I’m not really normal

While visiting relatives in our hometown of Tulsa last week, I found myself on kitchen duty with my brother-in-law one afternoon. Cleaning the kitchen during the holidays is somewhat like trying to hit a moving target, because the activity never really ends — it just reaches a lull between two peaks.
But we eventually conquered the [...]

Finding your passion

In her Shifting Careers blog this week, Marci Alboher shares an interesting self-assessment exercise. It is designed by career coach Michael Melcher (aka The Creative Lawyer) for people who are searching for passion in their careers.
According to Melcher, many of his clients don’t know what they want to do with their careers; they may have [...]

Right-brain vs left-brain test

 
Do you see the dancer spinning clockwise or counter-clockwise?

 
If clockwise, then you are using the right side of your brain.
If counter-clockwise, then you are using the left side of your brain.
I have no idea about the scientific validity of this test, but it is true that people see it differently. I’m curious to [...]

Introverts guide to self-promotion

When I wrote about sociable introverts last spring, I never imagined it would become one of the most popular posts on this blog. Even to this day, that post sometimes gets more hits than my current posts. There is much more interest in how introverts guide their careers than I ever imagined.
One of the [...]

Study: Personality can predict performance

A recent study conducted by Dr. Nathan Bowling at Wright State University found that personality can be an effective predictor of job performance success. A couple of excerpts from the findings follow:
I’ve often debated with fellow graduate students and managers over the relationship between job performance and job satisfaction. Are employees satisfied [...]

Note to butchers: don’t hire vegetarians

Thanks to the Be Excellent blog for pointing me to this article in Entrepreneur Magazine. In the article, Robert Kiyosaki stresses that businesses need to hire people with a passion for their mission.
Hiring the right people — the people with the right passion — is one of the toughest jobs for any business. But [...]

A sociable introvert

At a seminar I was attending recently, we were asked to divide ourselves into groups of self-described extroverts and introverts. Several people were surprised when I joined the introverts group. They pointed out that throughout the seminar, they had observed me

approaching strangers to introduce myself,
initiating conversations,
asking questions during the session, and
volunteering to speak before the [...]