Paul Copcutt, in Career Hub, writes about an enterprising young Canadian, Sean Aiken,  who has taken a very different approach to career search. Sean Aiken is working his way across Canada, one week at a time, doing a different job every week! He is up to week 27 and has done everything from bar person to dairy farmer and plans to spend 52 weeks trying to figure out what he wants to do.

What he has achieved already is a very decent Google score - over 17,000 pages and is building his personal brand with a very informative and interactive blog (internet TV show), One Week Job and has had plenty of media coverage etc - he is also donating all his earnings to charity (over $10,000 so far) and has gathered a few sponsors on the way.

What is the dream on your back burner? Do you find yourself on Sunday evenings dreading Monday morning? Would you like to look forward to Monday mornings? Does your career fit who you are? Are you using your key strengths, transferable skills, core values and personality traits in your current position?

Instead of taking a year off to discover a variety of careers, what about working with a Career Coach to find a career/position that is interesting and aligns with who you are (while maintaining your current career income!) so that you enjoy Monday morning as much as Friday afternoon?

For a complimentary initial session, contact Summit View Career Coaching to schedule a time to determine whether our services will bring you what you are looking for.

As we all know, there really isn’t such a thing as job security anymore. Diane Hess wrote, “The best strategy [for career success] is to be excellent at what you do, keep your skills cutting edge and love your work.”

So, if we practice Diane’s advice, are we…

• Excellent at what we do? I know that for myself, I’m continually attending 2-3 annual conferences and weekly teleseminars, ordering and reading books, talking with colleagues and anyone who is willing to talk about their career. Excellence and improvement are very important to me and a high priority.
  
• Keeping up your skills cutting edge? My answer would be that I am continually working at having my skills cutting edge. I’ve joined a group where we work with each other on our coaching skills. Also, I am looking at registering soon at a coaching school to improve, again, my coaching skills. Other skills I am continually upgrading.
• Love your work? I really look forward to Monday morning and each morning as much as I do Friday afternoon! I love helping people that are frustrated transition to a career/position that aligns with their strengths and what is most important to them! Sometimes my clients go through the coaching process and their perspective changes 180 degrees, so they stay in their current position, loving each Monday morning as much as Friday afternoon!

Diane Hess wrote, “There are many options for people who want to turn a creative passion into a solid career. Read this article about a musician who did just that: “How I Got to Where I Am Today: An Orchestra’s Operations Director.”

If you wish you enjoyed Monday morning as much as Friday afternoon, contact me for a complimentary initial consultation.

A few weeks ago I received an email from a woman who said she was so desperate to find an IT position that she would pay me whatever I charged to find her a job that would fit her. I wrote back and thanked her and then shared that I don’t offer that kind of service.

The best person to do the job search is yourself. If I were to do the job search for you, it would be like me telling you (if you’re unmarried) who to marry and you blindly getting married! With all the tools out there that Career Coaches have, the target job search can be a simple process. Although simple, the process usually takes lots of hours. Well, dating usually takes lots of hours, also, if you want to find the right person.

My expertise is in, first of all, coaching clients to discover their ‘Career FIT Plan’, namely his or her key strengths, core values, life purpose, identity, interests, transferable skills and personality type. If you know these areas well, you will be able to offer them to potential organizations. Conversely, if you don’t know yourself well, it is hard to share your value.

The next steps include exploration & research of careers, career branding, networking, resumes, and interview preparation.

If you want to start the career coaching process on your own, take some time to make a list of your key strengths, core values (what you need in order to be satisfied in your position), life purpose, identity (who you are now and want to be 10 years from now), interests, transferable skills and personality type.

I offer complimentary initial consultations to see if we would work well together in coaching you towards enjoying Monday morning as much as Friday afternoons! Contact me to schedule an appointment.

Richard Bolles wrote about the late Srully Blotnick, Ph.D., when he decided to find out what hppened to people who decided to ‘go for the money.’ Richard wrote, “Srully studied the career choices and financial success of 1500 people, who were divided into 2 groups, Group A (83 percent of the people in the study) chose a career because they believed they could earn a lot of money doing it, Group B (17 percent of the study group) chose a career because of their passion and desire for that work. Who do you think made more money?

Twenty years later, 101 of the 1500 had become millionaires. One hundred of them were from Group B, those who made choices based upon passion. Only one millionaire was from Group A, those who chose their career to make money. Dr. Blotnick concluded that the majority of people who became wealthy did so because they found work that absorbed their attention. Their ‘luck’ happened because of their passion.”

Pretty interesting, isn’t it? What do you really enjoy doing? Are your core passions the main part of your career? To find out more about your core strengths, take some time to ponder on work you enjoy doing so much it seems like play. Ask close family members and family what they think you are really good at. Take some online skills and personality assessments. Do some online research on strengths and transferable skills. If you would like to have a complimentary initial consultation or a Strengths Profile, please contact me.

Dan Schwabel has taken a lot of time pondering about Personal Branding and I really like the definition he gave in Career Hub’s blog. Dan writes, “To me, Personal Branding is ‘an individual’s total perceived value, relative to competitors, as viewed by their audience.’”

Most of us don’t take enough time to think about personal branding. We don’t think about how our choices affect our total perceived value. We all have a personal branding. Is it what you want it to be? What kinds of choices affect our personal branding? Every decision. Decisions about what we say, how we say it, the clothing we choose to wear, where we go, how we respond, how we initiate…every decision.

How is your personal branding coming along? What do you want to be known for? What is most important to you? What are your key strengths? If you want to improve your Personal Branding, take some time to answer these questions and compare your answers to the decisions you’ve made so far today. How do you want to change so that you are reflecting what you want to reflect? What do you want your personal branding to look like?

I’d love to hear your thoughts on today’s blog! If you’d like a complimentary intitial consultation regarding your personal brand, please contact me.

Salary negotiations! The thought causes most people to cringe. To a large degree, salary dictates our lifestyle. We typically enter negotiations hoping to make as much as or more than our last position. Money is often a touchy topic because there’s a lot riding on it.

Perhaps you’ve experienced a prolonged period of unemployment and funds are low or exhausted. Perhaps you’re committed to getting out of credit card debt and need some extra income. Perhaps the future is arriving more quickly than anticipated and you need to beef up your child’s college fund or your retirement account. Perhaps you want to increase your giving to worthy causes. Perhaps it’s all of the above!

If you’re going through a job search, one of the final mile-markers is the phase of salary negotiations. You’ve probably heard lots of good advice about negotiating salary (for instance, “wait until there’s a firm offer before discussing salary” and “he who mentions a number first, loses”). But, have you ever considered some of the behind-the-scenes factors that influence your thinking about salary? … such as

1. Lack of Trust: Much of the fear and anxiety that creeps into our lives around money is rooted in a lack of trust that there will be provision for us. It’s the scarcity vs. provision mentality! For an interesting look at this topic, read “The Soul of Money” by Lynne Twist.

2. The Clutch Factor: We clutch what we think is ours (money, possessions), instead of realizing that we are simply stewards of things entrusted to us as we pass through this world.

3. Seduction: Our society and the media encourage us to buy into the lie that what we have is not enough. We think we need the newest techno gadget or brand-name shoes or late-model car to be happy.

4. Identity: We equate our identity with how much we make instead of by our innate priceless value.

5. Pride: We want to impress others. Outward appearances—the car we drive, clothes we wear, home we live in—pressure us to “keep up with the Joneses” instead of pursuing our individual course.

6. Priorities: We prioritize making money over creating relationships with people.

7. Debt: We have mismanaged our money and are now under pressure to land a high salary to pay off debt. We’ve not been disciplined in spending less than we earn.

If any of these situations ring true for you, it can color the salary negotiation process. Don’t get me wrong. Having money (and even lots of it) isn’t bad. The question is whether it is ruling you or you are ruling it.

So think about it. Where are you on the trust factor? The clutch factor? How about identity, pride, and priorities? Is debt driving your decisions? After giving it some thought, how do you want to live your life, especially as it relates to finances?

Bottom line: Overcome the stumbling blocks and make salary negotiations about the VALUE you bring to the organization.

If you are interested in salary negotiation coaching, please contact Summit View Career Coaching for a complimentary consultation.

Billie Sucher wrote some great questions to ask yourself if you are one who has given out your resume to several hiring managers and you haven’t been called in for an interview. Billie writes, “For starters, pretend that you are the Hiring Manager…so put on your Hiring Manager’s hat and start asking:

• Does your resume reveal a phone number or personal e-mail where you can easily be contacted?
• Does your resume clearly state your professional focus? In other words, what do you want to do?
• Does your resume contain a Qualifications Summary or a Profile (30-second sales pitch) that 1. aligns with your target goal and that 2. captures the best of your experience, education, and employee traits that are relevant, essential, and supportive to doing the job? In other words, why can you do what you say you’re interested in doing? And does your Profile prove it?
• Have you branded yourself as a professional who is competent, proficient, or expert at delivering something of value to the organization? In other words, have you convinced the reader to sample your brand?
• Does your resume sound like you? In other words, does the reader get a clear sense of who you are? And when they interview you, will the “real” you align with the “paper” you? Or, is there a cavern between the two?
• Does your resume state where you reside and where you’ve worked, or is that data missing from the document?
• Does your resume communicate a feel for how much you are worth?
• When the Hiring Manager reads your resume, do you honestly think it will evoke a WOW or a WASTEBASKET response?”

I’d also add, “How does your resume look? At first glance, is your resume full of print or does it have enough white space to make it look inviting to read?” Billie asked phenomenal questions that would be worth your time thinking through if you would like to be called in for interviews. I’d be glad to coach you so that your resume stands out making you look like a ‘winner’!

Eve Tahmincioglu, a MSNBC contributor, wrote in her blog, “One of the hardest things to do is get back into an industry you’ve been away from for more than a year. But it’s not impossible.

You must be ready to take a step down and enter the world of the entry-level worker, says Tom Gimbel, CEO of staffing firm The LaSalle Network. “You have to take one step backwards to take two steps forward,” he explains.

You’ve already accepted that you have to expect less money, but you also have to accept a lower-level position such as a help desk employee. Business analyst may be aiming a bit too high, Gimbel adds. “If you really have the passion for the job” and the drive to prove yourself, he says, you’ll move up the ladder quickly.

When applying for job, if a hiring manager says you seem overqualified just stress that you’re looking to learn and get back into the industry you love.

And you could be onto something about the age bias issue. There are employers who shy away from older workers, but you can’t let that get you down. Focus on what you can bring to the table and make sure to show your enthusiasm for the job.

Your best bet, Gimbel advises, is to go to a temporary staffing agency and get a position to get your feet wet.”

If you are looking to re-enter the workplace, I would first suggest taking some online assessments to first figure out industries that align with your ‘Career FIT Plan’, a plan that lists your personality, strengths, interests and core values. After you have figured out your Career FIT Plan, I suggest researching careers that best align with who you are. Next, take the classes you need to take, start networking, and setting appointments for Informational Interviews. If you need any guidance, I would be glad to give you a confidential, 20-minute complimentary consultation. If interested, contact me.