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!
Thriving Women Leaders: Executive Coaching Forum for Women Leaders in Higher Ed

As a certified executive coach, I have been trained in the stakeholder centered approach for impactful leadership. How are you showing up in your organization? How do others perceive you? Are you willing to get vulnerable, embrace humility, and address your blind spots to honor a growth mindset? It’s essential to bring others into your […]
Can Every Leader Benefit from an Executive Coach?

I attended the Gallup at Work Summit and I was energized by the many sessions focused on coaching. 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 […]
Career Tips for The Class of 2015

It’s graduation season and close to two million millennials will earn a college degree this year. That means the Class of 2015 is seeking jobs in full force. The good news is that the NACE Job Outlook Survey indicates that employers expect to hire more new college graduates this year than they did in 2014. […]
Top 10 Most Overused Career Buzzwords

If your goals include making changes on the career front, a good place to start is your LinkedIn profile. LinkedIn recently published its lists of the top ten “Most Overused Buzzwords” – and the top of the ‘Top 10’, globally, is the word ‘motivated’. If you’re ‘motivated’ in your LinkedIn profile, you’re in good company […]
When You Don’t Get The Job: 4 Tips To Help You Bounce Back

Your resume is well polished. Your LinkedIn profile finely-tuned. You land the interview, and you’re hitting it off with everyone you meet. Then you’re called back for a second…then a third interview…you’re feeling like you’ve really got this! Then the waiting begins…followed by more waiting. And then the news…”We’ve decided to go a different direction.” […]
Be More Mindful: 7 Tips to Improve Your Awareness

Now that we’re well into a brand new year, my question to you is: Is it “business as usual” this year? Is everything working the way you’d like, or are you making changes in 2015? Many of us are hoping to fulfill New Year’s resolutions – wanting “more” and “better” in the job, health, money […]
Bad Bosses Happen, But Suffering Is Optional

Talent leaves an organization when they’re badly managed or when the organization fails to inspire them or provide room for new challenges and growth. You need to use your professional power and take control of your career trajectory. If you have a bad boss, suffering in silence (or out loud) is not a wise career […]
Improve the Staff Selection Process with Virtual Interviews

It would be an understatement to say that hiring is difficult. The constant refinement of technology and rising standards for applicants only serve to complicate the process, even before you factor in the challenge of the job interview. Of course, that same march also offers solutions that can help streamline the process, if not make […]
Propel Your Career Forward by Looking for ‘Extra Headroom’

Career advice from disruptive innovators, entrepreneurs and thought leaders. By Laura Deck, guest blogger Wait. I know what you’re thinking. You’ve heard all the salient career advice and most of it just rehashes what has been offered before. A recent Google search for “career development advice” yielded 38,700,000 hits, so there is no shortage of […]
How to Ace The Video Job Interview

More and more HR mangers use the Internet to interview job candidates nowadays. In fact, more than 63 percent, that’s 6 in 10 human resources managers say their company often conducts employment interviews via video, according to a survey by OfficeTeam. Mounting pressure on HR mangers to reduce recruitment costs, growing popularity of technological devices […]
Salary: 7 Tips To Help You Ask for What You Want

Salary negotiation…it’s right up there with root canals and tax audits in the minds of many. There’s no doubt, it can be challenging to be in the negotiating “hot seat”. In a recent study conducted by PayScale.com, 31,000 people were surveyed about salary negotiation, and over half responded that they had never asked for a raise. […]
Career Lessons from Kai Kight

Recently, I participated on a panel for the Council of Alumni Association Executives in Scottsdale, Arizona. A highlight during the event was a presentation by Kai Kight who identifies himself as an innovator, speaker, violinist, and entrepreneur. Kai created an experience for the audience that was steeped in music and visionary thinking. He believes in […]
Tempted to Take ANY Job: 4 Strategies To Help You Think Twice

Have you ever been at a point where you’re ready to take any job out of desperation – regardless whether it’s the right fit? There’s no doubt that job-hunting in this economy can be challenging and bills must be paid, however conducting a job search from a place of fear rather than strength doesn’t always […]
Sitting Is The New Smoking and A Hazard to Your Career Health

You’ve heard it before, we spend most of our waking hours at work and many spend the majority of their time at a desk in front of a computer. Not to mention the hours we commute to work in a car, plane, train, or bus – sitting. The sedentary lifestyle is a hazard to our […]