Every worker a global player

Whether we like it or not, every worker will soon become a global player and be subject to the competitive pressures coming from all over the globe.

This is the main message of Thomas Friedman's book, The World is Flat, where he says that technologies and globalization contribute to creating a "flat world" where everyone, anywhere on the planet, competes against everyone else.

To be sure, not everyone will become a global player like Maria Sharapova (see her "HR" profile above), but it is a good, productive mental framework to think about one's career as a sort of Olympic game where one has to compete against the very best in the world.

Only by adopting this mindset will a person begin to realize the inevitable need for continuous learning and training, and perhaps even the imperative of hiring a coach to continually help in the refinement and perfection of one's professional moves.