At some point in your career, you’ll question whether you’re on the right path. When your boss starts questioning your career path, it’s time to take a serious look at what you’re doing and why.
If your boss makes a suggestion that you may want to look for another job, there are a few steps you can take to find your next career move.
1: Assess What You Really Want
The first thing to do in this case is to step back and consider what direction you want to go in your career with this company. Be honest with yourself by asking “do you really want this job?” There is no reason to fight for something that no longer excited you.
2: Meet With Your Manager
After you evaluate your job and career path and decide you want to stay with your company, schedule a time to meet with your manager and discuss how you can move forward. This is a good time to talk about what issues the management team sees, where they feel you fit best within the company and what you’d like to do. During the meeting, you should share not only what you want moving forward, but also how you plan to address the original issue.
3: Create a Plan
What if you decide that you really don’t want to be in this job anymore? You have two options, stay and wait for things to improve or start looking for a new positon. Either way, you should evaluate your career and where/what your next role should include—you don’t want to make a bad decision. Finally, create plan for your registration. Evaluate the timing, insurance transitions and your registration.
We all know that your appearance is the first thing people notice, especially during an interview. With the tech startups on the rise, more job seekers moved to a more casual attire for interviews. However, more and more interviewers expect that job seekers dress professionally during the interview process. What’s appropriate attire depends on the industry…interviewing at a bank is different from interviewing at a gaming company. So, do your research to understand the company’s culture and attire standards. If you are unsure, you can always ask the company’s HR department or your recruiter. However, the best rule is always to dress more conservatively.
Tips for all candidates:
If you hate your open office plan, you are not alone. Surveys show that people who work in open plan offices are less satisfied with their workplace and jobs. Experts claim the open office concept causes more distractions and lowers productivity. So, if you are working in an open office how can you survive?
One big complaint in open offices is the lack of walls. This lack of privacy invites unwanted conversations. To get sustained work done, you are going to have to develop a polite (but firm) way to you are not interested in chatting right now. Wearing headphones to show you do not want to be disturbed or putting a sign on top of your computer “Busy Right Now” are examples of effective and polite signals for your co-workers.
You cannot control the open office space, so schedule some time every day to get away from the office. A daily walk or lunch break will give some time away from the busy, often loud open office spaces. If you don’t have breaks, consider taking advantage of an empty conference room or common area to get some quiet alone time.
Every office has busy time when everyone is bustling around and other times when there is a quiet lull. Use these patterns to your advantage. Consider adjusting your work hours so you can take advantage of the quiet lull to help maximize your productivity.
Headphones are the new office wall. If you work in an open office space, consider utilizing headphone and music to balance the unwanted noise with soothing music that helps your concentrate and be more productive. Consider nature sounds, white noise and music without lyrics to block noise without distracting you from your work.
In the workplace, there are small missteps that are easy to recover from and then there are big blunders that can kill your career. Whether you are just starting out or have been in your career for years, here are four career missteps to avoid:
Everyone wants to get ahead, but the successful ones know their limitations and the timing associated with the right career move. Knowing when to push for a new promotion or career move is important. Trying to climb the corporate ladder to quickly can result in a poor reputation or worse failure in the new role. Often the new role is very visible and can greatly diminish your chances of moving up within the organization.
The average millennial will change job 6.3 times from age 18-25. Changing jobs for the right reason can benefit your career, but it depends on how and why you are making the change. While employers are much more willing to accept job hopping from the younger folk, a lot depends on how they do it. For more experience professional, be careful not to ‘job hop’. Moving jobs too often, even for the right reasons can make landing your dream role move difficult. When you do decided to leave a role, be candid, pick an exit timeline and stick to it and put in the extra work to ensure a smooth transition for you and your employer. This will prevent burned bridges that can come back to haunt you in the future.
Human nature doesn’t disappear when you start a new job, so it’s understandably that like-minded people tend to gravitate toward each other. Often, workplace bonds can be deep and long lasting. However, getting too close with one group of people and it can hurt your career, particularly if that group falls out of favor or are part of a round of layoffs. A better strategy is to make friends across the entire organization. This will help you build your name and reputation within the company. The more people you know throughout the company, the greater your connections and networking opportunities.
No matter your level within a company, we all have manager and mentors that can help us navigate and improve our job performance. These people can provide you with invaluable advice and feedback, but you must be willing to accept it. If you never learn to accept feedback or criticism, you’ll kill your career before it begins.
Preparing for an interview can be the difference between success and failure. One of the best ways to prepare for an interview is to practice your interview questions and answers. This will help you hone your answers.
We have complied 20 of the most common interview questions below. Practice your answers so you will feel comfortable and put your best foot forward.
Delta Computer Consulting, Inc. is certified through the WBENC (Women’s Business Enterprise National Council) as a woman-owned and woman-operated business.
