Helping Career Changers Around The World

January 2010

Hello!

Welcome to the New Year 2010 edition of The 5 Minute Career Coach!

What's in this Issue

• Quote of the Day - Abraham Lincoln
• Community Member Spotlight – is it you?
• This month's article - Top Tips for 2010
• The Career Change Question
• Recommended Resources - Turn your passions into profits
• What Help do You Need?
• Useful Links

As you will see, I have slightly restructured the newsletter for the New Year so that you get a quick index of what is in the issue right at the start. My aim is to make it easier for you to navigate through to the items you want to read first.

I hope you have had an enjoyable Christmas season and that you are now ready to tackle 2010 with renewed energy.

I will carry on doing all I can to support and encourage you in your career change with the 5 Minute Career Coach and with all the information and advice on the How To Change Careers website.

If there are any particular issues you would like support with, do just get in touch.

With very best wishes for the year ahead. I hope it brings the new career you are seeking.

Cherry

Cherry Douglas
Your Career Change Guide

How To Change Careers

Please don't keep me a secret!

Feel free to share this newsletter and my website with your friends. I wouldn't mind betting that there will be a few of them who are unhappy with their own careers.

Remember that they can get their free copy of 11¾ Ways To Kick Start Your Career Change when they visit the How To Change Careers website.

Know Your Personality, Know Your Career

• Would you like to get greater clarity over what kind of work could be right for you?


• Are you intrigued by the idea that your personality can guide you towards the right career choice?


• Would a list of career ideas that match your personality be useful?

Then take a look at Know Your Personality, Know Your Career and find out more.

Quote of the Day

So as you face the start of another new year, don’t just think about how this is another year added to your total score.

Think instead about how you can put more life into the year that lies ahead.

What will your input be to 2010? What will you do to make it a memorable year for your career and for your life?

Community Member Spotlight

Here’s where I say a particular hello to one individual member of the 5 Minute Career Coach Community, just picked at random from the steadily growing list of career changers round the world who have found the How To Change Careers website.

For January I am sending extra best wishes to Valentino, who is one of the newest subscribers to the 5 Minute Career Coach.

Hi Valentino! Welcome to the 5 Minute Career Coach Community.

I hope you will enjoy the newsletter and that it will help you make the changes in your career that you want. I’d love to hear what you think of the newsletter and how you are getting on with your career change plans. Just use the contact link at the end of the newsletter to get in touch.

Top Tips For Getting 2010 Off To A Good Start

Need some inspiration? Here are my three Top Tips for getting 2010 off on the right foot.

Tip No 1
Start by spending some time reflecting on 2009, but I want you to focus on what went well last year in your work and in your career change plans. Take a sheet of paper and make a list of what was good about last year. What were the successes and high points? What happened that was a pleasant and unexpected surprise? What did you do that you feel proud of?

As you write, you may find your mind wandering to some of the things that went wrong too. Don't worry. It is a habit that many of us have got into. Just write these negative events on a separate sheet of paper.

You might like to come back to this exercise a few times over a day or so. Maybe share it with a colleague or partner so you can bounce ideas off one another. They may well remind you of things you have forgotten.

When you are done, put the list of successes up on the wall where you will see it. Let it be a reminder to you that you do achieve things, you do get things right and happy accidents do come along in your life.

And the other sheet of paper – the negative things? 2009 is over and done with and all those things are behind you, so just scrumple it up and throw it away!

Tip No 2
Think of someone who you have met or maybe even just heard about last year who you found inspiring. It could be a friend or relation who has struggled with a major challenge in life and yet who has managed to stay positive. It could be someone you heard about in the news who put energy and commitment into making something happen, maybe in your local community or even on a global scale. It could be a person who has achieved a high level of success - and I mean the kind of success that you see as important. Maybe they have made the break and finally changed their career!

What exactly was it that you found inspiring about them? What qualities make them special in your eyes?

Now commit to (in a virtual way) taking that person along with you in 2010. Have them in your mind acting as a mentor for you in all you do. As you face the daily challenges of your work and life, use them as a source of encouragement to keep you feeling upbeat and positive. Let them continue to inspire you as you go through the year.

And of course, if you have chosen someone you actually know, then why not ask them to be your mentor for real this year? They will probably be pleased and proud to help you. You only have to ask.

Tip No 3
One of the prompts I gave you in Tip 1 was to check for unexpected, happy surprises and coincidences. I really believe that there are many opportunities out there that we regularly fail to spot because we are so fixed on the daily treadmill with our eyes down and our brains stuck on autopilot.

I challenge you to make a conscious decision to be more open to chance opportunities and encounters in 2010. Just keep your mind open to the possibilities that may arise from people you meet or from events you hear about and could get involved in. Be ready to ask 'what might I learn or gain if I just gave this a try?'

People in particular can be incredibly powerful catalysts for change. They can help you see your career change plans from new perspectives and introduce you to new ideas and communities that can set your work and life off in a new direction.

So from today onwards, commit to being open to serendipity and see what opportunities for your new career emerge. But make sure that you also commit to getting out there with an open mind. Don't wait for opportunities to come to you – go and seek them out!

The Career Change Question

Challenging questions are a key tool in helping to create change.

Each month I offer you a question to think about. Just let the question wander round your mind for a few days, or even weeks and see what answers unfold for you. The questions are designed to get you thinking in new ways and hopefully gain insights that may open your mind to new possibilities for you career and for your life.

It is so easy to avoid tackling the things that are not quite right in your life. You are just too busy, it would be too difficult, you’ll do it next year, when the children are older, when you have just finished this big project...

Trouble with this is that you can end up just putting up with things for weeks, months, years even. Do you really want to find yourself looking back on all the time you have wasted being less happy than you might have been?

How about making 2010 the year when you stop just putting up with it and do something about it?

Recommended Resources

Passions into Profits
Nick Williams

I have recommended Nick Williams before and am happy to do so again, because I have used and benefited from his materials myself.

For the start of the New Year, I’d like to recommend his new course, Passions into Profits.

If one of the issues holding you back from career change is concern about money, then this course could be just the thing for you.

In this digital home study course, Nick distills fifteen years of personal and coaching experience into the definitive blueprint for your journey from employee to Inspired Entrepreneur.

11 Simple Steps
The programme is carefully crafted to guide you through 11 simple baby steps, so that by the end of the course you'll have successfully started your first business AND earned your first income as an Inspired Entrepreneur – all without quitting your day job.

The course also features twelve inspirational audio interviews with Inspired Entrepreneurs who share how they successfully started profitable businesses around their passions and talents, plus you'll hear intimate first-hand experience of the concepts, ideas, tips, tactics and strategies that this course delivers.

Your Escape Route
You may not be thinking of yourself as an entrepreneur right now, but Nick shows you how you can create an additional source of income that could on the one hand, be enough to help you cover the costs of a career change, or on the other, could lead you into making your living as an Inspired Entrepreneur.

This might be one of the best investments you have ever made as it could be your ticket to freedom from the job you hate.

Read more about Passions into Profits here.

Get 25% Discount
As a premium member of the Inspired Entrepreneur's Club, you will be able to buy Passions into Profits at a discounted price. You will also get 25% discount on all Nick's other products, events and coaching, free access to monthly teleseminars with Nick and you will become part of an incredibly supportive and inspiring worldwide community of Inspired Entrepreneurs.

And if you are within reach of London, you can come along and meet Nick and other Inspired Entrepreneur’s Club members at the monthly gatherings and listen to the inspirational speakers Nick invites along.

Read more about the Inspired Entrepreneur’s Club here.

I hope this recommendation will help you kick start an amazing New Year!

More recommendations
If you would like to see more recommendations for books and similar resources, follow the link to the Career Change Books page of the How To Change Careers website. Do keep popping back to it as I am adding to it all the time.

And if there are books and resources that have inspired you and that you would like to recommend, there is a place for you to do so on that page.

What Help Do You Need?

The 5 Minute Career Coach is my way of keeping in touch with aspiring career changers all over the world. I know there are many of you out there who are trying to find the courage and/or the inspiration to take a big step forward in your working lives so I hope you find this newsletter a useful source of ideas and encouragement to help you get on with your career change plans.

I love hearing from the people in my 5 Minute Career Coach community and I have been heartened to hear how many of you feel supported and encouraged by what I write. Do please keep your feedback coming.

What is your biggest question or concern about changing career?

I am regularly adding to the How To Change Careers website and I would like to be sure it continues to meet your needs and you find it helpful.

I want to be sure that both this newsletter and the website are focused on YOU.

The best way I can do this is by asking for your comments and feedback:

• What are the biggest challenges you face in changing your career?
• What one thing would help you most with your career change?
• Which careers would you like to know more about?
• What other information and support would you like to see on the How To Change Careers website or as an ebook, ecourse or teleclass?

Do let me know what you think and share with me how you think this newsletter might be improved. You can post your feedback here.

Useful Links

Read more articles about career change on the How To Change Careers website

Contact me with any queries or questions

Read my ezine articles

Find me on Selfgrowth.com

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