Career Decision Making

A 27-year-old Millennial sits at a café at 11 PM, exhausted, chasing a promotion. A 23-year-old Gen Z walks by, sipping coffee, thinking: “I won’t do this to myself.” For decades, long hours equaled commitment. Silence meant professionalism. Skipping breaks was called hustle. Then Gen Z arrived—and said NO. And suddenly, the system felt threatened. They’re not lazy. They reject exploitation. They’re not disloyal. They’ve seen loyalty go unrewarded. They’re not entitled. They just want what’s fair. Myths Gen Z is done with: ❌ “Hard work always pays off” – not in the age of layoffs and AI. ❌ “Unpaid internships are valuable” – then why is the CEO paid? ❌ “A degree is essential” – then why does experience matter more? ❌ “Job hopping looks bad” – then why is company turnover normal? Gen Z is simply saying: “We deserve better.” They’re not quitting work—they’re reshaping it: ✅ Freelancing, building brands, creating income streams ✅ Prioritizing boundaries, mental health, and balance ✅ Redefining success as thriving, not just surviving Past generations survived. Gen Z wants to live. And maybe—that’s what real progress looks like. #GenZ #WorkCulture #FutureOfWork #CareerEvolution #MentalHealth #Leadership #WorkSmart

90% of people are getting garbage career advice from AI. Including me, until I figured out this framework. Here's what nobody tells you about using AI for career development: It's only as smart as the context you give it. So I'm finally sharing my full prompting framework that's transformed my career: ✅ Start with context about your actual goal ↳ Not "help with interviews" but "I'm transitioning from data analyst to product manager and have 3 interviews next week" ✅ Set the tone you need to hear ↳ Ask for a mentor who's been where you are, not a robot reading from a career textbook ✅ Share your actual background ↳ Upload your resume, link your LinkedIn, mention the companies you're targeting ✅ Be specific about what you need ↳ "Give me 5 behavioral questions for a product manager role at a Series B startup" beats "Help me prep" every time ✅ Provide examples of your situation ↳ "I led a data migration project but have no direct PM experience" gives AI something to work with ✅ Include your career journey ↳ Where you've been, where you're stuck, what you're trying to achieve ✅ Ask for step-by-step breakdowns ↳ Complex career moves need phases, not one giant leap ✅ Request structured outputs ↳ "Give me: Current State Analysis, 30-Day Action Plan, Key Skills to Develop" makes advice actionable I went from getting the same recycled career advice everyone else got, to now getting advice that could only work for someone with my exact background, goals, and challenges. And that's the thing about AI… it's not magic. It's a mirror that reflects back exactly what you show it. ♻️ Reshare this if it helped and follow me Megan Lieu for more career + AI tips!

They didn’t see it coming. And I didn’t either. Back when I first started hiring (and had 𝑧𝑒𝑟𝑜 clue what I was doing), I over-indexed on the resume, trusted my “gut feeling,” and got swept up in what I wanted to hear. No surprise...I had terrifying turnover rates. So many founders I work with today don’t see it coming either. One founder I worked with recently was four months into their first VP of Sales hire when the cracks started to show... Big promises were made for the first 90 days, and there was no progress The fancy plan presented?.. Nowhere in sight Deals were stuck The sales team was frustrated and begging for help, yet couldn't seem to get it The board was starting to get "itchy" And the founder? Overwhelmed, frustrated, and confused Here’s the thing: This wasn’t just about the hire. It was about the 𝑝𝑟𝑜𝑐𝑒𝑠𝑠 they used to hire them. I’ve lived this story myself, which is why I’ve spent years learning how to avoid these mistakes. In the last six months alone, I’ve helped 50+ founders recover from hiring missteps that cost them an average of $450,000 - $3M+ per bad hire, and often much more that's harder to calculate immediately. Here’s what I see over and over again: · The candidates seemed great on paper, but their early performance fell flat · The team felt disconnected, unsure who was in charge or what was expected · Revenue targets missed by months, and employee trust eroded · Growth goals thrown into chaos These aren’t just “your” problems... they’re 𝑠𝑦𝑚𝑝𝑡𝑜𝑚𝑠 of a broken hiring process. And if this feels a little too familiar, you’re not alone. Here’s the truth: 𝐇𝐢𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐢𝐬 𝐨𝐧𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐝𝐞𝐬𝐭, 𝐡𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐞𝐬𝐭-𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐤𝐞𝐬 𝐝𝐞𝐜𝐢𝐬𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐲𝐨𝐮’𝐥𝐥 𝐦𝐚𝐤𝐞 𝐚𝐬 𝐚 𝐟𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐝𝐞𝐫. 𝐀𝐧𝐝 𝐰𝐡𝐞𝐧 𝐲𝐨𝐮’𝐫𝐞 𝐦𝐨𝐯𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐟𝐚𝐬𝐭 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐩𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐮𝐫𝐞 𝐦𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠, 𝐢𝐭’𝐬 𝐞𝐚𝐬𝐲 𝐭𝐨 𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐧 𝐨𝐧 𝐡𝐨𝐩𝐞. But hope isn’t a hiring strategy. Clarity is. When we peeled back the layers with this founder, the missteps weren’t just about the person they hired, they were in the process itself: 𝐀𝐬𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐞𝐝 𝐞𝐱𝐩𝐞𝐜𝐭𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬: No alignment on what success looked like 𝐒𝐡𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐨𝐰 𝐚𝐬𝐬𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐬: Relying on resumes and interviews instead of real-world problem-solving 𝐒𝐩𝐞𝐞𝐝 𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐩𝐫𝐞𝐜𝐢𝐬𝐢𝐨𝐧: Rushing to fill a seat instead of slowing down to find the right person With a reset, a clear process, and intentional steps to understand + repair the damage, we cleaned up the mess. The turnaround? Dramatic. The right hire stepped in, unlocked revenue, aligned the team, and gave the founder breathing room to lead with confidence. If this story feels a little too familiar, you’re not alone. These aren’t just your problems. They’re common symptoms of hiring under pressure. But here’s the good news: Fixing them isn’t just possible—it’s essential. So, I’ll ask you this: How much longer can your business afford the cost of hope?

6 Ways To Use ChatGPT As Your AI Career Compass: (Use These To Go From Analysis Paralysis To Crystal Clear Career Path). 1. Start With Your Career DNA Most people miss incredible opportunities because they only look at obvious career paths. Instead, feed ChatGPT your complete profile. Try this: "I have skills in [X], interests in [Y], and prefer [Z] work environment. What careers match?" You'll discover roles you never knew existed. 2. The Hidden Gem Finder ChatGPT knows about roles that aren't on your radar yet. Ask: "Based on my background in [X] and interests for [Y], what emerging roles combine both?" It might suggest hybrid roles that combine skills from different industries (e.g., MarTech Specialists, which combine Marketing + IT). 3. The Salary Reality Check Before diving into a new path, understand the financial landscape. Ask: "Compare salaries for [Target Role 1] vs [Target Role 2] vs [Target Role 3] in [Your Location]." ChatGPT pulls from vast data to show earning potential. Now you can prioritize paths that meet both passion and paycheck needs. 4. Build Your Roadmap Once you find interesting paths, get specific about next steps. Prompt ChatGPT: "Create a 6-month plan to transition from [X] to [Y]." It'll outline certifications, skills to develop, and networking strategies. You get a personalized action plan instead of generic career advice. 5. Uncover Adjacent Opportunities The best career moves often aren't straight lines. Try: "What roles are one step away from [Your Current Role] but pay significantly more?" ChatGPT can suggest roles that don't necessarily call for a vertical leap. These adjacent moves leverage your existing skills while opening new doors. 6. Test Drive Before You Commit Before making a leap, simulate the experience. Ask ChatGPT: "Give me a typical day in the life of a [Target Role] at [Target Company]." Then follow up with: "What would frustrate someone coming from my current role?"  This reality check helps you make informed decisions, not emotional ones. 🧭 Ready to turn AI into your personal career compass? 👉 Book a free 30-minute Clarity Call and we’ll show you how to use these prompts to map a crystal-clear job search strategy: https://lnkd.in/gdysHr-r 

Why Success at 45 Looks Different Than at 25 What was satisfactory and worth pursuing at 25 isn't it anymore – because success changes as you do.   At mid-career, many professionals experience a shift in how they view success. Early in our careers, we often focus on achievement—promotions, salary, titles. By mid-life, success is more about fulfillment—purpose, balance, and leaving a legacy.   Researchers like Hermans & Oles (1999) and Levinson et al. (1978)  highlight three key drivers behind this transition: 1️⃣ Finding previously satisfactory goals now dissatisfactory. 2️⃣ Recalibrating goals due to a change in temporal perspective. 3️⃣ Reinterpreting the future.   These shifts align with six key dimensions of mid-life transition, as shown in the diagram: 1️⃣ Postformal Thinking (Piaget, Integrating Complexity): Moving beyond black-and-white thinking to embrace ambiguity and contradictions. 2️⃣ Authentic Living (Yalom, Existential Choices): Living in alignment with personal values and making conscious life choices. 3️⃣ Eudaimonic Goals (Aristotle, Fulfillment-Based Success): Shifting from external achievement to inner growth and purpose. 4️⃣ Reframing Life Story (McAdams, Narrative Identity): Reshaping your narrative to make sense of past experiences and envision meaningful futures. 5️⃣ Role Reassessment (Super, Life Roles Realignment): Reevaluating life roles (e.g., professional, personal) to reflect current priorities. 6️⃣ Legacy and Contribution (Erikson, Generativity vs. Stagnation): Focusing on leaving a lasting impact and contributing to others.   Shaping success today starts with three exercises: 1️⃣ Reviewing Values: Coaches have many tried-and-tested exercises to help clients clarify what truly matters to them. Values are the compass guiding decisions and priorities. Revisiting them periodically ensures your actions align with your current self. 2️⃣ Auditing Your Career: A Critical Career Review is an excellent tool for assessing where you stand and identifying areas for growth or change. If you're interested, there's a link in the comments. 3️⃣ Setting Holistic Goals: Goal-setting doesn't have to focus solely on career milestones. The domain harmony approach helps integrate professional, personal, and relational aspirations, ensuring balance and synergy between all aspects of life.   Here's a caveat: Over the years, I've noticed that clients rarely address these transitions without guidance. Struggling to articulate the shift yourself is like trying to tickle yourself. A coach can facilitate unpacking these dimensions to uncover new clarity and meaning.   When did you last review your definition of success? Success isn't static—it evolves with your values, experiences, and aspirations.   #CoachRisto #CareerPerceptions   #Success #Careers  

This week, I facilitated a manager workshop on how to grow and develop people and teams. One question sparked a great conversation: “How do you develop your people outside of formal programs?” It’s a great question. IMO, one of the highest leverage actions a leader can take is making small, but consistent actions to develop their people. While formal learning experiences absolutely a role, there are far more opportunities for growth outside of structured settings from an hours in the day perspective. Helping leaders recognize and embrace this is a major opportunity. I introduced the idea of Practices of Development (PODs) aka small, intentional activities integrated into everyday work that help employees build skills, flex new muscles, and increase their impact. Here are a few examples we discussed: 🌟 Paired Programming: Borrowed from software engineering, this involves pairing an employee with a peer to take on a new task—helping them ramp up quickly, cross-train, or learn by doing. 🌟 Learning Logs: Have team members track what they’re working on, learning, and questioning to encourage reflection. 🌟 Bullpen Sessions: Bring similar roles together for feedback, idea sharing, and collaborative problem-solving, where everyone both A) shares a deliverable they are working on, and B) gets feedback and suggestions for improvement 🌟 Each 1 Teach 1:  Give everyone a chance to teach one work-related skill or insight to the team. 🌟 I Do, We Do, You Do:Adapted from education, this scaffolding approach lets you model a task, then do it together, then hand it off. A simple and effective way to build confidence and skill. 🌟 Back Pocket Ideas:  During strategy/scoping work sessions, ask employees to submit ideas for initiatives tied to a customer problem or personal interest. Select the strongest ones and incorporate them into their role. These are a few examples that have worked well. If you’ve found creative ways to build development opportunities into your employees day to day work, I’d love to hear what’s worked for you!

I’ve just published (with Sarah Wittman & Kendall Smith) a review article in Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior that synthesizes 25 years of academic research on career transitions and professional identity. Five patterns stood out: ✅ Career research has shifted from objective outcomes (jobs, promotions) to subjective experience (meaning, well-being) ✅ Career change is increasingly studied as a process over time, not a single decision or event ✅ Professional identity has moved to the center of how scholars understand career transitions ✅ People bring multiple identities—work, nonwork, and past selves—into career change, shaping how it unfolds ✅ Despite extensive research, we have limited cumulative evidence on voluntary exits, mid-career change and the critical, in-between (liminal) phase Overall, the research portrays modern careers as nonlinear, identity-shaping journeys, while also revealing how much we still don’t understand about how people navigate them. https://lnkd.in/eV5dub_m

Younger workers may be changing what it means to work in an elite job – and even de-emphasizing its importance entirely. How Gen Z are disrupting the definition of ‘prestigious’ jobs... from BBC and Meredith Turits. Some younger workers do still report making money is prestigious, especially as cost of living rises; and working for certain firms or in specific industries can make a career. But many are also emphasizing other elements, such as: - corporate values - flexibility - autonomy and freedom from the long-hours, high-octane grind This may include a position that enables a worker to - live the lifestyle they want ; whether that’s being an entrepreneur, working in an industry that aligns with their values and passion or securing a job that enables them to build their personal brand on the side. Some data indicates that Gen Z are indeed shifting towards more meaningful work. April 2023 data from LinkedIn of more than 7,000 global workers, reviewed by BBC Worklife, shows 64% of Gen Zers in the UK, France, Germany and Ireland now consider it important to work for companies that are aligned with their values. The data also shows these young workers highlight work-life balance and career growth as top draws for potential workplaces. Along with Gen Z’s shifting attitudes, embrace of entrepreneurship and emphasis on values, this mindset shift may be in part because mechanisms behind finding jobs and seeing potential alternative career paths are changing, says Josh Graff managing director of EMEA and LATAM at LinkedIn.   With a greater number of jobs being posted online, “people have so much more access to information today than we did when we were applying for a job 20-plus years ago … This allows you to have much better visibility into a wealth of roles”, he says. “That shift in the workplace, in the workforce … is leading people to understand there's a broader array of options out there.”   Molly Johnson-Jones, suggests the changing definition of prestigious work is also trickling up to older generations, including millennials, like herself. She believes older workers are expressing sentiments similar to Gen Z’s, also having a reckoning with what defines an elite job; they’re similarly re-defining the term as careers that enable better lifestyles. Read more below: #newjobopportunities #generationz #values #meaningfulwork #prestigious #disruptingthefuture #purposefulwork #redefiningsuccess #careerdevelopment #changingcareers #talentstrategy #peopleandculture https://lnkd.in/eyvZJzfh

Lets commit to developing leadership skills in EVERY employee! Leadership development programmes and initiatives are not just for formal existing leaders. They are for everyone. If you think about it... Leadership skills encompass more than just the ability to guide others; they're fundamentally about self-management and fostering effective collaboration. We need entire teams to be able to think critically, problem-solve and communicate effectively. We want emotionally intelligent individuals on every team. So...we need to cultivate these traits across entire teams—not just within individual leaders. But how? And how do we do this without sending training costs sky-high? Here are some simple tips that can be implemented with no cost, just intentional time and effort: 👉 Take a developmental approach in your coaching check-ins; help people to understand and develop key leadership qualities such as decision-making, communication, problem-solving, and team management. Use competency wheels or other self-assessment tools to help people identify their leadership strengths and areas for development. 👉 Pair employees with existing leader mentors within the organization who can explain leadership and provide guidance and support to those in non-formal leader roles. 👉 Provide cross-functional opportunities for everyone to expose them to different parts of the organization and help them understand the business more holistically. 👉 Cultivate an environment where it's normal for people to ask for feedback on their performance and receive it. Existing leaders can lead the way by asking for feedback on their own performance, which teaches non formal leaders to do the same. 👉 Give every employee the opportunity to take on leadership roles in smaller projects or teams. This distributed leadership approach provides a practical training ground for people, giving them a chance to experience leadership in a controlled, manageable environment. 👉 Encourage self-initiated learning in everyone! Support and encourage employees to seek out learning opportunities themselves, whether through online courses, industry conferences, or by taking on new challenges within the company. What are your top tips for building leadership skills in everyone? Leave your thoughts in the comments 🙏 #promotion #leaderdevelopment #retention #motivation #culture #organisationalbehaviour #coaching #crosstraining #talentmanagement

Most hiring managers don’t actually know what they want. They have a job description. Approved. Polished. Pages long. But clarity? Not really. Because a job description isn’t clarity. It’s documentation. Ask what success looks like in the first six months. Ask what problem this role truly solves. Ask what actually matters. The answers change. Or depend on who’s in the room. So interviews become subjective. Feedback conflicts. And hiring decisions turn into opinions. Vague roles attract vague candidates. Shifting expectations break hiring processes. Hiring doesn’t fail because job descriptions are missing. It fails because clarity is. And clarity isn’t a nice-to-have in hiring. It’s the job.