December 2006 - Posts

• Can the Zodiac Provide Career Direction?

  Here’s something fun for the holidays: instant career direction based on your zodiac sign! I have to admit that I’m one of those people who reads my horoscope whenever I get the chance, mostly because I find it interesting that my sign, Aries, is so close Read More... Posted Thursday, December 28, 2006 7:00 AM by AlexandraLevit | 0 Comments Filed under: Career Change, Discovering Your Passion, Job Hunting, Goals, Plans, Hopes, Work Attachment(s): http://www.astrology-love-horoscope.com/pics/aries.jpg

• Banish These Words From Your Vocabulary

  Over at Occupational Adventure , Curt Rosengren has a terrific post about a few troublesome words that are too often a part of our vocabulary – namely “need to,” “have to,” and “must.” According to Curt, people stress themselves out unnecessarily by looking Read More... Posted Tuesday, December 26, 2006 7:00 AM by AlexandraLevit | 0 Comments Filed under: Attitude & Motivation, Emotional Intelligence

• SHRM Says 3/4 of Employees Want Out of Their Jobs

  More than 75% employees are looking for new jobs, according to the 462 employees and 367 HR professionals surveyed in the 2006 U.S. Job Retention Poll released last week by the Society for Human Resource Management and The Wall Street Journal’s CareerJournal.com Read More... Posted Sunday, December 24, 2006 7:00 AM by AlexandraLevit | 4 Comments Filed under: Employment Trends, Business, Job Hunting, Life Balance, Work Attachment(s): http://i.a.cnn.net/cnn/2006/US/Careers/03/29/cb.quit.job/story.quit.job.jpg

• These Celebrities Can Teach Us Something About Work

  Last week, Yahoo! ran a piece about people in the public eye who made big professional strides and damaging missteps during 2006, and how we can learn from their experiences. Here are some of my thoughts on the subject, some of which were included in Read More... Posted Friday, December 22, 2006 7:00 AM by AlexandraLevit | 0 Comments Filed under: Business, Mentoring, People Skills, Professionalism, Goals, Plans, Hopes, News and Politics, Work

• Holiday Bonuses Are Out of Fashion

  Hannah Clark over at Forbes has an interesting piece on end-of-year bonuses. Apparently, the traditional holiday bonus is nearly extinct, a fact which comes as no surprise to me given that I have never received one. Clark reports on a study by Hewitt Read More... Posted Wednesday, December 20, 2006 7:00 AM by AlexandraLevit | 2 Comments Filed under: Compensation, Current Affairs, Employment Trends, Business, Work Attachment(s): http://www.emarketmakers.com/images/email/emm/holiday/CashBundle_05.jpg

• Working at Home: Friend or Foe?

  Two and a half days a week, I work from home. I’ve had the opportunity to do this full time, but I haven’t. This baffles some people to no end. Wait, they say. You are actually choosing to dress up and go to an office instead of sitting in front of your Read More... Posted Monday, December 18, 2006 7:00 AM by AlexandraLevit | 3 Comments Filed under: Life Balance, Daily Life, Goals, Plans, Hopes, Work

• The Quandry of Gift Giving at Work

  It’s that time of year again – the time that tacky lights and grating music assail us everywhere we go, and the time that we all get to worry about the awkwardness of gift-giving in the workplace. The questions are endless and unavoidable. Do you get Read More... Posted Friday, December 15, 2006 7:00 AM by AlexandraLevit | 0 Comments Filed under: Current Affairs, Office Politics, Workplace Humor, Work Attachment(s): http://www.ultimateentree.com/mm5/graphics/00000001/Present%20clip.jpg

• Calling in Sick is a Dying Art

  The Society for Human Resource Management reports that CCH Inc ., a provider of HR and employment law information and services, has released its 2006 Unscheduled Absence Survey . The rate of unscheduled absences rose to 2.5 percent in 2006, the highest Read More... Posted Wednesday, December 13, 2006 7:00 AM by AlexandraLevit | 3 Comments Filed under: Current Affairs, Employment Trends, Business, Life Balance, Workplace Humor, News and Politics, Work

• Is the American Dream on Steroids?

  I'm both frightened and intrigued by a new Center for Work-Life Policy study I found via the Fast Company blog . According to the new research and the CWLP study, work for many has become the ultimate extreme sport - high level, high impact workers pushing Read More... Posted Monday, December 11, 2006 7:00 AM by AlexandraLevit | 0 Comments Filed under: Attitude & Motivation, Current Affairs, Employment Trends, Life Balance, Work Attachment(s): http://www.chem.ucla.edu/~chia/snowboard.jpg

• 5 Steps to a Painless Job Search

  I often get asked for a few key pointers related to job hunting and finding a career that really floats your boat. Naturally, this is a topic that has inspired hundreds of books and blogs, but here’s some quick advice in a nutshell: 1. Learn about thyself: Read More... Posted Thursday, December 07, 2006 7:00 AM by AlexandraLevit | 0 Comments Filed under: Entry Level, Career Change, Business, Job Hunting, Goals, Plans, Hopes, Work Attachment(s): http://seeker.dice.com/assets/images/jump.jpg

• Big Brother Is Watching

  The Associated Press, via the New York Daily News , has reported that as of this Friday, U.S. companies will need to keep track of all the e-mails, instant messages and other electronic documents generated by their employees. The rules, approved by the Read More... Posted Tuesday, December 05, 2006 7:00 AM by AlexandraLevit | 3 Comments Filed under: Current Affairs, Personal Marketing, Professionalism, Work

• Talking Business Over the Holidays

  I just love this post from Pamela Slim over at Escape from Cubicle Nation . The topic is talking about your career with your family over the holidays, and how to deal when your relatives don’t necessarily understand your plans. Pam says: Finding out which Read More... Posted Sunday, December 03, 2006 7:00 AM by AlexandraLevit | 2 Comments Filed under: Attitude & Motivation, Career Change, Troubleshooting Attachment(s): http://content.answers.com/main/content/wp/en/a/a6/NLCV-Turkey.jpg

• Interview with Paul Phelan Continued

  Today, we continue our interview with Paul Phelan, a twenty-four year-old Canadian who’s currently an English teacher at Qiongzhou University in Wuzhishan City, Hainan, China. What do you think makes you a good teacher? To be a successful ESL teacher, Read More... Posted Friday, December 01, 2006 7:00 AM by AlexandraLevit | 0 Comments Filed under: Career Change, Cool Careers, Discovering Your Passion, Work