Thoughts on Career Development, Communication Strategies, Job Search, Ruminations and more
Apr 05 2010
The concept of up-selling (trying to sell the customer more than just what they asked for), has been around for a long while. Whether it’s the waitress asking, “Do you want fries with that?”, or the appliance vendor asking if you want the matching stand for the plasma TV, offering more to the customer than [...]
Jan 25 2010
Like millions of others, I spent some time this past weekend watching the NFL playoffs. Congrats to the New Orleans Saints and the Indianapolis Colts, who will battle it out in the Super Bowl. Although I’m not the world’s biggest sports fan, I do enjoy watching teams try to execute their offensive and defensive strategies [...]
Oct 19 2009
Recently I attended a very large, and very crowded free outdoor 3-day music festival in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park. Moving between six stages of exceptional talent proved to be an arduous and exhausting experience; that thankfully wouldn’t diminish the inspiration and invigoration fueled by the great music.
But I was thinking that it might have [...]
Sep 21 2009
Throughout the country, state-provided resources for job seekers are drying up. Staff shortages, mandatory layoffs and furlough days that close facilities all impact the employment offices’ ability to provide comprehensive one-on-one services. It wasn’t that long ago that if you were out of work, you could have gone to your local unemployment office, talked to [...]
May 19 2009
There are an awful lot of things that get in the way of our success, whether the objective is looking for and finding work, or any other personally important endeavor. Fear of rejection and failure in the job search are among the most cited concerns voiced by job seekers. “What if I don’t get the [...]
Apr 06 2009
One of the questions I get asked most often is: “Do I need to customize my resume for each job that I apply for?”
Unless you are applying for only one specific kind of job with little variance to the functions you want to perform (and even then so), the answer is Yes, you do need [...]
Feb 23 2009
In school, were you the one who always had a better/different way of doing things? When the teacher was explaining that 2 + 2 = 4, were you the one who said the same result could be achieved by adding 3 +1? Or by subtracting 1 from 5?
If you’re still looking at things a bit [...]
Jan 26 2009
An Objective statement on your resume, and reiterated in your cover letter is a concise way for you to communicate your career goals. Too often Objective statements are written as flowery batches of verbiage that convey little or nothing about the job seeker’s real aspirations. Once upon a time it was OK to use a [...]
Dec 01 2008
With the unemployment rate rising, it is apparent that more people are completing for fewer jobs. And as employers are receiving more resumes than they have positions to fill, they can’t always spend the time coding, classifying and filing all the resumes they receive – electronic or paper – for present or future consideration.
Even though [...]
Nov 16 2008
There’s no question that one’s skills, experience and qualifications should be the primary consideration by an employer when selecting a candidate for hiring. But one of the most important skill sets any applicant can bring to a job is far less recognizable from interviewing alone. The qualities one brings for being able to deal with [...]
Sep 07 2008
Recently I was asked to review a cover letter from a bookkeeper/accountant who for many years had been an independent contractor (IC), and who is now seeking a full time position. Luckily for her, she has had a number of very long-term clients, who have kept her very busy, and she has not been [...]