The Landscape: Understanding the Challenges and Opportunities

The current climate within the federal government presents a unique set of challenges; however, it may open unexpected opportunities. The push for resignations – coupled with programs like the OPM’s deferred resignation option – has created a sense of uncertainty for many federal employees. They’re grappling with questions about job security, retirement benefits, and their long-term career paths. This is where you step in as a service provider.

Your Role: Providing Clarity and Support

Career services professionals are uniquely positioned to provide the support and guidance these individuals need. You are the navigators, helping them chart a course through this period of change. Here’s how you can empower them:

Key Areas of Focus for Your Counseling:

• Acknowledge and Validate – Start by acknowledging the uncertainty and stress your clients may be experiencing. Validate their feelings and reassure them that they are not alone. Your first and most crucial job is to create a safe and supportive space.
• Needs Assessment – Conduct a thorough needs assessment to understand each individual’s unique situation, goals, and concerns. What are their career aspirations? What are their financial considerations? What are their transferable skills?
• Skills Translation – Federal employees possess a wealth of valuable skills, but they may struggle to articulate how those skills translate to the civilian workforce. Help them identify their transferable skills and frame them in a way that resonates with potential employers in different sectors. Focus on accomplishments and quantifiable results.
• Career Exploration – Encourage your clients to explore a wide range of career options. Encourage them to research different industries, job roles, and required qualifications. Provide resources for labor market information and job search platforms. Don’t limit their thinking, but encourage them to consider possibilities they may not have considered before.
• Networking Strategies – Career transitions are made easier with the help of meaningful relationships. Teach your clients to develop effective networking strategies, including how to leverage LinkedIn, attend industry events, and connect with professionals in their fields of interest. Offer workshops or seminars on in-person and virtual networking etiquette and building professional relationships.
• Résumé and Cover Letter Support – Provide guidance on crafting compelling résumé and cover letter content that highlights transferable skills and accomplishments. Work with them to tailor their application materials to specific job openings in the civilian sector. Offer résumé review services followed by instructions on how to customize the résumé and cover letter for individual roles. This is where PARWCC members truly shine: leveraging expertise in résumé writing for these transitioning professionals.
• Interview Preparation – Conduct mock interviews and provide constructive feedback on each client’s interviewing skills. Help them anticipate common interview questions and develop strong responses that showcase their qualifications. Incorporate ideas from effective interview coaching frameworks such as the Organizational Message Chart (OMC) from PARWCC’s Certified Interview Coach program. 
• Emotional Support – Career transitions can be emotionally challenging. Offer emotional support and encouragement throughout the process. Build your clients’ confidence and resilience, boosting their motivation and empowering them to tackle the challenges of a job search. 
• Resource Navigation – Be a central point of contact for relevant resources, including government agencies, professional organizations, and career development websites. PARWCC can be a valuable partner in this effort too. We can provide you with up-to-date information and resources to share with your clients.

Collaboration is Key

This situation requires a collaborative approach. PARWCC is committed to supporting career services professionals walking through such a massive shift in the federal job market. We encourage you to connect with us, share best practices, and leverage our resources. Together, we can give federal employees the tools they need to navigate this potentially fear-inducing transition and build successful careers. We also encourage you to highlight your PARWCC membership and credentials to build trust with clients based on your expertise and training in résumé writing and career coaching.

The post Empowering Federal Employees in a Time of Transition: A Guide for Career Services Professionals appeared first on PARWCC.

Originally, LinkedIn offered a very powerful brand. They promised its members an efficient and effective way to use genuine networking to move their careers forward. For the first time job seekers could reach out authentically and directly to people and organizations who might need their skill sets on their teams.

But LinkedIn didn’t carefully consider the power of the words they use and the product they delivered. Consider the major headings. It should have been no surprise when members saw a portion marked “About,” they took that word literally. They filled up the space with information about their background. But what hiring officials want to know is how someone is going to make them money. Said another way, the “About” section should be a concise and commanding statement of a brand.

Let me use my own “About” section as an example:

“Rising, senior, and very senior executives worldwide who work with me rise above the frustrating business of applying for jobs. The best jobs seek them. I invite you to leverage my coaching and writing skills to win the career you’ve always deserved, get paid what you’re worth, and reduce career stress. We will go far beyond powerful résumés and cover letters. Think of me as your professional career advocate and confidant—the only one who understands your career needs at every level, the only one you can talk to with complete candor. Since actions are stronger than words I never send you to some faceless website…”

As you know so well, a brand is more than a set of specific actions readers will see that prove the author will add value to their organizations. A brand must also identify the market your clients are targeting. Because most readers have very short attention spans, I recommend your clients identify their market right at the beginning of their “About” sections. Since I work exclusively with senior executives, my first sentence is designed to let them know what they will read applies to them directly.

Your well-written “About” sections then expand upon the promises your clients make to future employers. Here’s an example from a client whose specialty is business development for companies supporting the government’s space programs:

“I cultivate a unique blend of leadership expertise, technical systems proficiency, and problem-solving skills at the intersection of federal processes and commercial technologies. These capabilities allow me to address and solve pain-points faced by companies leveraging future space technologies. Those often bring human and operational complexities. I own those challenges: making your vision irresistible to internal and external stakeholders. I lead your people to action – creating excitement and meaningful relationships that further propel your vision. It is my personal mission to advance our organizational goals while cultivating thoughtful relationships with those around me. When that happens, the greatest and most enduring benefit will go to those we serve and the people that make our organization great. I encourage you to email me any hour of any day or night at johnsmith@gmail.com. I promise a prompt reply.” 

LinkedIn continued their missteps by calling the next section “Experience.”

It should not have been a surprise that virtually every member copied and pasted a stripped down version of their usually ineffective résumé here. 

But experience isn’t a laundry list of companies and dates. There are people who don’t have ten years’ experience; they have one year’s experience ten times!

Useful experience shows our clients growing professionally over the years. While their employers’ names and the years they were with them provides context, success stories document how well our clients’ adapt—a vital capability in today’s world. Consider this example from the same client:

“In this position the challenge was as thrilling as the eventual rewards. Senior leadership tasked me to reassign portions of a key satellite program to new, external agencies amid a struggle for how we should grow and increase our resiliency. Of course, doubts arose from all sides. Would engineers lose key contracts? Would the Department of Defense lose services they relied upon? I listened—really listened—to their concerns. I made time to truly understand the goals…I found agencies made assumptions that weren’t solid. I carefully leveraged those missteps into advantages.…I promised every agency I would get them every critical resource they needed…they saw those new resources as the path to successful futures. …By leveraging the strength of each agency partner we formed a coalition. The program, stalled for two years, was soon back on track because I led us to focus on value, not obstacles.”

Your more powerful “About” and “Experience” sections make writing a commanding “Headline” (the text below your clients’ names) easier.

The “Headline” is your clients’ compact brand statement.

Thanks to you, your clients now have a powerful networking tool. You’ve told them networking cannot be hoping potential hiring officials will somehow stumble across their profile. Reinforce that with numbers: LinkedIn has more than 1,000,000,000 members! If only one one-hundredth of them are looking for positions your clients are seeking, the odds they will be found are one in a million!

Your clients’ networking will start to pay off powerfully when their brand is seen by people who find it useful and respond positively. They are found in LinkedIn Special Groups. Guide your clients to sift through the many thousands of such groups to find the few that will work best for them.

Here’s how it’s done.

Your clients can use appropriate keywords to find the best groups. Because the search function is not very precise, the number of hits will be large. These guidelines will help clients find the best groups for them.

• Older is better. The best groups have been around a long time because they consistently offer networking value to their members.
• Bigger is better. You want as many group members to learn about your clients brand as possible. That’s not very likely in a group that consists of fewer than 1,000 people.
• More focus is better. The best groups have posts that are truly useful. Off topic texts never show up.

Because your clients need to be visible in these groups, it’s best to limit their participation to two or three at the most. Trying to produce content for lots of groups every week will be a distraction, not an advantage.

Have your clients apply online to help both them and the group. When they ask to join a group, a manager or administrator will usually respond. Your clients can show their skill at networking by promising to be a valuable member of the group. To do that well, they can ask the administrator or manager what the key issues are now.

Those ideas will drive the content that your clients post. And they can use the same content to post to their entire LinkedIn network as well as the members of groups.

Guide your clients to produce engaging content. Have them ask questions to start building relationships. Consider this post to a group supporting marketing executives:

“I suspect we’re all struggling to find ways to make AI tools as useful and powerful as possible. Given that AI relies so much on the large language model, I’m searching for ways to make our marketing messages truly authentic. In other words, I want our content to sound like people speaking to people—not like some distillation of text posted on websites. I’ve come up with some tentative ideas. But I’d love to bounce them off of other group members to see what their approaches are. That’s too important to be left to a series of posts. If this issue concerns you as much as it does to me, let’s talk about it. If you can suggest days and times I’ll work hard to align my schedule with yours.”

Once your clients have established strong relationships with other LinkedIn members, ask them to consider the next step: requesting recommendations. This has nothing to do with the idea of “selling oneself” many clients find uncomfortable. Consider this example:

“May I ask a favor please? Would you consider writing a LI recommendation for me? This has nothing to do with ego or vanity. Recommendations help me serve others. If you’re willing, once you’ve written your testimonial, please e-mail it to me. Be as specific as possible. I’ve included a brief guide to make the process easy. With many thanks for your time and consideration,”

I hope this article will help you deliver what so many clients really appreciate: you supporting them with value they never anticipated. Before you mentored them, many clients thought LI a useless time waster. After all, the networking invitations and emails  they saw every day were little more than sales pitches. 

Your guidance does more than introduce clients to new approaches. You’ll equip them to make networking easier, more productive, and a great deal more fun than they ever thought possible.

The post LinkedIn’s Flawed Brand Can Boost Your Clients’ Profiles appeared first on PARWCC.

I ask my students to think about familiar brands, such as Coke, Mercedes, Target, and McDonalds. Some branded logos are very prominent in our minds. Using the concept that products are branded, people may develop a personal and professional brand to market their best qualities and qualifications for career management, including job search, looking at lateral moves, making career transitions, seeking promotions, securing new clients, or seeking a committee or association leadership role. 

When coaching my clients to develop a brand, I begin by asking many questions. Diane’s Query System is a critical career coaching proficiency – that, when mastered – will coach clients to new revelations in the career management journey. Questions are part of the intelligence collection process, exploration, and discovery. Asking pertinent, open-ended questions is a key skill in career coaching. In the CPCC program, I ask my clients to define their purpose, values, motivational factors, and goals. 

• What differentiates you from others in your field? What makes you unique? What positive impact do you provide an employer? (Why does someone call you instead of the other experts in this field?)
• Together, we make an extensive list of differentiating factors and their impact on employers.
• What makes you memorable? (What is your passion; what makes people want to contact you repeatedly? What makes people want to hang out with you and listen to you?)
• We brainstorm and list my client’s most memorable characteristics.
• What makes you credible? (What is your track record? Where and what are the proof and metrics?)
• We review my client’s track record for the past several years and list all the significant achievements. This also begins the story development process for developing the résumé, social media profiles, and the interview process. 
• What makes you visible? (How are you more visible than your colleagues? What makes you different that puts you ahead of them?)
• Looking at my client’s competition and colleagues, we compare essential and desirable traits by employers.
• What value do you offer an employer? (This is a difficult question for many clients – as many people do not know how to answer it – but it must be addressed.)
• I ask my client to describe the value he/she offers an employer, like saving money, making money, solving problems, team leadership, program launch, and more. What are the most compelling value statements? 
• What is your area of expertise? What compels someone to call you? If someone calls you – and they ask, “Can you help me with _______________________?” (It might be about solving an issue concerning engineering, nursing, organizational development, addressing and resolving team dynamics, providing conflict coaching, providing guidance concerning leadership development, mediation, or legal matters. You might be an analytical person, a money-maker, or a decision-maker. You might be a subject matter expert in your field of expertise.)
• I also ask my client to describe his expertise. We list all the times people (customers, leaders, competitors) call my client to ask a question. We create a list of themes and focus on the themes and patterns to guide the brand development
• What does your brand stand for? (What are you an ambassador for? What is your personality – and how does that affect your brand?)
• These questions help my client pull the lists and responses from all the above questions into one. From this conglomeration, we identify all the similar patterns and themes and prioritize them in order of significance and prominence to develop the brand statement.

Prominent products and services are branded to communicate their differentiators and attract customers and clients. As job seekers begin to define and design their brand via personal branding, I coach my clients to learn how to best communicate, articulate, and convey their individual value proposition—that differentiating factor. The value proposition is used on my clients’ résumés, social media profiles, interviews, and the job. It goes where they go, and it represents them. 

To solidify the branding statement and create an actual “branded” image in the minds of potential employers, customers, reviewers/recruiters/hiring managers, and human resources professionals on social media or on résumés, clients can develop branded logos or looks. They may use a specific color, picture, or logo on a résumé or social media platform.  This look, color, and feel should accompany the written brand and create a seamless look through all written materials. 

Literal branding is a mark that is burned or frozen on the skin (yikes). However, that visual can be burned into one’s mind—just like Nike, Apple, or Columbia are universally recognized brands. We can even just see a glimpse of these branded logos, and we can recall the brand.  

• Nike’s brand statement: “To bring inspiration and innovation to every athlete* in the world.” *If you have a body, you are an athlete.
• Apple: “To contribute to the world by making tools for the mind that advance humankind.”
• Coca-Cola’s brand statement: “To refresh the world in mind, body, and spirit and inspire moments of optimism and happiness through our brands and actions.”
• Disney’s brand statement: “To entertain, inform, and inspire people around the globe through the power of unparalleled storytelling.”

When writing the brand statement, avoid generalities and jargon. Instead, be specific. Offer numbers and impact/value. Include personality if appropriate, e.g., emphatic, emotional intelligence, wisdom, or other. Coach your clients to craft an indelible personal branding statement in the mind of the reader or hearer. 

The ultimate goal is long-term personal brand loyalty!

The post What Differentiates You? appeared first on PARWCC.

It’s that time of year. The time of year when most of us are bombarded with advice about, and countless methodologies, to set goals. And before we move on, let’s be upfront and honest. Study after study reveals that a significant percentage of people who set goals and New Year’s resolutions, fail to achieve them. While specific numbers vary by study and population, here’s a general breakdown:

• Only 40–50% of people set goals for a new year, or create New Year’s resolutions. 
• By the end of January, nearly 25% have already abandoned their goals and resolutions.  
• Less than 10% are successful in fully meeting their goals by year-end.
• Of the < 10% who succeed, the attainment of their goals has little impact on their lives.

Why do well-intentioned folks set goals and then fail at achieving them? Once again, studies suggest the most common reasons for failure include: 

• Setting overly ambitious or vague goals.
• Failing to develop inspiring actionable steps and strategies.
• Loss of motivation, where initial enthusiasm wanes.
• Poor habits, a negative environment, and/or never-ending distractions.
• Lack of accountability and/or no system to track progress.

The ‘Big Why’ goal

I believe there’s an explanation that supersedes the bullets above. I call it the Big Why goal.  The Big Why goal represents the ultimate benefit we attain by achieving it. Joe’s Big Why goal is to land a better job, not just to earn more money to pay the bills, but for his family to live an extraordinary life. The Big Why goal has a deep emotional connection to attaining it. Then, all other goals Joe sets are in pursuit of his Big Why goal – an extraordinary life for his family.

As 2025 starts anew, it’s a good time for you, and your clients/students, to ponder your Big Why goal, so that when accomplished, it would make 2025 one of your best years ever. It’s the perfect time to start over, set new goals, and pursue all those things and experiences you want and deserve in the coming year. Yet, most people are throwing together a bunch of ‘I hopes,’ and leave it at that.  In other words, they are setting goals, but they have no deep intrinsic connection to them.  

They don’t ask:

• Why am I setting these goals?
• What will achieving my goals do for me and my family?
• Who will I become as a result of achieving them?

My contention is this: If we know our Big Why goal, all other goals and resolutions we set will support it. Without a Big Why goal, most goals and resolutions we set will fall to the wayside at the first uprising of adversity, resistance, or distraction.  Or we’ll end up settling.   

The Big Why goal is like a magnet that draws us toward our ultimate desire. It’s a deeper, emotional desire than ordinary goals. As you would do anything for your child, you’d do almost anything to achieve your Big Why goal. It’s easy to see that without a Big Why goal, less than 10% of those who set New Years’ goals and resolutions fail to achieve them.  

You only need to think ‘1’ thing

Have you ever attended or participated in a half-day or full-day goals workshop? I have – many.  Here’s what happens. You spend quality hours and positive energy pondering and brainstorming your goals in many different categories: personal, financial, vacation, health, family, adventure, spiritual, professional, things I want to buy, and stretch goals for the coming year. Usually you’d select 10 to 12 varying categories. 

Once you’ve selected your categories, you then select the 3-5 most important goals in each category that you really want to achieve. You write them down, put a date you want the goals to be achieved by, and jot down a preliminary paragraph (or two), which is the beginning of a more comprehensive action plan that you complete at home.

At the end of the day, you pack up, leave the workshop, and go home totally drained. Ultimately, you forget them all. Your brain is fried, overwhelmed, and confused. You wake up the next day and feel like you never went to sleep and pulled an all-nighter. Totally spent. The last goal setting workshop I attended, I had 10 categories with 3 goals in each category. That’s 30 goals, 30 dates to keep in mind to achieve all 30 goals, and some semblance of 30 action plans on how to achieve each of the 30 goals.  

These were great workshops led by highly respected professionals with well intentioned outcomes for their participants. But here’s the thing – our brains can’t focus on 30 goals. It can’t focus on 12. Actually, it has trouble handling 2 major goals. But the good news is… the brain can easily focus on, pursue, and achieve 1 Big Why goal.

The Big Why goal question 

Think December 31, 2025. In fact, take a trip into the future and envision yourself at the end of 2025 – 12 months from now. Before you begin whatever process of goal setting you practice, you must first identify your 1 Big Why goal – that will then drive all others.  

Here’s the question you ask to determine your (and your job seekers’) Big Why goal:

If you could identify and achieve just 1 outcome by the end of this year, that would SIGNIFICANTLY ENHANCE THE QUALITY OF YOUR LIFE – and that YOU WOULD COMMIT TO… what would it be?”

It takes courage to ask this question

This is not an easy question to ask, because it makes us vulnerable to the inevitable – self-doubt, rejection, and resistance. In fact, vulnerable to the primary fear – ‘What if I fail?’

And the HOW is missing. This is why most people won’t ask this question, because they need to know how they will succeed before they know the deeper, ‘why do you want to succeed?’ Why do you really want to go to the moon? Why do you really want the right to vote? Why do you really want to reduce emissions? Why do you really want a better, more rewarding job?  

When we know our Big Why goal, the how always shows up – “where there’s a will (the Big Why) there’s a way (the how). It’s a Big Why goal that creates a determined and resilient mindset. 

Commitment 

Ah, this is where the rubber meets the road; where the heart meets the test of commitment. As noted previously, the following questions are important when seeking to identify your Big Why goal:  

• Why am I setting these goals?
• What will achieving my goals do for me (and my family)?
• Who will I become as a result of achieving them?

When your Big Why goal is truly exciting and compelling, your mind in concert with the minds of others around you, will find a way to achieve it. It’s a commitment you make to yourself. Your Big Why goal is so magnetizing, you won’t back down under duress or adversity. Quitting is not an option and settling is unacceptable. And all other goals and resolutions that will be set, will be set, primarily, to support your Big Why goal.

5 real life examples:

“If you could identify and achieve just 1 outcome by the end of this year, that would SIGNIFICANTLY ENHANCE THE QUALITY OF YOUR LIFE – and that YOU WOULD COMMIT TO… what would it be?”

Joseph B.

“To relocate to a less expensive state and secure employment there, so my family can live a higher quality, less stressful life.”

Kelley O’

“To be cancer free by Christmas.” 

James Q.

“To stay happily employed, and replenish my kid’s college funds.” 

Milly C.

“To hire a career coach in the Denver area so I can land a new job there, so I can relocate to be close to my grandchildren.”

Jay Block (as I turn 73)

“To be alive, energetic, and healthy.”

And yours?

The post The “Big Why” Goal appeared first on PARWCC.

I look at four primary areas for this evaluation/inventory of business success, as well as any changes needed. In proper coaching form, I will pose several questions to help you evaluate your career coaching business, whether as a solopreneur or within a career services office/center:

• What went well?
• What did not go well?
• What are the gaps?
• What were your personal successes? 

These four areas will help you identify how to adjust your business, collaborate better with your clients/client population, create new goals or adjust goals, and/or shift operations within a career services office. 

Begin by making a list of the primary areas of services and products. From this list, determine which services and products made money and which services and products reduced income or caused frustration for clients (or you) in the past year. Also, consider time, not just costs:

• How much money did you invest in advertising, website management or development, office equipment and supplies, professional development including education/training/certifications/conferences (including travel), administrative support, bookkeeping and accounting, sub-contractors (1099) or employees (W-2), medical insurance, legal services, 401K/retirement savings, credit card processing, bank fees, rent or mortgage, Internet, smart phone, business loans, liability insurance, utilities, business entertainment, car lease/or expenses, and other specific expenses your business requires? Did you save for taxes?
• Which services and products created the most significant income/Return on Investment (ROI)? 
• For example, did you sell more résumés or more interview coaching packages? 
• Do any of your services cost you money (e.g., a sub-contract résumé writer who received a percentage of the fee you charged the client)? If so, how much? Subtract the expenses from your income – that is your ROI. 
• Are there ways to cut expenses? Like switching from a personal bookkeeper to QuickBooks or a similar product or comparing the cost of insurance or Internet providers to see if one might be less expensive.
• Do you need a bookkeeper and a virtual assistant? Can one do both jobs?
• Do you need a website manager and a branding expert? Or can one do both jobs? 
• Did you pay for advertising? What was your ROI after paying for the advertising or funnel campaigns? Does the money need to be reinvested in the same advertising or shifted to a different advertising or marketing program? 
• Is there a product or service that is burning you out? If so, is it a top money maker? If it is not a top money maker – maybe it is time to retire that service or product. If it is a top money maker, you might consider hiring a sub to work on projects that burn you out. 
• Did you experience any crises or circumstances that were unplanned or caused business troubles? 
• What did not go well? Can you adjust these areas? For example, oftentimes, new businesses take on any client population to generate income. If you enjoy working with college graduates and you find yourself working with mid-level professionals, you may want to reevaluate. 
• Are you comfortable coaching mid-level professionals, or do you need to niche your coaching services to only one client population? For example, a new In-n-Out Burger opened in Boise this week. The lines were hundreds of cars long. Their long-term success comes from specializing in one thing: burgers. They have not diversified – like other establishments that offer burgers, chicken, ribs, salads, etc. The same goes for Chick-fil-A. They serve one thing: chicken. Each company specializes, and they each do it well enough to be long-lasting, growing, and popular. 
• Did you end up with an unexpected, substantial tax burden at the end of the year? If so, congratulations! – that means you made a lot of money. However, it also means that you need to save 30% of every dollar, no matter what, to be prepared for such contingencies. 
• Figure out how many hours a week you are working and compare that to your income. Are you making an adequate salary / hourly wage – or did you find that you worked 80s per week only to make $10 an hour?

The overall inventory of your products, services, and programs that went well in 2024 and things that did not go so well should expose any gaps, e.g., the need to save money for taxes and contingencies; adjust funds for advertising into another area; consider niching the client population; decide only to write résumés, provide interview coaching, provide job search coaching with an action plan and assessment tool; and more. 

For Career Service Centers and Solopreneurs: 

• Take an inventory of the products and services that worked for your clients. Did you offer too many products and services, which may have overwhelmed them? 
• Did you offer enough services and products to ensure career management success?
• What requests do you receive the most, e.g., résumé writing, assessment testing, interview coaching, onboarding planning, salary negotiations, career direction, LinkedIn profile writing, etc.? Keep an ongoing list to determine which products are the best to provide. 
• Do you need to develop specific tip sheets or guides to assist your clients in their job searches?
• Have you worked with your team to create systems to ensure clients return for sessions and complete homework? 

One way to help determine client career success is to send a survey and ask about progress. Questions may include:

• What services did you receive from our office?

• How many résumés did you circulate?

• Where did you circulate your résumés? 

• How did you engage in networking?

• How many interviews did you engage in?

• How many offers did you receive?

• Did you receive a promotion?

• Did your salary increase?

• Did you attain your career and work-life balance goals? Describe?

• How would you adjust your career management action plan for the next job search?

Personal Accomplishments

In good coaching form, don’t forget to congratulate yourself on a job well done. Identify the goals you attained in 2024. Look back and see how far you have moved forward. Even if it is baby steps, it is progress. 

• Did you make more money? 
• Did you implement a new program/product/service for your career services offerings? 
• Did you complete a training or certification?
• Did you obtain a new degree?
• Did you check off your goals to see how much you accomplished from the year before?
• Did you have a new baby? Get married? Have a grandchild? Take a bucket-list vacation?

Give yourself credit!

In 2025, reflect on 2024. Conduct a thorough inventory of your company or career services office. Identify the best of the best and eliminate those that do not work well, are less profitable, or cause burnout. Create your action plan to adjust your services for 2025 and beyond—and add in new ideas like writing a book or starting a podcast and personal goals like getting fit or saving for a bucket-list vacation. 

I wish you a New Year filled with career success, health, happiness, and prosperity! – Diane

The post 2024 Reflections appeared first on PARWCC.

The better news is asking that question is a great way to open up powerful, new opportunities. In this article I’ll offer a rock solid plan to have your practice be the very best it can be.

It all begins with your brand. Is your brand really working for you and your clients? It will, but only if it contains two important elements. The first is a clear definition of your market. The second is your promise of the specific value you pledge to deliver to every client.

Those two elements are tied to your clients’ career fields. If your brand isn’t aligned with those fields, you’ll produce a general résumé—a near useless document.

Let me offer my own brand as an example of folding in both elements: 

“I help rising, senior, and very senior executives win the careers they’ve always deserved, get paid with their worth, and reduce the stress of the job search.”

My market is clear. And I know precisely what I’ve signed up for. I will only work with people who hold senior leadership positions in any career field. I’m also committed to support people in all three economic sectors: private, non-profit, and public. Finally I am committed to assist clients worldwide.

Let’s look at what I promised item by item. Since I pledged to help my clients win the career they’ve always deserved, I must qualify them very carefully. That’s easy when I see people who don’t qualify. Those would include job seekers who have slacked off or have unrealistic expectations.

I promise my clients they would get paid what they are worth. “Paid” is shorthand for the entire compensation package. Said another way I’m going to help them win a reasonable salary (or commissions), perks, benefits, bonuses, and severance. Beyond that I pledge to help them find and thrive in a supportive corporate climate. 

I also pledged to reduce the stress of their job search. Almost all our clients are influenced by two major stress-producing factors. First is not understanding the serious limitations of artificial intelligence (AI). The second is what I call “folklore.” Let’s examine each one.

AI uses the large language model. It searches millions and millions of résumés to find what it considers the best. Unfortunately, the vast majority of those documents were never successful. The result is predictable. AI will guide people to produce résumés that look like too many others. The frustration builds because those job seekers don’t know why they aren’t moving forward. In addition, AI has no sense of empathy, no code of conduct. Users are on their own. No wonder they soon become disenchanted. (What a great opportunity for your marketing campaign!)

“Folklore” produces the same results. The trap is endless searching for so-called “key words.” Those are collections of nice sounding adjectives, traits, or responsibilities. All they really define are the minimum standards. No one would hire somebody who wasn’t… 

“An executive with an exceptional record of success…turning around underperforming organizations…delivering strategies to facilitate growth…excels at leading enterprise-level change…and streamlining processes to increase efficiency.…”

Your advantage is offering clients your wisdom. When we apply advanced techniques we replace uncertainty with confidence.

So let’s use the same techniques that serve your clients so well to bolster your practice. Using your brand as a guideline, describe what your practice would look like if it were the very best it could be. Be as specific as you can. 

Your brand must meet your needs as well your clients’. That’s why you include your preferences in the expanded version of your brand. Theoretically, doing everything for every client might serve them well, but if that required working 70 hours every week, the cost may be too high.

Now compare what your practice looks like today with your ideal model. You’re seeking deficits between the two. Your next steps are now very clear: what must you do to fill those wisdom and knowledge shortfalls?

Formal training and certification programs often meet the need. But before you invest time and money in any of them, ask the provider this key question: “If I completed your training or earned your certification, what would I be able to do at the end of that effort I couldn’t do at the beginning?” You are looking for solid answers. If you get generalities, you’re seeing a program that’s not well put together, not worth your time or money.

PARWCC offers a huge variety of articles, tools, and exercises to help you gain the knowledge you need. One of the most powerful resources is our annual conference. If you haven’t yet looked at what Thrive25! offers (https://www.thrive.show/) do so, keeping the knowledge you need uppermost in your mind.

Now your brand adds real coherence to your plan. It tells you how you are going to benefit your clients with new wisdom. And it is all measured against the market included in your brand statement.

Even if you can’t serve a potential client because they aren’t in your brand, you can still provide value. Refer that jobseeker to a colleague. Your win is the 15% referral fee for very little work. The colleague to whom you referred gets a new client. The client wins because you arranged a great match between their needs and your colleague’s capability.

To make this article valuable please consider this homework. Write out your brand. Are you serving the best market as you define “best?” What’s keeping your practice from being the best it could ever be? Which resources do you need to close the gaps?

Improving your practice is much like what you do for your clients and offers the same kind of returns on investments. Let me illustrate.

Why should my clients pay me $1,200 for a résumé and cover letter? Because I know my brand so well, I know most clients make about $200,000 a year. Every week they aren’t employed at that level costs them the $3,800 they didn’t earn. If I can cut their job search by just two days they will have made up their investment before their first day in the new job.

Suppose you’re research shows it will cost you $5,000 to get the capabilities you need. And suppose you charge $500 for a résumé. You will have made up your investment once you’ve sold ten such documents. Do you write two résumés a week? You’ll recoup your investment in just five weeks, about a tenth of a year.

If you think $5,000 is too much, wait till you do the math if you don’t spend that money. You’ll continue to lose potential earnings every day from now on.

So, I suppose your practice could have a greatest weakness after all. 

That would be not having your brand deliver all the value it can to you, to your clients, and to our industry.

The post What is Your Practice’s Greatest Weakness? appeared first on PARWCC.

Operations at the North Pole have grown exponentially over the years requiring more and more maintenance and repairs for equipment, facilities, Santa’s sled, and operations. Santa also needed more help for decorations of the North Pole including lights, holiday displays, and placing the star on the holiday tree in the center courtyard of the Campus. Over time, the team experienced many injuries as the Elves had to climb tall ladders to perform the maintenance.

Santa decided to hire a Facilities & Equipment Maintenance Manager to take over the job the Elves tried to accomplish. This would free the Elves to focus on their specific jobs of toy making, wrapping, baking, packing, and other tasks while preventing injuries. 

I spoke with Santa to develop the position description and job requisition order to place on LinkedIn and Indeed. We decided that the new Facilities & Equipment Maintenance Manager needed to be a licensed electrician and be at least six feet or much taller. We also decided that after hiring and onboarding this Facilities & Equipment Maintenance Manager we would then hire a Facilities & Equipment Maintenance team to support the new manager. 

By putting on my coaching hat I asked Santa several questions to accurately craft the perfect position description for our new Facilities & Equipment Maintenance Manager. My questions included specific position responsibilities, cultural requirements, particular qualifications, and education/certifications. 

The Grinch and I then drafted the position description and listing:

JOB VACANCY ANNOUNCEMENT / POSITION DESCRIPTION

Reference Code: Operation FIXTOY

Job Title: Facilities & Equipment Maintenance Manager 

Location: North Pole

Position Description:

Santa is seeking a Facilities & Equipment Maintenance Manager professional with a passion for overseeing large-scale and multi-faceted operations. We need a professional to keep the North Pole toy making, gift wrapping, reindeer facilities, the Campus facilities, and more running like a well-oiled machine. 

This position is on-site at the North Pole and requires a manager who appreciates cold weather, snow, and ice. The Facilities & Equipment Maintenance Manager will need to appreciate the joy of the holidays, and have a passion for on-schedule toy delivery services globally while serving thousands of Elves working at the North Pole.

Desirable Qualifications: More than 6 feet tall

Position Responsibilities

• Supervise the daily activities of multi-disciplinary teams of electricians, plumbers (HVAC) and custodial workers to maintain and repair grounds, reindeer pastures, enclosures and training facilities, Santa’s sleigh, the toy shops, baking facilities and kitchens, and other facilities. 
• Schedule and assign duties in carpentry, electrical, painting, plumbing, heating / ventilating, lighting, decorating, and roofing for the Toy Making, Gift Wrapping, Decorating, Cooking Baking, and other operations facilities.
• Routinely inspect buildings, sites, and equipment for needed repair and respond to emergency maintenance requests from Elves or Santa as required.
• Work with vendors as needed and oversee execution of contracted services.
• Maintain records and prepare reports for management review, including work orders.

Minimum Requirements

• High school diploma or equivalent. Bachelor’s degree preferred
• 5+ years of hands-on management or leadership experience in high-volume manufacturing and distribution centers
• Experience with mechanical, electrical and plumbing (MEP), landscaping, HVAC, and electrical systems
• Licensed Electrician
• Strong problem-solving and communication skills. Communicate with management team regularly (Santa, the Grinch, Rudolph, and Operational Directors)
• Manage heights and ladders well
• Appreciate extremely cold weather – below -20 Fahrenheit 

Sweet Benefits, Perks & Stocking Options

• All expenses paid Santa’s sleigh ride to home of origin for 3-month R&R from January to March
• 401(k) with 8% employer match. Multiple bonus programs, including profit sharing
• Lodging and meals including Gingerbread, Candy Canes, and Mrs. Claus’ cookies and hot cocoa
• Nightly display of colorful flickering lights dancing across the sky
• Classes in Time Travel
• Flying Reindeer Rides
• Gym membership
• One annual dental cleaning
• On-site fitness center and beautifully maintained walking paths across the frozen tundra
• Tuition Assistance Program that covers professional continuing education

We received scores of résumés including the résumé from Bumble – The Abominable Snow Monster of the North. Since we knew that he had a previous relationship with Rudolph and Rudolph recommended Bumble, we decided to interview him. His résumé was impressive and the Grinch and I asked several questions to further validate his expertise and experience. 

• Why do you want to be a Facilities & Equipment Maintenance Manager for the North Pole?
• What is your main area of expertise?
• You are currently living in a different country – are you okay with moving to the North Pole? 
• What will happen if you become the Facilities & Equipment Maintenance Manager and you do not like it or feel like you do not fit in the role?
• Are you a micromanager? Why or why not?
• How do you motivate others? Provide an example. 
• What does team player mean to you? Provide an example.
• How do you resolve conflict? Provide an example.
• Describe your ability to multi-task and meet specific deadlines. Provide an example. 
• What do you value most in a job? Provide an example.
• What do you believe makes a successful leader? Provide an example.
• What value can you bring to Santa’s operations by being the Facilities & Equipment Maintenance Manager? Provide an example.
• What questions do you have for us?

Bumble was very honest in his responses and explained that held a high level position for another company – but the company’s mission was not his passion. He believed that working with the Elves, Rudolph, and Santa to make and deliver toys to children globally and prosper the mission of goodwill would meet with his values and motivational factors. He also explained that his height and ability to bounce and be soft and fluffy would bring great value to the North Pole and the Elves. He also explained that his knowledge of maintaining highly specialized equipment like wind tunnels, arc jets, high bays, vertical motion simulators, and other similar complex, technical assets would benefit time travel and Santa’s sleigh operations. 

He did bring some Diane’s Whole-Person Theory issues to the discussions, where he described the situation where he was considered an angry monster when he had a previous run-in with Rudolph. It, however, did get resolved. (For background on The Abominable Snow Monster of the North, he was the villain in Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer, but has reformed and is a friend of Rudolph. The Abominable Snow Monster of the North is a giant yeti and the main antagonist in the 1964 Rankin/Bass special Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer. In the 2001 sequel, he is Yukon Cornielius’ bumbling sidekick. Yukon calls him Bumble.)

Santa, the Grinch, and I deliberated on the hiring of Bumble and agreed he would make a wonderful new additional to the North Pole leadership team. In our offer letter to Bumble, Santa invited him to put the star on the holiday tree in the Campus courtyard as his first assignment – to demonstrate joy and team unity to the Elves. 

Best wishes for a very joyous holiday season and prosperous New Year – Diane

The Abominable Snow Monster (Bumble)

of the North | 000-222-555 | bumble@gmail.com

Target: North Pole Facilities & Equipment Maintenance Manager 

QUALIFICATIONS

Licensed Electrician | HVAC | Facilities & Equipment Maintenance and Management | Sustainability | Environment Management | Planning | Budgeting | Strategic Infrastructure | Customer Satisfaction | Capital Improvements | Facility Engineering Level 2 Certification | Project Management Professional (PMP) | Building Modernization 

• Reach tall heights. Climb tall ladders. Able to place the star on the holiday tree – due to my height
• Bounce – soft and fluffy – an extra bonus when Elves fall from tall ladders

PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE

Chief, Facilities Engineering and Real Property Division | Mountains of Asia | forever to present

Direct a staff of 42 personnel and 500+ contractors. Manage engineering support operations. Provide oversight leadership for a Campus of 3,000 acres and 5.1 million square feet of facilities worth more than $4.5 Billion. Oversee engineering analysis, design, construction, Campus maintenance, grounds care, energy conservation, minor construction, facility planning, facility utilization, real property management, and more. Direct the development and execution of building modernization initiatives supporting energy efficiency, sustainability, and tenant satisfaction.

Maintain and repair highly specialized equipment and infrastructure that provides technical capabilities such as wind tunnels, arc jets, high bays, vertical motion simulators, and other similar complex, technical assets. 

Key Leadership Initiatives & Accomplishments 

• Chaired the Research Center Facility Utilization Review Board. Revised the format and instituted an action tracker that held leaders and project officers accountable for meeting their deadlines and tracking progress on initiatives. 
• Led major initiatives including multi-million-dollar renovations of historic buildings, relocation of the motor pool, and identifying the location for the new multi-million-dollar Engineering Services Building.
• Constantly look for new and innovative ways to make facilities management more efficient, cost effective and satisfactory to customers. Introduce industry best practices to improve management practices. 
• Led the planning and execution of the Lean Six Sigma Kaizen Blitz Week. Led teams to introduce improvement and savings including a 40% reduction in set up time for water cooled test articles and 50% reduction in set up time for non-water-cooled test articles for the Aerodynamic Heating Facility (AHF) model installation and alignment.
• Engaged staff in a way that empowered them and created a culture of innovation and individual ownership that will have long range benefits for the future wellbeing of the complex.
• Changed the way shipping containers were purchased and placed on the Campus preventing them from becoming habitable space. The resulting inventories identified and disposed of hazardous materials that were being improperly stored in the containers. 

EDUCATION & PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT

• BS in Engineering 
• Licensed Electrician 
• Project Management Professional (PMP)
• Facility Engineering Level 2 Certification

The post Santa’s New Operations & Maintenance Manager appeared first on PARWCC.

The updated materials include an expanded section on salary negotiations, a specific section on workplace and group coaching, additional coaching scenarios and career transition requirements, more career coaching questions with expanded coaching proficiencies, executive leadership competencies and coaching, coaching for COVID-related/other emergent issues, including working from home, and more. There are several new résumé samples, two new case studies with résumés, and a review of job announcements and résumés for gathering keywords and messages for résumé and LinkedIn profile development. 

Beginning in 2025, I will include a live component to the CPCC program for students who desire to engage in live coaching sessions by delving into the coaching proficiencies, practicing the coaching proficiencies with Diane and other participants, preparing career management action plans for clients, and developing a coaching program. This live component will be offered quarterly – so students can begin the CPCC program at any time and join the quarterly calls as their schedules permit during the 12-month completion time.  The live practice coaching sessions will help career coaches build confidence as they learn the career coaching proficiencies, skills, strategies, and tools.  

The live sessions will allow participants to ask questions focused on client scenarios and current client issues, and enable participants to engage and practice career coaching skills. 

We will also include time for Q&A to cover some of the most often asked questions from CPCC participants including:

My client did not complete his homework. What can I do to get him to complete his homework?

• There are a couple of things you can do to prompt a client to complete homework. Begin the sessions with a service agreement whereby the client agrees to submit homework promptly. Try to obtain an upfront commitment to begin the coaching sessions. 
• If the client does not respond to completing homework after a 3-strike or other rule you determine, you can move that client to the sidelines until he agrees to follow the program. 
• Hold a coaching session to ask the client what is preventing him from completing homework and try to create a solution together (e.g., if the homework is too overwhelming, perhaps ask for less response initially; if the homework involves completing worksheets and the client does not like that type exercise, ask him the questions directly and keep notes; if the client does not understand how to edit his LinkedIn profile, consider screen-sharing and walking the client through the process in a live session). 

I feel like I am more of a consultant; I speak too much. How can I focus more on listening and not providing guidance? 

• Listening is a key career coaching competency. We do not make decisions for our clients, so we must pose open-ended questions to engage them in making decisions independently.
• Remove all distractors, e.g., phone and texts, email, and background noises.
• Ask the client for permission to brainstorm ideas. 
• Recap and clarify what you heard – to ensure clarity. 
• Take notes. 

I finished the CPCC materials but am not confident yet. How can I feel more confident in leading coaching sessions?

• The CPCC program has many resources and tools that you can use to manage career coaching sessions. The coaching log and Diane’s Query Piece are two essential tools that you can use to begin coaching sessions. 
• The beloved GearBox also has many resources and templates you can customize and use with your client populations.
• By outlining a career coaching program and leading a client or two through the program, you will learn to adjust your coaching program and processes – and after a few clients – you will be much more confident and create a program that works well for you and your client population. For example, if you coach executives, you may need a complete 6- or 12-week program. You may only need to work with young adults for 4 or 6 weeks. Some coaches who work with the military only get to coach them for two or three sessions. You will adjust as you understand what sessions work well and which sessions need adjusting. Determine the greatest needs of your clients and focus the coaching sessions on these needs. 
• Create easy-to-use checklists and tip sheets for your clients. 

How do I charge for my career coaching services?

• You can charge hourly or as a bundle program for your coaching services. 
• Determine how many deliverables your coaching package will include, e.g., determining direction and a career management action plan, assessment tool, résumé, LinkedIn profile, interview preparation, salary negotiations, onboarding, and basic research.
• Determine the number of hours it will take to work with a client (including face-time hours and back-end work). 
• Determine your hourly rate and multiply it by the hours it will take to coach a client through XX sessions and deliverables. 
• Our colleagues charge anywhere from $100 to $450+ per hour. 

How can I build my career coaching business? 

• To build a career coaching practice, be credible, and be visible from day one. 
• If you work a day job and plan to open a career coaching practice in the next 3 to 5 years, get credible and visible now. 
• Launch a small website, monitor your LinkedIn profile, write blogs, and build relationships with stakeholders now (e.g., if you coach engineers, offer to write blogs or career coaching/career management tips for an engineering organization) – so that when you open your business, you are established as an expert for your population. 

In the new live CPCC sessions, we will discuss these questions and many more based on specific client scenarios. I have learned that no one client is like the next. They each approach a career coach at a different stage in their job search process, and we must understand the career coaching proficiencies and the entire career management process from A to Z to coach our clients to become Job-Search-Proofed.

The post Revamped and Ready: The CPCC Program Gets a Fresh Facelift appeared first on PARWCC.

Patience may seem like a luxury you can’t afford, but that couldn’t be further from the truth.

The Rarity of Patience in Modern Business

Why do we lack patience? Our digital world has us moving faster than ever, and instant gratification has become a way of life.

If you’re not getting rapid results, you’re failing. Or at least that’s what the never-ending stream of mass-appeal “grow your coaching business to six figures overnight” ads on my Facebook feed want me to believe.

The pressure to perform, generate leads, and bring home the bacon can overshadow the need for thoughtful, sustained growth. We’re often so focused on immediate needs – chasing the next client or the quickest revenue spike – that we neglect the consistent, systematic efforts that ensure long-term stability.

→ Sounds like something we’d tell an anxious job seeker, eh?

The Necessity of Patience for Business Owners

While counterintuitive, patience for business owners isn’t just a virtue – it’s our best strategy, especially when it comes to marketing, lead generation, and building consistent revenue.

Here’s why:

1. Cultivating Relationships: Whether it’s with clients, peers, or mentors, building meaningful relationships takes time. Patience allows these relationships to mature into networks that offer support, business, and opportunities, but it takes time to build a consistent referral base that drives reliable leads.

2. Marketing and Lead Generation: There is no magic wand to wave or potion to concoct that will take your business from zero to six figures overnight. Trust, brand loyalty, and visibility take time to build, as do marketing and lead generation strategies that take time to percolate. Rushing these processes can lead to a big waste of money, but more importantly, impatience can set unrealistic expectations that have you jumping from channel to channel without truly cultivating any one potential source.

3. Revenue Growth Expectations: When starting a business or in the early stages of growth, revenue can come in waves and be unpredictable. This is normal – and it’s normal for even the first year or two. What you don’t want to do is have one great month and say, “Great, I made it,” make big decisions based on that spike, and then you’re starving (literally and figuratively) for the next three. Don’t get me wrong, we want great months, but one doesn’t mean you know how to reproduce it, so take one great month and turn it into three back-to-back. Then take that three months and do it all over again, and now you have your formula for consistent revenue – see how important patience was to that sustainable growth?!

Patience in Practice: A Closer Look at Business Growth Areas

In addition to setting realistic expectations and goals for the revenue side of business, patience, and forethought can do a lot for other areas of your business. Speaking from experience, I naturally fall into the “I have an idea; let’s do it NOW” trap that can end up taxing teams or giving initiatives too little focus.

After working with a coach (a coach without a coach is like a doctor who won’t go to the doctor), I learned how to put ideas into execution at the right time.

I learned to be patient.

Here’s what that can do for you:

Strategic Planning: Long-term planning is only possible with patience. Set your vision, establish your goals, and create annual road maps that include launching new products or services, your time off, and other milestones you can lock in advance. This will keep you accountable for the activities you need to do to make that vision a reality while also keeping those “I have an idea” impulses in check!

Client Retention: Securing a new client is an achievement; keeping them is an art. Patience in your client engagements – and giving them the experience they want instead of the process you think they need – allows you to understand, meet, and exceed their expectations. Don’t rush into writing the résumé if they need a coaching session; don’t rush to close a sale if they need time. Fostering loyalty is more profitable in the long run than new client acquisition. It’s also more fun!

Building Your Skills: How to Be More Patient

1. Establish Minimums: When deploying new marketing strategies, lead generation channels, or even launching a new product or service, give it time. Pre-establish a timeline to gauge the effectiveness of any single initiative.

Hint: Three months is typically needed to see if marketing or lead generation strategies will provide an ROI. This period allows enough data accumulation to make informed decisions and see trends while avoiding the typical knee-jerk reaction to short-term fluctuations or a week of crickets.

2. Set Incremental Goals: Break down your larger business goals into smaller, manageable milestones.

Hint: Go back to the suggestion above about planning out your year. This will make big, hairy, audacious goals less daunting by breaking them down into smaller chunks, which also means more opportunities to celebrate wins (and celebrating reinforces patience and persistence).

3. Reflect and Adjust: Set regular monthly or quarterly intervals to review your business strategies, goals, and current outcomes.

Hint: Knowing your numbers helps you adjust your approach to maximize efforts, and a dose of patience will ensure the incremental goals and activities remain aligned with your long-term objectives and market realities.

In Summary

Cool it. No, just kidding – but maybe back off the need for instant gratification a touch?

There’s a time and place to be fast, and there’s a time and place to be slow, methodical, and thoughtful. This is just another example of a time to look in the mirror and give yourself a dose of the advice we give clients every day: consistent, methodical action paired with realistic expectations (translation: patience) will get you the reward.

Turtles win races, too, ya know.

Coach Well!

Your Friend and Coach,

Angie Callen

The post Patience is a Virtue Most of Us Don’t Have appeared first on PARWCC.

Many of my clients began working from their kitchen tables, bedrooms, and basements. 

Many employees lost their jobs – either temporarily or long-term. They feared losing their paycheck and medical insurance benefits. 

Children were sent home from school to begin education from home via laptops – which meant, in many cases, parents had to remain home to be with their children and manage their education. Many parents of younger children were forced to work around the children’s schedules, waking early to work for hours before their children attended online classes, and they again worked later in the evening. 

Many elementary-aged children experienced a lack of socialization. 

Many youths experienced canceled graduations, proms, and other educational and life milestone events. These same youths experienced loneliness, frustration, and heartache. 

Some workers never worked from home – those in emergency medicine, grocery retail, and other critical/essential sectors. Many of these workers became burned out and left their professions. I have spoken with many nurses who quit nursing after a year of working through the COVID-19 time.   

These events describe Diane’s Whole-Person Theory to a T. Grief permeated the experience, which lasted two or more years.

As a career coach, I worked with my clients to embrace working from home and finding workarounds to the disruption of working from home. Parents unaccustomed to working from home experienced upheaval in many cases, for example, trying to work from home with a new infant or holding office Teams or Zoom meetings in the kitchen with the TV blaring in the background. I heard many of my clients shouting at their spouses: “Be quiet. I need an hour for this meeting. I will help you when I am done.”

I coached these clients to create systems for working from home by requesting equipment from their employers, creatively finding space in their homes to work quietly (one client set up an office in a large closet), and sharing responsibilities with a spouse who worked and cared for children attending school at home.

I also coached managers and supervisors of personnel who became frustrated with their employees who they believed were underperforming. I asked questions like, “How did John perform before he was sent home to work?” If the answer was very good, one of the highest performers. I then coached the manager to adjust to the work-from-order mandate and learn to coach his employee to make his performance just as successful from home. The manager had to change his mind set and accommodate the employees.

Some companies and government agencies did not renew leases to save money and shrink their footprint. Some employees moved away from the office they once worked in.  

Everyone was “retrained” in their thinking of productivity and work-from-home styles, schedules, and accommodations. Many people learned to work effectively from home or remotely. Even basic medicine, e.g., doctors treated medical conditions via Telehealth platforms (my doctor asked me if I had a thermometer and blood pressure machine at my house for one telehealth appointment I experienced). 

In a flip-the-switch, many companies have mandated that employees return to the office in the last two years. According to a ResumeBuilder article from 2023, 90% of employers planned to return to the office during 2024, and 28% of those companies said they would fire employees who do not return. 

Companies requiring employees to return to the office include JP Morgan Chase, Google, Apple, law firms, Tesla, SpaceX, Citigroup, AMX, and many government agencies. 

Employers have stated that collaboration, employee engagement, knowledge sharing, and mentorship suffer when employees work from home. Ideas are shared easily in an office/team environment. Those working from home state they are just as productive and create as many new ideas as possible in virtual meetings. 

Some companies have required employees to return to the office one or more days a week, up to five days a week. Interestingly, I have coached some companies that brought employees back to the office one day a week as a show of support to the rest of the team, who are required to work five days a week; the managers want camaraderie and knowledge sharing. Yet, the one-day-a-week-in-the-office employees do not have a designated office space/cubicle and are, in fact, working isolated in a conference room. It begs the question, is that motivational to any of the staff?

I work with some clients who have to register in advance to secure a cubicle to work in the office, and some days the cubicles are unavailable. Some employees try to book cubicles as many days in a row in advance as possible. This also means that the same team members are not always in the office for collaboration and knowledge sharing. 

Some employers that employ remote workers also ask employees to sign waivers indicating why they work remotely, how many remote days a week, and the number of remote hours. These waivers include statements like: “The company is not liable or responsible for providing internet or a cell phone; the company is not liable in the case of an accident at the employee’s worksite (home), and the company expects any equipment provided to the employee to be returned immediately upon employment termination for any reason, or the employee can expect a fine or lawsuit.” 

I always say that if such a statement is required to be sent to employees and signed, something evidently happened that made the company liable for something that happened at an employee’s home—the employee’s place of work.

When I coach an employee who is upset about having to return to work, I ask them to prioritize the pros and cons of working at home over working in the office. They must decide what is most important: working from home or having no job and finding new employment. 

For those who are insistent about working remotely, and if they know of some personnel in their company who are allowed to work from home, I coach them to prepare an accomplishment résumé to justify their work-from-home productivity to present to their company’s management. Sometimes, managers can request notable exceptions for exceptional personnel to allow them to work remotely. 

The past few years have been a time of considerable and complex career transition for many in the workforce. Changes are continuing to permeate the workplace. How we respond, adapt, and move forward is vital for ourselves, our families, and our clients.

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