She clearly makes a case for the digital rise of Asia in particular China, the move to the Internet of Things and Mobility, and a compelling argument for immigrant of top talent to the USA.
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This is so Silicon Valley
Anyone who thinks they should wait and see how things progress will be left behind in the dust of societal, economic, cultural, and political change. The job you will have tomorrow may be in an industry that is just being born today. The products, markets and companies of next month and next year may not have existed 6 years ago. Facebook opened its site to the general public just six years ago. This article is a great testimonial to the power of change driven by technology. Now in YouTube stars are born, serious money is made, and the global economy feels more and more like a neighborhood. A decade ago the record industry’s gears clicked along more or less as they always had: Labels signed up promising acts discovered by A&R scouts, paid those acts advances against future music sales, and hawked that music through a sprawling network of radio programmers and retailers. Today, with album sales continuing to plummet—in 2004, 666.7 million albums were sold; by 2012 that number was down more than 50 percent, to 316 million—labels and artists depend more than ever on touring and merchandise for revenue. Songs are ads meant to help sell tickets and T-shirts, and YouTube is beginning to rival radio when it comes to breaking those tracks. Recognizing this, the trade magazine Billboardrecently overhauled its formula for determining the most popular music in the country, giving YouTube plays more weight. The following week, Harlem Shake topped the Hot 100 chart—the first instrumental track to do so since Jan Hammer’s Miami Vice theme in 1984. Five weeks later, it was still there. Read more at Bloomberg BusinessWeek This is probably the most useful networking tool Linkedin has launched since Groups. I always thought Answers, and Polls were for people who needed more to do, but Linkedin Alumni has some merit. I can look at my school and see where people work who graduated from there. The catch is I see 1st, 2nd, and 3rd degree connections but nobody out of my network. Given I have 7000+ linkedin connections the reach this tool has can be very helpful. However, those with less than 500 connections will find themselves at a disadvantage. That will be hard on new grads and current students. Time will tell to see who uses it. Start Mapping Your Career With LinkedIn Alumni Christina Allen, January 30, 2013 Whether you’re a current college student, a prospective student, or a recent graduate, you know that your educational choices – where you go to school and what you study – have a big impact on your future career. Gathered from the profiles of more than 200 million members, LinkedIn’s Alumni tool helps you explore alumni career paths from more than 22,000 colleges and universities worldwide – and build relationships that can help you along the way Check out www.linkedin.com/alumni. Explore your own school or any other (using the “change schools” button) to see where graduates live, the organizations they work for, andthe types of jobs they pursue. You can also change the dates to track careers of specific graduating classes. And we just added some new features: You can now explore alumni careers based on what they studied, their top skills, and how you are connected on LinkedIn. All the graphs are interactive, just click on the bars to drill down to the specific careers most interesting to you. Read more Top 10 Tech-Influenced Hiring Trends for 2013 How Today’s Tech Trends Translate to Talent By Kathryn Ullrich 1. Renewed Focus on Innovation Now more than ever, rapid advancements in digital interconnectedness, big data and other technologies mean that tech companies need executives who can innovate and envision the next generation of users and devices. We’re seeing this even from leading tech industry clients who are already innovators but realize that innovation requires constant attention and reinvention. Execs who can see beyond today to visioning the future are in high demand. 2. Strategic Nimbleness Rules Working in Silicon Valley for early stage companies requires what I call "strategic nimbleness" – the ability to take a business model and adapt it to what the market is saying now. I’ve handled some VP Sales and General Manager searches recently where the company believes it understands the sales model and why customers are buying. But the company may need to strategically pivot a product and/or sales message based on the latest marketplace learnings. Entrepreneurial companies need executives who can strategically pinpoint new opportunities and then execute for results. 3. Emphasis on Selling Services I’ve long specialized in finding executives who can sell services for consulting company clients who place a premium on strong skills in this area. Most tech salespeople are experienced at selling products or software applications. But as more tech firms start offering high-margin information-based services, companies are seeking sales execs who know how to sell them. It's a different animal requiring hybrid skills of a consultant who has installed services and who can communicate their value to customers. Today’s most in-demand sales execs know how to sell both products and intangibles. 4. Analytics Acumen a Must Companies now have huge amounts of customer data available to help boost targeting and efficiency. That puts a premium on execs who truly understand analytics, and – more importantly – know how to use data-based findings to improve performance. Whether the field is general management, marketing or engineering, executives who learn how to harness data analytics will have a bigger role going forward. In my view, marketing – typically a non-tech function in the past – will become an increasingly technical role based on an explosion of marketing analytics. 5. Social Media Marketing Goes Next-Gen Marketing executives must keep pace with the changing digital landscape of web advertising, social media, SEO/SEM, and myriad of new owned, earned and paid marketing channels and techniques. One VP Marketing tells me she reserves budget specifically for advances she doesn’t yet know about. Companies are well beyond simply trying out Facebook, Twitter and other social platforms. Now it's about turning engagement into sales. The only sure thing is that social will keep evolving. 6. Enabling Technologies Hold Sway During the California gold rush, the suppliers – or enablers – made the most money. In similar fashion, various tools and technologies that support and amplify the Internet and social media will be the "pick axes" of our connected world. Executives understanding and producing these enabling technologies will continue to derive value rather than competing for the next generation of users. 7. Execs Embrace Gamification A half dozen years ago, one CMO candidate distinguished himself by finding innovative ways to market through cleverly imbedded games and product placements deep within targeted search results. Now we even see companies such as Salesforce adding gamification in the form of badges for increasing sales. With millions of casual gamers and a growing percentage of those paying for games, executives who understand gamification can find ways to increase revenue through this mechanism. Who knew countless hours of game-playing could pay off? 8. More Asia/America Leadership Connections With China’s explosive growth and Silicon Valley's already strong manufacturing relationships with Asia, I’m seeing a lot more inter-region hiring activity. Several multi-billion dollar Asian companies have engaged our firm to start or enhance Silicon Valley offices. And we’ve been hired to find Asian Americans to fill critical leadership roles in Asia for US-based firms that want US-style leadership skills infused into an Asian office. I’m already brushing up on my college Mandarin! 9. Resume Keywords Get Real Companies look for talent by searching for resume keywords such as cloud, SaaS, Big Data, mobile applications, etc. But some candidates go overboard with job titles saying, for example, "VP Sales Cloud Computing" in 2000 – long before the term cloud computing was ever used. I find it’s better when executives list the predecessor technology they worked on. My advice is to use “software defined” language such as client server, thin client, hosted software or others. It shows me – the recruiter – that you understand the underlying business models. 10. "Value-Based" Interviewing Takes Hold Interviewing can be subject to trends and has, itself, moved beyond behavioral and case interviewing. The trend now is toward probing the specific value a prospective candidate can bring to the company. What would the candidate do today? At the executive level, candidates should have a well-defined point of view on what skills and experiences they bring that can make a difference. Companies are asking candidates to present a 90-day business plan for the job. Candidates may weary of providing "free consulting" but that’s the new price of admission. Current Searches Kathryn Ullrich Associates' recent search work has included a VP Sales for a hosted software company, VP Sales Cloud Computing for a $35 billion technology company, Regional Sales Director Asia Pacific for an electronics distributor, and VP HR for an ecommerce company. We are currently working on the following searches:
For more information, visit www.ullrichassociates.com. Kathryn Ullrich Associates, Inc. focuses on C-level, VP and Director hires across the functions of Sales, Marketing, Product Management and Consulting for technology and services companies. News Kathryn Ullrich and Getting to the Top have been quoted extensively in the news this past year! Read details at http://www.gettingtothetop.com/MediaKit.aspx Follow us… Twitter at http://twitter.com/GettingtotheTop LinkedIn at http://www.linkedin.com/in/ullrich, and Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/gettingtothetop. More Information For more information on Kathryn Ullrich Associates, Inc. and our executive recruiting services, please call 650-458-8775, email kathrynu@ullrichassociates.com or visit www.ullrichassociates.com. Yes Linkedin has a new layout and we all still look the same, but prettier. However, since recruiters are paying $8000 USD annually to find us, let's do what we can to help them. In fact let's make it easy on them. Here are 5 simple and quick things to implement that will put you in a recruiter's headlights. It will wildly improve your visibility to recruiters on Linkedin. But before you go crazy, on Linkedin go up under your name and click on Settings in the drop down menu to close down all you visibility. You really do not want Linkedin to announce to the whole world every time you join a group or add a contact. Yes, you have to set your privacy as the default is total public nakedness on Linkedin...not good.
These 5 tasks will not take long and the rewards you will reap will be astonishing. Linkedin is really a numbers game to be seen and found. My client who connected to over 500 recruiters on 3 continents in less than a month ended up with 2 interviews. He is at the top executive level so those searches are not plentiful. He got a good return on his investment. Further, every time he posts a blog that highlights his expertise, it goes to his Linkedin updates. His LInkedin updates remind all his recruiter-connections continually of his talents and availability. This is a virtuous circle of creating a reputation and having it be seen on If you want help in building out the content to make your Linkedin Profile really shine, contact me at patti@careercompany.com They have been doing the same ridiculous surveys for year and the results never change. Neither does the corporate response to the answers. Employees want to be better paid. It is no secret that the American worker's standard of living and income has continually lost ground over the past 30+ years. The workloads increases while the wealth has not trickled down and it is unlikely to do so as globalism continues to level the employment playing field. Only the very few types of skilled professionals will be sought after and well compensated. On the other hand, the continuous request for flexibility has shown some improvement over the years as global, distributed teams have increased the necessity to work remotely and at staggered times across borders, as has the increased cost of energy. It seems that having employees work from home saves on energy costs at work. People have wanted the same things since serfdom ended: to be recognized for work done not micromanaged for time put in, to be rewarded fairly, and to trusted and treated as thoughtful, contributing adults not mindless drones. CareerBuilder Survey Reveals Most Wanted Office Perks and What Motivates Workers to Stay With Companies CHICAGO, January 24, 2013 – .....A new CareerBuilder survey explores which job factors are most important to today’s workers. More than 3,900 full-time workers nationwide participated in the survey conducted online by Harris Interactive© from November 1 to November 30, 2012. Nearly one-third of employers (32 percent) reported that top performers left their organizations in 2012 and 39 percent are concerned that they’ll lose top talent in 2013. While most workers (66 percent) stated that they are generally satisfied with their jobs, one in four (25 percent) said they will change jobs in 2013 or 2014. How important is title? While upward mobility is a key factor in job satisfaction and employee retention, having a certain title isn’t important to more than half of workers (55 percent). The vast majority (88 percent) reported that salary matters more. Other factors that outrank job title in what is most important to workers are: · Flexible schedule – 59 percent · Being able to make a difference – 48 percent · Challenging work – 35 percent · Ability to work from home – 33 percent · Academic reimbursement – 18 percent · Having an office – 17 percent · Company car – 14 percent Read more All resumes are digital, but people still don't seem to get that. I don't care if you are CEO or a Barrista at Starbucks. Nobody will see your resume on a piece of paper unless : A. you carry it into them, or B. you walk in for an interview. Your resume gets passed around from computer, to tablet, to cloud database. If you are going to be networked, connected, and screened for jobs online then why not think out of the box and emulate the best at the same time? I give you the madly gone viral "resume" for Philippe Dubost that is a direct send up of an Amazon product page. And, yes, it is being called a resume in an article by Will Oremus at Slate.com I think Philippe is funny, brilliant, and creative. I'd buy him. View Phil's resume here TalentBin Takes On LinkedIn By Targeting Recruiters By David Zax | January 14, 2013 .....That’s because TalentBin doesn’t compete with the services LinkedIn offers to the average user. Rather, TalentBin competes with the behind-the-scenes services LinkedIn offers a very specific, and lucrative, segment: recruiters. You may not have known this, but LinkedIn makes the majority of its revenue by serving recruiters who want to scoop up talent for their companies. In the third quarter of 2012, fully 55% of the company’s revenue came from what LinkedIn calls “Talent Solutions.” (Premium subscriptions, by contrast, only make up 20% of revenue.) LinkedIn largely achieves this by digesting resumes into what Kazanjy calls “this master database that recruiters pay a pretty penny to essentially get God rights to.” TalentBin digests data from ... many others. For hackers, it stalks sites like GitHub or StackOverflow; for designers, it scans the likes of Dribble and Behance. It even trolls the U.S. Patent Database, looking for inventive types. Most recently, says Kazanjy, the team “indexed the entirety of the PubMed Life Sciences Publication Directory,” some 20 million articles, to glean information about talented medical researchers and their interests. “It starts to show this approach doesn’t just work with software engineers,” he says. “It also works with physicians, researchers, biotech people, and so forth.” That project was just completed in December. Gradually, TalentBin has built a “search engine for people,” as Kazanjy puts it, one which he charges $6,000 per year for the privilege of accessing (undercutting LinkedIn’s reported price tag, which can climb to $8,000). Read more While TalentBin may nibble at the edges of Linkedin to do specific, niche searches for gurus in the esoteric fields, Linkedin is a runaway train for talent search. The reason is that recruiters for less esoteric positions like the interactive search of Linkedin. They like being chased by candidates who may turn out to be a good fit for something. Recruiters like developing a "presence" online and a following. That makes future, non-esoteric, searches easier and quicker. One of my executive clients literally went from 50 to 600 connections in less than a month by sending invites to recruiters in all of the 50 groups he had joined on Linkedin. Recruiters never turn down your offer to connect. We pushed him past the magic 500 number and made him look well-connected virtually overnight. Once he was over 500 then professionals he did not know more readily accepted his invitations to connect as they perceived him as a valuable networking contact. People like communities, even recruiters, which explains why Linkedin groups, even with all their spam, are so popular. The only recruiting category killer lurking on the horizon is Facebook. And it's method for data capture has to be improved to give Linkedin a run for its money. If you can’t get into a top-five MBA program, don’t even bother By Jay Bhatti — January 15, 2013 Jay Bhatti is an investor and advisor to startups in New York City. Previously, he was the co-founder of the people search engine Spock.com. He also worked as a product manager for Microsoft. In 2002, he received his MBA from the Wharton School. Read more. The extent of his understanding about MBA is limited by his elitist world view. His main complaints are:
So, why get an MBA? For the network. Yes, the network. Example, UCLA is not in Jay's top five but it has over 30,000 alumni out there to help you with introductions, resources, access to opportunities, and career advice. That network doesn't become obsolete over time, better still, it keep on growing. You are buying a built in database of connections better than whatever Linkedin can do for you. Your fellow alumni are all invested in your success as much as their own as you will reflect back well upon them and the alma mater. How should you pick the MBA school? By the numbers. How many total graduates are there? How many in the geographical area of your preference. Example, most UCLA MBA alumni are in Southern California. How many are in the field or industry of your preference? Some schools are known for finance and accounting vs marketing and management. Do not pick an online school and degree as there is not enough connection and loyalty to the school to be good for networking. Pick a big enough school so that you have ample selection. Example, my degree from JFK University in Career Development was so small and niched that I practically know everybody in the alumni pool. Is an MBA worth it? If you want a career in business, yes, as a bachelor's degree is now the equivalent of a high school diploma for entry into the world of work. Who said you can never be too thin or too rich or have too many diamonds? The whole goal of personal branding is not to limit your exposure online but to expand and control it. Linkedin, other social networks, a personal website are not either or choices. This is not a zero sum game. Self-marketing online (and where else is it nowadays?) is best done by delivering your message using as many platforms, tools and devices as possible. This also includes a "Presume" on Sliderocket.com and a personal Prezi presentation too. Then link them altogether. How weird would it be if Coca Cola used only billboards for advertising and not TV, online and magazines? Same goes for us. When someone puts your name in google search...not only Linkedin should come up but a whole plethora of branded links about you that you own and control: website, blogs, etc. But, like everything else online, websites are now commodities and therefore cheap, if not free. You can build your own with little talent for design and no money and still have a passable result. I will be better than Linkedin because it is uniquely you. A personal website enables us to truly express our uniqueness compared to template-driven social sites. They all have different purposes. Linkedin and other social sites are first and foremost connectors rather than a branding instrument. There are several cloud services for websites where the building and hosting is free as well is the maintenance. Try www.weebly.com . I build all my client's sites there...since 2009 almost 80. My own business and personal websites and blogs are on Weebly: www.pattiwilson.com, www.pattiwilson.net, www.santacruzcalifornia.us, www.joyousdancer.com, I don't think it matters in a Google search which site is point as people (especially search consultants) are curious enough to look at everything. When I sign my name in an email, I list my title, company, Linkedin, SKYPE, website URLs, my phone number. People usually copy all of it for their Outlook files or whatever. The web is moving towards image driven content and curated content. How better to provide both images and curated content of ourselves than a website? Although I do have my business on Pinterest too. in addition... www.about.me is an online business card that will link and point to all other sites online where your profile and dossier exists. If you can only put one link under your name in an email, then use that site. It is free. The only competitor that I know of to about.me is www.flavors.com . You can do both. About.me is one page and they will provide you will a print business card that matches your about.me profile too. Send me an email if you want to see a rainforest research science project website that a 9 year old built by herself using Weebly or some of the sites I have done. Patti@pattiwilson.com How long is long? Is the perception of length different in a print document vs an online page? What is the big deal about a one or two page resume when your Linkedin profile, if printed, can run upwards of five pages? Why are you still worried about having a short, tight, brief, truncated, abbreviated resume to not tax the time and mental agility of a recruiter? They, meaning search firms, contract recruiters, hiring managers and HR dedicate considerable time and energy to comb and cull through LInkedin profiles looking for the perfect candidate. In fact they pay $8000+ for a seat license to so do. They read through the recommendations, the summary, each job description, skills lists, projects, honors/awards, interests, education, group membership, certifications, languages, lists of connections, and, of course, the updates. Why is there still such archaic rules around resumes? Resumes are held to different standards than an online social profile because the hiring powers, especially the search firms, still see a resume as a page or pages printed on paper. They have this unique twist of mind that can rationalize the fact that a resume lives entirely a digital life except for a brief appearance on paper during the interview. They still see a resume's online state as temporary because they do print it out when they bring in a candidate. It is this historical, traditional, head-in-sand viewpoint. It is pretty ridiculous to say a resume has to be short since people are being hired every day on the basis of their very long and detailed Linkedin profiles that are referred to and viewed on a tablet or laptop screen during the interview. Ironically, your resume is stored in the clouds or on a server database for further reference, key word searches, and archive records. Its life in print is very temporary indeed. What do you do? Make your Linkedin profile as robust and informed as possible? Maybe with great care as it is very public given the networking nature of Linkedin. It matters that you fill out most categories fully and with captivating information. But, that information should be designed to elicit further contact with you, not as data to screen you out. The important idea to keep in mind is that both your resume and Linkedin profile exist for one purpose to attract positive attention that results in you being contacted for an opportunity that would be of interest to you. They both, to that end, should be as long as it takes. This is a new twist. I have been saying for several years now that recruiters and hiring managers are looking in Linkedin first for potential hires and then Google searches. They bypass resume searches out of their own website databases in favor of prowling through online profiles. Now some HR experts, notably the esteemed Dr. John Sullivan, have realized to require an employee to submit someone's resume to make an employee referral is a really dumb idea. And he tells you in this article all the good reasons why. Time to just burn that resume and build a professional website instead? I think so. Why “Name-only” Employee Referrals Produce Dramatic Results by Dr. John Sullivan Oct 29, 2012, 5:42 am ET Employee referrals provide the highest quality and the highest volume of hires, but you won’t receive as high a level of results if you don’t minimize roadblocks to referrals. Requiring a current resume for employee referrals is a major “under-the-radar” detriment to reaching the goal of having referrals exceed 50% of all hires. Requiring a resume to start a referral process might not seem like a big deal (because the resume is “the currency” of recruiting) but it can be. Although “active candidates” all have current resumes, employed people who are not actively looking (some people call thempassives) don’t have an updated resume available and they may have little interest in creating one. Requiring an updated resume in order to move forward slows down and occasionally stops employee referral efforts. Consider an alternative approach, which is offering an option to employees, so that all they must submit is a prospect’s name and contact information in order to begin the referral process. This approach is known as a “name-only” referral. read more
You do the math: 150 thought leaders is far less than 1% of its 175 million members. LinkedIn Rolls Out Redesigned Profiles, 'Thought Leader' Feature By Damon Poeter October 16, 2012 PCMagazine LinkedIn also introduced a new feature for users with the redesign--the ability to follow 150 of "the world's most respected thought leaders" (pictured above). The company called the addition of a "follow" mechanism, which allows users to keep up with this select group of individuals, "a natural extension" of existing tools for following companies and news feeds, but said it had no current plans to monetize the new feature. Read more Linkedin has decided for us who these people are. They will be expanding the list and add people who are experts in their field. You can apply at http://partner.linkedin.com/influencer/ Linkedin is doing a one-off from the Google+ style of posts where we can freely put anybody in our circles and follow them and comment on their posts. Linkedin has artificially set-up 150 follows with the same intention. But, how can millions of us get any kind of visibility with a Thought Leader to have a conversation? There has always been a huge culture difference between Linkedin and Google+. Linkedin is very template-driven, structured and rule bound while Google offers the, "I'm feeling lucky" feature for search. Google Circles and Follows have grown organically from the bottom up while Linkedin Thought Leader Follows are obviously trickling down. What do you think of the Linkedin Thought Leader Follows? Do you have a problem with being provided a highly controlled and limited list of chosen elites? Follow me on Google+ It is interesting to note that drops in the equity markets and general economic crashes have generally occurred in the Fall. Even though the US economy has done a yeoman's job of pulling itself back from the abyss, it doesn't mean we won't be dragged over the cliff by the rest of the world. This certainly makes the tech sector the brightest star in the night heavens compared to other employment sectors. Consumer electronics is a cheap thrill compared to buying a new car. And tech devices and Cloud computing are productivity tools that impact the bottom line when growing revenues doesn't. We aren't out of this mess yet. from the Globe and Mail article BRIAN MILNER The Globe and Mail Published Tuesday, Oct. 09 2012, 7:48 PM EDT Last updated Wednesday, Oct. 10 2012, 6:34 AM EDT The rest of the world is ratcheting up already intense pressure on Washington and Brussels to head off another global economic crisis, as the outlook grows ever dimmer. The gravest threats to the increasingly fragile recovery lie in a divided United States and a wounded euro zone, according to the growing chorus of voices that are urging governments to act quickly and decisively to deal with crippling debt and fiscal problems. A headhunter by definition is an employee or an external vendor who works to search, source, identify, and place the best possible available talent fit into a company's job opening. Known as HR staffing, contingent recruiters, and employment agencies, they are paid by the companies who engage their services to hunt talent for them. Hence the nickname, headhunter. Everybody knows this, right? Why is it that headhunters are too often the first avenue used by professional and executive job seekers especially when unemployed? They are the least helpful resource when trying to make a big career transition. They are the most helpful when you are looking for the exact same job, industry, and position level in a different company. Most people are not. The reason why we have this knee jerk outreach to search firms is habit long ingrained into us. Our first experience with any kind of recruiter is when they appeared on campus to recruit new graduates and interns. They hosted pizza nights, gave away bling and cool toys at career fairs. They got some of us our first jobs. We make mistaken assumptions about them due mainly to a long, satisfactory history and pattern of relationship with them. Often, it was a headhunter who lured us out of a current position and into a new opportunity. In time, we used their help to fill our open openings. They continued to cultivate relationships with us as we grew in title and responsibilities. It is the the nature of their business. It only makes sense to let them know that we are looking when it is time for us to move on. But, don't assume that they may actively work in our behalf to help place us by way of reciprocity. Sometimes they will try to help but we cannot expect that they will act to our benefit. We tend to lose an objective perspective of the demands made upon them by their corporate and organizational clients. They are looking for the absolute best fit for a position in terms of industry background, professional experience and position level. Transferable skills are not a significant factor because they don't consider someone making a career transition the best possible fit for a position. Yes, the whims of the economy affect all hiring, as a headhunter may have the perfect position when we aren't looking or desiring to make a move. Timing is everything. Do make connections with headhunters, but don't expect what they simply may not be able to deliver...a job. I came to appreciate the hidden value of SKYPE as the sum total of all its features: screen sharing, file transfer, conference calls, revamped dial pad, address book management, group video calling As my business has grown globally, SKYPE has become a low cost/free option when making calls to remote (from the USA) areas like Vietnam. I have gone through numerous GoToMeeting, and other screen sharing websites,paying exorbitant money with my clients struggling to log in and hear me. I came to rely on the file sharing and screen sharing features. When talking to potential and current clients, I could share my screen and show them real time examples and resources as we talked. SKYPE's file sharing and IM features quickly transferred data during and in between conversations while keeping a history of all exchanges. Each client contact's profile became a centralized place to maintain a history of what data has been exchanged and content shared and when. Adding on apps enables me to record video and audio calls as well. Certainly that all adds up to a client tracking and management system and I have come to rely on it for all my clients not just those off shore. But what is the most interesting is how much more accessible it is to be able to drop a random IM message in somebody's chat box while in SKYPE to engage with someone else. It makes keep up and staying in touch a whole lot easier because it keeps of history of what you sent and said most recently. I don't know about you but I can't keep the onslaught of data coming at me in short-term memory anymore. Green Mountain Train Wreck, March 21, 1910 Kudos to the article author, career strategist John Lees, as he is absolutely spot on in his assessment of how we become our own train wrecks. If You're Looking for a Job, Get Out of Your Own Wayby John Lees August 15, 2012 Why do some job hunters give up when they are just in sight of their goals? I've just seen Simon, a client who has been looking for a job for 6 months. Like many people on the market, he started out optimistically but has given up — not officially, mind you, but he's suddenly taken an urgent interest in redecorating his house. His argument to hire a career coach is summed up in this comment, "By insisting that job searching is logical, simple and hardly worth thinking about, we don't think about it at all. We act as if it's as simple as making an online purchase. Yet it's an activity which is all about influencing, communicating a brand, eliciting support, and making connections — skills that can take half a lifetime to perfect." Here are his 5 Ways to Derail a Search Summed Up:
I would add a 6th Way Often my clients come to me after they have committed the article's five top job search errors and lost valuable search time. But, I would add a sixth as well. The job hunter who expects and assumes that their next position should come through a search firm because their last four did. Time changes executive opportunities in marketplace as career growth raises position level and the corresponding availability jobs at the top. Successful job hunters respond with new approaches, tactics, tools and technologies that meet the current status quo. ResumUp is a new tool that is a graphically social based view of your experience and talents. Whew, graphically-social based, now that's a mouth full. But how do you describe the new image driven content style of cloud apps coming up online now? It is an interesting concept and of course it remains to be seen how they will monetize this but I like the look. Hint, sign up using your Linkedin profile not Facebook as it populates the data fields from the site you choose. I am not sure I would want a future employer to take a look at my credentials presented in this fashion. However, the resume is a dying breed we need to stay ahead of the curve and manipulate these tools to our advantage. If you want to sign-up for the free best click here. Normally, I don't print the whole article but didn't want to risk losing the link to this one. It is interesting how a corporation paying 28% in income tax will move offshore outside the USA to save 5% in taxes skirting a 2004 law. There is no stopping a trend that has political will and lots of money behind it but it is helpful to decide our own trajectories in life and work to mitigate the risks and maximize the benefits of wherever we are. U.S. Firms Move Abroad to Cut Taxes Despite '04 Law, Companies Reincorporate Overseas, Saving Big Sums on Taxes More big U.S. companies are reincorporating abroad despite a 2004 federal law that sought to curb the practice. One big reason: Taxes. Companies cite various reasons for moving, including expanding their operations and their geographic reach. But tax bills remain a primary concern. A few cite worries that U.S. taxes will rise in the future, especially if Washington revamps the tax code next year to shrink the federal budget deficit. "We want to be closer to where our clients are," says David Prosperi, a spokesman for risk manager Aon AON -0.08% plc, which relocated to the U.K. in April. Aon has told analysts it expects to reduce its tax rate, which averaged 28% over the past five years, by five percentage points over time, which could boost profits by about $100 million annually. Since 2009, at least 10 U.S. public companies have moved their incorporation address abroad or announced plans to do so, including six in the last year or so, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis of company filings and statements. That's up from just a handful from 2004 through 2008. The companies that have moved recently include manufacturer Eaton Corp., ETN -1.16% oil firms Ensco International Inc. ESV +0.81% and Rowan Cos., RDC -0.65% as well as a spinoff of Sara Lee Corp. called D.E. Master Blenders 1753. Eaton, a 101-year-old Cleveland-based maker of components and electrical equipment, announced in May that it would acquire Cooper Industries PLC, another electrical-equipment maker that had moved to Bermuda in 2002 and then to Ireland in 2009. It plans to maintain factories, offices and other operations in the U.S. while moving its place of incorporation—for now—to the office of an Irish law firm in downtown Dublin. Associated Press Eaton plans to maintain factories and offices in the U.S. When Eaton announced the deal, it emphasized the synergies the two companies would generate. It also told analysts that the tax benefits would save the company about $160 million a year, beginning next year. Eaton's chief executive, Alexander Cutler, has been a vocal critic of the corporate tax code. "We have too high a domestic rate and we have a thoroughly uncompetitive international tax regime," Mr. Cutler said on CNBC in January. "Let's not wait for the next presidential election" to change the rules. The moves by Ensco and Rowan, which operate offshore oil rigs, show how one company's effort to lower its tax rate can spur other shifts. In moving from Dallas to the U.K. in 2009, Ensco followed rivals such as Transocean Ltd., RIG +0.29% Noble Corp. and Weatherford International Ltd. WFT -1.90% that had relocated outside the U.S. The company said the move would help it achieve "a tax rate comparable to that of some of Ensco's global competitors." In fact, Ensco's tax rate has declined. In the second quarter, the company said its "effective tax rate" was 10.5%, down from 19% in 2009. The savings: more than $100 million a year. Around the time of Ensco's move, Rowan executives fielded questions from investors and analysts about their own tax rate. In February, Rowan answered the questions, announcing plans to move to the U.K. from Houston. "We're able to be competitive, with a low effective rate," says Suzanne Spera, the firm's director of investor relations. Fear of such moves is what prompted Congress to pass the 2004 law, which was backed by Democrats and some Republicans and included exceptions that some firms and advisers have sought to exploit. In June, the Internal Revenue Service tightened an exception that had allowed companies to move to countries in which they have substantial business activities. It will not prevent moves through a merger, such as Eaton's. Lawmakers of both parties have said the U.S. corporate tax code needs a rewrite and they are aiming to try next year. One shared source of concern is the top corporate tax rate of 35%—the highest among developed economies. By comparison, Ireland's rate is 12.5%. The Obama administration has proposed lowering the rate to 28%, while Republican rival Mitt Romney has proposed 25%. Critics of the tax code also say it puts U.S. companies at a disadvantage because it taxes their profits earned abroad. Most developed countries tax only domestic earnings. While executives would welcome a lower tax rate and an end to global taxation, some worry their tax bills could rise under other measures that could be included in a tax-overhaul package. U.S. multinationals often pay far less than 35% because of various breaks, including the option of deferring the payment of U.S. taxes on foreign earnings until they are brought to the U.S. Those companies could pay higher taxes under Obama administration proposals to limit the benefits of deferral. Rowan cited that potential change in announcing its move. Obama administration officials play down the significance of the recent company moves and say their proposals would encourage companies to stay in the U.S. In his State of the Union speech in January, President Barack Obama said that "it's time to stop rewarding businesses that ship jobs overseas, and start rewarding companies that create jobs right here in America." Some companies worry that lowering the general corporate tax rate would require eliminating tax breaks for specific firms or industries. Even without a tax-code overhaul, Congress could eliminate some tax breaks to reduce the deficit. For companies that leave the U.S., the appeal of lower taxes "is still there, but people now are also getting more concerned about where tax reform is going," says Bret Wells, a University of Houston law professor. Still, several key lawmakers hope to rewrite the tax code to give companies an extra incentive to stay in the U.S. Tax reform needs to "put American businesses in the best position to compete in the global economy while adding U.S. jobs." said Sen. Max Baucus (D., Mont.), the Senate Finance Committee chairman, in a recent statement. And House Ways and Means Chairman Dave Camp (R., Mich.) said in a recent statement that "comprehensive tax reform that lowers rates and transitions the U.S. to a territorial approach that is used by our global competitors is critical to making America a more attractive place to invest and hire." Write to John D. McKinnon at john.mckinnon@wsj.com and Scott Thurm at scott.thurm@wsj.com A version of this article appeared August 29, 2012, on page B1 in the U.S. edition of The Wall Street Journal, with the headline: U.S. Firms Move Abroad. Understanding your salary: Are you a pork belly or a sausage? The quiz in NPR's Marketplace.org brings home the obvious truth about how to get ahead. Yes indeed, we all need to brand ourselves to stand out from all those other pork bellies. But just being a best of class pork belly isn't enough to make more money, be lay-off proof and get ahead. In today's dog eat dog world we all need to evolve into being a true sausage. Whether that is by adding special skills and knowledge to our portfolio, or gaining unique training beyond the average degrees, we need to be able to distinctly be able to separate ourselves by our uniqueness value proposition. If you don't fit into their standard, generic job descriptions you can't be pigeon-holed into a salary range. Having a career description unique to you, like a gourmet sausage, will add to your market value, the salary you can command and, certainly, the demand for your abilities in the marketplace. The quiz, by the simple comparison questions, gives you the path to follow to become a true sausage. I won't be a spoiler and list them. Click on the title at the top or here and go take it for yourself. Then figure out what you can do to improve your differentiation in the marketplace and then how to tell your story so that people get it. Email me if you have trouble: patti@pattiwilson.com Author and New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman discussed job opportunities, the growth of the global middle class, and an outfit in Jordan that's launching scores of new businesses. He spoke May 10, 2012, at the Stanford Graduate School of Business' View from the Top Series.
Business Insider has 23 examples of cool resumes using Instagram, the image-based website that Facebook just bought for $1 billion. They said in their intro: It seems like a boring black and white resume won't get you very far anymore. Inspired by 7 cool resumes we found on Pinterest, we scoured Instagram for some more. Here are the most creative resumes we found. View all 23 here Some of the examples are stunning, others quirky, and all are young...very young. This really can work for you if you are under 30 and fighting for visibility in this very tough job market for early professionals. Certainly it can give anyone in the creative arts, digital media, and technology an extra edge and opportunity to showcase their talents. But will Instagram and Pinterest work for mid-career experienced professionals and senior executives? A qualified yes. It depends on the sector, the role and position level. In heavy equipment manufacturing at the C-level it would not be advisable. At least not this year. But in consumer packaged goods, fast moving consumer goods, hospitality, sports, recreation, entertainment, consumer electronics, fashion, advertizing, and technology sectors, those sites could well be a differentiating addition to your online branding. The position is important too. Traditional fields of finance, insurance, risk management, facilities management, for example, don't lend themselves, right now, to this kind of treatment. This kind of personal branding would not be expected nor accepted in more conservative sectors or professions. With all of the above caveats, in the parade, it is far better to ahead of the elephants and horses than behind. In 2003, when Linkedin launched nobody had ever heard of it let alone wanted to join and connect. Back then it was easy to get thousands of connections (and I did) and now you have to buy them. My advice is to register your name on Pinterest and Instagram to just hold a place for your profile. Eventually they will become acceptable social sites like linkedin is now and you then can leverage them for online branding. See all my blogs and website on Pinterest boards . Instagram is next. |
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