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 […]
The Power of Great Teamwork
It’s summer sports season and from the recent victory of the US Women’s World Cup soccer team, we can learn a lot from the global professional athletes as well as the local sports enthusiasts playing in community recreational leagues. Teamwork lessons that serve athletes well on the court are also applicable to your professional life. […]
The Art of Public Speaking and How It Can Enhance Your Career
Among the pressing fears for human beings, public speaking ranks at the very top along with heights and snakes. As someone who really enjoys public speaking, I realize that I may be part of a small population but I also know how speaking has enhanced my communication and leveraged my career brand. I offer wisdom […]
Embrace “Good Enough to Go” for Career Momentum
As a career development and executive coach, I work with many individuals who are focused on making changes to their careers to better align with professional values and strengths. But for some, their best plans often get stalled in analysis paralysis, which results in stagnation and a hard stop to all forward momentum. Ambivalence Trap […]
Don’t Be A Work Loser – Take All Your Paid Time Off
As a recovering workaholic, I strive regularly to integrate life and career to honor my personal relationships and my professional ambition. My life often resembles a roller coaster with ups and downs of activity and never a steady balance. This reality check has allowed me to navigate the ultra-busy career times and offset them with […]
Single Task Your Way to a Better Life and Career
Multitasking used to be a sought after professional competency thought to be a valuable skill for the busy professional. Research tells us that singletasking is actually more effective and can result in higher productivity and time efficiency. I can envision the woman at work reading this blog while eating her lunch, checking her email, listening […]
Spring Cleaning: Letting Go With Gratitude
There’s something about fresh starts outside that inspire fresh starts inside. Sun shining, buds popping, and milder temperatures inspire us to open the windows to let the springtime air in, which can, in turn, inspire us to send the clutter out! Marie Kondo can certainly help in this regard. Kondo is the organizing wunderkind and […]
There is No Mind Reading in The Career World
Gone are the days when working hard was enough to earn recognition or a promotion in the career world. Take control of your career trajectory and design your unique path. In addition to mapping out your career future, be sure to tap the wisdom of those who can empower you to achieve your goals. Keeping […]
Career Wisdom for the Class of 2019 That Also Works for Seasoned Professionals
The Class of 2019 Commencement speakers included celebrities like Glenn Close at the College of William & Mary, Fareed Zakaria at The Ohio State University, Laverne Cox at Pitzer College and Apple CEO, Tim Cook at Tulane University, to name only a few. While the style and wisdom shared by the myriad of commencement speakers […]
How to Get Organized and Increase Productivity
Quite often when we’re working, we don’t get to the bottom of our to-do list, things get in the way, unexpected things happen, time flies and sometimes things just don’t get done. This can leave you feeling disheartened, stressed and then demotivated which is no use to anyone. If you were just a bit better […]
What My Father’s Death Taught Me About Grief
The first few months of this year have been filled with significant loss. My Dad died in February after a very rapid decline from Alzheimer’s disease. We knew his condition was terminal but in December when my siblings and I contemplated that this family Christmas gathering might be his last, we didn’t realize his death […]
5 Ways to Care for Yourself – Even with a Busy Career
For many of us, weekends are a time for relaxation. Counting down to Friday becomes routine because it means you can finally recover after five days of beating yourself up at work. However, this is a toxic cycle that tells us we should put self-care on hold for most of the week, when it should […]
Curiosity: Let It Be Your Guide
“I wonder…” Whenever I hear coaching clients start off a sentence with these two words, I feel heartened. It means wheels are turning…intuition is kicking in, and mobilization is in the offing. It means my clients are curious, and ready to move past what is safe…beyond the known. It signals that they’re ready to step […]
