Accelerate Your Search™ Now

If you are new to LinkedIn you may have questions on where to start.  Here are tips for getting starting with LinkedIn.

LinkedIn and Personal Branding can be great tools to help you in your job search.  LinkedIn can help you be seen by those who need to know you, find you, and get to know you better.

Using Groups and LinkedIn Answers are both solid ways to reach a target audience.  Each feature provides interactive ways for you to be seen and heard by your target audience.  As you engage in a group dialogue or a business conversation with peers, group members you showcase your knowledge you can answer questions and become seen as an expert by answering the questions of others in your field, industry or area of interest.

Be sure you cover the basics and have a solid foundation before you move to advanced features and apps.  Think about your brand, communicate your unique value and be consistent.

Here are the pillars for your foundation:   Name, Headline, Photo, Your Personalized URL, Experience, Education, and Summary.  The first five (5) are critical to getting started.  You can set up your account and in a professional manner and begin connecting with others after you have these areas set up as your foundation.

Don’t forget about your account settings.  Many in the career field will also recommend you upload your text résumé to your account to save time.  That is not a recommendation I make, but do it if you are in a rush and speed to market is more important to you than quality.

Now get busy, offline and make a list of those key people and centers of influence that you wish to invite to join your LinkedIn network.  Once you have the list, take time to reach out to them, tell them you have joined LinkedIn and ask if they would accept an invitation from you to connect?  Then send a personalized LinkedIn invitation to you initial list of contacts and centers of influence.

Again, this method is not the easiest or fastest one for adding LinkedIn connections.  It is a method sure to enhance your relationships and strengthen your network as you build your list of connections on LinkedIn.  If speed or just amassing large numbers of connections is more important to you than the quality of the connection or the relationship, you can simply allow LinkedIn access to your email addresses, and send all of your email contacts who also have a LinkedIn account, a generic invitation to connect with you on LinkedIn.

You have your LinkedIn foundation set, this tool in place and initial invitations sent.  Next you can focus on other features to leverage LinkedIn to accelerate your search.

Do you have a question about your search or LinkedIn?  Look to the right and sign up for next Q & A session, join the session and ask your question.

Who decides if you are overqualifed and why?  The employer does.  That’s who. 

Why is there so much focus on overqualifed?  I don’t know.  I, of course, do have an opinion on the matter, but I doubt that will help you accelerate your search.  However, maybe I can help you by looking at the issue a bit differently.

Have you ever said to a door to door salesperson, “Not today, thank you” or the Boy Scout “No thank you, I bought caramel corn from another scout before you” or “we don’t eat caramel popcorn, thank you for stopping by”?   In many cases the dreaded statement “You are overqualified for this position” is just simply a no thank you.

Yes, I know the dreaded statement stings.  It does not feel like ‘no thank you’ or does it?

What happens if you reframe “You are overqualified” to “No, thank you”?

My bet is you think the later stings less, but does it really?  Think about it.  It is still rejection.  Rejection is, in my view the underlying issue with most of the conversations around the issue and statement “You are overqualified”. 

No one (at least no one I know) likes to be rejected.  And almost no one I know likes to reject others.

Especially, if you are in business and interviewing someone or talking to someone with good skills, and loads of experience.  Most people don’t like to be mean or reject another person, even when they don’t personally connect.  Sure there are some that do, you know them, and I do too.

What would happen if you heard “No, thank you” in lieu of “You are overqualified for this position”?  Think about  it!

I once knew a hiring manager who, said “thank you” and allowed someone else to say “No, thank you”.  Here is how he did it – during the each interview he was very good at finding something good about all the candidates he rejected.  He picked out something good about the candidate and made a mental note.  At the end of the interview, he confirmed the candidate’s home phone number, and he called each one after an interview.  Usually he placed the call before the person arrived home and left a message, he would share the one good point he noted and thank them for interviewing.  He would end the message with ‘good luck, your <whatever the good point was> will be of value to your next boss.   I learned that good quality he shared with the candidate was always a quality he appreciated, but he did not value at that point in the role that he was attempting to fill.  

Why, did he do this?  Well, I never ask him, yet here is why I think he did it.

He cared about people and the feelings of people. He saw value and appreciated what each person offered.  He appreciated the time the person set aside to interview.  He did not like rejection, and he might want to hire the person for another position some day.  He was building a team and running a business.  The call was “rejection protection” – so that in the future if he had a role for the person, the person would recalled him in a positive light in lieu of the hiring manager who had once rejected them.  It helped him build relationships and create goodwill.

The end result – still the rejection, but the rejection did not address a lack.  It appeared to sting less.

In my view it can be hard to build talented teams when you focus on lack.  Yet most hiring systems and hiring situations will reject several people.  The process in most organizations is look at many, interview some, hire one.

The truth is you were not selected and someone else was for whatever the reason.  That feeling is rejection.

Yet if you reframe your feelings, and focus on your value and not  the ‘over’ or ‘under’ or what you lack, you may be surprised at what you attract.  Why continue to focus on the lack? 

My suggestion – understand you will be rejected from time to time, learn to cope with it.  You don’t need to like it, crave it, nor attract rejection with continued focus, thought and conversation. 

I would also suggest you not dwell on the rejection, or try hard to figure out why you were rejected, nor rail against the company, your experience or your age.  The rejection may be a blessing you can not yet count.  Reframe it as “No thank you”.   

One day on the radio I heard, rejection in dating referred to as protection from a bad situation.  What a point of view!

What would happen in your job search is you reframed the rejection or the statement “You are overqualified” as “No, thank you – I value you as a person and want to protect you from this situation”?

Just a different point of view on “You are overqualified”.

Feel free to share your comments below.

If you are not turned in and aware of  SOPA maybe it is time to learn about it …

It can impact you, small companies, large companies, it might impact what you pay for any service or product you access online and it might well impact your job search.

Learn more:

http://thenextweb.com/lifehacks/2011/12/21/confused-by-the-stop-online-piracy-act-heres-sopa-for-dummies/

I hope you will learn, be informed, and share your views whatever they my be with those in Congress.  Congress will decide on this matter.

My view is mine alone, I don’t think SOPA will stop piracy.   I do think it will increase costs for small business and non-profits, slow job grow in those areas, limit some options and have a huge impact on the structure of the internet which currently allows the free exchange of information.  Including access to key people and hiring managers. 

If you enjoy and use the internet to exchange and share information today with a minimul cost, like your connection and access tools, get informed.  Share your view with Congress.

This can be a tough time of year. It is also is one of the best times of the year to be job searching. Businesses are looking forward to the new year and planning for the year ahead.

If you do have the holiday blues because you need or want a new job, yet you are not sure what to do to chase the blues away, ask yourself a few questions:

–          What am I willing to do to get the job what I want?

–          Can I clearly describe the job I want?

–          When will I start to take action to get the job I want?

–          Am I willing to help someone else get want they want?

The answers may surprise you or seem painfully obvious … but if you want to land the job you want now, you must stop doing what others are doing, what you have been doing and take a hard look at what you want to do and what your ideal employer wants and needs.

If an employer wants or needs something you don’t want to provide, that employer is not your ideal employer.  

If you are not willing to help an employer get want they want – more revenue, reduced costs, a better product, more customers, and/or more sales, then you are not their ideal employee and why would they hire you!

What is causing your holiday job search blues?  

Could it be because you are trying to cram your wants and needs on an employer with different wants and needs?  OR are you trying to cram yourself into a job where the wants and needs are different than what you really want to do to achieve your goals?

Take a look at what you are doing.  Are you willing to change what you are doing?

Stop and focus on your ideal employer.  What do their issues tend to be and what do they need most right now – how would you change your personal marketing message and your job search so that your ideal employer would see you as the solution to their needs right now and say WOW, let’s talk – you are just the person we need to join our team and get the results we want in the coming year.

Here is your assignment to chase away the holiday blues.  Discover what your ideal employer wants and needs.  If you can meet those needs formulate a clear message to communicate to your ideal employer how you can deliver what they want and need and how you will help them achieve their goals.

One of the fastest ways to chase away your blues is to help someone else get what they want.  Helping an employer get what they want and need is one of the fastest ways to get what you want, to help you achieve your goals and to get hired.

Do you need more action assignment to do to speed up your search? 

Look to the right and request my gift to you – “162 Ways to Accelerate Your Job Search and Land the Job You Want”.

During a job search there are days when focus is hard to achieve and your search slows down or stops, we all have those days.  Those days can impact your attitude, your focus, your workflow and the pace of your search. 

You know the days I am referring to – don’t you? 

YES, those days were you wander from your email, to LinkedIn, follow a link, read an article, listen to an interesting podcast, sign up for a free webinar, talk to friends on the phone, watch TV, or YouTube and then before you know it the day is gone and it is 6:15pm.  Your family is home and there are more distractions.

Here are a couple of ways to avoid the lack of focus.  Create practical plan and time within the plan for focus and to get you on track and moving forward. 

Plan your search.  Create a plan for your day and your week.  This really helps on those days when feel lost or frustrated and you don’t know what to do or where to start. 

When those days come, you look at your plan and do the tasks on your plan.  Just get the job done; doing what is on your plan helps you focus and continue to move forward.  If you don’t do what is on your plan, you may be consumed with distractions, lack of focus, and the result is you find yourself wasting the day.

Then there are also those days that when there is consistent string of interruptions to your work flow.  For each interruption it can take you 10 to 15 minutes to return to the task at hand in a productive manner.  The time you waste due to interruptions can be massive and the impact on your focus is dreadful.   

Here is how to create space for focus and avoid this consistent time waste of those days within your plan.  Choose specific hours of your workday as your uninterrupted time.  Block the time as an appointment with yourself on your calendar.  Don’t schedule other appointments or calls during that time.  Each day during this time turn off the communication tools and all distractions, email, phones, chat, text, etc.  Educate your family and friends that you may not be interrupted during this time. 

Each day during this time work on one thing and one thing only that will accelerate your search until that one thing is complete.  My bet is you will be amazed at your productivity increase and what you can achieve in a short time.  It works for me.  Try it.  Then let me know how it goes.

Have a comment, thought or tip to share?  Post it below.

Need more ways to speed up your search?  Look to the right and request my gift to you – “162 Ways to Accelerate Your Job Search and Land the Job You Want”.

It is the job you want, you landed the interview, it went great, you are leaving and planning your follow up and the first day at work – yippee!  Then it hits you – you didn’t ask for the job.

Don’t be afraid or forget to ask for the job.  Landing a job is about sales and in sales you don’t close deals if you don’t ask for the sale.  It can be scary, intimidating, or just plain uncomfortable but you must do it.

Do you believe in your skills?  Your value? Your ability to do the job? Can you help this company get results?   If you answered yes, then help them hire you and ask for the job.

Practice a few ways to ask for the job.  You don’t get what you deserve you get what you ask for, state you value and what you can do for the company and ask for the job! 

Have a question about how to ask for the job at the end of the interview? Sign up and join me on the next Q & A call, ask your question and get an answer.

Need specific ways to speed up your search?  Look to the right and request my gift to you – “162 Ways to Accelerate Your Job Search and Land the Job You Want”.

Have a comment or thought?  Post it below.

People are often afraid of something new.  You might be afraid because interviewing is out of you comfort zone, or had a bad experience, or have no experience interviewing. 

Fear does pop up for all of us from time to time – at least if you are like me and honest with yourself. I am afraid of different things, usually for me it is either something new or something I do really don’t have much experience or practice doing.  Fear does pop up in my life.  Does it in yours?  I have discovered most of people I know don’t share what they are afraid easily.  Do you?

On Friday, I was with a group of great and talented people, discussing interviewing and we did honestly talked a bit about interview fears.  Why, because the talent in the room understood that if the fear remained it would hold them back. 

You know what I mean – don’t you?  

It is like when you were a kid and you were afraid there was something under the bed, outside, or in the closet.  As soon as you shared the fear with someone you trusted like a parent, friend, brother or sister – what happened? 

Well for me, I only shared those fears with trusted people, who would not judge me for the fear, because to me that was as scary as the fear.  What I learned was if I picked people I trusted, they would then help me explore my fear. 

I usually I discovered with help and guidance that my fear was “False Evidence Appearing Real”.  Like the noise I heard was not evidence of something under the bed that would harm me, but the bedcovers brushing the floor when I moved in bed.

What I learned by sharing my fear, was to reduce the fear to a concern.  Once I did that then I could discover what the concern really was and how to address the concern. 

If you have interview fears, try this. What is your interview concern?  How can you address it?

A common concern I hear often is what if the interviewer doesn’t like me.  Reduce the fear to a concern and take action to address the concern.

Need a tip for this fear?  Here is mine – like the interviewer first! 

Here is how in simple steps:

1. As soon as you meet the interviewer, notice something about him/her you like.  It could be a tie, shoes, smile, anything. 
2. Hold the thought of what you like in your mind for 30 to 60 seconds.
3. Got it. Say to yourself (doing this aloud might work, but works better to yourself)   “I like John’s <use his/her name> smile <insert what you like> he is very friendly <insert why you like whatever you like>.”  
4. Now, repeat the message and make eye contact.  “I like John’s smile, he is very friendly.”  
5. Then let the thought go.

When you like the interviewer in some way first, think about it and then let the thought go, you have taken action, moved your fear to a concern, and addressed the concern.  From fear, to concern, to action. 

Have a question about interviewing? Sign up and join me on the next Q & A call, ask your question and get an answer.

Need specific ways to speed up your search?  Look to the right and request my gift to you – “162 Ways to Accelerate Your Job Search and Land the Job You Want”.

Have a comment or thought?  Post it below.

What is the best answer or best way to sell myself to land the job I want?

Not a week goes by that someone does not ask this question – there is not one best answer or one best way.   No two people are alike and no two candidates are alike.

The most successful approach it to focus on who you are, your strengths, what you offer and your unique talents.  That’s what sets you apart from the other candidates who will interview for the job you want. 

This approach is not hard but does require focus.  Begin with an assessment of your strengths, skills and talents.  Then plan how to communicate your value in each area.  Build your marketing message and tools showing how you can and will use your talents to provide consistent, performance to help an organization achieve its crucial business goals.  

The reason this is hard for most people to sell their talent and strengths during a job search is they get too focused on the past, or on what is missing or what’s wrong.  Focus first on you and your value. 

It is easy to get focused on what you don’t have, what you need to “fix” or what your weaknesses are, and move into comparison mode, but that is a dead end road to mediocrity.  Invest some time and focus on assessing your strengths, what you do well, your talents and how you can best apply these to the marketplace. 

When you know yourself, your value, your talents, your strengths, and how to communicate what you want, then you don’t dread an interview or talking to a potential employer.  Nor do you need to spend hours fixating on re-wording a résumé or writing a cover letter to fit a job posting, instead you can spend your time on targeted interactions within the organizations who can use and are looking for your skills and talent.

What are your natural talents? 

What pertinent knowledge and skills do you offer the marketplace? 

How can you use your talent to help the organization achieve a significant return on their investment in your salary?

Can you clearly share this information with a potential employer in a few minutes?

Your job, your career, and what you do to earn a living shapes your life and your well being in many ways.  Some people love the break no job allows, some learn to make being unemployed work for them, some love to work and return to work quickly, still others buckle under the stress, don’t know what to do, how to find a new job and struggle to find employment and return to work.  How are you adapting?

The stress of not having a job and looking for a job may not only have major financial and emotional impact, the impact is long lasting.  According to the research by economists Andrew Clark and Yannis Georgellis and psychologists Ed Diener and Richard Lucas that was published the June 2008 issue of The Economic Journal, of the six life-changing events studied, only unemployment has a consistent effect for the five years after the event.  Five years! A 60-month impact!  That is significant. I see that impact daily!  The research is focused on Germans, however I doubt that is would be much different if focused on Americans.

The impact is great for some and not so great for others.  The stress of a job search with little focus, a limited plan, and poor execution can throw a talented professionals into a long drawn out search.

A long search can create financial challenges, stale skills, and adaptation to circumstances that often do become a double-edge sword.  Don’t get me wrong – adaptation is not a bad thing. It is a good thing that people are adaptable and can flex to a change in schedule, changing seasons, or 30% to 40% cut in pay – that is often the difference between a paycheck and an unemployment check.

However, I see adaptation play out on the other edge of the sword too.  Such as behaviors the lead others to make value judgments or have their biases confirmed.  Have you adapted to a more casual dress or appearance, a different view of time or activities, a different sense of urgency or sense of value, or a sense of entitlement?  How you clarified your view of what is important and what type of work you want to do going forward?

In many cases our behaviors and actions are not perceived by others as we intent.  People adapt to their environment over time, some do this with purpose and for some this just occurs.  People get used to everything, a style of dress, pace, culture, weather, and income level. It does take time to adjust but everyone adjusts.

The caution I have for those in a search is that employers know people adjust too.  If your pace, dress, or attitude has adjusted, take a look to see if this adaptation is one that the employers you are targeting view in a favorable manner.  Does the adaptation align with your values and the values or the organizations you want to join?

If the adjustment is not favorable or in alignment, the change may impact how potential employers view you and your ability to get the job done and how you will fit into the culture.  The employer’s perception is their reality. 

If you don’t at least understand the perception of your target employers, it can be very hard to address the needs or concerns.  If the employer’s concern is you have adapted to a slower pace of life or business, or different manner of dressing, and the employer wonders if you can quickly adapt to a high stress, fast pace again, or a standard of business dress, it may be in your best interest to discover and address the concern.

What adaptations have you made?

How do these changes impact your goals?

What are the concerns a target employer might have about your recent adaptations?

Have you adapted too much to being unemployed?

In Katherine Bindley’s post “Should Women Wear Engagement Rings to Interviews?”  she explores an interesting question.  She addresses elements of interviews and/or negotiations that I still find many people don’t think through completely – the perception of others.  What others think is their reality and it counts!

Everyone (recruiters, career coaches, hiring managers) I know will tell you eliminate distractions and sending the wrong message during interviews and negotiations.  I agree.  One of the best ways to avoid sending the wrong message is to be very clear about your message and to be on brand.

 When you take the time to identify, clarify and communicate your brand you create solid ways to leverage what sets you apart from the crowd and your unique value.  It is one of the best ways to avoid and eliminate distractions.

You may never change the perception of others.  However, a strong personal brand will draw your brand audience and those who value your unique value to you.

Your strong personal brand will help you leverage your strengths; align your values, goals and vision.  A strong personal brand will help you dliminate distractions.

Also with a strong personal brand you will not find yourself asking the question – Should I wear ___<you fill in the blank> ___?  … before an interview, negotiation, or performance evaluation again.  Instead you will prepare with confidence and a smile knowing what you wear is on brand and helps to send your message without distraction.  You will also give the interviewer and the world what is exclusively yours to give.

Do you have questions or comments?  Post them below.