Putting Your Whole Heart and Soul into Ordinary Moments is What Creates Workplace Magic

Career coaching and résumé writing have traditionally focused on tactics: keywords, formatting, workplace responsibilities and achievements, interview answers, and networking scripts. These matter. But anyone who has worked closely with job seekers knows a deeper truth – that two candidates with nearly identical credentials can experience wildly different job search outcomes. One lands a job quickly and confidently. The other struggles, stalls, and burns out.  

And it’s been my experience that the difference is rarely the résumé, interviewing, or intelligence. The difference is presence.

Thirty-five years ago I realized that putting one’s whole heart and soul into ordinary moments of a job search – like drafting a résumé, practicing an interview answer, sending a follow-up email is what creates workplace magic.  Let me assure you, teaching this way of operating isn’t just motivational voodoo.  It measurably shortens time-to-employment, and dramatically reduces job search stress – on both job seeker and coach!

The Hidden Variable in Rapid Employment – Performance Mindset

Most job seekers approach the search mechanically. They “apply,” “network,” and “prepare” while mentally checked out, anxious, or just going through the mundane motions – allowing fear and discomfort to rule the process. This shows up everywhere:

• Résumés that technically qualify but are flat and uninspiring
• Interview responses that are correct but forgettable
• Networking conversations that are uncomfortable – akin to begging 
• Follow-ups that sound polite but desperate or bland

This is not motivational fluff. It’s developing a performance mindset applied to career transition. And some of us have been integrating this into our practice for decades… with beyond stunning results.  But now, all résumé writers and career coaches will have to integrate this into their coaching – because this is the one area AI is incapable of doing well, if at all. 

Ordinary Moments Are the Real Interview

Career coaches often focus heavily on the “big moments:” the interview, the offer negotiation, the final presentation. But it’s putting one’s heart and soul into the seemingly little, ordinary things that influence successful outcomes.  Teaching job seekers how to embrace and be fully engaged in those seemingly little, ordinary things is key.  Consider the ordinary moments:

• Writing a résumé bullet point
• Answering a screening email
• Preparing a one-minute introduction
• Updating a LinkedIn headline
• Asking a thoughtful question during a call

When job seekers slow down and fully reflect on what they’re doing, they stop sounding like everyone else. Their language becomes more human. Their stories become more relevant.  Their self-confidence becomes unstoppable.  

For résumé writers, this means moving beyond the traditional (“Tell me your accomplishments”), and toward presence-based questioning: 

• Why did this work matter to you?
• What problem were you genuinely proud to solve?
• What moment made you realize you were good at this?
• What results do you deliver that would lead to a bonus or promotion? 
• What does success mean to you? 

The answers to these (and other similar) questions, help coaches better engage their job seeking clients/students.  It’s a powerful way to inspire job seekers to be present in all activities – and to enjoy the ordinary tasks to confidently influence job offers. 

Why This Approach Reduces Job Search Stress

Stress in a job search comes from uncertainty combined with emotional discomfort. Job seekers feel powerless, judged, and constantly waiting for validation – or luck; out of control emotionally and strategically.  Teaching presence and full engagement flips the experience 180 degrees!

Instead of measuring success solely by responses from employers, job seekers begin measuring success by how they show up. Did they prepare with intention? Did they leave it all on the field at the end of the day?  Are they proud of what they intended to accomplish daily?  This creates emotional control, which reduces fear and anxiety. And when clients feel grounded and intentional, several things happen:

• They procrastinate less and work harder for their better futures 
• They don’t over-apply for jobs, they become much more selective
• They stop chasing roles that don’t align with their values 
• They recover faster from rejection and setbacks
• They’re MORE FUN TO WORK WITH !

Coaching from Presence, Not Pressure

For career coaches, this means shifting the coaching mindset. Instead of:

“You need to apply to 20 more jobs this week.”

Try:

“Let’s make sure the 6-8 you apply to feel right and are fully aligned with your values.”

Instead of:

“Your answer needs to be stronger.”

Try:

“What do you actually want the hiring manager to understand about you – in your own words?”

In PARWCC’s Certified Empowerment and Motivational Professional (CEMP), presence-based coaching teaches job seekers to invest emotionally without attaching emotionally. They care deeply about the quality of their effort, but ‘not’ the outcome they can’t control.  They know that when they take good care of the ordinary – good things will happen in good time. 

Résumé Writing as a Confidence-Building Act

A résumé is often the first place job seekers emotionally disengage. They rush it. They AI replicate it. They delegate it.  When résumé writing pros slow the process down (or change it completely) and invite job seekers to embrace their emotional presence, the résumé itself becomes therapeutic. 

In other words, the process (not the résumé) builds sustainable self-confidence. This is because job seekers are present (engaged) with their coach, and pour their energies into the ordinary, to create a growth-driven journey to land the right job. 

Teaching Clients to Bring Heart and Soul into Interviews

Interviews are not performances. They are economic meetings (what can you do for us that we would pay you for?)  Job seekers who try to “get it right” often sound rehearsed or guarded. Those who bring their whole heart and soul into ordinary interview moments like listening deeply, answering honestly and confidently, pausing thoughtfully, and mirroring the interviewers communication style – nail it!

Simplicity is a coaching artform. I teach that there are usually 6-8 things that make 90% of the difference on resumes, when networking, in interviews – to land the right job. The challenge for coaches is to help job seekers identify those 6-8 things, and then for job seekers to pour their heart and soul into 1) believing them and, 2) communicating them expertly. 

Faster Employment Comes from Fewer, Better Moves

For more than 35 years, one of the biggest myths in job searching is that volume equals speed of success. In reality, intention equals speed of success.  When job seekers are fully present and engaged:

• They target specific roles that actually fit
• They prepare more efficiently and productively
• They build stronger more meaningful relationships
• They don’t go into funks and question their value
• They don’t waste time procrastinating or majoring in minor things

The Coach’s Role: Modeling the Magic

It’s been my personal experience that career coaches and résumé pros cannot teach this approach unless they embody it themselves – walk the talk.  When I am enthusiastically and confidently engaged with my clients, listening intently, and maybe even integrating a little humor – I inspire them to embrace the ordinary disciplines required to achieve the results they desire.  

When I bring my whole heart and soul into ordinary coaching moments, my clients mirror (copy) that behavior in their job campaigns.  Even when the inevitable setbacks and rejections take place, there is a sense of calm and confidence.  This is because they know if they work the process (the ordinary) the process will work for them (results).  That is how transformation happens.  This how the magic is created.  

The Real Outcome: Employment That Feels Right

Perhaps the most powerful result of this approach is not just faster employment, but the right employment.  Job seekers who learn to operate with presence and engagement don’t just accept the first offer out of fear. They choose roles that align with who they are becoming – and how it best serves them, their families, and, of course, their employers.  

They honor the ordinary because they know that to reach the summit (job they want) – you have to climb.  There are no free rides to the top.  And here’s what’s exciting.  When job seekers genuinely put their heart and soul into every step up Job Search Mountain – the easy and the tough – they won’t just reach the summit – they’ll go over the top!  

Final Thought

Putting one’s whole heart and soul into ordinary moments is not a soft skill. It is a strategic advantage. For career coaches and résumé writers, teaching this approach elevates your work from transactional to transformational.  AI does transactional expertly.  Only transformational career coaches and résumé pros can teach and inspire a transformational approach.  

It’s magic.