To Work or Not to Work Over the Holidays If You Have an Office Job

Do you plan to work during the holidays? If you have an office job, you’ve heard about coworkers taking time off to spend with family and relax. Big projects are winding down or postponed to next year. Clients aren’t booking meetings and have automatic email messages.

How about you? Are you one of those who are taking time off for the holidays? Or will you be working throughout the last two weeks of December?

Many don’t take time off for different reasons. Some decide not to take time off because of their workload. Taking time off will put them further behind in January. 

If you work from home, it’s easier to keep working when many are on holiday. You’re not walking into a half-empty office and getting spooked when you hear noises when you know that you’re the only person in the immediate area. Working from home pre- and post-December is like any other work day.

Working during the holidays is a great time to get caught up and get ahead. You’re not flooded with constant emails and DM notifications. Your calendar isn’t filled with meetings. Last-minute projects aren’t being piled on your desk. You can finish up the old ones without playing catch-up to start a new year.

It’s also great for mental and physical health to avoid working during the holidays. You can get caught up on sleep and spend more time with friends and family. If you dislike your job or your workplace, the holidays are a great time to recharge and get away from a strict schedule of meetings, deadlines, and 9 to 5. A break from battling rush-hour traffic. 

If you have an office job, what are your plans for the holidays? Do you plan to work or take time off?

Pre and Post Holiday Goals

December can be a very busy time of the year. Parties to attend for work and parties with friends and family. Shopping for gifts and time spent decorating the house for Christmas or other holidays at this time.

Businesses are either picking up speed or slowing down, depending on their products or services. Some businesses have been busy selling seasonal gifts. Others have said they have noticed a severe drop in sales compared to the previous year. Companies may be wrapping up projects or putting a hold on them until the new year.

December is the perfect time to think about what you’ve accomplished this year and what you want to accomplish next year. What are your goals for the upcoming year? With talks of a recession in 2023 and alarming inflation rates, it’s hard to predict what the future will bring.

As December comes to an end and January looms ahead, take stock of what you have and grab onto the dependable things in your life, whether it’s family and friends you’re grateful for, loving pets, a solid income, hobbies or health that keeps you going… and get ready for the next chapter!

What To Do If Your Career Takes A Wrong Turn

Regret is a powerful motivator.

This year brought some unprecedented changes to our lives. We are seeing a sudden rise in food prices, and rent and mortgage rates, but shortages in items that we used to see in abundance at the store.

People say that salaries are about the same while many are looking for work. Some are looking for a second job or another gig to supplement their income.

Times are tough. You might be thinking of changing careers or changing to a similar job with a slightly different skillset, but you don’t want to spend thousands of dollars on courses. What can you do?

If you’re thinking about changing careers in order to earn a higher income and keep up with rising costs, consider these tips:

  • Assess your financial situation. How much do you have in savings? How much debt? Should you borrow money to pay expenses while you work to get your career back on track? It may be wiser to take the first job you find so your expenses are paid while you continue to search for better opportunities.
  •  Look for options in which you can develop your skills while working. Can you use your current skillset to get a job that gives you opportunities to develop new skills that are a stepping stone to a different career?
  •  Build a professional support network. If you look around, you’ll find some positive online communities that share career resources and job opportunities. It’s also a great idea to attend in-person networking events and get to know people who can introduce you to companies or tell you about job openings.
  • Work with a mentor. A career coach or someone with more experience than you in an industry or field can guide you. They can point out what you need to work on, steer you away from making potential mistakes, and share important wisdom with you.
  • Build your skillset. Take free or paid courses that build your skills and qualifications. Read books. Join mastermind groups. Share your knowledge with your portfolio. 
  • Build a portfolio. Share your expertise online. Blog or post articles or advice on your website or LinkedIn profile. This approach is especially useful if you don’t have actual job experience in the field you’re interested in. For example, if you’re interested in a career in graphic design, you can start building a portfolio of your work on your own website.

Changing careers is tough. Through a lot of investment in yourself and creating networks, it’s possible to change careers with effort and time. 

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Dangerous Jobs: Real Match Girls

Jobs and Tech

On a cold winter night, a little girl lights her matches to keep warm. She sacrifices everything just to see the fantastic images created by the flame of the matches. You may have heard of “The Little Match Girl” by Hans Christian Andersen, a story of a girl who can’t go home until she has sold her matches. She isn’t the only match girl in history, however. In the same century, “matchstick girls” suffered terrible health issues manufacturing matches.

In 1845, Andersen published his tale of a girl who is too afraid to go home and be beaten if she doesn’t sell her matches on the street. Shivering from cold, she lights one, then another, and another as she sees comforting visions of a Christmas tree, food, and finally, her late grandmother. The story was an insight into the horrible conditions of the poor. 

In the 1800s, people worked in horrible conditions: long hours in factories in unsafe and unhealthy environments. Both children and adults worked in these places. In 1888, the “matchstick girls” made news headlines with a strike that brought attention to the dangerous conditions of the factory where the matchstick girls worked.

They worked long hours, starting at 6:30 in the morning for little pay. Some girls started working at these factories as young as age 13. Thousands of people labored at these factories in terrible conditions to manufacture matches, working with machinery after receiving insufficient training.

The women worked 14-hour days in London and were exposed to deadly phosphorous vapors from the white phosphorous dipped onto the tips of matches. The toxic phosphorous caused health complications such as “phossy jaw” that caused the jaw to rot. The purpose of the strike was to improve working conditions, but it was decades later before white phosphorous was banned from public use.

Today, wooden matches are made entirely by machines. The process is safer for the workers compared to a century ago. When you think about it, a match is such a small item, but it has more impact than just creating a flame.

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Could You Be Sued for Saying a Common Word or Phrase?

Do you have a favorite phrase that you like to say a lot? Now imagine liking your favorite phrase so much that you would want to prevent other people from using your preferred words by trademarking those words!

Celebrities and companies have trademarked words and expressions that you’ve heard in movies and advertisements. Some of these words are so common that you might wonder if you could get in trouble with the law for innocently saying an everyday word or phrase.

Interestingly, it is possible to trademark commonly used words and phrases, such as apple. Apple, the company, can’t trademark “apple” if they’re selling fruit products. But they are selling devices such as computers and phones, not edible products related to fruit. 

Similarly, you can’t trademark the word “pencil” if you want to sell pencil products. But you could trademark “pencil” if you wanted to sell, for example, sofas or gardening tools under the name “pencil.” For more on trademarking common words, check out this post.

You might be surprised that an expression as common as “Merry Christmas” is trademarked. With Christmas around the corner, you might wonder if you, as a business owner, can write “Merry Christmas” on your custom-designed T-shirt that you’re selling on Etsy. Or if you can write Merry Christmas on the homemade card you’re going to give to your family.

Fortunately, you can write “Merry Christmas” on the products that you are making because you’re wishing someone a certain feeling. However, you can’t use “Merry Christmas” on certain food products, decorations, cigar products, and types of clothes… if you’re using them as a type of trademark for your business.

So you don’t have to worry about infringing trademarks on common, everyday words unless you’re thinking of creating and marketing a product using a trademarked word or phrase. 

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