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A Guest Blog Post by Donna Mitchell

It is every college-grad's dream to climb up the career ladder in the shortest span of time and make his or her mark in the world. He or she find a job they love, work hard at it, and in time, hope to make more money and earn more respect in the chosen industry. But what most of us don't realize is that a climb up the career ladder really worth it only when:

• It brings you mental satisfaction: You may be earning more money; you may have moved into your roomy corner office with a view to die for and a fancy nameplate on the door with your new designation; and you may be boss to many minions; but it is all worth nothing if you are constantly stressed out and never really happy with your situation. When you love your job and are able to handle all the challenges it throws at you without losing your mind, only then is your professional advancement really worth it.


• It does not ruin your personal life: No matter how successful a career you have, if you have no personal life worth mentioning, you have achieved nothing in life. The most precious assets we earn in life are the love and affection of our friends and family, so if you neglect them in the pursuit of a career, you're going to be nothing but an empty shell - the shell may be golden, but when there is no substance to it, it has no value at all.


• You haven't pushed down people to get up: If your meteoric rise in the professional world has come about because you trampled over your coworkers and others to climb up the career ladder, then you can bet your last dollar that your actions will come back to haunt you. You won't be appreciated by your colleagues, and your victory will only leave a sour taste in your mouth.


• You don't neglect your kids to do so: If you're a parent who's torn between staying home and being an ambitious careerist, you may find that professional advancement can come at a great personal cost. When you're never around for your kids, when they grow up without your involvement in their lives, you lose something you can never gain back. So weigh the pros and cons of your decision before you choose your career over your children.


• It does not offer you any advantages: Some career changes may come with a change of title and little else. You may be earning the same salary but with a fancy designation now. And you're more likely to be doing more work because of your new "promotion" and designation. In such cases, when the disadvantages of the promotion outweigh the advantages, it's not really worth the climb up the career ladder.

Need help with your resume, cover letter, or other career-marketing document? Order today from Quintessential Resumes and Cover Letters, powered by CareerPerfect.

Quintessential Careers marks second annual Job Action Day worldwide on Nov. 2 — a day for job-seekers and workers to confront the recession head-on and take action steps to bolster their careers.

(QUINTESSENTIAL CAREERS: DeLand, FL) - To encourage and motivate workers and job-seekers through flickers of hope amid the current recession, Quintessential Careers will for the second year spearhead Job Action Day on the first Monday in November — Nov. 2. Like the successful Job Action Day 2008, the 2009 event aims to empower workers and job-seekers to take proactive steps to shore up their job and career outlook, said Quintessential Careers Founder and Publisher Dr. Randall S. Hansen.

“While much doom and gloom still pervades the employment scene,” Hansen said, “hopeful signs of recovery should spur workers and job-seekers to adapt to the ‘new normal’ and develop career and job-search plans that work in a changed economy.”

Hansen points to employment leaders like ExecuNet’s president and chief economist Mark Anderson who recently declared “the question is no longer about when will there be a recovery, but how big it will be.” A new study by Deloitte (“Here today. Where tomorrow? Taking action in uncertain times”) notes that most executives feel a rebound will appear in the first or second quarter of 2010. Just a minimal part of the federal government’s massive recovery spending program has been spent so far, suggesting significant future opportunities. “That’s why job-seekers must gear up now,” Hansen said.

While the 2008 event focused on taking action in the face of a sudden economic meltdown, Job Action Day 2009 will examine such New Economy opportunities as green/clean-energy jobs, “stimulus” jobs, federal jobs, entrepreneurship opportunities motivated by unemployment, and “new normal” job-search advice.

“Job Action Day 2009 is a day to strategize plans for developing new-economy job and career options and devising new and better ways to track down job leads and position yourself for emerging opportunities,” Hansen said. “It’s a day to take stock of careers and develop a plan for next career steps.”

Quintessential Careers will mark Job Action Day 2009 with service-oriented articles introduced in a special Job Action Day edition of Quintessential Careers’ newsletter, QuintZine, to provide workers and job-seekers with information, ideas, and concrete steps to secure their futures in a changed economy.

The Quintessential Careers family of blogs, including this one, will feature Job Action Day entries and, as in 2008, will be joined by a cadre of career and job-search bloggers in blogging about the event.

Job Action Day is intended to empower workers and job-seekers to confront both a dismal economic climate and an upcoming recovery by taking control for a brighter career future, Hansen said.

Need help with your resume, cover letter, or other career-marketing document? Order today from Quintessential Resumes and Cover Letters, powered by CareerPerfect.

Our colleague Chandlee Bryan of Best Fit Forward has launched a Twitter initiative for March in which career experts are offering innovative job-search and career strategies (especially geared to the troubled economy) under the #hashtag of #mcm. Here’s an excerpt from Chandlee’s blog post:

Is your job search is becoming a twisted version of the NCAA “big dance”?

Do you find yourself applying to 64 opportunities before making it to the “final four” candidates for a position?

In the process of beginning a sudden job search? Feeling stuck? Need to get “back in the game” with your career? Don’t despair…the time has come for a new kind of office pool.

… we introduce the Twitter Invitational, otherwise known as “March Career Madness.”

This event, which will run throughout the month of March, is a joint effort of a team of career experts who have committed to sharing their wit and wisdom with us in “tweets” of 140 characters or less on Twitter. Posts will be written on a singular theme—innovative strategies for your career.

All posts will include the following code: #mcm (referred to in the Twitterverse as a hashtag)

You can follow March Career Madness through Twitter Search (search #mcm) or by following the tweets of individual contributors (name and user “handles” listed at the bottom of this post). Share posts with others by “Retweeting.”

Participating Career Experts (and their Twitter “handle”) This list will expand as additional career experts join us.

• Barbara Safani (barbarasafani)
• Brian Kurth (briankurth)
• Chandlee Bryan (Chandlee)
• Dawn Bugni (dawnbugni)
• Deb Dib (CEOCoach)
• Kevin Donlin (kevindonlin)
• Katharine Hansen (kat_hansen)
• Kimberly Togman (ktogman)
• Laura Allen (la15secondpitch)
• Megan Fitzgerald (expatcoach)
• Miriam Salpeter (Keppie_Careers)
• Pam Slim (pamslim)
• Paul Copcutt (Paulcopcutt)
• Phyllis Shabad (Phyllisshabad)
• Sital Ruparelia (SitalRuparelia)

Join us, and find a new play or two that helps you make a “three-pointer” in your career!

Need help with your resume, cover letter, or other career-marketing document? Order today from Quintessential Resumes and Cover Letters, powered by CareerPerfect.

Quintessential Careers has declared Nov. 3 Job Action Day 2008 worldwide — a day for job-seekers and workers to confront the current economic crisis head-on and take action steps to improve their careers.

(QUINTESSENTIAL CAREERS: DeLand, FL) - To rally those who have lost their jobs or are facing possible job loss in the current devastated economic climate, Quintessential Careers has created Job Action Day, to be implemented on Monday, Nov. 3. Job Action Day 2008 aims to empower workers and job-seekers to take proactive steps to shore up their job and career outlook, said Quintessential Careers Founder and Publisher Dr. Randall S. Hansen.

“For job-seekers,” Hansen said, “Job Action Day is a chance to take a break from the daily grind of job-hunting to take a look at the bigger picture of their careers and job-search strategies. It’s a day to strategize plans for developing new job and career options and devising new and better ways to track down job leads and position themselves for employment opportunities.”

For workers facing possible job loss, Job Action Day is a time “to not only examine their current job and employer, but also evaluate both the stability of that job and employer as well as their personal fulfillment with their jobs,” Hansen said. “It’s a day to take stock of their careers and develop a plan for their next career steps.”

Hansen said he deliberately set Job Action Day 2008 for the eve of the U.S. presidential election to encourage voters to think about job creation and the avoidance of further job losses as they cast their votes. Beyond the election, Hansen said, “workers and job-seekers must hold the next president’s feet to the fire.” Echoing Hillary Rodham Clinton’s battle cry at a recent rally in Orlando, FL, the concept of “Jobs, Baby, Jobs” must be a top priority for the new leader, Hansen said.

Quintessential Careers will mark Job Action Day 2008 with service-oriented articles and blog entries to provide workers and job-seekers with information, ideas, and concrete steps that they can take to secure their futures — both in the short-term and the long-term.

In addition, the Quintessential Careers family of blogs, including the Quintessential Careers Blog, Career Doctor Blog, Quintessential Resume and Cover Letter Tips Blog, and A Storied Career, will feature Job Action Day entries.

Hansen has invited bloggers in the employment and careers sector to join in blogging on Job Action Day about the importance of being proactive in their jobs and careers.

Pointing to a hurting U.S. economy — and ailing economies around the globe — along with daily announcements of employer retrenchments, mergers, and layoffs, Hansen explained that “no job is safe in these situations, but opportunities for hiring and promotions still exist - under the right conditions and with the right strategies.” Job Action Day is intended to empower workers and job-seekers to confront the economic climate and take control for a brighter career future, Hansen said.

Need help with your resume, cover letter, or other career-marketing document? Order today from Quintessential Resumes and Cover Letters, powered by CareerPerfect.

Has this ever happened to you? You’ve been instructed to list your career accomplishments, and you can’t think of any. Or you’re asked in a job interview, “What accomplishments are you most proud of?” — and you freeze up. You know you have had accomplishments, but you just can’t dredge them up. The inability to come up with accomplishments happens to lots of job-seekers. We know because we ask our resume and cover-letter clients to list accomplishments as part of the process of preparing their job-search documents. Although we stress that accomplishments are far more important than duties and responsibilities, a surprising number of clients are unable to articulate beyond the day-to-day tasks they performed in their jobs. Accomplishments are the points that really help sell you to an employer — much more so than everyday job duties, and you can leverage your accomplishments for job-search success at all stages of the process: resume, cover letter, interview, and more. Find out more about why and how to use your accomplishments in our article, For Job-Hunting Success: Track and Leverage Your Accomplishments.

Need help with your resume, cover letter, or other career-marketing document? Order today from Quintessential Resumes and Cover Letters, powered by CareerPerfect.