Ms. Career Girl is celebrating her first birthday this month!  I can’t believe how fast 1 year has gone by.  The blog started because, as a banker, I needed a creative outlet and had a passion for career development and personal finance.  I also noticed that every time I talked with friends, we were all stressed out about the same things: the uncertainty of being in our twenties, money and our jobs. 

I put these ideas into action via a plain white free Wordpress blog with a Googled image as the banner.  I am not a tech person by trade, so Ms. Career Girl and I have grown significantly over the past year.  Since I believe in celebrating small victories, let’s review.  For example:

·        I started using Twitter less than a year ago.  Now I’m totally hooked and have grown my following significantly.

·        After spending a few Saturday nights watching You Tube videos on how to do html and attempting to read “Blogging for Dummies,” I realized I probably wasn’t going to get smitten with the back-end of my blog. I decided to hire someone to help me make it pretty. I mean let’s be honest, if it took me so long to figure out how to unzip a file, this techy thing just wasn’t going to work out.

·        A whole new world of social media and the blogosphere emerged which I didn’t know existed- and I became fascinated with it.  I attended several social media events in Chicago and Milwaukee, and read books like Groundswell and PR 2.0 to learn everything I could.

·        I learned what happens when you blog while getting really personal about a bad situation and - and for me- that turned out to be my all time traffic record and brought me several opportunities to guest post for other awesome blogs.

·        I’ve built significant relationships through participating in social media.  I met my career mentor @johnhead and my graphic designer @leahdossey on Twitter.  I have had the opportunities to do freelance social media work, be quoted in books and articles through relationships I’ve built online. 

·        I’ve met some of my local social media icons in person such as @kellyolexa and @blagica!

·        One of my favorite moments this past year is when I sat down at a social media conference put on by @sohobiztube and introduced myself to the girl next to me, and @hollyegg says “Oh hey Nicole!  You’re Ms. Career Girl! I flew here from Iowa because I read about this event on your blog.”

·        Ms. Career Girl has been therapeutic for me and others. It got me through a breakup, a job change and a year of huge personal growth and change. 

I’m really looking forward to pumping up the volume even more this year to bring Ms. Career Girl to the next level. 

Thanks to those of you who have sent me personal messages and emails with your career/money questions, and for thanking me for articles that were helpful to you!  Your suggestions, comments and critiques are encouraged.  Thanks for reading!

I happened to catch the news story on former University of New Mexico soccer player, Elizabeth Lambert. If you haven’t already seen the videos or heard about this online, Elizabeth Lambert, 20, was indefinitely suspended from her soccer team for violent behavior on the field.

The video below shows her pushing, tripping and yanking pony tails of her opponents.

Elizabeth Lambert Plays Rough

I couldn’t help but to think how this will affect Elizabeth’s personal brand wherever she goes. She hasn’t even graduated college or settled into a career and she already has to deal with very bad google search results wherever she goes. How would you possibly start to explain this type of behavior in a job interview?! If I were interviewing her, I’d be extremely skeptical because I would assume she would take obstacles in the work place too far and possibly backlash with anger.

I wonder how Elizabeth will move forward with this viral media attack. What would you do? How do you think this will affect her career?

Iphone and ipod users know how annoying it is to operate your devices during the winter as it requires removing your gloves in the cold! My Mom sent me a pair of these awesome iphone-compatible gloves and I had to share them with you! My gloves are by echo (which has tons of other cool stuff too!) and work like a charm. The magic is in the material on the thumb and index fingers. Check them out here, they are $30.

This week I will be answering a series of career questions that relate to twentysomethings.  Please feel free to email or tweet me your questions! Thanks! Nicole

Question from @pghjen: I work from home once a week and I have a tough time focusing.  Do you have any tips that will help me stay productive?

Nicole: I can only imagine how tough it would be to stay focused when there are distractions all around you!  I can see it now: Oprah, laundry, cleaning, bills, errands- oh my! Here are a few things I would do if I were you.

1.  Evaluate and improve your home office.  Do you work in a human pig sty?  Do you have papers all over your desk? Take the time to shred all the paper work you don’t need anymore and clean up.  Clutter is a guaranteed distraction AND guilt trip which will only take you away from the task at hand. 

Also, If your home office is currently set up in your bedroom, do anything you can to put it somewhere else.  Yes, this may entail putting your desk in your living room if you have a small apartment like me.  It’s so important to separate your work from where you sleep, otherwise you may have a hard time getting quality shut-eye and leaving your work “at work.”

2.  Avoid distractions by planning ahead.  If you’re like me, you know how easy it is to suddenly say “Oh my gosh, what was I doing again? How did I end up so distracted?!”  If you know you work at home on Fridays, make sure you take care of distractions by Thursday night.  For example, send your bills out, vacuum and watch the episode of “Flash Forward” that you missed BEFORE Friday, that way you have no excuses not to stay productive.

3. Shower and get dressed as you would if you were going into the office.  As much as we all occasionally fantasize about working in our PJ’s, we know that PJ’s signal “relaxation” to our brains, rather than signaling “kick butt at work!”  Get up, take a shower, put your makeup on and get ready to conquer the day.  You’ll feel so much better and avoid another excuse to stray.

4.  Schedule breaks into your day.  It is my belief that working from home can be as productive (if not more) than working from the office.  The trick is planning out your day more than you usually would.  You may benefit from scheduling time to meet a friend for lunch, take a walk, or attend a mid-day Pilates class to keep your focus.  Perhaps working out in the morning charges you up, even if you have to start a bit later.  Having something on your calendar will also push you to finish things before you leave.

5.  Look into joining a group of those who work from home.  A great example is a group like “Jelly” which is popping up all over the country.  Jelly was started by two friends who liked working from home but missed the creativity, friendships, and interaction that they got from working in a traditional office.  If you work better with others around you or hate the loneliness of working from home, joining a group like Jelly would be great for you!  If it’s not in your city, consider starting your own by emailing hello@workatjelly.com .

By, Nicole Crimaldi

I started using my new salad container this week and I love it!  The concept of this type of container is great!

There is an ice pack built into the top and you can put your dressing into the dispenser so you don’t have to bring a separate little container, eat a mushy salad or risk making a mess in your work bag when the dressing inevitably spills everywhere.

Now that I have this nifty container it’s much more enjoyable to bring a salad to lunch each day.  Just dispense, shake and enjoy a healthy lunch!