You want to find real career satisfaction. Probably you’ve considered some of these questions:

• Should I start my own business?
  This can involve rewards, but also high risks, long hours and years of financial hardship. Would that lonely road be right for you anyway?

• Is there a resume secret that gets interviews?
  And what are the right words to say in an interview?

• Do the best jobs go only to people in an ‘insider’ group?
  What is the missing key that will turn the lock and open the door to the right role?

Millions of people wrestle with these questions.  Most people – including executives, managers and professionals – never find the answers and never reach the career rewards that do justice to their hard work.

Changing your career (and your life) demands a different set of questions.

Why?

Because many of these questions are based on a misunderstanding of how the job market really works. These questions can’t get around the big problem in our employment system.

The problem: Our society’s employment system was designed for a different day and age – an age when…

• workers were interchangeable,
• valued for physical rather than their mental abilities, and
• forced by necessity to take any available job.

Today this system is utterly inadequate. Today education, experience, drive, cultural fit and commitment – to a role and to a team – are the essential foundations of success.

Yet still we relegate our best people to the role of ‘candidate’, as if they were seeking a favour or handout, when in fact they are seeking a place to bring their contribution and passion.

Modern changes like recruitment agencies, psychometric testing and the Internet have not changed this system at all. It’s not showing any sign of changing any time soon. For now, the solution must be found by each of us individually.

The solution begins with an understanding of how employers function within our dysfunctional employment system – in other words, learning how the job market really works.

And with that understanding in place, the solution includes:

• Correctly identify roles that are right for you (and why you are the right person for them)
• Discover how to directly reach people who control the jobs you want
• Find out how to sell yourself as the best solution to an organisation’s need
• Build a level of confidence that’s contagious. Without it, you’ll be massively handicapped. If you’ve lost it or never had it, you’ll need a strategy to gain or regain it.

In future posts we’ll address these areas in more detail.

In the meanwhile, let me make a sincere offer:
I’d like to invite you to try a free and completely confidential 60-minute meeting with one of our Senior Career Consultants.  This is a chance to explore some of the solutions we discussed above in more detail.

Irrespective of whether or not you ultimately choose to work with us, you will walk away with practical ideas that you can use to advance your career both immediately and for years to come.

To book a meeting, simply complete the online application form or call 1300 123 377.

To get started, here are eight of the most common broad-stroke career mistakes that executives commit…

1.     Never defining their career (path): More than 95% of executives falsely believe a career is progression by doing a great job in their role. Most executives do a great job, but have no plan for actively achieving their aspirations. This puts their career largely in the hands of other parties.

2.     Attempting to advance their career solely by working harder: Because most executives believe career advancement is solely dependent on performance, they put all their effort into working harder. All too often their hard work is fruitless, leaving them frustrated and demotivated.

3.     Relying on intermediaries to determine and provide their best outcome: Executives should never abdicate control of their career to intermediaries such as recruiters and search consultants. It is impossible for them to know what’s best for you. Moreover, because of the way they’re remunerated, they have neither the time nor the incentive to achieve the best possible outcome for you.

4.     Believing their position offers all the access they need: Executives who believe their calls will always be taken, their meetings will always be scheduled and the power of their position will work in any situation are mistaken. Executives out of a job find accessing decision makers vastly harder.

5.     Believing they can throw together a resume whenever it’s needed: Resumes and covering letters are critical marketing tools. Excellent resumes are more than mere chronologies. As such, their creation needs time, and substantial effort to uncover and present the core of one’s value proposition. A hastily compiled resume causes higher-than-average rejection rates and makes career transition that much harder.

6.     Believing their skills will always be recognised by other executives: Many executives have outstanding talents. However, in front of a recruiter or an important contact you need to crisply and persuasively showcase those talents. If you can’t do this, potential employers will not go out of their way to give you a chance.

7.     Failing to network effectively: Those executives with an active and systematic approach to networking are far more likely to be tapped for the best opportunities. Making yourself actively available for networking also allows you to build up credits with contacts and acquaintances. This pays itself back in the future if you happen to find yourself unexpectedly in the same position. And it reduces reliance on third-party recruiters who ultimately have the employer’s interests – not yours – as their priority.

8.     Not liking the position and feeling stale professionally, but staying put for security: Often, executives stay in a position for financial security, even though they’re experiencing slow, grinding personal and career erosion. Considering the unpredictability of business and the impact of this subtle self-devaluation on confidence, morale and life satisfaction, this can be one of the biggest mistakes executives ever make.