from About.com video coaching interviewers How to Judge Potential Employees on Behavior and Mannerisms This is the title of a video from About.com Human Resources that says,"A potential employees behavior and mannerisms can be the most telling part of the job interview. Learn how to gauge actions and behavior to see if the candidate would be a successful employee." Hopefully, I have successfully reverse engineered the process advised in this video so that my clients display appropriate interview behaviors to match any interviewer. Our goal is always to do what it takes to turn the interview into an offer. You can always turn down an offer if you think your are not a fit or it isn't quite the right opportunity. But you don't want to hand over that power to the interviewer. You control your total delivery during the interview, not just what you say but how you look, sound and move when you respond. The most scary statement a recruiter can make is to tell you to relax and be yourself. Do not do that! But this does put you on the alert to be very attentive to the recruiter's body language, mannerisms and the non-verbal feedback to the answers that you supply to their questions. That's exactly what they are doing to you! Interviewing as an art should be a well choreographed dance between you and the interviewers. How many times have you lost out on a great position because you didn't read the interviewer correctly or rubbed them the wrong way? Record your voice as you practice answering questions. Use your laptop to video your practice interviews. Microsoft OneNote will actually record the screen as you to this so you can track your improvement. If you get really good at interviewing in any situation, with any style of interviewer, and any company then you can afford to be your self when you want to not when they want you to.
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http://sachachua.com/blog/p/23203/ We all know by now about very successful launch of The Startup of You by the founder of Linkedin. It has good tips and advice for the Social Generation's job search. But that's not my point here. I have been mulling the changes that 20 years can make in how we have careers, look for work and create our success. In 1990, Tom Peter's published in Fast Company, The Brand Called You. During the past 20+ years, people, with the help of the Internet, have figured out and mastered how to brand, pitch, promote and market themselves to get or stay employed. Everybody is on Google+, Linkedin, Viadeo, Xing, and FB pages with profiles describing their accomplishments. Many professionals (all my clients) are setting up professional websites, iPad profiles, and even Presumes. Yes, we have got the branding part down to the point that everyone is sick of hearing the word used. Unfortunately, being well branded, positioned and marketed isn't enough anymore. The Startup of You addresses the really salient career challenges that the Social Generation faces today. How do you find a job and stay employed in a global marketplace for talent where there aren't enough jobs, the competition is fierce, and everybody is a brand? Well the message is threefold:
Some reading this may say that this is all old news that is just repackaged. I don't think so. What is interesting to note is the shift in emphasis over 20 years from the sole individual with a brand to a person as part of a collective network. As we all live digital lives, building a the global village around us to support our career survival has become a most efficacious route. http://arquazuarma.blogspot.com In an interesting addendum to the article below, I was speaking with a long-time client last night who told me that all the job postings up in Silicon Valley are not as accurate as one might think in the economic boomlet going on here. Apparently more hires are being done by headhunters outside the company and internal hires inside. The postings are window dressing to satisfy government requirements and to distract competitors. I can't tell you companies names but he got it verified by insiders at former places where he has worked. I double checked and agree. Why is all the internal hiring happening? Well it's faster, cheaper and, at least in Silicon Valley, the person has been "test driven". Typically anywhere from 20to 60% new hires are contractors. When an regular hire opening comes up, then the company sources internally from its contractor and consultant pool. That's my best guess on this. The other part of using headhunters for outside, well they control the deal flow so a fire hose of applicants isn't engulfing HR. With so much good talent out there looking, they can cherry pick top candidates with much less hassle than the company's staff can. Here is an excerpt from Peter Capelli's article. He is using his gut, anecdotal, hunching as well! HR leaders tend to try to push back against the fetish in their corporations to hire from outside instead of promoting from within. A new study offers some evidence to bolster their case. By My editors always say give away the story early on, so the answer is, "no." But it requires a little more background to make the story interesting. Probably the most important development in corporate life over the last generation or so has been the decline of lifetime careers and the rise of outside hiring. The situation in many businesses now is that, when there is a vacancy, they automatically think about filling vacancies by looking outside. Internal promotions are something of a rarity. I don't have any hard evidence for this, but my sense from anecdotes is that the outside hiring trend has been driven by CEOs and other top executives who (a) if they were hired from the outside think that is the way to go for other roles as well or (b) seem to have a "grass is greener" view of external candidates, especially those who come from an admired employer. read more here This is your new blog post. Click here and start typing, or drag in elements from the top bar.
The following excerpt from the CFO article underscores the need for all job seekers to get beyond the fill in online application,social profiles, and the emailed resume to inculcate themselves into hiring opportunities. The cloud app described below turns any candidate into one of many to be screened, scrutinized and culled from the herd. That process just doesn't get you hired. I agree with CFO's title but in a different way. For you to get a job, make the resume an afterthought, leave behind paper at the on-site interview. Don't put it between you and an employer. They just might make you fill in a form anyhow. In a recent survey, more than a quarter of the responding CFOs said they increased accounting staff in the past two years. Indeed, the biggest growth in jobs right now seems to be occurring in the professional- and business-services sector. But chances are the majority of those organizations are still hiring the old-fashioned way: posting openings and sifting through piles of résumés. Not Esker, a French-based document-automation company that has gone from 220 full-time employees to 280 in the past two years. “I haven’t looked at a résumé in nine months,” says Esker managing director and U.S. chief operating officer Steve Smith, “and I won’t look at résumés anymore.” Instead, Smith uses Unrabble, a cloud-based, software-as-a-service hiring tool that eliminates all the paper, résumés included. “If a candidate approaches me the old-fashioned way and sends me a résumé, I send the person the link to the tool and tell [him he’s] got to go through this process,” he says. “Within 30 seconds, I can tell if it’s worth my time looking into this person.” Unrabble is browser-based. Instead of submitting a traditional résumé, candidates fill out an online form, and the hiring company can then sort applications based on qualifications for the position. The Unrabble tool is searchable (job experience and companies can be checked), interactive (candidates can be ranked), and easily shared with any number of people. It also enables users to search a candidate’s Facebook page and Linked-In profile without having to hunt for them on the web. Smith chose Unrabble over two other tools; one required a software installation, the other lacked desired functionality. He estimates Unrabble has reduced the amount of time Esker spends on hiring by 20% to 30%. The premium service costs $49 a month for 10 open positions; more than that, the price goes up. “I haven’t run it through an ROI calculator,” Smith says, “and I haven’t calculated the dollar savings. But if you figure just my time alone, and what I’m paid, and the time I’ve saved — it’s more than paid for itself.” Read the entire article This is your new blog post. Click here and start typing, or drag in elements from the top bar.
These two news stories below from Inc. Magazine and the New York Times underscore the recurring economic themes that I have been blogging and writing about e.g. globalization and new technology. This is not a passing phenomena but rather a sea change in how, where, and what the next generation does with their careers. If they can't make it here then they will go elsewhere, anywhere, everywhere there is opportunity. This pattern will follow them as they mature in their careers. They will continue to follow opportunities across borders. And if the corporate entities are hiring fewer people and driving existing employees harder, then it is a good idea to take an entrepreneurial path and work hard for yourself. Not surprisingly, the two combine where entrepreneurship has a global reach and the upcoming generations under 50 are driving their own destinies worldwide. New Grads Seek Startup Opportunities reads the story from Inc Magazine: Several new programs are trying to expand entrepreneurship opportunities and training for recent college graduates. In a tight job market, recent college graduates are finding more opportunities to tap into their inner entrepreneur, according to USA Today. Even with corporations planning to hire 10% more college grads this year than last, a Pew Research Center report found that just over half of 18- to 24-year-olds had employment, the paper reports. That’s the lowest rate since 1948. As a result, more new grads are looking at business plan competitions and start-up initiatives. A nonprofit organization called Venture for America—modeled after the better-known Teach for America—recruited about 45 college graduates to work with small start-ups in lower-cost cities for two years, starting in June. The group’s big goal: to create 100,000 jobs by 2025. And then... Many US Immigrant Children Seek American Dream Abroad according to this NY Times article. The story goes on to say: In growing numbers, experts say, highly educated children of immigrants to the United States are uprooting themselves and moving to their ancestral countries. They are embracing homelands that their parents once spurned but that are now economic powers........Enterprising Americans have always sought opportunities abroad. But this new wave underscores the evolving nature of global migration, and the challenges to American economic supremacy and competitiveness. This is your new blog post. Click here and start typing, or drag in elements from the top bar.
It is so addictive when surfing around the Internet to identify and click on interesting bits of information, articles, news stories with the little Pinterest Pin It button and post an image and link to one of my Pinterest boards. Pinterest is a visually, discriminating version of Delicious.com, and Stumbleupon. I pick out a relevant image on the article's page, tag it and attach a brief comment/opinion of my own. I use the image to attract your attention to the information and the article. I know that's not exactly what Pinterest intended but it works. Most people put up a collage of clothes, artwork, jewelry, photos, fashion, food, travel, movies and music images. You know, lifestyle. Just look at the Pinterest category list. There is no category for business, the economy, globalization, philosophy, history, politics, careers and jobs, or any of my board titles. Pinterest has self-created its own limitations because it focuses on the image as an end unto itself rather than the means, conduit and connection to an even greater end... the source of the image and attached link. I connected my Facebook profile to Pinterest so that all my pins post to FB. I have had, in just two days, several people comment and repin a number of pins. Now that is cool because nobody comments on my blog posts, except for the occasional spamer. Check out my Pinterest boards on Career Tools, Global Economy, Working Wisdom and Culture. You may get addicted too! What to do with QR Codes? By creating your own QR Codes (called "qurifying") you can make whatever you want more interactive. - Put one on your business card, on flyers for a party or poster to promote your products or services. - Or use them to help sorting your books or CD's, put them on your keys or tools so you know what they are for. (from the Qurify website) Tools? Really? So I put this code on my screwdriver and I always know what it's for? Ok, I am having fun. But these QR codes are pretty cool and Qurify has probably the simplest site to use to make codes for use by the executive, professional, solopreneur and small business owner. What am I talking about? QR or Quick Response code is a bar code that can be read by an app in your iPhone, Droid or my Blackberry. Putting the code on any real life object enables it to transmit whatever information is embedded in the code. Typically most services limit you to a certain number of characters to embed in a QR code. Qurify said 255 characters but some QR codes hold up to 7000 characters.The code above has my business card information embedded in it. I used all but 37 characters of the 255. What do you do with them? Look at them as an interactive bridge between the digital universe and the bricks and mortar world. Put in the QR code information from a v-card, business card, links to Facebook, Linkedin, YouTube, eBook, a resume, and your website. Apply the code to a piece of paper, a card, a flyer, a tee shirt, a book to enable the coder reader to receive extended information about you online or any topic or site you want to send them to.. Is it worth adding to your business card, resume, and other documents? Sure, why not? You have nothing to lose and much to gain with the increased visibility. I think the best use would be to build a great website and use the QR code on the back of your business card to get networking contacts to the website's landing page. That would be the best brand message delivery compared to sending code readers to linkedin or other template-driven apps and sites. You could offer a special deal on an ebook you have written and use the code to send users to an Amazon.com page to buy it. The applications are endless. Just think of it as the simple little wireless connector between the world and the interweb. In my universe there is nothing better than leading the pack compared to following the herd when it comes to new and wonderful technology gadgets. QR codes are easy to create, and the uses are limited only by your creativity, strategic vision, and brilliant imagination. Start with your business card as code. Companies may be hiring more now in some sectors as the economy continues to recover but they are still running lean. People inside of organizations, happy to be employed, are working hard...very hard indeed just to keep their situation. I delivered a webinar today to UCLA entitled Digital You. It was about using three key online tools that combined together would give any executive or professional an edge in the competition to be seen and heard. Someone reminded me that five years ago I was passionate about being on Linkedin.com and now I was telling people to move on to other sites and tools. They asked, "Why was that?" I explained using the analogy of the Red Queen in Through the Looking Glass telling Alice as they were running that in order to get anywhere they had to run twice as fast. Technology is like that. What's new today will be used by everybody in 4 years or less. Everybody (reaching for 200M) is on Linkedin.com now and that's a good thing for networking but not for personal branding. Linkedin is a template-based site as is VisualCV and they have you fill in their blanks. You end up looking just like everybody else. I described it as an online MBA resume book. Good people look at it but you can get lost in the shuffle. You are running, so to speak, to stay in the same place. Using new tools like personal profiles (flavors.me, about.me/pattiwilson ), personal presentations (sliderocket.com) and personal pages using website builders gets you moving twice as fast as others vying with you for visibility, eye-balls, and market share online. I personally use Weebly but there are others that are great too ( here is Wikipedia's list of top website builders). Is this more work? Sure. Do you want your career to continue until you retire? Then run twice as fast to get somewhere and keep doing it. The good of all this is that once it is in place the only maintenance you do is blogging or updating when you change positions, write articles, are interviewed by Wall Street Journal or other notable events worth capturing ongoing. There is a downside. One person asked at the end if this required that you have a very clear, defined, well-positioned brand, value proposition and career target. Yes, it does and that's is the most difficult part actually. Once you have clearly defined yourself the content, images, and look all falls into place. My mentor, Richard Bolles author of What Color is Your Parachute said, in describing this process, "this is the hard part. This is where you have to think, people"... and run faster. The tendency to hire people we know is deeply embedded into our DNA. Man (and woman) has a tribal orientation inculcated into his system since the Pleistocene cave dwellers. Tribes working cooperatively have been integrally to commerce from the surf system of the feudal middle ages, and the guilds of the Renaissance to modern day. Fortunately our comfort with the size and number of our tribes has grown significantly beyond our nomadic/agrarian roots. Our DNA instinctual drive for belonging to the group is embedded in business processes today. In Reid Hoffman's new book, The Startup of You, he makes the point that our opportunities and business success comes from our networks e.g. tribes. Networking inside or outside organizations requires meeting people you don't know and being able to talk about yourself and find out about them. I have executive clients with minimal footprint on Linkedin expect the perfect job posting to magically appear. Building a network is not learned behavior. Growing and advancing within a big company depends on who knows you and who gets to know and like you. Those whose networking fluency is weak or not a style fit for their company culture rail against the corporate "politics" they face when they should be getting better at networking. Why is networking so hard? As much as we like to belong, we are hardwired in our DNA for a adrenal reaction of flight or fight that gives us a wariness, if not fear, of the new, the unknown, and change. Networking requires all of the above: we must change our behavior and reach out to unknown people to grow connections. It is an interesting DNA dynamic, we have move past our wariness of meeting new people in order to satisfy our drives to belong to a group (tribe). I agree with Reid, that anyone who develops fluency in networking will up their success quotient in their careers because doors are opened by people you know. The easiest first thing to do to grow your network is use Linkedin, Viadeo, and Xing to invite people to connect with you. It is a great start on instantly building your a base of hundreds if not thousands of contacts. The next easiest step is to start attending events: professional associations, conferences, trade shows and alumni groups to meet people. Younger, thinner, more interesting looking is the new oatmeal look. After 136 years, the Quaker Oats guy logo has been updated to appeal to a new generation of young adults as well as appeal to age-phobic baby boomers. If you compare the two logos, yes the one on the right is the new one, the new one shows an updated font style too that is a brighter white and not "old timey" looking. According to the Time Magazine article, Quaker Oats owner PepsiCo introduced the changes in an effort to make the brand “fresh and innovative,” which might take a bit of doing, given that their product is a dessicated cereal grain. You may not be going on 136 years old, but when it comes to staying viable in the global talent marketplace, well then consider an update of your personal brand. How do you do that? Well it is less the wording in your content which focuses more on branding/rebranding. Rebranding positions you to move into new fields, business sectors, and industries. A brand refresh is gives your current brand a younger, more vibrant, newer, fresher appearance. That is more about image and look. At the warp speed of business and the Internet, a professional look evolves much more rapidly. Digital Documents in 2012 look different from those in 1998 Well, theoretically they should look different but some professionals are still using resume formats and layouts since before the faxed resume. Resumes, websites, blogs, or social profiles are built now to look great on a screen as that's where they are read. In fact, if you go to the Way Back Machine (Internet Archive) and check out early Linkedin, Amazon, blogs sites, you will see how different and dated they look now. The fonts now must take into consideration how well a font renders online and on a screen. Just look at the different in readability between the two Quaker Oats logos. Modern sans-serif fonts look younger and fresher. Serif fonts like Palatino render better onscreen than the traditional Times Roman, making for a crisper, fresher look. The layout and design of all documents are moving to a lighter, more open look. Just look at the new Google Blogger with dynamic, open blog that is image focused versus the blog you are reading now. The older you are, the younger your photo style Most executives use their photos provided by their company's PR department on Linkedin and for other business requirements. If you are over 50 and not working in government and financial services, this is not a good idea. More stable, traditional business sectors like seeing their executives in suits and business attire as does consulting services. There is a reason for the slang referring to "the suits". Using photos taken outdoors, in natural light, preferably in business casual will create an image of health, vitality and youth as well. Business formal creates age aura. If you have substantial career credentials and achievements, then you don't need to look the part as well. Take the photo one step further and be in dressy sports on a wind swept beach with a Golden Retriever. Lacking ocean, use a park and a poodle, or ski slopes, etc. Just don't look too much like you're into extreme sports. Remember how the category "interests" was put at the bottom of your resume and you got to list things like: biking, skiing, marathon running, etc etc? Well, one well done photos creates the better impression of you without the ubiquitous laundry list. Update your look, wardrobe, and appearance There is age discrimination and it is subtle, unconscious, and hard to prove when practiced in hiring and firing. In a media marketing driven, consumption based culture, we are manipulated by the image and look of products which are presented with an emphasis on sex, power, fun,and excitement. Yes, we like functional too, but we get sucked in by looks first. Think how many people wear those ergonomically uncomfortable, auditorially poor, and, basically, cheesy Apple iPod earbuds because they look cool and recognizable in white. A style makeover may not be annually necessary but every five years it is mandatory. This includes product: skin care, hair care, and body maintenance. There is a reason sites like Dermatologistrx is thriving online, and why both men and women no longer consider facial peels and lifts optional. It is not about looking younger which may be hard to archieve, especially after a certain age, but looking fresher, more vibrant and vital. The Quaker Oats guy looks thinner, healthier, and a bit younger and you should too! Is it fear and loathing? Being a creature of habit and learned behaviors? A lack of imagination? Or do we just tend to just take the path of least resistance? All of the above, depending on the individual. What qualifies as low hanging fruit when it comes to job opportunities?
We are creatures of habit and learned behaviors so if you got recruited out of college and search people "placed" you in all your jobs, then we assume the past predicts the future. It doesn't in career advancement. As we climb to the top, there are fewer jobs and the competition is fierce. We don't just get "placed" as easily. And as we age, there is younger, less expensive talent competing for the same opportunities. Your business sector may become commoditized and there is no room to grown professionally. We don't realize that the best fruit can be harder to find, be at the top of the tree or hidden under leaves and branches. Often our mentors, bosses and colleagues can be our undoing. They may as they move on bring you with them but that may not be the best option for you. I have seen professionals in a beleaguered companies and business units actively solicit their colleagues to join them. Did misery need company? Did they want to be rescued from their drowning struggles? Were you misled or did you just not even expend the effort to find out about the mess you were getting into? When we buy fruit at a stand or market it is often green and unripe, or bruised in the picking. Today, the savvy professional, especially if not having conducted a search in the past 5 years, must:
Despite four years since the global crash and 9+ since Linkedin was born, many executives and professionals haven't grasped the full impact of a reset economy and the Internet on a job hunt. Here are some the most common ill conceived notions that I hear: 1. Being on Linkedin will bring job opportunities to you. There is a common belief that if you build your profile, then the recruiters will flock to you. Well, most likely, your Linkedin profile will give you a boost on Google ranking in a name search. Solution: The big value of Linkedin is the access you get to networking in 50 groups and 50 subgroups. Rather than waiting to be found, build your Linkedin connections into thousands for ongoing leverage. 2. I customize my resume for every position and opening. Good luck with this one because they will all have to synch your one Linkedin profile. For that matter, all your profiles on Viadeo, Xing, Linkedin, Orkut, etc should all deliver the same message about you. Solution: Focus your search target on one or two overlapping business domains. Gear all your branding and positioning of yourself around those sectors. 3. The search firms don't get back to me or they have nothing for me. Search firms more than ever are working to find the perfect fit for their client companies. Given that their business is down by more than half since the crash, the demand of top talent continues to exceed supply. Unless you exactly fit their requirements, you will find no opportunities forthcoming from them. Solution: Using search consultants and headhunters as a source of information about market trends and companies hiring would provide more fruitful results. 4. My continued outreach to my network is wearing out my welcome with them. Don't use up your direct network by continuous asking for introductions to job openings. When those turn up empty, or as dead ends... and they mostly do... then your network is exhausted. Solution: Double or triple your network by using your existing connections for introductions into their network. This grows a relevant source of contacts in your field without much effort. 5. My employer will suspect that I am looking if I am highly visible on the Internet. I am still surprised by how much that concerns people when millions are on social networks now. Just do an advanced people search on Linkedin by your company and competitors. You will find more than you expect. Solution: Get on the Internet with gusto because you only have to do it once. Put up profiles. Build a website and blog. Become visibly well branded and be done with it. Once you are on it, that becomes old news. 6. Since I am not willing to relocate, I am looking only at local employers. The market place for talent is now global and your competition can come from anywhere thanks in part to the Internet and to the willingness of professionals outside the USA to seek opportunities anywhere. Solution: Search globally and work locally. You cannot determine who or where your next employer will be. You can negotiate the details like location when they make an offer. 7. I don't need to be visible online as my job is secure and I am happy in my current situation. Nowadays all marketing is online. Look at every Superbowl ad for its references to product websites. Professional advancement, and career promotion are done equally outside your organization as within. Solution: The professional status you build for yourself outside your company reflects positively on you and your organization. Making a name for yourself is most easily done online. In a recent BlueSteps study of over 100 senior executives working in China, seventy percent stated that executive pay had become more competitive over the last 5 years, and 89% indicated their intent to stay in China for over 3 years. The majority of respondents were expats working in China (77%), in general management roles including CEO/COO (63.4%), earning over USD $150k (74%). In a comparison of six nations, senior executives ranked China as the fourth highest paying country, ahead of other emerging markets, Brazil (5th) and India (6th), yet behind developed nations Germany (3rd), UK (2nd) and USA (1st). 70 percent of respondents indicated that compensation in China has moderately or significantly increased in competiveness in the last 5 years. "BlueSteps is the exclusive service of the AESC (Association of Executive Search Consultants) that puts senior executives on the radar screen of over 8,000 executive search professionals in over 74 countries. Be visible, and be considered for up to 75,000 opportunities handled by AESC search firms every year. Find out more at BlueSteps. " As a career consultant for BlueSteps, I can offer you a 20% discount on the one-time membership fee. BlueSteps, a resource for senior executives, provides a wealth of resources in addition to access to the top search consultants worldwide. To join BlueSteps and receive the 20% discount, just click on the this registration link https://www.bluesteps.com/Registration/Default.aspx . When you get to the purchase page, input the following code: PattiWilson20. Your membership fee will be discounted by 20%. BlueSteps is well worth the one-time fee and you can receive a free consult from me as part of the package. My good friend Andreas Ramos just sent me a long email going into detail and great length describing how Facebook is once again changing things around. But, this time they are going after the Pages. Now that they have decimated the groups, and made Pages into a living hell of a lifeline, the Pages will be eviscerated and remade. If you setup a page you will need to redo it and it won't be as cool. This includes me and many of my clients as I used FB Pages as great online professional brochures for them. However, they were in addition to their websites not in lieu of them. Here is the ending summation from his email: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ In Summary: The change is radical. FB has abandoned pay-per-click advertising and switched to interaction based on messages. This makes sense: Social media is engagement, so the new model works with that. And advertising didn't work anyway. Companies and social media experts are going to have to change directions (and horses). It's no longer about polls, games, contests, and other gimmicks. It's no longer how to get the most fans. It now becomes a matter of writing messages that engage. It's a good question as to what this means for other social media companies. Their results were also equally bad. Will they continue on a ad-based model? Or switch to FB's new strategy? Don't abandon FB. Millward Brown found that Facebook was the most efficient form of media at driving desired brand perceptions and overall brand equity when compared to other online, out-of-home and television advertising. It's just not clear on the best way to do this. Finally, this is the perfect example for why you should not use FB as your main digital platform. FB, which is run by kids, owns your company's presence in FB and they can do whatever they like and they won't even notify you. You spend hundreds of thousands of dollars, hire people, etc., and then FB changes everything. Build your own website. Don't rely on FB. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ I couldn't agree more with Andreas. I have been building inexpensive, beautiful websites as branding vehicles for my clients for the past few years now with great success. A professional website is the sole means to fully and completely controlling your message. You cannot, in the end, count on Linkedin, Facebook, or any other social profile site to keep your brand intact and give you access to your network. It is not your network it is theirs as it is on their site not yours. Anyone that relies on Linkedin or Facebook brand visibility and network connection management is trusting fate. With a professional website, you own and control your brand message, the image you project and your Google ranking of your name's URL. If you want to see examples of client's websites, email me at patti@pattiwilson.com. Check out my Facebook Page in the new confusing layout..it looks just like a Facebook Profile...virtually identical. Please Like Me while you are there. You get no prize or bonus for doing so, just my thanks. Andreas goes into great detail in his email to me and if you are interested just click on the read more link below. These trends may seem not new to many in the career coaching field or in Silicon Valley but this article does an excellent job of covering and updating the take on these dynamics in global work: 5 Trends Driving the Future of Work by Chris Jablonski Summary: From legions of independent consultants to cities dotted with coworking facilities, the future of work is virtual, online and global. Trend 1: Independent consulting to see hockey-stick growth curve Trend 2: Order books, movies and now … workers online Trend 3: Coworking moves beyond early adopter stage Trend 4: Adaptive lifelong learning the norm Trend 5: Jobs of the future will either retrofit and blend existing jobs, or solve entirely new problems. Read more at ZDnet.com, Yes, we know that the jobs of the future will be different, even with the same title, from what they do now. Who would have thought that a car mechanic would need some computer skills to diagnose and repair the inner mechanics of an automobile 50 years ago? But they do now. Certainly, marketing exists more and more online than off. Challenge: predict where your job/field/function is going and how going are going to mutate into those changes yourself. One solution includes applying #4 and being continuously learning new skills before you need them. Coworking suits the Contract Nation USA just fine as more and more of the labor force is on a just-in-time basis. Banding together for company, economy of scale, and collaboration yet remaining independent entities is one very useful technique to survive working as Me Inc. Challenge: finding the right co-habitation work space with people who create synergies of opportunities and networks with yours. This is more critical than finding your soul mate. But the article does well in painting in tangible living color brushstrokes just how fast we are moving to that Me Inc. world with the visceral image of the hockey stick. Fan that I am, it also brings to mind the brutality of that game as an apt analogy to the sometimes cutthroat competition for projects and gigs. Challenge: to differentiate yourself and keep from becoming a commodity price-driven member of a herd of contractors chasing business. This is another place where #4 learning new skills and acquiring new knowledge would help. We know everything will be online as it seems like most of it is now. Of course recruiters live on Linkedin and deploy Google searches to find talent. Resumes are rapidly becoming obsolete in favor of more copious dossier on you in the interweb. Workers online using the various sites such as guru.com, elance, etc is now the norm. Challenge: to by-pass the 3rd party brokers that add on 20-30% to your hourly rate and market yourself directly to potential employers making copious use of online branding and marketing. Using a website, blog, social profiles (lots of them), etc, build visibility to promote Me Inc. Good trend spotting means good responses on all our parts. If we see it coming we can do something about it. Moreover, these trends are global. We compete, work with, network and collaborate across borders, timezones and countries. Opportunities can be anywhere and so can you. Email me if you want to find out how I can help you be a guru consultant and look like a thought leader online. I have done it for others and can show you how too. patti@careercompany.com The Labor Market Bites Chinese Factories As retention of factory workers becomes a problem for companies in China, wages and benefits are increasing. But employers still face a labor shortage -- and their potential responses to it may have big implications for China and the rest of the world. By Peter Cappelli the George W. Taylor Professor of Management and director of the Center for Human Resources at The Wharton School. Read entire article This fascinating article reiterates some of the themes I have blogged about concerning the global economy. The free market for wages and labor has finally arrived in China. Coming back from Spring Festival, workers are delaying their return to shop around among factories for the highest salary and best perks. Foxconn, Apple's i-everything manufacturer, has announced wage increases that bring the Chinese factory worker on par with their counterparts in Mexico. This is coming faster than I expected in terms of a rising tide raising all boats (countries) closer to wage parity. And this will eventually budge the USA off the salary sandbar where wages have been moored for more than a decade of steady declines. Cappelli expresses hope that this turn of events will help usher in modern management practices into China such as employee retention. Wow! I never thought that I would mention that and China in the same sentence. This all bodes well for long term technology manufacturing coming back to the USA with the rising wages and costs of fuel driving that return. Steve Jobs was wrong on that one. On the other hand, there is a glut of new college grads without employment opportunities as they lack experience and training. They might be potential converts over to factory jobs according to Cappelli. However the increasing number of college grads in China will apply more competitive pressure to that same demographic sector here in the USA. Once again, this is another action call to new grads in the USA to gain internship experience, add to their portfolio of marketable skills, learn languages and build a career sustainable network to launch them well. Companies in the USA, especially the big dogs, the global multinationals need to develop immediate contingency plans to secure ongoing stable cost of goods produced including labor costs. Short-term Vietnam, other Asian nations, or Latin America will provide those options. However, long-term might look like North Dakota next to that tar sands oil pipeline. Fuel and supply chain costs to deliver to markets and cost of labor will be the deal makers or breakers in the next 5 years. FB move from Palo Alto to Menlo Park Here is an excerpt from an article about Facebook moving to Menlo Park and the hardship to the city: "On the other hand, Sun used to generate annual sales taxes of $431,000 to $827,000 for the city. That's because the state levies taxes on physical goods like computers that it doesn't levy on virtual services like online ad sales. Having more employees on the campus means the city is going to have to expand services to accommodate them, such as hiring more police officers or clerks. And while new high-income Facebook employees moving into the area might send property assessments soaring, Proposition 13 will limit the amount of additional property taxes." Read Chris O'Brian's story in the San Jose Mercury News You want Facebook to move to your city right? Think of all the job creation and tax revenues! The City of Menlo Park has mixed emotions about Facebook bringing its entire workforce into one mega campus formerly occupied by Sun Microsystems. Yes, there will be some upfront fees and revenues collected with the move-in but the long term liability is increased demand on city services with little increase in ongoing sustainable tax revenues. What is Menlo Park doing? Why asking Facebook for a handout to subsidize low-income housing in one of the most expensive cities in the Bay Area. Facebook is more than obliging. It is truly being a good citizen and why not? It certainly is getting off virtually scott-free compared to actually paying taxes. The issue is one of unequal and unfair burdens of taxation on different types of industries and sectors in the California economy. This is an antiquated tax code that does not respond to the realities of a new economy and the Bay Area's economic base moving from computer and semi-conductor products to the Internet. The State of California is fighting to get Amazon to charge sales tax to residents of the state. But compare that tax income, to the revenues that could be generated by the virtual services of local Internet companies. Facebook is a $500,000,000 company (I put all the zeros in to make a visual point). Why are they, and Linkedin, Groupon, Yelp, Zynga, and others not paying tax on their virtual revenues as Sun did on their computers and Apple does now on its iPhone, iPad and iPod? The law needs to change and now. How ridiculous that a city is reduced to begging for a handout from a company. Let Facebook hire its own fire department, police force, street maintenance workers. There are known knowns. These are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns. That is to say, there are things that we know we don't know. But there are also unknown unknowns. There are things we don't know we don't know. Donald Rumsfeld I laughed when the then Secretary of Defense made that statement as it sounded like a military-speak aphorism. But, it rings with profound wisdom the more I deal with career management and employment issues in this economy. How do we deal with the business and career issues we don't know we don't know? I advise my clients to do deep research on companies for interview preparation, but that never, within time parameters, uncovers sufficient information to make a well reasoned decision on an offer if one comes. Sometimes it is the luck of the draw that you land well. What do you do with networking referrals devoid of context or personal engagement? You are left in a vacuum to deal with the referral and in the dark as to how to proceed. Time is so precious. You know it if you are in a driven high-pressure position, in career transition, or an entrepreneur. There isn't enough of it, and your living comes from the finite amount of time that you can dedicate to your business. We don't have time to be sidetracked with the unknowns that we don't know. What's worse is that we don't know what we don't know until it is past tense. Often in retrospective, we can look back at an entire situation and see what we needed to know at the time. I believe that is the Monday morning quarterback syndrome personified. Unfortunately, I don't know what to advise you as I don't know what you don't know. But I do have a few mental guidelines that help me and I am happy to share them. Everyday is Groundhog Day Remember the Bill Murray movie where he relived the same day over and over again until he actually had no unknowns left to figure out. Seriously! He ended up knowing everybody in the town and everything they were going to do that day. His level of response by his final rerun day was masterful. I try to remind myself that every day is essentially the same. Within each day there will always be unknowns that are unknown. The result of that attitude is not ending up feeling blindsided as I have already factored that in. When I stay very attuned and mindful I can almost sense them coming out of left field. It is comforting at least. Belts and Braces The British, bless them, had an unspoken rule about being prepared for the unknowns in life. Back in Victorian times and the early part of the last century, men work both a belt and braces (suspenders). Over time and the era of spandex and jeans below your butt, the braces have fallen by the wayside. But belts and braces represented a way of approaching life. The message is clear, expect catastrophe and be doubly prepared: keep an umbrella in the car, hide a house key under a rock, back up your files...twice. You may never need to implement plan B but it's good to know that you can. Think about it. That's why we have a Vice President of the United States. The Morning After the Night Before Letting decisions stew a bit is a good thing. Figuratively, "sleeping" on business problems and issues allows time to have more information unfold and it diminishes the number and size of unknowns. There are certain Myers Briggs personalty types that are really in their comfort zone when they get things decided, goals set, and marching orders relayed to the troops in an expedited fashion. They rush to judgement and freak out when the other shoe drops with unforeseen catastrophes. Other personality styles prefer to put off decisions and just let things unfold. Often that is the best remedy for those blindsiding unknowns. Just let them sort of slide into view rather than dropping on you. Embrace the Unknown The greatest adventures, opportunities and joys in life are most sweet when they have not been predicted, expected, and factored in. Aren't the unknown unknowns often some of the nicest, best surprises that come upon us. We just think that any unknown will be necessarily be bad, negative and undesired. If life is like a box of chocolates then it helps to be an epicurian with a broad palette. Thus you are delighted with whatever you find in the box. The unknown unknowns will always show up in our lives. The impact they have depends on how we choose to experience them. What is worse than job interviewing in person? Interviewing with a bad webcam using a poor SKYPE connection. You end up with the goldfish bowl look because of the camera distortion. Or your eyes are always looking down at the screen at the interviewers to whom you give no eye contact. The fine art of interviewing is not improving anytime soon. It can still be a painful, dreaded, nerve-wracking experience on both sides of the desk. Everyone has a nightmare story about the "interviewer from hell", someone who was so bad at asking questions that you absolutely knew you were never going to be hired. What about the interviewer who doesn't ask questions but rather just chats as the new best friend that you never hear from again? Or, the interviewer who asks questions so unrelated to the job you wonder if you applied for the wrong position? Then there is the distainful interviewer, who acts as though it is a supreme imposition just having you in the room. I could go on and you can in the comments section to this blog. How Do You Ace It? Yes, bad interview stories are abundant. However, it still is on you to acquit yourself well during the interview. What does that mean? - Should you ace all the questions with absolutely appropriate answers? - Should you offer great, relevant examples, facts and figures with glib ease? - Should you mirror the interviewers body language to make him/her comfortable in your presence? - Should you create a dialogue to interact in easy conversation, thus putting your interviewer at ease? - Should you provide business solutions to demonstrate the compelling value in hiring you? Yes, of course, to all of the above! But, while that will certainly go a long way to getting you hired, that's not it. If you do everything above, unless you are a glow-in-the-dark java software developer, it is not enough to be hired. And, if you do just some of the above with a less than stunning acquittal of your expertise and you successfully do one more thing, odds are that you will be hired. I have been working with top executives worldwide as well as in Silicon Valley for a number of years now. They are primarily employees of the big multinational European and American companies. Some are Americans, most are not, and many were educated in the USA at a top business school. The vast majority of them are not company "lifers" in that they haven't been with the same company for years, but have job hopped from company to company and country to country. A Silicon Valley executive called me the other day thinking he needed to make a job move. His company (a top Fortune 500 software provider) was insisting that he take a promotion and 4 year transfer with his family to China. With a Chinese wife and his two small children becoming bi-lingual, this would have been a good experience for the family. He is in finance and the role would have been at the country level running all operations. It was a plum assignment. With Asian experience, he would be able to attract the best global opportunities from other corporations after this assignments. It took much refection and research before he convinced himself to take the opportunity and see it as such. The World Economic Forum ended on a dark worried note about the future of the worldwide workforce. The Davos gathering didn't doubt the numbers or projections. It is the means to the end that gave them consternation. According to Vikram Pandit, CEO of the global bank, Citigroup Inc., "The world needs 400 million new jobs between now and the end of the decade, not counting the 200 million needed just to get back to full employment, so "that should be our number one priority". It is not a simple scenario to just materialize 600 million jobs in 8 years. It is a real and dire problem with the nothing less than the world economy at stake. The financial leaders and heads of corporations spent time finger pointing across national boundaries, but they came away without a tangible solution how to grow worldwide GDP and therefore jobs. That there is no concerted and coordinated global response to a looming work crisis may indicate a fundamental problem with how our worldwide economic system functions with implications that impact all class and economic levels. We Aren't Entitled to Work? Is there such a thing as a right to work in a free market, capitalistic, global economic system? Are we as a population in the USA entitled to earn a living if we are sound of mind, able bodied and skilled? It was easy to ignore this issue when unemployment numbers were composed of the poor, uneducated and unskilled. However since 1980, every recession has generated unemployment creep upwards from manufacturing, to white collar, to now the executive suite. This has resulted in a substantial ongoing dislocation of the socioeconomic structure of the US population . Today the 12+ million "officially" out of work is about the size of Illinois and that fails to account for the underemployed and those not looking. At the same time, the employment agency, Manpower, reports that 75% of its revenues are now from outside the USA. In America, we know where the jobs have gone and continue to go-- elsewhere. But that begs the question as there still won't be enough work to go around worldwide with an emerging, educated, skilled, global middle class. Are we entitled to earn a working living at the expense of another somewhere in the world? Doesn't everyone deserve the opportunity to make a contribution and be paid for doing it? The essence of work is contribution. You do a day's labor and are paid a living wage. But what if there is not enough work to go around anymore? Does that mean that those that want to work and can't find it are facing life as an underclass of people who are going without the basic necessities of survival, and are deprived of being contributing members of society? Will work, especially highly skilled, intellectual work, become an entitlement or privilege? Wherever you are in the world, you got your job because of a set of advantages. Call it luck, fate, geography, position, status, connections, or price-point. The others who missed out on the opportunity didn't quite have your unique set of advantages but they were just as smart, talented, hard-working, earnest and yet unemployed. Private Equity firms own companies that employ 1 in 10 employees in the USA making them the nation's largest employer. They own across all sectors including Harrahs, Hostess, Clear Channel, Energy Future Holding Company, AMC Movies. How did the protestant work ethic of Sweat Equity get replaced by the Blood Equity of the leveraged buy-out? No value is created, other people's money is used to buy companies and the resulting profits are gained by corporate dismemberment, divestiture, and downsizing. This is the premise a new book by Josh Kosman, a veteran financial reporter and the author of The Buyout of America, How Private Equity is Destroying Jobs and Killing the American Economy. There is no point in turning this into a debate about the function of private equity given that it is now a phenomena that is well integrated into the warp and weft of the financial landscape in America. However, it is always wise to explore the career possibilities this portends for professionals and executives. What are the opportunities? Start-ups What are the employment opportunities that present themselves? Well, for starters, private equity firms have become very involved in start-up investments. Start-ups have always been the domain of the Venture Capital firms. But they have been hard-pressed to fund new ventures in the past several years. They lost investors initially after the crash and then they have been preoccupied with keeping their current farm of companies afloat. Private equity offers an alternative funding source for budding entrepreneurs for long-term funding. As the saying goes you either have lunch or be lunch. When Kodak filed for bankruptcy restructuring, I wept over my vintage Brownie and played the Kodachrome lyrics by Paul Simon: Kodachrome You give us those nice bright colors You give us the greens of summers Makes you think all the world's a sunny day, oh yeah! I got a Nikon camera I love to take a photograph So Mama, don't take my Kodachrome away What can executives and professionals take-away about from this? Why does a company have talented teams who create bleeding edge products see failure because executive management fails to capitalize on it? "Through the 1990s, Kodak splurged $4 billion on developing the photo technology inside most of today's cellphones and digital devices. But a reluctance to ease its heavy reliance on film allowed rivals like Canon Inc. and Sony Corp. to rush largely unhindered into the fast-emerging digital arena. The immensely lucrative analog business Kodak worried about undermining too soon was virtually erased in a decade by the filmless photography it invented." This is from an article by Ben Dobbin for Associated Press. The article went on to quote: "If you're not willing to cannibalize yourself, others will do it for you," said Mark Zupan, dean of the University of Rochester's business school. "Technology is changing ever more rapidly, the world's becoming more globalized, so to stay at the top of your game is getting increasingly harder." Read more here Like Kodak, Xerox PARC (now just PARC) invented but never capitalized on the Graphical User Interface that made the personal computer a tool for the masses but Apple did with the Macintosh. Sony and Canon capitalized on Kodak's digital camera breakthroughs. Other sector leaders have met with the same fate such as RIM and AOL. These companies were all market makers yet lost out to the competition by a failure to adapt, transform and innovate. Certain people have management styles that tend to be risk averse and impede the growth and expansion of the company with a "let's not get ahead of ourselves" attitude. They need too much proof and they take too long to make the right decision in the face of market movements. They lack a capacity to see beyond their self-imposed company rulebook, and, worst of all, they fearfully protect their next quarter profits by keeping dated products alive too long. When a sector is moving, like the global economy, at the speed of light agility and flexibility are essential skills. Keeping up is not sufficient when getting ahead is in order. The same holds true for individuals. We must continually evolve and respond to organizational, market and economic changes. Knowing when to get out and move on is insufficient if you don't do it. Executives that do not embrace the trends of today will have the marketplace pass them by because of risk averse and dated views regarding their own career advancement. Why are professionals so easily convinced that if they add on one more certification or degree they will somehow be more employable or desirable? My field is among the biggest offenders and first initiators of this practice that includes the breadth of services consulting: management, projects, counseling, coaching, IT, financial, etc. I don't mean certifications in technical, scientific tools and methodologies. I am speaking to certifications that fluff up one's perceived expertise, importance and value to the marketplace. Just to name a few in my field as it's so easy to find them, but I am sure you can find them in yours as well: Master Career Counselor (MCC), Professional Certified Coach (PCC), National Certified Career Counselor (NCCC), Master Personal Branding Strategist, Board Certified Coach (BCC), Career Management Fellow Practitioner (CMF), Career Development Facilitator Instructor (CDFI), Distance Credentialed Counselor (DCC), Master Resume Writer (MRW), Credentialed Career Master (CCM), Certified Employment Interview Professional (CEIP), Certified Job & Career Transition Coach (JCTC) Let's take my favorite the Distance Credentialed Counselor. Since I work with clients all over the planet, I use a phone, SKYPE, a web-cam, web meeting sites, and file sharing tools. Does that require a certification? Really? Or do you just need a good IT person to set you up and provide tech support? Here is how the certificate is described: A Distance Credentialed Counselor (DCC) will be nationally recognized as a professional with training in best practices in Distance Counseling. Distance Counseling is a counseling approach that takes the best practices of traditional counseling as well as some of its own unique advantages and adapts them for delivery to clients via electronic means in order to maximize the use of technology-assisted counseling techniques. The technology-assisted methods may include telecounseling (telephone), secure email communication, chat, videoconferencing or computerized stand-alone software programs. Those unique advantages are further described as flexibility, convenience and asynchronous communications. Okay, but do you really need a certificate? The phenomena is epidemic in professional services today because enterprising people in an industry discovered that the best way to make money is to sell certifications, products and tools to other professionals. Industry trade associations and Universities extension program certifications have blossomed into a hundred million dollar cash flow based on revenues from tuition and their profits help underwrite programs within the organization and the university. At least, we can know that there is an academic, knowledge-based foundation to these programs with the organization or university's brand at stake. However, all this has been been eclipsed by enterprising professionals who leverage a certificate out of their business and books...often not even that much. For example, a business colleague extended his consulting practice on product management to tools, online training, books and now a certification. The degrees Competing for a piece of one pie leads all of us to try and get an advantage, but branding differentiation is not best done solely by degrees (or certificates)...no pun intended. _The Mountain Dew soft drink brand dissolved a legal challenge from a customer who claimed a mouse was found in his can of the "Dew". The company argued that would not be possible as their product would have dissolved the mouse in less than a week. Coca Cola has the same reputation with pennies.
This does not explain why I continue to drink this stuff but it does make an analogy to the act of appreciating. When we appreciate and acknowledge others it has the same corrosive effect on rancor, resentment and grudges as the dissolving of a mouse in a cola can. Appreciation dissolves low morale, under performance and obstructions inside a company. This article in the Harvard Business Blog describes this in more detail. One quote sums it up how appreciation is an antidote to a toxic organization: "The impact of negative emotions — and more specifically the feeling of being devalued — is incredibly toxic. As Daniel Goleman has written, "Threats to our standing in the eyes of others are almost as powerful as those to our very survival." Read the entire article here. |
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