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.
Innovation Is Not Found in a Calendar Invite
You are familiar with exhaustion of the modern workday: a back-to-back gauntlet of calendar invites that leaves you staring at your screen at 5:00 PM, wondering when you will actually have time to get your work done. Meetings and meeting culture can stifle innovation, reduce productivity, and be a significant pain point for your team. In its push for cross-functional alignment, corporate culture has made a critical error. “Meetings" and "collaboration" have become conflated. Relying on meetings as your primary vehicle for teamwork is often the very thing stifling true innovation. To build high-performing teams, leaders must understand where meetings fail and how genuine collaboration happens….
Mind the Gap
We all know that the current job market is an employer’s market. We hear stories of candidates who go through multiple rounds of interviews, submit work for free, and create presentations as part of the recruiting process only to receive a curt “thanks, but no thanks” email from the recruiter. It can be a harrowing, soul-sucking endeavor. The labor market is particularly tight right now, and it is not unusual to see professionals who have been out of work for extended periods. Employers know this, but many are still fixated on “gaps in employment….”
From Desks to Toolbelts
For decades, the American Dream followed a linear script: graduate high school, secure a four-year degree, and climb the corporate ladder toward a corner office. Skilled trades—plumbing, electrical work, HVAC, and carpentry—were often framed as "Plan B" options for those who weren't cut out for academia. However, as we move through 2026, a cultural and economic shift is underway. Prestige is no longer found in the cubicle or on a Teams call; it is being rediscovered on the job site….
From Sci-Fi to Strategy: AI and the Modern Workplace
Indisputably, popular culture’s most famous AI nightmare is James Cameron’s film The Terminator, which was released in the fall of 1984. In addition to making “I’ll be back” part of the mainstream lexicon, the film continues to resonate because it captures a fear that feels newly relevant in today’s AI-driven world. While modern artificial intelligence bears no resemblance to a self-aware Skynet, the film’s core warning about handing too much autonomy to powerful systems without sufficient oversight mirrors real concerns surrounding automation and algorithmic decision-making. As AI becomes embedded in everything from finance to defense, The Terminator serves less as a prediction and more as a metaphor, reminding us that the greatest risks of AI stem not from machines themselves, but from how humans design, deploy, and trust them….
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….
The Burgeoning Issue of Fake Candidates
Just ten years ago, AI seemed like a far-off, futuristic theory. Now, it is a ubiquitous reality. Almost every press release, business journal, and job posting references AI or emphasizes the importance of being knowledgeable about leveraging it. As any job seeker knows, AI is being used extensively in the recruitment space, with companies using it for screening, interviewing, and onboarding candidates. This technology has also given rise to the phenomenon of the fake job candidate. What was previously limited to embellished resumes or inflated experience has evolved into sophisticated forms of deception, including identity theft, interview impersonation, falsified credentials, and rampant scams. This can create significant financial, security, and reputational risks that extend far beyond merely making a bad hire….
Eight Trends that Will Shape the Workforce in the New Year
The 2026 job market is poised for transformation. As companies adapt to rapid shifts in technology, changing employee expectations, and external factors such as globalization, the new year is set to break the old rules. Some trends we will see will be evolutionary. Others will be revolutionary. Regardless, these dramatic changes will fundamentally reshape the way companies hire and source talent, and how people actually work….
Top Hiring Trends of 2025
The end of the year is here, and it’s time for my annual retrospective. External factors such as technological acceleration, shifting worker expectations, and economic uncertainty shaped the job market in 2025. In sharp contrast to 2021 and 2022, hiring became much more selective. Some would say that the process became absurd, with protracted interviews, projects, presentations, and assessments. Candidates waited, sometimes for months, to hear whether they had secured the job. Employers still wanted to attract and retain talent in this challenging market, and those that embraced more flexible talent strategies were better positioned to compete for that top talent….
AI Is Coming for Your Job
Almost daily, the world takes another step toward artificial general intelligence. The most powerful AI models can do an astonishing array of tasks, from writing detailed reports to creating videos on demand. Your company’s CEO is comparison shopping right now. You cost many thousands of dollars plus healthcare, vacation days, and that annoying habit of having opinions. AI costs less than your annual coffee budget and never complains about needing a day off….
The Virtual Interview Overreach: When Privacy Takes a Backseat to Transparency
Job interviews are inherently awkward and vulnerable situations. Sitting down in front of a stranger and basically saying, “My financial stability is in your hands,” never gets any less stressful, no matter how many jobs you apply for. These days, most initial interviews are being conducted via video conference. This medium can make the whole interview process more nerve-racking because it can be difficult to read body language when you’re not in the same room as the interviewer….