There are two types of people in this world: project managers and task managers. • • • I’m a project manager. Everything I do — from making coffee to launching a company to fixing my marriage — is a giant endeavor of some sort. I have a plan, I understand the steps, and I get…
This month is ten years since I quit my job at Pfizer. Technically, I didn’t quit. My position was eliminated as part of a broader HR restructuring. My husband’s job was eliminated, too. I signed a release and waiver, and I was given a severance package that provided some coverage while I transitioned to a…
I hate giving and receiving professional feedback. It’s the worst. • • • That’s why I agreed to write a six-part series on the Saba Halogen blog about giving and receiving feedback. If I’m ever going to get better, I need to learn how to communicate with other people effectively. The first two posts are…
I’m in the middle of pretty big changes in my life. I’m no longer working as an HR blogger. I’m not doing HR consulting. I’m trying to launch my nascent software company. And there’s always something going on with one of my cats. Right now, Emma has a hernia. You know, of course, my cat…
Hey, guys. I’m getting ready for my Facebook Live experience in San Diego, next week. So it’s important to calm down and communicate from a place of strength and power instead of going on stage and being a nervous idiot. My friend, Ita Olsen, is my coach. And she let me record our relaxation exercises.…
When I was a kid, I wanted to do TV weather. I would’ve been really good at it, too, except I don’t know science. Or how to convert Celsius to Fahrenheit. Or how to spell Fahrenheit without a spellchecker even though I ought to know better because Ray Bradbury is the man. I never did…
I’ve been attending a class at Duke to learn about mindfulness-based stress reduction techniques, and today is the last day. It’s bittersweet. I’m grateful for the experience. My personal and professional relationships have improved over the past ten weeks, and I’m making better decisions. But being mindful is exhausting. Part of me feels like there’s…
One of my mentors, Nick Morgan, believes that every public speaker is a motivational speaker. I think he’s right, and it applies to bloggers and writers like me. If you’re on the internet telling other people how to live, you’re a player in an industry full of people like Jim Rohn, Tony Robbins, Tim Ferriss,…
I should have known it was coming. Last year, around Halloween, I had an allergic reaction to a bite of food. It’s not my first bout with anaphylaxis. Thankfully, I was able to apply good self-care and survive the very scary episode. But I knew something like this was coming because my body was completely…
I’ve been studying up on different meditation and stress-reduction methods because, for some reason, this blog has led me down the path of being everybody’s big sister who is immediately ignored when she gives smart advice. (Just like my real life! How great!) Nobody knows how to make good decisions, especially at work where we…