The Worst Career Blunder You Can Make

ForbesWoman:

Throughout my years of working, I've made a large number of mistakes in my professional life and career planning - 52 critical mistakes, in fact. Even as I reinvented myself several times (from unhappy corporate VP, to marriage and family therapist, to fulfilled career coach and executive trainer), I took serious missteps, including waiting too long to move away from a direction that wasn't working, or partnering with the wrong folks who, in the end, made me miserable.

Of all the career mistakes I've made, and of those critical career errors I've observed in hundreds of professionals over the past eight years, there's one blunder that stands out as the most damaging and demoralizing.

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Comments

[Ascare26]

04:49 AM on 01/31/2012

Wow, this article was amazing for me at a time in my life. I actually was just fired because of another person in my same position who didn't like me. She had found out I had reported her, classic whistleblowing case. yay for me.

[Pippen]

08:13 AM on 01/30/2012

If you can remember that corporate politics are ruthless, cold, courteous to a fault, professional public relations so fake and polished that when you get your turn to push the wagon uphill through mud your gonna get muddy and others who are in the wagon are gonna smack you in the head as you work hoping you'll give up and prove them right.

On Christmas eve send out notices to 9 thousand employees that they nolonger have jobs and their jobs have been sent overseas to India then wake up Christmas day and go to church and "feel good" about yourself because your a great Christian.

If you can do all of those things and be "okay" with all of it ?.....your PERFECT for corporate VP. Congratulations YOU MADE IT GIRL. Your Mary Tyler Moore. Well......more like Cruella Deville with fangs but if you can look in the mirror and see Mary Tyler Moore even after ruining everyone around you, you're good to go.

[imonlyhereforthelaughs]

03:16 PM on 01/27/2012

So...I guess all of you corporate VPs need to take note.


But what about the 99.9% of working women who are not corporate VPs? What should they do?

[CAELadyJane50]

08:44 PM on 01/22/2012

The icon to "read the whole story" does not work. However, I have read "Ann Lander's Column" in local newspapers since I was 14 years old and I've read what some women went through in the world of work.

I would just like to give one piece of advice to working women and that is: do not mix personal or physical intimacy with professionals at your place of employment. I never had an affair with anyone in the workplace and I am glad I didn't; I've heard and seen the emotional pain women went through. When women break up with their boyfriends or husbands in the work place, they usually end up getting fired or forced to leave or quit their jobs while the boyfriends or husbands stay. Most employers prefer to keep their male employees than their female employees; employers tend to think men need to keep their jobs more than women, especially if he is divorced and paying alimony and child support or he is married and has a family to support. So when it comes to men in the work place, you have to ask yourself: are you willing to lose your job for him because most likely you will end up losing your job and reputation if your relationship does not work or if another female employee comes along that he prefers more than yourself? I don't mean to sound offensive but it is something to consider.

[squirrely girl]

04:43 PM on 01/26/2012

First piece of advice my dad gave me when I got my first job: Don't get your meat where you get your bread.

[Ascare26]

04:51 AM on 01/31/2012

Yeah, I've never thought that was okay. I was just raised that way, and I just have very feminist, professional ideals. Unfortunately others don't, and it creates so many problems.