San Diego Jobing Community Blogs

As we approach the end of the year, naturally we begin to review the events of the year as well as think ahead to the upcoming year. I think that most of us would agree that 2009 has had its set of challenges. The economy has been tough!  Personally, when I launched my business full time in January, I had contracts set that would have made it my best year ever.  However, as you might be able to guess, that is not what occurred! 

 I experienced such challenges as contracts being cut and scheduled classes being cancelled (sometimes with only 24 to 48 hours notice!), resulting of course in reduced income.  Then in keeping with Murphy’s Law… “If anything can go wrong it will” the sump pump on my property went out and needed to be replaced, the dryer broke and had to be replaced, and then of course there was the skateboarding accident with my 10 year old, when she cracked her two front teeth! So needless to say this has been a tough year. It’s tough to keep to a planned budget when your income drops and your expenses increase!

My strategy for surviving these challenges has been to keep my eye on my main goal “to grow my business and provide value driven service” (this is driven in part by the desire to feed the children and keeping the lights on, in the roof over our head). I have managed to keep my sanity most of the time b y focusing on what’s most important.  In order to do that however, you must have done the work so you know what’s most important.  I have done much work on goal setting in my personal life, and as I launched my business full time, I did the work to develop a strategic plan so I would be crystal clear on my business priorities. 

 According to an article in the September 2009 Harvard Business Review, “How Strategy Shapes Structure” http://hbr.harvardbusiness.org/2009/09/how-strategy-shapes-structure/ar/1 we can apply the concepts of business strategy to many aspects of work and life, from job search to business development to family management. With a clear strategy, we can provide the much needed structure we need to survive challenging times.

I developed a Strategic Goal Setting Worksheet  as a tool to assist in the process.  I am a visual learner and like to see the “Big Picture” all on one page. In short, the process involves focusing on one overarching goal, such as “Grow my Business”, then defining three to five strategic goal categories, such as:

1) Product Development

2) Marketing Strategy

3) Administrative Management

4) Client Service

The next step is to identify specific action steps for each category and who is responsible for the actions.  The key to successful implementation is the discipline to keep your focus on the goal, complete the action steps and follow up to revisit so adjustments and changes can be made as necessary. You must truly believe in the power of your dreams and keep your vision clearly set on what is possible!

If you are interested in a copy of the Strategic Goal Setting Worksheet, just send me an email maureen@wlpgroup.com and I would be happy to share it with you!

 

This week I had the pleasure of attending the 2009 Colorado Hotel and Lodging Association Conference in Colorado Springs, CO. At the annual conference, outstanding employees in the hotel & lodging industry are recognized for exceptional service in their respective areas of expertise. If you’ve traveled in Colorado you’ve likely met some of these service providers. They are the people who go out of their way to make guests feel “at home” while on the road and include bellman, concierges, reception desk staff, chefs, etc.

The evening before the award dinner I heard about one particularly outstanding employee …. Ken Wall of Doubletree Grand Junction. If memory serves correctly, Ken has worked at the property for 19 years. In that time he has not missed a single day of work, has never been late and has not been the recipient of a single disciplinary action. Ken is a “getter done” guy who is committed to exceptional service and making life easier for others.

Here’s the challenge……and the story as I heard it from several sources…..I-70, the highway leading from Grand Junction to Denver/Colorado Springs was closed. If I-70 is impassable it would be really unsafe and unwise to attempt any other way down the mountain. It looked like Ken would miss the conference….and the presentation of his award for outstanding service.

The owner of the Doubletree Grand Junction property is in the Denver area and was already at the conference. When he heard about Ken’s predicament he immediately went into action. Ken arrived later that evening…….by plane. The property owner recognized the importance of going above and beyond for Ken.…..just as Ken had gone above and beyond for so many guests over the previous 19 years.

My reaction to this story as it was relayed to me….in a word: Goosebumps.

If you want your employees to go the extra mile for your customers…..go the extra mile for them.

Are you holding yourself to the same standard you expect of all employees?

May all your Endeavors be Insightful,

Nora A Burns, SPHR


p.s. Next time I’m in Grand Junction ….. I’ll be staying at the Doubletree. They have earned my business by displaying exceptional leadership.

If you want to learn how to create a job search strategy for the holidays:

Mark your calendars for Tuesday November 24th at 9PM EST, 8PM CST, or 6PM PST for JobRadioUSA’s Episode 21 “How to Conduct an Effective Holiday Job Search.”

Duncan Mathison - author of Unlock the Hidden Job Market - will discuss:

1.       Why the holiday season is a great time to conduct your job search

2.       How to create a holiday job search schedule to move you one step closer to landing your next opportunity

3.       How to contact hiring managers of your targeted companies to uncover hidden opportunities

4.       Additional methods to generate job leads during the holidays

5.       How to land a seasonal holiday job (if you choose to do so)

You can access the show by either dialing 347-838-9326 or visiting http://www.blogtalkradio.com/thecareercatalyst.

Feel free to share this information with fellow job seekers.

During the Q&A session, Duncan will reveal:

 

How jobseekers can use holiday events to ultimately generate job leads or referrals

The essential signs that a jobseeker’s holiday networking is working

The power of volunteering during the holidays

Why holding back on a vacation during the holidays may be ideal

 

This will be a great show. Likewise, I look forward to your live participation Tuesday night.

Meanwhile, visit http://www.blogtalkradio.com/thecareercatalyst and listen to any of the previous 22 career shows you may have missed.

 

Keywords are a central feature of our business day.  We use them to search our resume databases and to parse through the profiles and resumes posted on job boards and social networking sites.  The problem, of course, is that we pesky humans have a bad habit of using different words to express the same idea.  That variability in human expression makes it difficult to know which keywords will actually identify the best candidates for each of your openings. 

So, what should you do?  How can you select the right keywords when there are so many competing alternatives?  The answer, I think, is to create a keyword taxonomy—an annotated list of search terms—that is rich in the language of the top talent in the specific career fields for which you are recruiting.  Think of it as a “set of master keys in words” that can unlock the candidate databases you are probing. 

Creating such a tool is not particularly difficult.  Doing so, however, is a departure from the current practice in many organizations.  It involves temporarily stepping outside the press of individual, day-to-day assignments and taking a longer term view of how keywords can best serve your recruiting strategy.  Here’s what I mean. 

The rule of thumb in developing a list of keywords has usually been to rely on the information provided to us in a job description or requisition.  The problem with this approach, of course, is that those documents are typically formulated by hiring managers—one of the least articulate populations on the planet.  The terminology they provide, therefore, is necessary but insufficient to unlock the best talent in an ATS or job board database.  It is a part of the master keyword set, but not all of it. 

How can you fill in the gaps? 

I suggest you borrow a page from your colleagues in sales and marketing and form a focus group.  Such a group is only useful, however, if it is composed of the right participants.  You’re trying to uncover the language used by the best talent for your openings, so your focus group should be populated with the same kind of people.  And, you have a ready source of such individuals among your organization’s “A” level performers in the career fields for which you’re recruiting.  They, better than anyone else, know exactly which terms their peers will use to describe their qualifications. 

Top performers are usually very busy, however, so you may have a hard time breaking them free for such an exercise.  If that’s the case in your organization, you can also build your set of master keywords by conducting a similar survey with your new hires during their orientation.  This approach is clearly more challenging to implement, however, because you will have to base your selection of the group’s participants not on their demonstrated excellence at work, but on your judgment of how they are likely to perform once they are on-the-job. 

In either case, your focus group will yield the best results if its work is conducted in three steps.

• First, build your baseline.  Ask the participants to list all of the terms they would use to describe the qualifications required for an individual to be able to perform their job effectively.  These attributes can include specific skills, occupational and/or industry knowledge, prior work experience, personality and any other factors that would bear on their ability to contribute.  If the group has a hard time knowing where to begin, ask them to review one or more of the keyword references that are currently available.  These include Google’s Keyword Tool, which will suggest keywords based on previous Google searches; Wordtracker, an online research tool; and WEDDLE’s 3 volume set, Finding Needles in a Haystack, which lists over 25,000 keywords and keyword phrases, across 5400 job and position titles in 28 industries and professions.
• Second, restate the terms in order of their importance.  Ask the group to prioritize each of their terms according to its impact on an individual’s job performance.  While there may be some disagreement among the group about the placement of specific terms, encourage them to arrive at a consensus rank ordering of the overall list.
• Third, group the terms into search baskets.  The best way to probe a resume or profile database is to conduct your search in concentric circles of ever greater specificity.  This approach enables you to hone in on and eventually determine a reasonable slate of the most qualified prospects in a database.  Therefore, ask the group to break their list into the following categories: absolutely critical, very important, somewhat important and nice to have.

 

Those four baskets of search terms should then be added to the terms you derived from the hiring manager’s job description or requisition.  If those documents enable you to do so, assign each of those terms to one of the categories used in Step 3 above.  If not, the most politic course to assign them to the absolutely critical category.  The resulting integrated list of search terms is your set of master keywords.  

The above process is clearly labor and time intensive so think of it as an investment to develop an asset.  The product you create—your keyword taxonomy—is just such a resource.  It is a state-of-the-art search tool that can be used over and over again by the entire recruiting team.  No less important, that tool gives them a genuine competitive advantage because it will increase both their efficiency and their performance.  It should, therefore, be password protected and carefully monitored.  As with all assets, it will require updating from time-to-time, but the effort involved will be substantially less than of the original development. 

Keywords are typically viewed as one of the basic tools in our profession.  For better or worse, everybody uses them so it’s easy to assume they have little or no differentiating value.  When forged into a powerful asset, however, keywords can help an organization unlock talent other employers can’t reach.  That’s why no recruiting team should be without “a set of master keys in words.” 

Thanks for reading,

Peter

 

The positive growth turned in by the American economy in the third quarter of this year suggests that maybe, just maybe this Great Recession is now in our rear view mirror.  As it fades away, of course, the tales will begin about what we did during this terrible time.  While recounting those legends is surely important, so too is sharing the insights we’ve acquired from our experience. 

Cataclysmic events often alter our perceptions of the world around us.  That was true during the Great Depression, and it will be true as we emerge from this Great Recession, as well.  Some of these new views are opinions about what happened and why, but others are actually lessons that we’ve learned about how best to survive and prosper.  They’re the things we wish we had known before the event occurred because that knowledge would have undoubtedly enabled us to fare better than we did. 

I think the sharing of this wisdom is good for us—it’s cathartic to acknowledge that we’ve earned an advanced degree in the school of hard knocks—but it’s even more helpful for our kids and grandkids.  In a very real sense, we are giving them a gift, a roadmap for the future that may help them avoid the dead ends and dangerous potholes they are sure to encounter. 

Each of us has our own view of the lessons we should pass along.  For me, the following four insights are among the most important.  They are realizations everyone must have in order to chart a successful and fulfilling career in the 21^st Century world of work. 

Seeking job security makes you vulnerable.  In today’s turbulent economy, employers have no idea what will happen tomorrow or the day after.  They may promise you job security, but they can’t deliver it.  So, counting on it is likely to put you out for the count.  A far better objective is career security—the ability to stay employed in a job of your choosing regardless of the condition of any single employer or the economy as a whole.  Unlike job security, career security is a state you create for yourself.  You don’t have to rely on the good will of some employer.  You anticipate the changes in your career—the timing of a move from one boss or organization to another, the refocusing or reskilling that’s necessary to accommodate shifts in your industry or profession—and then you plan and execute those changes so they benefit you. 

Recognition is something you give yourself.  Most managers and supervisors mean well, but if you wait for them to recognize your accomplishments at work, you’re likely to be disappointed.  Some have the social skills of a brick and others are too worried about their own security to take care of yours.  That’s why it’s important for you to keep track of your own “career victories.”  Sure, it takes a little effort to maintain a contemporaneous record of what you’ve done and how well you’ve done it, but that account will give you more satisfaction than most managers ever will.  Don’t just write it out, however; also review it regularly.  Take the time to remember what you’ve done and pat yourself on the back when you deserve it or give yourself a little counseling if you’ve let yourself down. 

Working tirelessly is a sure way to get tired.  Sadly, many people in today’s world of work find themselves wired up with no place to go.  They’ve learned the hard way that staying continuously in contact with the office doesn’t protect you.  It exhausts you.  We’re all worried about the H1N1 flu becoming a pandemic, but workaholism already is.  If you have any doubt about that, look left and right the next time you’re lying on the beach.  Every other person will be glued to their Blackberry or iPhone checking their email.  The impact of such behavior on both individual performance and wellbeing is already acute and likely to get worse.  In a knowledge-based economy, your worth is measured not by your connectivity, but by your contribution.  And, your contribution suffers when you don’t give your mind and body a chance to rest. 

Taking care of your career is the best way to take care of you.  The conventional approach to career self-management has been to get an annual checkup and leave it at that.  Historically, we paid attention to our career just once each year—during our performance appraisal and salary review.  That approach was dangerous then; today, it’s a sure-fire way to induce career cardiac arrest or what most of us call unemployment.  The only safe course in a workplace as turbulent as the one we now have is to develop career fitness the same way you develop physical fitness.  You have to commit yourself to building up the strength, endurance and reach of your career every single day.  Yes, that’s a lot of work, but it’s also a smart investment.  You spend one-third or more of your day in your profession, craft or trade, and you deserve an experience during that time that is every bit as good as the rest of your life. 

We have acquired many insights from our experience over the past two years, but these four maxims are the key lessons we have learned.  They are the things we wish we had known so they are now the things we want others to know. 

Thanks for reading,

Peter

 

Over the next few weeks I will discuss how to use Twitter and Facebook during the job search. For this post, I will share how to source job leads, locate targeted companies, and create a targeted company list.

1. Visit www.twitterjobsearch.com, sign in to Twitter, and click on the Allow Access button (if this is your first time using TwitterJobSearch).

2. Next complete your TwitterJobSearch profile by providing contact details, your skills, and URLs to your LinkedIn and online resume. You can log in to LinkedIn and click on “View My Profile” to obtain your public profile URL (located above the Summary).

3. To source job leads, click on the Browse button in the upper right of the screen, and type your job function in the search field. For example, I typed “corporate strategy” and retrieved 3500+ results. You can also use the categories and subcategories located under Browse Jobs on TwitterJobSearch’s home page.

4. Next refine your search using the filters on the right of your screen which include: Date, Job Title, Country, City, Salary, Job Type, and so on. For example, I clicked on “United States” under the Country filter and then clicked on “Dallas” under the City filter.

5. After setting up your search, click on the Subscribe button (on the right of your screen above the filters) to automatically have relevant jobs sent to your RSS reader.

6. Next follow individuals of interest who tweeted jobs (by clicking on their twitter name and the follow button) to ultimately network and establish relationships with.

7. To follow targeted companies that are recruiting and posting jobs on Twitter, visit the two links below:

http://tweepml.org/Employers-Recruiting-on-Twitter/

http://tweepml.org/Top-10-Companies-Recruiting-on-Twitter/ 

Then deselect the companies you do not want to follow, click on the Sign in on Twitter button at the bottom of the screen, and click on the Allow Access button. In an upcoming post I will discuss how to determine if specific companies are on Twitter.

8. Next place your targeted companies in a list. To do so log in to your regular Twitter account, click on the Create a new list button in the upper left of your screen, type the name of this list, select the appropriate privacy setting, and click on the Create list button.

Click on your following icon to locate the individuals and companies you are following. For each of the targeted companies (you are following), click on the manage list icon under actions, and select the targeted company list (you just created).

Click on the Home button and under the Lists section on the right of your screen, click on your targeted company list, and you will only see the tweets from these companies.

There is help out there for companies seeking alternatives to layoffs.  If your company is thinking of reducing hours as a way to save jobs and still keep moving forward, the State of California is offering some assistance in a Work Sharing Unemployment Insurance Program.

 

http://www.edd.ca.gov/pdf_pub_ctr/de8714bb.pdf

 

Your employees may be able to receive Unemployment benefits for the time off. 

 

Some of the Requirements:

·         10% of an employer’s workforce or a unit of workforce must be affected by a reduction in wages and hours worked.

·         The reduction in hours and wages must also be 10% or higher.

The costs:

·         The company pays Unemployment Insurance for the employees that receive this benefit.

 

An example:

An employee normally works a 40-hour week and is paid $500.00 (gross pay).  If the employer cuts hours to 32 per week, this is a 20% reduction in wages and hours.  The Work Sharing benefits for this employee are 20% of the UI benefits this employee would receive if totally unemployed.  This offsets the $100 loss to the employee by $60 so the net loss to the employee for the week is only $40.00. ($400 +60 = $460) 

 

Benefits to Employers: 

This is a temporary solution and when the economy picks up again, the company will not have to go out and spend important dollars on new recruiting, hiring and training. 

It is less expensive than restructuring; severance, outplacement assistance and organizational restructuring costs. 

The company retains its quality employees, who might not be able to continue working with the amount of salary lost. 

It demonstrates good will and caring for the people who work for you. 

This program can also be used to transition employees into a full layoff, but gives them some time for job searching before the final layoff. 

It saves money in the long run, by retaining productivity the cuts produce.  It increases employee morale and loyalty, reducing future hiring costs. 

 

Benefits to Employees: 

Employees can retain their positions instead of being laid off and going through an extended period of unemployment. 

The program promotes good will, which in turn increases company loyalty and willingness to find other solutions to save money. 

 

 

For more information on organizational development, transitions, training or conflict resolution, contact me at suearth@yahoo.com

 

 

 

Just as the economy goes through cycles of growth and contraction, so do individual companies and industries.  In order to better survive this roller coaster ride, companies are taking a hard look at their workforce and making decisions about who to retain and/or recruit based on the following key factors:

• Flexibility
• Self-Motivation
• Positive Attitude
• Continual Learning
• Accountability

Flexibility

As the Greek philosopher Heraclites stated, “Nothing is constant except change.”  Accordingly, if we are to survive, we must learn to adapt to the world around us.  If we remain too rigid and inflexible, we are sure to snap.  Only by learning to bend and adjust can we succeed.

Cheryl Hassan, Human Resources Manager with Lionel Henderson and Co., reported,  “As my employer in San Francisco was going through a third round of layoffs, the decision of whom to keep got tougher and tougher.  Ultimately, we kept the employees who were flexible enough and able to wear multiple hats and do what needed to get done.”

Self Motivation

Life continues to move at an ever-faster pace, and along with this reality comes the need to do more with less.  Some employees are either so motivated by fear, or not motivated at all, that they spend more time waiting for someone to tell them what to do.

Not surprisingly, employers are looking for people to join their teams who neither want nor need to have their hand held.  Employers seek people who can be told the final destination and the parameters in which they can operate, and then seize the opportunities to reach that goal on their own.

Positive Attitude

We can choose to be victims of our environments and/or situations, or we can choose how we respond to them.  We will never have complete control over everything that happens to us, but we can and do have control over how we choose to see and respond to any given situation.

Many employers, such as Southwest Airlines, place a high emphasis on hiring for the right attitude.

Ginger Hardage, Senior Vice President of Corporate Communications, comments on the Southwest Airlines website that her company embraces the philosophy - Hire for attitude and train for skills.  Skills can be taught, but attitudes are tougher to change.

According to Calista Davis, Vice President of Human Resources, YMCA of San Diego County, “Employees who are passionate about their work and embrace a positive attitude, coupled with the desire and ability to embrace change, will keep their organizations relevant and productive.”

Continual Learning

As previously indicated, life is continually changing whether we want it to or not.  We must be prepared to adapt, or we will be left behind.  If we fail to stay ahead of the curve, we become a liability to our employer, not an asset.

Rest assured that there is someone else who is more than willing to seize the opportunity that you are choosing to pass up.

Accountability

Nothing can be more frustrating to a supervisor than an employee who refuses to take responsibility for his/her actions or the outcome of any given situation.

Some employees take a defensive position and claim, “No one ever told me I had to do (fill in the blank).”  While that excuse may buy you some time, this strategy will not work over the long run.  The employee who thinks about the repercussions of his/her actions and proactively identifies opportunities to streamline processes, improve efficiencies, and approaches a supervisor with these ideas, will ultimately be deemed as a superstar at work.

These professional qualities may seem obviously desirable.  However, to the employees struggling to keep his/her heads above water, these qualities are sometimes forgotten.  It is our responsibility as managers and employers to inform employees and candidates of these factors to support their success.

The San Diego Workforce Partnership works with human resources professionals around San Diego to assess and relate ways that employees can be more successful in these uncertain times.  I’m pleased to share this post by my associate, Tim Brouillette, Director of Human Resources at Gafcon and SharePoint360. - Rebecca Smith, Vice President, San Diego Workforce Partnership

Dr. Edward Abeyta, San Diego Workforce Partnership

Think about ways that your career can be sustainable.  Are you constantly learning?  Do you have associates that encourage and challenge you?  Are you taking care of the rest of your life - your health, your family, your community?  I’m pleased to share this post by Dr. Abeyta from the University of California of San Diego. - Rebecca Smith, Vice President, San Diego Workforce Partnership

Going Green in Lifelong Learning - How Green Are You?
By Edward Abeyta, Ph.D.

Dr. Ed Abeyta is the Registrar at the University of California Extension.

Never before has it been necessary for us to consider taking a green approach to sustaining human capital and lifelong learning.

The focus on “going green” is a philosophy connected to sustainability, environmentally friendly, and accountability for the human resource aspects of business.

In today’s knowledge-based economy, we cannot afford to stop learning after leaving the formal school system. In many cases, individual success and satisfaction in the workplace depends on continually learning in order to upgrade skills and acquire new knowledge.

In a rapidly changing economy, it is easy to overlook that humans, not just technology, are the key to the future success. As such, it is quintessential that each person takes a green approach to become a self-sustainable individual.

To be a self-sustainable individual, one must apply a green perspective to all aspects of their life.

The question each person must ask, “How green am I?”

To answer this question, one must take an honest green self-review.

In business, investors look at how sustainable a company is by the fiscal health, business plan, stakeholders, and how they care about the betterment of society and the planet.

If individuals take a similar approach to themselves, then one can quickly determine their own “green stock” value when considering their physical, emotional, financial, social, family, and educational health.

When an honest inventory is conducted in the same way a business inventories its own performance, then adjustments can be made to become a more productive and self-sustainable “green” person. As in business, a central key in adapting a personal green philosophy is tied to ongoing refinement and self-renewal through lifelong and continuous learning.

Patrick Scott-Klingborg explains, “As a recent UCSD graduate, I realize my degree is just a launching pad into the workforce. It is clear that continuing to upgrade my skills and find a balance between work and personal demands requires a commitment to continuous learning to remain competitive in the workplace and find time to explore my personal interests.”

He adds, “UCSD Extension has been a great place for me to take courses in areas outside my major but directly related to my professional role. I have also been able to explore my artistic side exploring my interest in photography.”

Understanding how one learns is an ongoing skill connected uniquely to each individual personal preference. Each of us has our own learning style; however, the aspiration is that we can assist in creating those optimal learning conditions tailored to ourselves.

The road to a “greening ourselves” through lifelong learning is a personal journey not a destination. It is important to note learning is not just about mastering learning tools, the ability to think, and knowledge of specific disciplines.

Learning is also connected to what we do in gaining skills that contribute to a productive, prosperous, and quality of life in OUR community.

A green mindset leads us to learn to live together as a society through gaining a tolerance to understand other people and the political views, cultures, and values that enable a working relationship on mutual interests.

Ultimately, learning to adhere to a green self-sustainable approach to life and learning enables one to increase stock in oneself, but also contributes to a more productive society and strengthens our workforce.

The “green mindset” is essential to the collaborative effort between The San Diego Workforce Partnership and UCSD Extension to meet the ongoing workforce development demands in our region.

As Student Services administrator Charmayne Wood-Marshall notes, “The San Diego Workforce Partnership and UCSD Extension have had a long history of working together to train and re-train adults seeking to make a career transition or move into a new emerging field. UCSD Extension has provided training in areas such as Casual Gaming, Data Mining, and Clinical Trials that have led to successful job placement within these industries.”

When we work together to build more effective learning systems-governments and corporations; universities and non-profit organizations; industrialized nations and developing nations-we create a synergy that will add value throughout the economic system, and our societies and communities.

If we want to manage our global economy effectively, and overcome our economic difficulties, we have to do everything in our power to ensure that all human beings have access to training at every stage of their lives.

We need to encourage individuals to become more self-sustainable in their lives by promoting a well-balanced green approach.

 

You have prepared for traditional and behavioral interviews. You have accomplishment stories that demonstrate you are a problem solver who can increase revenue and/or decrease cost. Now let’s imagine that a potential interviewer wants to learn more about your problem solving abilities. Likewise, the interviewer gives you a case interview. Are you prepared to ace it?

A case interview consists of the interviewer presenting a problem and asking the interviewee to come up with a solution. It is typically a real life business situation an interviewer encountered. Most importantly, case interviews are used to measure a candidate’s business acumen, executive presence, and ability to think quickly under pressure. They are also utilized to measure a candidate’s problem solving, analytical, communication, and listening skills.

If you are ever presented with a case interview, below are tactics you can use to maximize your performance.

1. Verify the information you received - you will be given an initial set of facts including the situation and the problem you need to solve. For example, “Our client is a global industrial engineering firm that manufactures wind turbines. Revenue is increasing while profit is declining. Our client wants to improve profit. What do you suggest the company do?” Afterwards, verbally paraphrase this information to ensure you understand the problem you need to solve.

2. Structure your thoughts - next you should take up to 60 seconds to structure your thoughts. This entails breaking down the problem into components and subcomponents. For this case interview, your components could be revenue, cost, and competition. The revenue and cost subcomponents would be price and volume and fixed and variable cost, respectively. The subcomponents for competition could be competitor benchmarks, actions, and so on.

3. Share the path you are going to take - verbally share your structure with the interviewer. To ensure you are going down the right path, state “Unless you suggest otherwise, I am going to start with revenue.” Likewise, the interviewer can point you in the right direction just in case revenue is not the main issue.

4. Next ask probing questions - you should ask thoughtful questions to acquire the information you need to ultimately crack the case. You should also ask questions in a structured fashion. For example, gather all the information you need for revenue before asking questions to acquire cost data. Then obtain all of the facts you need for cost before moving on to competition.

5. Perform calculations out loud - you will be given facts, figures, and/or charts to use to perform calculations. It is vital that you perform these calculations out loud so the interviewer can correct you if you make a mistake. If you perform your calculations silently and the final results are incorrect, the interviewer will have no idea where you made a mistake.

6. Structure your recommendations - once you have all of the information you need, take up to 60 seconds to structure your recommendations. This will also give you time to prioritize the supporting details for your solutions and identify potential risks and implications.

7. Deliver your solutions - finally present your solutions or recommendations with confidence and list the supporting details. Next mention the potential risks and implications and/or discuss potential next steps.

You should listen to Carole Martin’s “Personal Branding During the Interview Process,” which was a good show. Click here: http://tinyurl.com/yekyfgh  to listen to this podcast.

Linkedin is the number one Social Networking site for professionals on the Internet with over 60 million users. A growing number of Green companies and professionals are using Linkedin to conduct business and make connections. If you are interested in a career in the Green industry or promoting a Green business then this workshop is for you.

Green professionals and job seekers will learn how to create, update manage and use important features of Linkedin to effectively promote their skills and business to the world. Attendees will receive "Insider" information that will help them get the most out of the must-have business tool.

Topics that will be covered:

    * Why Linkedin?
    * Your Linkedin Profile - create, manage and key features
    * Linkedin Groups
    * Linkedin Events
    * Contact Management
    * Linkedin Applications
    * Communication Strategies
    * Building Effective Networks

Cost and Registration: $29 prepaid online at http://greenlinkedin.eventbrite.com/

This seminar will be held at the

California Center for Sustainable Energy
8690 Balboa Ave., Suite 100
San Diego
CA
92123-1502

Did I mention, Pizza and soft drinks will be provided!

See you there!

 

P.S. You may want to bring a laptop with you, you'll be able to immediately put our tips and tricks into action.

All of a sudden, an argument erupts out of nowhere.   If you are employed, you dread coming home, and if you are unemployed you dread the question “what did you do today?”   Does this sound familiar in your house? 

An article in the New York Times, gives some good examples of family situations caused by unemployment.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/12/us/12families.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1&th&emc=th

The tension created by extended unemployment is taking its toll on family relationships.  How does this happen? 

When someone loses a job, there is often a lingering doubt about ability or personality that may have contributed to being let go, even when we can objectively point to the economy as the real reason.  Why was I the one let go vs. someone else?  The longer the unemployment, the louder the doubts become, eroding self-esteem and affecting behavior.  Your patience is shorter, your tolerance level for stress is lower, you may be isolating yourself or lashing out. You are suffering and so are those around you. 

The same questions of competency, willingness, caring for the family unit start to surface in your spouse, and in the children as well.  

Role reversal is one area of conflict.  If Dad loses his job, it may be nice to have him around the house more, but it changes the family power dynamics.  Budgeting and finance decisions, caring for and discipline of the kids, daily chores and responsibilities become areas of contention when the family dynamics change.    Dad is perceived as weaker, Mom has to pick up the slack, which she resents, and the kids wonder who is really in charge and what the future may hold for them.  

Conflict usually does not bring people together, it separates them.  We look for reasons to explain what happened, someone to blame. 

So, what can we do about it?  

I don’t have the answer, but personal experience has taught me that open, honest communication can help.  Is this easy?  NO.  But it can be beneficial.  If we can be open and vulnerable enough to be honest about fears, ask for help, accept our shortcomings and try to learn from them, try to be more flexible in our reactions, show compassion, change the attitude to “one for all and all for one” we can come out stronger on the other side.  I’ve seen this transformation and truly believe in it. 

What is the bigger picture?  As a company or a country, if our collective self-esteem takes a hit, the same responses as the family occur.  We may lower our expectations, lower our standard of living, lose momentum in innovation, and lose our standing in the world.

So, what’s the message here?  Be kind to yourself and your loved ones.  Be open to change, and don’t give up!

1. Make telephone calls - Few things are more terrifying than the unknown. The fear you create for yourself is far worse than the reality of cold calling. Once you start making telephone calls and continue making telephone calls it gets easier. You overcome fear by doing.

2. Make a lot of telephone calls - If you have only one prospect to pursue, that prospect becomes overwhelmingly important. If you have hundreds of leads, no one prospect can make or break you. The more calls you make, the more success you will have.

3. Prepare - Prepare for cold calling the way you would for any major presentation. Know what you want to say, how you want to say it and how you want to represent yourself, your company, your product or service. And know the goal of your telephone call.

4. Practice - If you are new to cold calling or uncomfortable with cold calling practice your pitch out loud. Role-play with friends or colleagues. Practice various sales scenarios. This way you will not have to worry about what you are going to say, you will be prepared and you can focus in on your prospect.

5. Start with less important leads - It will be good practice and less stressful. Once you feel more comfortable, start working on the more important leads.

6. Stay calm - You will for the most part be talking to people who will appreciate your call. If a prospect is rude, remember: This is not personal. They may just be having a bad day. Move on.

7. Realize your priorities and your prospect's priorities are different - You want an immediate "yes," your prospect may want to finish a report, finish a conversation, start their vacation.… Be very careful not to read negative or extra meaning into early conversations with your prospect or prospect's secretary. If, for example, your prospect's secretary says that your prospect is "on the phone," "in a meeting," or "out of the office," that does not translate to "My prospect knows that I am calling and is avoiding me."

8. Accept some things are out of your control - If a prospect does say "no" ultimately that is out of your control—but what is within your control is continuing to prospect and continuing to make calls. It is also within your control to improve your cold calling skills, take seminars, read books or hire a coach-then fewer prospects will say "no."

9. Play Arlene's game - The object of Arlene's game is to focus on rejection. The goal is to reach 100 points. You get 1 point for every rejection. Give yourself 1 point for every "no" answer. If your prospect says "yes," that's a bonus! Focus on acquiring points. The more calls you make, the more points you acquire. When you reach 100—You Win! Give yourself a prize!

10. Have fun!  This is not life or death—it's only a cold call. The fate of the world does not rest on you and your telephone. You will not destroy your company or ruin your life if a prospect says "no." Loosen up, be creative, have some fun!

Wendy Weiss - "The Queen of Cold Calling ™" - has been training some of the largest sales organizations (Avon, ADP and Sprint to name a few) on how to create more effective cold calls and generate more results. Wendy has been featured in The New York Times, Business Week and Entrepreneur Magazine.

Kevin Kermes publishes the ‘Build the Career Your Deserve' e-zine with over 21,000+ subscribers. If you are ready to empower yourself with the vital tools and information necessary to find the job you want and build the successful career you deserve, visit him now www.kevinkermes.com

 

A call to action for the Traditionalist Generation
(AKA, the so-called Silent Generation, born by 1945)

Did you know that most babies born in the last years of the last century and in the first years of this century will live to 100? No? Well, look it up! The Associated Press article on October 2nd was widely distributed throughout the media and suggests that living longer is not just about chronological years but about living better with however many years the youngest generation are bestowed. Longer lifetimes bring up a number of questions as to how living better while living longer might be achieved. Work itself offers its share of meaning to longer lifetimes. Ask yourself, on the present course, will your children and children's children be likely to live better if you purposefully offer an example of work's role in finding the meaning of life?

Did you know that the U.S. has slipped globally in terms of its ability to compete? Switzerland, for example, just passed us as the most competitive nation in the global economy. Along the same lines, for every 100 students in the 9th grade today, only 68 graduate high school on time. Of those, only 40 enroll directly into college. Of those, only 27 are still enrolled in the following year. Of those, only 18 earn an AA within 3 years or a BA within 6 years (Source: AARP). Ask yourself, can you help children to value learning for learning's sake?

Did you know that, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 80% of new U.S. jobs require some form of post secondary education? Education may, in part, be defined by our education because children are well served when bright, educated minds share knowledge with eager, fresh minds just embarking on life's journey. Are you a retired engineer, scientist or mathematician? Your knowledge, as well as that from other disciplines, is a gift to give when it comes to preparing America's children for the future.

Today, more than ever, our contribution to our youth must change from the extremes of over-indulgence, or widespread neglect, to demonstrating the benefits of purposeful living and the excitement of meeting competitive challenges. Wizards say that the transfer of knowledge IS stimulus.

"Good work is work that works for you. It may be work that you do for
a fee, for free, for learning or for the future of a struggling nation."

As for the Boomers and Traditionalists themselves:

Did you know that almost half of U.S. workers retire long before they had hoped to retire? The Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI) recently conducted a very large survey of people to determine the relationship between when they "planned" (their word for "hoped") to quit working and when they actually retired. 23% aimed to work until age 65 but only 12% left the workforce at that age. 21% said they planned (there's that word again) to work until age 70 or longer but just 5% of retirees managed to work into their 7th decade. Over a third of retirees surveyed became unexpectedly retired due to a downsizing or business closure. Do you have a plan or merely a hope for your future?

Did you know that we are within a few years of a point in time when there will be more people on earth over age 65 than there are under five? So what, you ask? Well, for one thing, the graying population will slowly transform society, and retirement ages may soon be pushed back, according to Wizard Richard Suzman, an aging expert at the U.S. National Institute on Aging. Difficult to reconcile with the actual retirement ages of those surveyed by the EBRI study? Is this one of the facts that gives you more reasons to plan now than regret later? You decide.

Did you know that by the end of 2010, the first Boomers will turn 65 to be followed by 76-78 million others, nearly twice the number of people currently enrolled in Medicare? Wizards believe that it is this shifting demographic that will force changes to the program beyond any changes made in health-care reform. If you continue to work, in some capacity, will you be able to pay for supplemental insurance beyond the scope of Medicare? For the coverage you will need and, most certainly you will want, will you be forced to pay an increased amount for this coverage?

Did you know that the majority of public sector pension plans are underfunded and, do you think there is a potential conflict because of the discrepancy between private sector (the go-it-alone folks) and underfunded public sector pension shortfalls that most likely will result in either or both: (1) a higher obligation for all taxpayers or (2) a limiting of existing public sector pension payouts in a variety ways? Think not? Listen carefully! The media is beginning to pick up the story.

Did you know that government numbers of the unemployed are greatly under-counted? If the government claims 10% unemployment in the U.S., the truth is that real unemployment is closer to 17% and that figure does not include the underemployed. And, in several not-so-hot spots in the U.S., real unemployment is between 20-30% Do you know the realities of your hometown's unemployment and employment figures and, more importantly, what both might mean to your own career "plans"?

What is our point? Is it simply that "shift happens"
or is it that the future belongs to the prepared?

Carleen MacKay & Brad Taft
info@AgelessInAmerica.com