New Year Musings

Every year, I think to myself, what can be some of my New Year’s resolutions that I know that I will (not) keep? So this year, I decided to write some resolutions that I will not be able to attain in 2012, but will try to..

• Lose weight. The more the better. Every year I say, I’m going to lose 10 to 15 pounds and this year I went the reverse direction and gained.  Not Good.  I guess the “See Food” diet just doesn’t work. Either, I change this pattern in 2012, or, I’ll be facing more medical bills and ailments than I did this year..
• Be Debt Free: This year, financially was better than 2010, but I’m no closer to being debt free than I was last year.. It’s not like I spend more recklessley this year on credit cards, but chasing the moving target gets harder and harder. I’ve tried different stragegies to reduce debt, but it’s like I keep floating in the same pool of debt..  In 2012, I gotta think of a strategy that will really make a dent in my credit card balances, or I’ll be writing about it AGAIN next year at this time. Gotta figure out how to use less plastic and/or pay off what you buy… Both are good ideas in theory..

 

• Have 6 month cushion of Money – Yeah right.. Refer to “Be Debt Free”. Only difference now is that my household income has gotten a spike upwards, but that doesn’t mean, my savings to debt ratio has gotten better.. Sad but true. I guess the motto “the more you make, the more you spend” applies here”.
• Reduce my Medical Bills by taking care of my health.. Refer to bullet 1.. “Lose Weight”. It seems if I can’t do this, my medical bills will continue to go up every year..
• Make my other passion BharatBeat successful: In 2011, my partner and I made some progress by setting up a dedicated page on Facebook .. but getting people “LIKE” us continues to be a challenge. In 2012, our goal is to finally step out of our comfort zone and go all out… maybe people will “LIKE” us then?? We shall see
• Make strides in my Day Job – Actually 2011 was pretty good here for me… Enjoy my job, have a challenging position.. yet the rise to a higher pay scale continues to elude.. Yes, I know.. “Work hard and you shall succeed”..

Even with my cynical outlook, I do realize that what I have far exceeds my expectations of where I thought I would be as I hit the half century mark as well as well as 2011 draws to a close.. Now the question is what 2012 resolutions should I write that are actually attainable goals?

 

Related articles

• New Year’s Resolutions. . .or just screw it! (misleadingtonowhere.wordpress.com)
• The Only New Year’s Resolution You Need for 2012 (socyberty.com)
• New Years Resolution! (wordsfromusa.wordpress.com)

Job Search – Part 6 – Path 101 – Career Discovery

I was skimming through my Yahoo front page and I found a site that allows you  get career guidance and coaching. Now who can’t use that? The Path 101 site is data driven

As I’ve indicated in the past, I find that Mashable always seems to have postings with pertinent sites related to topics that are timely in this time of high unemployment and job uncertainty.

Path 101 labels itself as a “Community Powered Career Discovery”.  Having browsed the site, I will recommend you take a look and print out and keep for reference

the pages that are usable

Here’s what I recommend:

1. Go to the Mashable site I listed above and get an overview of the Path 101 Alpha site.
2. Take the Personality Quiz at Path 101 to determine YOUR personality type.  As the site indicates, you’ll need 25 to 30 minutes to take this test. Answer as honestly. I always believe the first answer is your true answer.
3. Analyze the results of the quiz and see what career interests you. As I’ve said in the past, when you are unemployed, it’s the best time to do analysis on your future career.
4. Based on your analysis, start the process of finding the job in the career that interests you.

Let me know what you find out about Path 101.  I’ll be taking the personality test.

Job Search – Part 4 – Mashable

I was thinking that now that I had written the fundamentals on the Job Search,  I was going to write in detail individual parts of the search.  After I read the posting in Mashable I quickly realized that I was reinventing the wheel when others had done a much more capable job than I could do! Read on…

Yet before I could even go there, I saw in this morning on my yahoo on my Mashable widget a posting by Dan Schawbel (author of Personal Branding 2.0 and build a powerful  brand) which expands on the networking portion of the job search.  This wonderul, amazing post  teaches you the art of  social  networking using the top 10 social networking sites for finding a job (besides linked in) you absolutely need to look at with a fine tooth comb.

Another link within mashable talks about 30 sites that you absolutely need to visit once you have been laid off.  Many of these sites, I knew of, but many were new to me.

In one of my prior posts, we talked about your resume, but we didn’t go into any details. Take a look at building at the posting for the how to build your ultimate social media resume.

If you follow this posting by Dan Schawbel and the asociated links, you will be well on your way to getting yourself a new job in this tough economy.  Thanks to Dan for these great contributions on Mashable!

Job Search – Part 3 – Find work

• Been awfully busy at work for the past few days, so haven’t had a chance to gather my thoughts to post the 3rd in my series on Job search.

So now you have created a resume (draft of course), started building your network. You are now (almost) are ready to pursue your job search. Before ou post your resume, it’s important that you proof read your resume (typo’s, grammatical errors, consistency, etc).  So before you pass GO and collect $200, you need to make sure that your resume (the first and lasting impression) on the reader…

So for the next few months or until you get the first offer, you should consider yourself to be employed. You  job is to find a new job!

Normally, people go and register at Monster or Careerbuilder, but I’m going to share with you a few sites that will give you a better bang for your buck (or free as the case may be).

If you are indeed serious about your job search and you know where you want your new job to be, you should try out the indeed site.

Another good site that is pretty new is the iList classifieds. What’s unique about this site is that you are exploding your resume or your skillsets across your social network on facebook, Twitter, and Myspace .

By this time in your job search you are truly ready for full speed ahead. What I want you to realize is that each of the job posting boards will send you daily/weekly emails on jobs that you “qualify” for. Yet you have to remember that just as you are out there, there are thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of others that are doing the same thing.

So what can you do to distinguish yourself?

• Utilize LinkedIn to build your network and get look for jobs that are listed there. Remember that if you find a job that you are interested in, you MUST find out whether you already have a second or third level network contact in the company you are interested in. This in itself is very tricky. You don’t want to reach out to someone that you don’t know. Remember, people will help you if they don’t feel that you are a “threat” to them.

• Scan through Craigslist, for jobs. This again is tricky. There are many listings here that are just plain and outright scams. You have to be very very careful here.

In my opinion, the steps above are the trickiest and most sensitive part of your job search. You want to send your resume out, but you have to be very careful.. You don’t want to blast our resume, without a purpose.

You should also prepare multiple versions of your resume. Each version is tailored to the the job that you are applying for..

So the motto of this posting can easily be said as: “Look before you Leap”.

Stay tuned for additional postings on how to get re-employed…

Good Luck!

Job Search – Part 2 – Networking

In my last post I talked about the first phase of recovery after you lose your job. Now, I’m going to discuss the one of the most important things of a job search: Network, Network, Network!

In order to be successful in your job search building your personal And professional network .

• This network can exist of family, friends,business associates,  acquaintences,  and any others that can help you to find your next assignment/job.
• Build an On-line network utilizing LinkedIn (professional) and Facebook (Personal/Professional).  For the purposes of this post, I will only talk about LinkedIn.

Remember, that every person you have met and will meet is a potential network contact for you (yes even the individuals you don’t care for)).  So if you can build your network quickly, the quicker you will be back to work. Keep in mind  that networking is known to be the best and most effective way to find a new job. As opposed to sending out resumes without the networking touch!

So let’s start to build your network!

Here’s a step by step way to develop and and maintain your network.

• Jot down all your network names by category (work, family, friends, and just people you know)

• Within each category, write down names and emails (and if you have it, their contact numbers). In my opinion, the emails are most important today. You’ll see why later.

• Create a “new” email using Gmail (my favorite), like this: “xxxx_net99”  (ex. abc_net09) this will be your email that you will use for all your job search and network efforts.  It’s important to include some numbers in your email to reduce SPAM to this box.

• Now get LinkedIn: Maximze this FREE  professional networking site  to establish an on-line network with your newly created email (“xxxx_net99). When you create the account, you will have the ability to import your emails from the various email accounts you may already have (Gmail, Hotmail, etc..).

Once you have created a profile, allow Linked-In to import and determine many of your pre-existing contacts already have linkedIn accounts (saves you time with data entry). These individuals are your first target for your professional network. You will send out personalized invitations

• Note: When you create your Linked In, make sure your privacy settings reflect the actual amount of information you wish to divulge about yourself. There are plenty of long time “linkers” as I call them that are constantly patrolling looking to sell you some financial planning or stocks, or just in general annoying invitations. So do due diligence in making sure you only reveal the things about yourself that you want the world to see on linked in.

Now that you are on the premier site for professional networking,  you need to:

1. Create your Profile
2. Upload Your Resume (if ready). If not
3. Start exploring linked in for it’s tremendous networking utilization and job listings.
4. Start your job search here!

Mastering and utilizing Linked-In itself will take you a few weeks.  In my opinion, this site is the best place to start in your job search. Looking around the site you will be able to join discussions, groups, ask questions, look at company information, and develop a professional network that can be amazing. LinkedIn is your one-stop shop for professional networking.

I started using LinkedIn a few years ago when I lost my job and over 3 years have developed over 430 first level contacts.  You can see my public profile on LinkedIn.

Of course there are other sites on the Web that provide networking for professionals, but I always come back to LinkedIn as my personally preferred networking site.

If you have other professional networking sites that you would like to share,  feel free to leave your comments.

Job Search – Part 2A – Build Your Network

In my last post I talked about the first phase of recovery after you lose your job. Now, I’m going to discuss the one of the most important things of a job search: Network, Network, Network!

In order to be successful in your job search building your personal And professional network .

• This network can exist of family, friends,business associates,  acquaintences,  and any others that can help you to find your next assignment/job.
• Build an On-line network utilizing LinkedIn (professional) and Facebook (Personal/Professional).  For the purposes of this post, I will only talk about LinkedIn.

Remember, that every person you have met and will meet is a potential network contact for you (yes even the individuals you don’t care for)).  So if you can build your network quickly, the quicker you will be back to work. Keep in mind  that networking is known to be the best and most effective way to find a new job. As opposed to sending out resumes without the networking touch!

So let’s start to build your network!

Here’s a step by step way to develop and and maintain your network.

• Jot down all your network names by category (work, family, friends, and just people you know)

• Within each category, write down names and emails (and if you have it, their contact numbers). In my opinion, the emails are most important today. You’ll see why later.

• Create a “new” email using Gmail (my favorite), like this: “xxxx_net99”  (ex. abc_net09) this will be your email that you will use for all your job search and network efforts.  It’s important to include some numbers in your email to reduce SPAM to this box.

• Now get LinkedIn: Maximze this FREE  professional networking site  to establish an on-line network with your newly created email (“xxxx_net99). When you create the account, you will have the ability to import your emails from the various email accounts you may already have (Gmail, Hotmail, etc..).

Once you have created a profile, allow Linked-In to import and determine many of your pre-existing contacts already have linkedIn accounts (saves you time with data entry). These individuals are your first target for your professional network. You will send out personalized invitations

• Note: When you create your Linked In, make sure your privacy settings reflect the actual amount of information you wish to divulge about yourself. There are plenty of long time “linkers” as I call them that are constantly patrolling looking to sell you some financial planning or stocks, or just in general annoying invitations. So do due diligence in making sure you only reveal the things about yourself that you want the world to see on linked in.

Now that you are on the premier site for professional networking,  you need to:

1. Create your Profile
2. Upload Your Resume (if ready). If not
3. Start exploring linked in for it’s tremendous networking utilization and job listings.
4. Start your job search here!

Mastering and utilizing Linked-In itself will take you a few weeks.  In my opinion, this site is the best place to start in your job search. Looking around the site you will be able to join discussions, groups, ask questions, look at company information, and develop a professional network that can be amazing. LinkedIn is your one-stop shop for professional networking.

I started using LinkedIn a few years ago when I lost my job and over 3 years have developed over 430 first level contacts.  You can see my public profile on LinkedIn.

Of course there are other sites on the Web that provide networking for professionals, but I always come back to LinkedIn as my personally preferred networking site.

If you have other professional networking sites that you would like to share,  feel free to leave your comments.

Job Search – Part 1 – Decompress and Plan

I’ve been thinking for the past few days on what I could write about and I have to admit, I had reached writer’s block.

Over the past few months at least 3 of my friends/relatives have lost their jobs due to the economy. So instead of  just providing links, I decided to write about what I have substantial experience in. Job Search and finding a New job.

Over the next few posts, I will  post some of my tips and techniquesto finding a new job in this tough economy. Some of these tricks may seem like old news, but some tricks I’ve learned myself by just trial and error. I hope you find the next few posts useful if you are out there looking for a job.

So what do you do if you lose your job and have no clue on how to start your job search?

You should try the steps below, of course the steps I list below should be tried as a combination and not sequentially.

1. Decompress :It’s very  traumatic to lose your job. Take the first few weeks to acknowledge that you are moving on to a new part of your life. Do not blame yourself for losing your job. This in my opinion is the most important step. If you don’t decompress, your stress levels will be exponentially be greater as you begin your job search. This process could take a week or it could take a month. It’s important that you realize that this is based on your DNA.
2. Prioritize: Realize that your full time job over the next (several) months will be to find a job. In order to do this, you have to acknowledge the difficulty in this economy that finding a new job will take time and a substantial amount of energy
3. Start a log or a better yet a blog of your job search.  What I recommend is create a private blog to jot down your thoughts day over day to see how you are progressing. I know this sounds tedious, but this will pay off as you become a “professional” job seeker.
4. Build/rebuild your professional Network: Get the word out to your friends/family/former co-workers/professional contacts that you are available. I’ll build more on this on my next few postings about establishing your network. In this economy, your friends/family and your professional contacts will develop to be your best source of network!
5. Document your accomplishments and skills – When you work, you don’t normally sit down and write down what you have accomplished (except for annual reviews). Now is the time to in free form, document your accomplishments and you skills. Remember, the idea here is that you are documenting what you know and what you have done.
6. Get Reference Letters – Get Reference Letters from your previous employer  and/or individuals that have worked with you and will do so. Be prepared to write these letters of reference, so the person giving you this reference letters has a good frame of reference that he/she can utilize.
7. Build your resume/cover letter – Go to your local library and take out books on resume writing. Of course you can always go to my favorite bookstore Barnes and Noble to buy a book on job building a resume that sells and gets your foot in the door. Remember an integral part of this is the cover letter. One important thing here is that the resume that you build should be an Internet Resume. This will be your resume (and you will have multiple flavors – for multiple job types of jobs) that you will post on internet job posting sites. The process of building your resume will take a few weeks. Before you post the resume, have someone else proofread your resume and critique the resume.
8. Build your survival guide (financially): How do you plan to use the severence (if any), and/or the unemployment benefits to keep you afloat during your period of job search.
9. Establish Daily Goals – Every day you are off payroll, you have a job. that job is to find a job. In order to succeed you need to establish (attainable) goals for each day. Doing this allows you to establish a structure in your daily routine. Daily structure is important in the job search.
10. Make sure you have a Laptop: You need to be totally portable. Invest a few hundred in a laptop. These days you can get a good laptop for about $400 or less. You are not looking for our, you are looking for functionality.
11. Be Positive: On a daily basis do things for yourself that relieve stress. Yoga, Exercising, Walks, etc..

Once you do the steps above (not necessarily in the order that Ihave listed), you are ready to start your job search.

Always keep in mind that the job search process yields best results when you are positive and plan successfully. Execution of the plan comes next.

Next we will discuss Networking in further detail.. TTYL and good luck!