Blog
Debra Wheatman, President of Careers Done Write, provides expert insight to the job search process that puts your career in gear with tips for interviewing, networking, job search strategies and how to create a winning resume and cover letter.
Reclaiming Your Career from Parkinson’s Law
We often confuse being busy with being effective. If we have eight hours to fill, we will fill it with minor details, extra formatting, or unnecessary research to feel like we put in a full day's work. In the modern corporate world, this manifests as endless email threads, over-engineered slide decks, and back-to-back meetings that could have been handled in a single message. We treat our workdays like expanding balloons, stretching tasks until they consume every waking hour, leading to burnout without necessarily driving meaningful results….
From Peer to Boss: The Survival Guide for New Managers
Congratulations! You got the promotion. You’ve traded in your old responsibilities for a shiny new title, a bump in pay, and… a sudden, overwhelming wave of imposter syndrome. First, take a deep breath. What you are feeling is completely normal. Transitioning from an individual contributor to a manager is one of the sharpest learning curves in any professional career. To help you navigate the messy, rewarding, and chaotic first few months, here is a practical guide to surviving and thriving in your new role….
Exchange Analysis Paralysis for a Smarter Job Search Strategy
Today’s job market is overwhelming. The urge to maximize is natural, but it often leads to exhaustion and regret. By adopting a satisficing mindset, you reclaim cognitive bandwidth. Stop chasing the myth of the best; commit to the right criteria, and you turn the job search from an ordeal into a decisive mission. Don't let the infinite scroll keep you hungry—define your standards, close the menu, and order….
Streaming Past Success: Lessons in Adaptability and Humility
On a Saturday night in 1990, the internet was in its infancy, Wi-Fi was a futuristic technology, and video streaming had yet to be conceived. Consumers went to physical stores to rent VHS tapes to watch at home. By the mid to late 1980s, almost two-thirds of American households owned a VCR. VHS had achieved market dominance over the technologically superior Betamax and had driven a new culture of at-home movie enjoyment. And no one was a bigger player in this market than Blockbuster Video. Their stores sprang up all over the country and were immediately recognizable by their blue-and-yellow logo, which also adorned the company’s membership cards. It seemed as though their growth was unstoppable….
Don’t Fall into a Heuristic Trap
Heuristics are mental shortcuts that our brains use to make decisions quickly. Rather than carefully analyzing a situation, we rely upon past experiences, core beliefs, and patterns to come to a quick conclusion. These solutions may not be optimal, but given the limited time and information available, they are incredibly useful. People use this sort of intelligent guesswork, trial and error, process of elimination, and experience to solve problems or chart a course of action. In a world that is increasingly complex and overloaded with big data, heuristic methods simplify and accelerate decision-making through shortcuts and good-enough calculations. Without leveraging heuristics, our brains would suffer cognitive overload….
Things to do differently in 2022 to better manage your career
As 2021 winds down, it is only natural that we look to 2022 with renewed optimism and hope. The New Year is always a time designated for getting out of old routines and looking toward the future. We’ve all heard the adage that doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result is insanity. There is truth in that statement. As the end of the year approaches, evaluate how you’ve managed your career and what you can do differently. Change can be scary, overwhelming, and daunting. But it’s the only way to improve. If you continued to exercise your muscles by executing the same movements and lifting the same weight, your strength and endurance would never improve. Your career is like a muscle. Without exercise, you run the risk of stagnation, at best, and atrophy at worst….
8 Things to do differently in 2022 to improve your job search and your career
The job market is hot right now. Employers, regardless of industry, are having trouble recruiting and retaining the talent they need, and candidates have more interview options than ever before. While this is an excellent environment for job seekers, it’s putting a strain on hiring companies and employees trying to execute on goals amid constant uncertainty and chaos. The pace of voluntary turnover shows no sign of slowing down, nor do the hiring needs of companies in all industries and fields. Add to this the ongoing pandemic; to say these are uncertain times is a gross understatement. Here are some things you can do to improve your focus and optimize your brand, your job search, and your current company….
Improve your job search and productivity with focus
One of the biggest mistakes job seekers make when looking for a new role is to spend their time randomly chasing down every lead they can find. They will spend hours scouring LinkedIn and other job boards for every opportunity that meshes with their experience and submit applications online into the black hole. They put forth significant time and effort, yet they reap minimal results….
Effective Management During a Time of Crisis
My inbox is flooded with questions about COVID-19, including how employers should be handling the crisis and what employees should expect from their management…..
Deciding on a Career as a Prosecutor, beyond a Reasonable Doubt
This month blogs, news reports, and cable talk shows are full of courtroom drama. Several of these high-profile cases provide us with better entertainment that any reality show could. The Jodi Arias murder trial, O.J. Simpson’s hearing, and the sentencing of Kermit Gosnell are examples of court room dramas that have captivated the nation. What…