A career resolution is exactly what it sounds like: a resolution for your career intended to help you grow into a better professional. At Work It DAILY, we believe that you need to work on your career every day (yes, you do, in fact, need to "work it daily"). So, everyone should make a career resolution or two along with those other ambitious personal resolutions. They can be little things like learning a new skill or growing your professional network, or bigger goals like landing a promotion or getting a new job.
But how do you know what kind of career resolutions to make?
You can begin by asking yourself, "Am I where I want to be in my career?" If your answer is "no," you need to take a closer look at your career goals.
Here are five more career questions you should be asking yourself this new year to figure out how to grow your career and become the professional you know you can be.
1. Am I Proud Of My Job Title?
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You could be a janitor or a neurosurgeon, it doesn't matter. If you aren't proud of what you do for a living, there's something missing: passion and purpose.
Career burnout is real, but sometimes it's deeper than that. Our passion at 25 won't necessarily be our passion at 40. And that's okay.
When we are passionate about what we do, we are proud because we are doing what we think is important, what we love doing. We feel a sense of purpose. We are adding value to and making a difference in this crazy world—in a small, but significant way.
Every job is important. No matter what your job title is, if you aren't proud of it, and don't feel like you can leverage your strengths as a professional in the position, you should absolutely change that. Identify that one problem you want to find a solution to and go after it. What are you waiting for?
Remember, the only bad job is the one you aren't passionate about, the one that isn't allowing you to leverage your professional strengths and reach your potential.
If you don't know what your professional strengths are or what kind of work you'd find purposeful and fulfilling, we recommend taking our free career quizzes.
Take the quizzes now to learn your unique combination of professional strengths and how they can help you get better career results so you can be proud of what you do.
2. Do I Feel Secure In My Career?
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This is a bit different from job security. Actually, job security doesn't exist. Every job is temporary. Think you can stay in the same job for decades and then retire? Think again. While that may have been commonplace for past generations, today's workforce and job market are completely different than what they were a decade or two ago.
So what does it mean to feel secure in our careers? When we believe as professionals that we can add value wherever we are.
You are a business-of-one. A company won't want to invest in you if they don't know the kinds of services you provide, the kind of value you could add to the organization, and the problems you could solve for them. Here are some examples of questions that will help you determine if you're secure in your career:
- Are you adding value at your current job?
- Are you honing your skills, expanding your network, and building your personal brand?
- Do you feel confident that if you lost your job, you'd be able to find a comparable one in the same field?
- Do you feel confident you'd be able to demonstrate to potential employers how you add value?
Since every job is temporary, it's extremely important to constantly work on our careers and ask ourselves these questions frequently so we always feel secure in our businesses-of-one.
3. Will I Be Able To Achieve Wealth?
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When most people think of "wealth," they think of dollar signs and anything that you can attach a monetary value to. Our jobs help us build wealth. We're not going to tell you that money isn't important. Of course it is! It allows you to live the life you want to live. In many ways, money equals freedom.
But the truth is, there are other forms of wealth that are more important that you can't attach any monetary value to.
Real wealth comes in the form of family, friends, hobbies, experiences, knowledge, and community. If you don't have these things, money will never fill that void.
So, is your career allowing you to build this type of wealth? The intangible kind? Or are your relationships suffering because of your job? Is your work-life balance nonexistent? Do you have any time to pursue hobbies, learn, or volunteer?
Your career should never inhibit you from achieving real wealth. The best job isn't the one that pays the most. It's the one that pays the bills and gives you enough time to live, too.
4. Do I Have Any Regrets?
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Just asking ourselves this question can be difficult because maybe we don't want to know the answer. Acknowledging that you regret something in your life is the first step to making a change. Guess what? There's still time to chase your dreams!
If you do have regrets, that doesn't mean you haven't been a successful professional. That also doesn't mean you haven't had a good career. You could be the most successful person, but if you never got up the courage to start that business, make that career change, or go back to school, you'll most likely think, "What if?" for the rest of your life.
You'll never know if you don't try. Don't be afraid of failure. Life is just one big experiment, and it's your job to learn from those experiments. That's how you discover what works and what doesn't. That's how you discover what's possible.
And even if you do "fail," that's an incredibly more valuable experience than waiting out the clock on a mediocre career. So, don't give up on your dreams just yet.
5. Can I Reach My Full Potential In This Role? In This Career?
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When we feel like we have more to contribute to society, that's a sign we haven't yet reached our full potential. Do you feel like you're wasting your potential at your current job? Do you think you'd reach your full potential in another career?
Really think about what you want your professional legacy to be. It's a lot harder to get up in the morning when you don't find fulfillment in your work. When it comes time for you to retire, are you going to look back on your career and feel like you could have accomplished much, much more with those 50 years?
Everyone has unique gifts, skills, and expertise. When we focus on developing ourselves as individuals, as businesses-of-one, it's a lot easier to share those things with the world. Give yourself a chance to reach your full potential. If you haven't taken our free quizzes yet, your results will help you do just that. You may be surprised by what you can accomplish.
Before you get back into the same routine at work this year, we hope you take a few minutes to ask yourself these career questions. Listen carefully to how you answer them. You may need to make a career resolution or two.
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“I just had my resume done by someone else, but I’m very disappointed with it.” “I have no love for my former resume writer.”
In my practice, I hear words like these all the time. In fact, I heard them as recent as last week.
And without knowing any details, I can tell the person on the other end of the line right then and there what went wrong as it’s always the same thing, or a combination of things.
One look at their resume tends to confirm my suspicion.
If your resume looks cookie cutter – and it may not look that way to you, but I can spot these resume templates from miles away, I know you probably engaged a large resume-writing firm that offers fast turnaround (48 hours or so) and offers no personal phone time. You fill out a questionnaire and that’s it.
I get hired by many clients to rewrite these resumes.
By the way, this is not to say large resume-writing firms are always bad and small resume-writing businesses are by definition good!
Check out these 3 signs you may need to break up with your current or prospective resume writer. That is, if you were hoping to receive a quality resume:
1. You were charged or quoted a very low fee to have your resume completely revamped – say around $200 – and offered a very quick turnaround (48 hours).
(If you think $200 is an average fee for a resume rewrite then you need to read on, too!)
Why is this a bad sign?
Although we all want a great deal; with professional resume writers, you pretty much get what you pay for. Professional resume writers with years of experience, who have been published, who hold resume-writing credentials (especially the MRW and ACRW which are head and shoulders above all other resume credentials as they are hard to obtain and maintain), know the ROI and value they bring to the table, and they’ll charge you for that.
So, how much do they charge?
Roughly between $500 and $2,000+ depending on your level, industry, and the complexity of your project.
Writers who charge very little tend to have limited experience and are trying to compete on price alone. Because the field of resume writing is not regulated, many people thought they could make a quick buck off all those folks who got laid off due to the economy.
2. When working with your resume writer, he or she only asks for your current resume and refuses to get on the phone with you. Maybe they’ll use a questionnaire, but that will be it.
Why is this a bad sign?
One of the things you pay a resume writer for, is his or her knowledge of how decision makers review resumes. With this knowledge, a good resume writer will ask you specific questions to draw this information out of you. They will want to get a feel for you to accurately represent you on paper. In other words: data gathering should be a huge – and very important - part of the process.
3. Your resume writer cannot explain to you what the latest developments are when it comes to effective resumes and job search strategies.
A lot has happened in job searching and resume writing the past few years. Make that a LOT.
Just asking, “Can you explain the difference to me between today’s resumes and those 'back in the days' (aka pre-2008)?” will be a great way to qualify a professional resume writer.
The response you get should include some words about personal branding, about the need for tighter and crisper documents, and about the impact both social media and mobile technology are having on the job search and thus resume writing.
If you want a more in-depth answer to this question, head over to my blog for the latest resume-writing and job-search trends.
So here’s what I recently did in reaction to all my previously burnt clients...
I created a special for all the unsatisfied folks out there walking around with a so-so or flat-out god-awful resume along with a bad taste from their experience with another resume-writing firm. I’m one of the pricier resume writers out there so I wanted to help those who were going for a second round of resume development by giving them 20% off my regular resume-writing fee. For more details, click here.
What’s more – I’m asking for your input to create a whole series of specials as part of our 10-year CareerBranches anniversary. Name your own special and I might just give it to you! It’s all on my blog, you need just comment!
Ilona Vanderwoude, founder of CareerBranches, is a career designer who helps her clients fit a million passions into one lifetime while providing the tactical support to actually make it happen. Read more » articles by this approved career expert | Click here » if you’re a career expert Photo credit: Shutterstock
