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!
Establish a Gossip Free Workplace
I read a fascinating New York Times article by Shayla McKnight who shared a story about her job interview with an online printing company. The Human Resources Manager was clear about the no-gossip policy and no office politics rule before she was even hired. While McKnight thought the policy was refreshing it also seemed hard […]
Be Your Own Valentine: Love Who You Are
It’s the time of year for cards with red hearts, chocolates, and flowers as Valentine’s Day approaches. It causes anxiety for some who are seeking affection, and bliss for others who are celebrating their love with someone special. This Valentine’s Day I encourage you to see it through a different lens. By all means celebrate […]
Professional Poise Can Distinguish You
As an opera singer I know from experience that stage presence speaks volumes about how you are perceived. The audience forms an impression of you before you even open your mouth and the same rings true in the world of work. You have control over the way you carry and comport yourself and these traits […]
The Art of the Informational Interview
Part of your career reinvention strategy is to figure out what you really want. Once you have completed your self reflection and connected the dots linking your values, interests, personality and skills you should come up with a general idea of career fields that are a good personal match. The reality is that you may […]
Showcase Your Resiliency
With staggering unemployment rates and job insecurity, many people have changed careers by necessity and others, by choice. You must learn to navigate the new normal of this job world and take ownership of your personal career destiny. Now more than ever employers want to see that you can bounce back and recover quickly from […]
Lessons About Soft Skills from Peggy Klaus
My last entry discussed the importance of recognizing your unique skill set, so I want to take a moment to highlight adaptive skills often referred to as soft skills or emotional intelligence competencies. Peggy Klaus, a nationally acclaimed Fortune 500 communication and leadership coach is a friend and mentor of mine and I am a […]
You Have Skills You Didn’t Even Know You Had!
Every day I speak with students and private clients who have no real sense of what their skills are. Simply put, a skill is an ability, based on training or experience, to do something well. We all have skills and the trick is to discover what they are and market them with humble confidence to […]
Know Thy Self
Following the career development steps of self evaluating your VIPS (values, interests, personality and skills) it’s time to focus on personality. This happens to be one of my favorite parts of the career reinvention and self reflection journey. Personality refers to your unique patterns of mental, emotional, physical, and behavioral characteristics. You may have heard […]
Plan B Job Search Strategies – Radio Interview
In November I was interviewed by Chicke Fitzgerald on Transition Solutionz blog talk radio. I discussed identifying your personal brand, playing to your strengths and the power of networking in the job search process. Check out the archived interview online http://www.blogtalkradio.com/resumelive/2009/11/10/transition-solutionz-series Transition Solutionz has a theory. They believe that being in career transition is not […]
Find Your Passion and Play to Your Strengths
A recurring bit of career advice from the women with whom I conducted interviews across the globe was to find your passion. It sounds simple but I am shocked at how few people are actually in tune with their personal passions. I’m not talking about romance but I’m asking you to consider what motivates and […]
What Interests You?
The next predictor in your personal self assessment is Interests. Knowing your interests can help you discover your passion and choose a career. Interests are the biggest predictors in career selection since we gravitate towards what we like. One of my favorite assessment tools is the Strong Interest Inventory® (Strong) which measures career and leisure […]
What Do You Value?
Choosing the first few entries for the blog launch was a difficult task since I truly cherish each woman’s unique story. Heidi Roizin’s transition is indeed motivational for many women so it was a great place to begin. Heidi was motivated to lose weight which led to her profitable CD venture: SkinnySongs. She had a […]
Ready, Set, Launch!
Welcome to my blog – This is Not the Career I Ordered. In this tumultuous economy many women have changed careers by necessity and others, by choice. We’ve had to learn to navigate the new normal of the career world and take ownership of our personal career destinies. This has given women a unique opportunity […]
