3 lessons to help end disengagement in the workplace

3 lessons to help end disengagement in the workdistribution policy3 lessons to help end disengagement in the workplaceThe wild roller coaster ride of our careers has peaks and valleys. At times we are riding the wave of success and other times we are mired in a soupy, toxic work mess.For many, the career roller coaster stays up more often than down. Life is good. Never looking back.For others, the roller coaster stops. Sometimes we put the brakes on ourselves due to our own career/life choices. However, there are times that others make damaging career choices for us.Confusion, anger, betrayal, and negativity are all feelings that invade us when our career is changed by the doing of others. Downsizing, layoffs, badeanstalt bosses can all adversely affect our careers and can turn us into detached employees.Solution? Make a change and get the heck out of your work situation Sounds so simple and yet crazily, many of us dont. We settle into total job disengagement and become apathetic tow ards work-life, creating a resentful, bitter you.Settling should never be an option.Out of controlAt 23 I started my first job in human resources with a large company in an entry level role. It welches awful. Painfully administrative. Not at all what I envisioned I would be doing when I graduated university. However, I knew that in order to step ahead I had to put in the time and learn the foundation of my profession.By 26 I had made my first career jump to an advisory HR role with another company. Finally doing real HR work with a super progressive organization. Within a year an opportunity presented itself for me to be leading a team. Within another year I welches managing an entire department. A year later I was starting up entirely new HR divisions within the organization in a senior position. My career trajectory was nothing but up and I was in full control. Totally unstoppable.Or so I thought.The dreaded organizational restructure happened and as a result, I was shuffled off t o a department completely outside of my profession. No consultation. No option for a different role. Simply moved with an avalanche of change.Now, normally I am a glass half full type of guy. Upbeat and positive. But after this man was I bitter. The career path I thought I was on had completely ended without the decision being mine. I was angry, embarrassed and totally disengaged.Now in the grand scheme of things, my situation was very minor in terms of all the awful things that that happen to employees. I still had a job and the career path I thought I was on was just taking a momentary detour. Sounds so straight forward but I was trapped feeling angry. Stuck not able to rectify my situation. Why?We all react differently when we are faced with work adversity. It can be a big or small work event that tips us over the edge and completely turns us off our employer. The challenge is to take control and not settle. Heres how I did it.Wisdom by urinalThe urinal is not your normal place to find a revelation. Get in. Business done. Get out. No time to hang around.But sure enough there I was face to face with one of those bathroom ads in front of a urinal at a local restaurant. I cant even remember what the ad was for but the caption on the ad gave me pause to think and changed my focusPush yourself because no one else is going to do it for youSerious mind blowing stuff here.Sure I heard this before, but for whatever reason this time, at this urinal, I woke up. I realized only I could take control of my situation. No one was going to fix my situation but me. I needed to push myself to get back on the path I wanted to be on.So simple but when your mind is in a dark place it is sometimes hard to see the light. This urinal ad just happened to be my light.I had a choice. Be negative and miserable. Or push to change my situation for the better.I wisely chose the latter.A new dayI quickly decided that my first step was to get a new job back into my profession of choice. Wi th my resume dusted off, I applied to select companies that I thought match my values. Soon enough I was hired and happy. Kind of.What my career upheaval made me realize was that working for any company wouldnt fully satisfy my creative side. I truly liked my new employer but I also had other aspirations. I wanted to write. I wanted to guide people. I wanted to give back. So that is what I did.First I started writing. 10 minutes a day. Day after day. Before long I had a book and then not long after that I started consulting. This creative side of me continued with another book and another consulting company. I pushed myself to create the work balance I wanted for me. Six years later Im doing what I love.What I learnedThe events I went through led me to where I am today. I am telling my story in an attempt to inspire those who need it for positive change.Here are the nuggets of wisdom from my experiences that I hope will help all those who find themselves in a state of work disengage ment.Lesson 1 Negativity is a choiceYou chose to carry on all the behaviors associated with negativity. This is a choice you make. As soon as I realized that I had a choice to change, that no one else is going to remedy my situation but me, life got better. I got back to positive.Remember, life is short. Its up to you to make changes that give you the life you want. The key is to create personal accountability, with a no excuses attitude. This will lay the foundation for future job happiness.Lesson 2 Step wonYour choice for change and positivity is your first step. Reading this article may be your first step. Congratulations. This is the essential catalyst of forwarding momentum.I wrote an article on the power of making just one simple step. Getting yourself out of a negative work environment is hard. It can seem insurmountable. However, breaking it down into small steps allows you to see success and build momentum along the way.Perhaps your step is to talk to your boss about your d issatisfaction, or write a new resume or look at a job board. All great first steps. Many of us leap straight our perfect end state and then think about all the steps we have to take to get there. The volume of steps to get to our end goals can seem insurmountable and causes total paralysis.Break it down into single steps. Have your end state in mind but take it one step at a time. You will be amazed at the effect this has on you and the positivity it builds. Each step equals success. Each step is a win. Celebrate each win.Lesson 3 Believe in YouI struggled to make the first step because I didnt believe in me. I questioned my abilities and was focused on how others perceived me. I was embarrassed. I didnt want to make a move to a new job or start my own business because of how I felt others would judge me. This way of thinking kept me at a standstill.We make up our own perceived notions of what we think we are capable of and we allow it to influence us into do nothing. We are our ow n worst enemy when it comes to stalling our progress because we dont have the confidence to move ahead, being fearful of stepping out and setting our own course. Realizing that I was the only one holding me back, I was able to reset, focus and get going.Time is precious and no one will change your circumstances other than you. Never let your perception of what others think dictate your life. Lean in, make positive change and believe in YouClark Glassford is the founder of My Practice Interview. The companys purpose is to inspire others to achieve their dream career. My Practice Interview provides industry-leading services including tailored resume writing, curated LinkedIn profiles and expert interview coaching delivering results beyond expectations.

Marissa Mayer Thank you for a great resume!

Marissa Mayer Thank you for a great resumeMarissa Mayer Thank you for a great resumeOur team met with the former Yahoo CEO in London for a brief catch-up on resumes, motherhood and the best ways for dealing with bad press.Few would take on the challenge of walking a mile in Marissa Mayers shoes. After five years as CEO of the troubled Internet behemoth, she is now taking her superwoman cape off and moving on to the next big thing. Her achievements as CEO (during her leadership, Yahoo became one of three digital companies with over 1 1000000000000 users globally) and personal sacrifices for the companys well-being (she only took a total of eight days off for the birth of her first son) are numerous.Yet, it is safe to say that Mayer is leaving a troubled legacy behind. From spending over $1 billion on the acquisition of Tumblr, which she herself called poetic, to failing to disclose the large-scale security breach, which affected over 500 million Yahoo users Mayer has had her fair sha re of cringe-worthy moments.The team welches inspired by Mayers ferocious ambition and in August 2016 we created and published her resume. It welches a crucial force in enabling more users around the world to learn about our platform. Mayers resume welches liked over 40K+ times on LinkedIn, without any paid advertisements. And the Business Insider article covering the story received 300K+ reads. Today, boasts over 250K+ registered users from over 150 countries worldwide.This is why we were particularly excited for the opportunity to meet Mayer and thank her in person for the unknowing contribution she had to s success. Imagine how proud we felt when her face lit up with recognition and amusement as we introduced ourselves. I know you, you did a great job with my resume I loved it, she said.We also had the chance to ask Mayer a few questions, which we are happy to share with you. Get an exclusive peek into the thoughts of the First Lady of the InternetWhat welches the biggest chall enge you tackled at Yahoo? Definitely, it was returning the company to its original 1990s culture. The Silicon Valley tendency to combine business and fun has its roots in the work environment created by Yahoos founders Jerry and David. The idea that the corporate culture and brand of an enterprise can have a meaning larger than the business itself has in my view been one of the key ingredients to Yahoos early success. The challenge which I faced when I joined as CEO, was to reboot the original culture, while also encouraging Yahoo employees to spend more time at the office and give that extra discretionary effort, which the company needed to pull through.Related articlesInfographic 8 Tips From Your Dog On Starting A CareerPros and Cons of working in a startupTravis Kalanick resigns as Uber CEO heres his resumeYou were the first Yahoo CEO to promote maternity leave. Why then did you hide your pregnancy for six months and why didnt you take a longer break from work following the b irth of your children? For legal reasons in the US maternity leave technically is a disability leave. If I took maternity leave, I would have had to appoint a temporary deputy, which would have been complicated and confusing for the board and shareholders. I also felt that Yahoo needed me, needed a strong leader, who was present. Whats your strategy for dealing with bad press? I follow the advice a close friend gave me I dont read any news or articles about myself. One question, in particular, remains on everyones minds. Namely, what caused Yahoos slow demise? As made obvious by the many achievements on Mayers resume, she was expected to over-deliver during her time at Yahoo. Yet, the geek goddess was largely criticized for almost every decision she ever took, while in charge. It may be that expectation was set too high. When Mayer joined the company as CEO in 2012, Yahoo employees made posters with her picture and the word hope underneath. These make-shift pieces of art were in a similar graphic style to the emblematic Barack Obama 2008 presidential campaign. The posters were hung all around Yahoo headquarters. Newspapers all over the world were blasting headlines like Googles First Lady Jumps Ship to Yahoo. A good indication of her slim chances to steer the Yahoo ship in the right direction may have been the short-lived careers of Mayers predecessors. She was the fourth CEO in four years. Her immediate predecessor was taken down after it was discovered that he had lied on his resume. Observers judged Mayers task of saving the poster-child company for the first era of the Internet as close to impossible. Googles search algorithms had been performing better than Yahoo employees categorizing the web by hand. Facebook was doing a better job of serving the communication needs of digital consumers than Yahoo chatrooms. Apps had taken traffic away from desktop computers to mobile phones and Yahoo was lagging behind. Regardless, Mayers name will grace the tech hi story books, while her life experience will inspire young women and girls the world over to dream big and aim high. Kudos, Marissa Should you be looking for a job again, we will be waiting for you at www..com.

How to Become a Successful Music Promoter

How to Become a Successful Music PromoterHow to Become a Successful Music PromoterAre you organized, great with people, and have a deep love of music? Have you been wondering how you can combine your skills and passions together to become a music promoter? As one of the most popular music industry careers, a music or concert promoter is in charge of booking, organizing, promoting, and hosting musical performances at concert halls, clubs, events, and various other venues. How to Become a Music Promoter If you want to work in independent music, becoming a concert promoter might simply involve taking the leap and booking your first show. If you want to work in larger venues and with larger artists, becoming a promoter often involves doing some work with an established company and working your way up the company ladder.Here, we look at two different paths to becoming a music promoter. Path One- Work for a Promotion Company Concert promotion companies, such as AEG, tend to handle promotion for big-name artists. They may plan festivals, stadium/arena shows, or they may work for specific music venues, handling all of the promotion of shows for that location. If you learn the ropes at such a promotion company, you may start out doing very basic things, like distributing flyers/posters for events and work your way up to being the lead promoter on events. You may also specialize in advertising, accounting or some other facet of putting on an event. Some of the pros and cons of working for a promotion company include Getting to work on major events/with big-name artistsOften mora lucrative than indie promotingNo personal financial risk for showsMay have to work with music genres you dont personally enjoyCan be a hard business to break intoMay take a long time to climb the company ladder Path Two- Working for Yourself/Indie Promoting Sometimes, getting started in concert promotion is as simple as booking your first show. Where there are musicians, there is a de mand for people to promote live shows for them. All it takes is a few successful shows to make your phone start ringing off the hook with calls from people who want you to put on their show.Some of the pros and cons of working for yourself/Indie promoting include Getting to pick and choose the shows you want to work onYou are the boss from day oneYou may carry the majority of the financial risk of a showLots of responsibility and wearing many hats, all of which require a large time investmentAdvancement can be difficult- you may end up in a cycle of promoting small club shows that dont allow you to make a lot of money Which Is the Right Path for You? There is no right answer here. It is a matter of personal preference and of course, your career goals. If you crave the excitement of putting on a music festival or working on arena shows, then working for a promotion company is a great way to get started. If you like working with indie musicians and labels, then working for yoursel f may be the best way to get started. Consider your end game and choose the path that leads there.Either way, its important to know that both paths depend on finding the initial funding required to promote a concert or event, be it through the backing of a large promotion company, your own investments, through fundraising or seeking others who will share in the overall expenses (and in return share in the profits as well).