This Is Not The Career I Ordered™ Blog
Savvy Professional Career Wisdom by Caroline Dowd-Higgins
This is Not the Career I Ordered is read by thousands of careerists around the globe. With savvy tools, inspiration, and resources, this timeless book empowers you to enjoy your career, and love your life!
Can You Benefit from an Executive Coach?
As a certified executive coach, I work with a coach – a few in fact, who help guide me on my career and life journey. My coaches have provided a space with psychological safety and confidentiality to allow me to explore, discover, self-reflect, and polish my strengths, and mitigate my blind spots, so I can […]
Showcase How You Are Indispensable for Job Security
The Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, and Ambiguous (VUCA) world-of-work has made us question job security. Gone are the days when company loyalty made you feel protected during difficult times. All sectors from corporate to non-profit, and higher-education have deployed downsizing, reductions in force, and lay-offs to navigate tumultuous times. Being indispensable in the current competitive world […]
Autonomy, Mastery, and Purpose at Work in a Global Pandemic
I follow the work of Adam Grant, an Organizational Psychologist at Wharton and I’m an avid fan of his podcast WorkLife. The title of Adam’s podcast is very similar to my Your Working Life podcast, but Adam you should know – my podcast came before yours. I hope you check it out! Many thanks to […]
Career Recovery: Be Resilient After a COVID-19 Job Loss
The global pandemic has forced millions into unemployment with business closings and an economic downturn that beat the Great Recession. A common denominator for both tumultuous job markets is the necessity for job seekers to showcase resiliency and recovery as they navigate their career future. Here are some essential tips to help you deal with […]
Practice Intentional Acts of Kindness
You’re stressed beyond measure at work – toiling away on the umpteenth Zoom meeting; racing the clock to get a grant proposal in; or working overtime to iron out a distribution snafu. Then a colleague sets aside their own project to pitch in on yours, or a friend, who’s been through something similar, picks up […]
Radical Candor: Part II – Breaking It Down
In my last blog post, I shared the story of Kim Scott’s radical-candor-epiphany while at Google, when her boss at the time, Sheryl Sandberg, pulled her aside and confronted her on a performance issue. While the experience was not a comfortable one for Scott, Sandberg’s forthrightness helped Scott to improve and grow, and become even […]
Radical Candor: Part I – Getting Real
It’s performance review season for many organizations, despite the pandemic, and that can mean difficult conversations. Managers are giving evaluations that can be hard to deliver, as well as hard for those on the receiving end to hear. In her book Radical Candor: How To Be A Great Boss And A Kick Ass Citizen, author, […]
Take Time to Focus on Yourself and Reframe COVID-19
The coronavirus pandemic has disrupted all of our lives. Careers, relationships, and personal projects are all on hold while we wait for the world to settle into a new normal. Many people have found their mental health has suffered with the heightened stress. Small businesses worldwide are struggling to stay afloat. With all the tragedy […]
Jump Start Your Career Search After Being Let Go
Being dismissed or furloughed from your job has been more common than not as a result of the COVID-19 global pandemic that rocked the worldwide economy. For the unemployed, or underemployed – now is the time to pick yourself up and get back into the saddle in order to find your next job. Showcasing your […]
Journaling For Health and Well-Being
I’ve always been a proponent of journaling on a regular basis. More than ever, journaling offers an oasis – providing a respite from the pressures and tumult of these scary and unnerving times. I find I’m journaling more than usual these days and I’m encouraging my clients to put pen to paper to record what […]
Twelve Tips for Turbulent Times
My friend and side-hustle colleague Kris Taylor wrote this awesome blog, which I am delighted share with you. There is always wisdom to be found in turbulent times. Too often, a fair amount of time must pass for that wisdom to crystallize. The organizational change work I’ve done in organizations over the past 20 years […]
Finding Ways To Keep In Touch with Social Distancing
Like sunshine and water to a garden, we humans thrive on touch. Countless studies have found that touch is a key part of our blossoming and growth, and so it’s been heartening to see the news stories featuring creative workarounds by moms, dads, kids, young and old, and even teachers – all trying to maintain […]
Your New Normal: How Will It Look?
You may have seen them on social media…the memes and articles about how our lives will be forever changed due to Coronavirus. One of those memes, from Brené Brown, recently appeared in my social media feed questioning the whole idea of “normal” and pointing out that “normal” in the current age has had a very […]
COVID-19 Workaholism is Real
The COVID-19 pandemic has created a work-at-home scenario for me that has potential for backsliding into my dangerous workaholic tendencies. The back-to-back Zoom meetings with no transition time and lack of a lunch break are needed when urgency is real, but I am concerned that we are slipping into an unsustainable and unhealthy new work […]
