Movin' On Up: What Has Your Network Done For You Lately?

When you’re looking for a job, the importance of networking cannot be emphasized enough. Having a network of contacts is vital to ensuring your job hunt success. Yes, it’s imperative to study hard while you’re in school and do well within your field of study, but the old saying holds true: It’s not what you know, it’s about who you know that counts.

Who you know could bring about some new life-changing possibilities for you – and a job opportunity could be one. That’s why you need to make sure you’re meeting as many people as possible and focusing on building quality relationships with them. And, you always need to continue building your contact base – even after you’ve been working for 30 years. Social networking is great, and it’s definitely a must, but doing a little networking in person also never hurts. So, what are some basic tips to ensure your networking works for you?

Meet in person. Regardless of what type of networking you do, there’s still no substitute for meeting a person face-to-face and shaking hands. A direct meeting helps leave more of a lasting impression of who you are.

Start going to professional meetings. There are many professional organizations within your field of interest. Usually, they have regular meetings once a month and charge a small fee to attendees. But, it’s often worth the investment! This is a great place for you to meet several people at once and gain some new knowledge, since many of these meetings bring in guest presenters to broaden your skills. If you are unsure what professional meetings are available in your city, contact your local chamber of commerce to find out which organizations can benefit you.

Be prepared at all times. To ensure you put your best foot forward and present a great first impression, always have business cards and your résumé on hand with all of your contact information. In addition, have an elevator speech prepared. Be able to identify your skills and the type of job you’re looking for. Also, don’t avoid bragging about yourself a little. This is your chance to tell why you’d be a great employee. The goal is to show your networking contact how polished and confident you are – but just be sure to not come across as too confident because that can make you look arrogant. 

Follow-up with contacts. Your networking’s not over just because the networking event ended. You have to continue building relationships with the professionals you meet. Send a quick e-mail or mail a note after the meeting to let key contacts know how glad you were to meet them. This will give potential employers a chance to respond back to you, helping open the door for more communication down the road.

Online networking. Be sure to have an online presence when it comes to networking. Create profiles on sites such as Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter, and add the professional contacts you know. Networking is most effective when you combine both face-to-face and online options. After you meet someone in person, send them a friend request on Facebook, add them as a connection on LinkedIn, or follow them on Twitter.  Just, be aware of what your social networks reveal about you and make sure you project the same impression online that you do in person.

Networking is a great way to get your foot in the door when you’re looking for work. Building a broad range of connections is a good idea – but just remember to build relationships with those contacts! Doing so takes time, but the end result is well worth the effort because the top way that people find a job is through a referral. So, get started today! 

via blog.expresspersonnel.com

Posted via web from AndyWergedal

The Retirement Disaster in America

Many Americans in real trouble when it is time to retire because they have insufficient savings to carry them through old age. Even those that have retirement accounts at work could be in for a rude awakening when they reach retirement age because billions of dollars in retirement funds that companies owe to workers has not been put aside for them. With the troubled state of the economy, this spells retirement disaster for millions of people.

Click to Enlarge

via billshrink.com

Posted via web from AndyWergedal

Success Is Made of Little Victories

Everything we do to be successful comes from little victories. When someone takes notice of our success, it looks like something big. It feels like one big moment. But always, and I mean always, it comes from a series of little victories. Look at the successes you’ve had. Did they all come at once? Or did you build up from nowhere to somewhere to somewhere better to a quick fallback to a new success, and then pow? Right.

In August 2003, I decided to get healthy. So did Kat. We started with nutrition. We lost a little weight. Then we lost some more. We worked on our fitness. Then we did even more. Then I got into running. And by November 2004, I ran and completed a trail marathon. I sure didn’t wake up one morning in November 65 pounds thinner and start running. It was built on several hundred (thousand?) little victories along the way.

Start With Little Flags and Bigger Flags

One way to start achieving your own victories is to know what you’re aiming to accomplish. For instance, if you hate your job, plant a positive flag in the ground that says, “I’m going to change roles/careers.” That’ll be your bigger flag. If you want to get really specific, you should consider adding things like dates to your flags. (Otherwise, they’re more like dreams.)

Then, plant some smaller flags. For instance, having some extra money stashed away so you can cover your transition for a few months might be a good way to accomplish your bigger flag goal. So, how will you get that money? Maybe it will be to start an eBay business. (My friend Marsha Collier is THE author of all the best books about eBay and eBay businesses.) With extra revenue, you’ll reach another little flag that builds up to your next victory.

See how it works? Put out a bigger flag that signifies your victory: “I’ll work independently 8 months from now.” Then, figure out how many little flags you’ll need to put in the sand for all the little victories that will get you there. “I’ll look to start taking in an extra $2000/month within 60 days.” From there, figuring out HOW is a bit more concrete.

Praise Each Little Victory. Then Move on.

On your way to success, make sure you praise your accomplishments. I’m working on my fitness and nutrition again after a long hiatus. At the time I wrote this, I’d lost 10 pounds in my first two weeks. I’m happy with that progress. But, I’m also not going to linger. I’m going to work harder at getting more fit, at reducing my calorie intake a bit more (I’m not eating a fad diet and I’m certainly eating more than enough food), and working those little victories. But I just accept each win, nod, and move on.

Never Justify

One secret to your little victories: never use one to justify a fallback. “Well, I did lose 10 pounds. I’ll just have this vat-sized popcorn at the movie theater.” No. Never. That’s how you got there in the first place. Apply this thinking liberally over all the other things you do. If you get a win with one client, never let that be a reason to mess up with another. Treat every victory as crucial to your success, or you’ll risk eroding your success.

Your Flags, Not Everyone’s Flags

The flags you set for yourself, the little victories, are yours. They pertain to goals you’ve made. Sometimes, on the way to success, our passion to be helpful sometimes overrides our sense that our efforts are our own, and not prescriptive across everyone else. That’s when we risk coming off as preachy. For instance, just because you realize that Twitter and Facebook are the wave of the future doesn’t mean that everyone else who doesn’t is a jerk, behind the times, and doesn’t get it. Maybe those aren’t the flags those people are working towards. Maybe their victories are different than yours.

Work your own flags.

Praise Others Often

The best thing you can do with success is share it. Praise others along the way. Be grateful. Thank others. Share as much of the stage and spotlight as you can. Hoard nothing. Instead, give as much praise away as possible and keep only what you can’t possibly deny to yourself. Your success was made up of many other helping hands. Do what you can to thank them.

Success Accepts Temporary Setbacks and Failures

I called my business New Marketing Labs because I wanted us to always be experimenting. We win business by telling our partners that sometimes we’re not sure the outcome of our efforts until we give it a try. We have, on many occasions, told someone in a meeting, “We’re not really sure if this will yield, but we’re going to try it, and if it does, we’ll do it some more. If it doesn’t, we’ll figure out how to make things work.”

Experimentation, failure, and setbacks are all part of the map. Just don’t dwell on them. Airplanes are off-course 90% of the time, I once read. As long as they land safely and on time (oh, how I wish), that’s good enough for everyone involved. Accept your setbacks (but learn from them).

What Happens With Success

Depending on your views, what happens next is usually the most important. When I’m successful, I do what I can to educate others in how they can accomplish what I’ve done, or at least they can have access to the tools I used to get there. Teaching, raising others up, doing what one can to bring success to others is perhaps the biggest measure of the real value of success. It’s not money that determines success. It’s not fame. It’s the chance to help others with their own success that I value most of all.

Our efforts to achieve success hinge on little victories. When it’s all said and done, after 10,000 hours of hard work, the external sense that it all seems effortless is just another external sign that you’ve worked hard to achieve your position. But it’s really only the start of another kind of effort, complete with more little victories to be had along the way.

What about you? Does that describe your own successes? How are you planting your small flags? What do you find discouraging?

via chrisbrogan.com

Posted via web from AndyWergedal

Employment Digest: How to Identify the Career You Want in 5 Easy Steps

Some people may identify their careers when they are very young. At eight years of age, they may decide that they want to have occupations just like their parents or they may decide to enter different professions. Others may discover their career ambitions while they are attending high school or at some point later in their lives. Even though people may select careers to work in, it is important to realize that they can change to other professions at any time. Although many individuals may feel as though they are locked into their careers for financial or other reasons, they should take a moment to assess their situations and determine if other career opportunities are more ideal for them. When they look through their lenses, they may discover the freedom to select new, more appealing careers – careers that may even be dramatically different from their initial choices.

My own career changed in a remarkable fashion. Even though I knew that I wanted to be a veterinarian since I was thirteen years old, I decided to transition to a career that assists people instead of animals. After sixteen years of practicing veterinary medicine, I made the radical decision to lay my stethoscope down and accept a unique opportunity working for the Chairman and CEO of a Fortune 500 company. I became a senior executive for that organization and had many job responsibilities. Despite the numerous day-to-day job duties that I had, I found time to coach many of the company’s employees and other people employed at various institutions. During this period I discovered that I loved supporting people during their pursuit of career success. My passion to help others led me to establish my own business and motivate others to experience the bliss of pursuing their own career dreams.

You can also determine the career that is ideal for you. Take some time to consider your responses to these questions.

o What would you enjoy doing even if you did not get paid to do it? o What occupation could you do every single day and not grow tired of doing it? o When you picture yourself in that profession, does a huge grin suddenly appear on your face?

After you spend sufficient time reflecting on the questions above, proceed to the five steps below. These steps will help you identify your ideal career.

1. List the careers that appeal to you. If you can not think of any, write down what you really enjoy doing and list the careers that are associated with these activities.

2. Obtain substantial information about each of the careers on your list so that you have a reasonable understanding of what the career entails. You can obtain data on the careers by searching on line or reading books that describe the careers you selected.

3. After conducting your research, return to your list and eliminate the careers that you are no longer interested in based on the information you gathered. Now you can focus on the careers that you are still interested in.

4. Take your abbreviated list and speak to people employed in those professions. During your conversations with them you can ask additional questions that were not answered when you conducted your research. These discussions will provide great opportunities to get their personal perspectives on the careers. You can speak to these individuals on the telephone, however meeting with them face-to-face allows for a more personal exchange (having coffee or tea together is a great way to have a nice discussion). When you schedule your meetings, be careful not to develop intimidating thoughts about speaking with them. Just remember, they began their careers using the same process and will be extremely flattered that you want to discuss what they know best – their very own professions!

5. Continue to re-evaluate and refine your list until you gather sufficient data to determine which career is right for you.

The more you learn about your career of interest, the more you increase the probability of knowing whether you truly want to pursue it. As a result, you will significantly decrease the time or money that may be wasted training in a discipline that you do not want to have as your career.

Dr. Daphne Mobley had a career path that is unlike any other path taken by a corporate executive. She is a veterinarian that transitioned from a behind the scenes role to become a Vice President at a Fortune 500 company. Dr. Mobley moved from helping animals to assisting people in order to share her motivating story and provide successful career enhancing principles that she used to ascend the corporate ladder. Dr. Mobley invites you to visit http://www.drmobleyonline.com so that you can learn more about her unique background and how she can support

via feedproxy.google.com

Posted via web from AndyWergedal

Send a letter stating you are over qualified.

Send your resume and a cover letter which states “It’ll appear obvious from my resume that I’m over-qualified for the job you advertised, so let me tell you why you should interview me and consider “super-sizing” your opportunity”.

Write a bulleted list of 3-5 benefits you think they might be interested in. Close the letter saying something to the effect that “I am old enough to have already learned from my mistakes – so my experience is more cost effective than a more junior person. In a few months, or years, you’ll need to send them on training to upgrade their knowledge, whereas I come fully equipped to do the next job too.”


Point out any certificates or advanced training which
you already have that someone in that job might be expected to acquire.

Show you are already qualified to do the next position
too.

Point out any retraining allowances or incentives
employers might be eligible for if they hire a more seasoned person.


Compliments
of David Perry and Kevin Donlin

Send a letter stating you are over qualified

Create a 30/60/90-Day Plan Now To Boost Your Job Search in the Future

image by Joe Lanman


A 30/60/90-day sales plan is a written outline for exactly what you’ll do in the first 3 months on a new job. It’s the goals you’ve set for yourself as a new employee for the first 30 days, the first 60 days, and the first 90 days. A 30/60/90-day sales plan is tremendously impressive to a hiring manager because it takes a lot of effort to write one, and requires that you research the company and the job very well in order to be specific in your goals. (It takes the idea of “doing your homework” to a whole new level.) 

Very few people put this kind of effort into a job they haven’t even gotten yet. When a hiring manager sees a candidate with one of these plans, they think at least two things: (1) “This person knows exactly what I need here, and he can hit the ground running…I can see him doing well in this job” and (2) “Wow. If this candidate will work this hard before she gets the job, imagine what a go-getter she’ll be on my team.” (Either one means great things for you.)

If you’ve got lots of experience, your 30/60/90-day plan will show the hiring manger your energy, enthusiasm, drive, determination, and knowledge, setting you apart from the pack.
If you have little experience, a 30/60/90-day plan will show the hiring manger that you do, in fact, know what it takes to be successful at this job, and it’s not going to be a risk to hire you. (Click here for more tools to help you get into medical sales.)

OK. I said all that to say this:

Don’t throw away your 30/60/90-day sales plan after you get the job.

First of all, you’ll need to use it on the job. If it’s a good 30/60/90-day plan, actually following it WILL make you more successful.

Second, unless you’re already flirting with retirement, the job you’ve got probably isn’t going to be your last stop….so job searching, interviewing, and 30/60/90-day plans will still be a part of your future.

With that in mind, here’s my big tip for the day: make notes on what worked for you in your 30/60/90-day plan and start a “Job Search” folder, where you keep notes on interesting companies, recruiter contacts, “attaboy” (or girl) emails, etc.–and put your 30/60/90-day sales plan in there for future job searches. Like a brag bookfolder, it’s going to be a personalized resource for you. You won’t need to start from scratch on your job search or your 30/60/90-day sales plan if you find yourself suddenly in the market for a new job. And, you can use what you’ve learned to improve your plan for each job you interview for….you’ll be more efficient, and you’ll become a better candidate.

Original Post Create a 30/60/90-Day Plan Now To Boost Your Job Search in the Future