occupational risk

Get a Life, Not a Job

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I made a new friend the other day.  While catching up on my non-book reading I came across a manifesto from http://changethis.com/ with the title Get a Life, Not a Job. My curiosity took hold; I thought this short essay might help me figure out where I’m headed in my life and career, so I read it.  Then I contacted the author to tell her how much I liked her manifesto.  Now we’ve connected on LinkedIn and I’ve made a new friend.

My new friend’s name is Paula Caligiuri. The following bio comes from her website:

Paula Caligiuri, Ph.D. is a work psychologist dedicated to helping people navigate the professional and personal challenges associated with their careers. She is the author of several books including Get a Life, Not a Job: Do What You Love and Let Your Talents Work for You, which FT Press will publish in April 2010, and the career blog. Dr. Caligiuri is a frequent contributor to CNN on career and management topics and has completed a pilot for a television show, CareerWATCH.

Dr. Caligiuri is also a Professor in the Human Resource Management Department at Rutgers University, where she teaches courses in career management and global human resources at the masters, PhD, and executive levels. She is an internationally recognized expert on global careers and strategic human resource management. She has lectured in numerous universities and has been a speaker for many major corporations in the United States, Asia, and Europe.

As a consultant, Dr. Caligiuri is the President of Caligiuri and Associates, Inc., a consulting firm that advises leading global organizations on ways to ensure the success of their internationally-oriented talent through assessment, training, and development.

Dr. Caligiuri holds a M.S. and Ph.D. from Penn State University in industrial and organizational psychology.

The book should be an awesome read.  You can get a copy of Paula’s manifesto by clicking the link below.  I’ve also added a link to her website on my sidebar.  I get a steady stream of visitors to my site who are looking for work.  I do hope you find or create what you are looking for.

69.04.Get a Life

Work as Paradox

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The Job Satisfaction Paradox for the Self-Employed – BusinessWeek

How can the self-employed earn less money, work more hours, and experience more work-related stress than the wage employed—yet still report greater overall job satisfaction? The answer appears to be that people value highly the autonomy, flexibility, and opportunity to work in a small organization .

Many studies show that the desire to be one’s own boss is one of the leading motivators of self-employment. Others report flexible schedules are a key motivator of self-employment. Moreover, human beings have a preference for working in settings where they can interact with all the members of the organization, according to research by Bruno Frey and Matthias Benz of the Institute of Empirical Economics of the University of Zurich.

In short, the paradox isn’t such a paradox after all. People will work harder, earn less, and put up with more stress so that they can enjoy the freedom, flexibility, and work environment that self-employment provides.

CTE = Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy

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NFL Brain Collector Shows Violence in Slices of Gray Matter – Bloomberg.com

Healthy tau helps strengthen the neurons in the brain, like steel reinforcements in a concrete bridge. Repetitive trauma can lead to a change in tau, making it clump like tangles of yarn. The more tangles, the more the communication between cells is hampered. Functions such as memory and anger control can disappear; dementia and death can follow.

CTE is a unique pathological condition, according to Stern. The postmortem diagnosis of Alzheimer’s requires the presence of deformed tau and another protein, beta amyloid. The diagnosis of CTE requires only the presence of deformed tau.

The Contingent Workforce – a $425 Billion Market

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You’re Hired. At Least for Now. – Kiplinger.com

The job is not a timeless fact of human existence.  It is a social artifact.

William Bridges wrote these words over 15 years ago.  We need to fully understand this concept and decide what kind of future we want for ourselves.  Do you want to be in or out?  Nearly four years ago I started my business on a part-time basis.  One year ago, I became  100% self-employed. If you are an underwriter, the time to be an independent for hire has never been better.

If you’re in underwriting management your options for creating the right hybrid model to fit your needs has never been better.  I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again:

I have a mortgage, two kids in college, and a small fleet of cars to support.  Hire me please.

How to Be Happy

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How Adults Achieve Happiness – BusinessWeek

Our findings were in many cases unexpected but clear-cut. There is an incredibly high correlation between people’s happiness and meaning at work and at home. In other words, those who experience happiness and meaning at work tend also to experience them outside of work. Those who are miserable on the job are usually miserable at home.

The implication is unmistakable. Since work and home are very different environments, our experience of happiness and meaning in life appears to have more to do with who we are than where we are. Rather than blaming our jobs, our managers, and our customers—or our friends, family members, and communities—for our negative worklife experience, we might be better served by looking in the mirror.

Worried Sick (not a question)

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Worried Sick

The link above takes you to the abstract quoted below.  Highlights in bold are my emphasis and not the author’s.

In today’s global economy, employees are much less likely to stay at one organization for the length of their careers. One significant side effect of this trend is that many employees feel less secure in their jobs. According to this study, being afraid of losing your job may be bad for your health. The authors analyzed questionnaires distributed to more than 1,700 people in the U.S. during two separate periods spanning two decades, which allowed them to control for poor health, job insecurity, and actual employment losses over time. As many as 18 percent of the employees surveyed said they felt insecure about their jobs. In one of the study groups, the authors found that chronic job insecurity was a more reliable predictor of poor health than smoking or hypertension. And job insecurity was more closely associated with failing health than actual unemployment, the researchers found, because of the ongoing stress caused by an uncertain future, an inability to take action, and a lack of institutionalized support. One implication for businesses is that employees who worry about losing their jobs have trouble concentrating, experience more stress, and take more sick days. The researchers argue that programs aimed at displaced or unemployed workers won’t reach people who have jobs but are insecure, and they suggest that organizations and government policies aim to lessen the degree of stress linked to job insecurity.

Bottom Line:
Even more than actual unemployment, persistent job insecurity is closely linked to declining health and increased stress in American workers.