Many clients come to me when they feel stuck in their current role and are not able to break through the promotion barrier to get the next higher title. The most common refrain in these discussions is how others around them holding higher titles are barely able to do their jobs and how the company rewards politics over performance. When clients complain about these unfair treatments and...

A large group of clients from my current pool is in middle management looking to move up in their company to the next higher level and to build their brand to stay on track for their ongoing movement up the ladder. This band of managers includes those whose titles include manager, senior manager, director, senior director—and any level just below a VP. Working with thousands of clients...

Acing Interviews for Executives Tweet: Many executives with stellar résumés are bummed-out by the democratic selection process at their target companies. Here’s an analysis of how to avoid failure. Having now worked with many C-level and senior executives I find that they often run into problems when going through job interviews, as they navigate through their...

“Age to me means nothing. I can’t get old; I’m working. I was old when I was twenty-one and out of work. As long as you’re working, you stay young. When I’m in front of an audience, all that love, and vitality sweeps over me and I forget my age.”— George Burns  As a career and life coach I often get prospects calling me about their apprehensions...

Antidote/noun   1 A medicine given to counteract the effects of a poison (or, formerly, a disease). (Foll. by against, for, to.).   2 fig. Something which counteracts an evil. (With constructions as sense 1.)   Although the title of this blog suggests that it is about how to overcome bad management (which is, actually, a process) it is written more for those who...

Although the phrase Design Thinking has been bandied about lately in many discussions that go beyond product design, its origins date back to the concepts of systems thinking. As contrasted with Linear Thinking, Systems Thinking is a discipline that requires anyone engaged in making decisions about any topic or matter to look at all the implications of a change as that change affects everything...

Malcolm Gladwell is famous for his eye-opening five best sellers during the past decade. His most recent best seller, Outliers: The Story of Success, incorporates some important rules of success. Although he gives examples for each of the 10 rules of success throughout his five books, it is sometimes difficult to for those engaged in everyday activities to translate those rules into practices...

My client pool includes managers at all levels, including CEOs. Throughout my career coaching I’ve seen examples of what managers need to do and to avoid. But during the last few weeks I ran into some egregious client situations that made me realize that very few managers really understand their true responsibilities and what they must do to be effective in their roles. This is...

After being in this career—my fifth—for 16 years and having now worked with almost 6,500 clients globally, I have run the gamut of client challenges. My clients range in their ages from 18 (out of high school, choosing a career path) to 65+ (retired, not knowing what to do). The range of their profession also is equally varied: From high-tech executives to physicians to those in...

Blog Post by Dilip Saraf Posted by FC Admin     After working with over 6,000 clients from all ages (16-75 years), almost all levels (apprentices to CEOs) and from diverse disciplines (I have entrepreneurs, physicians, and neurosurgeons in my client pool) I have come to realize that nearly 90% of those coming to me let the career happen to them. By this I mean...