Career and job search advice...
NEW YORK, NY -- PAY ATTENTION: Take time to seriously evaluate where you are and where you want to be. Remaining alert will prevent you from being blindsided if your job suddenly disappears. FIGHT OBSOLESCENCE: The only job security you can count on is the transportability of your skills. Do whatever it takes to keep your qualifications minty-fresh and marketable.
NETWORK FOREVER: Never has it been more important to participate in professional organizations and to network with other groups and individuals. Contacts you nurture over the years are the people most likely to return your calls and open doors for you when you're in employment distress. MENTOR MOVES: If you can find a rising star willing to guide and support you and vet your ideas, be grateful. STRATEGIC ZIGZAGGING: Fertilize your career climb by judiciously changing employers when opportunity knocks. Job changing doesn't hold nearly the risk of you being seen as a job hopper that it once did.
SELF-EMPLOYMENT: If you have strong entrepreneurial traits, running your own business may prove more secure and rewarding than being at someone else's call. TAKE A LONG VIEW: Look at your career as a whole. Stay true to your personality and look at personal timelines for progress and how you're moving through phases of growth. FIGHT FOR MONEY: Learn critical salary negotiating skills. If you don't know market rates for your work, you can't fight back a lowball offer.
