Advance Your Career (Part 3)

This is the third installment of a series of articles about advancing your career and taking steps to improve your skills, raises, and annual reviews at your job to increase your income. Read Part one of Advance Your Career here. Part two of Advance Your Career here.

Making Lemonade at Work

Sometimes, life, work, love, money hands us lemons. The key is to make lemonade out of those lemons when possible. By turning an unexpected downturn into an opportunity to re-evaluate and perhaps make some life changes, unexpected lemons can be one of the most powerful catalysts for positive change in every aspect of our lives.

Dont Let Lemons Turn into Sour Grapes

Learning that despite all of your preparation, all of your efforts, that sometimes lemons still happen is one of the most important lessons I’ve learned about working in the business world. People have different motivations and make decisions based on what is important to them. Although it would be nice to think that everyone has ‘the company’ at heart in everything they do, it just isn’t the case.

Staying Positive

For situations that get sour, staying positive is one of the most important lessons to learn and practice in the business world. A positive, honest, company-serving attitude will allow you to succeed and do well despite any workings within your company. Even in a bad situation like losing your job or having a major project fail, keeping this attitude and maintaining your integrity will allow you to be strong and confident as you move into the next endeavor.

Its OK to Question

Whenever major lemons come along for me in my job, I start a simple sanity check. This is not to make a rash decision; I will likely do nothing rash with my job situation for a week or two after a bad situation plays out. However, the questions below can serve as a great guide to help you decide if you should be considering leaving your job:

- Am I still happy here?
- Is this job still the best Job for me, given my skills?
- Have the reasons I am here changed/gone away?
- Is this job still a challenge?
- Is this salary comparable for my location/field/skill-level?

Write/Review Career Plan

A second great way to consider whether or not these lemons are an impetus to change jobs is to review your career plan. Ideally, you will have written it before now, but if you haven’t, write one up. Write it in the first person and include sections for short term (6 months), mid-term (1-2 years), and longer term (5 years). Every so often, when you get major work-lemons or if you haven’t done so in about a year, review this plan. It might be something that you work on with your HR or manager at work, but if not, it is something for you to focus on as a longer term goal as you crank through work 9-5 for weeks on end.

Part of your career plan might be to become self-employed or run a business.
Check our part 4 of this Advance Your Career series to see if your career plan might take you down this path to money.

Did Advance Your Career (Part 3) Deliver on the Promise?
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