The Right Way to Transition to a New Career

Is there a right way to transition to a new career?

No, there is not. Oh, everyone will have an opinion on what you should do and how you should do it but the only "right" way is the way that works for you and your family.

Here's how the husband is going about it . . . 

He is exercising more, reconnecting with family and friends on Facebook, planning a mid-week winter fishing trip and preparing to return the favor of care he received during his heart surgery as a volunteer with Mended Hearts.

But, it's not all fun and games.

He's writing resumes, reaching out to references and tweaking his LinkedIn profile. He's attending classes with the Minnesota Workforce Center where he is developing a Career Performance Portfolio, completing a vocational profile, taking the MBTI, and acing the assessments for a top-graded National Career Readiness Certificate.

His confidence is building and he's got his feet firmly planted on the ground as he is unwinding, relaxing and preparing himself for his next career move. It's interesting to watch.

I never had a job loss of my own but, if I did, this is not how I would have gone about it.

I would have had my resume out there the day I received the layoff notice and would have been doing anything and everything I could to find a job. I would have went with a job I know because it would have been a sure bet and I would have found a position before my last day ever came.

And it would have been a mistake.

When in our adult lives do we ever give ourselves permission to step off the hamster wheel? To assess where we've been and to reassess where we want to go? To stop and actually see what we have and to appreciate it for what it is - nothing more and nothing less?

When I make my next career move, I am taking a page from my husband's book and am going to take the time to stop and smell the roses.

It's the right way to transition to a new career.

<It's my blog, I can say that. I can also tell the husband to can the roses for Valentines Day and pocket the cash for our vacation to the lands of butter beer and quirky boutiques>

Photo credit iStockphoto

{Labor} Relations and this HR Pro

As an HR professional and leader, I have touched just about all there is to touch in day-to-day organizational HR and after being in this game for over 18 years, I have come to the conclusion that I {suck} at labor relations.

Actually, I am pretty good but you have got to know that the very nature of the labor-management relationship can stress the people pleaser in me.

Collaboration, mediation, hold your line, give an inch, negotiation, agendas, partnership, and positions . . .  labor relations can be a running reel of contradictions.

When faced with contradictions in your HR life, what do you do?

Although I may come face-to-face with the desire to go tit-for-tat, it's just not in me to operate that way. I feel strongly about "no surprises" and even when the upper hand is mine, it is not often that I will lead with it. I never walk into a meeting unprepared yet as the ultimate optimist, I believe we can work through anything together - even if that means working to the point of agreeing to disagree.

That's not where my problems arise.

My problems arise when I break the #1 rule of business, human resources <and life actually> and I take things personally. 

You'd think after so many years of being in this game, I'd know better. Try as I might not to, it happens anyway and when it does, I can see it coming like a Mack truck. Thanks to a wonderful support system and creative coping techniques, I get it together rather quickly.

Labor relations. Pshw. My gig is up. You know as well as I do that this really has nothing at all to do with labor - pick a relationship, any relationship at all and the dynamics for me are the same. Relationship is the color of the glasses I see my world through.

Over the years, on request, I've tried to change the color of my lenses, but in the big scheme of things it's simply not happening. Nothing is going to change. I am not going to change.

Don't like it?

Sue me.

Photo credit iStockphoto