How Can Gifts Become Baggage in Your Career?

I have been blessed with a gift that has served me well my entire life.

My gift is I’m the girl you want to be in the foxhole with — I will stop at nothing to get out. So if you are with me in the foxhole, you will get out too. No doubt.

I operate extremely well in crisis. I have this innate ability to see a path (or a few paths) out.

I have this relentless drive to get out of the crisis. My vision is hyper-crystal clear on seeing what needs to be done next to get to a foreseeable “out-of-the-foxhole” result.

This gift of mine has been showcased in many ways throughout my career. Here are some examples how:

–Throughout my 13 year recruiting career, I was assigned with turning around 3 failing offices successfully and leading 2 startups to profitability.

–I thrived working in and managing intense operations at high-end hotel restaurants in the beginning of my career (Four Seasons and Pebble Beach). I am an adrenaline junkie to this day for the organized chaos of these places. The restaurant business is naturally a foxhole-type environment.

–I started Chameleon Resumes in June 2009, dead smack in the middle of a full-blown recession. Starting a new business in a down economy (as the breadwinner of your family) is a crisis I didn’t walk away from, thankfully.

See, this is my thing.

It’s my gift. Or as some would say, my super power.

So how can gifts become baggage?

Well, when things are good, my future-seeing senses can get clouded. The lack of pressure from a crisis being absent can muddy my ability to see a path for myself or a desired final destination.

I have learned over the years about myself, that when I get out of crisis, I wouldn’t know what to do next.

So I would go find the next crisis to fix.

This worked for a while… until it didn’t.

I reached a point where I didn’t want to have to operate in crisis everyday.

I want to work in next level growth, too.

This may be a great first step—to realize I don’t want to have to crisis around to operate effectively on all cylinders.

But I have no freaking idea on how to actually operate in the same vision-crystallized manner if a crisis isn’t present.

Yep. I admitted it. I didn’t know how to not be a crisis-junkie.

Alas, my gift became my baggage.

So I hired a coach to help me. It’s been an ongoing issue I have worked on or worked with someone over the past few years.

Yes, I got help.

What in your career has served you well but now seems to be holding you back?

A few examples I have seen in experienced professionals are:

— A prideful drive to work 80-90 hours per week that allowed you to sail upward to the lofty accomplished position you have now, but now you don’t want to work those crazy hours anymore …. but you don’t know how not to.

— You have been an awesome Manager/Mentor throughout your career, and you have been blessed to grow some amazing staffs. Yet now you would be completely content if you never managed another person and want to be a stand-alone consultant. But who knows how to make that happen??? (I can recommend someone who can help – LOL).

— You have been recruited, sought after and/or promoted your entire career, but now find yourself needing to do a job search and have no idea how to do it. You never learned how, or never had to do a proactive job search. Clearly your gift became your baggage here, and it’s why you may feel strange promoting yourself when you are used to your reputation preceding you.

Yes, gifts can become baggage in your career.

My suggested solution when this happens to you is to admit you have a problem.

Once you admit this, you can get start seeking out the right help and get back to basics.

For the examples above, I suggest getting back to basics: Write your resume to promote what you want now (not the professional desires of the 25-year old you), and to learn how to construct your resume to put yourself in the line of sight of employers and connections who will have well-paying, balanced opportunities for experienced talent.

These opportunities do exist.

You can learn to be productive differently than you have in the past.

Resources like our Ultimate Resume & LinkedIn Profile Critique guided coaching package are a perfect fit for you if you have a wealth of experience, interest in different industries, and don’t know how to present your resume or LinkedIn profile in way that books you interview calls.

As part of your critique, we’ll look at your resume and profile in combination with your target roles and give you specific, actionable feedback for you to easily improve your documents.

If you’ve been struggling to book interviews, tired of getting the WRONG interviews, and can’t figure out what’s missing, we’ll guide you directly towards creating an effective, high-quality pair of interview-generating documents.

Rid yourself of the baggage and let your gifts shine through: The Ultimate Resume & LinkedIn Profile Critique 

Let’s do this…

Lisa

Lisa Rangel – Executive Resume Writing Services