How to mix and mingle your way through the holiday season

By Annette Richmond

We all know that networking is one of our most powerful business tools. One of the things most of us forget is to continually nurture our network even when things are going well. The holiday season is a great time to catch up with old friends and make new ones.

Why are the holidays so great? When do you have a better opportunity to rekindle relationships? This is the perfect time of the year to get back in touch with people just to find out how they are doing. Make sure you take the opportunity to reconnect with friends and family.

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Don't Let Social Networking Negatively Affect Your Career

By Eric Richmond

I’m sure you’ve all read the stories about people being fired for doing something dumb with their social media profile. Like the guy who calls the office, too sick to come in, and then posts photos of himself drinking at a baseball game with a bunch of friends on his Facebook profile. Or the woman who tweets about how she’s going to get a promotion as a result of an upcoming merger when the news isn’t supposed to be public.

You didn’t think your online life was private did you?

Today’s technology makes it possible to share virtually everything about yourself instantaneously. Pictures. Thoughts. Locations. While social networks are a great tool for keeping your family and friends abreast of what’s happening in your life, that same information is available to prospective employers. All they have to know is where to look for it.

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What you can and can’t expect from your college roommate

By Susan Fee

"I knew my roommate before we lived together. She seemed really nice, so I assumed we'd hang out together or talk. But it's nothing like that. She's a lot different than I thought she'd be. Now, we can barely stand to look at one another."

-Jamie, age 18

Do you ever look at your roommate and wonder, "Who is this person?" "What am I doing here?" "How can I get out of this mess?" Whatever your situation, it's probably not what you expected, especially if you've always had your own room and private bath and have never lived in such close quarters with anybody. It might have sounded cool to room with a foreign exchange student at first, until you realized you had nothing in common. Or maybe you played it safe and roomed with your best friend, but now you're living with tape down the middle of the room. Maybe you agreed to share food only to find out your roomie never buys any!

When you expect one thing and get another, it can be a shock. It can also be disappointing because you were prepared mentally and emotionally for something else. Even the greatest of relationships have conflict. Expecting to have disagreements is a lot different than assuming you'll never have a fight. The bigger the gap is between what you expected and the unpleasant reality of the situation, the higher your stress level. You can bridge that gap by learning to adapt your expectations. That doesn't mean you have to lower all of your standards, but you may have to adjust a few.

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Carole Martin is a coach with over 18 years in Human Resources Management. She is an acknowledged expert in the use of behavioral interviewing techniques.

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Style expert Bridgette Raes is the author of Style Rx: Dressing the Body You Have to Create the Body You Want and the president of the NYC based style consulting company for women, Bridgette Raes Style Group.

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Annemarie Cross is a multi-award winning, triple certified Professional Resume Writer, Career Management Specialist, Speaker, and Author of 10 key steps to Ace that Interview!

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Annette Richmond, MA, is founder and editor of career-intelligence.com and The Career Intelligencer. She is author of several publications, ebooks and interactive workbooks on career management.

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