These are our explorer’s notes. Everything we’ve seen on our journey so far. From wonderful moments of discovery to not so wonderful mistakes and follies. We hope you learn as much from them as we did.
Planting A Seed
If we have a very precious seed, and we want that seed to grow, should we just plant it anywhere and walk away? No, because it makes more sense to ‘tend’ a precious seed. To care for it as best we can – which is something we all know how to do. ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ By ‘tending’ we look after a seed’s environment and growth. We make ourselves part-responsible for the best possible outcome – of course, the seed must also do its bit. Tending also speaks of applying the best of our energies, and skills, along with...
read moreOf Ghosts Past
There’s nothing new under the sun, as the old saying goes but isn’t it also true that we find something new wherever we look? Talking of something that certainly isn’t new – although it has endured and been revived countless times – at the start of the year, I read A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens for the first time. Inside this old book, something that felt very new caught my eye. Well over 100 years before corporate social responsibility or intrinsic career drivers, Jacob Marley’s ghost gave clear warning to anyone...
read moreLove Your Job?
One of my favourite websites is Gavin Aung Than’s Zen Pencils, so imagine how happy I am whenever he writes, illustrates and muses on anything even loosely related to career development and work/life. Gavin has a great career story (as explored in this Forbes article) so when he picked out the quote below there was a very personal connection… Choosing a job I loved was never a mission for me, until I got a sniff of something I enjoyed doing, then this quote from Confucius made all kinds of sense. Supporting other people to find jobs...
read moreHow Do You Spot High-Potential?
Somewhere along the way of spending thousands of hours, talking to hundreds of people about work, it occurred to me that no one has higher potential than anyone else. At first, this sounded like an odd idea and was easy to ignore. Outward signs of career success suggested otherwise but the same notion of higher-potential kept coming back, and kept showing itself in all kinds of different and unexpected ways. The beating heart of working in career development is making people feel more confident at times of career decision. Supporting people...
read moreIs it ever too late to switch careers?
The idea of switching careers rests on an old notion that we are defined by what we do. A carpenter is a carpenter. A banker is a banker. A retail store assistant is… well, you get the idea. If we accept this view of our relationship with work, switching careers becomes a great personal upheaval. It becomes a negative even morbid notion; something we do at times of despair and desperation because of the great personal risk, especially if this is something we’re thinking about in the second-half of our career. Who in their right mind...
read moreWhat do employers value?
As employees, workers and jobseekers, we all have huge capacity and high potential but sometimes we are the last to see this. If you want proof, on any given day there are people out there undervaluing and underselling themselves, particularly when they are looking for work – which is perhaps when a person needs to see and know his or her value most. I remember a news article about employers in the US hiring ex-service personnel. Companies who did this are more likely to do it again. As the article says of one such case… “[Employers]...
read moreExploring The MBA Experience
I have spent a good deal of time (interview, assessment & career development time) with MBAs from schools all over the world. Some of these MBAs completed their degree 5, 10, 20 years ago, and even longer. Others graduated more recently, while some were still studying when we talked. Albeit for their own reasons, all of the graduate MBAs I have spoken with agreed that their intensive period of study was career and life changing. Another thing this same group agreed upon (unanimously again) was that the MBA opened their eyes to everything...
read moreUnreachable Goals?
There’s a definite football/soccer slant to the following but this was also an opportunity too good to miss. Jumping straight in to the big, exciting question… Are there any unreachable goals? If Leicester City F.C. can win the English Premier League, what previously unreachable goal can you now set for yourself? Even for people with no interest in football – which admittedly is just twenty-two people spending 90 minutes of their lives trying to put a ball into a net – Leicester’s incredible,...
read moreThe Importance of How
Perhaps my favourite How story is this fable from Aesop… The North Wind and the Sun were arguing which was the stronger, when a traveller passed by in a heavy cloak. To settle the argument, they agreed that whoever succeeded in making the traveller take off his cloak would be considered the stronger. The North Wind blew as hard as it could but, the harder it blew, the closer the traveller drew his cloak around him. When the North Wind finally gave up, the Sun gently shone on the traveller, who almost immediately removed his cloak. Here is...
read moreCulture: A New Horizon of Learning & Growth For Your Career?
It is completely normal to talk about company culture but we are still a long way from appreciating the power and importance of culture when it comes to our careers. While it is great to observe companies engaging with and expressing cultural beliefs (because when this is done well and done right, it is impactful and meaningful) no single company, organisation or country has a monopoly on culture. Culture is for everyone to appreciate, to learn from and understand. The benefits of being fluent in any culture are numerous, so what can we (as...
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