Our habits can make us or break us. Yet, as humans, we either pay little attention to them, or if we do change them, we often lapse back into our old habits. Just ask anyone who attempts New Year’s resolutions! We’re not completely to blame. Why is that? So, does that mean we’re off the hook? And how does any of this help us build a better career?

Being successful at anything, but especially in a career, does not involve a total focus on self. First, none of us can do anything without help from other people. If people aren’t aware you exist, how can they be of help to you in your career? Better yet, a good question is, if you go around connecting other people, what’s the benefit for you?

We’ve all heard the phrases, the excuses, and the sarcastic remarks surrounding articles and people who tout the reasons for and benefits of delegation….and how many times did you roll youreyes! Ask any parent, administrative assistant, professional, entrepreneur, or manager at any level about the dilemma entertaining delegation can cause. Why is this?

Just hiring top talent – a job in itself – is not enough. Retention is paramount and career development is a main component in winning the retention game. That may be easily achievable if you are a Fortune 500 company. However, smaller organizations, including non-profits face a seemingly insurmountable challenge with retention and creating a viable career development program.

Not only is creating a solid career path and succession program a challenge, recent societal cultural changes help compound this issue. According to Millennial expert, Chris Butsch in his upcoming new book, Those Damn Millennials, “There are alternatives to unfulfilling positions or careers, and Millennials know it; it’s become easier than ever to build our own boats.” So, a generation that makes up 53.5 million people in the workforce couldn’t care less about your prestige positions or gold watches; and you can kiss company loyalty goodbye. Further complicating retention issues for small businesses is, of course, the lack of resources that just require dipping into deep pockets for a larger organization. So here are some ideas that can help.

Building a better career is important to people who want to get ahead and create a better life for themselves and their families. Careers come in all shapes and sizes. Trades people have a career, administrative assistants have a career, real estate agents have a career, CPAs have a career and on and on. Electing not to get an MBA or a Ph.D., does not mean you do not have a career. You most certainly do. For organizations, creating career path programs is an important strategy regardless of the industry or the size of your organization. How can your company be career strategic?

“The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.” Henry David Thoreau. Mr. Thoreau’s quote applies to anyone who has no values, who values unimportant physical items or concepts, or people who may have values, but fail to honor them. Our values, affect every part of our lives, including work. For many of us it is not that we don’t have values, but that we don’t honor them in our work lives. This doesn’t mean that we are dishonest at work or are engaging in illegal activities, but that the work we do, does not manifest our values. Why is this and how can we make a change and build better careers around our values?

Recently a colleague suggested that he doesn’t bother reading cover letters from job applicants as he feels they hold no value. To him, communication may be a dead art, but cover letters can provide great insight into a candidate’s qualifications, skills, and attributes. If a job seeker is smart, the cover letter is a valuable tool to landing that next job. In fact, according to Career Quest “communication skills consistently rank at the top of the list of soft skills hiring managers are looking for in new hires.” How can candidates and employees use communication for success?

Often when conducting training and coaching sessions, even at supervisor, manager, director, and vice president levels, many people feel powerless at work. Indeed, a title alone doesn’t necessarily guarantee you a higher level of power or greater influence. Yes, it’s true, authority does and always will have the final power leverage in almost any given situation. But that does not mean you have no power or influence.  So, how can you gain power and influence and why is it important in helping achieve your career goals?

There are already skill gaps today and the future will only increase that gap. Technology is, of course, the most obvious. It isn’t that technology is taking jobs, but also creating them faster than we can keep up. There is already a skill gap in areas around managing tasks and people that too will grow as there will be increasing needs for cognitive skills such as critical thinking, problem solving, writing, and analyzing. Social emotional skills have a high gap, but an increasing demand. This includes skills such as continuous learning, advanced communication, and empathy. Is your organization getting ready and staying ready for the future jobs it will need?

The title of this article asks the question about the connection between career building and high performing teams. Here’s the answer, in a word, everything. Some may think of building one’s career as an egotistical endeavor as in the old trifecta of power, prestige, and profit. However, career building is important for both the organization and employees. Here’s why.

Businesses of all sizes provide some form of perks, benefits, or resources to their employees. The larger the organization, the more benefits, and perks. This is a tougher challenge for the small business owner. However, to compete, they must provide some attractive incentives.  If a company can afford expensive benefits and incentive packages, great. But there are benefits that are budget friendly, such as a career path program. Of course, while the benefit of a career path program is obvious for the employee, this begs the question, what is in building a career path for the company and how do you do it anyway?

Keeping employees happy, engaged, and on the payroll can sometimes be challenging. Keeping up with trends takes effort. But keeping up with chaos can prove almost impossible. Yet these are real time demands every business is encountering. While all these challenges can and do crop up at any time, the recent chaos has brought about more and bigger changes in a shorter amount of time. What does this mean for career and team building and how are the two connected?