Ready to quit? Maybe you should – here’s how to know…

By Gina Calvano | Leave a Comment

To quit or not to quit – that is the question…

 

In my last blog I offered you the opportunity to understand the importance of adopting a daily recovery strategy.  This strategy will help you to recharge after the daily, draining demands of your job.  Not engaging in an active plan to recover is like making daily purchases on your debit or credit card but never adding any money into your accounts.  Eventually the bank will shut you down and you will risk bankruptcy and maybe even exposure as being fraudulent in your practices.

 

Yes – the effects of draining job demands are cumulative.  It’s a debt that racks up and eventually it manifests as health issues (exhaustion, susceptible to common infections such as colds and flus, gastro-intestinal problems, back/neck/shoulder pain, panic and anxiety disorders, depression – to name a few), if left unaddressed.  The truth is you can recover and heal from the daily affects of your job – especially if you are going through a tough time that you know will soon pass.

 

But what if your not so sure this tough time at work is a passing phase?  Do you have this unsettled feeling about your job?  Are the demanding conditions an expected way of life (and it’s not what you want for your life)?  Is your fight or flight instinct is kicking in?  Are you wanting to run (quietly and quickly) or stirring up a heap of trouble due to feeling backed into that same corner where all the other “misunderstood and undervalued” employees are hanging out (are you fighting with some poor souls who deserve it – and even some who don’t)?  Maybe the time has come to make a drastic move – right out the company front door.

 

(Almost) convinced you’re ready to quit?  Maybe you should – here’s how to know…

 

2 factors that matter greatly for deciding if you should stay or go -even without another job lined up are:

Continue Reading

Feel like everyone else’s agenda runs your day and you can’t get anything done at work? You can break this cycle – here’s how…

By Gina Calvano | Leave a Comment

Do you feel incompetent, insufficient, discouraged or powerless to get done what you need to or want to accomplish?  Welcome to inefficacy.

 

How much would you agree with these statements:

 

  • I accomplish the things that really matter every day at work.
  • I have the resources I need to get my job done.
  • I feel supported and encouraged at work by my colleagues.
  • I value my contributions at work.
  • Others value my contributions at work.
  • I feel qualified to do my job.
  • I feel I can handle anything that may come up in my job.
  • It’s ok to contribute to others in my unique way.
  • My job matters.
  • I play an active role in addressing issues that come up related to my work or workplace.

 

If your degree of agreement with many of the statements above is low, you may be at risk for experiencing a feeling of powerlessness at your job which can lead to disengagement and eventually burnout.

 

Feeling powerless at work is especially concerning because it can directly affect the quality of your work.  We all know when the quality of your work falls, we stand out – and not in a good way.  In my experience, management tends to tolerate a degree of cynicism from workers who are still producing strong results – and everyone can easily empathize with exhaustion because we all experience it from time to time.  But when you don’t produce – your boss isn’t producing – so it’s a problem that quickly gets noticed.

 

Although there is a lot an organization can do to improve an employee’s ability to recover more quickly from inefficacy – but often it’s left to the individual to “shape up or ship out.”  It usually goes down something like this “It might be a tough time/situation, but your _____________________ (fill in the blank with some negatively perceived quality you may have – i.e. anger, complaining, lack of confidence, unwillingness to participate, etc.), isn’t helping.”

 

The organization often sees feelings of powerlessness as the employee’s problem to fix – not theirs.  Organizations tend to do their part by starting performance counseling – a “talking to”, poor reviews,  written documentation, demotion, etc. or threats of those things come your way to put you on notice that you need to improve.

 

So, do you feel like everyone else’s agenda runs your day and you can’t get anything done at work?  You can break this cycle – here’s how…

Continue Reading

Feeling tired, crabby, powerless – pretty much every day? You can recover – here’s how…

By Gina Calvano | 3 Comments

Do you experience any of the following pretty much every day?…

 

1.  exhaustion (mental, emotional and/or physical)

 

Do you experience depleted energy due to helplessness, futility or tiredness due to overwork?

 

2.  crabby 

 

Do you frequently have a negative or cynical attitude or loss of concern for something you have a responsibility for – this can include people you interact with fairly regularly?  Do you seek to remove yourself from these situations or people whenever you can?

 

3.  feeling powerless 

 

Do you feel incompetent, insufficient, discouraged or powerless to get done what you need to or want to accomplish?

 

Chronic exposure to any of these 3 experiences can unleash a case of burnout.

 

Burnout typically starts as a form of disengagement which may be triggered by perceived threatening situations, diminished returns on personally invested resources, enhanced demands, or lack of resources.  It can begin as mildly as developing a “wait-and-see attitude” towards aspects of your life – meaning you might hold back from investing too much time, effort or energy in something because you prefer to see how things “play out”.  But here’s what happens when we allow solutions outside of ourself to develop…

Continue Reading

May the force not be with you

By Gina Calvano | Leave a Comment

Have you ever felt forced to do something at work you knew was downright wrong?  Of course you have – we all have!  “Wrong” holds no degrees of “wrongness”.  We think it does – but the truth is if something doesn’t feel right – no matter how minor it might seem (i.e. assuring someone a deadline can be met when you’re just not quite sure that’s true or telling someone you read something you didn’t read – not yet anyway!), it leaves us feeling uneasy and it drains our sense of personal power.  

 

You might think it’s easier to cope with “wrong” doing when the decision to engage in a minor level of corporate cloak and dagger is in your control – and better yet – when it’s a secret you can keep to yourself – no one will ever know!  You might justify these little white lies as necessary to keep the peace (in corporate speak this really means – to preserve your reputation with people you believe have power to harm you in some way).  

 

But, when it’s out of your control…

 

Continue Reading

10 Secret Skills that Build Confidence and Engagement for Your Work…

By Gina Calvano | Leave a Comment

Continuing on in our countdown of 10 Secret Skills that build confidence and engagement for your work…

 

Remember, they are a countdown because these are a progressive set of skills that can be developed and practiced in your daily work to connect you to a more vivid sense of personal power – of confidence that what you do makes a difference for others.

 

As we practice these skills we not only build our confidence, we simultaneously quiet the noise (the self-sabotaging comments) that produces naturally from our brain/ego in response to anything that is expressed from our spirit – our higher self.

 

So let’s get on with the countdown of  “Secret Skills” – and practice, practice, practice away at them!  Here’s #2 and #1…

 

Drum roll please….

 

Continue Reading

I love that this was said…

By Gina Calvano | Leave a Comment

“The closer we grow to our inner light, the more we feel the natural urge to share that light with others.  The meaning of work, whatever its form, is that it be used to heal the world.  Love is the most powerful fuel in any endeavor.  The most important question to ask about any work is ‘How does this serve the world?’”  Marianne Williamson

 

I believe the purpose of anybody’s life is to serve others and that the capacity in which you serve others (what you do) and the unique way you do it is your calling.

 

When you do your job – no matter what it is – think of yourself as a service provider.  Not just to your boss – but to the people who will be impacted by the job you do.  Channel your “inner-marketer” and think about how you relate to those you serve – imagine a “customer-profile”:

  • who they are – imagine a story about them in your mind (how old they are, where do they live, what’s their gender, family dynamic, sense of style, favorite thing to do, what makes them happy, sad, angry, and what goes on in their life day in and day out)
  • what their problem or struggle might be that is perfectly solved by something you can create for them through your job – imagine what happened to them that they need the work your company does – and more specifically, the work you do at your company.
  • how can you perform that work in a way that makes the biggest difference for that customer – even if you never interact with them directly?
  • who else might be impacted in a positive way because you perfectly solved this customer’s problem?

 

Living with a connection to a sense of purpose and calling begins in the discovery of what you can uniquely and easily do for others.  When we give what is easy for us to give, we feel happy to give it.  When we happily serve others what naturally follows is that we become more appreciated, respected, trusted and admired for what we bring to the table.  That leads to a sense of fulfillment because we see the value we can bring to others.  That sense of happiness and fulfillment attracts success including the material markers of success (i.e. money, recognition, etc).

 

Unsure what you uniquely and easily do for others (even in a job you hate)?  Contact me today at 888/560-8233 to schedule a Career Success Insight (“CSI”) Session for only $47.

 

In 1 hour, get an understanding of something unique to YOU that you can practice to make a difference for others and in return, get yourself on the path to a sustainable sense of job satisfaction in return!

 

 

Is your boss dragging you down? Learn what your favorite movie can teach you about thriving despite your boss’s behavior

By Gina Calvano | Leave a Comment

The Society for HR Management recently released their annual Employee Job Satisfaction and Engagement report for 2015.  In that report they reveal the top factors that contribute to employee job satisfaction.  The top 2 contributors had to do with relationships at work:

 

  1. Respectful treatment of all employees at all levels
  2. Trust between employees and senior management

 

Following this theme around relationships with people…

 

Relationship with immediate supervisor ranked #6, Immediate supervisors respect for my ideas ranked #7, Communication between employees and senior management ranked #8, and Relationships with co-workers ranked #15.

 

The work itself ranked #11, Meaningfulness of the job ranked #14, and Variety of work ranked #21.

 

Relationships at work rule!!  More than anything else at your job – because how you feel about the people you work with/for has more to do with your ability to feel happy and fulfilled at your job than any tasks you are accountable to perform.

 

So, is your boss dragging you down?  Learn what your favorite movie can teach you about thriving despite your boss’s behavior…

Continue Reading

What professionals in their 20’s can do to get the job satisfaction they crave (even in a job they hate).

By Gina Calvano | Leave a Comment

In recent blogs I explained What can employees do for themselves to improve their job satisfaction and engagement? I also gave suggestions about how to get more money from your boss and how to improve relationships at work since money and relationships with our co-workers and bosses ranked highly as mattering to employees for job satisfaction and engagement.

There is however another component that the report found matters greatly for engagement – and that piece concerns employee’s opinions and behaviors. Here are the study’s top 5 opinions and behaviors for employees to have, as viewed by employees, that matter for engagement:

  1. “I am determined to accomplish my work goals and confident”
  2. “I can meet them I frequently feel like I’m putting all my effort into my work”
  3. “While at work I’m almost always completely focused on my work projects”
  4. “I am highly motivated by my work goals”
  5. “I have passion and excitement about my work”

These are the top 5 factors across gender and job level – except for one…

The 1 thing professionals in their 20’s are missing to get the job satisfaction they crave is (drumroll please)…

Continue Reading

What can employees do for themselves to improve their job satisfaction and engagement?

By Gina Calvano | Leave a Comment

In May of this year, The Society for HR Management released findings from the Employee Job Satisfaction and Engagement: The Road to Economic Recovery research report which conducted a study of 600 randomly selected employees and assessed differences in responses related to the following demographics:

  • age (Millennials – generally refers to those born in the ‘80s/‘90s, Generation X – generally refers to those born in the ‘60s/‘70s, Baby Boomers – generally refers to those born in the ‘40s/‘50s, and Veterans – generally refers to those born in the ‘20s/‘30s)
  • gender
  • job levels (non-management, professional non-management, middle management and executive management)

The study looked at 3 things:

  1. job satisfaction
  2. engagement conditions
  3. engagement opinions and behaviors

Job satisfaction refers to how much study participants are satisfied with their job. Job engagement is defined in the report as “…employees’ connection and commitment to their particular organization”. Engagement is looked at in 2 components:

  1. conditions in the workplace (“the environment and the work itself”)
  2. workers’ opinions and behaviors (“how the employees perceive their relationship with their work, as well as how they view others around them”)

The report included suggestions on what organizations could do to address the findings and close some of the more significant satisfaction gaps. Organizations will ultimately do what they will do to address these findings (or not). Corporate efforts however will never be more powerful than what employees can do for themselves to become satisfied or engaged.

This data can be an inspiration for workers to protect themselves from loss of satisfaction and engagement no matter what their employer ultimately does. Why do it?

Continue Reading