You’ve spent your time and energy trying to break into a big-name agency, doing editorial work, and appreciating the “seed-planting phase.” Have you ever considered that you might find happiness and job satisfaction working at an in-house agency?

To clarify what I mean by in-house agency, many mid-sized to large companies have departments that handle advertising and marketing needs that aren’t done by an advertising agency. For example, a company like Kaiser has an agency for their broadcast work supporting the famous Thrive campaign, but depend on their in-house team for smaller or regional campaigns. Sometimes in-house agencies do the same high-profile work as an external agency – for example, that infamous Kendall Jenner ad was produced by Pepsi’s in-house team.

I’ve spent half my career at in-house shops, and the other half working at agencies, so I’ve seen it from both sides. To help you decide if you want to switch from agency work, these are (arguably) the best and worst parts of working in-house.

The 5 Best Things About Working In-House

1. Work-life balance

During my in-house tenure, I’ve never worked a weekend, and on the few occasions I had to work late, it was never by more than 90 minutes. (Your mileage may vary). The unfortunate truth of #agencylife is that it’s filled with long hours and late nights.

2. Stability

Again, with that #agencylife: if you’re at an agency that loses the big client, the agency execs may lay off everyone on that account. (I, personally, was laid off three times in three years for that exact reason.) While in-house agencies occasionally get swept up and out in corporate restructuring (been there, too), it’s relatively infrequent.

3. Predictability

With minimal overtime, a regular work schedule, freedom from the fear of being laid off, and almost no travel (since your client is usually just down the hallway), you’ll be free to make long-term plans – that could either be for a vacation next month or taking night classes at a university next year.

4. Opportunity to try new things

Many in-house creative teams are kept lean and mean, so you’ll work on many different projects. In-house teams usually don’t have the same hierarchy and structure of an agency, so the team may work on UX, outdoor, branding, event marketing, and other things that are usually highly segmented at agencies.

5. Get close to the brand

One of the most exciting things about working at a company is your ability to shape its brand, even beyond just suggesting a color palette and font family. You’re closer to the people who champion the brand voice; even if your company uses an outside agency for branding, you’ll help articulate and hone your brand’s values.

The 5 Worst Things About Working In-House

1. Lack of variety

If you crave variety, you may not find it in a corporate environment. Working on just one brand means you’ll probably work on the same things, over and over – and if you’re a designer, that means sticking to one color palette, one set of fonts and one asset library.

2. Sh!t jobs

The one exception to the lack of variety rule is the type of lackluster requests you’ll get because the company doesn’t want to have to pay for an advertising agency. These include, but are not limited to: designing a flier to notify employees that the parking lot will be closed for a week, writing a 10-second spot to be read over the PA system at a tradeshow, or being asked to rewrite the words to Katy Perry’s Firework to make them specific to selling insurance. (Fun fact: That last one was me; the song was going to be played at the introduction of a national sales meeting.)

3. Lack of respect

If your company has the budget, glamorous jobs will go to an agency, and you might get lucky if you can do production. In some places, it’ll be no secret that they’re only using your services because you’re cheap, close and convenient. But this is not something you need to accept if it’s crossing a line.

4. Less mobility

You may find yourself with fewer job opportunities within the company, unless you’re OK with branching out of the creative department. Even if you’re creating award-winning work and your team uses a traditional agency process, it’ll be tougher to find work at an agency. Just look at how many job listings stipulate “X years of agency experience REQUIRED.”

5. The corporate-ness of it all

Depending on where you work, you may find yourself in a sea of button-ups, slacks, and people who want to “leverage” your “core competencies” and will “circle back” later.  Some companies appreciate that creative employees are different and give them more flexibility with their hours, workspace, and wardrobe. Still, the rest of your colleagues may be corporate citizens.

Still not sure? You can always go freelance.

The alternative to deciding on one or another is freelancing, and getting a taste for both. You could also learn you want to build your own environment and make your own rules, and start a business of your own.

Either way, take time to decide what is really going to work for you. Searching for a job can lead to frustration and desperation, but knowing what you will say no to can help you design a life you can be proud of.

Lisa is a Creative Circle candidate and seasoned advertising copywriter who lives in Los Angeles. Her background includes both in-house and agency work on Fortune 500 and global accounts in the consumer and healthcare/pharmaceutical fields. She excels at words, fashion, and cats. If you want to work with Lisa, contact Creative Circle Los Angeles.

Thinking about your future can be overwhelming. As children, we are regularly prompted by parents, teachers, and mentors to dream, set goals, and systematically take the steps to get us closer to those goals.

After you complete your formal education, reminders are infrequent and incomplete:

• Development conversations with managers focus exclusively on your professional life; you aren’t at liberty to truly speak freely about your professional goals if they involve leaving your employer.
• Speaking with family members may not allow for the freedom you need, as relatives may struggle with objectivity.
• Gatherings of classmates and friends — including weddings and reunions — may prompt reflection, but conversations tend to emphasize what you’ve accomplished more than what you want to accomplish.

If you want to give some attention to your future but are feeling stuck, here are five ideas to get you started:

1. Meditate

I resisted this one for so long. My excuses were countless: I don’t have the time; I’m not spiritual in that way; it’s just not “me.” Then, last May, while attending a conference at the UCLA Anderson School of Management, I sat in on a morning guided meditation led by Sarah Tucker, director of the business school’s Coaching and Team Skills Program. I entered the room frazzled by L.A. traffic and my subsequent late arrival. The meditation lasted only 10 minutes, but to my surprise, it calmed me down and helped me refocus on my goals for the conference. It shifted my mindset on the entire day, which ended up being one of the most productive conferences I have attended. Coincidentally, a chance meeting in the courtyard with the executive director of the career center at UCLA Anderson led to a project on her team, which aligned directly with my goals for the next year.

Meditation has many uses related to your future, including priority-setting, focusing, discovering a sense of appreciation, and releasing regret. As little as three minutes can make a difference in your day, and a regular practice can make a big difference in your life. You don’t have to be in the presence of an expert to give it a go. I’m a fan of the Headspace app. I’ve been using it to wind down before bed, and most nights, I fall asleep before the 5- to 10-minute meditation is complete. I’ve also received personal recommendations for Calm and Insight Timer.

2. Listen to your body

When you need to make important decisions, how well do you listen to what your body is telling you? Where do you feel it? In your heart? Your gut? You can try to make decisions solely through analysis and reason, but most important decisions require listening to both your head and your heart.

Last year, I was considering a big professional move. It was an unexpected opportunity, but shifting priorities and a strong sense of trust in the team I’d be working with pushed me to explore it. I’d worked out the opportunity in my head and on paper, but there was a tightness in my chest that persisted for the three days leading up to a final commitment. I ultimately passed on the opportunity, and I haven’t questioned once whether I made the right decision.

If somatic awareness is not something you practice regularly, it can take time to learn what to look for. My first several attempts to articulate what I was feeling prompted the feedback from my coach, “That’s what you’re thinking. Try again, and tell me what you are feeling and where the feeling is in your body.” One warm-up is to reflect on times in the past when your heart or your gut spoke and consider how well those messages served you. To go deeper, check out Suzanne Zeman’s book “Listening to Bodies: A Somatic Primer for Coaches, Managers and Executives.”

3. Get outside

Important conversations frequently happen face to face: business conversations are held across a desk; talks with significant others may happen across a table. Without intending to, these setups create distance. Each person faces in an opposing direction, resulting in different views. This reinforces opposing forces and presents the two participants as being on different teams. And there’s literally a piece of furniture creating distance between the two.

Heading outside for a walk — or even better, a hike — changes everything about what it means to have a conversation. First, you are both moving in the same direction, suggesting that you are in this together.

I offer every coaching client who’s local to Los Angeles the option of hiking during a session. Recently, a client accepted my offer. Without the crutches of notebooks and pens, we pushed beyond to-do lists and explored deeper questions about obstacles. Since I was moving in the same direction, challenging her viewpoint presented more as a curiosity than as a threat. At the end of the hike, she felt ready to try some of the ideas we’d unpacked to help her move forward.

A recent Business Insider article from Lauren F. Friedman and Kevin Loria, “11 scientific reasons you should be spending more time outside,” lists several mental and physical health benefits of getting outdoors, including restored mental energy, improved concentration, and sharper thinking and creativity. What feels more energizing to you: sitting at a table over a laptop or opening up possibilities on a heart-rate–increasing hike?

4. Pick a personal board of directors

Businesses have them to stay on track with their goals, so why wouldn’t you want one for yourself? Loved ones and close friends may have advice for you, but it’s hard for them to be objective enough to give you the support and guidance you need. After all, your decisions are likely to impact them.

There are different approaches to building your board. Vanessa Van Edwards, lead investigator at Science of People, a human behavior research lab, sees the value in board members with perspectives outside of your industry. Leaders from other, different businesses may offer an unexpected but effective approach. Tim Kilpin, President/CEO of Activision Blizzard Consumer Products Group, is part of a group of leaders who all come from the same industry, albeit from different parts of the value chain. They can look at the same situation with unique perspectives, which increases the likelihood of valuable, divergent viewpoints. Because these leaders have a shared history, he also values their mix of professional and personal advice.

Consider your goals in picking the right board. If you are in startup mode, you might consider individuals who’ve taken this path and are further along the learning curve. If you are aware of your weaknesses, who excels in those areas? If you are considering a career change, how can you gain insights from people who’ve taken similar leaps as well as people who have taken different paths?

Lastly, your board doesn’t have to focus exclusively on professional topics. What areas of your personal life would benefit from the insights of someone you respect?

5. Unpack your suitcase

Motivational speaker Jim Rohm famously said, “You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.” How well do these five people align with your goals and the life you want? Are there relationships that are holding you back from your future?

This is not a call to break up with or ghost any friend or relative who isn’t living the life you want. Take stock of their support for you in achieving your goals. If they aren’t helping you become the person you want to be, maybe it’s time to establish clearer boundaries in the relationship so you can make room for relationships that honor where you are headed.

This process of unpacking to make room for the resources and relationships that will support you can be applied to other areas of life, including setting priorities at work, focusing on community commitments, and maintaining self-care.

Peter Drucker said, “To try to make the future is highly risky. It is less risky, however, than not to try to make it.” These five activities can get you closer to turning your dreams into a plan and ultimately into accomplishments. They can all be done together, but trying even one is better than doing nothing. Pick the ones that spark your interest. Test the waters with an experiment and see what sticks.

Peter Gandolfo is an executive coach and founder of Gandolfo Group Coaching & Consulting. He’s passionate about helping men achieve professionally while being present fathers and about creating a more diverse workforce by helping leaders develop their authentic leadership styles.

In addition to individual coaching, Peter facilitates team workshops and gives talks on marketing strategy, listening to customers, effective communication and more. He lives in Los Angeles with his husband Andrew and their two sons.

If you’re job-hunting, you need to know about a scam that could end up costing you thousands of dollars – not to mention your faith in humanity and a good chunk of your time. In June, scammers started targeting communications professionals with “job leads” and fake job offers at top agencies like Weber Shandwick and MKTG.

The scam in question was a variation on the well-worn “Nigerian prince will send you a check for $100,000; you keep $90,000 but wire him $10K.” The difference was that it was tailored and targeted to prey on hopeful job seekers.

The Details

The scam artists placed bogus want-ads on ZipRecruiter. The jobs were legitimate-sounding opportunities (e.g., work-from-home graphic designer) with high-profile and well-respected agencies. The ads themselves used professional-looking logos, real employee names, and even language copied from the real agency’s website. In a few cases, the scammers sent emails to unsuspecting individuals.

Once a job seeker replied to the bogus ad, the scammer set up a job interview via Google Hangout. After a long and fairly convincing interview, an offer letter (also fairly persuasive) was sent. Then the job seeker was mailed a check to be deposited and used to purchase computers and equipment to furnish a home office.

The catch is, there’s no job. The check is from a non-existent account, and of course, it bounces after the job-seeker makes the expensive purchase through a vendor that is linked to the con artist and doesn’t send the furniture.

If you make it to the end of the process, you’ve been duped out of your money, your credit card numbers, and your social security number.

How to Protect Yourself

Even though this particular scam was brought to light and the agencies unfairly implicated have gone to great lengths to inform and warn job seekers, scams are a lot like cockroaches: Where there’s one, there’s probably 1,000 more of them, and the minute you get rid of one of them, another pops up instantly to take its place. Be ready so you won’t get taken by the next one.

Never, ever give out your personal information online – especially your social security number or banking information. If anyone asks, consider it a giant red flag.

If you start smelling a rat, pay attention to details. If you’re applying for a job at a large and reputable company but all of the communications are sent from someone at a Gmail account, this could be a sign that not everything is as it seems. Cybersecurity experts McAfee have a thorough checklist on recognizing fake emails that is a must read.

Similarly, watch out for communications of any kind riddled with misspellings, typos, and poor grammar.

Beware of any ad that says IMMEDIATE HIRE. If you’ve ever interviewed at large agency, you know the bureaucracy involved – almost no one is EVER hired after a single interview. One candidate interviewing for a graphic designer position reported that the interviewer never asked about his portfolio.

Likewise, most legitimate companies will never hire via a chat app.

If you’re working with a recruiter and they ask for money upfront, run. Recruiters make their money when a company hires their candidates.

How to Continue Your Job Search

Even when they’re 100% legitimate, applying to an online job posting can make you feel like you’re throwing your resume into a bottomless pit. Instead, energize your job search and get more rewards for your efforts.

If you do decide to apply to a job online, reach out to your network to learn more about a job. Your odds are so much better if you can get a real email address to send your resume to – or, better yet, a friend or contact who’ll put in a good word for you when they forward your resume.

Find positions through your friends and colleagues. Statistics vary, but anywhere from 70 – 85% of all jobs are found through word-of-mouth and networking. Many companies don’t even publish some of the best jobs, so the only way to learn about them is from someone with some ‘insider information.’

Above all, trust your gut. Always be positive and optimistic about your job search. Remember, cases like this are the exception, not the rule. However, remind yourself that if something sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

Lisa is a Creative Circle candidate and seasoned advertising copywriter who lives in Los Angeles. Her background includes both in-house and agency work on Fortune 500 and global accounts in the consumer and healthcare/pharmaceutical fields. She excels at words, fashion, and cats. If you want to work with Lisa, contact Creative Circle Los Angeles.

Money is a taboo topic in our culture; it’s something we use every day that we don’t talk about often. As a result, some of us may struggle with a negative money mindset, where even though we always want more of it, we struggle with subconscious beliefs that may prevent us from actually seeing more money in our pockets.

Just as your mindset around your freelance work affects the clients and projects that come your way, your mindset about money (and what it means to have money) also plays a huge part in your success as a freelancer.

What is money mindset?

At a simple level, our beliefs about money influence how we feel and what decisions, choices, and actions we take each day. If your subconscious perspective on money is along the lines of, “I’ll never make that much money,” or “I’m not capable of making enough money,” or even “Money = greed,” your daily actions and reactions will perpetuate that.

For example, if you believe that money is the root of all evil and that only greedy and selfish people make a lot of money, then it’ll be tough to ever put yourself in a position where you can make a lot of money and feel good about it.

Similarly, if you feel that you will never have enough money or that you’re not capable of financially supporting yourself through your freelance work, then these subconscious beliefs will continue to pop up and create limiting patterns and behaviors in your day-to-day life. You’ll push away opportunities to earn money because your subconscious belief system views it as dangerous, greedy, selfish, or impossible.

It might seem confusing at first, but when you start to see how your subconscious beliefs lead to thoughts, feelings, actions, and results, you can begin to reverse the pattern. If you aren’t happy with your money situation, trace it back to the root by looking at your underlying beliefs about money in the first place.

How can you change your money mindset?

To change your beliefs about money, start with acknowledging any currently limiting beliefs and work your way forward. Here are four ways to get your money mindset to work in your favor:

1. Write down your current perspective on money. This usually comes from your childhood and can have a lot to do with your family’s point of view on money. What did your parents teach you (directly or indirectly) about money? What beliefs did you take away from your early life that are still in your adult life? Write down whatever beliefs you have about money that might be holding you back from creating more of it.
2. For each belief, ask the following questions: Is this belief true? Is this something I want to continue to believe? If the answer to either of those questions is ‘no,’ ask yourself: Am I willing to see this differently? Being willing to change is a key step in rewriting our beliefs. If you’re willing to see things differently, you can move forward in releasing the subconscious belief that’s keeping you stuck and move forward in creating a new, positive belief instead. Ask yourself, How does this belief hold me back from what I want in my work/life? Seeing the ways this belief is limiting you will help your subconscious brain get on board with rewriting it.
3. For each negative, limiting belief, replace it with a more positive and empowering statement. Here are a few examples:

• “Artists will never make a lot of money” can become, “My work as an artist brings me financial abundance and freedom.”
• “Money is a limited resource” can become, “Money is a limitless resource, and I am open to receiving, spending, and investing my money freely.”
• “It’s dangerous to make a lot of money and be successful” can become, “It’s safe for me to make money from my creative skills and abilities.”

4. Put these new empowering beliefs somewhere you’ll see them every day to remind yourself of your new perspective. Read the new beliefs out loud to yourself every day until they feel true to you. Remember that you’re rewriting beliefs that you’ve likely been carrying since childhood, so it might take time to see the benefits! Be patient, and know that just by becoming aware of these beliefs, you’re taking a huge step toward rewriting them.

It may take some time, but reframing your beliefs about money will make you feel more empowered and capable of receiving payment for your freelance work. Remember that it’s OK to want to make money (we all need it to survive!) and you can choose beliefs that support you in achieving your financial, personal, and professional goals.

Lauren Madden is a Mindset and Wellness Coach and Yoga Teacher in Phoenix, AZ with a background in advertising and marketing. She helps women break through fears and limiting beliefs that are holding them back from living their best lives. To find out more, visit this.

Perhaps no other business, other than professional sports, so vocally celebrates the anointment of winners, whether it’s the winning of a pitch, a promotion, an award at any one of the dozens of award shows, a fancy title, or other public announcements that one person did something better than everyone else. With this type of celebration culture, some degree of professional envy is inevitable.

However, not all envy is created equal. There are some people who feel a twang of jealousy, give themselves a moment, and then go on with their business. Others have a hard time letting it go, and if this sounds like you, enjoying a long and fulfilling career in this industry is going to be tough.

The Different Types of Envy

First, there’s the kind you get when you’re looking through an awards annual or checking out someone’s portfolio, and you see an ad, a logo, a tagline, whatever, that’s so freakin’ brilliant that you smack yourself on the head and think, “ARRRRGGGH, why didn’t I think of that?” Experts call this benign envy, and there’s most definitely a place for it.

Then there’s the other kind, the “not-so-benign” envy. You know what I’m talking about:  the visceral feeling that your heart has been pushed out of an elevator shaft coupled with the flush of anger mixed with shame burning your cheeks. Over the course of my career, I’ve had friends who ended up with some really impressive bullets on their resumes, one in particular who’s star rose much faster than my own. He was humble and appreciative of his success, but a white-hot anger — not at him, but the unfairness of the world! — began consuming me.  I just couldn’t shake it, so I consciously chose to disconnect from the friendship — a friendship that had enriched me personally, and could have led to professional recommendations.

That kind of jealousy is a zero-sum game: There’s never a winner, and the only person who loses is you.

What To Do

To keep moving forward after what seems like a professional setback, try these strategies and learn to constructively deal with your own jealousy.

1. Own it. Being honest with yourself and acknowledging your jealousy is the first step to releasing it. To break through, it may also be helpful to acknowledge it with the object of your envy. You can simply praise their accomplishment, or you might add, in a positive and non-threatening way, that you’re even a little bit jealous of what they’ve done and that it’s a motivation for you.
2. Work on your confidence. If you think about it, jealousy is basically a lack of self-esteem. Hobbies and side-hustles can help, even if they’re not 100% relevant to your job. Do something you love and you’re good at. But also, don’t be afraid to try something new. Not only is the challenge good for your brain, it will also get you more comfortable with not being the best at something.
3. Believe that there’s more than enough success to go around. Some psychologists believe that jealousy is a natural reaction to a “scarcity mindset” – that is, if you think there’s a limited number of accolades to go around, you will naturally be threatened when someone gets one.
4. Use it to your advantage. Benign envy can be hugely useful to you. In a 2011 psychology study called Why envy outperforms admiration, psychologists found that, as a motivating force, envy outperforms admiration! The distinction between admiration and envy is that envy contains a shred of belief that you could be that good, too. For example, you might admire Elon Musk or Usain Bolt, but you envy your friend who just landed a job at Wieden+Kennedy. It’s that envy that will inspire you to grow.
5. Make your own success. It really does sound like a Catch-22, but the best way to deal with jealousy is to not let it keep you from attaining your own success. Remind yourself that success in this business depends on many factors. Hard work and talent are part of it, for sure, but a lot of it is…well, maybe not luck, but there’s definitely some chance involved. There’s the chance that a company is hiring someone with your experience at the same time you’re looking for a job, or the possibility that someone you know thinks of your name at the exact moment one of their colleagues asks for a recommendation.

The great thing is that these are all things that you can influence.  Do everything you can to improve your own skills now (which, again, happens by observing the great people around you). Network and market the hell out of yourself. Keep it up and sooner or later, you’ll find your own success.

Lisa is a Creative Circle candidate and seasoned advertising copywriter who lives in Los Angeles. Her background includes both in-house and agency work on Fortune 500 and global accounts in the consumer and healthcare/pharmaceutical fields. She excels at words, fashion, and cats. If you want to work with Lisa, contact Creative Circle Los Angeles.