Whether you have listened to previous episodes or you are just finding us now, welcome! This season is all about “opportunity”. Each week, we will focus on a key skill you need to shine bright and navigate your career through all the opportunities in front of you. How to find your moment, ask for help, set your goals, and be in control of your path with confidence and how to put it into play. Every episode has specific and actionable tools and advice. You deserve to shine bright in work and in life!
We have some amazing guests this season who all have similar stories of finding the opportunity when really they wanted to dive deeper into their current path or exploring a new career path. It's amazing the journey these folks take and I'm honored they share it with us
I’m Karen Weeks, the CEO & Chief Shine Officer (aka transformation coach) at KDW Coaching, the host of the Shine at Work podcast, award winning culture leader (currently leading the People team at Ordergroove), a speaker and published author. My purpose is to help career-oriented humans get unstuck so they can shine bright in business and in life. And I know how that feels, I navigated a career from theatre & the arts to HR (with lots of twists and turns there) to expanding my career into coaching as well. I live in NYC with my husband and furry babies!
As always, please consider subscribing, leaving a rating and review and sharing this podcast and the whole series with others. We do this podcast to help spread the word that everyone can get unstuck and find the thing that brings them joy in their careers. If our guests can do it, you can too!
Welcome to the Shine at Work Podcast! On this show, your co-hosts Karen and Dan will shine a light on your job search so you can land a role that lets you flex your strengths and progress your career in an environment you actually look forward to working in each day. From creating a stand-out resume, to confidently negotiating your salary, to finding your footing as a new manager, you can expect to hear actionable advice to help you shine your brightest in your role.
Karen D. Weeks is the CEO and Chief Career Coach of Shine at Work Coaching. She has over twenty years of HR experience, including as CPO at Ordergroove.
Dan Carr is a Shine at Work Career Coach with over a decade of recruiting experience helping high-growth startups expand with top talent.
Hello my friends welcome to the shine at work podcast. I'm your host Karen weeks. As a transformation career coach and culture and people leader. My goal is to help career oriented humans get unstuck, so that they can shine brighter in business and in life. I believe that you deserve a career that lights you up. Because spoiler alert, it also impacts how bright you shine in your life. This season. Each week, we will focus on a key skill that you need to shine at work, and inspirational stories on ways to navigate your career. Because I know what it feels like when your light is dim. I made a career change from theater to HR, and now expanded to coaching. And at times in my life, I had to take a look deep inside to see what was most important, what made me shine bright, and make adjustments along the way. It's possible. I did it, my guest did it. And I help others do it every day. I hope you walk away from each episode not just inspired, but with some actionable advice. And I hope that you find it so valuable that you subscribe to the podcast, leave a review and tell your friends because we all deserve to shine bright in our lives specifically at work. Okay, let's jump in into this week's episode. Hello, my friends. Welcome to season four of the shine at work podcast. I can't believe we've done four series, where we have really celebrated people who wanted to make career changes, who have made career changes, the impact that had on their lives, and the ability that it gave them to shine the brightest in both at work and at life. And the thing that is so exciting is that, yes, it's inspirational. Yes, it's cool to hear these stories and the roles that people have found, and the impact it had. But it also has really helped people realize, I too, can do this. And this is how this is actually how I get to do the change I'm looking to make this is how I can actually find a new job, talk about the skills that I've had, identify something new and actually go out and get it. So thank you, for those who have come back who have listened to a bunch of the different episodes. If you're finding us for the first time, welcome. My name is Karen weeks. I am the CEO and chief shine officer at KW coaching, aka I'm a career coach, as well as an HR leader and people and culture champion, specifically for tech startups. I'm also an author, a speaker, and of course, host of this podcast. All of that is to say that my passion is to help people get unstuck in their careers, so that they can shine bright in both business and in life. What does that actually mean? Well, I work with individuals trying to navigate their careers trying to figure out what's next? Am I happy? Where I am? Do I need to make a change? How do I get that promotion. And then I also work with new managers who are making that transition from Rockstar individual contributor to results driven, human focused managers. I've been doing it for 20 years in my HR career and still do it to this day with teams that I work with directly. And now I'm thrilled to also offer it for folks, one on one with managers and other groups as well. So not to get too woowoo. Cuz I know everybody feels a little different about manifestation in the universe and all of those things. But I will share, I really found a purpose in this work. Because I know what it's like to make a career change, to be a new manager to want that promotion, but not sure how to advocate for yourself, to feel like you're on a path that's not actually genuine to who you are in to feel overwhelmed in a new job. I have been in your shoes. And as I mentioned, for the last 20 years, I've partnered with people to help them with their careers. So the point of this podcast is to let you know you are not alone. I started this podcast at the very beginning of the pandemic in 2020. I was hearing more and more people tried to re evaluate what was important to them to think about what their career was going to look like. Whether it was forced on them and they were laid off there is really, really tough times. Or to be honest just to go through some reflection time as we were all reconsidering what was important to us as our lives were turned upside down. As the world was turned upside down as this country here in America was turned upside down for the pandemic for politics for social injustice, all of the things that were going on in 2020. And I wanted people to hear a voice that said, you can do this, you don't have to stay where you are. If this doesn't feel right for you. This is how you can make a change because I needed that voice. So 20 plus years ago, I was a theater professional. I was a stage manager. I worked in Hollywood for a while when I thought that maybe the business side of the arts was a better fit. Theater was my life. I was that kid that had posters of musicals on my dorm room wall that had CD mixes and tape mixes of different musicals that I loved that could literally Sit with a friend and sing the full of Vita score top to bottom, I was that person. And it was my life. And so when I realized that it wasn't going to be my livelihood, I was so lost, not just because of the skill set that I didn't know how to leverage moving forward, but also because it was such a part of my identity. And so I work with folks who not only find the path forward, that's right for them, again, internal, external, whatever that path may be. But also to give yourself the permission to figure out what looks next, to give yourself the permission to think about, I am more than just this thing I used to be yes, even the theater kid is more than just being a stage manager, I have so many other things going on in my life. So I figured out the things I liked, most were helping people with their careers. That's what I was doing with the talent agency with the actors, and creating a shared experience for people when they came to see a show. This was long before we called it employee experience, or any of the cultural things that are now talked about within work environments, it was still very much HR. But I knew there was something there that if we worked all this time and spent all this time in our jobs, we deserve to be happy, we deserve to feel successful. We deserve to feel like we were part of community within that work. So I've found HR in all these years later, my HR career has taken a lot of different journeys from different specialties and training and development and compensation and benefits to more general roles like HRBP, which is the partner to different organizations within a team all the way to leading in HR ops function. So we were sort of the the middle of the wheel for an HR team and everything that they needed to support them to now being the head of HR for a tech company, and building that culture from the ground up. So even within HR, I've had lots of different opportunities. I've seen peers get promoted when I wish I had, I saw jobs disappear and not know what was going to be next for me, I moved cities, I moved industries, all trying to figure it out. And by the way, along that running in parallel, I try to figure out my life. You know, I started professionally in my early 20s, I made the shift in my mid 20s. By the time I got to my mid 30s, I looked around going this is the life I actually wanted to lead. I was living for other people's expectations what I thought I was supposed to be in my mid 30s. And so I had to let some of that go so that I could shine brighter in my life, not just in my career. I mean, when I turned 40, I jumped out of a plane because I wanted to skydive. And I always thought it'd be cool, but thought that wasn't a smart thing to do. And I said eff it, this is what I want to do. So I did it. And it was such a fun experience. So the point of all of these stories, is because I want you to find the path that's right for you. But that's hard. I had to have helped along the way through advisors, mentors, family members, my father, who's been in business his whole career, I turned to him and said, So what do I do in corporate world that I could do that i from theater, I needed that advice along the way. So that's what I'm hoping both the work that I do individually, the work that I do, and organizations, and the work that I do through this podcast, is to help you realize you can make the change. But you have to find those moments, you have to dig up everything inside of you and be able to say the words out loud, I need help figuring out what is next. And what is next can be a variety of different things. And we will talk about all of those things. It's not just about making a career change, it could be figuring out how to get that promotion, it could be figuring out what is my longer term goals. So what can I get out of this role that will help set me up for the future roles. It could be I'm in a brand new role, I work with a lot of new HR folks that are actually trying to figure out the HR strategy for their organization. And as the first time HR person, they want to make sure they're setting themselves up for success. You could be a new manager. And so it's amazing. You've taken this great next step in your career, but how the heck do I actually be a manager, it's a whole different job than what it's been your whole career. So with all of those different avatars in mind, and all the different humans that are listening to this conversation, and the conversation that we have moving forward, the theme of this season is opportunity. We're going to talk about how you can feel more in control of the path that's in front of you or the path that you want to put in front of you build the confidence to take these steps. Create an energizing plan so that you're really excited about everything that you're working on. And find the support to help you along the journey and seize the opportunity to make a change to shine at work. It's great if you have the idea, but you actually have to put it into play. How do you put it into play? Every episode? We're gonna have actionable advice, tips and tools that will leave you yes inspired because obviously that's a first step while also continuing to share this career stories of our guests and a very specific topic and key takeaways of things that you can apply in your life. Because when you are not happy at work, you are also not going to be fulfilled In life, and you deserve to shine in work and in life. I hope this podcast helps you find a path to shine your brightest, and I can't wait to share Season Four with you coming soon. Thank you so much for listening to the shine at work podcast. If you enjoyed today's episode, please subscribe and leave a review. Leaving a review takes just a few minutes and truly helps other people find the podcast. If you want to learn more about how I work with people to help transform their careers, and shine brightly in their lives, let's connect. I work with amazing humans one on one to help them make a career change, go for that promotion, set career goals and build a plan for success for a new job. I also lead group programs for new managers that are navigating this huge change in their careers and entrepreneurs who are building their teams for the first time. If any of that sounds like it could be helpful for you. You can email me directly at Karen at karendweeks.com or message me through Instagram LinkedIn or my website. I just want to give a final shout out as always to astronaut go home for our music and Novice studios for making the podcast come to life. Until next time, remember that you can and deserve to shine at work