Welcome to ‘Workthoughts’, a place to consider and reflect on how we spend our days, set our priorities and define success.

Work is a word that enters our vocabulary in our earliest moment of awareness. Our parents leave the house or drop us at daycare and disappear for hours or days ‘at work’. Some return home exhausted by the physical exertion of the workplace, others energized by the freedom to decide and create. From our earliest memory, we begin to formulate impressions of work. In our first jobs as babysitters, waitresses or camp counselors we collect first hand knowledge of the expectations of a workplace. In our neighborhoods, schools and churches we encounter the members of our first professional network. At the cinema and on television we watch actors portray a variety of callings, the majority happy with their career choice as lawyers, doctors, detectives, engineers and superheroes.

In the beginning we are open to any possibility. We haven’t learned the value society places on work and workers. Our exploration of the world of work begins with the folks who keep us safe. We imagine ourselves as those fictional superheroes, donning capes and masks, scaling buildings to save the city or the planet from threat.

Throughout our years of formal education we gain additional information about work and workplace options. By the time we are in high school, our academic performance and test scores have segmented the class into college bound and not.

As we progress through education we acquire the biases of our community and culture, strongly influencing our choice of work.

We begin our careers as interns; apprentices excited about an opportunity to finally realize a long held dream. Along the way we translate that experience into a full time job and begin our careers acquiring skills and learning the culture of the organizations we join.

We become engaged in our communities, raise families and continue our education.

At some point the momentum of our career trajectory outruns our initial dreams and values, and it’s important to ask, why work?

Workthoughts is not a job site, but a place to consider choices, share ideas and reconnect with dreams