11 Strategic Career Resolutions to Make Right Now

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new-years-day-1926337_1920We did it again.

Hubby and I procrastinated, waiting until the last day of vacation to realize that we have not crossed one thing off of our lengthy at-home to-do list.

All of the things we had been waiting for months to accomplish over the Christmas vacation. Nothing.

Of course, putting so much weight into the last week of the year was definitely not a good strategy.

It’s not because we didn’t plan.

It’s because we are not good at personal planning. Despite the fact that we have spent our careers planning at work.

And we are so busy lamenting the fact we’ve missed our holiday goals, we are both woefully behind with developing personal goals for the new year.

How about you? Have you planned for the New Year? Either professionally or personally?

I can hear your silence.

Which means you probably haven’t thought about your goals or resolutions or whatever you want to call them either.

At least I’m in good company.

Here’s the deal: throughout my career, I’ve learned that everything comes back to planning.

Plan the work and work the plan.  You can always alter the plan as things happen, but in order to be successful you need to have goals, as well as the strategy and tactics to accomplish those goals.

As individuals, we sometimes forget that we need personal plans too. We get so caught up in the plans we have at work that we miss the opportunity to develop personal goals outside of the office.

Something everyone should have – and review each year – are career goals.

You can call them goals or resolutions or simply “things I want to achieve.”

The main objective is to write your goals down, along with strategy and tactics for action.

To help you get started, here are 11 Strategic Career Resolutions to Make in 2017: 

  • Vow to do things differently. Stop doing things the same way you’ve always done them.   What’s the definition of insanity? Doing the same thing over and over again but expecting different results. If you want to see change in your career, examine what you’re doing now and try something new.
  • Push past fear.  I’m always afraid when I’m trying something new. Who isn’t?  Fear has stuck with me at every new job or promotion I’ve had, like gum sticks to the bottom of a shoe. Yet I’ve always fought through it, knowing that it’s temporary.  The first three months can be nerve-wracking as I question what I’m doing.  By six months I know enough to be dangerous. By nine months, I’m fine, and I wonder what I was so scared of to start with.  Go ahead, push past the fear.
  • Persevere: Realize that achieving your goals requires dedication, patience, and hard work. Anything worth having is worth working for. Persevere, if it’s something you really want.  My goal out grad school was to be a buyer at Neiman Marcus. To do so, you had to not only be accepted into the executive development program, but also proceed through several different jobs designed to weed people out.  It was a “sink or swim” mentality.  Took me five years to achieve my goal and I succeeded – the only one from my program who did.  Patience, it turns out – along with hard work – really is a virtue.
  • Tune-Out the negative self-talk.  Positive thoughts create positive things/results.  Negativity helps no one.  Yes, we can all have a moment here and there, but that’s it. At staff meetings at one company I worked at, we each had to tell our “high” for the week – one good thing that had happened to us. It could be work-related or personal.  The point was that something good happened to everyone each week, and we should remember it.  Keep this is mind when negativity creeps in.
  • Be proactive.  I believe in making plans and preparation.  Yet at some point, we have to take action or our planning becomes procrastination.  Identify your goals, develop a strategy along with the tactics for execution, then GO! If you need to adjust the tactics along the way, do so.  The important thing is to Be like Nike and just do it.
  • Try to fail 10 times. I’ve heard it said in sales training that it takes 10 “no’s” to get a yes. That means the more “no’s”, the closer you are to success.  Don’t be afraid to fail; that’s where we learn our greatest lessons, and ultimately each failure will help us achieve our greatest success.  It also means you’re trying to succeed, vs. doing nothing towards your goal.
  • Appreciate Your Career Journey.  Don’t compare yourself to anyone but you. My definition of success is different from others.  A friend from graduate school has been retired for years because she had the opportunity to work for Dell in the beginning and stock options were part of the compensation. To me, she made a good decision and as a result achieved success.  Yet she believes I’m one of the most successful people she knows.  It’s all in the eyes of the beholder. Believe in your journey.
  • Embrace New Opportunities.  Sometimes the best opportunities are not what we envisioned. A VP interviewed me for a buying role, then offered me a role in event marketing – something I had never before considered. The initial title and compensation was lower yet I could see the long-term potential of gaining experience in a new area. I accepted the opportunity and my career took off.  Sometimes it pays to be open, take a chance, and drop your ego if you must.
  • Engage your network.  Or become engaged, if you’ve lost touch.  This includes connecting with college pals, former colleagues, friends of your parents, family, etc.  Get involved in your local alumni group, industry association, or even social groups to meet new people.  Focus on building a relationship with individuals, especially if you can help them out; not simply connecting with mass quantities of people. There will come a day when you need something – like a job – and the better the relationships, the more likely it is your network will help you.
  • Upgrade Your Skills. We all need to learn something new to stay on top of our game.  It’s good for our brains as well as our ability to advance in our careers.  And it’s easy to do.  There are industry events to attend, and plenty of online sites offer a wide variety of affordable webinars and courses (sevendollarcourses.com and Lynda.com, for example).
  • Volunteer. You’ll get satisfaction from giving back, as well as make new connections. You never know when either may come in handy. And you can add this to your resume.  

Take one step at a time. The important point is to take the first step, then another and another. By the end of the year you will see progress!

Last Minute Gift To Myself

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arm-1284248_1920T-minus four days until Christmas and again this year the holiday seems to have crept up on me. How does this happen?

This year was going to be different.

I was ready.

You name it, I was prepared for just about everything.

Except bronchitis.

Showed up at the beginning of December and knocked me down for a couple weeks, refusing to leave.

It’s the gift that keeps on giving, for sure.

While my excuse is legit, it doesn’t change the fact that I’m behind on everything: work, decorations, gifts, and even holiday spirit.

Most importantly, I’m behind on planning for next year.

December is usually when I’m up to my eyeballs getting ready to kick off the next year. By now, I should have outlined my career goals for next year, along with a strategy and tactics for execution.

Instead I laid on the couch and binge-watched last-season’s Grey’s Anatomy.

Now I’m frantically trying to catch up. It’s hard to think strategically when my mind is going in a million holiday directions.

Standing in line at the post office, I started to think in broader terms about goals, more along the lines of a personal mission statement. Which is something I usually don’t like, BTW.

After much thinking about who I want to be as both a person and a professional, I came up with something I’m calling a “Last-Minute Gift to Myself”:

  • Give everything your all
  • Integrity is everything
  • Work with purpose
  • Always have hope
  • Give of yourself
  • Have fun
  • Maximize every experience
  • You can’t control much except your attitude
  • Inspire others
  • Do your best; always try
  • Love deeply
  • Take risks
  • No regrets
  • Forgive easily
  • Exercise more; stress less
  • Eat everything in moderation
  • Buy the new shoes/handbag/whatever (Within moderation, of course)
  • Take the trip
  • Connect with friends

There are more of these; I stopped at what I thought was the best.

The point is that these over-arching ideas are what motivates me as a professional. If I lose sight of these, my career is going nowhere fast and any professional goals I’ve made will not be met.

This “Last-Minute Gift” to myself will serve to remind me of what motivates me as a person. This in turn will help keep me on the right track professionally.

(I encourage you to do the same. To give a “Last-Minute Gift” to yourself by thinking about personal motivation and goals.)

Now I’m ready to think about my goals and strategies for next year.

After I’m done shopping, wrapping presents, and decorating the tree, of course.

The Morning After: 7 Tips to Help You Recover from a Career Setback

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coffee-1199943_1920When you have a career setback, the morning after is always tough.

Imagine if you were one of the presidential candidates right now. Today would be very, very tough.

All that work over the last 18 months or more, now gone. All of your hopes and dreams, crashing down around you. The team you led, the people who believed in you, all stunned.

And suddenly you are unsure of your next move.

Perhaps, even, you have no place to go career-wise.

All you really want to do is to crawl into bed and pull the covers over your head.

But that’s not realistic. Or what it seems a presidential candidate should do.

Switching gears and getting personal here: Does any of this sound even remotely familiar to you?

If you’ve ever lost your job, you know what I’m talking about.

The Morning After.

Whether it’s a layoff or you’ve been fired for whatever reason, it’s one of the toughest situations to find yourself in.

Suddenly you’ve got no place to go. Your identity has been stripped from your hands. The work, colleagues, friends – your career – gone.

And there’s nothing you can do. No going back.

That part of your career is over.

All you want to do is hide. Binge watch TV. Eat.

Yet that’s not productive, nor sustainable, for any length of time.

Bottom line: Suffering a career setback, whether you’re a presidential candidate or one of millions of workers who’ve been through it, sucks.

The good news is, you – we – can all recover.

Here are 7 Tips to help you recover from a career setback:

  1. Take one day to have a pity party. Invite your friends or go it alone, but you only have one day to wallow.  After that, time to move on.
  2. Make a list of your strengths and use those to begin strategizing your next career move.
  3. Similarly, be honest and understand your weaknesses in order to improve at your next job.
  4. Realize that this is just a setback; it’s not the end of your career.
  5. Consider the setback an opportunity. Maybe you weren’t 100% happy at your job anyway, or maybe even in your industry. This could be the chance you were looking for to reinvent yourself in a new career.
  6. Take advantage of this new-found free time to learn something new, discover a hobby, or reconnect with friends. Network like crazy while you can; you never know what might happen.
  7. Above all, stay positive and have hope.  While “hope is not a strategy”, it’s necessary to keep moving forward.

Taking these tips to heart won’t make the hurt go away but they will help you move forward.

And don’t forget to be thankful that your career setback was not displayed in front of millions around the world.

Career Stalled? Change What’s Not Working

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halloween-background-1772683_1920

 

 

 

 

 

Have you ever planned for something, only to discover things didn’t work out?

How we respond to changes in our plans speaks volumes about our ability to move forward.

Our response can determine our future success.

Even how we respond to simple changes can help us when a real challenge presents itself.

Take Halloween. After years of apartment living, Hubby and I were super excited about Halloween the first year we moved into our house.

We decorated the front of the house. We purchased tons of candy. The house was so well-lit you could see it from space.

We waited for the doorbell to ring.

And waited, and waited, and waited.

I went outside to look for Trick or Treaters.

Our street was silent. Like a ghost town.

Despite the fact that our neighborhood was teaming with children.

We brought lawn chairs and candy out front in an attempt to appear more friendly to anyone who might pass by.

Nothing.

We looked pathetic, sitting alone in the front yard. We had planned this night for months and had been looking forward to seeing all the little ghosts and goblins from our neighborhood.

Who lights up their home, full of decorations, with bags of candy, yet no Trick or Treaters?

We started laughing, the situation was so absurd.

Desperate to succeed at Halloween, we quickly ditched our current plan and developed Plan B.

If Halloween wouldn’t come to us, we would go to Halloween.

Pouring the candy into a tote bag, we grabbed a flashlight and started walking. Didn’t take long to find Halloween. The next block was alive with Trick or Treaters!

We immersed ourselves into the action, meeting our neighbors and passing out candy. We learned from our new friends our street is considered too busy for children, which explained the lack of candy traffic.

Ultimately, we had a successful Halloween for three reasons:

  • We accepted the fact our current strategy and plans were getting us nowhere
  • We quickly developed new plans and executed the tactics to achieve our goal
  • We refused to wallow in self-pity or accept “no” for an answer

Is your career stalled? Is your job search providing the results you need and expect? Or are you still at “Square One”?

Maybe it’s not your job search so much as it’s your resume that’s holding you back.  Are you sure it clearly states who you are to hiring managers and explains how you can solve their problems?

Or maybe it’s in the presentation. Are you confident in your ability to answer the toughest interview questions? Or perhaps a few practice sessions would be of benefit?

Sometimes we all need to take a step back and re-group.

To accept that our current plan, or even some of our tactics, may not be working.

And when it comes to careers, sometimes even the best of us don’t even know what we want to be when we grow up. We feel that lost.

Remember, it’s okay to press “pause” on your plan, take a moment and regroup. Develop a new plan that will lead you to success or ask for help, if that’s what it takes.

But don’t stick with a plan that’s not providing the results you need to meet your goals.

*If you need assistance with your career – anything from refreshing your resume, to interview preparation, to career changes – contact me. I’m happy to help.

When It Comes to Interviewing, Make These Assumptions About Your Competition

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social-1206614_1280It’s not much fun to get older anymore. At least not as much fun as it was when we were younger and could look forward to parties, presents, balloons, and cake.

Thank goodness social media has come to rescue our birthdays in place of the parties!

Hubby prepared a wonderful “Birthday Extravaganza” for my recent birthday, yet despite his efforts social media was the highlight of my day.

I was overwhelmed with greetings, so many that I lost track counting.

Long-time friends, new friends, family, former co-workers, neighbors – all sent birthday wishes.

I truly enjoy this aspect of social media. It’s a great gift to send someone a note, and I make sure to post birthday wishes to my friends on their special days.

Honestly, I thought I was doing a great job as a “Social Media Birthday Greeter.”  So good, in fact, I considered adding this skill to my resume.

Until I was humbled on my recent birthday.

Apparently, it’s not enough to say, “Happy Birthday” or “Have a great day!”

My wishes, that I had so proudly been posting, sounded canned and almost like an afterthought compared to those I received.

Many were quite personal, demonstrating how well the person knew me.

Others were funny.  Several got creative and included memes, photos, or videos.

And I loved them all!

This level of posting caught me off-guard.  As difficult as it was, I had to be honest with myself and realize I had let my creativity slide. I had forgotten my competition.

“That’s not going to happen again”, I thought to myself.  “It’s time to up my game.”

While birthday posting on social media is not exactly a competition, I fully believe if I’m going to do something I should do it right.

This situation – letting my guard down, becoming somewhat lazy, losing my competitive edge – reminds me of interviewing for a new job.

We should always remember our competition, especially when it comes to the job search.

To stay on top of our game, we need to make the following assumptions regarding the other interviewees:

  • Every candidate is at least as qualified as we are, if not more so.
  • Every candidate will be at least as prepared for the interview – maybe even better prepared.
  • Every candidate has a great personality and will make a personal connection with the hiring manager.

It’s not enough to have a good resume, to wear a nice outfit, to have a good handshake.  We must over-prepare and be ready for whatever the hiring manager throws our way.

In other words, we must regard every other interview candidate as our competition and assume they are at least as competent as we are.

By acknowledging our competition, we will stay sharp. We will prepare for every interview. We will fight for each job instead of assuming we’ve “got this”.

Up your interview game. Be ready for it and you will win.

Critical Thinking Skills From A Grilled Cheese Sandwich

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grilled-cheeseToday’s students have it too easy.  And I’m not just talking about Google and laptops and cell phones, although they are a huge part of the equation.

I’m talking about living conditions.

The dorms of today are much more like a luxury hotel than student housing.  Gone are the bare-bones cinder block walls, linoleum floors and modular furniture we felt lucky to have “back in the day.”  I doubt today’s students would tolerate living in such spartan conditions, although we thought they were spectacular once decorated with rugs, comforters and posters.

Back in the day, we would save our money to rent a mini-fridge for the room.  Not a medium one; the very small, square unit that could barely hold a six pack.  Diet Coke, of course.

Today’s dorms are posh in comparison, with many including fancy items like flat screen TVs,  bigger refrigerators and microwaves in the rooms, as well as full-size kitchens on each floor.

In a DORM.

This is in addition to WI-FI, movie rooms, study lounges, pool tables, and cafeterias.  There’s the occasional swimming pool and even covered parking for some.  It’s crazy what is considered “normal” for dorm life anymore.

All of this luxury comes at a price. Not only for the parents wallet, but for the students’ long-term well-being.

The opportunity cost of living such a luxurious college life is students are missing out on building their critical thinking skills.  With everything at their fingertips to solve their problems, there’s no need to improvise or develop solutions to a college student’s most pressing problems.

Example: I’m hungry, the cafeteria is closed, and I’m out of money.

The solution is not: Go to the ATM, use a credit card, or call mom.

The only food options available in the room and/or mini-fridge include a loaf of bread, peanut butter, single cheese slices and an assortment of beverages.

What’s a hungry student to do?

This is where the critical thinking skills come in.

When faced with the same situation back in the day, we got creative.  We had nothing but the trusty mini-fridge, a coffee maker, popcorn popper, and a meal plan. Late night hunger pangs were satisfied by popcorn or pizza delivery, if we could pull together the cash and the pizza place was still open.

Most of the time we were stuck without pizza.

It was like being on Survivor: Dorm Edition. How can we make something different to eat given the limited resources in our room?

We had the same staples as today: bread, peanut butter, and cheese. We also had an iron!  It was a brilliant idea to use the iron to make hot sandwiches. And cheap, too.

Of course we were not the first students to make grilled cheese sandwiches using an iron but we were proud of our resourcefulness.

We had no choice.  What else were we to do?

Is the ability to make a grilled cheese sandwich really an important skill for today’s college graduate?

If you’re still focused on the sandwich, you’ve missed the point.

It’s about solving a problem in a new way. Critical thinking.

There will be many times on the job when a new hire will be asked to develop a solution to a problem.  Gut instinct always tells us to go with the most obvious solution: Find a pan, put sandwich in pan, heat pan on stove until sandwich is done. 

Many times we will not have the resources necessary to solve the problem in the most obvious manner. It could be we lack financial resources, or human resources, or technical resources –whatever – yet we are still expected to arrive at the optimal solution.

The earlier we develop our critical thinking skills – learn to improvise ways to the optimal/desired solution – the better.

Critical thinking in the form of a grilled cheese sandwich.  Brilliant!

The Single Most Important Aspect of Networking

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office-336368_1920One of my goals for 2016 was to get out of the home office more. More = once a week.

The goal was twofold, really.

First, working from home is isolating. It’s great but sometimes I crave the interaction of colleagues, even for a few minutes.  Social isolation is a real bummer, people!

So you could say I’ve been looking for work friends.

The second – and real – goal was strategic and part of my business plan: expand my business.  New business certainly wasn’t going to simply ring my doorbell.

Attending networking events seemed to be the perfect solution for both.

I’ve been at this almost a year now, even longer for some networking groups.

What have I learned about networking?

  • Have a Plan. Establish your goals before attending a networking group or event. Do you want to make new business contacts in the hopes of obtaining new clients? Is your intention to learn new skills by interacting with people in your industry? Are you interested in meeting with like-minded professionals while giving back to the community?  There is a networking group available that will meet your criteria, as long as you know your goals.
  • Presentation is Important. Take ownership of yourself, including dressing for success. Yes, people will judge you in the first ten seconds they meet you. It’s time to present yourself as if you are interviewing for a job, even have your elevator speech ready in order to tell others what you do and who is your ideal client.
  • There’s an Initiation Period. Not with hazing or rituals, but true membership takes time.  Like any group, friendships form and as a newcomer you are not yet part of any inner circles.  You can get there; it takes a while.  Give up too soon and you’ll always be in search mode.
  • Groups are Fluid. Don’t judge the group by only one visit. People come and go; not all members attend each meeting. If the group meets weekly, attend for three to four weeks to get an idea of who attends as well as the dynamics of the group.
  • Mingle! It’s tempting to sit with the one person you met and feel comfortable around but that’s not the point. The goal is to cast a wide net and meet as many people as possible each time you attend.
  • Know When it’s Not Working.  If, after multiple visits over several months, you are not achieving your goals, it might be time to consider another networking group.  If your goal is to gain prospects yet after six months of regular meetings all you’ve gained is five pounds from the food, this may not be the right group for you. Then again if you’re a foodie, it may be okay.  It’s all about goals and expectations, and marrying the two with the right group.

All of these are important. Yet the The Single Most Important Aspect of Networking is this:

  • Do you help others in the group? Do you bring them what they need, be it new clients, suggestions, or assistance when they ask?  This will help you above and beyond anything else in building your network and getting others to help you.

Networking is something you have to schedule; it must be part of your business plan. It’s strategic and you have to work at it.

Anything less is just socializing.

Does Your Resume Answer This Question?

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burger-760873_1920Have you ever read a book that seemed to list endless details about a character, or went to great lengths to describe a location, noting every little obscure fact?

You kept reading because you were confident there was going to be something exciting and worthwhile at the end.

Much to your dismay, the plot never thickened and you were left with of a bunch of inconsequential details instead of an enticing drama.

Basically, there was no real meat to the story.

Many resumes read like a novel without a plot, listing inconsequential details that leave the reader asking the question, “Where’s the beef?” 

The reason for this is simple: Most people describe their work experience as a series of responsibilities.

  • Financial responsibility
  • Staffing responsibility
  • Responsibility for generating reports

Wrong! And boring too.

Your resume really has little to do with your responsibilities and presenting it as such is a rookie mistake.

It has everything to do with your achievements.

Big Difference.

Hiring managers are searching for answers to the question, “How can you help solve my problems?”

They are not looking for a laundry list of your job duties.

How do you move from “boring list” to “interesting plot development?”  

Use action verbs with results that show what you accomplished.

Examples of phrases to use include but are not limited to:

  • “Saved the company $XX by …..”
  • “Improved operations with ……”
  • “Developed new plan for XX resulting in XX for the company”
  • “Grew new subscribers by XX% over last year, exceeding our goals”

Results drive the interest of hiring managers. They answer the question, “How can you help solve my problems?”

Right now review your resume. Anywhere it reads, “Responsible for…”, replace it with an action phrase that highlights your achievements rather than your duties.

We all should have at least one – if not several – quantifiable achievements for each job.  Accomplishments that show how you took action and made an improvement or delivered on a promise, even if it’s not quantifiable.

Make sure your resume has enough “beef” to attract the interest of hiring managers by answering their most pressing question: How can you help solve my problem?

 

 

A Mistake That Could Cost You The Interview

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shot-putter-558158_1280Did I tell you about the time I blew a job interview? It was not my finest moment.

It was a phone interview, one I thought I had done well to prepare for. I had researched the company, made notes of questions to ask, and had practiced answers to potential questions the hiring manager might ask.

I felt so prepared that I turned out the lights and went out of town for the weekend.

On Monday morning I was still confident, opening my computer and by memory typing in the company website. With my resume on hand and other notes, I thought I was ready.

Everything was going well until the hiring manager asked me a question about a “crisis plan” and I began talking about the need for a global response, especially given the factory in India.

The silence on the other end was deafening.

“What are you talking about?” she barked.

Wondering why she was upset with me, I said, “The company’s overseas operations, I’m looking at right here on your website.”
Again, radio silence.

Apparently I had researched the wrong company.

In my defense, there was a one-letter difference between the two companies. And both happened to be in the same industry doing very similar work.

Still, the hiring manager was not amused. Nor impressed that I had done research.

The fault was mine and I lost the opportunity. All my preparation didn’t matter.

My one shot was gone.

Embarrassment sunk in. Humiliation. The agony of defeat.

My incorrect preparation was similar to an Olympic athlete who, after spending years preparing for the shot put event, arrived at the games to discover he had mistakenly entered the discus throw. While knowing everything about the shot put and being 100% prepared to compete, all the preparation in the world would not impress the judges if he could not throw the discus.

Thank goodness I was not competing in the Olympics with millions of people watching this drama unfold. Not to mention the weight of disappointing my countrymen either.

In many ways interviewing for a job is like preparing to compete in an Olympic event. You’ve got one shot at glory; if you make a mistake it could cost you the gold medal (job).

You may think I’m crazy, but consider this:

Preparation: Olympic athletes train and prepare for years for one moment to capture their dream of winning a medal. Job seekers have even less time to prepare a specific interview, however similar to athletes we are training every day for our next job. If you don’t see that you are kidding yourself. We should hone our craft, work on our skills and update our resumes so we are ready for that one moment when it really counts. Take time to assess your skills as they relate to your industry and jobs you might interview for – do you need to make improvements? Update your resume at least once a year with your accomplishments. And network constantly so you are ready when you want to make a career move.

Practice Makes Perfect: Olympic athletes are “in it to win it”. Their job leading up to the Olympics is to practice every day with the goal of doing better than the day before. Many job seekers prepare for networking events or interviews up to a point then stop, thinking they’ve “done enough”. Let me tell you it’s never enough and “winging it” is not a winning strategy. You’ve got to practice everything from your answers to knowing what you’re going to wear. Even practice smiling in front of a mirror. I’m not kidding, this really works.

Mental Focus: Athletes are masters at focusing on the job at hand and tuning out everything else in order to do their very best. Job seekers should laser-focus their attention on the interview: research the company, know in advance how you will answer potential interview questions and practice those answers out loud, develop your professional story that summarizes who you are instead of boring the hiring manager with every detail of your life. Before walking in to the interview, clear your head and refocus your mind – nothing else is important at that moment.

Preparation. Practice. Focus. These are key ingredients to success whether you’re an athlete or a job seeker.

And take it from me: make sure you have the correct spelling of the company as well as the correct website. Researching the wrong company is a mistake that could cost you the interview.

Carrying a Business Card While Wearing a Bikini

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IMG_3505There’s a strategic reason Hubby and I vacation in the desert every summer.

First the phrase “It’s a dry heat” really does mean something to us.  Compared to the hot, humid temperatures at home, the arid heat of the desert is lovely. We can step outside without sweating and misters actually do their job of cooling a person off.

The main reasons are the silence and the savings. The luxury resort we visit is almost vacant and summer rates plummet to the point where it’s too good to pass up.  With so few guests, the staff to guest ratio is about five-to-one and we are treated like royalty.  Hubby and I pretend the hotel is our “estate” and the staff our employees, allowing them to wait on us hand and foot.

Isn’t that what vacation is all about? My philosophy is, if I can’t live this way year-round, at least I can live this way for seven glorious days.

So it was bound to happen.

The resort was quiet; we had the giant pool to ourselves.  In-between romance novels and fruity drinks I floated in my “private” pool on a giant inflatable pink donut I had purchased specifically for this occasion.

Suddenly there was splashing and commotion and loud talking and a flurry of staff activity. I raised my head, peering through my Ray-Bans.

Millennials! At least a dozen or more were descending on the pool area – my pool – totally disrupting the peace and quiet.

Sigh.

It was late in the day so I decided to just “float with it” and let them have fun.  As I did, one of them called out to me.

My giant pink donut and I floated over to see what they wanted; probably to borrow the donut and inquire about the fruity drinks.

I totally underestimated my new friends. They were attending a sales conference and one of them noticed the visor I wore with my school logo emblazoned across the front. That’s sure to start a conversation.

Suddenly we were networking, right there in the swimming pool. Let me tell you, it’s hard to be professional when you’re floating in a giant strawberry pink donut.

Discussion came to a critical point when we realized we needed to connect beyond the pool. “Let me get my business cards,” I said.

A thought crossed my mind. “Where does one carry a business card when wearing a bikini?”

As a former Girl Scout I knew to be prepared and had some in my bag along with my sunscreen and romance novels. My new friends were not as lucky.

They stuttered and stammered, saying they did have business cards but they were elsewhere.

I tell my clients, “Always, always, always carry a business card.”  You never know when you might have an opportunity to connect with someone.

Floating on a giant pink strawberry donut is highly unusual. As is networking while doing so.  But my new friends will remember me.

And they each have a sunscreen-stained business card with my information.