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Have you ever had one of those days or maybe even a full week when felt really busy the whole time…but when it was over, you were like – what did I actually accomplish?

I know I have…and I’m guessing you have too.

The truth is – you probably accomplished a ton, but you weren’t even aware of it because you were just so busy.

The bigger question (and the more interesting question) is – how do you know if you were really working on the RIGHT things…or if you were unintentionally falling into bad habits or wasting your time on unimportant, low-value work.

These are really good questions. And a time audit can answer all of them. I’m going to be doing a time audit myself in the coming months so I thought I would take you along for the journey.

In this video, I’m walking you through exactly what a time audit is and why it’s such a valuable process. I’ll also explain exactly how to do it and what I’m going to use to make the process a little easier. And be sure to stay until the end, because I’ll tell you how to get my free downloadable reflection worksheet to help make the most of your time audit.

GET THE WORKSHEET HERE > >

Hi I’m Chrissy Scivicque, professional development trainer and founder of Eat Your Career dot com helping you create a nourishing professional life. I train on topics related to time management, project management, process improvement – basically all the stuff that helps professionals do more and do better.

And that’s exactly what a time audit is all about. Doing more and doing better.

Productivity experts have used this kind of exercise for decades and it’s a pretty basic concept – you just track what you’re doing all day long for a set period of time. That tracking gives you data and from that data you can make smarter decisions about how to use your time in the future.

There are some tricky parts to it though – but we’ll get to that in a minute.

First, let’s talk about the benefits.

Benefits of a Time Audit

In my experience, tracking what you’re doing all day and how long you’re doing it for has a surprisingly profound impact.

Just the process of tracking actually changes your behavior. If you know you have to document your activities, you’re naturally going to make better decisions. There’s a universal truth that states – “that which is tracked tends to improve.”

Whether you’re tracking time or finances or calories, the same thing happens. You just become more aware of what you’re doing and that, in and of itself, is a really useful thing.

But the goal of a time audit is to track over a relatively substantial period of time, anywhere from a week or two, to a month or even longer – that way, you settle into the process and you capture a significant amount of data. That data can then be analyzed to identify patterns and potentially pinpoint hidden problem areas.

The first time I did this at work was back in the early 2000s, when I was working as an executive assistant (and we had to do the time audit by hand which was really tedious – thankfully we don’t have to do that anymore – but we’ll get to that in a minute).

That first experience really taught me so much about myself. I learned that I do my best thinking before 11 am in the morning. I’m most social in the early afternoon, right after lunch. And the only way I will get things done in the late afternoon is to have a very clear plan. Otherwise, if I don’t have a plan, I tend to waste time and fall into unproductive rabbit holes.

But a time audit gives you so much more than just self-understanding. When you track your work, you also gain an understanding of how long various tasks actually take to do. If you’re the kind of person who makes a to-do list with 100 things on it and you honestly believe you can do them all in a day and you’re constantly shocked that you can’t – you need to do this.

You may find that a project you thought would take all day only takes a few hours. Or something you thought would take a few minutes actually takes all day.

It can be eye opening to see how our expectations are sometimes so completely different from our reality. And once you understand that, you can then create much more realistic plans for how to use your time.

As I mentioned earlier, I’m starting my own time audit this week and this time around, I really want to see if how I’m spending my time aligns with my true priorities. So I’m mostly interested in looking at the overall data. I want to see what percentage of my time during an average week is spent on certain activities.

I have a feeling that I’m spending too much time on things that aren’t really moving me closer to my goals – things that are kind of inherently satisfying to check off the list, but not necessarily valuable. Or maybe they’re still valuable things, but they might not be THE MOST valuable. If I can see the reality, I think I’ll be more confident to make the hard decisions that might need to be made to get things more aligned moving forward.

I will say that, for many of my clients, this is one of the most useful parts of a time audit. If you can show your boss with real data how much time you’re spending on certain things and the things that are being sacrificed in exchange for that, it can really help support prioritization discussions.

I had one client who discovered that she was spending more than half her week dealing with last-minute emergency requests and because of that, some really important projects were getting stalled out. Having that data helped her advocate for changes so she could start making progress on other things.

And all of this just brushes the surface. There is so much to gain from this exercise that it makes the pain of doing it worth it.

So now, let’s talk about how we do it.

How to Do a Time Audit

As I said earlier – the idea of this is so simple. You’re just tracking what you do all day long. The trick is, you have to track as you go – otherwise, if you wait until the end of the day, you are (more likely than not) gonna misremember and it just won’t be accurate. But tracking as you go is really tough. We all have daily habits and tracking probably isn’t one of them. So it’s really hard to remember. You might start off the day with the best intentions to track every single little thing. But by noon, you’ve completely forgotten. Plus, if you’re a multi-tasker, it gets really complicated because you’re switching around from one thing to another and then back to the previous thing. It gets messy.

You can probably tell I’ve run into these issues myself in the past, especially when tracking on paper or even using an Excel spreadsheet which I’ve done for many years. But now, we have time tracking tech tools that make it whole lot easier. It’s not totally automated, which is a good thing because we DO want the improved awareness of doing it ourselves. But these tech tools definitely make the process a lot easier. This isn’t to say that you can’t do a time audit on paper or in Excel, but I personally will not be doing that. I want to make it as easy as possible to capture the data from my computer or from my phone. And I want to be able to analyze the data using AI once I’m done. So here’s an overview of what I’m doing.

I’m using the Early app, which used to be called Timeular, which is a recommendation from my dear friend Julie Perrine. There are lots of time tracking tools out there – I’ve tried a few others but this one is definitely my favorite so far.

I’ve downloaded it on my phone, on my work computer and my home computer. I’ve connected it to my calendar and I’ve given it permission to see what apps I’m working in.

I’ve set up two folders – one business and one personal. And I’ve defined the activities I want to track in each.

You’ll notice that I’ve been tracking sporadically for a while just to get the hang of this tool, and to figure out exactly how I want to set things up…And I think I’m almost there.

To track an activity you just hit start button and then hit the stop button when you’re done. I can add tags to make the data more specific, and I can manually adjust things if I forget to start or stop an activity.

Plus, since it can also see the apps I was in and the things on my calendar, I can double check myself and, if I ever forget to add an activity, I have evidence that tells me what I was doing, rather than relying on my memory.

In fact, if I wanted this process to be entirely hands off, I could just rely solely on the automatic tracking column. But I don’t want to do that…because I do want the benefit of consciously tracking and building my awareness throughout the day.

Also, inside the app, I have a section called insights that will give me some high-level analysis of my data.

I’m planning on tracking for at least two months starting in the fall, which is usually my busiest time of year. I think it’s smart to do an audit like this in each season, but space them out a bit so you’re not going it back to back. Though, I will say that several of my clients have (through this process) made tracking such a habit that they just continued to do it as a regular daily thing. I can see a lot of benefit to that so I am slightly angling in that direction. I’m not fully committed yet, but Early is so easy to use, I can see that as a real possibility.

For now, my plan is to do this for two months and then reflect on what I learned and make improvements from there. I will definitely make another video at that point, sharing some of what I learn.

If you’re interested in doing at time audit yourself, you can get my free downloadable Time Audit Reflection worksheet to help you organize your thoughts and analyze your data once you’re done. The link for that is in the description below.

GET THE WORKSHEET HERE >> 

I would love to know what you think… Have you ever done a time audit or are you thinking about doing one? If so, what tool are you going to use? Let me know your thoughts in the comments below.

Thanks for watching and I’ll see you next time.

The post How to Do a Time Audit: Analyze Your Behaviors and Stop Wasting Time appeared first on Eat Your Career.

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I manage more than 50 projects a year in my business. And I could not do it without project management software.

That being said, it’s not right for everyone. Some people do just fine managing projects with things like Google Docs, OneNote notebooks, and Excel spreadsheets. I did that myself for a long time. Those tools are all perfectly adequate when you have a limited number of projects and a limited number of needs.

But if you’re watching this video (or reading this article!), I’m guessing that you’re past that limit. And you’re wondering if a dedicated project management software system might help you get control of all of the elements of all of your projects.

Well, I’m here to tell you that YES, a new Project Management app MIGHT be the perfect solution. There are a lot of benefits to these kinds of tools. But they also come with some very real and fairly significant drawbacks.

So, before you make the investment, you definitely want to do your research – and that’s why you’re here.

In this video (and article), I’ll share the main reasons I personally love project management software. I’ll also share the most common complaints I hear about it and some things you can do to overcome them. I’ll also give you some tips for choosing the software that’s right for you, because there are a LOT of options out there. And be sure to stay until the end because I’ll share how you can get a free downloadable worksheet to help you evaluate your needs and options.

GET THE DOWNLOADABLE WORKSHEET HERE >>

Before we dive deep into the world of project management software, if this is our first time meeting, hi, I’m Chrissy Scivicque, I’m a professional development trainer and the founder of Eat Your Career dot com helping you create a nourishing professional life. I train on a wide variety of topics including project management, process improvement and change management—basically all the stuff professionals need to do more and do better.

Now, fair warning here: I am a big old nerd when it comes to topics like this. I’ve tried many, many project management software systems over the years – partly because it’s my job. I train on project management, so I have to know what’s out there. But I also try different systems because I honestly enjoy it. I do it just for fun.

Asana is my preferred project management tool and it has been for more than 7 years now. But prior to that, I used Basecamp, Teamwork, Smartsheet and Todoist. Not all at the same time but over a number of years. I’ve also tried out Click Up and Monday.com. And I even used Trello to plan my wedding, so I’ll probably always have a soft spot for it…

And this is an easy tip whenever you’re considering a new project system: Most of them do have free limited-use trials – and some have very generous limits. So it’s worth it to sign up and just play around. Pick a personal project to put in there and see how it feels. You’ll learn so much by just using a system.

I should also say that I’m very much system agnostic. I love Asana but it’s not right for everyone. There are so many good options out there and most of them have a very similar set of features. The biggest difference is the user-experience—meaning how it looks and how it functions. But overall, they mostly let you DO the same things. You can set up projects, define tasks, assign tasks to other people on the team, set deadlines, create interconnections between your tasks, and that’s really just the beginning. Different systems might use different names for these things, and they all have different ways of doing them, but they’re still relatively similar.

Plus, if you’re using a cloud-based system, it’s accessible from anywhere and from any device. So, you don’t have the risk of leaving your project notebook at home and then needing it at the office. (I’m not saying there isn’t a place for paper in your project management system, but if you’re working with other people who need visibility into the project and if you’re working from different locations, a digital cloud-based system is the way to go.)

Benefits of PM Software

Let’s talk benefits…

One Task List Across Projects

As I said, I manage roughly 50 to 70 projects a year between clients, conferences, public workshops, webinars, and so on. I’ve identified 9 categories of projects in my business. Within each category, I have multiple projects, and each project has multiple tasks. Obviously that can be a lot to wrangle. But Asana makes it easy because it creates one consolidated task list that pulls ALL tasks that have been assigned to me across all of projects in all categories. So I don’t have to click through EACH of my projects individually to see what I need to do. I just need to look at that single consolidated task list.

This is one of those common features you’ll find in almost all project management software and to me, it is truly the ultimate time saver.

Deadline Management

With any project management system you can define tasks and deadlines really far out into the future, which means you don’t have to think about them until it’s TIME to think about them.

For example, I have training programs scheduled for December. It’s currently the beginning of August and I’m not thinking about them. But all the tasks for those programs are already loaded into the system. So, sometime around late October, those things will pop up on my task list and remind me to start working on them.

Recurring Tasks

I also have a lot of recurring tasks in my business—things I need to do every quarter or every January 20th for example. So I load those things in, I make them recurring, and I know I’ll be reminded at the right time in the future.

One thing to note here – the due date in the system is the deadline Asana is going to monitor and that’s when I WANT to have it done by. But, for my own awareness, I also put the actual CONCRETE due date in all caps in the task description.

Templates & Automations

You will save a tremendous amount of time by using templates and automations inside your project management software. If you do a lot of routine projects that require the same or a similar set of tasks each time, this is a game-changer.

For example, when I start a new webinar project in Asana, it automatically loads a pre-event task list for me. When I move a webinar project to the post-event section, it automatically loads the post-event task list for me. I don’t have to remember the steps each time and I don’t have to manually enter them.

You can even set dynamic deadlines in your templates and automations by attaching them to a specific trigger date or making them relative to the other dates in the project.

Depending on the system you’re using, you can do some very sophisticated things. But don’t let that overwhelm you. It’s an option that’s available not a requirement. I probably use a pretty small portion of the features available in Asana. That’s really common for most project management systems. There is a TON they CAN do, but the only thing that matters is what YOU NEED them to do. Forget everything else. All the sophisticated, advanced features may be useful at some point in the future…but they may not be. You get to choose how you want to use the software and what you want it to do for you.

Easy, Sophisticated Visuals

If you’ve ever tried to manually create a Gantt Chart or some kind of visual project roadmap, in something like Canva or even Excel, you know how painful it can be.

(Incidentally, please never create a Gannt Chart in Canva…)

Even if you’re using Excel’s chart creation functionality, it’s still a surprising number of steps.

YES, AI can now help with this kind of stuff, but even then, when things get delayed or deadlines get moved, you have to regenerate the chart or the image or whatever.

With project management software, you can view your current project data in all kinds of different ways. You don’t have to explain what you want, and you don’t have to manually adjust anything. As long as the data in the system is accurate, the visuals are accurate. And, when you change something in the visual, it changes the data behind it. Because it’s all tied together…which is a huge load off your back.

Team Visibility & Accountability

One of the biggest challenges in project management is just making sure everyone knows where things stand at any given time. Remember that a project is an interconnected series of tasks, so when one person is working on something, it can impact what another person is working on.

There’s nothing worse than when Bob (who is making no progress) says, “I’m waiting on Judy!” and Judy says, “I’ve been done for two weeks, Bob!”

Project management software makes everything visible so you’re not caught in between Bob and Judy and everyone else. They can all see what’s happening and (more importantly) you all can see where delays are happening. There’s nothing more satisfying than holding a project meeting and pulling up the software in front of everyone to see who’s holding things up. A little public shaming can really light the fire beneath people.

You can also attach documents and have conversations about the project within the project itself—that way, everything lives together in the same place. You’re not going back and forth with 125 emails and 50 slack messages and multiple project folders on multiple drives.

Archive Completed Projects

Last but not least, you can archive your completed projects so you’re not looking at them every day, but they’re still accessible if you need them. I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve done a project thinking it was a one-of-a-kind type of thing, only to find later that I had another project exactly like it. There’s no need to reinvent the wheel – I can just go to the archives and pull out the old project and use that as a template.

Drawbacks of PM Software

Now let’s talk about the complaints.

Project management software isn’t for everyone and it might not be for you. In my experience, the biggest complaints all fall under the same broad umbrella, which I will label generically as – “It’s a lot of work.”

This is true. There’s no denying it. Depending on the software you choose, the learning curve can be very steep. This is why you should test different systems out and see what intuitively feels the most natural for you. I’ve stuck with Asana for so long because I find it very user-friendly. But I’ve also invested a lot of time into learning it.

Don’t expect to learn everything overnight. Once you start using a system, you’ll want it to do certain things in a certain way, and you’ll have to figure out how to make that happen. That’s the learning process in action. It can be slow and tedious when you first start, but over time, it gets easier and faster.

Along the same lines, any software is only as good as its data. You’ve heard it a million times: garbage in, garbage out. So you have to make sure that anyone using the software is following best practices. I’ll do an entire separate video on that topic in the future.

But for now, the most important thing is that people ARE consistently using it. When a system gets out of date, it becomes less than useless. It actually becomes a burden because now you have to go in and clean it up and invest more time just to get it back to baseline.

And this brings me to the final complaint I hear, and that is around team compliance –how do you get people to actually use a project management software? Most people are really busy, they have established work habits, they don’t like learning new technology and they don’t necessarily want to use a new software. For all of these reasons, I typically recommend that you start by using the software yourself rather than trying to get the whole team on it all at once. Once you’re really comfortable with it and you can show people how it works and the benefits, they are much more likely to be interested.

But even then, it’s probably still gonna be a challenge. If having the software is important to you, you might have to accept the ultimate responsibility for keeping the system up-to-date. You can still refer people to the system when they have questions about the status of a project or the deadline for an assignment. That way, they get comfortable looking at the system and they know it’s a trusted resource even if they aren’t actively updating it themselves.

So that’s it for the pros and cons! If you’re still interested in exploring Project Management software, you can get my free downloadable worksheet to help you understand your needs and evaluate how well different options might match them.

The post The Pros and Cons of Project Management Software appeared first on Eat Your Career.

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My colleague has an uncanny ability to come up with process improvements for, it seems, just about anything. I know that having that ability helps make you valuable and seen as an employee. What can I do to become better skilled at this? I just feel like my brain doesn’t work in that same way. Is there a trick to it, or is it just ingrained in some people?

This is a great question! And it’s wonderful that this person identified, “Oh, I have a colleague who is making improvements to processes, and that seems like a really valuable skill I would like to hone myself.”

I think you’re right that it can be very natural for some people, less natural for others, but it’s very learnable.

The first thing I will say, just so that we’re all on the same page, a process is just an established way of doing something. We have processes across the board throughout our work. You have a process for how you manage meetings. You have a process for how you run certain types of reports, a process for how you create presentations, a process for how you handle certain requests. So processes exist all over.

How we improve processes is through, first and foremost, awareness. Because a process is an established way of doing something, it turns into routine, and routines inspire autopilot. Autopilot means you stop paying attention. You’re just doing things the way you’ve always done them because that’s the way you’ve always done them. And in order to start seeing opportunities for improvement, you need to get off autopilot and really reconnect. Be aware of what you’re doing and why you’re doing it that way.

One way to do that is to document processes. Through the documentation of a process, you become hyperaware of it. You really think through every single step of it. And a lot of times then the the places where the process doesn’t make as much sense as it should pops out. It becomes very, very evident because you’re really hyper focusing on all the different details of the process. So that’s a a great kind of first step is pick a process, document it, and see just what comes naturally from the documentation.

I will say the documentation of a process is in and of itself an improvement in the process Because any process that is undocumented lives in someone’s mind, and that is an organizational risk. So documenting it is a good first step for a number of different reasons.

The other thing that you’re really kind of training your brain to do is to identify friction. Friction is when a process slows down, when it gets harder, things get confusing, errors start happening. A lot of processes have friction in them, and we get so used to it that we develop workarounds or we just say, “Ugh. It’s just the way it is.” The goal that you’re trying to achieve here is to identify friction because that’s the thing you’re trying to fix with improvement. Improvement doesn’t have to mean that you throw it all out and start from scratch. Instead, it’s really asking, “Where can you make some small tweaks that will help reduce or maybe even eliminate friction in the different steps of the process?”

I like the terminology that doctors use where they talk about the lowest effective dose. They’ll talk about with the medication, what’s the lowest effective dose? The dose that’s gonna have an impact, but it’s the lowest amount. That’s kind of what you want with the process improvement: the smallest thing that’s going to have the biggest impact on the process. That’s what we’re looking for. You’re not trying to make these huge changes all at once.

Just ask yourself, “What can I do to reduce friction?” You could print that out, put it up on your your cubicle wall or your office wall, and just have that be a mantra that you’re repeating to yourself, looking for friction and finding ways to reduce it. That’s the goal of process improvement.

Kristen says, “Gosh. It sounds a lot better to say I’m good at process improvement, and the truth is I’m lazy and looking to make this task as easy as possible.” But isn’t that the truth? That is what process improvement is. You’re looking to streamline it. Let’s make it easy. Let’s take the pain out. We all want that.

The post How to Train Your Brain to Spot Process Improvements appeared first on Eat Your Career.

If so, you’re not alone. Most people who operate in a support capacity experience this frequently. It’s one of the more complicated and uncomfortable dynamics of the support role.

Maybe you’re coordinating a leadership initiative, or organizing a rollout, or overseeing a cross-functional project where nobody directly reports to you. Still, you’re expected to make sure deadlines are met and deliverables are completed.

But you can’t rely on formal authority to make any of that happen.

This is where a lot of people start softening their communication without even realizing it, saying things like…

• “Can you do me a favor…?”
• “Whenever you get a chance…”
• “Sorry to bother you…”

You start treating legitimate work requests like personal favors because you know you’re not technically someone’s supervisor.

But here’s the important thing to remember:

If leadership has trusted you to coordinate a project, manage a timeline, or oversee the execution of something, then part of your role is to make sure people follow through on their commitments. You are communicating on behalf of the initiative and the leadership behind it, not simply making casual requests. You are not inventing authority for yourself. You are a representative of the leader and their authority.

This simple but powerful mindset shift can completely change the way you communicate.

Stop Sounding Like You Need Permission

Remember: When you delegate work, you’re not imposing on people. You’re coordinating responsibilities that are already connected to organizational goals.

Instead of this:

“Just wanted to see if you might have an update when you have time…”

Say something like this:

“We need the finalized report by Thursday so it can be included in next week’s leadership review.”

The second version sounds calm, organized, and clear. It’s not aggressive, but it’s not apologetic either.

People respond better when expectations sound normal and established rather than hesitant or overly softened.

Context Helps People Prioritize

People tend to be far more responsive when they understand why something matters.

If you delegate a task with no context, it’s easy for someone to mentally place it behind everything else competing for their attention.

But when you connect the request to a larger outcome, priorities become clearer.

For example:

“We need your team’s numbers finalized by Tuesday because the executive budget review is Wednesday morning.”

Now the task has visibility, timing, and organizational importance attached to it.

You’re helping people understand what else depends on their contribution.

This becomes especially important when you are coordinating across departments where everyone already feels overloaded and they don’t necessarily know how one thing impacts another. Context helps people decide where your request fits among competing priorities.

Follow-Up Is Part of Delegation

This is the part I think people struggle with most. Assigning a task once is easy. Following up when someone misses a deadline or stops responding is where things get uncomfortable, but it’s part of managing the situation. Note that I’m not saying “micro-managing.” Following up with people is NOT the same as micro-managing; it’s just managing.

Stop thinking of follow-up as an annoyance or inconvenience and start treating it as a vital part of the job. Leadership has entrusted you to successfully coordinate and execute the work, and follow-up is an essential part of that.

Try saying something like this:

“Checking back on this since we need the finalized version before Friday’s meeting. Where do things stand?”

This is a simple and direct request for a status update.  The goal is to maintain accountability without being overly aggressive. You are reminding people that they have made a commitment and you’re relying on them.

Visibility Strengthens Authority

One reason delegation becomes difficult is that work and communication are too fluid.

Someone agrees to something verbally in a meeting. Another person assumes someone else owns it. A week later, nobody is aligned on deadlines or responsibilities.

The more formal and visible you make the work, the easier accountability becomes.

That might look like:

• documented action items
• shared timelines
• meeting recaps
• ownership trackers
• status update reports
• clearly assigned deliverables

These things reduce ambiguity for everyone involved and make follow-up feel less personal because you’re referencing documented commitments.

Instead of this:

“I feel like this should have been done by now…”

you can say:

“This is still listed as pending on the project timeline, and we need it completed before budget approval.”

The conversation stays rooted in reality, not feelings or imperfect memory.

Sometimes You Need to Escalate

No matter how organized you are or how effectively you communicate, there will always be people who fail to meet their commitments. This can happen for a variety of reasons and it’s worthwhile having a conversation to find out what’s going on. But if and when the situation becomes unmanageable, escalation may be necessary.

A lot of people avoid escalation because they associate it with conflict or punishment. But think of it as operational transparency.

Leadership can’t help resolve issues they don’t know about.

The key is to keep escalation focused on facts and impact.

For example:

“We’re still waiting on the compliance review from James, and the delay may affect next week’s implementation timeline.”

That keeps the focus on the issue, the timeline and the consequences, not personal frustration.

The calmer and more organized you stay during these moments, the more credibility you build.

Effective delegation without direct authority is not about sounding powerful. It’s about communicating clearly, following up consistently, and managing expectations professionally so that people understand the work is going to be tracked until it gets done.

When you do these things consistently, people begin taking your requests seriously. Not because they fear consequences from you personally, but because they respect you. They understand the work is being actively managed and tracked, and they don’t want to let you down. THAT is true influence and credibility. And over time, these things become their own form of authority, far more powerful than some fancy managerial title.

The post How to Work with Borrowed Authority: Effective Delegation as a Non-Manager appeared first on Eat Your Career.

It can look a lot like ordinary stress on the surface. You may find yourself unusually irritated by small inconveniences. Tasks that once felt manageable suddenly require enormous effort. Your patience gets shorter, your focus slips, motivation disappears. Even small or positive changes can start to feel like an overwhelming burden.

Sound familiar? If so, you’re not alone. We probably all feel a touch of it right now.

The problem is not necessarily change itself. Contrary to popular belief, most people don’t dislike change; it’s the adaptation that causes exhaustion.

• We love new technology that makes our lives easier but learning it is a challenge.
• We love living in a new house, but the process of moving is a pain.
• We love the new job, but struggle to get used to all the new routines.

Adaption requires huge amounts of energy. Constantly changing means operating in uncertainty and continuously recalibrating. New expectations, new systems, new priorities… Your brain never really settles in before the next disruption arrives.

Change fatigue is what happens when the disruption caused by change becomes greater than your ability to absorb it. In other words, your adaption muscles are depleted. This is not a sign of weakness! It’s a natural outcome in our modern world and it shouldn’t be ignored.

The Two Ways to Reduce Change Fatigue

If change fatigue happens when disruption outweighs capacity, it stands to reason that there are two options for dealing with it:

1. Decrease the disruption of the change, or
2. Increase your capacity to deal with it

Think of disruption as the amount of chaos you’re being asked to process, while capacity is the amount of physical, mental, and emotional energy you have available to handle it.

Sometimes you can do BOTH (decrease disruption AND increase capacity) but sometimes, you can only do one or the other.  That’s okay. Even small adjustments can help overcome change fatigue.

Decreasing the Disruption

You’re probably not in control every change happening to you or around you, but you can still reduce how much disruption reaches you personally.

Sometimes resilience is not about absorbing more chaos; it’s more about reducing your exposure to chaos. We can do that by creating more stability and predictability and reducing demands where we can.

That might mean:

• Reducing the scope, pace or complexity of the change
• Postponing nonessential parts of the change or other projects/commitments
• Delaying some changes until timing is better
• Simplifying outcomes instead of trying to optimize everything
• Breaking large changes into smaller, more manageable pieces
• Reducing the number of competing priorities
• Lowering/adjusting expectations for what’s reasonable
• Narrowing your focus (temporarily) to reduce information overload
• Avoiding unnecessary multitasking

People often underestimate their ability to impact timelines, expectations and workloads. Asking for clarity and pushing back against unreasonable demands is part of being an active participant in change. Reducing disruption is often about creating more manageable conditions for adaptation, even when you don’t have total control.

Increasing Your Capacity

When people feel overwhelmed by change, the instinct is often to just push harder. But constantly forcing yourself forward without recovery eventually shrinks your capacity.

Expanding your capacity requires time for restoration. That might look like:

• Protecting your sleep and recovery time more intentionally
• Reducing unnecessary decision-making (or batching decision making)
• Asking for help sooner rather than later
• Creating energizing routines that bring consistency
• Clarifying what actually matters most right now (Hint: it’s not everything!) and where your energy actually needs to go
• Talking through stress with a trusted advisor instead of carrying it silently
• Giving yourself permission to not adapt perfectly
• Redistributing responsibilities in other life areas

One of the most helpful things you can do during periods of intense change is stop expecting yourself to function normally. That sounds obvious, but many people never make that adjustment mentally. They continue holding themselves to the same standards, same pace, and same emotional output while everything around them is in transition.

Of course, that’s exhausting and unrealistic.

Another important shift involves acknowledging that life and work need to be paced strategically together. When one is demanding enormous adaptation from you, consider postponing major changes in the other. Not everything can or should be done all at once.

Change Fatigue Compounds

One of the most difficult things about change fatigue is that it accumulates gradually.

You deal with change after change. Adapt more and more. And then suddenly, it feels like one more thing will break you. But it’s not about that one thing; it’s the compounded weight of everything you’ve been carrying for a long time.

People cannot remain in a permanent state of disruption without feeling the consequences.

Sometimes the most productive thing you can do is not to demand more resilience from yourself. Instead, it’s to stand back and remember the two-sides of the formula: disruption and capacity. What can you do to reduce one and increase the other?

Change fatigue is not a sign that you’re failing. It’s a sign that adjustments are needed.

If you’re interested in learning more about effective change management strategies, consider joining the upcoming Change Championship Learning Lab. Learn more and sign up here. 

The post How to Overcome Change Fatigue appeared first on Eat Your Career.

This is the essence of what it means to be resourceful. Instead of waiting for help to arrive or relying on someone else to tell you what to do, you simply figure it out.

Resourceful people don’t shy away from the unknown. They sit with the problem, pull it apart, look for clues and test possibilities. They may still ask for help, but not before they’ve made a serious attempt on their own.

This process of “figuring it out,” is an essential skill that expands your professional acumen far beyond the task at hand. It builds self-sufficiency and self-confidence. It proves, to you and others, that you can connect the dots and think for yourself. It is the foundation upon which you can build a powerful professional reputation. Without it, career advancement will always be an uphill battle.

Some people are born naturally resourceful. Others learn it early, either through structured programs or because life demands it. For many of us, myself included, it’s a skill we develop later.

If you’re looking to expand your skills in this area, the following strategies will help.

Work the Problem Yourself

Before you ask for help, spend time trying to make sense of what’s in front of you.

This doesn’t mean spinning your wheels for hours. Just give yourself enough space to form an initial point of view.

What exactly is the issue? Where does it show up? What have you already tried?

Even a rough attempt is useful because it gives you something to build on.

You’re not trying to avoid asking questions. But you always want to come into the conversation with context. You want to be able to say, “Here’s what I think is happening, and here’s what I’ve tried so far.”

This approach changes the dynamic completely. You’re no longer asking to be rescued; you’re collaborating.

Research with Intention

Much of the time, answers are easily accessible if you know where to look.

We’re working in an environment where more information is at our fingertips than ever before. A quick search can provide detailed explanations. Internal files and past work often hold examples you can reuse or learn from. Online forums are full of people documenting the exact problems you’re trying to solve. And if you need help thinking something through, AI tools can help refine your approach.

The gap isn’t access. It’s initiative.

When you run into something you don’t know how to do, the instinct to immediately ask someone else might be strong. It’s faster in the moment. But it also short-circuits your ability to build this skill.

A more resourceful approach is to pause and ask: what can I find on my own first?

That might mean running a few different searches until you land on the right phrasing. It might mean digging through shared drives or old projects to see how something was handled before. It might mean reading through a few conflicting answers and figuring out which one actually applies to your situation.

And again, if and when you do eventually ask for help, you have proof of your efforts. You can say, “Here’s what I found, and here’s where I’m still stuck.”

Over time, you get faster at finding what you need and better at filtering what’s useful.

Look for Patterns

The more problems you work through on your own, the more you start to recognize familiar patterns. At first, everything feels new. But over time, you notice that many issues share the same underlying structure.

A breakdown in a project might come back to inconsistent management practices. A recurring error might point to the same root cause, even if it shows up in different ways.

When you run into something unfamiliar, it helps to ask: what does this resemble?

You may not have an exact match, but even a partial connection can give you a starting point.

After you solve something, take a minute to think about what kind of problem it really was. This small habit builds a mental library you can draw from later.

Practice Trial and Error

Resourceful people have a bias for action.

Waiting for complete certainty usually leads to delays. Trying something, even if it’s not perfect, gives you information you can use.

The key is to be intentional. Make one change at a time so you can see what effect it has. Pay attention to the outcome, then adjust.

Done in this way, it’s not guesswork. It’s a process of narrowing in on what works.

People who are strong at figuring things out tend to move through this cycle steadily. They don’t get stuck after one failed attempt, and they don’t overreact to early results. After all, “error” is an inherent part of “trial and error.” You have to stick with it long enough to learn from what you’re doing.

Shift Your Default Response

When you don’t know how to do something, your first move matters.

If your default is to look for someone to tell you what to do, you limit how much you develop your own capability. If your default is to engage with the problem (understand it, research it, test your thinking) you build something much more valuable.

You don’t need to get all the way to the answer on your own every time. Just meet the problem halfway.

Resourcefulness comes from repeated practice in small, everyday situations. Over time, you will become known as someone who can be trusted to handle things, even when the path isn’t obvious. And, more importantly, you’ll trust yourself to work through whatever shows up next.

The post How to be Resourceful: Building Your “Figure It Out” Muscle appeared first on Eat Your Career.

Think of it like this: You essentially have two broad routes for advancement:

• Internal advancement – staying with your current employer.
• External advancement – moving out of your current organization and into a different one.

Within each of these options, there are many further options to consider. So, let’s unpack this even more.

arrow forward iconInternal Transition: making a lateral move (i.e., maintaining the same or similar level and career path) to a different group or area of the business.

When this makes sense:

• You are happy with your organization and have established a strong internal reputation you can leverage.
• You want to expand your skillset and make yourself more visible to different stakeholders.
• You don’t want to confine yourself to your existing group’s growth trajectory.
• You’ve identified a work group where the opportunities and requirements match your interests and talents.

arrow forward iconInternal Promotion: earning a higher-level role within your same work group (typically with a title change and pay increase).

When this makes sense:

• You’ve already built credibility, relationships, and domain expertise where you are.
• You can show both a track record of past success and potential for future growth.
• Opportunities for growth are established, accessible and align with your long-term goals.

arrow forward iconInternal Change: moving in any direction (typically down or lateral) inside your organization but with the intention of changing career paths.

When this makes sense:

• You want to shift your path to something brand new and can leverage your internal relationships and reputation to get a foot in the door.
• You have identified transferrable skills that will help you be successful in this new role.
• You’ll have the support you need (management, mentorship, resources) to learn on-the-job.

arrow forward iconExternal Transition: making a lateral move (i.e., maintaining the same or similar level and career path) to a different organization.

When this makes sense:

• The internal career path is limited, or you’ve reached a career ceiling.
• You want a culture change, new industry, or fresh challenge that your current company can’t provide.
• You’ve defined your long-term goals and have new clarity on what kind of environment or role will support it.

arrow forward iconExternal Promotion: earning a higher-level role within a new organization (typically with a title change and pay increase).

When this makes sense:

• Any of the reasons listed above (for external transition).
• You’re able to leverage your experience and network to earn growth opportunities in an organization where you don’t have a track record.
• You’re willing to stretch into a growth position while also learning a new organizational culture and team.

arrow forward iconExternal Change: moving in any direction (typically down or lateral) at a new organization but with the intention of changing career paths.

When this makes sense:

• Any of the reasons listed above (for external transition and external promotion).
• You want to shift your path to something brand new and need an opportunity to get your foot in the door.
• You have identified transferrable skills that will help you be successful in this new role.

Here are some questions to help you decide which path is best for you:

• Where do I want to be in 2‑5 years? Does my next step (internal or external) align with that vision?
• What capabilities or experiences do I still need? Which path offers them most directly?
• What’s the disruption cost? (Internal usually means an easier transition and lower risk. External often means higher risk, possibly higher potential reward, and a more difficult transition.)
• How comfortable am I with change/risk? Do I thrive in new environments or prefer continuity and making deeper impact?
• What’s the culture and structure like in each scenario? Does the organization/team support the kind of growth I want?

Career advancement isn’t a one‑size‑fits‑all journey. Sometimes the most impactful move is to stay right where you are today. You can sharpen your skills, grow your influence, and build a track record with your current team. Other times, shifting sideways or stepping outside opens entirely new possibilities. As you weigh your options, focus on your long‑term vision and consider the skills you want to build and the kind of impact you want to have.

The post Rethinking Career Advancement: Navigating Internal and External Options appeared first on Eat Your Career.

While these terms often get used interchangeably, they each serve a distinct purpose. Understanding the differences can help you choose the right kind of support to get you from where you are to where you want to be.

Career counseling involves working with a trained practitioner to reflect on past experiences, behaviors, and patterns, some of which may have been detrimental or limiting. This work is usually focused on reviewing your history to gain insight into why certain choices were made and how those patterns might be reshaped moving forward. Counseling can help you understand what’s been holding you back so you can move forward with more clarity.

Counselors often have formal therapeutic training and may be licensed. If you are dealing with particularly complicated personal and emotional dynamics related to your career, a counselor may be better suited for addressing these things productively.

Career coaching is forward-focused and action-oriented. It centers on helping you clarify your future vision and guiding you to create a plan to get there. A coach doesn’t tell you what to do; they help you arrive at your own conclusions, solutions, and strategies through structured guidance and thoughtful questioning.

Coaches may be trained in certain techniques and certified, but that’s not technically a requirement. (As a coach myself, I strongly suggest you seek someone who is certified and experienced.)

Mentorship is built on a relationship with someone who has walked the path you want to take. Mentors share from experience and offer perspective, advice, and encouragement rooted in a career you admire. It’s not about structured development; it’s about gaining insight from someone whose achievements, reputation, or skill set you respect.

Mentors don’t need credentials. Their value lies in their experience and perspective. Look for someone who “has what you want,” in terms of skills, character, career, etc.

Common Use Cases

When to seek career counseling:

• You’re stuck in recurring patterns you don’t fully understand.
• You want to explore past decisions and behaviors to better inform your future.
• You’re experiencing emotional resistance or fear around change or career growth.

When to engage a career coach:

• You’re ready to define a new goal or career direction.
• You want accountability, structure, and tools to take meaningful steps.
• You’re looking for a thought partner to challenge and support you as you grow.

When to look for a mentor:

• You admire someone’s career path and want to learn from their experience.
• You’re seeking real-world advice, encouragement, and networking support.
• You want perspective from someone who’s achieved what you’re aiming for.

How to decide what you need

Here are some guiding questions to ask yourself as you consider the options:

• Do I need to better understand my past or take clearer steps toward my future?
• Am I searching for insight, action, or inspiration?
• Do I feel stuck emotionally, strategically, or motivationally?
• How structured do I want the relationship to be?
• Do I need credentials and training or perspective and relatability?

Of course, these roles aren’t mutually exclusive, and you don’t have to pick just one. You can work with multiple people in multiple capacities if you want. Understanding the different roles helps you choose wisely and ensure the partnership actually meets your expectations and helps move you forward.

The post Finding the Right Support: Counseling vs. Coaching vs. Mentorship appeared first on Eat Your Career.

While the transition between stages isn’t always exact or predictable, this framework offers a helpful lens through which to view your career progression. It reminds us that we don’t have to do everything all at once; each stage has its own purpose, priorities, and payoffs.

Learn: The Lifelong Foundation

We often associate the learning phase with early-career experiences, and for good reason. The start of your career is full of steep learning curves, new skill development, and lessons that come quickly and often uncomfortably. But the truth is, learning never stops being essential.

Even when you’re well into your later years, learning is what helps you keep your competitive edge. It’s how you’re able to stay relevant and continue adapting to new demands. No matter how far along you are in your career journey, it’s important to stay intellectually curious. When learning stops, growth stops.

You may begin your career in this stage, but you should never really leave it behind.

Earn: Leveraging Your Expertise

The “Earn” phase is where you begin to see the returns on your investment in learning. You’ve gained experience and (hopefully) developed competence and confidence. You’re contributing meaningfully, making a solid income, and enjoying the fruits of your labor.

Earning isn’t just financial. It’s also about credibility, influence, and choice. In this stage, you’re able to shape your work more intentionally. You know what you’re good at and what brings you fulfillment, and you have more power now to build your work around those strengths.

If you’re lucky, this stage can last for a long time. And while it can be deeply satisfying, most people begin to shift into the final stage as they begin to contemplate late-career growth and even retirement.

Return: Building Your Legacy

At this point, you’ve probably achieved many of your career goals. People might now come to you for guidance more often. Perhaps you’re starting to think more about impact than achievement.

This is the “Return” stage. It’s not retirement (yet). It’s not slowing down. It’s the season where you give back through mentoring, teaching, advocating for others, and creating opportunities that didn’t exist before. You’re sharing your hard-earned wisdom with others who are in earlier stages.

You draw on everything you’ve learned and earned, and you start to reinvest it back into your professional community. Typically, this stems out of desire to leave things better than you found them and to leave a legacy – something that lives on far beyond you.

And of course, you’re still learning and earning in this stage too. But your motivation changes. It’s less about climbing and more about lifting.

Understanding the stage you’re in can bring a sense of clarity and purpose. But more importantly, it can help you focus on what matters most in the moment and let go of unrealistic expectations and comparisons.

The post Learn, Earn, Return: The Three Phases of Career Growth appeared first on Eat Your Career.

So, what do you?

For some of you readers, this scenario is all too real. So, let’s address it.

First, I want to acknowledge that this is a very disorienting place to be. You don’t want to leave; you just don’t want to stagnate.

When upward mobility is not available, but your ambition and curiosity are still alive and well, there are several options to consider.

Redefine Growth

If you’re only measuring career progress by title changes and salary bumps, it’s time to widen your lens. Growth can also mean deepening your expertise, expanding your influence, or taking on challenges that stretch you in new ways, even if they don’t come with a traditional promotion. (This is the difference between progression and advancement, which you can learn more about here.)

If you’re really happy where you are, you might want to focus on finding other ways to progress.

Maybe become a mentor for less experienced colleagues. Take ownership of interesting projects. Volunteer for a committee to work on a long-standing organizational challenge. These activities might not come with immediate rewards, but they can still help you build leadership skills and develop depth and breadth of expertise.

Reshape Your Role

If you’ve been in your role for a while, you likely have a unique blend of institutional knowledge, practical skills, and people insight. Use that mix to evolve your current role in the direction you want. Propose initiatives that align with business goals but draw on your specific strengths and interests. This process is commonly referred to as career crafting.

This isn’t necessarily about taking on more work. It’s about shifting your work to focus more on things that energize you and add value. Maybe your role can expand even if your title doesn’t.

Build Sideways, Not Just Up

Career development isn’t just a vertical game. Consider lateral moves that give you exposure to different teams, organizational areas or business functions. These transitions can build agility and perspective, and they make you a stronger candidate for future opportunities that might not exist yet.

You can also look outside your organization for professional growth that complements your current job. Speaking engagements, industry panels, writing, and training can build your reputation and satisfy your drive for growth without requiring a job change.

Understand What Matters Right Now

Before making any decisions, check in with yourself. What are your priorities in this season of your career? At certain times, stability might outweigh the need for advancement. In other seasons, the drive to grow, lead, or earn more might take priority.

Be honest about what you value most right now and what you’re willing to sacrifice to get it. Greater responsibility might mean longer hours or more stress. A title bump might mean relocating or leaving an organization you love. Knowing what matters most to you now will help you make decisions with clarity rather than obligation. Too many people feel a constant desire to advance not because it’s what they want, but because it’s what they think they SHOULD want.

Recognize When It’s Time to Move On

Sometimes, despite your best efforts, there’s no room left to grow where you are. That’s just reality. Ceilings exist at every level. If advancement is a priority for you and you’ve exhausted your options internally, it may be time to look externally.

Leaving a job you like doesn’t mean you’re disloyal or selfish. It means you’re aligning your career path with your goals. Just be sure that any move you make is a thoughtful step toward something you truly want.

To be clear: you don’t have to leap into a brand-new field or chase a title elsewhere to keep your career growing. There are often options right where you are, even if they aren’t traditional “upward” moves. However, if and when you’ve outgrown the space you’re in, it’s okay to seek more. Give yourself permission to move on.

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