Friday, May 29, 2020

Dick Bolles Videos

Dick Bolles Videos Yesterday I wrote about Dick Bolles, and said its the end of a legacy. Perhaps I should have written the end of a legend. Or, the next chapter of a legend. From the comments on yesterdays post, and throughout the internet, its clear that this man was the father of the modern job search, and that he impacted many, many people. Great tributes have been written about him. I found a 32 minute video when he was at Google, doing a presentation titled How to decide what youll be doing five years from now.  Check it out here. Years ago, when I was doing the Ask the Expert interviews, Dick graciously agreed to be a guest on my show.  You can watch it below but if you do, youll notice the first 20 minutes I was flying solo. That was not planned. Heres what happened: I had been in touch with Dick, the consummate professional, about being on my show. He readily agreed, and I didnt want to hound him with reminders. I was very sensitive about giving him enough information without him feeling like I was harassing him.  I was sure that he would come, be on time, etc. After all, he had probably done this a gazillion times. So I started the webinar and had a great audience. Questions were coming in for him, and you could feel the excitement build.  But Dick wasnt there yet. I emailed him, I even called him but nothing.  No response. I remembered that he was in his mid-t0-late eighties, and I worried that perhaps he had. passed away.  This was about four years ago I think he was 86 or 87.  Was my show going to be the way that everyone knew he had passed away? I hoped not. I wanted to interview him, and learn from him! For twenty minutes I ad-libbed, I sweated, I worried, and I wondered.  That was a LONG twenty minutes. Then, thank goodness, Dick joined the call.  He was apologetic, and I was relieved!  He was ALIVE! He said he was late because he stayed up all night working, on deadline, on the next version of his book, which was due the morning of our call.   He fell asleep at his desk (that made for an interesting visual), and just barely woke up. Did I say I was relieved?  Not for me, nor for the interview, but that Dick Bolles was okay! Heres the interview I was amazed that he brought new-to-me information and ideas. Dick Bolles Videos Yesterday I wrote about Dick Bolles, and said its the end of a legacy. Perhaps I should have written the end of a legend. Or, the next chapter of a legend. From the comments on yesterdays post, and throughout the internet, its clear that this man was the father of the modern job search, and that he impacted many, many people. Great tributes have been written about him. I found a 32 minute video when he was at Google, doing a presentation titled How to decide what youll be doing five years from now.  Check it out here. Years ago, when I was doing the Ask the Expert interviews, Dick graciously agreed to be a guest on my show.  You can watch it below but if you do, youll notice the first 20 minutes I was flying solo. That was not planned. Heres what happened: I had been in touch with Dick, the consummate professional, about being on my show. He readily agreed, and I didnt want to hound him with reminders. I was very sensitive about giving him enough information without him feeling like I was harassing him.  I was sure that he would come, be on time, etc. After all, he had probably done this a gazillion times. So I started the webinar and had a great audience. Questions were coming in for him, and you could feel the excitement build.  But Dick wasnt there yet. I emailed him, I even called him but nothing.  No response. I remembered that he was in his mid-t0-late eighties, and I worried that perhaps he had. passed away.  This was about four years ago I think he was 86 or 87.  Was my show going to be the way that everyone knew he had passed away? I hoped not. I wanted to interview him, and learn from him! For twenty minutes I ad-libbed, I sweated, I worried, and I wondered.  That was a LONG twenty minutes. Then, thank goodness, Dick joined the call.  He was apologetic, and I was relieved!  He was ALIVE! He said he was late because he stayed up all night working, on deadline, on the next version of his book, which was due the morning of our call.   He fell asleep at his desk (that made for an interesting visual), and just barely woke up. Did I say I was relieved?  Not for me, nor for the interview, but that Dick Bolles was okay! Heres the interview I was amazed that he brought new-to-me information and ideas.

Tuesday, May 26, 2020

What Are the Most Commonly Asked Interview Questions

What Are the Most Commonly Asked Interview Questions A good job interview gets you one giant step closer to your dream job  so you want to be prepared in order for it to run as smoothly and successfully as possible. Employers  tend to ask similar questions, and knowing how to put together some strong answers to these questions is key to landing the role. Here are some of the most commonly asked questions in a job interview, to guide you in your interview prep. Can you tell me a little about yourself? This is usually the first question asked in a job interview, and it is your chance to leave a good first impression on your potential employer and really make yourself stand out from the crowd. You should keep your answer brief and concise, beginning with your qualifications and jobs you’ve held. There is no need to go into too much detail at this point, however it is a good idea to highlight some of your strengths that are pertinent to the job you are interviewing for, as this will capture their attention from the start.   What are your strengths? It’s important for you to pick some of the skills that are most relevant to the job you are applying for. These skills could be either tangible or intangible. For example, knowing how to use a particular software is a tangible skill, while good time management skill is an intangible skill. The job description usually gives you some hints on what skills the employer is looking for. What are your weaknesses? For many people, this is the hardest question of a job interview and can be a tricky one to negotiate.  The best way to handle this is to put a positive spin on your weaknesses. For example, if you are not good with a certain computer software, point it out to the interviewer and tell him or her how you plan to work on improving your skills in that area. The interviewer may view your initiative as a strength. What are your goals? It’s best to split your goals into long-term and short-term, and relate these goals to the job you are applying for. Show the interviewer that you are motivated and you know exactly where you want to be. Most employers are looking to hire individuals who will be committed to the company and stick around for a while, so try to link your goals to the company or industry you are applying for.   Why should we hire you? Again, this is where the  job description will help you. Before you head into an interview, put yourself in the employer’s shoes and come up with an ideal candidate. When you are asked this question, answer it as if you are the ideal candidate. Tell the interviewer about your achievements and what these achievements can benefit the company. Why do you want to work here? One thing you should never say is “I need a job.” Even if its true, you may come across as desperate and uncommitted to the role you are interviewing for. To prepare for this question, you need to know the company’s mission statement, values, plans, and products. Tell the interviewer how your goals align with the company’s values. Finish your answer by telling the interviewer that you would enjoy working for the company and would strive to become a valuable asset.

Saturday, May 23, 2020

Three Factors that Make Work Miserable

Three Factors that Make Work Miserable (This is the second post based on Primed to Perform by Neel Doshi and Lindsay McGregor.) In Primed to Perform, Doshi and McGregor make the case that any company can improve performance by increasing workers’ sense of play, purpose and potential. Unfortunately, most companies focus on extrinsic factors when they try to increase performance. And it’s a sure recipe for disaster. Embed from Getty Imageswindow.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'hVmtkaetRdpJ_u3ryOC_Rw',sig:'RIz-tLpzGIwYikUhXmI_4kFxuoS_Br1tciI1kt5u61Q=',w:'507px',h:'338px',items:'169270630',caption: false ,tld:'com',is360: false })}); Choose a size: In dozens of case studies, companies that managed to increase intrinsic motivators found that their workers were happier and performed better. But when was the last time you heard your manager say: “Today, we’re going to learn how to play more at work”? Instead, managers are trained to focus on goals, and they employ a couple of methods to get workers to perform. The first is emotional pressure. This is classic behavioral programming: getting people to do something to avoid negative feedback. If I don’t do what I’m expected, I’ll feel guilty or ashamed. My manager or my co-workers will be disappointed; they might get angry with me. If I fail to meet expectations on a regular basis, I’ll start to feel like a loser, a failure.   These are intangible but powerful de-motivators. For some of us, they don’t even require another party â€" we can create and perpetuate these feelings ourselves. When emotional pressure takes over, we’re no longer working for the work itself. We’re working to avoid these negative feelings (which may or may not stop when we start to improve.) If you’ve ever “choked” under pressure, even though you know exactly what must be done, you know how devastating this factor can be. As I write this, the Minnesota Vikings have just lost a crucial playoff game because kicker Blair Walsh missed an easy chip shot field goal that would have won the game in the last seconds of play. He broke down in tears in the locker room after the game. Economic pressure is when you work to gain an economic boon, such as a raise, promotion or bonus, or to avoid being punished or losing your job.  Economic pressure can also occur outside the workplace when someone feels pressured by the boss to socialize or act a certain way. Dan Pink has written about what a de-motivating factor money can be; people who performed simple tasks in experiments actually got worse when they were paid to perform.   But if intrinsic motivation is present, studies have found that money won’t make much of a difference to the end result. The third de-motivator is inertia. Inertia, is of course, the force that keeps a body at rest immobile. When a worker is suffering from inertia, he doesn’t even try to find motivation for the work he’s doing. He simply does today what he did yesterday. Students continue their classes, even though they’ve lost all interest in their major. Workers continue in the same dead-end job, even though they dislike the work and the company â€" and eventually, even themselves. When these three factors increase in a workplace, performance decreases.   When play, purpose and potential increase, performance increases. They use “TOMO” as measurement of “TOtal MOtivation.”  The authors of Primed to Perform offer an online survey to measure individual or team TOMO. See how you and your job rate on the TOMO scale. In a future post, we’ll discuss why Culture eats Strategy for lunch.

Monday, May 18, 2020

Underrated Cleaning up your offline identity

Overrated Cleaning up your online identity / Underrated Cleaning up your offline identity The idea of having a perfect online identity is not realistic. Instead, maybe you should focus on making your offline identity one that youre proud of. First of all, no one is getting away with anything online. Today recruiters are expert and tireless Internet researchers when it comes to scoping out candidates. I just read a story about someone interviewing for a job who was asked about his wish list on Amazon. I would never have thought of that. (In fact, I cant even figure out how to find other peoples wish lists on Amazon.) The list of ways to snoop feels infinite. And the list of ways to fix snoopable problems seems very limited. If theres someone in your life who is glued to their computer each night, posting career-killing commentary, maybe you should forward a link to this Wall St. Journal article by Vauhini Vara chronicling one mans struggle to get his page removed on MySpace: He emailed MySpace, begging the site to take down his old page. Nothing happened. He sent at least eight more urgent messages to the site, including a note to MySpace co-founder Tom Anderson. Finally, he received a cryptic email telling him to write his user name craigisanidiot and password with a marker on a piece of paper, to take a photo of himself holding it up, and to email it to MySpace along with a note saying, I wish to be removed from MySpace. (Note to the concerned: It worked.) A pseudonym will not save you. A majority of bloggers use pseudonyms, but people will find out who you are. The first weekly column I wrote was about my job while I was in my job. I used a pseudonym and presumed I was safe. I wrote about my CEOs pharmaceutical cocktail and diagnosed him (correctly, I still think) as manic depressive. I described the scene of my boss sexually harassing me. I documented my expensive and useless business trip. It turned out, pretty much the whole company had been reading my column. If you are going to be anonymous, take a tip from Waiter Rant, who never reveals his restaurant but never disses it either, or Your HR Guy, who writes funny human resources scenes, but publishes his policy of not getting fired for his blog. But dont go to the other extreme. If you get too careful, youll be like college student Matthew Zimmerman, and find yourself unable to write anything. (Dont worry, he got over it.) The BBC News tells us How to Blog and Not Get Fired, but it seems much harder to give advice on how to blog and still get hired. When it comes to recruiters, a blog is like a lighthouse: You dont know how many people have been repelled because they never show up. At some point, you just have to be yourself. Figure out your best self and be that online and offline and then no one will be surprised. The people entering the workforce today did not grow up posting every little thing that happened to them. But in five years, those kids coming to work will have no way to cleanse the Internet of their posting transgressions from when they were fifteen years old. There will have to be new standards for what is okay to have online. It will have to be okay to say, Oh, yeah. I remember when I posted that. Stupid, huh? Interviewers will have to judge people by what they are doing right now, or else they wont be able to hire anyone. So for now, take a look at that wish list you made. Does it make you look like a moron? Instead of getting rid of anti-social items and replacing them with crowd pleasers, ask yourself why you want to read books that reflect poorly on you. Ask yourself who you are. Karen Salmansohn writes about the idea of congruence: Be yourself wherever you are, whether at work, with your partner or with friends. When you compartmentalize yourself to be wildly different in different circumstances you can start to feel out of whack. Create a life that is congruent with the person you truly are. The impact of incongruence is big: Youll have an online persona that conflicts with your work persona. Youll have huge stress. When I was making fun of my co-workers in my column it was because I was a fish out of water in that office. When your impulse is to write mean things about the people you work with then you probably shouldnt be there. Research published in the Harvard Business Review (paid) shows that in order to be a great leader, you need to make your work consistent with your core self. When you can be authentic in your job and authentic when you blog thats a step toward living congruently and you will be priming yourself for success.

Friday, May 15, 2020

Find A Resume Writing Service

Find A Resume Writing ServiceIf you are looking for a resume writing service in Louisville, KY has many available. The process of reviewing and analyzing resumes is very important in the selection of potential employees. This can be accomplished using the review of a resume. Whether you are looking for a professional resume writer or a great resume that a resume writer can create for you, you need to use the best possible service available.When it comes to hiring professionals for your business, you may want to consider contacting a resume writing service in Louisville, KY has. They can produce a resume that can be used as an initial consideration for an individual with a resume that may be posted. A professional resume writer can write the best possible resume that can be submitted to a hiring manager. There are many choices in what you can achieve by having a professional help with your resume.As you evaluate what to do with a resume of yours, you want to make sure that you conside r how you will want to present your skills and experience to a hiring manager. You need to know what your goals are, but you also need to ensure that you do not forget to include the critical information that is required. After you know your goals, you need to know how to go about getting them. You need to find the best possible service that will help you to get the best result.With so many choices out there for a professional to create a resume, you need to get the best result that you can get. It is important to find the best possible service that can provide you with a professional resume writer. This is the way that you can ensure that your resume will show that you are willing to work hard for the position you have applied for. The best possible way to get the best possible result is to find a resume writing service in Louisville, KY has that can handle all of the work involved.Professional resume can be a great help to anyone who is looking for a resume writer that can produce a quality resume. You can see how the resume you are looking at can help to further your career. A professional can be the key to helping you achieve the success that you want. This is a service that will help you get the information you need from your resume.One option that you have is to search for freelance writers who can provide you with a resume that can be used for your business. This may include companies that offer the service that you are looking for. You can see how your resume can be a valuable tool to help you get the best results possible. You may even find that this is a good idea for you to have done to help you get the results you want.There are many benefits to using a service to help you with your resume. This can help you get the resume that you need. You can do this when you are trying to figure out which professionals are the best fit for your needs. This is a simple step that can be completed to get the results you want.You can easily do this when you contact a service in Louisville, KY. You will want to get the best possible service that can produce a professional resume. This can be something that you can use to help you get the results you want. You may want to consider getting a professional to help you with your resume to help you find the best possible job you can get.

Tuesday, May 12, 2020

Motivation Monday Lather, Rinse, Repeat

Motivation Monday Lather, Rinse, Repeat Remember the old shampoo instructions: Lather, rinse, repeat. What happened to them? Did the manufacturers decide it wasnt necessary to repeat or did consumer complaints leadd to these well-known instructions demise? And who decided that a cup of coffee needed a warning Careful. Hot Liquid. Duh, its coffee for crying out loud. Well, maybe common sense isnt so common. And maybe job search isnt intuitive! Know Whats Worth Fixin Almost any HR professional or recruiter you talk to will admit that their work is not getting easier. Finding the right talent is a challenge and their processes and systems are not helping. It is time consuming to respond to every applicant. It is often not their expertise to remove or update the company website listing available jobs. And the online application is a carry-over from the one they used 20 years ago that asks for your social security number. They know better than to ask for that information online, but it used to be that getting that information up front made their lives easier. There are probably hundreds of other ways I could list that prove the process is broken, but all a company has to do is listen to their applicants, new hires and potential employees to know this. So instead of complaining, know that the process could be and should be improved and move forward, OK? There are some problems in this world we cannot solve, so instead of letting them eat away at us, make the choice to accept the facts and know what is worth changing. Humility Can Be Dangerous To Your Career Learn how to convincingly communicate your strengths and successes. You MUST read Communication Breakdown to see why this is so important. Employers arent looking for employees who are hard-working, dedicated and reliable. In fact, those are probably minimum job requirements. What employers really want are people who will make their lives easier and they do this by doing their job well. Have you outlined your successes on your resume? Can you talk about them during an interview? If you do not convey your strengths, for fear of being a braggart, then the next applicant will and guess what? Theyll get the job! You owe it to yourself today to begin compiling your accomplishment (STAR) stories. Learn how to recall your past accomplishments. Zero In on Targets, Not Jobs Stop searching for posted jobs. Get in control of your search by seeking unadvertised jobs. How? By pro-actively researching and meeting with people who work at companies that could potentially hire you. If you are looking for ways to find these potential employers, you can read Proactive Job Search on Job-Hunt.org This week, what conventional new wisdom will you challenge? Which will you embrace?

Friday, May 8, 2020

Catch me on NBCs Today Show re Dealing with BIG change

Catch me on NBCs Today Show re Dealing with BIG change Change is not something most people deal with well.  It can however, be a great teacher inspiring you to grow in positive ways.  Catch me on The Today Show this Friday (3/15/13) at 10a ET sharing my personal story of dealing with big change, in this case the 3 month premature birth of my son Mercer while on vacation.Often we think we the best way to cope with massive change is to go BIG in our adjustments. Not true.  As I found out and as evidenced by a new book, Tweak It by work-life fit expert Cali Yost, small tweaks are the secret to dealing with big change.My husband Craig and I were shocked by the early birth of our son.  We were completely unprepared for his arrival at the 28th week of my otherwise very smooth and healthy pregnancy.  We were on vacation, in a city we didnt know. It was a lot to take in.  Luckily we had the support of family, friends and experts like Cali Yost . Cali had been a frequent guest on my radio show and over the years became my go-to person for d ealing with work-life issues.  After my family, Cali was the first person I called to deal with this situation in a healthy and productive way. (Read Calis advice in my post When Life Throws You a Curve Ball).Inspired by that conversation and by the sage insights of my StayAdventurous.com founder husband Craig, we realized we had to get used to a new normal and then tweak back to the life we knew.  Here are the tweaks we made:Career tweaks We both chose to go back to work part-time but do it remotely.  I went back to hosting my SiriusXM radio show two weeks after Mercer was born and while this surprised some, it was the right move for me.  Planning, preparing and delivering my show took 4-5 hours per week but that time was a welcome respite from the challenges of being the parent of a micro-preemie.Wellness tweaks We stayed in a hotel next to the hospital for the 61 days our son was in the NICU.  Though we could have saved some money and gone with a standard room, we upgraded to an efficiency with a kitchen.  It was important to us that we eat healthy during this time to have the strength and emotional wellbeing to be there for our son every step of the way.Peace of mind tweaks Having purchased a small angel figurine a few months earlier, I could think of nothing better to put in Mercers incubator.  It was my way of watching over him when I couldnt be there in person. Though the hospital staff were wonderful, having that little angel there withMercer at all times, helped me focus on love and the possibility of miracles.  Thankfully that is what we got.  As I write this, Mercer is a happy, healthy 2 year old!  We celebrated his birthday at Disney coincidentally on the very same day I received the call that the Today Show wanted to fly me to NYC to tell his story.  (Listen to my latest podcast for more on Career Coincidences).Now I not only believe in miracles, I get to see one everyday in Mercer.  My hope is that this Fridays Today Show segment i nspires people who themselves are going through big changes to make the small but essential tweaks that will not only help them survive but thrive too.  Tune in Friday (3/15/13) at 10am ET to NBCs Today Show with Kathie Lee, Hoda, Cali and me!While we try to teach our children all about life,  Our children teach us what life is all about.  ~Angela Schwindt