Career satisfaction

How important is career fulfilment at work?

December 9, 2020 By // by Rachel Brushfield

2020 has been a strange year.

Covid-19 has made it so.

Lockdown has given many people more time to think than usual as well as a different way of working.

No commuting.

No face to face meetings.

Working from home.

More time to think about their career and whether it is giving them what they really want.

Whether they have career fulfilment and a decent work life balance usually.

Many people have been thinking about whether they want to go back to the old ‘normal’.

Do you?

Lots of articles in the media about ‘hybrid’ working – a combination of working from home and going to the office.

So how important is career fulfilment at work?

Below are some self-reflective questions for you to ponder.

Not all people have enjoyed a good work life balance during 2020.

Working mums home schooling have had a tough time juggling everything.

Poor career fulfilment is a common catalyst for people to seek a career change.

Ask yourself these questions to reflect upon your own career fulfillment.

7 questions – purposeful reflection about your career fulfilment.

How fulfilled am I at work at the current time?
How can I increase my own career fulfillment?
What most motivates me at work?
What most demotivates me at work?
What have been my most fulfilling career highlights to date and how can I replicate them?
What or who is most causing my dissatisfaction at work?
What, in my view, is the number 1 factor causing disengagement in my employer?

Are you at a career crossroads?

Why not:

a) Put an Energise career coaching gift voucher on your Christmas ‘wish list’?

b) Get in touch to arrange your confidential no obligation 20 minute meeting: https://www.inspiringportfoliocareers.com/contact-us/

Simon Strong’s portfolio career #3

May 4, 2015 By // by DigitalJenIPC

This is the third in a series of 6 blog posts by Simon Strong about his portfolio career. Reading how people have created their own portfolio career can be useful to inspire you to create one yourself.

In case you missed them, here is part 1:

https://liberateyourtalent.wordpress.com/2015/04/11/simon-strongs-portfolio-career-1/

Here is part 2:

https://liberateyourtalent.wordpress.com/2015/04/16/simon-strongs-portfolio-career-2/

The rest of this blog is in Simon’s own words.

How did your portfolio career come about?

It certainly wasn’t intentional. In part it came about because I find it hard to say no. In part because I’m always having daft ideas (my outdoor cinema for the football world cup was an unmitigated disaster!). And partly because I started to give myself permission to do things if I thought they were interesting.

How has your portfolio career changed over time?

It started with a business focus underpinned by the arts. I left advertising and got involved in using improvisational comedy as a tool to facilitate creativity, professional development, culture change, and branding workshops. I discovered there was this world of amazing people who did extraordinary business work: horse whisperers who did leadership development, a poker player who taught risk assessment and decision making, a Tai Chi master who taught negotiation skills etc.

For a short time I drifted away from a business focus to a more arts based interest with a business underpinning, partly due to the impact of the recession when the budgets dried up and companies found it difficult to justify working with someone like me!

I have now come back towards the business world and seem to be finding a way to combine my interests in really productive ways. I feel creatively potent and productive at the moment.

When people ask you ‘what do you do?’ – what do you reply?

Ummmmm…

My mum is really happy about the coffee shop – it means that she actually has an answer! But it is something that I have struggled with and angst over. Probably unnecessarily. It has been especially difficult at networking events when I think I should have something smart and concise to say.

Really, it depends who asks. Sometimes I say I am a barista or that I run a coffee shop or cafe. Other times I say I run a creative consultancy. Mostly I laugh and say I do stuff, for people, for reasons!

Part 4 of Simon’s 6 part guest blog series coming soon.

View Simon Strong’s LinkedIn profile:
http://https//uk.linkedin.com/in/simonstrong

View the Human Zoo web site:
http://www.humanzoo.biz/

What could your portfolio career be made up of? Find out what your transferable skills are by downloading our free report:
http://careerstrategies.co.uk/changingcareersreport/

Simon Strong’s portfolio career #1

April 11, 2015 By // by DigitalJenIPC

This is the first in a series of 6 blog posts by Simon Strong about his portfolio career.

Reading how people have created their own portfolio career can be useful to inspire you to create one yourself.

The rest of this blog is in Simon’s own words.

What are the components of your portfolio career e.g. study, paid freelance work, part time job, volunteering etc.?

I don’t really have components as such. More a load of stuff that I’m doing. Some I get paid for. Some I invest in. Some is just because I want to. Interestingly, it’s often the stuff I do just because I want to that leads to the most satisfying and lucrative work opportunities. Probably the easiest thing to do is tell you what I’ve been doing recently and what I’m up to now.

I ran Pecha Kucha Night in Guildford for a couple of years which allowed me to connect with so many amazing creative people and their stories. This led to being asked by Ellen Dowell (who runs Einstein’s Garden at the Green Man Festival, and whose academic work is based on interdisciplinary collaboration) to help set up Bright Club Guildford – where University Academics do stand-up comedy based on their research. Ellen and I ran Bright Club for 3 years before we stepped down in January this year. We have handed over to a fresh committee who we hope will be able to take it on to the next level.

I run a creative consultancy, Human Zoo, named after a book by the amazing Desmond Morris with whom I had the great honour of working when in advertising. We work with our clients across a broad range of projects including branding, innovation and culture change, running lots of seminars and facilitating workshops and conferences. We act as Ambassadors for the University of Surrey Business School and are involved in delivering seminars on their MBA and executive MBA programmes. I’m currently consulting with a global print company and am about to go out to Dubai to run a conference.

Last year my business partner in Human Zoo and I got bored of expending so much energy on client projects that went nowhere, so we decided to start investing time in our own innovation projects. We’ve got three projects currently underway:

1) We won a funding competition from the Technology Strategy Board (now Innovate UK) under ‘Re-Imagining The High Street’ for a feasibility study on an innovation we developed and we’ve just been asked to apply for phase 2 funding for a market test which we are just about to submit.

2) We are working on developing an accelerated learning platform which has been proven to deliver the same learning outcomes as 27 hours of traditional classroom based learning in just 1 hour. We are working with the University of Surrey Business School to run a learning tournament to compare different learning techniques in one of the largest studies of its kind – and we are engaging the top 1,000 businesses in the UK on how this will impact on engaging Gen Y and creating ‘Business Ready Brains’.

3) We are working with one of the University MBA students to take a charity start-up idea to market. We are about to go into a funding round…

Part 2 of Simon’s 6 part guest blog series coming soon.

View Simon Strong’s LinkedIn profile:
http://https//uk.linkedin.com/in/simonstrong

View the Human Zoo web site:
http://www.humanzoo.biz/

What could your portfolio career be made up of?
Find out what your transferable skills are by downloading our free report:
http://careerstrategies.co.uk/changingcareersreport/

Feeling career satisfaction?

March 8, 2015 By // by DigitalJenIPC

Career satisfaction is a growing movement.

There are many reasons for this including the needs, wants, and values of Generation Y/the Millennials, the growing influence of women on the workplace in senior decision making roles and perhaps that many people are a bit (or alot!) weary from the downturn years.

Research by Bruce Woodcock from the University of Kent has explored the factors that create career satisfaction.

15 factors key for career satisfaction:

1. Living near work
2. Access to green spaces or working outdoors
3. Mindfulness – being aware of what we are doing
4. Flow – being immersed in an activity we relish
5. Learning new skills
6. Having purpose and motivating work goals
7. Helping others
8. Autonomy
9. Challenges with clearly defined steps
10. Receiving positive feedback
11. Having supportive social contacts
12. Working for small organisations or self-employment
13. Realistic deadlines
14. Reasonable hours and good work life balance
15. A conducive environment to working productively without distractions

Score your current work. Give each of the 15 factors a score out of 100%.

Add up your total – maximum 1500. What does this tell you?

Our company cat can be a distraction at work, but a furry and purring welcome one. I am sure she sends e mails sometimes!

Working in many companies does not give people many of these 15 factors. Is it really surprising then, that more and more people are choosing to become self-employed, to work for less bureaucratic smaller companies and to design work to suit them – their own business or tailor made portfolio career?

Download our free report to uncover your transferable skills – they could be the key to increasing your career satisfaction:
http://careerstrategies.co.uk/changingcareersreport/

Click on this link to read more about career satisfaction:
http://www.kent.ac.uk/careers/Choosing/career-satisfaction.htm