The New York Times recently published a piece discussing married couples in the workplace. The basic bonds of a marriage do not always coincide with the fundamental ties that successful coworkers must forge, and yet married couples in business tend to do quite well. So what’s the secret?

Barbara Taylor’s New York Times article discusses two very important details that make her work life with her husband successful. Firstly, their work strengths complement one another—her husband has great people skills to deal with employees and customers, while Taylor is great at focusing on tasks that require a good deal of reading and solitude. This makes them great business partners because together they can accomplish a great deal. If they were both great at dealing with clients but tired easily from reading, no contracts would get read, no invoices would be filled, and no applications would be processed. Their differing strengths give them balance.

However, it is probably the second aspect of Taylor’s piece that is most intriguing. She admits that she and her husband have different work styles—she prefers to work on several things a little bit at a time, while her husband likes to focus all his attention on one project at once. Taylor rightfully claims that “either method can be effective, but failure to understand — and respect — different work styles can be a major cause of stress, resentment and fractured communication in any relationship” (NYT 2009). Her recognition of this fact is what makes her business venture with her husband successful.

In order to work well together, spouses do not necessarily need to work at the same pace or in the same way. What is crucial—as Taylor points out—is that each spouse understands and respects the other’s work habits. If Taylor does not understand her husband’s work habits, she may think he is incapable of multi-tasking, while her husband may in turn think she is incapable of focusing. Neither of these things is true—Taylor and her husband have simply developed different ways of focusing on tasks that work well for them. Maybe if Taylor tried her husband’s method of work she would get bored and be unable to focus. Maybe if her husband tried her way of working he would be unable to keep different tasks straight and become confused. Both people have become successful business people because they have developed working habits that work for them.

If you work with a spouse, have a married couple on your staff, or simply would like to know more about work styles and how to understand the work styles of others, call Your Life’s Path today. We offer team building test facilitation, seminars, and reports, and can help your team work better as a unit and respect one another’s work styles. We utilize the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator to analyze the work styles and habits of your team and can show people with different work styles how best to work together. If you are interested in our team building services, call Your Life’s Path today at 1-877-7PATHWAY.

The Myers-Briggs test is a very common personality assessment test that has been administered for over 30 years. This multiple-choice assessment takes your answers to simple questions and determines basic facts about your personality. Your type is then determined as either showing preferences for Introversion (I) or Extraversion (E), Sensing (S) or Intuition (N), Thinking (T) or Feeling (F), and Judgment (J) or Perception (P). You may learn from this personality assessment text that you are an INFP or an ESTJ. These classifications can help you learn about your strengths and weaknesses and learn what type of career path would be most suitable for you.

Many people have heard of this personality assessment test and have taken it at one time or another. Some people have their results analyzed by a professional, while others simply use the Internet or books to learn about their own results. However, many people tend to take the assessment once and then move on. The staff at Your Life’s Path, however, would like to remind you that while basic personality traits do not usually change, the traits measured by the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator assessment just might. Maybe you were more judgmental as a teenager, and now tend to rely more on your perception. Maybe you were a shy, introverted teenager, and have learned to be more outgoing as an adult. Though most people do not change too dramatically over the years, it may be worth re-taking the Myers-Briggs assessment again if you have not taken it in many years.

The staff at Your Life’s Path suggests taking the personality assessment test in high school, in college, post-college, and during middle age, as these are times of major turning points in people’s lives. A person who mostly relied on intuition at the age of 15 may learn to tune into their senses more after having children and raising a family by the age of 45.

If you have not taken a personality assessment test for many years, it may be time to take the assessment again. The way you answer certain questions on the assessment may have changed, or you may even know yourself better than the last time you took the assessment, helping you to answer questions more truthfully. In any case, we offer Myers-Briggs and other personality tests in order to help you understand yourself more fully. Please visit us at www.yourlifespath.com or give us a call at 1-877-7PATHWAY

In today’s economic environment, everyone needs that extra special edge when applying for a job. Every time a job or position opens up, recruiters and hiring managers receive hundreds of applications that they must sort through. Not every hiring manager has the time to interview hundreds upon hundreds of applicants, so several candidates must be decided on based on their resumes and applications alone.

Resumes and applications should be flawless and well-crafted; everyone knows this. So when you are competing against hundreds other candidates, all just as qualified, with resumes just as flawless, how can you set yourself apart? We here at Your Life’s Path have a recommendation.

One thing that can help your resume to stand out among the rest is to opt for the video resume. Hiring managers have called this approach both bold and edgy, as it demonstrates a candidate’s confidence and communication skills. In addition, the hiring manager is able to put a face with a name, often helping to establish a more personal connection between the applicant and the recruiter. Where other applicants can only be identified by a piece of paper, video applicants have the advantages of having already made a more personal connection.

Video resumes need to be constructed with care. Videos that are sloppy or poorly put together might be seen as stunt-like or unprofessional; your personality and qualifications are what should stand out, not the video itself. Keep in mind that you are not auditioning for a reality TV role. Your video resume should not be silly or gimmicky—you should conduct yourself as you would during an interview, and you should present your information as it is presented on your resume. Start with your identifying and educational information, and move on to your professional history. List all of the places you have worked with a brief summary of your job description. Do not be wordy or too vague; what you say should be taken from your resume. Make sure to list your personal achievements at each job or position in order of importance and to use action words. The job of the video resume is to make the written resume come alive.

This article from the New York Times gives some great tips and ideas for video resumes. If you are still searching for the perfect job, consider taking the Strong Interest Inventory at Your Life’s Path to help guide you on your way. We look forward to assisting you!