Once upon a time, the most important thing about finding a new job was passing the interview. Still true but other things have become as important. Here are a couple of things to pay attention to and get right.
CHOOSE REFERENCES CAREFULLY: When you ask someone to be your reference, you are asking them to put their reputation on the line for you. Some references have cost people jobs so make sure your referee genuinely believes in you. Choose referees you’ve worked closely with, maintained a good relationship with, preferably someone who can discuss your skills and experience in relation to the position you’re applying for. Consult referees before putting them down so that they agree and are not caught off guard when contacted. Remind them of your achievements and of the value you have provided in previous jobs. Remember to thank them and let them know the outcome of the interview.
WATCH YOUR SOCIAL MEDIA TRAIL: These days employers can google candidates to learn more about them. Social media is where you let down your hair but fact is it’s out there for all to see; so follow the unwritten rules for anything that’s put in in 'black and white'. Think before you post. Vent if you feel you need to but do so without name calling, using foul language or creating a negative picture of who you are. Ever googled yourself? If what you see doesn't portray you accurately, may be time to reflect more of the real you
KNOW WHAT THE COMPANY WANTS: You want a job but to have a good shot you must understand what the employer needs. Successful job seekers understand that what the employer needs is what matters. So study the organization before showing up for that interview, what problems are they facing? What solutions can you offer? Besides qualifications, what organizations look for are whether you’ll do the job or will be a good fit so find ways to respond effectively to these aspects.
Now take action: Review your references and ensure they are fit for purpose
Tuesday, January 17, 2012
Monday, January 9, 2012
Take a long term perspective
Long term perspective is the amount of time you take into consideration when determining present actions. If you want your career to develop well you have to take a long term view and act in line with that approach.
START WITH THE END IN MIND: Have a long term goal. Hard work helps but making the right choices is crucial. For example if your aim is to be a senior executive in a financial services firm in the next 5 years, spending the next 3 years in the fashion industry might not necessarily help you develop the top end skills you need.
BE PREPARED TO SACRIFICE: Bear the good ‘pain’. For example foregoing buying that new item so that you can take that professional magazine subscription instead? Or skipping your favourite movie and for a mind-enriching conversation?. These ‘sacrifices’ increase your value and improve your future opportunities
THINK THROUGH CONSEQUENCES: Before you implement decisions. You won’t be able to determine the impact of every decision but neither should you just do things anyhow. Ask yourself; what will happen if I don’t take that action? How can I minimise any potential negative consequences? Why is the decision the best course of action?
THINK AND WORK STRATEGICALLY: Focus only on high priority and high value activities and spend sufficient time on them. Practice forward thinking and pursue what’s consistent with your values and what you are trying to achieve. Don’t just do what comes to mind or what you feel like doing in the moment but things that will move you forward.
PRACTICE SELF DISCIPLINE: This is getting yourself to take action regardless of without you feel like doing it or not. Tough call but without behaving in a disciplined way, you are likely to derail. So have a plan that has specific targets, take stock regularly so that you can improve and without fail do something daily to support your goals.
Now take action : Write down you want to achieve in the next 3 years.
START WITH THE END IN MIND: Have a long term goal. Hard work helps but making the right choices is crucial. For example if your aim is to be a senior executive in a financial services firm in the next 5 years, spending the next 3 years in the fashion industry might not necessarily help you develop the top end skills you need.
BE PREPARED TO SACRIFICE: Bear the good ‘pain’. For example foregoing buying that new item so that you can take that professional magazine subscription instead? Or skipping your favourite movie and for a mind-enriching conversation?. These ‘sacrifices’ increase your value and improve your future opportunities
THINK THROUGH CONSEQUENCES: Before you implement decisions. You won’t be able to determine the impact of every decision but neither should you just do things anyhow. Ask yourself; what will happen if I don’t take that action? How can I minimise any potential negative consequences? Why is the decision the best course of action?
THINK AND WORK STRATEGICALLY: Focus only on high priority and high value activities and spend sufficient time on them. Practice forward thinking and pursue what’s consistent with your values and what you are trying to achieve. Don’t just do what comes to mind or what you feel like doing in the moment but things that will move you forward.
PRACTICE SELF DISCIPLINE: This is getting yourself to take action regardless of without you feel like doing it or not. Tough call but without behaving in a disciplined way, you are likely to derail. So have a plan that has specific targets, take stock regularly so that you can improve and without fail do something daily to support your goals.
Now take action : Write down you want to achieve in the next 3 years.
Practice self-conversations
Happy 2012! I want to share with you one habit that I think will help you throughout the year– Self-conversation. Here are my three questions to get you started.
WHAT DO I BELIEVE IS POSSIBLE FOR ME?: What are the things you wish for but never see happen? Maybe time to reflect on it again?. What do you need to achieve it? Which ones do you already have and which do you needed to develop? Whose support do you need? What wrong habits are stopping you that you need to drop? Think again; that ‘big goal’ may be within your reach as long as you go after it.
WHERE DO I NEED TO SHOW MORE COURAGE?: Usually it’s not skills or habits or even lack of ambition that stands in the way but fear or a lack of confidence or belief that based on where you are now you cannot go after that big vision; you can’t even imagine yourself doing that. Of course you can; ask yourself what would you do if you were being courageous? What would you do that you are not doing now? Don’t think courage has to be about doing something mighty. Maybe for you it’s just having the courage to speak up more so your opinions count. So take that action and see what happens.
WHAT BAGGAGE DO I NEED TO OFFLOAD? These are things that worked for you in the past and which you are holding onto but which no longer work. It could be not being open to a new way of doing things because you’ve always done things a particular way or perhaps having a certain image of yourself, of what you can or not do? Indeed, anything you are holding onto that prevents you from moving forward or restricts your progress is baggage. Identify these and make a deliberate decision to leave them behind and unlearn attitudes that are holding you back.
Now take action: Identify baggage you need to drop.
WHAT DO I BELIEVE IS POSSIBLE FOR ME?: What are the things you wish for but never see happen? Maybe time to reflect on it again?. What do you need to achieve it? Which ones do you already have and which do you needed to develop? Whose support do you need? What wrong habits are stopping you that you need to drop? Think again; that ‘big goal’ may be within your reach as long as you go after it.
WHERE DO I NEED TO SHOW MORE COURAGE?: Usually it’s not skills or habits or even lack of ambition that stands in the way but fear or a lack of confidence or belief that based on where you are now you cannot go after that big vision; you can’t even imagine yourself doing that. Of course you can; ask yourself what would you do if you were being courageous? What would you do that you are not doing now? Don’t think courage has to be about doing something mighty. Maybe for you it’s just having the courage to speak up more so your opinions count. So take that action and see what happens.
WHAT BAGGAGE DO I NEED TO OFFLOAD? These are things that worked for you in the past and which you are holding onto but which no longer work. It could be not being open to a new way of doing things because you’ve always done things a particular way or perhaps having a certain image of yourself, of what you can or not do? Indeed, anything you are holding onto that prevents you from moving forward or restricts your progress is baggage. Identify these and make a deliberate decision to leave them behind and unlearn attitudes that are holding you back.
Now take action: Identify baggage you need to drop.
Sunday, December 25, 2011
Gear up to become a better you
A new start is always an opportunity to become and act more wisely. As you start to pin down your new year commitments may I suggest that you consider adopting the following to guide you and your career and give you a strong start in 2012
BE AN IMPROVER: There’s always room for improvement? True. There are a lot things we do routinely without really thinking, nothing wrong with that. But what’s not a good idea is to keep doing things as we always have without considering if there’s a better way. An attitude of improvement will push you to do what you do with thought, with interest and determination to make it a little better every time.
BE A SOLUTION FINDER: Don’t dwell on the problem. Of course you need to understand the problem in order to find a solution; but don’t let the problem fester. In finding solutions don’t always reinvent the wheel; find out if there are already solutions that help you and adapt them as appropriate.
BE A LIFTER UP: This may include for example choosing not to react in a volatile situation, saying a kind word when you are tempted to utter a sharp one, not passing judgement just because you can or indeed putting in a good word for someone who might not deserve it.
BE GENEROUS: Especially with what you know. I believe knowledge only becomes positive power when we share it so that others benefit from it and use it to do something useful. When you hold onto what you have, it does not grow so my advice? freely share knowledge and contribute skills.
BE STABLE: Don’t wear your emotions on your sleeve. Keep any bad moods in check. Don’t stress over every provocation and slight annoyances. Maturely handle negative feedback. Don’t react when others try to rub their frustrations on you. Probably tough to do but well worth the effort.
Now take action: What good lessons from 2011 will you take into 2012?
BE AN IMPROVER: There’s always room for improvement? True. There are a lot things we do routinely without really thinking, nothing wrong with that. But what’s not a good idea is to keep doing things as we always have without considering if there’s a better way. An attitude of improvement will push you to do what you do with thought, with interest and determination to make it a little better every time.
BE A SOLUTION FINDER: Don’t dwell on the problem. Of course you need to understand the problem in order to find a solution; but don’t let the problem fester. In finding solutions don’t always reinvent the wheel; find out if there are already solutions that help you and adapt them as appropriate.
BE A LIFTER UP: This may include for example choosing not to react in a volatile situation, saying a kind word when you are tempted to utter a sharp one, not passing judgement just because you can or indeed putting in a good word for someone who might not deserve it.
BE GENEROUS: Especially with what you know. I believe knowledge only becomes positive power when we share it so that others benefit from it and use it to do something useful. When you hold onto what you have, it does not grow so my advice? freely share knowledge and contribute skills.
BE STABLE: Don’t wear your emotions on your sleeve. Keep any bad moods in check. Don’t stress over every provocation and slight annoyances. Maturely handle negative feedback. Don’t react when others try to rub their frustrations on you. Probably tough to do but well worth the effort.
Now take action: What good lessons from 2011 will you take into 2012?
Take charge of your work load
When you have a lot of work to do, you may not be as helpless as you think. You could keep your head down, work long hours and hope that ‘someday’ you will get through it all. Or you could take some of the suggestions below.
REDEFINE THE WORK: Think of your job as delivering a result instead of doing every single thing that hits your desk. Take charge of what you really need to work on based on your awareness of priorities in your team or office and then renegotiate the deadlines for any others. When you do this you avoid the trap of a never-ending cycle of busy-ness that eats up hours instead of delivering good value.
FIGURE OUT WHAT COUNTS: Things that make a difference and not what you enjoy doing. This does not mean the other stuff is not important. It just means you have to be ruthless with what you spend you time. If you focus on the real priorities you’ll not be distracted worrying about the 100 other tasks that need doing but which you’ve had to reschedule.
GIVE TIME FOR EMERGENCIES: Building some slack in your schedule: Sounds counter-intuitive when you have loads to do. Doing this is recognising that emergencies happens. So if you assign only 90% of your hours on the tasks for the day, you can deal with that emergency when it comes. But be realistic about how much time emergencies happen and how much time they take so that you can handle then without feeling becoming unnecessarily stressed.
DELEGATE QUICKLY AND THOUGHTFULLY: Think of delegation not just as passing on work that you do not have the time to do yourself but as an opportunity to get the best job done. Even if you are the best person to do it but have other pressing priorities then pass it on and quickly to someone who can. And please give the credit to whoever does the work on your behalf.
Now take action: How can you prioritise your work load better?
REDEFINE THE WORK: Think of your job as delivering a result instead of doing every single thing that hits your desk. Take charge of what you really need to work on based on your awareness of priorities in your team or office and then renegotiate the deadlines for any others. When you do this you avoid the trap of a never-ending cycle of busy-ness that eats up hours instead of delivering good value.
FIGURE OUT WHAT COUNTS: Things that make a difference and not what you enjoy doing. This does not mean the other stuff is not important. It just means you have to be ruthless with what you spend you time. If you focus on the real priorities you’ll not be distracted worrying about the 100 other tasks that need doing but which you’ve had to reschedule.
GIVE TIME FOR EMERGENCIES: Building some slack in your schedule: Sounds counter-intuitive when you have loads to do. Doing this is recognising that emergencies happens. So if you assign only 90% of your hours on the tasks for the day, you can deal with that emergency when it comes. But be realistic about how much time emergencies happen and how much time they take so that you can handle then without feeling becoming unnecessarily stressed.
DELEGATE QUICKLY AND THOUGHTFULLY: Think of delegation not just as passing on work that you do not have the time to do yourself but as an opportunity to get the best job done. Even if you are the best person to do it but have other pressing priorities then pass it on and quickly to someone who can. And please give the credit to whoever does the work on your behalf.
Now take action: How can you prioritise your work load better?
Make your self introduction count
We meet new people all the time; so introduce ourselves often so much so that we do not give much thought to it. But if you are looking to create opportunities for yourself, learning to put your best foot forward via how you introduce yourself to new contacts is important. Here are your options;
BY TITLE: This is by far the most common way and works if you’re meeting someone familiar with your industry or organisation and can tell just by your title what your job entails or your level of responsibility. What it doesn’t do is to allow you to give some idea of what exactly the value you bring to that role so effectively becomes just a label.
BY FUNCTION: This is where rather than mention you title only, you explain the function. For example instead of saying ‘I am the sales manager’ you may say ‘I am responsible for ensuring achieving over xxxx in sales per annum’. This is more helpful because it qualifies the title by communicating what you are capable of or at least entrusted with.
BY IMPACT: This explains what your job achieves. So again as sales manager, you would say something like ‘My job is to increase the profitability of keep my organisation by increasing sales by xxx per annum. In a few seconds it says who you are, what you do and achieve. Of course some jobs are easier to explain ‘by impact’ than others but whatever you do, ensure you are able to explain what you job achieves.
BY YOUR STRENGTHS: This is ideal where your day job does not reflect your range of skills. For examples if you are the junior officer at work but chair an important committee in your community or are involved in other influential activities, you can introduce yourself with that.
The Bottom line is your self introduction can do what your business card can’t and that is by communicating more than your title and organisation.
Now take action: How can you improve the way you introduce yourself?
BY TITLE: This is by far the most common way and works if you’re meeting someone familiar with your industry or organisation and can tell just by your title what your job entails or your level of responsibility. What it doesn’t do is to allow you to give some idea of what exactly the value you bring to that role so effectively becomes just a label.
BY FUNCTION: This is where rather than mention you title only, you explain the function. For example instead of saying ‘I am the sales manager’ you may say ‘I am responsible for ensuring achieving over xxxx in sales per annum’. This is more helpful because it qualifies the title by communicating what you are capable of or at least entrusted with.
BY IMPACT: This explains what your job achieves. So again as sales manager, you would say something like ‘My job is to increase the profitability of keep my organisation by increasing sales by xxx per annum. In a few seconds it says who you are, what you do and achieve. Of course some jobs are easier to explain ‘by impact’ than others but whatever you do, ensure you are able to explain what you job achieves.
BY YOUR STRENGTHS: This is ideal where your day job does not reflect your range of skills. For examples if you are the junior officer at work but chair an important committee in your community or are involved in other influential activities, you can introduce yourself with that.
The Bottom line is your self introduction can do what your business card can’t and that is by communicating more than your title and organisation.
Now take action: How can you improve the way you introduce yourself?
Monday, December 12, 2011
Compete with yourself
Competition is part of career life. We compete often with others for jobs, for awards, etc. But the one competition that should be on-going is to compete with yourself. Because it helps you to improve your self awareness, to raise your standards and to bring out the best in yourself.
ENVISION YOUR IDEAL SELF: Whether you are stating from a ‘low base’ or from stardom, there’s more you can achieve and become. So competing against yourself should not be permission to go live in a ‘bubble’ and assume that whatever you do is ok. Your ideal self is working towards your full potential. If you don’t yet have a success circle, create one and let them help you.
GO FOR THE HIGHEST STANDARD: If you’re looking to become successful ‘good enough’ is not good enough. Too many excuses will hold you back. Put the vision of your ‘ideal self’ and the highest standards side by side and work out a plan for how you’ll get from where you are to attaining those high standards. It’ll require great discipline and diligence from you. But of you can do it.
ALWAYS STAY PREPARED: There’s a lot one can plan for but opportunity can show up early or unannounced and it helps to be prepared. That job you want suddenly becomes available, or a new exciting project comes up that needs a leader?. You can’t prepare for every thing so know what you are aspiring for so that you can map your preparedness plan and compete well.
FOCUS ON YOUR NATURAL STRENGTHS: The best you can be in an area you are not strong in is ‘average’, So focus on your strengths, honing them, leveraging them and using them to propel yourself forward. When you succeed with your strengths you know you can do even better and with less effort. So if you don’t know yet what you’re good out, figure it out quickly.
Now take action: What is your key strength? How are you honing it further?
ENVISION YOUR IDEAL SELF: Whether you are stating from a ‘low base’ or from stardom, there’s more you can achieve and become. So competing against yourself should not be permission to go live in a ‘bubble’ and assume that whatever you do is ok. Your ideal self is working towards your full potential. If you don’t yet have a success circle, create one and let them help you.
GO FOR THE HIGHEST STANDARD: If you’re looking to become successful ‘good enough’ is not good enough. Too many excuses will hold you back. Put the vision of your ‘ideal self’ and the highest standards side by side and work out a plan for how you’ll get from where you are to attaining those high standards. It’ll require great discipline and diligence from you. But of you can do it.
ALWAYS STAY PREPARED: There’s a lot one can plan for but opportunity can show up early or unannounced and it helps to be prepared. That job you want suddenly becomes available, or a new exciting project comes up that needs a leader?. You can’t prepare for every thing so know what you are aspiring for so that you can map your preparedness plan and compete well.
FOCUS ON YOUR NATURAL STRENGTHS: The best you can be in an area you are not strong in is ‘average’, So focus on your strengths, honing them, leveraging them and using them to propel yourself forward. When you succeed with your strengths you know you can do even better and with less effort. So if you don’t know yet what you’re good out, figure it out quickly.
Now take action: What is your key strength? How are you honing it further?
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