Internet Inspirations: Last Gasp for Winter

Winter’s last gasp!

Enjoy these interesting reads from around the internet as we wait for spring to evict winter from Maryland!

Here’s some great tips over at PT Money about checking out a potential employer’s approach to work/life balance. Even in this tight job market, it is still important to align jobs with your values.

We’ve written about how Craig’s List can be a great source for job listings, but as we mentioned, do your due dilligence. The Job Bait scam is described in this Wise Bread article. Use common sense and be careful about what personal information you share.

This article is part of a series on Women and Money over at Bargaineering.com and includes some good ways to keep your professional life moving forward even when you’re out of the traditional 9 to 5.

I loved, loved this article at the Jane Dough weighing in on the whole women and working debate that has been raging lately. The title alone is fantastic: “Why We Don’t Need Any More Female Billionaires Telling Us How To Have It All”. I really like the point Colette McIntyre makes that not all women have the same advantages as billionaire CEO’s and where are the men in this conversation?

And for something completely different…

I thoroughly enjoyed this guest post over at Mr. Money Mustache from David Cain entitled, “How To Walk Across A Parking Lot.” No, really. Read it and think about it.

Posted by: Heather C.

Internet Inspirations: Spring is Coming Edition

Get inspired to spring into March! Photo (c) Heather Comstock 2013.

It is the end of February. The groundhog predicted an early spring. The daffodils are up and the grackles are cackling in the trees of my neighborhood. As the weather turns warmer, here’s some inspiration to kickstart your March from around the internet!

Over on Jon Acuff’s blog, he’s got a great piece of the power of finding 30 minutes a day to move forward on fulfilling your dreams! John notes that “rescuing the first 30 minutes” is the hardest.

On the Harvard Business Review blog, Peter Bergman gives you “Nine Practices to Help You Say No”. When you say no, you create space to allow yourself to “Yes” to something more important.

While this advice may seem counter-intuitive when job searching, Learnvest has a great rundown on Signs You Shouldn’t Take That Job. Employment situations should be a good fit for both you and the employer for long-term success!

PEC Boardmember Cheryl Pullins has a great post on her blog about how to pry your ego out of the driver’s seat so you can move forward fulfilling your dreams. Plus, bonus Kool Moe Dee reference!

 

 

 

A Recruiter’s Perspective: Staying Ahead in 2013 with LinkedIn

This is a guest post from local recruiter Stuart TenHoor, who provides some valuable insight on how he uses LinkedIn to evaluate potential candidates with some tips on how you can harness LinkedIn for your Job Search!

Are you using online resources to maximum benefit for your job search? Learn more here.

Today’s everyday technological advances are head spinning, and that applies in the job finding and career building arena as well. Who would have looked for a job without a resume in past years? Today, the question is who would look for a job without being on LinkedIn? As a legal search consultant (recruiter/headhunter others might call me), when I look for talent to help my law firm or corporate clients, I do it in multiple ways. One way I always use is to check a candidate’s resume against LinkedIn. Essentially LinkedIn is making advances toward replacing the resume as the most important job finding and career building tool.

LinkedIn does three things for you. First, it establishes a certain aura of “being with it.” Some employers would see you as being behind the times or not taking yourself seriously if you lack a well written and informative summary of your career on line. Further, most entries have a photo with them. Ten years ago I frowned on candidates with photos on their resumes; today, the savvy entries all include a photo. If you don’t have one, probably someone you know has a digital camera or smart phone that can produce quality photos. You don’t have to look like a movie star to produce a confident looking photo.

Second, you control entirely what goes in your LinkedIn profile so, as in writing a resume, put your best foot forward. The rules for a LinkedIn entry are much looser. Not everything should go it your entry–just the highlights. So spend some time thinking about how you want to present yourself on LinkedIn; in other words, those things that show you headed in a clear direction. I will uniformly ask a candidate to rewrite her resume if it tries to be “all things to all people.” When I work with a Supreme Court law clerk looking for a position, their resume is invariably one page with a lot of white space. So do your best to project how your abilities will meet an employer’s need, as succinctly as possible. The more your confidence oozes out of your resume/LinkedIn entry, the greater your chance of landing an interview for a job you want.

Finally use LinkedIn in searching for information about employers that interest you. Find out who the President and key officers or the person interviewing you is by first using the employer’s website. Your next step is to then look up the individuals on LinkedIn and see their career paths. You might find out that a prospective interviewer went to your high school or college, or they are active in a civic association of which you are also a member. Remember employers want to hire people that “fit in” and learning about potential commonality that you share with a prospective employer’s key people can help you win big bonus points.

LinkedIn is an excellent tool which should be in the “toolbox” of every job seeker and career builder. I am sure there are many uses I have not even begun to tap into even with my years of experience with it! There are many low-cost seminars and how to use it for your career advancement purposes. Explore all tools to help you find that next good job but be sure that LinkedIn is one of them!

Stuart TenHoor is President of TenHoor Legal Search Services, Inc. and has over two decades of experience matching candidates with the right employers. You can learn more about him at stuarttenhoor.com.

Want help with updating your LinkedIn profile? Contact us at410-782-3002 xt 501 to schedule an appointment!

The Right Tool for the Job

PEC Board member Cheryl Pullins shared this piece with us from her own blog which is chock full of great information and inspiration!  Cheryl works with women entrepreneurs to elevate their businesses to new levels.

The right tools create interest and highlight positive attributes! (Photo by Mauro Cateb via Wikimedia.org)

In years past tools for a job search included the help wanted section of the Sunday edition of the local newspaper, a red ink pen and your resume. You could spend hours on a Sunday afternoon combing through the help wanted section to identify jobs within your industry and/or skill set.

How have things changed.

With the onset and growth of social media, the job search has progressed to a whole new level. The development of the internet created an opportunity for job seekers to do some detailed research on a prospective employer. However, if we fast forward, job seekers can not only do research about the company they can now interact and connect with potential employers on a deeper level. With access to sites like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn individuals can now experience the prospective employer’s culture, become exposed to the organization’s corporate values and engage with key staff.

Facebook and Twitter ranked number one and number three in social media popularity, but LinkedIn is a robust social media site where job seekers can find enormous value. With over 75 million members and executive level representation from all of the Fortune 500 organizations, LinkedIn has created a platform for job seekers to showcase their skill and experience, in addition to building and connecting with those who can provide value to the job search.

For more information about LinkedIn visit www.linkedin.com.  Don’t forget to join the Pinnacle Empowerment Center group to stay up to date on the latest from PEC!

Photo by Mauro Cateb of a diamond measuring tool via Wikimedia.org.

Possibilities and Opportunity: Where your talents and the needs of the world intersect

By Lisa Dolce

New Year’s Day has always been a day of reflection for me for as long as I can remember.

Find the intersection where your talents meet the needs of the world!

I celebrate the successes as well as the learning that came from the challenges of the past year. I take a deep breath in and exhale anything that may be holding me back and then breathe in all the possibilities of the coming new year.

The last few years have been tough for many of us personally and professionally. There seemed to be much that was out of our control. The good news is that not everything is out of our control. One of my favorite quotes comes from Aristotle, he said, “Ones purpose is knowing where your talents intersect with the needs of the world”.

The job market may still be tight but it is not without it’s needs, possibility and opportunity. So the big question is where do your talents intersect?

For some of us it may be the perfect time to reinvent ourselves. You have probably known for a long time that it was time to do something else, but it never seemed to be the “right” time to do it.

It may be a career change, going back for that degree or finally starting that business you’ve been talking about. Now is the time.

For others it might be time to find more meaning or balance in their work and in their lives. What are we chasing after and why? What beliefs or dreams are we holding onto that no longer serve us?

So as we enter 2013, breathe in all the possibilities this new year has to offer, and take the time to clarify what your talents are and how you can share them to fill a need in this new economy. Make a list of your top skills that you already have and ways you can reconfigure them to meet the opportunities that the new job market will yield–then go out and explore, network with others and learn what new jobs will emerge as government bail-out plans unfold, companies restructure and new leadership takes over.

And to help get you started, and as a New Year’s gift to you, the Pinnacle Empowerment Center is offering free monthly career clubs, empowerment circles.Come join us and other career seekers for inspiration, motivation and strategies for matching your talents with the needs of our community.

Wishing you a new year filled with exciting possibilities and opportunity!

Believe in Yourself

This is a post from Job Coach Cindy Virtue who encourages us to make the most of the holiday break and to BELIEVE in ourselves!

Believe in yourself and your dreams!

Today my calendar was marked to sit down and write the blog for Pinnacle Empowerment Center this morning. It was on my to-do-list for 9:00am to hold me accountable or Heather may not be too jolly with me come our Wednesday Open House Celebration. Well it is now 4:00pm a little later than anticipated, but as everyone knows little bumps in the road sometimes comes up. Here is my bump:

I have a good friend who wrote a book 8-years ago, which had sat on her bookshelf just getting dusty. While reflecting over the last holiday season and with the encouragement of her friends and family she decided to submit it for publication. She found three possible publishers in March and submitted her transcript. To her surprise two-weeks later she was sitting with a contract with a target publishing date for October 2012 in time for the holiday sales. Since this was a book about the meaning of Christmas timing was an issue. She worked very hard over the summer, meeting demanding deadlines for rewrites.  Unfortunately, due to factors out of her control, the book was finally printed mid-November missing the shelves in major book store, but it is now available online.

As we were catching up last week and she was filling me in with all the details of what the publisher will do to promote her book they also encouraged her to reach out to her network. Well, this is my area!   I could see she felt so overwhelmed so I helped her come up with a promotional plan- which is very similar to what I do when I help job seekers.

We sat and brainstormed on how to best use the limited time left before the holiday to market her holiday book. Helping her understand how to reach out to her network, making phone calls asking her friends for help to spread the word, identifying upcoming events to attend and possibly ask if she could setup a table for a book signing  such as the Dec, 20th Girls Night Out Even in Downtown Ellicott City. Finally, why not create a FREE website through wordpress.com which will make it easier for her network to spread the word. This was my BUMP since I only have created one several months ago this took longer than anticipated, but was well worth it. I am much better or should I say faster in helping job seekers with Linkedin profiles then I am in creating a website, so I may need to keep my day job. In the end, she took a leap of faith and she is now a published author!

With the holiday upon us and as you may be job searching you need to believe in yourself. Take this time to regroup, take a fresh look at your resume and Linked profile, come up with a game plan on how you can reach out to your network, and don’t be afraid to ask for help. Pull out your calendar now and start setting deadlines and goals for the New Year. Attend PEC FREE Job Club or Empowerment Circle for help. The year 2013 will be your time but you need to make it happen!

Note: January Job Club has been moved to Tuesday, January 8^th due to the holiday. Please contact me for times and location at cindy@empowerctr.org or (410) 799-1097 ext. 300

Have a safe and wonderful holiday season!

Want to learn more about Ellicott City newest author? www.missmarybelieves.wordpress.com

Talk Back To Us – Ask A Coach!

We’re all ears for your questions! Join us for Ask A Coach!

Ever heard that it’s okay if you talk to yourself but you’re really in trouble if you start answering back?  Well, we want to avoid that!  We want to start conversations about what’s on your mind so we’re creating an Ask A Coach feature and we need YOUR help!

• What questions do you have about how to get started with updating your resume?
• Do you need ideas on how to explain gaps in employment?
• Have you been at home with the kids for the last several years and want to know how you can make your resume more marketable?
• Do you have questions about how to get that small business started?
• Do you feel like there could be more to your life or career but aren’t sure how to identify the changes you can make?

Send us YOUR question and we’ll answer them on Facebook, on the blog, or in a message back to you.  You can post on our Facebook wall, send us a Direct Message, or just send us an email at info(at)empowerctr.org if you’d like to keep your query private.

Don’t forget we have lots of friends in a variety of fields to so if we don’t have the answer, we’ll activate our network and find out!  Look for answers on Thursdays.

Remember, the only stupid question is the one you didn’t ask!

Don’t want to wait?  Take our poll and let us know what topics interest you most!

Let’s Go Fishing! Maybe?

By: Cindy Virtue. Job Search Coach.

Are you serious about landing your next job or are you just giving hiring managers a near death experience?

This week I was preparing for my upcoming workshop on how to help teens with their job search and getting ready for a family camping trip to Point Look Out in Southern Maryland where my sister likes to go fishing off their pier. I came across this question from Dick Bowles, Author of “What Color is My Parachute” – How do you fish? Do you choose Pond One that has two fish and ten fishermen or do you choose Pond Two that has twenty fish and only two fishermen?

When I go fishing I like Pond One. Why? I really don’t want to catch anything. I like hanging out with my sister but I have a fear of touching the worm and the fish. I’ll sit there all day, sort of hoping to catching anything only to reel it in and to let it go. This is the “Open Market” in job searching. The Open Market are the job boards, want-ads, placement agencies, etc. This represents less than 20% of all jobs are advertised and yet more than 80% of all job seekers look here!

Now let’s talk about Pond Two. This pond is for the real fisherman, like my sister, who enjoys catching fish all day. The more fish she catches, the more motivated she is to keep trying for that Big Catch of the Day! This is like using the “Hidden Market in Job Search Method”. You access this job market through your personal network, company websites, yellow pages, social media, and by developing leads before they are advertised. More than 80% of all jobs are filled this way but less than 20% of all job seekers look here!

In today’s job market you have to get out of your comfort zone, step up and take charge of your job search, and build relationships that can help you move forward. So, how do you fish?

Cindy Virtue has over seven years of coaching experience. Drawing on her own career transitions experiences, Cindy helps clients chart a path for career success. You can meet Cindy at one of the Empowerment Center’s free monthly Job Clubs.