My dear friends, colleagues, clients and students:
Wow! What a response! We were overwhelmed by the e-mails we received about the recent CareerQuest Newsletter issue dealing with Spirituality and Career Counseling. The comments were primarily positive but we were very surprised that there was only one negative response to such a controversial topic! Some of these comments are:
"Fabulous and courageous."
"You can definitely add me to the list of leaders in the field who are people of great faith!"
"I believe that my work has meaning because God has equipped me, led me, loved me, encouraged me, and allowed me to touch others...who in turn, find the equipping, leading, loving, and encouragement to do what they are meant to do in this world."
"Found your article very interesting in that my daughter (a graduate student) and I were having this very conversation during the holidays, regarding spirituality, work and life."
"Your newsletter is interesting to read and inspirational."
"I have been addressing spirituality in my career counseling sessions for over 10 years."
"I have taught a monthly workshop which deals with spirituality issues including the purpose of life, God's gifts, and the uniqueness of each of us."
"I enjoyed your monthly newsletter and had my husband read it too."
"Thanks for your truly inspirational newsletter."
"My spirit led me to read your unusual article."
"I enjoyed your article tremendously. Many thanks for sharing!"
"Remove me immediately from your mailing list! Now you have gone too far! Religion and spirituality belong at home, not at work! I have lost all respect for you!"
This issue has a very thought-provoking essay, a real gem, by Damon Montal, a friend and colleague. It also has the usual feature,
Food for the Soul.
- Careers and Spirituality: Applying Spiritual Values to the Workplace (Damon Montal)
- Food for the Soul: The Four Chaplains (Don Sutaria)
Career Doctor Don Answers Your Questions appears as a regular feature in the International Society for Pharmaceutical Engineering (ISPE) - New Jersey Chapter newsletters. The September/October 2006, the November/December 2006, the January/February 2007, and the March/April 2007 newsletters can be viewed
here.
Many of you have asked us if we provide counseling over the telephone and
through e-mail, as well as face-to-face counseling. The answer is 'yes' to both
questions. Pre-paying with credit cards is very easy. Just a simple click on our
website at
www.careerquestcentral.com. You can also view past issues of this newsletter on the
Archives page.
CareerQuest is very proud to be a member of Career Counselors Consortium (CCC), which celebrates its tenth anniversary this year, as a top Internet source for finding career counselors and career coaches. Visit them on the web at
www.careercc.org.
The Gateway Regional Chamber of Commerce in their monthly newsletter
Inside Business, is planning to publish an article in their June 2007 issue,
Did you know...Is it hard to discover your Passion and Calling In the World of Work? by Don Sutaria, Founder and President of CareerQuest.
CareerQuest was interviewed recently by
Money Magazine. It deals with the first 10 minutes that a candidate has for making an impression in a successful interview. This special article by the noted journalist Ismat Mangla will appear in the July 2007 issue. We will excerpt these comments in a future issue of the
CareerQuest Newsletter.
Keep your feedback coming. We sense from your comments that many of you enjoyed our May 2007 issue,
Dating and Dancing During Job Search, and even called it one of the best and unique articles. Thank you. Please feel free to share these newsletters with your friends, remembering to give us the due credit.
Until we meet again through the magic of e-mail,
Peace! Love! Shalom!
Don Sutaria, MS, IE (Prof.), PE
Founder, President & Life-Work Coach, CareerQuest
Careers and Spirituality: Applying Spiritual Values to the Workplace
by Damon Montal
Remember the major headline scandals in our national newspapers just a few years ago with Enron, WorldCom and Martha Stewart taking center stage? There has been a lot of talk about the lack of ethics and values in the marketplace today. The real question is, "How would we as individuals fare with our own
personal integrity under the lens of the spiritual microscope?"
According to
The Kabbalah, when we die our soul passes into a "divine court" where we are held accountable for all of our deeds. Of all the possible questions that could be asked, the ancient sages deduced that the first question posed to us was "Were you honest in your business dealings?"
On the surface, this question seems to ask if we cheated our clients in money matters or with deceptive practices. In actuality, this question goes way beyond the obvious. It also deals with did we
cheat our employer?
Did we cheat our employer by not providing a full day's work for a full day's pay?
Did the previous evening's activities leave us too impaired to conduct our work properly?
Did we cheat our employer by playing computer games, holding personal phone calls, or engaging in lengthy conversations with co-workers on company time?
Did we pad our expense report or "borrow" office supplies or inventory for personal use?
Did we cheat our co-workers by stealing their credit or intellectual property?
Can we safely say we didn't commit gossip by the water cooler and thereby subtly assassinate our co-workers' character and standing in the company?
"How would we as individuals fare with our own personal integrity under the lens of the spiritual microscope?"
As employers, we need to ask ourselves, did we treat our staff fairly and without exploitation or abuse?
Did we provide for our employee's consideration both humanely and ethically during times of downsizing and other corporate crises? A poster boy of corporate responsibility is Aaron Feuerstein, of Lawrence, Massachusetts. Feuerstein kept hundreds of employees on payroll with full benefits for an extended period of time when his knitting factory burned to the ground in 2000. This act of generosity allowed his employees the opportunity to make plans without undue duress, at a great personal expense to himself.
Most religions have a concept of praying with intense focus and concentration and not just mouthing the words in some routine and dispassionate fashion. To be spiritually alive means to be fully present in the moment. The Buddhists refer to this state as mindfulness, and they have elevated this to an art form. In
Zen and the Art of Archery, the author speaks of the archer's concentration being so focused and intense, that the target and the archer become one. We can extend this concept of mindfulness to everyday activities in our lives, including our careers. Are we absorbed in our work, doing the ordinary in an extraordinary way; or are we merely working as if in a fog, detached and uninvolved in the process or in the outcome of our actions?
Corner offices, important titles and large paychecks could make practicing humility a little challenging. It is the enlightened person who understands that he/she is not their title, their paycheck, or their station. All of these "things" are external from us; they are borrowed, and could be taken away at any time. Being humble is the consciousness that no one person is any more important than anyone else. The world does not revolve around I/me. Moses, Jesus and Mohammed were the greatest of all biblical figures, yet they were the most humble of all human beings.
We live in a world where we are all interconnected. Being humble means our role is to serve and help each other. In business, this has direct implications. Successful salespeople know that when they put their client's needs before their own, they win business. Managers who are concerned about their staff, win their loyalty and respect. Being humble places the needs of other people first, and through our service we get our needs met in the process.
Spirituality is what and who we are.
If being humble is the mindset, then loving-kindness is the application. There is just too little loving-kindness in the workplace today. When our co-workers experience setbacks, do we feel compassion for them or do we secretly gloat? Loving-kindness means having compassion for your boss when she/he is being difficult. It is understanding that she/he may be experiencing stress and is just trying to make payroll—maybe it's even your payroll that the boss is trying to make. If there were just a little more compassion in the office, then maybe there would be just a little less office rage.
A central core of spiritual values is the concept of charity. We should be generous with our resources. When we go to work, we are not only earning money to support our families, but we also work with an understanding that a portion of our earnings is intended for charity. One of the highest forms of giving, is the giving of our time. Using our professional skills and applying them as a volunteer at a worthy charity is a great way to provide service that can help repair the world, while doing some important networking.
Spirituality is not something that we practice selectively on certain days of the week and not on other days; or in some places and not in others. Spirituality is what and who we are. It is integrated into our very fabric. Incorporating more spiritual values into the workplace is good business. It is also a way of having a successful career without losing our soul in the process.
Food For The Soul:
The Four Chaplains
Don Sutaria
February 3, 1943: The ship
Dorchester went down in the freezing waters of the North Atlantic, during the Second World War.
On February 2, the Dorchester was within 15 miles of the coast of Greenland. A German submarine was detected on the sonar readings. Hans Danielson was the Captain of this ship. He had
instructed his crew to sleep in their clothes and life-jackets that night because of the imminent danger. Sadly enough, his orders were ignored and most slept in their underwear. Very early in the morning of February 3, the
Dorchester was hit "head on" by two torpedoes fired from the submarine. The immediate impact was to kill 100 men in the hull of the ship and the ship began to take on water and start to sink rapidly.
In the last few moments of the ship's existence, while chaos swirled around them, four Chaplains began handing out jackets to the crew who were abandoning the ship. Guess what? The ship ran out
of life-jackets. When the four Chaplains saw this dilemma, they took off their own life-jackets and handed them to the needy crew. Together they sacrificed their last chance for survival, ensuring that at least four other soldiers would have a chance to be saved.
Many of the surviving soldiers reported that as the ship was going under the water they saw the four Chaplains, arms locked together, and holding onto the railings, praying, singing, and giving strength to the men in the water. Then, in only 27 minutes after the torpedoes struck, the
Dorchester went to her watery grave, taking these four brave men down with her. It started with 920 people on board but only 230 could be saved.
Rev. George L. Fox, a Methodist minister, from Vermont; Rabbi Alexander Goode, from Pennsylvania; Rev. Clark V. Poling, a Dutch Reformed Minister, from Ohio; and Father John Patrick Washington, a
Catholic Priest, from New Jersey; these four had met while attending the Chaplain's School at Harvard in November of 1942. They started serving on the
Dorchester on January 23, 1943.
On July 14, 1960, by an Act of Congress, the United States authorized the "Four Chaplains Medal." The Star of David, the Tablets of Moses, and the Christian Cross are shown in relief on the back of the medal.
At Temple University in Philadelphia, on February 3, 1951, they also dedicated "The Chapel Of The Four Chaplains." At the dedication ceremonies President Harry S. Truman said: "This inter-faith shrine will stand through long generations to teach Americans that as men can die heroically as brothers, so they should live in mutual faith and good will."
(Adapted from two websites, www.virtualnewarknj.com and www.homeofheroes.com.)
Don Sutaria is Founder and President of CareerQuest (formerly New Life Career Counseling), located in New York and New Jersey. CareerQuest is also mentioned in "What Color is Your Parachute?" Sutaria is a consultant to individuals and various corporations, offering executive coaching and career management services. He has developed unique methods for capturing jobs in the new millennium. He appeared on a Phil Donahue TV special on unorthodox methods of job hunting. Known as "Career Doctor Don", he has been quoted in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Salt Lake Tribune, The Star-Ledger, The Union Leader, WorkingSmart, SmartMoney, Fortune, and on WINS and WOR radio. He specializes in counseling of international professionals, Generation X (age 20-29), career changers, freelancers, consultants, mid-career executives and people over age 50. He really believes that your career is a pathway to your soul.
Mr. Sutaria has over forty years of diversified industrial and management experience, complemented by training in career development and hands-on experience in career advising. He is an international cross-cultural trainer. He has also served on committees of several organizations, and conducted courses, seminars and symposiums at Columbia University, New York University, Nyack College, Alliance Graduate School of Counseling, Rutgers, and Stevens Institute of Technology. He is a member of the Association of Career Professionals International and the Career Counselors Consortium.
Don earned his MS degree in Management from Kansas State University, an IE (Professional) degree in International Management and Personnel Relations from Columbia University, and obtained New York University's postgraduate Certificate in Adult Career Planning and Development.
