Coffee With Colby

The saying in poker holds true - "You can't win a game in the first hand, you can only lose it in the first hand." Like a poker hand, resumes are a necessary evil in the job hunt that can do little in leading you to final success, but when done wrong can knock you out of the running entirely. You can spend hours agonizing over a document that a hiring manager may glance at for ten seconds before deciding whether to keep you in the running for a role. In today's episode, Colby shares real world insight into how to build a strong resume, what hiring managers are looking for and how to make sure your resume stands out. He also shares tips for how to make customizing your resume less painful and time consuming.

Whether you are a high powered executive overseeing a Fortune 500 company, an entrepreneur boot strapping your first start up or a recent college grad in her first nine months on the job, burn out can happen to anyone. The important thing is recognizing it and knowing how to recover from it. In this episode, Colby shares examples of what burn out really feels like that anyone can relate to, what causes it in the first place and strategies to work through it and feel your best. This is a must listen for any new professional or anyone who may be diving into a new career.

Healthcare is more complicated than ever before and with a workforce facing chronic health conditions and rampant mental health challenges, accessing that care is more important than ever. Unfortunately, many new professionals gloss over the finer points of their health plan when they start a new job. In today's episode, Colby looks at some of the key areas of your health benefits you should review as soon as you start a job in order to identify all of the perks and resources available to you to live your healthiest life.

To grow your career, you need two things - a commitment to doing your job well and the opportunity to excel. Unfortunately, opportunity doesn't make an appointment and it doesn't exactly come with a road map. In today's episode we talk about the four ways you can show up and do your job the right way every day so that you are ready to seize an opportunity when it presents itself.

What is the one job hunting tool that is more important and more valuable than a good resume or cover letter? What one strategy will get you more results than spending hours trolling job boards online? The Informational interview. In today's episode, Colby shares the value of informational interviews, how he has used these tools to get several positions along his own career path and how you can put this to work whether you are a brand new college grad or a seasoned professional making a mid-life career change.

As a nation, we desperately need a vacation and yet employees regularly forego vacation time (which is part of their negotiated compensation) for the good of the office. In this episode, Colby takes a look at why we are so hesitant to take time off, why it's a health risk and the habit that so many people fall into that sabotages their time off. Pulling from his own experience moving away from a "constantly connected" mindset to a far more productive workplace approach that utilizes regular time off, Colby shares a six-step blueprint for young professionals to maximize their own vacation time, improving their performance and mental health, without sacrificing their career trajectory.

If you aren't screwing up, you aren't growing. It's a maxim that we are taught throughout our lives but when you have a "face palm" moment at work, it can be incredibly painful. So how do you recover when something like this happens? In today's episode, Colby pulls out one of his own top-5 most embarrassing professional moments to walk through how to respond when you screw up at work and how to work through the situation in a way that can help your career.

In a follow up to episode 5, Colby talks about how to recover from making a big mistake when there is no obvious way to make things right. Listen along as he walks you through the most embarrassing moment of his career and how he managed to come back from this epic face palm.

Data shows that even the most senior leaders hate giving feedback and will often take extreme measures to avoid saying something that could be viewed as criticism even if it means the company suffers. Why are we so afraid to give constructive criticism when it's the only way for our team to grow and improve? In today's episode, Colby Reade shares two examples from his own history in the workplace ... one of which involves a thrown stapler and a rage-y manager ... and discusses how to give (and how to NOT give) effective feedback.

Few things are as frustrating as when you are TRYING to do your job and some goon in another department seems hell bent on making that impossible. How do you work through those moments of friction in a positive way in order to do your job more efficiently and effectively? In this episode of the Coffee with Colby podcast, Colby shares some real life examples of how friction between coworkers can crop up in the office, WHY it behooves you to be proactive in diffusing the tension and HOW to help your colleagues get on the same page. Enjoy!