In your professional journey, you experience key career moments that impact your direction and focus. To gain more control over your professional future, try viewing your career as comprised of two elements: these key career moments, and all of the work you do in-between. The important realization is that key events generate the content and quality of your work.

Some key career moments are predictable and others happen spontaneously, turning out in retrospect to be pivotal moments on your profess…

You likely (and hopefully) have job reference relationships, people in your back pocket that you believe to be in your corner and ready to act as a professional reference for you, or help you out when you call.

When is the last time you checked-in on those job reference relationships? To see how they are doing? Congratulate them on their progress? Share something of value? Offer to help? Take them out for lunch?

Have you let things lapse so much that their strong reference and unwavering suppo…