Mother Teresa is universally praised for her legacy of good works, having emerged from obscurity to worldwide acclaim. The lessons of her remarkable life, such as learning from past mistakes, choosing goals compatible with your values, and being flexible in the pursuit of those goals, can also greatly benefit job seekers.
In this article, Harrison beautifully explains the importance of loving the work you do, being focused, and seeing each day of your life as the most important. You need to foster a relationship of love and improvement with your work. You need to focus on the big picture and not on the rewards. Being passionate about work leads to improvement in your performance, then to praise and rewards which motivates you to do even better and ultimately to more improvement. The growth is phenomenal and an ongoing process. Every bit of your efforts is being monitored by someone and you need to realize that your relationship with your job is an absolute reflection of your character and the sort of person you are.
When a company can no longer survive, all of its jobs disappear; a good manager’s job, then, is to ensure the company’s survival. As a good manager, you need to truly be on the side of the company and dedicated to its continuance; the more the company succeeds, the more you will grow along with it. Good managers care about what happens to their organization, but the best managers focus continually on the organization’s progress and best interests.
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Creating a sense of urgency is one of the most important things you can do in your job search. Understand that your career is itself a commodity and you need to sell yourself, and your salesmanship will determine your career success. Creating a sense of urgency will always help you close your sale.
It is absolutely vital to be in control of your life and career. When you fail to control your life, someone else will step in to do so and fit your life into their plans. Understand that it is in others’ interests to establish control over your life and work, and instead exert control yourself over your life and the events around you.
In this article Harrison discusses the importance of making good decisions pertaining to different important areas of your life. To explain his point he talks about the concept of ‘home team advantage’. The home team advantage is one of the most important concepts in sports and it is a proven factor in how well teams do. There are people who support us, validate us and make us feel good, and this helps us do well. There are also people around us who fail to support us, and this hurts us. Your success in your career and in your life will in large part be determined by whether you are living, working and associating with a “home team” crowd or an “away team” crowd. The best thing you can do for yourself is to put yourself in a position where you are supported, where you have the home team advantage.
In your job search you must question assumptions, find new ways of doing things, and consistently find new ways to search. You will be better off the more you seek out and adopt new job search techniques; your career is too important for you to be stuck in traditional ways of thinking. You must open your mind, and ensure that you are doing everything within your power to view your job search in a way that grants you more opportunities, not fewer.
Ignoring obstacles and setbacks will take you extremely far in life. The quality of your life will depend on how you deal with life’s inevitable setbacks and the intimidation of others. Develop an unconquerable spirit that disregards life’s setbacks, and you will experience massive success. Get up on time, and keep persisting when other people quit in order to achieve your goals
Seeking outside input, and taking feedback and criticism from others are crucial components of your success. The most successful people not only seek criticism, but seek situations in which they will be challenged and criticized, and surround themselves with people who are likely to challenge them. Arranging for regular input from others will help you improve in all respects.
Make sure that you are involved in groups that focus on positive things. Your success in life depends on your ability to focus on the outcomes you want, and the focus of the groups with which you associate will in turn shape your own focus. You must endeavor to always choose groups with a positive focus.
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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