The Shimmering Careers Blog

There’s no better time to look for a new job than when you’re already employed. You’re getting paid, there’s nothing pushing you to look elsewhere other than your own desire to find greener pastures, and there’s no doubt that employers look more kindly on candidates who are still employed. But there are also problems associated with that situation. You may not want to make your job search common knowledge, and you may want to keep it from your boss. For one thing, you’d run t

It’s a truism that the job search is a job unto itself. But if a truism is a statement that, while obviously true, adds nothing to the conversation, this may not be a truism after all, because it does add something to the conversation. In fact, the idea that the job search is hard work is an idea with important ramifications. And all that is doubly true when you embark on a job search while you’re already employed. But with or without that extra pressure, you can easily find

Prepare for All Types of Job Interviews Previously, I’ve covered all sorts of interview scenarios, from video to phone to executive and more, but there are two scenarios that come up from time to time that deserve a few words to round out your job interview preparation. First, there’s the panel interview, one of the more potentially intimidating of its kind. There, you’re greeted by what is essentially a committee of interviewers. While the substance of a panel interview won’

Why Always Updating Your LinkedIn Profile is Good for All Like it or not, LinkedIn is an indispensable part of the job search. But let’s say that you’re currently employed and not quite ready to disclose to one and all (and especially to your employer) that you’re in the job market. Conventional wisdom has often been to beware of making changes to your LinkedIn profile, because a sudden change can be a giveaway that you’re looking to move. When taken as a stand-alone proposit

Quitting is in the news this year. All kinds of quitting. First there was quiet quitting. This refers to people who don’t actually quit per se, but who are working strictly to the terms of whatever deal they agreed to. They do their jobs, but they don’t go above or beyond. No more extra hours. No more working on the weekend. No more being available 24/7. It’s about doing the minimum job requirements and trying to achieve a better work-life balance by giving less to the “work”

I often get requests for career help issues that are a bit unrelated to the common needs of resume writing and job hunting. One that I hear consistently is: “How should I handle stress and anxiety?” That’s a pretty broad area to delve into, but we’re not looking for a panacea for global anxiety in the 21st century. Instead, we’re talking about stress and anxiety as they arise in the job search and in job interviews, and, in that respect, there are two distinct sides to any so

In today’s competitive job market, hiring managers are seeing something curious: a flood of resumes that, despite coming from different people, all kind of sound the same. It’s not that they’re poorly written. They’re just generic. The Problem with Polished but Impersonal Thanks to resume builders and AI tools like ChatGPT, it’s never been easier to create a clean-looking, keyword-optimized resume. (Whether “artificial intelligence” is even the right term is debatable; tools

Finding Strength in the Music I listen to music constantly - classical, rock, opera, jazz; you name it. When I'm writing, when I'm thinking, when I'm processing difficult emotions. The playlist shifts with my moods and needs, but the music is always there, providing support through every challenge. And when I sit down to play music myself, something almost magical happens. The act of creating those sounds becomes both cathartic and energizing, helping me process whatever the