Lesa Edwards is a Certified Executive and Leadership Development Coach, Certified Job Search Strategist, and one of fewer than 25 Master Resume Writers in the world. In this podcast, she shares her expertise with the job search and managing your career. She periodically brings on guests that supplement her zone of genius.
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What stress is (and isn't), and - as a leader - how it affects you and your team.
8: Expanding Your Network Strategically
Episode 8
Wednesday, March 26, 2025 • Duration 21:57
Seven tips for strategically building and expanding your network.
7: How to Improve Team Collaboration (Part 2 of 2)
Episode 7
Wednesday, March 19, 2025 • Duration 14:35
Tips 7-10 of how to improve your team's engagement, cohesion, and results.
6: How to Improve Team Collaboration (Part 1 of 2)
Episode 6
Wednesday, March 12, 2025 • Duration 22:17
Whether you lead a team by your position or by your influence, there are strategies to improve collaboration.
I want to give a shout-out to the sources I used for this episode: Harvard Business Review, ir.com, and slack.com.
I should start by saying that some teams come together for a specific purpose, while others are more permanent. These strategies will benefit collaboration in any type of team scenario.
While I’m confident that my brilliant listeners know the benefits of team collaboration, here is a review:
increased creativity and innovation
enhanced problem-solving
improved communication
increased productivity
strengthened relationships
better decision-making
I want to use the MBTI framework to talk about assembling a team.
-Benefits of a diverse team in how they take in information, make decisions, order their world, and interact with others.
-Diverse teams are more effective, if they figure out how to work together.
Let’s frame this as what contributes to a failed team – and the solution.
1. Assembling a homogeneous team, i.e. a bunch of “mini me’s”
Why this is a problem: Many managers make the mistake of hiring people who think and act like them, aka “mini me’s.” This leads to blind spots on the team when the members are similar in their backgrounds, education, and cultural perspectives.
The solution: Diversity in all its forms has been proven to provide a better result than a homogenous team. There are a lot of tools out there focused on DEI; you can ask your HR department for assistance in assembling a diverse team.
5: The Value of an Impact Inventory
Episode 5
Wednesday, March 5, 2025 • Duration 12:18
Also known as a "brag file," here's what to keep - and why.
4: A 40,000-Foot View of the Job Search
Episode 4
Wednesday, February 26, 2025 • Duration 22:09
Seven mistakes I see job seekers making - and the solutions.
3: How Long Will it Take You to Land a New Job?
Episode 3
Wednesday, February 19, 2025 • Duration 24:51
Greetings and welcome to episode 3 of The Exclusive Career Podcast! I’m Lesa Edwards, Certified Executive & Leadership Development Coach, Certified Job Search Strategist, and one of fewer than 25 Master Resume Writers in the world.
I found a graphic recently from LinkedIn where respondents had indicated how long it was taking them to land a new job.
I wanted to share these data with you – and give you five strategies to reduce that time.
Here’s what I know for sure after all these years doing what I do: Your job search will take longer than you expect. I find it fascinating to see where people’s brains go when their job search goes past its arbitrary expiration date – we’ll talk more about this a bit later.
I’m also fully aware that some of you may be holding out for bonus season before leaving your current position. The point, then, is “How can I make my job search take the right amount of time for me?”
The prompt from LinkedIn was as follows: “I have been searching for a new job for…”
5%: 1 week
16%: 1 month
17% 3 months
19% 6 months
12%: 1 year
22% over 1 year
I could slice that data in a lot of different ways, but let’s instead focus on those strategies to reduce that time.
Strategy #1: Don’t spend all your time on job boards.
If you listened to any of my previous podcasts, you’ll be familiar with this metric:
2: Your Professional Gaps - And How to Address Them
Episode 2
Wednesday, February 12, 2025 • Duration 19:50
Greetings and welcome to episode #2 of The Exclusive Career Podcast! I’m Lesa Edwards, Certified Executive & Leadership Development Coach, Certified Job Search Strategist, and one of fewer than 25 Master Resume Writers in the world.
Today, I wanted to dig into your professional gaps, and the options for addressing them. For the purposes of this episode, I’m coming from the approach that you already know what your professional gaps are.
What do I mean by a professional gap? Here are some examples:
-Written or verbal communication skills
-Public speaking
-Empathy
-The ability to coach
-Lack of success in hiring the right people
-Micromanaging – or not being strategic enough
These are just a few examples. What I want you to hear – loud and clear – is that we ALL have professional gaps.
The question, then, becomes how to address them.
1. Direct education/training/development.
From formal degrees, to certifications, to continuing education courses, there are longer-term and shorter-term solutions to a professional gap.
You also have less formal options, such as Udemy, Coursera, and LinkedIn learning – even seminars at professional conferences may fill the gap.
In my opinion, this is a cost/benefit analysis – how long will it take? How much does it cost - and will my employer pay for it? Do I need to receive the credential from the very best – or is good enough, good enough?
1: Welcome to The Exclusive Career Podcast!
Episode 1
Wednesday, February 5, 2025 • Duration 15:34
My previous podcast, The Exclusive Career Coach, has now evolved into The Exclusive Career Podcast! Today, I share a favorite strategy to help you spend sufficient time on Important, But Not Urgent activities.
As the team leader, be sure that you are treating everyone on the team with respect and openness – pay close attention to areas where you may be inadvertently showing prejudice against someone’s ideas, thought processes, or work style.
Your best asset as a leader is to think of diversity in its broadest terms.
2. Lack of communication / unclear communication / miscommunication
Why this is a problem: Miscommunication or ineffective information sharing can lead to misunderstandings, delays, and even employee conflicts. This can become increasingly common as teams become larger and more geographically dispersed
The solution: There HAS to be a priority on creating transparent and open communication channels. Over communication is important, using various media.
At your first meeting, determine how the team members prefer to be communicated with, and set out the guidelines for communication and teamwork. Make sure that whatever the team decides on is inclusive and accessible for every team member.
3. Clash of personalities and different working styles
Why this is a problem: Conflicts will arise when a diverse team comes together without some ground rules around respect, understanding, and a willingness to listen.
The solution: Consider team-building exercises, conflict resolutions workshops, and other group activities such as going as a group for a meal.
Appropriate onboarding of the team is especially important – consider getting with your HR or L&D team to facilitate this. What if your team has been together a while? You can “re-onboard,” using the opportunity to establish new ground rules.
4. Lack of a clear purpose for the team
This one is a close cousin of the point about communication.
Why this is a problem: Collaboration and engagement WILL suffer if the team members don’t have a compelling reason to participate.
The solution: It should be said that the first solution is to make sure the team actually DOES need to exist. Beyond that, make sure you can articulate a compelling vision for the team – and tie that vision into the larger organization’s goals and mission.
This can’t be a one-and-done thing, but rather expect to regularly revisit the purpose of your team – especially when you see engagement and the overall energy of the team waning.
5. Lack of tools needed for success
Why this is a problem: I learned a long time ago in my graduate work that, if you want to know what an organization values, look at where they put their money. If your team doesn’t have what it needs to be successful, it will be incredibly difficult to keep your team motivated and engaged.
The solution: Before the team meets for the first time, make sure you have secured the proper technology and other tools needed for success. If this isn’t your area of expertise, who can you turn to for support around platforms, software, hardware?
Also – don’t forget things like meeting space and refreshments (if in person)…little things that can go a long way. I know someone whose entire company is remote, and she receives regular “care packages” from the company with items that relate to what they are working on at the time.
6. Not celebrating success
Why this is a problem: When team members don’t feel valued, they may begin to phone it in and disengage. Further, if there are one-sided celebrations, certain team members may start to feel as though their contributions aren’t as important as others’.
The solution: Recognition, rewards, and shout-outs – depending on the level of achievement – can motivate employees to engage in teamwork and foster collaboration.
These recognitions should include a peer-to-peer system to recognize each other’s contributions.
It's essential not to limit celebrations to major project completions; setting milestones and commemorating even small victories can be equally impactful. These small wins help maintain momentum and motivation
If this is not in your wheelhouse, perhaps a few of your team members would love to get together to come up with a recognition program and process to present to the larger group.
One idea that I’ve found incredibly helpful is to ask each team member how they like to be rewarded.
Come back next week for #7-#10!
The Exclusive Career Accelerator is a transformational career coaching program that sets you up for success in your current role, in your next job search, and for the rest of your career. You’ll receive customized 1:1 coaching, job search support, and world-class marketing documents written by one of fewer than 25 Master Resume Writers in the world. To learn more or to schedule a consult, visit my website at https://theexclusivecareer.com/teca or email me at lesa@theexclusivecareer.com.
-If you are just out of college: 75% on job boards
-If you’ve been in the workforce for a while: 50% on job boards
-If you are at the senior or C-level: No more than 25% on job boards; preferably 0%
How much time should you be spending on your job search?
-If you are working full-time: 5 hours/week
-If you are unemployed: 30 hours/week
You may need to adjust those numbers slightly; the idea is to decide on a number that you can consistently stick with barring emergencies or unforeseen circumstances.
Pick your job boards, set up job searches that come to you daily, and then review those daily emails during passive time (think waiting for your Starbucks order or the microwave to beep).
Then set aside time twice weekly to respond ONLY to the jobs that meet both these criteria: 1) You are very excited about the position, and 2) You are at least 75-80% qualified.
Which leads nicely into Strategy #2:
Strategy #2: +1 Approach or don’t apply.
When you are applying online, you are meeting with the maximum amount of competition. The +1 Approach requires you to do one more thing in addition to just applying online like everyone else.
Implementing the +1 Approach as a guardrail means that you won’t permit yourself to apply for any jobs you don’t want to go the extra step for, because you are either not that interested in the job or you don’t think you are sufficiently qualified to be competitive.
This keeps you out of “doing for doing’s sake” and keeps you into more proactive action.
Strategy #3: That Hidden Job Market is real.
Depending on where you look, 70-85% of all jobs aren’t posted on job boards. There are numerous reasons for that, but let’s focus on what that means.
If you are only looking at job boards, you are missing as many as 4 out of every 5 jobs. Often, these “hidden” jobs are the best ones.
Enter networking. The flip side of the percentages I provided earlier is as follows:
-If you are just out of college: 25% of your time should be spent networking
-If you’ve been in the workforce for a while: 50% of your time should be spent networking
-If you are at the senior or C-level: 75-100% of your time should be spent networking
One of the things I work with my clients on is what networking activities make sense for their career goals; I also help them with the before, during, and after phases of networking and we set specific networking goals.
Strategy #4: Focus on what is in your control.
So many people measure their job search success by whether they received an interview request or job offer that day. These things are out of your control.
What IS in your control are the job search activities you decide ahead of time to engage in, as part of a comprehensive, proactive job search.
For example, let’s say you decide to spend 1 hour, twice a week on LinkedIn. You set aside this time on your calendar, and you include on your calendar what your deliverables for that hour will be.
For example:
-Find 3 people who work in the X department at ABC company and ask them to connect.
-See who has accepted a connection from me since [date of your last LI session] and thank them for connecting.
-Follow up with [name of 3 people] to ask them for a Zoom meeting to [include the goals for these meetings]
This is all doable within 1 hour. And when you accomplish those 3 things, reward yourself.
One more thing: before you finish up your LI session, write in the deliverables for your next session on your calendar.
Strategy #5: Mind your mind.
Those of you who know me would be shocked if I didn’t talk about the importance of your mindset during your job search.
Take for example the fact that you think your job search is taking too long.
You could be thinking:
“No one wants to hire me.”
“The job market sucks right now.”
“I’m too…[fill in the blank].”
None of these thoughts will energize you to continue your job search. You are likely to start phoning it in, such as only applying to jobs online.
What if, instead, you think:
“My job search is taking longer than I thought it would, and that’s okay.”
“Companies ARE hiring people like me.”
And my favorite, for obvious reasons:
“It’s probably my job search strategy…let me find a job search coach to help me.”
You could even go so far as to look up some data on the job market – to prove to yourself that people are getting hired, and companies are hiring.
Watch what you are thinking – about yourself, the job market, your marketability. It makes all the difference.
I want to wrap up by letting you know who I work with, and how I serve them. I offer a six-month, transformational coaching program for employed professionals who want to change jobs in the next 6 months-1 year. This program is called The Exclusive Career Accelerator.
My clients receive marketing documents written by me – one of fewer than 25 Master Resume Writers in the World, as well as job search coaching that can include interview preparation, job search strategy, networking skill building, leveraging LinkedIn, and salary negotiation.
In addition, we work on whatever may be holding the client back from achieving the level of career success they desire. They have received feedback from their current boss, a colleague, or their direct reports – or they have self-identified something they want to improve upon.
Examples of how I’ve worked with clients:
-Moving from micromanaging contract workers to becoming more strategic
-Shifting relationship with boss to be more productive and enjoyable
-Learning how to navigate the politics at a higher level
-Developing a strategy and the skillset to uplevel his executive presence
-Communication skills
The Exclusive Career Accelerator is a transformational career coaching program that sets you up for success in your current role, in your next job search, and for the rest of your career. You’ll receive customized 1:1 coaching, job search support, and world-class marketing documents written by one of fewer than 25 Master Resume Writers in the world. To learn more or to schedule a consult, visit my website at https://theexclusivecareer.com/teca or email me at lesa@theexclusivecareer.com.
2. Hire complementary team members.
One of the most important skills a leader can develop, in my opinion, is the ability to hire team members who aren’t “mini me’s” – people whose strengths and motivated skills are diverse and different from yours.
This way, you can delegate tasks and projects that don’t play to your strengths, while at the same time giving team members projects that they will enjoy, be challenged by, and grow from.
Win-win.
This really must start at the hiring phase – otherwise, it’s a bit like trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. Asking behavioral questions around their strengths and skills, and listening carefully to their answers, will give you important clues.
While tools like the MBTI aren’t to be used for hiring, they can be extremely beneficial once you’ve hiring someone to further understand their preferences. Of course, there are hiring tools specifically designed to help you make the right hiring decisions.
3. Identify work-arounds.
This can range widely depending on the gap, from strategies you can use directly to support you can ask others for.
For example, direct strategies could include developing the gap via volunteer work, seeking mentors who can support your efforts to develop the gap, and professional networking to learn how others have been successful in your gap area.
Indirect strategies could include negotiating upfront when you are offered the job to reassign a specific job duty or hire a contractor, the previously mentioned assignment to one of your direct reports, to researching the possibility of technology taking over the job duty, to questioning whether the job duty needs to be done at all.
Get creative, be collaborative, and try to approach this challenge as if it were someone else’s – how would you counsel them to address the situation?
There are important considerations when addressing a professional gap. Here are some suggestions:
1. Give yourself sufficient time to conduct your research.
Allow yourself to research potential credentialing bodies, seek out mentors, or delegate job duties. Be patient – but don’t let too much time pass.
2. Plan your time accordingly.
Deciding to take coursework or ramp up your networking efforts takes time – schedule it in and determine what might need to be pushed to the back burner.
This might include time for studying, travel, follow-up, research…think through all the components of the option you choose and plan time to complete each.
3. Step into a growth mindset.
Whichever option you choose, you will be facing a (possibly steep) learning curve, a mixture of hits and misses, and frustrating delays and missteps.
You have two choices here: You can decide you’re on the wrong path and beat yourself up, or you can decide you are learning and growing – and this is all part of the deal you signed up for.
Of course, there is the possibility that you have actually chosen a path that isn’t working for you for whatever reason, but tell yourself the truth – do you really need to make a mid-course correction, or do you need to double down on your original decision?
No matter what – beating yourself up is optional and DOES NOT serve you.
4. Surround yourself with support.
Perhaps you need to make sure your boss is onside with your plan. Does your significant other or family and friends know what you’re undertaking – and will they support you?
Naysayers have no place in your efforts to address your professional gaps – surround yourself with supporters who will tell you the truth in love.
