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5 Signs of Career Dissatisfaction

Posted by on 3 April 2012, 12:52 pm
Unhappy

Does your resume make you look like the career equivalent of a butterfly, jumping from job to job with very short time spans for each? Do the jobs you’ve held over the span of your career have little in common? Most people admit to experiencing a sense of dissatisfaction with their jobs at some point over the course of their careers. So how can you tell if your dissatisfaction comes from the job or your career? That’s a question I’m often asked when a client is seeking career help.

Common reasons for job dissatisfaction include:

  1. Don’t like the boss, coworkers, or perhaps the company culture,
  2. Lack of advancement opportunities,
  3. Too much travel or commuting,
  4. Sudden change in job requirements or expectations,
  5. Pay or compensation issues.

But these issues are mostly external to an individual and can usually be resolved by making a job change that eliminates the area of dissatisfaction. That is, you seek out a company with a culture you like much better, a job where the pay is higher, and so forth.

Career dissatisfaction, however, tends to be more internally focused and requires examination and self-reflection to resolve. Five telltale signs that it may be time to look at a different career, not just a job, include:

  1. Frequent job changes,
  2. Lack of definite career path,
  3. Lack of motivation / feeling unfocused,
  4. Procrastination / work avoidance,
  5. Increased illness.

While sometimes there are legitimate reasons for having jobs with short tenure, having too or having jobs that appear to have little connection to each other means you haven’t yet figured out what you’re good at and what you love doing. Sadly, too many people find themselves in careers for which they have absolutely no passion to do the tasks that the career requires them to do most frequently.

It may seem counterintuitive that doing things you’re good or even great at doesn’t assure career satisfaction. Why? Because you may not love doing those things!

If you constantly find yourself trying to avoid certain tasks or projects, it may well be that you simply don’t like doing them. Another clue is that you seek out other tasks or projects that you do enjoy, whether at work, as a volunteer, or in your home environment, to derive satisfaction. Do you dread getting up to go to work or do you have a history of lots of sick days?

True career satisfaction comes from discovering your natural talents but also your passion and purpose in life. When these two things are aligned, work should actually not feel like work. Many years ago before I started my business, a co-worker gave me a coffee mug that read: “Do what you love and the money will follow.”

When you truly love what you’re doing, you can overcome fear or any temporary obstacles to achieve the success you desire.

 

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Pay Raises for US Workers in 2012 Expected to Focus on Pay for Performance

Posted by on 12 March 2012, 5:02 pm

The most recent survey on compensation trends from Mercer, a global leader in human resource consulting, outsourcing, and investment services, shows that 97% of organizations plan to award increases in base pay in 2012. However, pay increases will reflect a growing reliance on pay for performance, with higher rated employees receiving the biggest inreases.

Mercer’s 2011/2012 US Compensation Planning Survey shows the average pay increase in 2012 will be 3.0%, a slight improvement over the 2.7% increase in 2011. Top-performing employees, just 8% of the workforce, are expected to see an average pay increase of 4.4% compared to an average of 2.8% for middle-rated employees who compose 54% of the workforce.

The compensation planning survey, conducted annually for the past 20 years, includes responses from more than 1,200 mid-size and large employers nationwide and reflects data for more than 12 million workers in 5 categories: executive, management, professional (sales and non-sales), office/clerical/technician, and trades/production/service.

With the economy still limping along, companies are reluctant to increase compensation, but they’re also concerned about losing critical talent to their competitors. To balance their limited compensation budgets with the need to attract and retain critical talent, organizations are continuing to increase pay differentiation based on performance.

While pay for performance can be an effective tool for employers to assess their workforce needs and make better investments in employees are who the most likely to advance organizational goals, there are challenges in increasing employee engagement, especially in a down economy.

Mercer’s most recent What’s Working research shows scores on measures of employee engagement are consistently down overall on areas such as strong commitment to the organization and willingness to go beyond job requirements to help the organization succeed.

Meanwhile, employee intention to leave is up, as more employees feel burned out from having to work overtime and being asked to do more with less. Monthly productivity figures from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics throughout the recession show that productivity has consistently remained steady to high, confirming that employees indeed have a large workload.

Employers know they have to reward their best employees. While non-cash rewards help with retention, Catherine Hartmann, a principal with Mercer’s Rewards consulting group said “base pay remains the most important element of the employment deal.”

For more information on What’s Working and other surveys, go to www.mercer.com/cps.

 

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Social Media Recruiting Trends

Posted by on 20 October 2011, 5:24 pm

While networking and referrals remain the top methods that companies use to find talent, social media recruiting is rising to become one of the top rated external sources of hire, according to the latest survey data from Jobvite, the leading recruiting platform for social media. Not only are more companies using social networks, but 55% said they were increasing their investment in social media in 2011 as compared to 2010. Jobvite began conducting an annual survey four years ago when social recruiting was still a novel concept to many companies. Social recruiting has topped the list for two consecutive years as the most popular area for companies to increase investment.

Results from the online survey conducted between May and June 2011 showed that the use of social recruiting has grown from 68% in 2009 to 80.2% in 2011. Of the 800 HR and recruiting professionals in the U.S. who responded, 87% said they use LinkedIn, up from 78% last year. While LinkedIn has consistently been the top network each year, 64% of companies reported that they use two or more networks, including 55% using Facebook and 47% using Twitter.

The percentage of companies saying they successfully hired through social networks increased to 63.6%, up from 58% in 2010. LinkedIn’s popularity over other social networks is quite impressive, with 95% of respondents saying they’d successfully hired through LinkedIn versus 24.2% for Facebook and 15.9% for Twitter. Online candidate profiles have also gained importance in 2011, with 45.1% of companies saying they always search online profiles of candidates, compared to just 32% in 2010.

Data from CareerXroads’ 10th Annual Source of Hire report also confirms that the use of social media is increasing as a source of hire but mainly indirectly as part of direct sourcing. The report’s authors conclude that the degree and extent of social media influence on recruiting will become easier to measure as more individual companies track and share their results.

Social networks may not be the biggest source of hire yet, but they are growing in importance. Whether you’re an active or passive job candidate, you must include social media as part of your integrated career marketing campaign. Since LinkedIn is the professional networking site and has the largest influence, your online profile is more important than ever before in building and sustaining great visibility.

 

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What You Can Learn from a Spider Monkey

Posted by on 13 June 2011, 8:46 pm

How do you catch a spider monkey? The story goes that animal catchers looking to capture a spider money cut a hole in a gourd and place a banana inside to attract the monkey. As its name suggests, the spider monkey has a long, slender arm and thus it can easily reach inside the gourd and grab the banana. When the monkey tries to pull the banana out while still holding it, the monkey can’t because its fist gets caught. The only way the monkey can free itself is to let go of the banana. The monkey won’t do that, so it gets captured.

Spider Monkey

I’m not sure where this story originated, but it does illustrate the importance of letting go of what’s holding you back in your career or in life. From recent grads to seasoned professionals, one of the biggest career obstacles I see is a lack of clarity and focus.

Many individuals go through life without ever knowing what they want to be when they grow up. As a result, they are directionless, like a ship with a broken rudder, drifting along through life and heading into whatever direction the current winds are blowing.

Where do you want to go next in your career? That’s almost always the first question I ask of any prospective client. I also ask it of existing clients when I’ve not heard from them for a while, and they’re contemplating a career move. Many things can change in a person’s life in just a few years. Depending on the answer, I also ask how that next move is going to advance their overall long-term goals.

At least half the individuals, if not more, have no clear idea of what they want to do next or how that move fits into their career or life plan. This lack of clarity and focus is evident by their having

  • no target,
  • completely unrelated targets, or
  • too many targets.

Each is a symptom of their never having discovered who they are, what their purpose in life is, and what they can do to achieve their purpose. The spider monkey won’t let go because it focuses too intently on the banana in its hand, unaware of the danger lurking nearby. It thinks the banana is a sure bet, so it won’t let go. The monkey is myopic, blind to other possibilities, and thus loses its freedom.

A truism in marketing is that the more a company focuses on a target market, the greater its visibility and success. Once a company dilutes its brand and tries to be all things to all customers, it loses its competitive edge and then performs very badly and may even cease to exist. Individuals mistakenly believe that limiting their target “pigeon-holes” them and they want to “keep their options open.”

By trying to do too many different things, however, individuals weaken their career and personal brand and risk missing out on stellar opportunities. Imagine the following scenario when an undecided customer enters a store to buy something:

Salesperson: “How may I assist you?”
Customer: “I don’t know.”
Salesperson: “Are you looking for something specific?”
Customer: “Oh, I’m not sure what I’m looking for, I just know I want something better than what I have aleady.”

How can others help if someone isn’t specific about what he or she wants? When a recruiter looks at a resume that has no clear direction or focus, the recruiter feels a lot like the salesperson in the store, wondering what this candidate wants and how he or she can help the company achieve its goals or solve its most expedient problems. Networking contacts are equally confused and find it virtually impossible to connect that person to someone who might be of assistance.

In one of my favorite books, The Power of Focus, Canfield, Hansen, and Hewitt accurately point out that “your level of brilliance will determine the size of your opportunities in life.” What do they mean by brilliance?

Well, it’s not IQ, but rather discovering the activities you do brilliantly and effortlessly and that produce the most extraordinary results, give you the greatest energy, and provide the best income. Many individuals are competent in any number of activities and may enjoy them, but pinpointing the two or three that are your brilliant activities is crucial for your future success and will have a direct influence on your fulfillment and income.

It takes courage to let go of the banana. Individuals worry that they’re giving up something, and that’s true. Any choice necessarily means you’re giving up something else. Once individuals find their brilliance and consciously go after what they truly want, they find that what they let go of was frustration, dissatisfaction, stress, and a sense of feeling stuck. What they gain is growth that can never be fully measured but pays handsome dividends for the rest of their lives.

As one of my friends says, “History records the bold and the timid, but history remembers the bold.”

 

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Using the Right Tool at the Right Time: The Bio

Posted by on 27 March 2011, 4:11 pm

While the resume has long been the de facto tool most job seekers use to generate interviews, it’s not always the best “first” tool. For individuals who have been out of work for an extended time period or who are looking to transition to a completely different career, a resume could well be an impediment, especially if used as the first point of contact.

We have become conditioned to expect to either give or receive a resume, even when we’re just networking. But what happens to a stay-at-home mom who has been out of work for several years, or an individual who had to quit work to care for an elderly parent or a terminally ill spouse, or someone who has been out of work for a few years to undergo retraining as a result of job loss in an industry that has disappeared?

For these types of situations, a resume is not the best career marketing tool for initial contact because the recipient’s reflex is nearly always to look at dates and places of employment. Receptive communication is virtually impossible at that point because the person becomes fixated on negatives. Why has this person been out of work for so long?

A one-page executive or career bio, on the other hand, is great way to focus the conversation around what you have to offer a prospect. The bio filters your experience and succinctly highlights how your experience and achievements directly relate to the industry, company, or position for which you are positioning yourself. If you’re the job seeker, the purpose of a networking contact is most often to find out more information about a company, industry, or position of interest so you can better tailor and strengthen your marketing message and tactics.

By using a bio, you can tie together work and volunteer experiences that are relevant to your new career target, along with recent education or professional development training. For example, a few years ago I had a client who had been a stay-at-home mom for almost 10 years. Throughout that time span, she had been very active in volunteer organizations and served on the boards of several prestigious organizations. Her new career target was to provide career services at a college or university. In her volunteer experience, she had advised individuals and executives on a variety of career issues, and she’d recently completed a coaching certification program. With the bio, she felt much more confident meeting with someone to discuss potential opportunities because the bio presented what she wanted people to focus on about her strengths and value proposition rather than dates or places of employment.

After establishing rapport and building a connection with someone, it’s much easier to explain a gap in employment and avoid any potential negatives that might otherwise have arisen. There have even been occasions where using the bio during the meeting was so successful that the decision to hire the individual was already made and the resume became a mere formality. In some cases, the networking contact was not in a position to hire but did refer the individual to a close associate who then hired him or her.

It’s very important to remember when you’re networking to stick to established norms or specific rules. If you’re attending a networking event, find out in advance what the expectations are. For example, some professional organizations have events where attendees who might be job searching are encouraged to bring a bio or resume with them. Other groups consider that inappropriate and expect a simple business card exchange. Most job search groups or professionals-in-transition groups expect that attendees might have a bio or resume with them.

If you’re inviting someone to have lunch or coffee with you, what is the purpose of the meeting? You need to let the person know why you want to meet with him or her. If you tell that person you want to learn more about that person’s company or industry and you’d like some feedback on how you might position yourself, then that contact is likely to expect a bio or resume.

No matter how well the meeting goes, you are never to ask about openings or whether the contact is willing to distribute your resume to friends, associates, or colleagues. That decision is up to your networking contact. If things are going well, the likelihood is your contact will suggest a next step.

Always follow-up with your contact afterward by emailing or, better yet, by sending a handwritten card or note of appreciation. And by all means do what the contact suggested as a next step. For example, if your contact suggests you get in touch with one of his or her colleagues or associates and provides you the information, do it! So many times, I’ve had individuals say nothing is more annoying than to meet with an individual, offer some ideas or additional contacts, and then that person never follows up. You not only burn your bridge with your contact but potentially the persons he or she suggested you get in touch with. After all if you don’t follow through when you’re networking, one can only conclude you’ll not be a reliable employee.

 

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Speed Networking: Networking on Steroids

Posted by on 19 February 2011, 5:53 pm

I had my first opportunity to attend a speed networking event this week, and I wasn’t sure exactly what to expect. The event, organized by LinkingRaleighNC.com, was carefully orchestrated to ensure attendees knew before they registered what the purpose of the event was and that attendees would be screened to ensure a good mix of individuals so they would derive the most benefit. It was clear from the announcement and instructions that the event was for professional networking, primarily B2B. Attendees were told they would present a 30-second statement about themselves and why they were attending and that the format would have them moving around every 5 minutes.

In fact, what makes speed networking differ from traditional events is that attendees must move around the room quickly so that everyone has a chance to meet each other, at least that’s the goal. As it turns out, during the course of the 3-hour event, a few people quietly left at some point, which caused an imbalance in pairing individuals. At that point, with only 30 minutes remaining, the facilitator decided to allow people simply to interact as they saw fit.

While it may sound chaotic, it wasn’t. Attendees sat at a table across from each other. When the facilitator started the countdown (both a visual and auditory signal), each pair would have 5 minutes. In the pairing, one person would decide who would go first, each having 2.5 minutes to talk. It was great because the facilitator would say, “switch” when 2.5 minutes had expired, so the other person could start talking. In reality, some people followed the format very tightly, whereas others seemed more comfortable saying their introduction, then waiting for a couple of questions. Amazingly that process worked pretty well.

At the end of the 5 minutes, participants rose, shifted over 1 seat, and began again. With 45 to 50 people attending, it did get loud, so several people began to get hoarse after the first hour or so because they had to talk louder than one would in a normal conversation.

I found that only 3 people in this particular group violated or lost sight of the purpose of the event. Instead of framing their message as a quick introduction of what they do and letting the other person know how he or she could help them grow their business or help them professionally, these individuals launched into an aggressive attempt to sell me as an individual on their services/products. This approach was a total turnoff because that was not the intended purpose of this event. Fortunately, most people respected the rules and the format, presenting quickly what they do, either as a business owner or employee of a firm. I would then ask who their ideal client would be or how I could help them. In a few cases, the person was an unemployed professional who stated what they were looking for in the hope that the person seated across from them might be able to connect them with a helpful resource.

When it was my turn, I presented what I do as a career coach and resume writer. While I was there to find business opportunities, I was equally interested in finding people and resources who could potentially help my clients with their goals. For example, someone might be looking for an employee and my client would be a potential fit. In a few instances, there were people who had services that could help some of my entrepreneurial clients grow their businesses. I’m always looking for very good recruiters in different industries to whom I can refer my clients who are seeking new opportunities.

The concept of speed networking, like speed dating, is built around Malcolm Gladwell’s book, Blink, about rapid cognition where people think without consciously thinking. His research showed that people can actually pretty accurately “read” another person in about the time it takes to blink one’s eyes. If you haven’t read his book, I highly recommend it.

For someone like myself, a behavioral analyst, it was fascinating to observe body language and pace and to listen to tone of voice. Since much of what we communicate is done nonverbally, it was also interesting to pick up in just 5 minutes if there was a mismatch between the words and message and the person’s nonverbal communication. Only a couple of times did I detect something that seemed very off in a person’s communication. In one noteworthy instance it was quite dramatic and disconcerting. That person started talking, asked a question of me, and then abruptly stood up and walked away. The facilitator noticed and tried to direct this person back but he just walked away. His body language as I had observed earlier when he moved around the room seemed to indicated he was not really comfortable.

The key takeaway for those who might be reluctant to attend this type of event is that it gives you a perfect opportunity to polish your message because you end up saying it at least 20 times during the course of the event. Some participants were very accomplished, others a bit nervous, some a bit unfocused, but you can’t really lose when you’re meeting others. You either make a connection with someone or you don’t. You still come away being better able to deliver your message because you get instant feedback, if you’re really sensitive to not just the words but the nonverbal language of the person to whom you’re speaking. If most people seemed responsive, engaged, asked questions, and followed up with you after the event, you can feel pretty confident that you did well and there was good potential for you both to help each other.

It’s important to remember, however, that you won’t click with everyone you meet, so that’s okay too. I also appreciated that the facilitator made it clear from the beginning that it shouldn’t be a forced interaction, meaning if you didn’t want to connect again outside of the event, you shouldn’t feel obligated or pressured to do so. What the event also reinforced is that truly you only get one chance to make a good impression. Even if someone’s message wasn’t so polished or there was some nervousness, I found that I could overlook it because my gut feeling from the nonverbal cues usually were positive, with the exception of the 3 people I mentioned earlier. With the number of people attending the event, I think those are great odds. So if you can find a speed networking event, I’d encourage you to go for it!

 

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Avoiding Potholes

Posted by on 31 January 2011, 3:30 pm

How many times have you driven down an unfamiliar road, especially in winter, and you hit nearly every pothole? A few days later, you drive down that road again but now you hit fewer of the potholes. Provided road crews haven’t yet repaired any of the potholes, the next time you drive down that road, you say to yourself, “Hey wait, I know there’s a pothole at the spot coming up and I’m going to avoid it this time.”

Do you ever feel as though you’ve been hitting the same potholes in your career? Perhaps, you find yourself in yet another dead-end, boring job, or you look back over your career and  discover no definite career path. Nothing seems to link the companies or positions you’ve held.

Do you go from job to job, thinking the next one has to be better than the one you’re in? Maybe you’ve quit or been let go once or twice because of so-called “personality conflicts” between you and your boss or co-workers, or your boss said you had performance issues.

When these things happen, do you find yourself asking, “Why do I seem to keep making the same mistakes?” The good news is, while you can’t change the past, you can change the future by examining and improving your decision-making skills.

The first step to improving your decision-making skills and learning from past mistakes is to understand your emotional intelligence. No matter the size of your decision, large or small, your emotional intelligence influences the choices you make and the actions you take.

With my clients, I use a tool called the Emotional Quotient™, by Target Training International, to help individuals gain a better understanding of their emotional intelligence and how to leverage that knowledge to become more effective decision-makers. Your Emotional Quotient is the ability to sense, identify, understand, effectively apply, explain, manage, and control your emotions and that of others. Research shows that having a high EQ accounts for as much as 90% of success in top leaders.

The Emotional Quotient assessment measures five key areas:

Intrapersonal, the ability to understand yourself and form an accurate concept of yourself to operate effectively in life, which includes self-awareness, self-regulation, and motivation:

  • Self-awareness, the ability to recognize and understand your moods, emotions, and motivators and their effect on others.
  • Self-regulation, the ability to control or redirect disruptive impulses and moods and the propensity to suspend judgment and to think before acting.
  • Motivation, a passion to work for reasons that extend beyond money and status and the propensity to pursue goals with energy and persistence.

Interpersonal, the ability to understand other people, what motivates them, how they work, and how to work cooperatively with them, which includes social skills and empathy:

  • Social Skills, a proficiency in managing relationships and building networks.
  • Empathy, the ability to understand the emotional composition of others.

The EQ report helps pinpoint specific areas where you need improvement and outlines some strategies to help you. For example, if you score average or below average on intrapersonal motivation, you need to go beyond just developing a list of specific, measurable goals to include “why are these my goals?” Work daily on ways to achieve your goals, even if it’s just a few minutes a day. Find someone you respect whom you feel makes good decisions and is a goal achiever. Talk with him or her to learn how he or she overcomes obstacles to achieve success.

Another effective strategy is to maintain a daily journal. After several weeks or months of maintaining this journal, you’ll be surprised at what important, insightful discoveries you’ll make as you review your entries. Perhaps, you’ll find that you tend to make big decisions when you’re feeling particularly anxious about your job or important relationships or when you feel pointedly negative about yourself. For example, some clients have learned they tend to make job change decisions based mainly on what the job paid, not how or whether it would advance their long-term goals, provide new skill-building opportunities, or the potential negative effects on their family. If you find you have trouble articulating your emotions or making a link between your emotions, behaviors, and outcomes, a journal provides a way for you to write down your emotional responses to significant situations.

If you’re worried about someone else seeing your journal, you can always use an electronic journal and password protect it.

As you become more aware of what’s going on in your mind and your emotions when you’re contemplating important decisions, you’ll get better at making educated, sound decisions with your head, not just your heart. While it’s unrealistic to expect to avoid all the potholes in life, you can definitely learn to avoid the same ones and gain greater career satisfaction and success.

 

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Show Me, Don’t Tell Me

Posted by on 6 January 2011, 3:43 pm

One of the most memorable lines in movie history comes from the 1996 film, Jerry Maguire, where Rod Tidwell, played by Cuba Gooding, Jr., keeps shouting to his sports agent, played by Tom Cruise, “show me the money! Show me the money!” After hearing too many empty promises from his agent, Rod was emphatically making the point that he didn’t want more talk, just results, meaning a signed contract and the money that goes with it.”

Whether you’re out of work and searching for a new job or eyeing a promotion within or outside of your current employer, one of the most important points to remember is that employers are really only interested in your results.

What have you achieved, how did you achieve your results, and how do those results relate to the employer’s goals and the role/job/project they want you to perform? Do you have the knowledge and ability required to perform the job, do you play well with others in the sandbox, and are you motivated to stick around and get the job done without complaint, without excuses?

An effective resume must demonstrate what you can deliver. Just listing duties, responsibilities, activities, or education will not make you stand out from your peers or position you to overcome stiff competition in the marketplace. As the recession drags on and unemployment remains high, the competition is stiff indeed.

Sometimes, I use the analogy of an attorney who may deliver a great opening or closing statement, but what comes in between must be evidenciary in order to convince the jury beyond a reasonable doubt. In the case of a job seeker, the jury is the prospective employer. Another analogy is to think about the “show and tell” you used do when you were in elementary school. You had to bring an item or person with you to demonstrate the topic about you were speaking.

The pharmaceutical sales industry is a great example of an employer who demands verifiable evidence of your achievements. Many in that industry have a “brag book.” In today’s digital world, you have an even greater opportunity to showcase what you’ve done. No longer do you have to lug around a “presentation book” with reference letters, copies of quarterly goals achieved, and so forth to provide evidence of what you’ve accomplished.

Now you can use audio, video, and endorsements on your LinkedIn profile or other online social media sites to enhance your career marketing efforts.

Where’s your evidence? If you say you’re an expert relationship builder, give an example where you sourced and captured relationships that opened new markets, boosted revenues, or enhanced profitability for your company.  Maybe your relationship building efforts prevented the loss of an important customer.

To the employer, words are cheap. Remember, you’re competing with a lot of players because of the global nature of the marketplace. So to win, the employer demands that you show me, don’t tell me!

 

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Dreading Worse than Doing

Posted by on 14 October 2010, 11:48 am

One of the tasks I most hated when I was growing up, and admittedly still don’t enjoy, is washing dishes. I especially hated it on Sunday afternoons when the rest of the family would take naps after the big Sunday lunch, leaving me to do the dreaded chore all by myself. All through lunch, I would think about the mountain of dishes I would have to tackle and so I’d complain to my mother or just sigh a lot and make sure I looked sufficiently miserable so she might relent and have one of my brothers do it.

After lunch, I’d dutifully clear off the table but wait as long as possible before washing the dishes. I’d read a book, go sit outside, or find some other activity to distract and amuse me. Try as I might, however, the thought of those dishes would nag at me and dampen the enjoyment of my other activities.

Realizing my cheerless state of mind, my mother would often chide me, saying:”If you’d just make up your mind to do the dishes, you’d feel a lot better about it and you’d have the rest of the afternoon to do what you want. Dreading it is a whole lot worse than if you’d do it and get it over with.”

It’s human nature to avoid something we don’t like or think we won’t like, and we can be quite creative in our delaying tactics. Sometimes, those delaying tactics are disguised as activities we think are more important than the one or ones we’re avoiding. As humans, we have an endless capacity to rationalize and rely too heavily on momentary feelings.

Instead, we need to focus on our goals and doing what is necessary to accomplish those goals, even when it requires we stretch our capacity and move beyond our fears.

About twenty years ago, I attended a seminar on public speaking where the presenter repeated a phrase I’ll never forget: “You must fake it ’til you make it.” She talked about the importance of doing a particular action again and again regardless of your feelings until that action becomes comfortable and you gain proficiency. The discipline to do an action repeatedly until it becomes automatic is essential for long-term success in any venture.

In a job search or career management situation, there’ll always be activities you naturally prefer doing or are proficient in, whereas others create stress, uncertainty, and fear. Often, the activities you most fear are those that bring the greatest payoff on your time. For example, networking.

If an action is particularly hard for you, ask yourself what specifically is it that causes you fear or stress? In networking, clients often say they hate asking strangers or even friends for a job. A misunderstanding about the process of networking is usually at issue. Once clients realize networking is simply building relationships, not asking if someone knows of a job opening. the fear is diminished.

In building relationships, you find out what’s important to others and you also share your goals and interests. You should always seek to help others achieve their goals whenever possible. In doing so, you’ll discover others are willing to help you achieve yours.

Whatever has been holding you back from achieving the success you desire, the key is first deciding you’re going to tackle the issue despite your feelings and then taking purposeful action.

For example, if you feel nervous about how to approach others to network, consider finding a coach or mentor to help you. You might join a Toastmaster’s group to help you improve your overall communication and people skills. Any skill development involves learning more about the skill and putting that knowledge to work. Practice, practice, practice, then do it for real.

Each time you take the action that for you has been so hard to do, whether it’s networking, public speaking, or so on, reward yourself afterward and think of ways to improve areas where you may not have performed as well you’d like to have done. Also, compliment yourself on what you did well.

What’s interesting is that clients have said that an activity they used to think was scary eventually became something they looked forward to and enjoyed, but only after they had persistend in doing it. They felt proud of overcoming something that had heretofore been a hindrance and that success helped them tackle even greater challenges as they moved forward.

I’ll end today with inspiration from one of my favorite poems, It Couldn’t Be Done, by Edgar A. Guest.

 

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Filed under Career Advice, Career Development, Inspirational, Job Search, Motivational. Tagged , , , , , ,
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Interviews: Learning from Rejection

Posted by on 30 June 2010, 4:26 pm

You made it! You got the interview, and things went very well (probably feels like a major victory in the current slow job market). They gave you lots of information, asked you tough questions, and sold you on the company. You’re confident you made a good impression. When the interview concluded, they informed you they’d be selecting a candidate within two weeks and you’d be hearing from them. Now the waiting begins.

Knowing the importance of reinforcing your value, you sent a thank-you letter to the interviewer, making certain to demonstrate a couple of key points and reiterating you want the position! You’re confident you’ll get an offer.

The phone rings. The interviewer tells you they’ve selected another candidate who matched the position better. He or she thanks you for your interest in the company and wishes you success. Or, instead of a phone call, you receive an e-mail, telling you someone else has been selected.

Perhaps, more than two weeks have expired, and you’ve heard nothing. In that case, you call or e-mail the recruiter and politely ask the status. You find out someone else was selected.

No matter how the news is delivered, rejection feels terrible! The news feels especially devastating when you felt that the interview went so well. But rejection doesn’t mean failure, if you walk away with something positive!

Turning Rejection into Opportunity

For many people, getting turned down for a job, especially if it’s happened several times, becomes a vicious cycle of anger, frustration, confusion, and resentment. Left unchecked, these negative feelings can influence future interviews, leading to further rejection. So how can you turn rejection into opportunity?

Ask the interviewer for some quick feedback. Try to get one or two pieces of information to help you. If you call and get voice mail or if you e-mail, be polite and say you’d appreciate some quick feedback on your recent interview. Use the following as a guide, and please consider their time contraints. With a tight market as we’re experiencing now, hiring managers and recruiters can feel overwhelmed with the number of candidates for openings, and they may have fewer resources. Be realistic in your expectations. You may not receive a reply quickly or at all, but that shouldn’t stop you from trying.

  • What can I do better? Ask the interviewer what you could do better next time to improve your chances of getting an offer. Listen and learn. Resist the opportunity to defend yourself. For example, if the interviewer tells you, “Stay on the subject. You tended to get distracted.” Instead of saying, “I didn’t do that.” You might ask for clarification. “Could you give me an example of when I did that?” You’d be surprised how many interviewers will offer you valuable insights if you simply ASK. Interviewers are often prohibited by their companies from sharing the precise reason(s) for not extending you the job offer, but some of them will gladly share something to benefit you in the future. And the information is genuine.
  • Do you know of other opportunities in the company that would be a good match for me? This question is particularly good for job seekers whom the interviewer may have perceived as overqualified or underqualified. Asking this question may direct you to another job lead or help you discover whether the interviewer was truly concerned with your qualifications, or if there was another reason why you were not selected.
  • Did you interview a lot of good candidates? In a tight job market, you may very well be rejected for reasons over which you have no control. If the interviewer tells you the competition was fierce that may indeed be the case. Obviously, if they’re hiring one person and 1200 people applied, the competition is certainly fierce. It’s quite likely other candidates had more direct experience or more education, or more closely matched whatever criteria they sought.

Tip: Sometimes, you may see a job posting reappear several weeks or months later. Re-apply. You might get hired because you’ll be among a different pool of candidates. Just over a year ago, I had a client who interviewed and was not selected, but the person who interviewed her contacted her a few months later to let her know a similar position was opening and asked her to come back for an interview. She got the job. Ask the interviewer if he or she would encourage you to apply should a new position become available. That’s another way to gauge interest in you. Sometimes, a company may be hiring for several of the same positions, but not all at once.

Always walk away with something positive—need to improve your interviewing skills. Get some interview coaching. Need to adjust your job target, or take a course to boost your skills. Never burn your bridges. Everything you do makes an impression, good or bad. You never know who’ll be a conduit to a job.

The key is to ASK. Learn from your experience, and you’ll maximize your opportunity for success.

 

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Filed under Career Advice, Hiring, Interviewing, Job Search. Tagged , , , ,
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