The Positive Pathfinder

“Curiosity” seems to be popping up all around me. Recently one of my LinkedIn connections, Michael Zeidenberg posted these thoughts about curiosity: “Saturday's thought: They say, curiosity kills the cat. But, I believe taking the time during the day and to focus on being curious about people, events and ideas will only lead us to greater personal growth. Besides, you never know what conversations will lead to learning something new, a new friendship, a new job, or a business adventure. Cheers to embracing the concept of curiosity as its good for the soul!” - Michael Zeidenbery At work we organized an educational meet-up for job seekers called “Curiosity is the secret weapon for job seekers 50+.” I know that it’s not obvious from the topic headline as to what this meet-up was going to be about. I gather that people who came to our meet-up were curious. Some of our meet-up attendees were newcomers and some of our meet-up attendees were older. By being...

At work we have been organizing a series of educational meet-ups. All 6 of us pitch in with these meet-ups. My task was to arrange speakers. I wondered how I was going to bring in speakers. One day in 2016, I was looking at my LinkedIn feed and found Rakesh Kana’s story of how he and his wife (both newcomers to Canada) were having a difficult time finding a job.  They were using all the traditional methods that you can think of to find a job, but to no avail.  They decided to take a novel approach to their job search by wearing sandwich boards and handing out their resumes to passersby while standing in front of Union Station in Toronto.  They were successful in landing jobs. Rakesh wrote a LinkedIn post about his and his wife’s job search experiences.  You can read their post here . I was inspired by Rakesh’s post and I wrote a post that referenced them.    Flash forward a couple of weeks ago. I messaged Rakesh on L...

I “lost” my corporate HR job in 2013. But since that time I “found” myself. I found that I am an open and caring person. Recently I received a LinkedIn invitation from someone I did not know from another country. I noticed that we had a connection in common. Another commonality was that we are both Human Resources professionals. I pressed “accept” and accepted the invitation. We messaged each other for awhile on LinkedIn. We talked about some stuff that you might talk about at a live networking event. He mentioned that he was coming to Canada. And moving to Mississauga. That presented a barrier to me in terms of setting up a coffee meet-up. I live in Toronto and don’t like to drive on the highway to go to Mississauga. He told me where he was staying. I looked at the map (I’m old school sometimes!) and thought if he can get himself to Mississauga Square One, I could take a bus from the Islington subway station that would take m...

I get to organize free educational meet-ups at the Ontario Society of Senior Citizens Organizations.   T he intended audience are unemployed job seekers who are either 50+ or a newcomer to Canada. T he meet-ups are an opportunity for attendees to come to our office (in Toronto) to network and to learn an idea or two from our invited speakers. Our first meet-up was on February 28, 2017. At the time our way to get the word out about our meet-ups was to pick up the phone and to personally reach out to community agencies. I’d say: “Would you be open to distributing our poster to your network?” I’d follow-up with an e-mail and attach our poster. Some community agencies responded with a non-response. Some community agencies wrote back to say that they distributed our poster to their network. Some community agencies were open to engaging in a phone conversation. Since February 28, we’ve held meet-ups on March 10, April 20 and May 1...

I subscribe to Henrik Edberg’s blog called “ The Positivity Blog .” Today’s blog post was called “One of my absolute favourite ways to handle criticism.” I found that intriguing and I clicked on the e-mail. Henrik chooses to handle criticism by thinking that “everyone has the right to their own opinion.” I don’t like the word “criticism” – you can have “harsh criticism” and you can have “constructive criticism” and they both have a negative connotation to me. Instead of “criticism”, I like the word “perspective.” “Perspective” has a more neutral ring to it. Recently at work I submitted a piece for our company newsletter. My editor wanted to make changes. I looked carefully at each of the changes that were suggested. My editor wanted to change the title of the piece. I thought the title that my editor suggested was better, so let’s go with my editor’s suggestion. My editor wanted to say something that was not in my voice. I sugg...

I take the subway to and from work. Last week in the subway I noticed a guy sitting in a two-seater. The seat next to him was open. I could have sat down, but I’ve been sitting all day, and so for health reasons I'll stand for the better part of the trip. The guy pulled out his smartphone and started listening to a music video. Without headphones. The music wasn’t that loud, but it was loud enough that I could tell he was listening to a rap song. I shifted my gaze and looked up to my left at the poster on the wall. The poster was reminding subway riders to wear headphones if they are listening to music on their smartphones.  I thought it was ironic that I noticed the poster as I don’t have a smartphone. On the other hand, for the person who it was meant for, he hadn’t noticed the poster (which was inches away) and he was playing music on his smartphone without headphones. I looked around in the subway car.  No one else w...

My friend George Khalife shared an elevator story with his network this week. George stepped into an elevator.  He was listening to music on personal earbuds (or headphones).  A fellow elevator passenger noticed the blazer he was wearing and remarked:  “Love that blazer!, what does the symbol mean?”  George removed his earbuds in anticipation of a conversation and replied:  “Thanks! Not sure to be honest, but it looks cool.” This initial exchange was followed up with an introduction of names, where they work, an exchange of business cards and the possibility for future networking! When I read George’s update on LinkedIn, I had a feeling that I may have experienced my elevator story on or about the same day that George shared his elevator story.  Last Tuesday it was the end of the day and the elevator stopped on the 4 th floor where I work.   I stepped into the elevator.  A gentleman was already in the elevator from an upper ...