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Monday, March 2, 2009

Job Satisfaction: Your Job Is Not Just A Job

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Many people feel their job (and their work) is not meaningful. They feel their work doesn't matter, doesn't DO anything, doesn't help others, doesn't make a contribution to society, or make a difference. Many workers are disconnected from their work and feel their job is just a job, just a way to make money. In their most recent published survey (2007) the Conference Board reports that, "Today, less than half of all Americans say they are satisfied with their jobs, down from 61 percent twenty years ago." In addition, "Less than two out of every five workers under the age of 25 are satisfied with their jobs. This segment of the population has the lowest level of satisfaction and the lowest level ever recorded in the nearly 20-year history of this survey. Workers age 45-54 expressed the second lowest level of satisfaction with less than 45 percent content with their current job." As a worker it helps you to feel that your work is meaningful. If you feel your work, or job, has real meaning you will do your job better, you can prevent job burnout, you will be more productive, have less stress, be less bored, less fatigued and will be happier at work. And, as a result, you are likely to be more successful. If you feel your job is meaningless, you’re wrong - it DOES have meaning. It DOES help others. It DOES make a difference. You just have to look at your work differently and find the true meaning and purpose of your job. How can you increase your job satisfaction? Forget the work and the job title for a moment and look at what your company or organization does. Does it make and/or sell a product? Does it provide a service? What is the category of the product or service? i.e. construction, insurance, aerospace, gov’t, etc. Who buys or uses the product or service? How does the product or service help people or improve their life? i.e. does it save people time, give them more independence, provide money or food or education or something else that people want or need? Even though you may not be the big boss, whether you are in reception, customer service, data entry, sales, marketing, human resources, on the loading dock or in the classroom, your job is a key part of that product or service getting out there and helping people improve their life. You, YOUR job, YOUR work is an important and meaningful part of the big picture. Your job, your work does have meaning! And DOES make a difference! Think about that for a few moments. Now, do you feel better about your job? Does your job now have more meaning? Will it be easier to go to work knowing that by doing your job you are helping people? By the way, we didn't change your job we just changed how you look at it. And that's all it took. Now, go to work happily, do your job well and help people improve their life! Author resource Andrew Lawrence is the author of numerous inspiration articles and books, including "The Happiness Transformation" (Amazon.com and TheHappinessTransformation.com). He lives happily and productively in Los Angeles and loves to help people improve their life.

Making Your Résumé “Work” for You: Tips for Standing out Amongst the Competition

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It is no secret that we are facing the most challenging economy in decades. Several professionals, who not long ago had reliable and gainful employment, are now coping with furloughs, pay-cuts, and layoffs. This has left our job market flooded with individuals seeking employment and hiring managers staring at abnormally high stacks of résumé submissions. Even is a solid economy, a quality résumé is a necessity for securing a job interview. Today, this necessity has risen to an entirely different level. Hiring managers simply do not have the time to read each résumé submission that they receive. They need to look at a résumé and glean the information they need about the candidate immediately. So, how does this saturated job market bode for job seekers? In plain terms, it means that job seekers have to work that much harder to make their résumé “work” for them. The résumé must act as the job seeker’s Personal Marketing Assistant, selling their skills, value, and personal brand to the hiring manager. But, to develop a résumé that does this work effectively, the job seeker must also do some work. The following tips offer a guide to the job seeker for doing the work of creating a résumé that stands out amongst the competition. <b>Tip #1: Aesthetics Make a Difference</b> Don’t get stuck in the standard, dull format of the traditional résumé. Allow yourself to be creative by experimenting with borders, text boxes, shading, and bullet styles, as well as fonts other than Arial and Times New Roman. Fonts like Garamond, Goudy Old Style, and Sylfaen are classy and professional, but have more personality than Arial and Times. Keep your text clean and neat in appearance by justifying it (rather than left-justifying it) and not allowing one-three words of a sentence or bullet straggle onto another line. <b>Tip #2: Make Sure They Remember Your Name</b> While your name will be the first thing the employer sees on your resume, if you don’t do something with it to make it jump out, it may not be remembered. Some ways you can make your name stand out include bolding it and using a larger font, like a 16, and making the first letter of your first and last name slightly larger, such as in a 22 font. Consider using small capitals, rather than standard capitalizing. Small capitals have a more unique flavor than the standard capitals, and provide an attractive look. You can also use the character spacing feature to expand the letters of your name by 3 or 4 spaces. You can use the same techniques to make your section headings stand out as well. After your name, you should list your contact information (address, phone, and email) and let this set up for your name and contact information serve as your own, personal letterhead for all of your career documents (Cover Letter, Professional Reference List, Post-Interview Thank You Letter). <b>Tip #3: Trade in the “Objective” Statement for a Cover Letter</b> Objective statements are generally too vague and brief to be very useful in adequately explaining to the employer what kind of opportunity you are seeking. Instead, tell the employer why you are applying for the position, what you have to offer, and why you are the right candidate for the position in a Cover Letter. <b>Tip #4: Do Your Research</b> Writing an impressive résumé requires a little homework. Look on the major internet job boards to find out what employers in your field of interest are looking for in a candidate. Find out what kinds of soft and hard skills they are seeking, how many years of experience they want, and what kind of educational background they are seeking. If you possess any or all of the qualities the employer is seeking, you can be sure to include them on your résumé. <b>Tip #5: Sell Your Skills, Experience, and Personal Brand Quickly</b> Many individuals are uncomfortable “bragging” about themselves, and their résumés suffer for it. Save your modesty for a rainy day. In most traditional résumés, the hiring manager must read for a minute or two before digging up the skills and experience the candidate has to offer. But, most hiring mangers will only take 15 to 30 seconds to make a quick decision about whether to bring you in for an interview. Giving yourself a strong, specific “title” that describes you as a professional (such as Project Manager or Elementary Educator), providing a list of four to eight of your relevant hard skills, and writing a solid introductory paragraph that highlights what you bring to the table will go a long way! These things will allow the employer to glean the information he or she needs immediately to determine if you are a good fit for their needs. <b>Tip #6: Delineate Your Tasks from Your Accomplishments</b> Most résumés simply list each position the candidate has held and focus more on the tasks the candidate was hired to handle, rather than the ways he or she went above-and-beyond those tasks. We all initiative something new in our jobs, so why not take the time to tell your future employer about it? The hiring manager is less concerned that you did your job, and more interested in the things you initiated that went beyond your job description, resulting in value offered to the company. This means you’ll do the same for them and their company. You can delineate your tasks from your accomplishments either by having a section for career accomplishments right underneath your introductory statement, or by listing these accomplishments separately from your general tasks within your overall professional experience section. <b>Tip #7: Ensure That Everything You Say has an Impact</b> Often, the bullets we list to discuss what we did on the job are not clear and specific enough. If the reader has to read the bullet a few times to attempt to understand what you actually did, there’s a problem. If you use this simple formula, you should have a clear and comprehensive bullet description—tell them what you did, how you did it, and why you did it/what the result was. <b>Tip #8: Don’t Offer Too Many Clues into Your Age</b> Age discrimination exists in both directions. You can be considered too young for the upper level position you are applying for or too close to retirement to hire. Employers might try to play the “what’s their age” guessing game—it’s human nature. So, don’t make it easy to rule you out for silly reasons before you even get in the door for your interview. If it is 2009, and you received your Bachelors degree in 2004, you can leave off your college graduation date when you apply for that upper-level position that your education, experience, skills, and work ethic qualify you for. And, if its 2009 and you received your Bachelors degree in 1984, you can do the same. Also, for experienced professionals, always use the rule of thumb to go back no more than 15-20 years into your work history. <b>Tip #9: Make the Length of Your Résumé Appropriate for Your Experiential Level</b> If you are a soon-to-be college graduate or have only a few years of work experience, your résumé should not be more than one page, in most cases. If you have 20 years of work experience, your résumé should be more than one-page. In most cases, your résumé should not be more than two-pages. Some exceptions to this rule include federal resumes, curriculum vitas, and if the employer or specific career field dictates otherwise. If you are trying to save space, you can bump your top and bottom margins out further, but to no less than a .5. You can also decrease the white space font size in between résumé sections, and depending on the font, you can condense your font by .5 without it becoming unclear. <b>Tip #10: Scratch the “References Available Upon Request” Statement</b> This is one of those statements that almost should go without saying. Employers expect that you can provide them with at least three professional references that can vouch for your experience and work ethic. But, if you would like to specifically mention this, you can say that you would be happy to provide a list of professional references in your cover letter. And, when you get that desired interview, you can (and should) bring a list of at least three professional references along with you to give to the interviewer. <b>The Bonus Tip</b> Believe in yourself, your worth, and what you have to offer. Showcasing yourself and your confidence on your new résumé is the first step in achieving your desired career future. Enjoy the process of creating your résumé—your Personal Marketing Assistant who will go out there on the job market and boast about you to employers—you deserve it! <b>Author Bio:</b> Dr. Colleen Georges is a Certified Professional Career Coach, NJ Licensed Professional Counselor, and owner of Colleen’s Career Creations (www.colleenscareercreations.com), a résumé writing and career coaching business that serves clients nationwide. Colleen received her Bachelors, Masters, and Doctoral degrees in Psychology from Rutgers University and is a member of the Professional Association of Résumé Writers & Career Coaches (PARW/CC). Colleen has 11 years of experience in résumé writing and career coaching and has helped countless individuals achieve the careers of their dreams.

Know thyself – Socrates

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In searching for a life partner, one will pay close attention to see if the other person’s personality is compatible with him/her. For example, if you are someone with a short fuse and gets angry easily, you may want to find someone who is gentler, have more patience and harmonious than yourself. Or if you are a detailed type of person, scrutinizing nitty-gritty, you also tend to attract the “bigger picture” type of partner. I think there is an element of truth when they say opposites attract! How about our career? Look around you, who are those know who seems to enjoy their work very much and despite the stress/recession/bad business environment, they are passionate and energized at work. Perhaps, many would think salary is motivating factor that makes this group of people continue do what they are doing. The attraction of monetary gains in many sales jobs will entice a large pool of people to join initially. The ones that excel are those who truly believe in their profession, align their strength to do what they do best and thus achieve the rewards they rightfully deserve. Do you know what your strength is? How can you find and leverage it to achieve your goals in life? Do you have the attributes or strength stated in the Job description? A common job description for a Sales Manager may require the candidate to lead and manage sales team to achieve sales targets set up the company. How can the interviewer be assured that this candidate has this skill sets? Will his current position as a manager attest to his ability? Or does it mean if he has achieved x% for his current company translates to him being able to do the same for your organization? CV and interview (within a stipulated timeframe) reveals so much about his/her capability but not the true potential. Sadly, many employers used the same type of interview questions to assess the suitability and capability of today’s employees. To resolve these problems, many companies these days are using various Personality tools to aid their recruitment decisions. These range from the popular MBTI to Keirsey Temperament Sorter, Big 5, DISC model, to name a few. More sophisicated and creative tools are being introduced in the market but one increasingly popular tool is gaining a lot of attention recently. The Enneagram(pronounced as “Any-a-gram) is a model that describes nine different personality types and their interrelationships. Besides describing the 9 different personalities, it reveals the unconscious motivation behind our behavior. By increasing our awareness of different lens of the world each type is seeing, we can better understand ourselves better and seek more ways to manifest our true potential. Humans are creatures of Habit and years of conditioning have helped us cope very well to survive in this world with our defense mechanisms. For example, the Ones are Perfectionist and try to make everyone around them to be perfect as well. They operate from a Right/wrong, black/white mindset. Ones are fastidious workers and are afraid to make mistakes at work. Their strength is they are well-organized and orderly. Look at your colleague’s table that is spick and span with stationeries kept nicely in the holder and files neatly arranged in respective folders. Employers who knew these characteristics will know better where to deploy the Ones in the company. Due to self-critical and judgmental nature, they tend to procrastinate and delay making decisions. The manager needs to exercise caution and be aware by working along and not against their personality. Forcing a square peg into a round hole is counter-productive as it causes resistance and unnecessary friction in the workplace. The Ones will perform well in functions requiring them to constantly improve the products/services such as customer service, quality control, strategic planning, etc. Sales role require a certain routine – sales call, meeting, proposals writing, closing,etc. The sales process is repetitive with clear defined steps involved which the Ones may not truly enjoy. They will question the sales process, the CRM tool, the meetings, the pricing not competitive, the products not as good as competitor and a list of never-ending comparisons. This make the sales manager hard to manage a One, thinking he/she is negative, lack discipline or not persistent enough to achieve targets. What the manager did not realize was a difference in personality map against the role requirement. When the manager is able to align the strength of the employee with the job function, it is like a waterfall flowing downwards, natural and without resistance. This is the WIN-WIN situation that both employer and employee should strive towards. By including this transformational tool as part of the interviewing process, the employer is able to weed out candidates who on the surface may seem suitable. Conversely, those looking for job and knowing your own style will be able to align your style with the right job. Sending hundreds of resume to the same industry with the hope of getting a response may not be the wisest strategy, especially in this current financial crisis. The career one has need not be related to what one had studied in school. This is not to say Engineer grads out there start applying for Finance job and Accountancy grads going into creative arts without considering their academic skills. Some of us may elect to study a particular major because of parents and peers influence and not because you are passionate about it nor align it with your strength. When you graduate and start looking for job, you naturally/logically will choose those industries that you major in. More than a personality tool, the Enneagram when used correctly could help the person to uncover his potential strength and help explain his unconscious motivation to do things he do. When one is fully aware of the roadblocks that is affecting their career, then they are able to choose the response towards the myriad of choices. A student could turn his hobby (something he truly enjoys and is good at) into his career, eg gaming, internet-related business, etc. One should focus on his strength (flow) more instead of improving his weakness (against flow). Often, we hear people complaining about each other’s weaknesses, bad habits, mistakes but seldom acknowledge or identify clearly what their strength are. This is a grossly neglected area and one should play up to his strength and leverage on it. A street map contains landmarks, road name, signposts, etc to indicate how to get from Point A to B. If one uses the map correctly, he is able to reach his destination easily. Similarly, the Enneagram acts as a road map of change, assisting us to move out of our self-defeating behaviours and make new positive changes in our career, relationship, work, etc. “The greatest waste in the world is the difference between what we are and what we could become” - Ben Herbster About the Author Desmond Chua is a Regional Sales Director of a global consulting firm and has been using the Enneagram effectively in his sales, training and recruitment. He also coach people to resolve their problems in career, relationship, communication, health and fitness. He can be contacted at dessiechua@yahoo.com

The Man in the Mirror – Part 1

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We often heard remarks like “He is so like his father” or “He is what he is today due to his family upbringing”. Are our behavior, thoughts, feelings, values shaped by our parents? Is the difference between each of us lies in our personality? What makes each of us unique from one another? Briefly, personality is made up the characteristic patterns of thoughts, feelings, and behaviors that make a person unique. In addition to this, personality arises from within the individual and remains fairly consistent throughout life. (source – Pyschology.about.com) So, how do our thoughts, feelings and actions affect our work or career choice? Many of us are not aware that the type of job we do, its roles and responsibilities have a lot to do with our personality. Some people got stuck in their career and failed to see the recurring pattern in their past jobs. If we track back to the reasons some of us had left our previous employers, the answer could be devastating. Why were you not happy then? What really trigger you to leave? Was salary the main reason? Research shows many leave the organization because of bad managers. Not able to get along with your managers, colleagues over a prolong period of time is not only stressful but a career buster as well! Blaming others is an easy way out, an emotional escape that says you are not responsible and limit your choice of actions to take. In today’s fast changing economy, it is crucial that we play a more active role in our career management and be aware how our unique personality has an impact on the type of job we choose. When we understand why people behave the way they do, it helps to minimize conflicts and facilitate communications between each other. The following personality styles illustrate some of the unconscious motives to their behavior, and indicators showing their regress/progress at work. Some suggestions to the type of jobs best suited for these personality is also highlighted. <b>Peace to the world</b> You can easily identify the peacemaker and supportive personality type in your company. Colleagues enjoy hanging out with them as they appear “non-threatening” and avoid conflict at all costs. They tend to be complacent and dislike “rocking the boat” and like the work environment to remain status quo. Even-tempered, soft and friendly, they are attracted to the strong, power-starved and capable managers. They yearn for harmony and stability over their repressed need to be independent, assertive and courage. Because of their accommodating nature, their work performance, though shoddy at times are sometimes overlooked and forgiven by their superior. Some managers tend to have lower expectations and be less hard on them. If you have a Mr. Nice Guy/Gal in your team, it is important to make them aware to avoid daydreaming too much and pay more attention to what’s going on in the company. They could learn to exercise better judgment and realize it is possible to be polite yet firm with the colleagues to get things done. The “mediator” role in this group will find jobs in NGOs, teacher, music, artist, counselor, etc attractive. <b>The playful puppy</b> They are the extroverted bunch, party-goers who enjoys new challenges and often volunteer to take on new assignments from their manager. Like a playful puppy, they thrive on meeting new colleagues, take on exciting projects and lead a colorful lifestyle both in and outside work. It helps for them to be aware that spreading themselves too thin; they risk not completing any work properly. Due to their insatiable curiosity and positive outlook of life, their endless bountiful energy must be directed towards productive and meaningful work. Inexperienced manager who adopts such “puppy” may find it challenging to catch up with their agility and thirst for new knowledge/experience. You will find such multi-talented, creative and optimistic people thriving in roles like event management, hospitality, tourism, wedding planner, creative arts, design, music composer, etc. <b>Lion King</b> If you have a top producer in the company, you may notice that they possess traits like assertiveness, strong, powerful, territorial, authoritative and competitiveness in them. Rain-makers thrive well in a fast-paced and ever-changing work environment. They enjoyed basking in the limelight and enjoy the control and power they have. They are natural born leader who dares to accept daunting tasks and often surpassed the objectives set by the manager. While their aggressive and resourceful nature may repel certain people, the managers who manage them will need a different strategy to work amicably with them. Like the king of the jungle, the Lion King is not your typical “rules follower” and avoid depending on other people to get things done. Their sense of over-confidence or arrogance may make them hard to work in teams, an area that managers need to watch out for. They excel in sales, management position, strategic planning directors, etc. The revelation of the above three personality types seeks to provide a foundation of self-understanding, uncover the unconscious self-defeating qualities that prevent us from achieving what we want in our career. More importantly, it identifies the strength that we have so grossly underutilized in a blame and overly critical culture. It is more essential than before to galvanize this magnificent power that lies within us. Be in the moment, be in control. Getting in touch with your true self must be your first priority- Tom Hopkins Desmond Chua is a Regional Sales Director of a global consulting firm and has been using the Enneagram effectively in his sales, training and recruitment. He also coach people to resolve their problems in career, relationship, communication, health and fitness. He can be reached at dessiechua@yahoo.com

Should You Accept a Low-Paying Job Offer or Stick with Unemployment Benefits?

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Being on unemployment can be a scary thing but should you take the next job that comes along even if it's low paying? Here are some tips to help you decide what's right for you, staying on unemployment or accepting the job offer.
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