Identify and uphold your values, and live your life in an ethical manner rather than trying short cuts to get ahead at any cost. A meaningful life and profitable career simply requires work, and lots of it. While some attain success through shortcuts, this success is always short-lived; instead, you must base your life and career on doing things the right way for sustained, long-term success.
The character of your goals will determine your accomplishments, your impact on the world, and the quality of your life. The world respects people whose goals are of good character, and having such goals will motivate you to great achievement. Goals predicated on harming others will never take you very far, and people with such goals never retain their positions for long.
In this article Harrison suggests that you actually may be safer getting a job without the help of family or friends. It is exceedingly rare that a friend or family member will ever be able to get you a position. They may not even want to help you get a job for various reasons. Their involvement in your job search may actually hurt you. The organization may actually look upon you negatively if you try to use a friend or family member to get a job. So going through a close contact is often counterproductive to your job search. Even if you get a position through a friend or family member, you could harm your relationship with that person in the process. Your friend or family member’s act of kindness may ultimately unbalance your relationship. The risks involved in this kind of job far outweigh the potential rewards.
Every thought you have ultimately brings you closer to something positive or negative; you must therefore learn to control your thoughts, and direct them towards something positive. Negative experiences happen to all of us, but the worst thing you can do is let these things control your mentality instead of moving on.
The most successful people in the world have found new ways of expressing themselves professionally. To be continually successful, it is vital for you to reinvent yourself and find new, fresh approaches to the world. Settling into a single way of doing things is dangerous as it makes you predicable, and therefore easier to replicate and ultimately replace.
There are people in your life, just as in everyone else’s, who do not appreciate your talents and will seek to undermine you. You must avoid situations that place you among these kinds of people, and instead find colleagues who recognize and appreciate your efforts. Your work environment will do much to either motivate or de-motivate you, so make sure to find one that recognizes your talents.
You can easily make your vision of yourself more real when you start to do the things the person you want to be would do. Your life is defined by your beliefs and convictions about who you are. You can always change your behavior, but never your perception of who you are. The first step to making a meaningful change is to become aware of your unconscious beliefs about who you are and change them. You need to be able to believe and think positively about yourself and your capabilities and not be held back by negativity. Negative beliefs about yourself will harm you.
In this article Harrison suggests that you actually may be safer getting a job without the help of family or friends. It is exceedingly rare that a friend or family member will ever be able to get you a position. They may not even want to help you get a job for various reasons. Their involvement in your job search may actually hurt you. The organization may actually look upon you negatively if you try to use a friend or family member to get a job. So going through a close contact is often counterproductive to your job search. Even if you get a position through a friend or family member, you could harm your relationship with that person in the process. Your friend or family member’s act of kindness may ultimately unbalance your relationship. The risks involved in this kind of job far outweigh the potential rewards.
In this article Harrison discusses the importance of focusing all your energies on creating value for others. When your focus is on getting rewards and not adding value, you will find success eluding you. You need to create value by solving people’s problems to the very best of your ability. You will grow in your career if you solve people’s problems with dedication. You are owed nothing by anyone until you create value. People will seek you out as long as you create outstanding value for them. Once you start expecting something without creating value, the end is often near. Focusing on the rewards diverts your energy from what generates rewards in the first place. When you create value for others and focus on the work you are doing, the rewards come naturally.
In this article Harrison explains how you can ensure success in your career by externalizing your opponents. Your job is like a game; if you work hard, play by the rules of the company and are seen as part of the team you will be viewed as a valuable player for the company. The most significant part of any game is the presence of an opponent. Don’t look for an opponent among your co-workers. Never speak negatively of your team members. Instead, concentrate on the external opponents. External opponents bring you and the team closer as you work towards a common goal. In order for you and your company to succeed it is important to have an external opponent. Harrison advises people to consistently work hard and not participate in the politics. This is a sure way to score big in your career.
True self-esteem comes from within, not from the acceptance of others. When your sense of worth comes from within, you free yourself from comparisons with others and will enjoy a greater sense of internal security. You will no longer be bogged down by the experiences of others and can become much more self-reliant.
Your greatest successes will come from some of the smallest actions in terms of meeting people. You will cause a “stacking effect” the more you meet and connect with people; conversely, people cannot connect with you when you are withdrawn and nothing will happen. You must do everything in your power to connect with as many people as possible.
A powerful sense of self will make all the difference in your life. You must understand that your sense of yourself and your capabilities come from inside of you, not from the external forces that have brought you to your current place in life. What you feel internally might be completely different from what the world is telling you, and you must learn to focus on the former rather than the latter.
Adopting a positive attitude will always bring you closer to success, as nobody wants to be associated with a losing side. Everyone wants to associate with and hire winners, and avoids losers. Nothing is more important than maintaining a positive attitude, as many employers hire people based primarily on attitude; with the right attitude, everything else will fall into place. You must look like you are on the winning team, even if times are tough; nobody wants to hire a loser.
Everyone tries to maintain a certain emotional state, and learning to control your own emotions will have a profound impact on your career. While everyone allows their emotional states to be influenced by outside events, there is no advantage in basing your own emotions on things that you cannot control. Allow yourself to discover happiness and fulfillment naturally, rather than making your emotions dependant on external circumstances. Your outlook will have a tremendous impact on your psychological health, as well as that of those around you.
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