General career tips and advice to take your career to the next level.
The art of compartmentalising can be very useful in deciding where to focus your energy during the course of a stressful day. Let’s assume you just finished a meeting with colleagues in which you couldn’t reach an agreement... Compartmentalising is the skill that allows you to move on to the next meeting without the previous meeting weighing on your mind and affecting your performance. Think about this:
Read MoreYou may often wonder what it takes to be good at one’s job. I mean, really good. You see them everyday. They have their numbers at hand - Ask them anything, and they have the facts right at their fingertips. People who are really good at their jobs often cut the picture of confident, articulate and gutsy
Read MoreExcessive workload, few opportunities for growth or unchallenging work are just some examples of what can cause a professional to feel stressed at work. Feeling stressed for a protracted period of time however, can lead to a decline in work performance and physical health challenges.
Read MoreGetting promoted, though a sign that your work is appreciated, can easily become a stressful experience, if not properly managed. You will have new expectations of yourself and so will everyone else. From a position of being responsible for an outcome, you move to managing those actually doing to the work. It gets even more complicated when you are promoted to a position of managing colleagues that were previously your peers.
Read MoreProfessionals need to protect their minds. We need to protect the essence of who we are. We learn everyday and sometimes have to go through temporary trials to win battles down the line. It is ok to lose small battles from time to time so that you can win when it matters. It gives you a sense of progression.
Read MoreI never thought my boss would leave… Of course, I understand that he’s human and has ambitions of his own but I just never conceived of it and didn’t want to, until it happened. It was downright shocking and I felt at a loss, to put it mildly. Here was the captain of our ship, parking it in like it was just another day.
Read MoreBehavioural interview questions are very common in today’s workforce. These types of questions are great for the interviewer because it gives them a lot of information about the potential candidate. Many interviewers fear behavioural questions because they are open ended with no single best answer.
Read MorePhone interviews are quite common. They are often employed when potential employees live miles away from their company headquarters or the interviewer. For example, a company might want to stay true to their corporate social responsibility of reducing greenhouse gases by conducting remote interviews instead of asking the applicant to drive or commute to their headquarters. Whatever the reason, applicants who want to bag the position might well remember the following:
Read MoreHaving a sample resume to draw on is an effective way to approach your resume design. This post is a compilation of websites that can help you get your resume going. In no particular order, the sites have been listed as follows:
Read MoreThis post is an alphabetical listing of Career Advice Blogs you can subscribe to for posts on how to manage your career. It will be updated as we discover more so be sure to bookmark this page.
Read MoreIf you're prepared to experiment, stretch the boundaries of your knowledge and challenge status quo – you will make mistakes. This is not to say that mistakes are only made when we go beyond our comfort zone. Mistakes can be made even in everyday, straightforward and mundane tasks.
Read MoreMaking the decision of whether or not to go for a PhD is never straightforward. This subject always tends to evoke mixed emotions in prospective students due to the increasing number of drop-outs and well-documented challenges associated with pursuing a doctorate degree. It’s important to know exactly what you are getting into before making the decision to go ahead with it. The older we get, the more difficult it becomes to balance the demands of work, life and family with the demands of education.
Read More“Should I follow my passion or should I work just to earn money?”
Have you ever asked yourself this question?
No matter what stage of life or career you are in, deciding which path to follow usually requires weighing your options to know exactly what you are getting into.
Read MoreWe often hear people say getting a doctorate degree can make your career soar high. I, for one, have heard this before - “A Phd will give you a higher salary and higher chances of getting promoted.”
Read MoreIf running the rat race starts getting harder to do, you might want to consider taking a break. A career break can be taken for a variety of reasons. You may want to write a novel, study a subject/language or even travel the world. Before you clear up your desk, it's very important to understand what a career break is all about and be able to answer these key questions
Read MorePersistent feelings of underappreciation at work can be very worrisome and often signifies a deep-seated problem that needs to be addressed.
You do your best at work, make decisions you believe are right, deliver success after success but you still feel unappreciated. It’s very important to understand where those feelings are coming from before they take over and become crippling. Underappeciation has the potential to make you feel depressed and consistently unworthy of your role. Such feelings should not be left to fester and should be addressed immediately. Here are 5 simple steps you can take to improve the situation and how you feel about yourself.
Read MorePreparing adequately for your Interview is the key to acing it. A huge part of that preparation involves understanding what to expect and getting adequate practice before the big day. There are numerous sites online with courses and practice sessions on how to excel at interviews. Explore this list for websites that can help you get started:
Read MoreApart from those already high up the career ladder with nowhere else to go, the rest of us have to work very hard for a promotion. The terms for promoting an employee across organizations are not always clear or uniform. In some cases, promotions are done through a combination of performance evaluation and promotion examination. For others, it may be a combination of different factors. The key is to identify what factors your organization considers in deciding whether an employee should be promoted or not and work on getting yourself noticed.
Read MoreAre you always running late for…everything?
The fact that you are reading this piece implies that you are ready to hold yourself accountable, which is a positive step in the right direction.
Read MoreMeetings are usually called to solve problems, share information/feedback, brainstorm and build commitments, to mention a few objectives. Depending on the objective of the meeting, it may involve going through reports or presentations. Though there are many benefits to be had (in some cases), it can be quite challenging taking part in seemingly endless meetings and discussions.
Read MoreThis business analyst blog contains practical insights into business analysis, software testing and business process management. I will be sharing business analyst tips, CBAP Certification tips, lessons learnt and insights into all the things I've learnt during my BA career.
