our honest conversation about finding purpose in your career. Carolina and I worked together at Microsoft back in 2016 when we were both Recruiters.

1. Tell me more about your story, background

I am originally from Brazil, and in 2014, I decided to have an experience abroad. I went to Ireland with the primary objective of learning English and returning home. Still, I ended up staying for over six years. During those years, I was able to build my international career, live my hobbies, travels, dancing events, and eventually, in 2018, was also able to make my career transition.

In regards to my background, I am a Psychologist and Coach Certified. I worked for more than 13 years in Recruitment and Learning and Development, and in 2018 I started making a fundamental change in my career to live a life with more purpose.

2. What does that mean to you finding purpose in your career?

I believe purpose is something we can create in any environment where we are as long as this environment is aligned to our core values. That’s why finding purpose in our life or career it’s very much connected to who we are.  You need to be at peace with yourself at where you are. Once we know who we are, it’s easier to create purpose in any environment.  Speaking more in terms of purpose in your career, the company usually has its own values. What’s important is to find out if that’s the company is good for us. Lots of us don’t think about that. You need to connect yourself to the company’s purpose if it matches your values and goals as a person.

But if you want to build this purpose and don’t know how to start, that can be a challenge. There are many things that no one teaches us, for example, that we are free to choose whatever way we want and we can be successful anywhere we choose to be.

We are taught that we need to pursue certain things, roles, and careers to be successful. We start to believe in a success that is sold to us, not the success we want and feel makes absolute sense.

3. You went through a career change yourself. When was your sliding door moment?

I always thought that purpose was equal to success, and success was similar to living abroad and working for a multinational company I pursued and conquered. From 2014 to 2018, I worked hard to keep my dream until I realised that I was not happy living that success or that type of life. I had to review my entire life and choices made in the last few years to change the direction.

I cannot say that I did not have a purpose in my career before I made my career transition; it would not be fair to say that I was without goal working with Recruitment and L&D for over 13 years. I had a connection to this field. I would always love to help people get a job in a company I would be working for.

But the fact is that I would always find some limitations in terms of my delivery while working in big corporations. I would always give my best but never finding or feeling it my best. I would burn out having that feeling of not being enough. This sign that what I was doing was great but not what my soul wanted to do.

The sliding door was when I felt drained with my role, and I did not feel like continuing that path anymore. I decided to try different ways to my career. It was a long process of reflection; I tried to move from one company to the other in the same role but still felt drained, then tried different positions and companies. One essential thing when you are considering changing a career is to honour your previous experience. Through my previous experience, I could find out and understand how important it is to work with people.  It was a clue! I kept asking myself how I could do more of this? We need to allow the experience and understand that every experience signifies understanding what we really want. It’s not easy to know what we want; it takes time, maturity, reflection.

We shouldn’t be afraid to take steps and learn from them.

4. How to find a purpose in your career?

Knowing yourself better is the best way to find purpose in life and a career.

We think that a career is a part separated from life, but in fact, a career is part of our life. It is easier to find purpose when your job is integrated into who you are, what you believe, what you do well and what you want to deliver to the world or society.

And sometimes, we will need to dive into ourselves and the options that life is given to us at that moment, or we will need to ask for help, such as mentors, coaches, psychologists. It’s a sort of investment in yourself. There is nothing more important than yourself in your life.

You have filled out your job application, you submitted your CV through the portal, then after a couple of days, you get an invitation for the first stage interview.  One of the first questions you can expect from the interviewer is “why did you apply for this job?“

The same question can be phrased in lots of other ways. Examples:

What brought you to [name of the company]?

What attracts you to the [role/company]?

Why would you be interested in a [role/company]?

It sounds like a simple, straightforward question. But many candidates still struggle to include relevant details in the answer and sell themselves as the right person for the role. Let’s narrow it down to what the answer should include:

1. Research about the company, products, services, mission and vision of the company

Preparation is the key! You need to research the company before you attend the interview. Reading a few lines from the first page of the website it’s not enough! To answer it skillfully, you need to build up some knowledge and better understand the place. Read the news, learn about the products and latest announcements, and check all the social media channels.  If you have done your research well, you should be able to determine what you like about the place and be sure that you really want that role. 

2. Research about company’s culture, values, and your reflections on how that resonates with you

Try to understand what the company stands for, and what is its purpose. Learn what the shared ethos and values of the organisation are, and how people feel about their work there. In that context, think about your values and how do you demonstrate them in your day to day life?

3. Relevant details about the job that have attracted you to apply and how does that fit with your skills and interests.

Read the job description properly before you attend the interview. It is a most underutilised source of information for your preparation for the interview.

If you applied for few roles in the same company, make sure that you know exactly what role you are discussing during the interview.

What should you include?

• Bring specific examples that are related to the company explaining why do you like the company. During your research and preparation, uncover and learn interesting facts about the company and bring those elements to your answer.
• Express your cultural fit, show why you’re fit by giving specific values and how they resonate with you.
• Bring the skills that you have, show the elements of your previous experience, that are unique and can be stream to the next role.
• Use strong phrases, like:

I’ve always been impressed…

I’m very passionate…

What not to say?

• You should never attend the interview without the research; an explanation that you didn’t have time or was busy won’t work!
• Don’t jump straight into your work experience explaining that you did a similar role before and that’s why you applied.
• Don’t speak negatively about your current or previous employer. Bring positiveness and learnings from it!
• Don’t say that you are actively looking for a job and applying to every possible company.
• Avoid generic answers that would match every company in the industry.

Very short post, but I was reminded twice this week.

The greatest wealth is HEALTH.

Without it, every part of our life will suffer.

Remember to take care of yourself 🧡

Coaching, which became extremely popular in recent years, first developed in sporting activities where hiring a coach improved team performance. Later in the 20th century, Sir John Whitmore noticed the connection between sports coaching and organisations building a framework of GROW model, one of the most popular and common models in business coaching. 

Life coaching is relatively a new discipline in the coaching industry. However, it’s gaining more attention and recognition for the benefits, leading to enhanced well-being and personal functioning (Grant & O’Hara, 2006). Qualifying recently as a Personal, Leadership and Executive Coach and based on my work with the clients for the last year, in this blog, I will answer the question: What Life and Career coaching is and how you can benefit from Life and Career coaching process. 

What are Life and Career Planning Coaching? 

Career and Life Planning is a learning process structured to provoke your thoughts, to develop your working life and personal life, focusing on the moment, and moving forward.  

There are several different types of coaching, depending on the interventions, but the bottom line is why people are looking for change (Kingstown College)

The same applies to Life and Career Planning Coaching. However, discovering what you really want can take some time and reflection. The coach will not provide you with the solution but will start thoughts and feelings to help you find meaning in your life and work. One solution would not fit everyone but the process can help you find your personal vision and transform that vision into a plan with SMART goals. 

How is the Life and Career Planning process structured?

1. Analysis of the current situation

Reflect on your current situation right now. Many people underestimate this step, looking for an immediate change to run away from the situation. Career and Life planning looks into the entire life, looking into parts of your life that are important to you.  During your life, you will realise that the importance of different elements is changing. Ask yourself questions: 

• What is going well in your life and work? Give examples!
• What would you like to see more of?
• What are the areas of your life that are important to you?
• What is the meaning of my life?
• What is the quality of your life now? What type of life quality do you want?

2. Self-analysis- Career Design Blueprint

Make a self-analysis, inventory of your strengths, top skills, talents, passions, interests and understand better who you really are.  Focus on discovering what you know, what you have to offer and what you want to take with you to your future career. 

Look into a previous article to get some inspiration How to successfully change your career

3. Building my vision for the future

In this phase of the process, you have to be really honest with yourself. There are different reasons people are looking for a change; sometimes, they look for change without knowing what they want. There are many options available, and the sky’s the limit, but listen to your inner voice and answer the question: What do you really want in your life? Are you living the life you choose, or are you fulfilling someone else’s dream?

4. Goals and personalised action plan

You can complete your life and career blueprint with all the clues, traits, skills, values and paths. The next step is to start achieving what you really want. Change requires time; some steps can be achieved quickly, others take a bit longer.  They are not written in stones; you can adjust them during the process. But once you’ve set yourself a goal, you make yourself accountable for achieving this goal. 

 Check regularly the progress from your Career Blueprint and where you are with your goals. Regular assessment, constant validation of your goals and action plan are crucial in achieving the change.

Meet Kamila S. Kucharska, Recruitment and Employer Branding Specialist, working with thousands of companies globally, helping them manage their online recruitment strategies more effectively to find and hire the best people in the world.

Job seeking is one of the most stressful experiences in our life. Kamila shares her tips on how to search for a job and how to feel more confident during the whole process.

Tell me a little bit about yourself.

I have people around me, personally and professionally, who are always saying that I am a “people person” with the ability to build long-lasting relationships. When I heard it for the first time, I realized that it may be a good choice for me to study International Relations, focusing on Foreign Trade as I was always passionate about Sales and helping others solve problems. As the people aspect in the organization started to be more and more interesting for me, I worked hard to finish my second Master’s Degree, in HR.  Going this extra mile was a great choice as I have been working in this field for 12 years already. I may say I am lucky to connect my interests of Recruitment and Sales in my current role – as an Account Manager, supporting companies to find the best Talents on the market.

Where to start if you are looking for a new job?

When you start looking for a job, you need to understand your own professional needs and career goals fully. It’s essential not only for people searching for a job for the first time but also for those who are changing career paths completely or want to be promoted to a position in the new company. Make your plan, analyze things you may improve to reach your goals, f.e., additional training (improving your soft/hard skills), work on your CV and LinkedIn profile.

Why is customizing your CV so important?

Imagine the situation that you are a recruiter, and you are opening CV nr 57 today? If it is not customized, it won’t grab anybody’s attention. Think from the recruiter perspective – it should be easy to catch the experience and skills relevant to the specific position you are applying for. It is good to hear you have communication skills while talking with clients but is it really nr 1 skill when applying for the Data Analyst position?  Built your personal brand for the role that you are applying for.

What do you mean by Personal Brand?

In my opinion, a personal brand is very similar to a corporate one. It is showing who you are, what your values are and how you express them. It is your chance to communicate with future employers. What is important? Before you start to work on your Personal Brand, think about who is your audience. Create content (for example, on LinkedIn ) about the industry you are working in, participate in groups and connect with people who share similar interests.

How to stay on the top of the job search?

Whether you are currently working, you are unemployed or finishing your education; you have many sources where you can look for a job. It is good to use a few of them at the same time to increase the chances to find your next employer.

Recruitment Portals

If you are searching for a job on websites like Indeed, LinkedIn or Monster, do not forget to set up the job alert to make sure that you are aware of any new opening in the field you are interested in.

Upload your CV to their databases – your profile will be visible for recruiters and Hiring Managers that are looking for a specific set of skills, title, or education;

Social Media

Join the groups but also be active to connect with people. They may know about job openings.

Recruitment Agencies

Contact them and ask about the possibility to speak about your background, they have a wide pool of clients who are looking for candidates, and they may match your job expectations with the expectation of the company;

Networking

Create a list of companies you are interested in, connect with people who work there, follow their social profiles – may be, for example, there is a coming Open Day or they will be a part of Job Expo (once we will have them back :)),

Unemployment offices

Your local Intreo Centre can also provide additional support, especially for a job search in your area.

LinkedIn is a great place to grow your professional network with people from different companies and industries. It is a start point to build relationships with hiring managers and recruiters. But, like any other platform, you have to use it wisely and strategically to get the best results out of it. The steps below will help you structure your plan for running your Linkedin Networking Campaign when you are actively looking for a job.

If you are not familiar with LinkedIn and Networking, here are a couple of LinkedIn courses available:

LinkedIn networking: Online Courses, Training and Tutorials on LinkedIn Learning

5 Tips how to successfully build your LinkedIn Networking Campaign

1. Find your target audience  

Even if you don’t have a premium Linkedin accounts, make sure that you use Boolean Search when you look for people. Combine keywords and titles that are customised to your search. Before you start, make a list of targeted keywords.

2.  Reach out to the right people

Start reaching out to people on Linkedin who are doing the job you are interested in, hiring managers in the company that you are targeting, and recruiters hiring for the specific role.  Your ultimate goal is to start building a relationship with them, learning more about the future and the role.  Also, they can submit your resume as a referral later, when the role is open. It’s important to network regularly and keep consistency in your Networking Campaign.  Don’t ask straight away for help in finding a job (if you are reaching out to current employees)- ask for advice or network connection instead.

DO NOT SEND YOUR RESUME STRAIGHT AWAY!!!

3. Be patient- it takes time!

Networking takes some time. Make sure that you are consistent with your reach-outs.

1. 1. To make it efficient, book time in your calendar (30- 60 min) EVERY DAY.
   2. Set up a target and keep track of the invitations that you’ve sent. 
   3. From ca.100 invitations during the week, you should receive 15-20 responses.

4. Check your LinkedIn inbox every day!

If someone doesn’t follow up with you within a week- send a follow-up message.

5. Ask for an informal call

Some of your reach out will turn into informal interviews. It’s a golden opportunity to sell yourself as a potential candidate for the role.

Do you feel stuck in your job but are not sure what to do next? Have you been reflecting on your career recently and realised that you don’t find fulfilment anymore? Are you thinking of changing the industry, but you are not sure if you have skills?

Deciding on a significant career change can be a rocky road.  You might be someone who recently graduated and looking for a first job or someone who wants to pursue a new path. Perhaps you want to grow your career in your current field but change the industry?  How to be sure when is the right moment for change? How to know what to do next?

Career Change is a process, and there is no shortcut there. I went through it myself, and I have definitely learned valuable lessons as I went through the relaunch of my career.

Knowing yourself, taking time to reflect on your interest, passions, skills, and experience, understanding the fundamentals of your future job are the most important elements of the career change process.

Are you ready for the career change?

Fear of something new, leaving something that we know for something new and unstable, is why people are afraid of making a career change. Objectively review your current situation and evaluate if you are ready for a move:

1. What makes you unhappy in your current place? Is it a seasonal lack of motivation? 
2. Is it the right time to make a career change?
3. Is your life stable enough to make a change?

Deciding on your career

Take a matter in your own hands and reassess what path is right for you. It’s a golden opportunity to clarify what a perfect career should look like and truly understand yourself. 

Career Change Reflection – reflect on your current job’s components and how you feel about them. What are the elements that you like? What are the elements that you don’t enjoy? What are the activities that energise you at work, and what drains you? What is the definition of success to you? Think about the career ideas that are appealing to you and reflect on what you like about them? Go ahead with the search, look at the opportunities in the targeted areas, talk to people in the industry, research roles.

Personal values assessment – research shows an increase in job satisfaction if your values are aligned with the company values.  What do you stand for? If there is anything that you could change in the world, what would that be? There are plenty of personal value assessments available online if you are not sure about your values. Identify what really matters to you.

Identify your top skills and talents – reflect on your childhood and the subjects you were particularly good at? Is anything that you are particularly unique at? Talk to your friends and colleagues and ask them what they think your 3 top skills are? What are you really good at?

Personality assessment – investigate your personality type. You will gain more clarity on your purpose in life and natural strengths.

Your achievements – things you are good at and proud of regardless of the opinion of others. Anything that you did when your motivation was high, and you enjoyed doing it. Think about both your achievements at work and outside your work.

Passions and interests – often, we decide to pursue a career based on the influence of others without cultivating our true interests or passions. Think about what you really love to do, and how could you include that in your professional career?

Work Environment – think about all the elements of a successful career environment. Use the linked exercise to discover those elements that are most important to you.

Trust your instinct and make a decision – after doing the logical analysis, pulling clues from all the reflection and exercises collectively, it is time to make your decision. It is both an art and a science, and there has to be an alignment between your skills and what feels right.

From a dream to an action plan

Planning for financial flexibility – before you make an actual movie, you have to spend some time getting organised. A big part of it is financial planning and financial security during transition time. Consider compensation upfront. It’s important to know how much you spend each month and how much you need to earn your future job to meet your financial goals.

What skills can you transfer to a new career? Think about both soft and hard skills to have a healthy combination of both. Reflect on skills that you are lacking and look for ways how you can acquire them. Perhaps you can find a mentor or network with someone in the industry that you are targeting. There are plenty of free online courses available. Start networking with people and scheduling informal interviews to build your contacts.

SEO of your own brand – every industry speaks its own jargon, and you have to learn to speak that language. Your resume and LinkedIn profile need to include industry-specific keywords to get attention from recruiters and hiring managers. Craft your CV for a career change to sell all your skills and experience to the new role.

Change won’t happen overnight! Build your plan and take small, daily steps to execute it.