Accelerate Your Search™ Now

“Be thankful for what you have; you’ll end up having more. If you concentrate on what you don’t have, you will never, ever have enough.” ~ Oprah Winfrey

Happy Thanksgiving!

In the US many are making plans for Thursday, Thanksgiving Day! The day marks the beginning of the holiday season and hopefully for you a time for quiet reflection and gratitude for the blessings of your life and all you have, and have been given.

As you plan your week, travels, events or whatever you will do this week to celebrate may you also pause to be thankful, I know I will. Then take a bit more time to plan how you will take advantage of all the holiday gatherings to connect with family, friends, make new friends and build relationships within your network. The holiday season is the best time of year to connect and build your network. Here are a few tips to maximize each gathering and leverage the many networking opportunities you will have over the next few weeks.

Be prepared to give something to everyone you meet. A smile, a kind word, a connection, even an opportunity to get to know a family member better can is a wonderful gift you can give another. Don’t forget to have business cards with you and share them as appropriate.

Be prepared to answer the question “What do you do?” or “Where do you work?” Avoid saying, “I am unemployed” instead share what you do, or your ideal job, clearly in less than a minute. If asked questions share more as appropriate, if asked where you work reply with you are currently seeking new opportunities within XXX (list your top 3 target companies), or that you most recently worked for XXX (your last employer).

Don’t beg for a job, sell yourself, and don’t ask those you meet if they know who is hiring or if their employer/company is hiring. Instead ask questions about the other person, what type of work they do, the company they work for and what they enjoy most about for the company. The odds are you will be very surprised to learn how you could help another person or something about that person and/or the company they work for that you would not have known without that chat.

Give the person you are talking with your full attention. Avoid the challenge of balancing a plate of food, and a glass, hold a plate or a glass but not both at the same time. It is okay to eat before you arrive at the gathering and focus only on visiting and networking. If you are gathering for a meal, ask questions and listen, listen twice as much as you talk!

Have a positive attitude about the event. Be sure to thank the host and/or organizer, even Aunt Sally, of the event and show appreciation for the work and effort to ensure the event’s success. As appropriate prepare and deliver simple unique, affordable, fun holiday gifts to say thanks.

One of my clients created a simple bookmark with a list of 5 top tips from her field and added a lovely sunrise photo she took on the other side. She gave them to each host or mailed them with a thank you. These were created on the computer in less than an hour and printed six to a page, so the cost was just right.

Do your best to ensure that everyone you meet and talk with feels special, valued and important. One of the easiest ways to do this is with focused listening.

Ask others questions about what they enjoy about the event, the season, or what is exciting or interesting in their life. Listen and ask follow up questions, avoid offering helpful suggestions or ideas unless you are asked for your ideas.

Avoid negative comments, conversations, and discussing that you are unemployed. Be happy and maintain an attitude of gratitude. Your upbeat attitude will prove contagious.

What is it that you need? Life has a way of providing what is needed. At least in my life and the lives of the people I know and the people I help.

Have you discovered like I have, that you NEED to know what you want before it will show up?

One of my favorite books, Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill helped me understand that as long as I know exactly what I want and take daily action toward what I want I get it. In the book, Napoleon Hill calls this “Definiteness of Purpose”.

It really did take me a long time to figure out that getting what I wanted was not as hard as I had made it for years. Why was it so HARD? First I was not clear about what I wanted, then I thought I had to know anything like what I needed, when I would need it and how to get each of those things I would need before I could start to move forward to get what I wanted.

For years I made getting what I wanted and needed hard. It is just not that tough. The process of being successful and getting what you want a like a job, a new career, a promotion or whatever starts with knowing exactly what you want, being open to discovering what you need and taking specific action to get what you want.

Have you decided what you want? When you decide what you want and go for it, you are on your way. In Napoleon Hill’s book he tells a story about a young child who knew just what she wanted, the action she took to get it and how in her determination ensured her success.

Another lovely woman I know is starting the job she wanted this week, after a focused very determined search. Joy (not her real name but a name that fits her well) identified the job she wanted and she pursued it.

Just like the child in Hill’s book who wanted fifty cents, (a large sum of money in the early 1900’s) from Mr. Darby’s uncle and was determine not to go home without fifty cents. When the reply to the child’s request for money was no, the child did not quit. Instead the child’s resolve did not waiver and she demonstrated the power of persistence to achieve her goal. Joy was showed the same resolve. She determined that just because she did not get what she wanted with her initial application, testing for the job and efforts to get an interview were not successful – the game was not over. Joy’s resolve was to take additional action and find what she needed.

Yes, it took almost eight months to get what she wanted. Joy was successful because she knew exactly what she wanted, she asked for what she needed and got it, and she worked each day to get what she wanted.

When I talked to Joy last week, she is very happy to be starting her new job this week and moving forward to achieve new goals and enjoy future success. Joy is just one more example of getting what you need when you need it. For Joy and you knowing what you want, being determined to get what you want and asking for what you need ensures the need will show up when you need it and equals success.

Several months ago when Joy needed a resource to help her get what she wanted, the resource showed up. The answer to her need show up not necessarily the way she thought it would, but it was what she needed. Why? Joy took a risk asked for want she needed and stepped into the unknown. She lost or overcame her fear and had faith and courage to ask for what she needed and believe that is would show up. It did!

Would you like to know how to make the process for you?

Decide what you want, then decide that no matter what you’re going to achieve what you want, that is what Hill calls “Definiteness of Purpose”. Next face your concerns and fears head on and watch them begin to dissolve. Now work and move forward toward your goal. All the things that you NEED to reach your goal will show up in your life to help you get what you want!

What do you need? It is no coincidence that you are reading this message right now. This message is the message you need to take you where you want to go.

To your accelerated search and success!

“You are never a loser until you quit trying.” ~ Mike Ditka

AUTOPILOT, cruise control, and automated systems are great tools. I highly recommend them. My long drives and life would not be the same without these tools. I use great tools to enhance my life and my work. I encourage you to find and use as many tools as you can to automate and streamline your job search, your networking and all the things you do.

There is one caution I would share. Mike Ditka got it right; I don’t believe you fail at anything unless you stop trying. Don’t lock on the cruise control and assume you can stop trying. You are still in charge of the wheel of the car! Using tools to automate tasks does not let you off the hook for the important work that needs to be done.

One of the best ways to save time to work on important things is to put systems in place to take care of time consuming task that need to be done. So do it. Would you be shocked to learn that you can automate most of the passive activities in a job search? Of course not, you have done it. My question to you is by doing so, did you quit trying or quit working on the high value items with the time and effort you saved by setting up “search agents” and posting your résumé to 150+ sites?

Do you spend all or most of your time looking at job postings that are dropped in your inbox? If so, you are more of a “buyer” of the products (jobs) offered, than a seeker of “opportunities”.

Are you trying to find opportunities with your automated systems? Or have you stopped trying, and just hope the “prefect” job will show up in your inbox one of these days?

You can counteract the rollercoaster of the market. You are set up systems and create a pipeline of opportunities in a good or a bad job market.

Here is what you do. Set up systems and a schedule with very specific activities. Create a specific market plan and market yourself consistently. Assess where you are, define the job you want, determine your goals, set up the tasks to be done, your marketing plan, your schedule and do. Automate, delegate and execute the really important things each day.

This ensures you know what you are doing each day, week, month, quarter and year to market yourself and that you are working on the important things. Yes, even after you land the job you want you still need to market yourself.

Have you quit marketing yourself?

Are you waiting for the “right” job to show up on your computer screen or inbox?

Are you taking action and getting results?

Are the results you are getting great or just okay?

Do you need some help to tweak your systems or results?

“Wherever there is danger, there lurks opportunity; whenever there is opportunity, there lurks danger. The two are inseparable. They go together.”~ Earl Nightingale

Have you ever had one of those phone calls that when you heard the voice on the other end of the line speak and you felt danger or distress? I had one of those calls this week, the call began, “Hi, I need some help…”

At first, my thoughts raced as I listened, after a few seconds I knew there was no physical danger and no one was injured. The distress in the voice on the call was intense.

After the call, I was reflecting on the situation and the Earl Nightingale quote above popped to my thoughts. It is a reminder that the line between danger and opportunity can be very thin.

I know that awareness, experience, knowledge and preparation build confidence and create the best responses in all situations. In business and in our careers, we so often turn those “thin” points in time into unique situations with better than envisioned outcomes and profitable opportunities because of our preparation and awareness.

In life, business, and my career, I know that experience is often the thing I get just after I needed it most. I also know thousands of people who agree with me, that preparation and awareness are the keys that allow each of us to apply our knowledge and similar experience to create focus and successful outcomes that others view as luck!

In case you are wondering the call that began, “Hi, I need some help…” was from someone who had been working to create focus and successful outcomes. The caller was so prepared he built into his search what he called a “lifeline” call. That call helped him deal with an unexpected question about relocation and turn it into a second interview and continue conversation in a few minutes.

What preparation are you building into your job search?

Are you using a portion of your time each week to create focus, tap into your experience and knowledge?

Are you prepared to create the most successful outcomes in your job search and career?

What opportunity lurks if you are prepared?

Are you creating your own luck or are just hoping for the best?

Are you too busy doing things to make time to prepare?

To Your Accelerated Search and Continued Success,
Cindy