How To Win In a Tough Job Market [5 Practical Ways]

How To Win In a Tough Job Market [5 Practical Ways] OK, you are looking for a new role â€" maybe still looking since last year. Here are some ideas that I hope will help you to stay focused. Some of this may come across as a little glib but I really don’t mean it that way so stay with it and I hope you will find this practical and helpful: 1) Smile it could be a lot worse! By: Rory MacLeod No I don’t mean to trivialise the challenges of any job search, let alone one in a tight market â€" been there myself a few times. But if you step back for a moment and take a somewhat bigger picture view, for most of us will acknowledge that there are many people â€" even right here in our own city â€" who are far worse off than we are. Count your blessings? Yes, that’s not a bad idea sometimes, to get a bit of perspective and remain grateful for the ways we have been blessed.  Research  seems to shows that if you  smile  more it helps you to feel more relaxed, less stressed. You will also probably come across to others as more likeable = hireable! 2) Get over it and get on with it! There’s lots of negative press around, gloomy economic analysis and predictions, declining volume of advertised jobs etc. etc. Well, you can choose to be negatively affected by this or you can choose to tune out at least some of this noise and not let it influence your own internal ‘chatter’. Not suggesting you ignore reality â€" far from it â€" but the more you tell yourself things are bad the worse they will seem to be. That has a tendency to impact your confidence and your energy level needed to get on with the job search. So, start with the assumption that you will (eventually) find a good role, put your plan together, get help if you need it â€" and get busy. As Richard Branson said in a recent post on entrepreneurship â€"  now is the time to do! 3) Be seen and be heard Do whatever you can to raise your professional profile. Work on your social media strategy and presence; participate in relevant online forums; write articles on your areas of expertise and work on getting them published; look for organisers of conferences and industry functions who may be looking for speakers or group facilitators; hey, why not start a  blog?! And remember to keep growing your face-to-face  network, building relationships with people who could potentially  advocate for you. 4) Get a grip on reality In these market conditions you may have to accept the possibility that the “perfect” role may not be available to you â€" or at least that it may be quite a long time before you find it; you may also have to re-calibrate your salary expectations. At times like these employers tend to be less flexible, more cost conscious and operate from the view that it is largely a buyer’s market â€" in their favour.  Do you have the financial resources and emotional resilience to ride this out? I would always encourage you to stay true to your longer term goals and make sure that whatever role you ultimately accept makes sense to the market when you are preparing for your next move. But you may have to temper your aspirations to land that ideal job with a “good interim decision” â€" or at least be able to give a sensible account of what you have done with your time and how you have continued to make a contribution during a protracted job search 5) Keep at it â€" persistence pays Never, ever give up on growing your network. The very next person you speak to could be the one who creates the lead to an amazing job. What if you never met them because you stopped?  You may well need occasional periods of downtime to rest and refresh. Hunting for a job looking tired and desperate is never going to be productive â€" but stay in the game. Keep watching the advertised roles and putting in targeted, tailored applications; stay in touch (without stalking!) with a smallish number of recruiters who are very active in your field; network, network, network. Often the best opportunities are “right under your nose”.

The Police but not as you know them

The Police but not as you know them I’ve continued my summer visits to potential employers with a trip to New Scotland Yard for a briefing on the new graduate entry scheme for the Metropolitan Police. It’s called Police Now and is launching at the beginning of October aiming to recruit 50 trainees to start in Summer 2015. It’s so new that the website isn’t live yet but it will be here: http://www.policenow.org.uk/. So what’s different from the old grad schemes? The Met reckons that policing as a career is not on the radar of many graduates and  hope their  new scheme is going to change that. Police Now is a two year grad programme modelled on the fantastically successful Teach First. You’ll sign up for the two years with no expectation that you’ll remain at the end of that period. Thats certainly different and on the face of it sounds a bit odd. Why would the police want to train you and then let you go? The answer lies in part in some of the scandals which have beset the police over the last few years. Hillsborough and Plebgate are just two which spring to mind! The police force needs to change but it also needs genuine supporters in high places. The hope is that if you join the scheme you will be part of bringing change about. If you chose to walk away at the end of two years and embark on another successful career the Met hope that you will continue to be an enthusiastic  advocate for them in the wider world of business. What would you be doing? Entrants will go off for a six week period of intensive training after which they will become warranted police officers with full powers of arrest and will be appointed a Ward Officer in a tough area in London. Ward Officers are responsible for around 25 streets and work closely with residents. This is a challenging front line role  and Im told  you’ll be investigating wrong doing, actively problem solving thorny (and often long running) issues, managing risk, safeguarding the vulnerable and ensuring that your community has access to justice. You’ll be working in teams where your managers are fully committed to and enthusiastic about the Police First initiative. What  is the Met looking for in candidates? The Met say that this is a unique opportunity for the brightest and best graduates and they are looking to recruit those who’d never have considered the police. So what do they want in their recruits? There are  seven key competencies: 1. A vocation to “serve” and to “help” and an ability to build effective relationships. 2. Strong self-management powers. You’ll need bags of persistence and resilience. 3. An ability to solve problems innovatively. You’ll be asked to seize responsibility and take difficult decisions to develop evidence based solutions to community problems and you’ll be using your considerable brain power to do so! 4.Excellent developed powers of communication and persuasion. Youd have to be able to communicate messages clearly and interact effectively with your community. You will genuinely meet (and need to work with) people from all sections of society. 5. You’ll have to build relationships with key stakeholders. Their “buy in” and support will be invaluable when you have to negotiate to broker support for plans you are trying to implement. 6. Leadership skills will be a must. Youll have to have honed these already through your work experience and/or involvement with societies on campus or through experience you have already had in the wider community. 7. The ability to deliver! You’ll also have to be able to pass a medical and fitness test, have a 2.1 degree and a minimum of 300 UCAS points, have an unlimited right to remain in the UK and no tattoos which are normally visible. What’s in it for you? 1. Responsibility from the start. As soon as your six week period of initial training Im told you’ll be leading a community. 2. Challenge. It sounds to me as if you’ll be challenged in every way! I am sure that youd grow as an individual as well as developing fantastic transferable job skills. 3. The opportunity to make a difference. You’ll make a difference to policing, the image of the police force and you’ll be giving something back to the community. 4. I think you will develop skills which will be really useful in the wider graduate market place and which you will differentiate you from others. The Met says it is negotiating with a number of organisations which it expects will become partners of the scheme.  These are likely to range from accountancy and law firms through to the Civil Service and the existing fast track graduate scheme for the police.  Theres a plan to allow you to do internships with some of these partners in the second year of the scheme, (much as Teach First offers internships). The expectation is that the partners wont only support the scheme financially, theyll also look to recruit from it. This is an interesting offering and it is different. Its starting small looking to recruit 50 grads this year and expand from there.   Do come to see me if youd like to talk about if further.

Tips for making teams work better

Tips for making teams work better At age ten the Farmer  was doing chores before and after school and most of the weekend. This was normal for his family. Its what his parents did and what their parents did. I told him my kids were not doing that. Being a full-time farmer means kids dont have the chance to figure out what they really want. But now that we live on a farm, I see farming like a language. And the same way it seems sad to me that immigrants dont teach their kids their native language, it seems sad to me to raise kids on a farm without teaching them how to farm. So I told the kids they need to start doing more work on the farm. Make the work matter. We started with smaller jobs like  collecting rotten pears to give to the pigs. It was my idea for something the family could do together. But the kids could tell this was kid work that the parents  were doing with the kids. The kids wanted to do adult work. The final blow for kids collecting the pears was when the kids asked the Farmer if he did this job when he was a boy, and he said no. I said, What did you do with the pears on the ground? He said, Nothing. Management is about  patience. When the Farmer tells  me he is  going to ask  his dad to help him bed down the pigs, I ask if the kids can  help him  instead. The kids meet the Farmer at the end of the barnyard and the Farmer says, Go back and put on boots. This is a messy job. The kids say  they dont want to get their boots dirty. What are the boots for if you dont want them dirty? Theyre for clean dirt. Not pig shit. Hey, he cant say that! Moooommm! He said a swear  word! The Farmer gets the kids two pair of old boots. I  put their names on the boots. The job is already taking ten times longer that it would have with my father-in-law helping. I tell the Farmer that I read that people who have gratitude have more patience. He says, P, I have plenty of patience. He only starts a sentence with P when hes being impatient.  The Farmer thinks if he doesnt say hurry up then hes being patient. I am patient with his inability to be patient,  so I tell the kids just to do what he says. An important part of farming is not talking. Farmers dont talk to each other. They say its because animals get more difficult to work with if they hear voices. But really farmers get more difficult to work with if they hear voices. No one chooses farming to socialize. Get the right people for the job. The pigs need straw on the floor of their building to prevent it from becoming  too wet. And the pigs like to build little nests  with the straw. When they get low on straw it gets mushy muddy on the floor, so we need to bring a huge hay bail to them. The boys fail the first time. Imagine two pre-teen boys fighting with each other in  foot-deep pig manure, trying to handle 40 300-pound pigs. Do you have that image? Now imagine my older son gets his boot  stuck in the manure. It was like quicksand! Thats how he explains  it to me. It was like living hell, is how the Farmer explains  it to me. So the next time I go  with the boys to do the job. Match each person with the right tools. The trick is keeping the pigs away from the gate, but they love getting out of their building. For most of the summer the pigs are on pasture, so they know being in the building is a rip off. The kids and I clear the gate end of the hoop building. Each boy takes  one side. The Farmer gives  the kids sticks to defend against  the pigs. The younger boy is a natural, wielding the sticks like  a Medieval warrior. The older son is horrified at the thought of accidentally poking the pig with a stick, and he screams about how the sticks are immoral. So he gets a panel. The pigs see  both types of tools as something to avoid. Mom, what are you doing? You need a stick. Im  supervising. Watch your pig. Teach people how to communicate. Older son: Mom tell him to shut up. Younger son: Im doing call outs. Older son: We dont need call outs. This is not a video game. Younger son: Im just telling you where the dangers are. You were about to let a pig out. Me: I thought people dont like call outs. Younger son: They like call outs. The big kids dont like me talking during the game because they say Im a squeaker. Older son: Yeah well if older kids dont want to hear you do call outs on your video game, then just assume I dont want call outs either. Me: Fine. Great. So we have some ground rules. Dont talk unless someone is going to get hurt. We take our positions. The Farmer drives the loader in the building with a hay bale for the pigs. The boys stand quietly, probably thinking of the next thing to fight about. But for a short moment, all you hear is the snorting of pigs waiting for straw and the squish of the loader navigating  manure. Dont put a non-manager in management. We close up the gate. The pigs have hay bales, no pig was hurt, no child got stuck. It was a job well done. But the Farmer doesnt say that. It doesnt occur to him to say that. I tell the boys good job and then the Farmer remembers he is supposed to be positive, and says, Yeah. Good job. Thanks, you guys. He is trying to be a motivational team leader, but he doesnt see why people need to be motivated by someone else to do a good job. Show gratitude, I tell him. I know he privately sees a million ways the team could have worked better. We could have moved faster. We could have kept the pigs calmer. We could have stayed further away from the wheels of the loader. I tell him a team is like a marriage. There is never just one crazy person in a marriagebecause it takes a crazy person to pick a crazy person. And there is never a good manager managing a bad team. Because everyone can be a good team member if you give them what they need. He says, What does that mean? It means if you want a more competent  team, be a more competent  leader. He is speechless. The next time the pigs need bedding down, he does the job himself. Two pigs  get out, and he has to herd them back into the hoop building, and it takes an extra thirty minutes, but hed rather do that himself than lead a team.

Celebs with Glasses Love or Hate

Celebs with Glasses Love or Hate Ive been in need of contacts for a long time.  And by a long time, I mean that Ive probably been needing them for the last 5 years.  Oops.  Has anyone else out there avoided contact lenses for years? It started in high school when I couldnt see the board very well.  Then as the classrooms got bigger in college, glasses and a seat in the front row were a must.  Today Im cramped up behind my lap top all day so my need for contacts doesnt seem as crucial UNTIL I give a speech and cant see anyone in the audience Or, on the rare  occasion  that I drive and I cant read the signs Or, when Im at the grocery store and everything far away seems blurry When these things happen, you can bet money that I dont have my glasses and I probably dont even know where my glasses are. Im pretty sure its time for me to get some contact lenses, but Im a little scared. Once the ultimate accessory that screamed geek, glasses have come a long way from the old 1980’s  thick and ugly jam jars.  In fact, I got the glasses in the picture above because at the time I was convinced theyd make me look like Jennifer Anniston.  I look at this picture now and have no idea where I came up with such a comparison My guess is that a majority of people who actually need help with their sight prefer wearing  contact lenses  over glasses.  As a test, I looked up celebs who wear glasses to see which look I liked better. Turns out that, hands down, I  preferred  every single celebrity WITHOUT glasses (and presumably WITH contact lenses). Which celebrities do YOU prefer with glasses?   And whats a post about glasses vs. contacts without the infamous Sarah Palin?! PS- Anyone know if there are negative consequences to NOT wearing contacts regularly?

How to Write a Resume For Yourself

How to Write a Resume For YourselfHow to write a resume for many applicants is often a difficult question to answer. There are a number of ways you can go about generating one and the format you choose is going to depend on how unique you are, as well as how different your job history or expertise may be. Employers want to know if you have some knowledge of specific jobs, whether you've worked in those areas previously, and what positions you might be qualified for.Job hunting is not a cheap venture, and many people are still looking for work even after many years of employment. The number of people looking for jobs each year has continued to grow, and that is creating a huge demand for qualified individuals. People from all fields are seeking employment, and although there are plenty of positions available, not all of them require formal education.No matter what kind of experience you have, no matter how much education you have had, it's usually required to pass a background check i n order to become employed. Even if you have worked previously in an academic setting, you'll need to update your resume with additional information. It's also worth noting that employers often require people to update their resumes when they leave jobs or get promoted.If you've been out of college for a long time and haven't had any job training, you'll want to start off by writing a resume for yourself. Take notes, and look for lists of what industries are looking for in their staff. Then, you can develop a professional-looking resume that includes all the necessary qualifications.Another question that people ask is what to write a resume for people who have recently graduated or got another job change. It's never a good idea to leave out relevant details. The most important part of a resume is its content. You'll need to show that you're an asset to the employer, and that you're ready to make a career change to your current position.You could develop a very simple resume that jus t lists the positions you held before you got the new job. You might also add in your references, something that might be included on your old job contract. Other sections of a resume include education, employment history, interests, skills, and credentials.While you might want to move to a higher level of education quickly, this can be somewhat of a learning curve in your new position. So it's probably best to wait until you've gained experience in your current field before you consider moving up to a higher position. If you've worked at the same job for several years, consider taking an unpaid vacation so you can start from scratch.Learning how to write a resume for yourself is a good way to make sure you won't be left behind on the job market. It's also a good idea to keep an updated resume on hand so you can use it if you're ever in need of a job. It may be a while before you need to take advantage of this advice, but it's definitely worth it in the long run.

What I love about the NEW Twitter

What I love about the NEW Twitter Heres Whats New On Twitter Twitter changed their user-interface and some of their functionality not long ago (in 2012).   I wanted to share with you some of the changes I like a lot (or maybe love)!   I like the more simple design/layout.   So thanks, Twitter.   Clean and simple. Heres Whats New On Twitter @Connect This appears on the top menu bar and when you click on it you see INTERACTIONS.   The Interactions timeline shows you how others have been interacting with you on Twitter. This shows all interactions including: Retweets of your tweets Someone favorited your tweet Follows you Mentions your name How I use this: This is a super way to monitor what is being said about your on Twitter! I like the fact that it is all in one spot.  Acknowledge people who have shared my tweets or mentioned me I can chose to follow back people who have followed me I do find this a bit overwhelming sometimes so I prefer to go to the MENTIONS right under the INTERACTIONS option to thank people for their retweets.   Just my personal preference. #Discover Visually appealing, Twitter is using the #Discover page to show top news stories and Trending Topics  on Twitter. Stories are personalized for you based on recent popularity and your connections, location, and language. There is so much information being shared on Twitter and this can be a good place to go to find a digest of top stories relevant to you. How I use this: Keep current on trends and news that might be important to me. Skimming You dont have to read every tweet sent by everyone.   You dont read every single article in the news paper, do you? I have found that creating lists is one of the best ways to filter what is important to me.   Each time I follow someone, I categorize them based on what they are talking about. Tweetdeck My belief is that those that dont really like Twitter arent using Tweetdeck (or Hootesuite or the like).   Heres why I LOVE Tweetdeck; It allows me to better see what people are saying because I can create multiple columns. I can schedule tweets for the future so I dont overwhelm followers with too many tweets sent at one time. I can share content on LinkedIn, Facebook and other platforms without leaving Tweetdeck. If you want to learn more about the Twitter, their Help Center has great information Welcome to Twitter   (easy to follow help!) Twitter Profile Help What do you love about the new Twitter?   What do you miss?

How To Make Your Career More Interesting

How To Make Your Career More Interesting Most everyone has a semblance of interest in their work, but if you do it for forty plus hours a week, and always live the same routine, then it’s understandable that it can begin to get a little bit boring after a while. Indeed, even if your career and industry are generally interesting, it’s not advisable to do the same thing forever and ever. People need stimulation; they can’t just do the same thing over and over. The good news is that no-one’s locked into a job or way of being for life. There are ways to make your career more interesting! We take a look at a few options below. Work With a New Company Here’s the thing about companies: they’re not loyal to you, so there’s no reason why you should be loyal to them. There are a lot of advantages to setting forth and switching to work for another company. You’ll generally earn more money, for starters (loyalty is one of those things that should be financially rewarded but isn’t). Plus, you’ll meet new people, face new challenges, and get to mix up the daily routine. It can require a bit of a push of effort to do it, but it’s worth it! Changing Scenes Of course, sometimes changing the company doesn’t really provide you with the change in scene that you need, even if you thought it might. If you’re taking the subway from your flat to a downtown office every day, then switching to taking the subway downtown to an office in a slightly different location isn’t going to do all that much. Instead, why not look at changing scene altogether? Take a look at hansenagriplacement.com, and you’ll be able to find jobs in more rural areas. You’ll have interesting work, and be living in a completely different environment. Working Overseas But no-one says you need to limit yourself to just the United States. We live in an increasingly smaller world, and that means that its never been easier to find a job in a foreign country. You might not want to leave the states forever, but you could go and work for a year or so before coming back. In that time, you’ll be giving your resume a major boost, and be able to enjoy the experience of immersing yourself in a different culture. If you work for a company with overseas offices, speak to them about transferring. Stepping Sideways But what if you like the company you work for, and the place you live in, and so on. What then? Well, you can always step sideways. This is sometimes looked down upon, but it shouldn’t be! You’ll be working in the same industry, but taking on a different job, and thus a new challenge. Take a Break Finally, consider taking a break. Sometimes we just get a little burned out, and we forget why we liked our job in the first place. If you take a break from work, you might just find that you still find the work highly interesting!