Woody Wonders

Have you ever sat down and really thought about your career values?  I was very lucky recently to have been invited to an event at work where we had a truly inspiring speaker.  One of the things he spoke about was 'non-negotiables', in other words what values would you not compromise on when it comes to your work life.   It set me thinking about all the jobs I've had throughout my working life and the values that were important to me.  I set about doing an exercise that would provide me with some valuable insight.  Amazingly, I've only had 10 jobs over the course of the last 33 years which doesn't seem many compared to some people I've spoken to - I don't know, is it? I started off by making a list of all the companies where I'd worked, then took my time to think about each one.  To protect the innocent (and a few guilty!), I won't be naming names but here's the industries and a few insights into how I felt about each one: Sewing factory - hated...

I've been thinking about ageism quite a lot recently and how it can affect us, and no, before you accuse ME of being ageist, I'm also referring to how it affects young people too.  In fact, it can affect many age groups - children, teenagers, adults, senior citizens.  Obviously, most of this blog will feature on ageism from my point of view and the age I am now because that's simply where I'm at right now. Think back to when you first started out in your career, no doubt you were anxious, nervous, self-conscious and worried that you wouldn't be taken seriously and that other people would think you had no experience or knowledge As you get older, you start to experience very similar feelings, anxious, nervous, self-conscious and worried that people will also be thinking you've lost your drive and ambition and that you're not up-to-speed with how fast technology is moving and such like. Before I started in my current role, I went for an interview at another co...

How to improve your career prospects, chance of promotion or a pay rise The world of work has changed significantly over the past decade and, unless you're in a career with a very defined path of progression such as a doctor, you're more than likely to have quite an unstructured and often bumpy road ahead when it comes to your career. So what can you do in order to smooth out those bumps and improve your career prospects?  That's what we're going to discuss in this week's blog. More important than anything else when it comes to your career is that you should be happy and actually enjoy what you do.  Your time is your life so don't ever waste it on something you don't enjoy doing because you can't ever get that time back. Whether you're looking to move jobs or you're happy in your current role , there are numerous things you can do to improve your career prospects and earnings potential: Volunteer - whether it's help...

So what do you do on Fridays? I started my 'side hustle' in 2006, way before it was trendy to call it a 'side hustle' and having two careers became 'a thing'.  Although to be perfectly honest, back in those days my 'side hustle' consisted of one boot camp on a Thursday night and writing the odd training programme.  For quite a few years, it remained like that and then in 2011 I decided to do a 'walk to run' course and it kind of exploded after that.  I started taking on more fitness clients and I eventually dropped down to 4 days in my 'day job' as a PA so I could do more fitness work on Fridays. I was torn as to what to do as I felt under pressure to choose one career over the other.  I really enjoyed being a PA.  After starting out my office life as a receptionist and working my way up the 'admin ladder' I quickly realised that I wasn't cut out to be a manager or anything like that but being a PA was the next best t...