Don’t Neglect Your Career While Focusing on Your Job

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Are you so focused on your job that you’re neglecting your career? Here’s how to strike a better balance between your short-term responsibilities and your long-term goals.

Start by analyzing the strategic value of your tasks. Create a Venn diagram, with one circle representing your existing responsibilities, and another the job description you aspire to. Use this diagram to help you identify the tasks you’d like to hold on to, stretch toward, and eventually let go of.

Next, work with your manager to build toward the future you want. Explain the career path you’d ultimately like to take. “I’m committed to doing a great job in this role,” you could say, “and I’d also like to position myself for success in the future. If you’re willing, I’d love your help in strategizing around how to make that work.” Ask for their help in identifying and recommending you for stretch assignments or opportunities to develop new skills and contacts.

Finally, be willing to experiment with “120% time.” This means carving out extra time to experiment with activities outside the scope of your current job requirements.

Do you study for graduation?

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Yes – Because good grades might help you progress in life.

No – Because it clouds you, it gives you a false sense of achievement which might not be true.

Graduation is just the beginning of life, it’s just the first step, and you need to learn a lot. So the best thing to learn is “How to learn” anything, anywhere, how to keep un-learning and learning.

Life’s battle is mostly won by someone who is ready to change, ready to adapt, ready to learn, and that too at a fast pace.

So enjoy your graduation but don’t get too comfortable, life is coming and you better embrace it with your attitude rather than your grades.

Days going by…

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Days going by,

Some days are good,

Some days are bad,

But it seems to pass by,

Like sand in your hand,

It’s skipping you every day,

And calling it life,

Where we know you know,

It’s all in for rife,

So enjoy it if you can,

Before days goes by.

Start Your Day with Silence

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We live in a world full of noise and chatter, and it can be hard to find a break from it all. If you’re feeling overwhelmed, give this mindfulness exercise a shot. It’s called the Sphere of Silence, and it’s a 60-minute routine to help you collect your thoughts, stay grounded, and decide how you want to enter your day. There’s one important ground rule: Complete the steps below in silence.

  • The first half hour is broken down in three 10-minute segments. Spend the first segment writing your short-term, medium-term, and long-term goals. Then, dedicate the next 10 minutes to assessing your progress on your goals from the previous day. Use the final 10 minutes to take note of unmet goals and assess why you haven’t achieved them. This will motivate you to focus on moving forward.
  • Spend the next 10 minutes reading something — an article, a book, maybe even a poem — that teaches you something new or enriches your mind.
  • Then, spend 10 minutes writing. Maybe you’ll jot down a reaction to what you just read, or a poem of your own.
  • Use the final 10 minutes for self-reflection. This part of the practice allows you to harness your calm during stressful situations and mindfully choose to stay out of negativity.

What Can You Really Accomplish in a Work Day?

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Many of us overload our workdays, only to find ourselves facing an unfinished to-do list at the end of the day. How can you break free of this magical thinking that causes you to disappoint others, miss deadlines, feel depleted, and lose your inspiration?

To get a realistic sense of how long your current and future projects will take to complete (and how to prioritize them), start by reviewing your major projects from the past year. Which were planned and which were opportunistic? This self-audit will help you paint a more realistic picture of how your future calendar will be populated. It will also help you prioritize the top of your to-do list and renegotiate the rest by saying no, lowering expectations, or requesting help.

Crucially, you need to stop convincing yourself that next time will be easier. This kind of optimism may be misguided, leaving you at risk of falling short. Always lean toward building in more time for your work, not less.

Finally, look for opportunities to build your team’s capacity, and delegate when you can. You don’t need to go it alone.

3 Strategies for Presenting When Your Time Is Cut Short

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One of the most common—and unpleasant—surprises you can face as a presenter is having your time cut short. Maybe there’s a technical issue that causes a delay, or maybe the previous speaker(s) ran long. How can you still nail your presentation when you have less time than you expected? Keep these three strategies in your back pocket.

  • Come prepared with two versions of your presentation. Create a full-length slide deck and a short, backup one—and practice delivering both from start to finish. If you have to go with the shorter one because of an unforeseen time constraint, be sure to let your listeners know that you’ll provide additional context after the meeting.
  • Deliver the headlines. Don’t just write bland headers for each slide; instead, write complete, descriptive headlines that tell the story. For example, rather than titling your slide “Economic Outlook for 2023,” write “Economic Outlook for 2023 Is Optimistic.” This small tweak will highlight the important, bottom-line information up top, making it easier to go through your presentation quickly in a pinch.
  • Don’t apologize, throw your colleagues under the bus, or sulk. Act like this is exactly the version you’d always planned to present all along. If you do, it’s highly likely that your audience won’t be able to tell the difference.

Performing Under Pressure

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No one is immune from freezing during high-pressure moments at work. Maybe you lose your voice or your ability to think straight when speaking with an important client, manager, or audience. That’s normal, but also preventable. To set yourself up for success in your next big moment at work, use visualization. Bring to mind your previous successes to remind yourself that you have what it takes. This will reduce your anxiety and boost your comfort level.

Next, visualize the upcoming moment in as much detail as you can. What will it look and feel like to walk into your manager’s office and ask for that raise? How do the lights feel as you walk out in front of the audience, into the boardroom, onto the stage, or even sign on to Zoom? What will be the first words you say? You might develop a short ritual — such as a breathing exercise, repeating a phrase or mantra, listening to a particular song, or sipping a favorite tea — that can get you in the right mindset to get through those first nerve-wracking moments before autopilot kicks in. Once you’ve got a routine you’re comfortable with, you can use it whenever you need to.

Finally, consider simply writing down your fears ahead of time. Doing so can help to both normalize them and make them seem not so daunting after all.

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