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How to Deal With Personal Issues at Work

by Dawn Rosenberg McKay, About.com Guide

Personal issues including family problems, life changing situations, emotional difficulties, illness, and even one’s sexual orientation, can impact your job and ultimately your ability to advance your career. Try as you might to keep your private life separate from your work life, inevitably one may begin to run into the other. Learn how to keep personal issues from negatively affecting your job and career.

Prevention is the best medicine. Your co-workers and boss will only know as much about your personal life as you share with them. If you don’t want those with whom you work to know about things going on outside work, then learn to keep a secret.

  • Too Much Information

Everyone gets angry from time to time. Some people react very quickly, in a negative manner, to anger. Others manage their anger and approach it in a calm and reasonable way. Obviously, especially in a workplace setting, the latter is a much better reaction

  • Anger: What It Is and How to Manage It

  • Oh, I’m So Mad: Resolving Anger at Work

If you are a gay, lesbian or transgender person you may wonder if it’s a good idea to share this information with your boss or co-workers. Some people make this decision based on how they think others will react — will your life at work change for the better or worse, or will it remain the same?

  • Coming Out at Work

Shyness can hinder one’s career advancement. Fortunately, many people can overcome shyness and eventually have successful careers.

  • Shyness: Can It Affect Your Career

When a co-worker dies it impacts all the people with whom he or she worked. Everyone will be affected on a professional level, but some will be affected on a personal level as well. While work can be an escape for those who have lost someone in their private lives, one will be reminded of the loss of a co-worker each time he or she goes to work.

  • Death in the Workplace

Job burnout can result from working too hard because you are concerned about losing your job. Ironically, it can lead you to become less motivated about work and actually threaten your job, in addition to causing some serious mental and physical health issues. Before that happens, there are things you can do to turn things around.

  • Job Burnout: Causes, Symptoms and Cures

Because treatment will probably dictate that you take time off from work, you may be unable to avoid sharing news of a cancer diagnosis with your employer and co-workers. How much detail you provide is entirely up to you. One thing you don’t have to worry about is losing your job because of your diagnosis.

  • Cancer and Your Career: Know Your Rights

A disability doesn’t have to keep you from having a productive career, and certainly, no one but you and your physician can decide what, if any, limitations you have. You also don’t have to provide your boss with details about your disability, or tell her about it at all, unless you have to ask for certain accommodations.

  • Working With a Disability

Generally, there is a great deal of excitement surrounding a pregnancy. When a woman gets the news, she often wants to tell everyone she knows. Before you make your announcement, learn how your pregnancy can affect your job and how the law protects you.

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