Stop ruminating!

Kathryn Crawford Saxer Career Management

A beloved coaching client didn’t get the job she had worked so hard for. “I’m a failure,” she emailed me. “I am lost.” I checked in with her a week later and heard the same notes of sorrow and anguish and anger. “I’ll get over it soon, I promise,” she told me. “It’s just so unfair.” I’ve known that feeling. You probably have, too. Years ago, I had a job I loved and a boss I adored. And I can still …

The sweaty sweater

Kathryn Crawford Saxer Career Management

I was putting on makeup in my office, getting ready to go on TV, when I noticed sweat stains on my summer sweater. “Uh oh,” I thought to myself. I had less than an hour before showtime, and a decision to make: I could freak out and scramble to buy a new shirt, or I could decide not to worry about it. I decided not to worry. In that moment, I was leaning heavily on Carol Dweck’s book, “Mindset, The New …

Career crossroads

Kathryn Crawford Saxer Career Transition

How do you walk away from something you’ve spent your entire life preparing for? A beloved coaching client is a professional musician. He’s played since he was 3 years old, studied music in college, worked in orchestras his entire adult life. He has $80,000 worth of instruments in his music room. Several years ago he earned a (nonmusical) professional degree and discovered another career that he loves. For a long time, he balanced both careers: professional job during the day, …

Job interviews are not therapy sessions

Kathryn Crawford Saxer Career Management

I was at a party, half listening to a guy talk about an upcoming interview. “I’m just going to be myself,” he said confidently. “I’m going to show them the good and the bad.” He’s a newly minted lawyer with no work experience. He’s never had an interview for a professional role. I sipped my wine, admired the view, and kept quiet. “There are aspects of my personality that can rub people the wrong way,” he explained. “I want to …

Sleep as a career strategy

Kathryn Crawford Saxer Career Management

“I am so burned out,” my coaching client told me, her head in her hands. “I am so unmotivated. I’m really struggling to juggle my work and my family.” “Tell me about your sleep,” I answered. I recently read “Why We Sleep: Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreams,” by Matthew Walker, Ph.D., and it rocked my world — and my career coaching approach. Walker is a professor of neuroscience and psychology at University of California, Berkeley; the director of the …