Career – Page 5

Molly…You in Danger Girl!

October 5, 2016

Are you on LinkedIn? As I sit here on a plane to the annual LinkedIn Talent Connect Conference my frustration is growing. Why is it growing? Glad you asked. Literally thousands of recruiters and HR professionals are traveling to Talent Connect to discuss and learn how best to find and retain TALENT through things like employment branding, employee referral programs, creating better job postings, data/analytics etc. with a LinkedIn narrative. I hear people say all the time there are no jobs and I would have to say that’s not completely true (I’ll explain more in a separate post). One of the biggest and best tools to find a job or networking opportunity is, LinkedIn.

The majority of the world’s professional talent and hiring authorities are on LinkedIn. I tell jobseekers all the time there has to be more effort on your part these days. I know it’s probably not fair, but when you have hundreds of candidates applying for the same role it’s necessary. We are living in a digital world and you, the jobseeker, have to physically reach out to people to highlight what separates you from other candidates. I have personally used LinkedIn as a tool to pursue 3 job opportunities that have been wonderful for my career. Submitting your resume and just letting the chips fall as they may, is not always going to get you that dream job. Companies pay thousands of dollars to LinkedIn for sourcing great talent despite the fact they have a stream of online applications. My charge to you is, make sure you have a professional online presence via LinkedIn and that you use it to your advantage. Here are a few tips to get started:

Go to LinkedIn.com and setup a profile
Upload a professional headshot/photo (no selfies!)
Make your summary interesting and marketable (include keywords that make you searchable)
Don’t list jobs dating back to 1990
Make sure to check your settings so people can find you
Connect with people you know you build your initial network (i.e. school alumni, former colleagues, etc.)
Join affinity groups based on your skill set

We’ll be talking about LinkedIn more in the coming months so stay tuned. Our friend Julie Huval from Benchley Design, wrote a great post last week on Branding Yourself like a BOSS! Take her advice and follow through with creating a profile on LinkedIn.com. If you’re not on LinkedIn, in the words of Oda Mae Brown (Whoopi Goldberg) from the movie Ghost, “Molly, you in danger girl!”

Follow @thecareersalon on Instagram and Twitter to keep up with the happenings at the LinkedIn Talent Connect Conference this week!

Shop Talk: Brand Yourself like a BOSS

September 27, 2016

We are so excited to have THEE marketing genius of Julie Huval, President and Director of Strategy for Benchley Design in the salon today for Shop Talk. Julie is a walking brand and a highly sought after speaker on all things marketing, brand, analytics, and other smart people things, so it is our pleasure to make the introduction and have her speak about how to brand yourself like a BOSS!

by Julie Huval

“Word of mouth.” A lot of times we think of that phrase when it comes to hearing about a new restaurant, the funny outtakes video on YouTube, or that amazing book our friend read on the beach. But “word of mouth” also applies to individuals. It is called personal brand.

Personal brand = Someone’s “word of mouth” about you

In the realm of career development, personal branding can be a huge boost. Your ideal employer may already know a lot about you because of “word of mouth” from your professional network. Your peers may acclaim you are a creative, able to work through difficult situations, and shocked the pants off your client because you delivered ahead of schedule on that really big project. That’s an amazing personal brand.

Or your personal brand can be a huge door slam on opportunities. What if your “word of mouth” sounds something like …

And, thanks to our digital world, there are a lot of people with a personal brand that they would like to fix. Pronto! So how do you develop a personal brand?

Develop your legacy.

What do you want to be known for? At the end of your life your legacy is the culmination of your life’s work: what you stood for, what you fought for, what you educated other people about. Your legacy may be helping your community get out of poverty or you want to be the best/favorite educator in your district or you want to be a renowned architect. This step is not “What do you want to be when you grow up?” but a bigger picture idea of how do you want to affect the world. As you start to develop your legacy start acting on it. Don’t wait for “the right time” to get started … just start. Overnight successes took years of practice to get to where they are.

Be authentic.

Don’t try to be something you aren’t. Instead, be open and honest. This is the awkward phase. You will not be applauded by everyone for being authentic because authenticity means different. But stick to your authentic self. It is what makes you stand out from the crowd. Break the mold, discover new stuff, and continue being you.

Promote yourself.

This step can get tricky. Promoting yourself feels wrong. This is the pinched nerve part of personal branding. However, if you don’t start supplying other people with your “word of mouth” messaging then you are leaving it up to them to create it for you. You can help them craft their words in this step. But you need to have the first two steps in place in order for your messaging to take hold.

A good personal brand can go a long way in life … not just your career. More opportunities will open up so you can continue to build your legacy because people are excited about your authentic approach and they found out about all of it through your self-promotion.

Look out for my next post about correcting your dreaded digital personal brand! Get ready to delete some photos and inappropriate posts.

For more information on Julie and Benchley Design visit her website at benchleydesign.com.

Iyanla, come fix this resume!

September 21, 2016

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In the opinion of some of my friends, the jury is still out on whether Iyanla fixes anyone’s life but for the purposes of this post I needed the comedy, energy, and facial expressions of Iyanla Vanzant to get my points across. The .gif above is exactly how myself and many of my colleagues feel about the atrocities, known as resumes, that come across our desks everyday. I guarantee you this will not be the only post about resumes, but in the words of Iyanla Vanzant today we are going to “Call a thing, a thing BELOVED!” I’m compelled to go over a few (not all) parts of frequent resume infractions so that the foolery will stop, if only for a small group.

OBJECTIVE: Just stop (period)
EDUCATION: After about 2-3 years this goes to the bottom of the resume. I don’t need to know you graduated with a 3.0 in 1986.
- Let’s add to that. If you are going to list your GPA please note if it’s below 3.0 leave it off…(we’re giving you the serious side-eye)
SKILLS (TYPING/WPM): Unless you’re an administrative assistant or a data entry operator we don’t need to know how many words you type per minute. Include skills that are relevant to the role.
EXPERIENCE: I find it hard to believe that the job description bullets you copied and pasted were all of your day- to-day responsibilities. Be detailed and show how you were an asset to the company, list accomplishments/results, and provide depth.
HOBBIES: Stop again.
- Instead of hobbies include organizations and/or civic activities you are involved in
PERSONAL INFORMATION: Can’t say it enough, STOP. A social security number and number of kids is not necessary on a resume.
THE BOOK OF ELI: Literally I should not have to put extra paper in the printer to print a resume. Enough of the resume booklets.
FUNCTIONAL RESUMES: I’m going to speak for my colleagues when I say this is an offense that has no coming back. I literally just want to see your resume in chronological order with the things you’ve done for the position I’m recruiting for.
EMAIL ADDRESS: Shouldn’t have to explain this but if your email address is strawberry69@xxx.com or fuzzynavel@xxx.com it’s probably not appropriate. Trust me, this happens all the time.
RESUME GHOSTWRITER: If you’re going to get someone to write your resume, get someone good. I can tell within seconds of reviewing a resume if it was written by a resume writer. The best person to communicate your experience is YOU. If a resume writer is not going to get to know you and write your resume with intention you don’t need them.

This post really stresses me out because there are so many resume writing self-help books and career coaches out there and yet for over 11 years I’ve seen madness more often than not. I could write a book on resume writing but until that time I’ll just leave you with continuous reminders of things to STOP, BELOVED (In my Iyanla Vanzant voice).

What steps are you taking to make sure your resume is solid? Let’s talk about it in the comments below.

Motivational Monday: You Need a Hype Man!

September 19, 2016

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I get so excited when speaking with people about their careers and how to make that next move, I would literally do it for FREE (I’m not, but I would think about it lol). I take my years of experience and knowledge of my craft to help build confidence or “hype” the person up so to speak because hey, we all need a “hype man.” Let me explain who the “hype man” is for the sake of this post.

Typically, in hip hop culture or even sports (i.e. boxing) you have someone or even a group in front of and behind the scenes pumping you up, encouraging you and basically filling in when you need to take a breath. Flavor Flav made his career being a permanent hype man alongside Public Enemy (I know, not the best behavior off the stage but you get my drift). In everyday life we all need influences to lend an ear, speak positive words, and be supportive. When looking for opportunities it can become discouraging because of long timeframes, limited responses, and people telling you no. It’s important to weed out negativity to prevent it from creating a situation of despair. Here are a few recommendations that might help:

Surround yourself with positive and encouraging people
Manage thoughts of negativity and block negative thoughts from others, no exception
Ensure your “hype man” has genuine motives
Create a goal-oriented environment of peace and productivity

We’d love to hear what strategies you use to keep a positive circle in the comments below.

The Interview that Ended Before it Started

September 13, 2016

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As a point of intro, this website will sometimes discuss simple topics that everyone should know and sometimes not. As an HR/Recruiting professional there are just conversations that I need to facilitate, especially if you’d like to take your career a little higher. I find that after years of recruiting there are some things candidates should be reminded of, to prevent inadvertently ending the interview before it even starts. One of those things is definitely, not doing research on the company.

It happens numerous times per week to myself and colleagues, that phone screen/interview we’re excited about and then we are quickly let down at the onset of the phone conversation by simply inquiring, “Do you know much about the company?” While this seems simple to some I’ve lost count on a weekly basis of how many candidates haven’t done research on the company they are interviewing with and are totally clueless. I’ve even interviewed graduates of Ivy League schools that give answers of dumfounded silence. Some candidates have even asked me to tell them about the company…the nerve! We all know that construction companies build buildings and toy companies make toys DUH! Hence the GIF above from one of my favorite movies. When you get that question we’re looking for more, what you know about the company and where your interests lie. Your answer is a key indicator of things like attention to detail, preparedness, and generally caring about things that are important.

There are so many places you can research a company and I’ve listed just four below:

Company Website
Google
LinkedIn
Glassdoor

These sources are helpful to prepare you for the interview process whether it’s a phone interview with HR or you’re speaking with a hiring manager or team. There are too many resources to be ill-prepared and while conducting researching make sure to get information on the person you are going to be speaking with. I’m always impressed when candidates do their homework and can find commonalities between us, it shows a finesse that I don’t come across often. I’ve just barely scratched the surface of preparing for an interview and we’ll dive into it a little more soon, but what are some ways you prepare for an interview? Feel free to post in the comments section below.

The Salon is Now Open!

September 9, 2016

This is 36. Today is my birthday and the launch of what I hope to be a great resource for people in whatever career they’re in. I want people to walk confidently into an interview, salary conversation with the boss, or a client meeting exuding their personal style and creating a path to walk in purpose .

Why “The Career Salon”?

My dad was a part-time barber growing up. People young and old came to the barber shop for haircuts and wisdom. It was a melting pot of topics and you could even take a chance on dominoes or checkers. In the barber shop there were seasoned people giving soapbox (sometimes hilarious) speeches, sports rhetoric, and advice from life experiences. I also went to the hair salon with my mom to get the proverbial “tea” on celebrity or neighborhood news, fashion trends, etiquette, and oh yeah a new style for the week. Those environments were so interesting to me, as it celebrated and discussed so many things in one single place.

So this is it, the place where there is NO filter, we rid the internet of ridiculous interview advice, ill-fitted pants suits, and go behind the scenes of the recruiting and acquisition functions to achieve that next great opportunity with style.

Welcome to The Career Salon!