Category: Charting Your Career for Success

Charting Your Career for Success:
Feeling a pull towards something different in your work life? This category is your compass for navigating the exciting and sometimes challenging journey of career change. Whether you’re contemplating a slight pivot or a complete industry leap, you’ll find guidance and resources here to help you:

Explore new career possibilities that align with your passions and skills.
Identify your transferable skills and how to leverage them in a new field.
Develop a strategic plan for making a successful transition.
Learn practical tips for networking, upskilling, and adapting your job search materials.
Find inspiration and real-world stories from others who have navigated career changes.
It’s never too late to pursue a more fulfilling and meaningful career. Let’s explore the possibilities together and help you confidently chart your new professional path.

The Biggest Job Hunting Mistake You Can Make Is Not Trying.

Hunting for jobs take a lot of work. It is easy to let up and take your search lightly. Finding a job is like building a business. Even when business is slow you can make preparations for when business will return. Here are some things you can do during a lull in activity.

1. Send a thank you note to your friends and references to thank them for their support and let them know that you remain active in your search effort.

2. Make your resume tighter. Reduce the accomplishments in older jobs and increase the list of accomplishments in recent jobs.

3. Get on your professional network and review your group memberships.

4. Build your database of company contacts. Making a direct application to an employer is far better than applying through a job board or a membership site. There is a company research page on the tab “Companies” at the top of this JayWren.com website.

5. Buy career books or get a library card and check out books that will help you hunt for a job.

6. Work on your skills.  There are YouTube videos on nearly every subject imaginable.  There are nearly 900 links and articles on this website to help you with your career.

7. Keep your chin up.  Work on your attitude through videos on YouTube.com, books, and websites.  Hunting for a job is tough work.  Be tough on yourself to work hard in your job hunt but never get down on yourself,

8. Avoid negative people.  Stay in touch with people who always have a positive attitude and who will urge you to stay focused.

9. You are your greatest asset.  Eat healthy.  Get daily exercise,

10. Remember that tough times pass.  You may just need to work really hard to move through them.

The 30-60-90-Day Plan for Jobs and Job Interviews

Before you go to a job interview, put together a 30-60-90-day plan.

You can write the presentation in Word or PowerPoint.

Some people use Excel.   If you can keep the presentation to two or three columns, you might use Excel.  From what I have seen, people load Excel with so many columns and rows that the audience has trouble understanding the presentation.

With a 30-60-90-day plan, you can do three things.

When interviewing, you can use your plan to see whether your plans fit the company and whether the company fits you as a person.

You can show the hiring company that you are right for the job.

When you start, you can begin with a head start at your new job.

In the first thirty days, you need to learn the job.

If you have experience, you might be able to assume full responsibility in 90 minutes.   If you are a trainee in an entry-level job, your first week to thirty days is training.

Even if you are able to step right into a job, you will need to learn a great deal.  Get to know the other employees.  Immerse yourself in the company culture.  You will find new systems and that the new company does things differently.  A good way to start your new job is to become a sponge.

  1. Ask questions.
  2. Listen to what everyone has to say.
  3. Read all the company material on your responsibility.
  4. Keep all the material you receive.  You may need it later.
  5. Ask your supervisor how you can work together.
  6. Discuss with your supervisor how the company fits together as a culture and as an organization.

A dangerous pitfall for experienced people is to do things the way they did them at their former employer.

Treat each task as though it is new. Ask yourself whether you know how to do your new job or whether you are doing what you did at your old company.  If the two are different, you can fail to do your new job well.

After the first thirty days, you should work with more freedom.

Your confidence and comfort are higher.  When you speak with your supervisor, discuss your activities and plans.  Ask your supervisor for feedback on your priorities.  If there are things that you need to have finished during your first thirty days on the job, add those things to your daily schedule to get them done as quickly as possible.  Show your supervisor how you are tracking on the things you are doing.

After sixty days on the job, you are working independently.

Your work is up-to-date.  You have successes you can show your supervisor.  You have scheduled your activities into the weeks and months ahead.

In your 30-60-90-day job interview presentation, you can show a list of things you will have completed during the first ninety days.

After ninety days, your skills and knowledge are high.  You can add a matrix to your presentation to show how you will manage your job and future projects beyond the first ninety days.

SWOT SUCCESS ANALYSIS

STRENGTHS

WEAKNESSES

OPPORTUNITIES

THREATS

If plan with this amount of detail, you will learn whether the job is correct for you. You will show the hiring company that you are right for the job. When you start to work at the new company, you have a head start.

19 Top Job Interview Questions

19 Top Job Interview Questions

You can never know what questions an interviewer will ask you. However, here are some of the more popular questions.

  1. Why are you leaving your current job?
  2. What is your greatest achievement?
  3. Who was the best supervisor you have ever had?
  4. Who was the worst supervisor you ever had.
  5. What makes you the best person for the job?
  6. What is your greatest strength?
  7. What is your greatest weakness?
  8. What are your long-term goals?
  9. What do you plan to do the first 90 days on the job?
  10. What do you do to grow professionally?
  11. What qualities to you seek in building a team?
  12. What are your career passions?
  13. What did you want to become when you were a kid?
  14. What is your typical day?
  15. What is your greatest failure and what did it teach you?
  16. Have you ever told a lie?
  17. Whom do you most admire?
  18. What is the most difficult problem you ever had to handle and what did you do handle to the problem?
  19. Where did your parents work?

Add to these questions some other questions to ask yourself some questions before you go to the interview.
The first questions are the things you will do for the hiring company.

  1. What five things you will do for the company the first 30 days on the job?
  2. What five things you will do for the company the first 60 days on the job?
  3. What five things you will do for the company the first 90 days on the job?

The next questions are how your professional goals will do for the company.

  1. What are your short-term professional goals that match the short-term company goals?
  2. What are your long-term professional goals that match the long-term company goals?
  3. What goals do you have that can create innovation at the hiring company?
  4. What professional development goals do you have that will make you more effective for the company over time?

The next questions are what you want to work for this company.

  1. What do you think of the company’s products?
  2. What do you think of the job place?
  3. What do you think of the company’s mission statement?
  4. What do you think of the company’s business sector?

Writing out these questions and writing out your answers will help you be ready to show the hiring manager how you are the best person for the job.

Turn Job Shopping into Job Hunting

Turn Job Shopping into Job Hunting

“I must create a System, or be enslav’d by another Man’s.”  -William Blake

Shoppers buy products that are easy to find and are popular with other shoppers.  When I go to the supermarket, I shop.  I buy the things that the store has on hand.

The people who buy products for resale decide what products to buy based on the amount of profit in a product and how quickly a product sells.  If a buyer invests in a product that sells for a 50 percent profit and takes six months to sell, the buyer might consider the product a good investment.  If the product sells for a 1% profit and take six months to sell, the buyer might consider the product a risky investment.  On the other hand, if the buyer invests in a product that returns a 1% profit and sells in one week for weeks on end, the buyer will more likely see that product as a lower risk.  The buyer can sell that product four times before the bill comes due from the supplier.

The less space a product takes on the shelf is also important.  Retailers try to make the most profit possible per square foot.

The place where the retailer is most likely to sell the most products is at the checkout stand.  The simple reason is that everyone must go through the checkout aisle to buy any products.

Chewing gum, mints, and popular magazines take little space, sell very quickly, and get the premium spot in retail stores.  Retailers place these products at the checkout stand where every customer must go before leaving with any purchases.

So when I go shopping, I am buying things that buyers consider a good investment.  In most cases, shopping satisfies all my needs and wants.

When I hunt for a product, I take my efforts to a higher level.  I want something that buyers may not consider a good investment and do not regularly stock.

Buyers value customers as much as they value profit on an individual product.  I moved to Sacramento from Houston.  While living in Houston, I developed a taste for Tab colas.  When I moved to Sacramento, I discovered that most retailers do not even carry Tab and that the bottler shipped Tab only in six-packs and not in twelve-packs.  The price of a six-pack of Tab was the same as the price of a twelve-pack of Coca-Cola.

To get all this information, I had to do some hunting.  I spoke with the store manager at the Raley’s market where my wife and I regularly shop.  I called the buyer at the Raley’s headquarters.  I called the vice president of sales at the bottling company that made the Tab.

I became a product hunter.  The bottling company agreed to bill the store where I bought Tab the twelve-pack price for two six-packs of Tab.  The store began to stock Tab, which invariably sold out as soon as the product came in.  In response to the out of stocks, the store began to keep a back room stock for me to pick up when I was in the store.

Retail shopping and job shopping are similar.  Job shoppers go to the regular places everyone shops for jobs.

  1. Job boards
  2. Corporate Recruiters
  3. Company websites
  4. Current contacts in their networks

Job shoppers find the jobs that hiring companies promote the highest.  Job shopping may fit your needs.  You may find that you can pick from a variety of jobs.

However, you may not want to settle for what you find from job shopping.  Just as I found when I moved from Houston to Sacramento and attempted to buy Tab Colas, you may need to go to the job sources to get the job for you.  You may need to become a job hunter.

A job hunter decides what to hunt for and where to find it.  If a job hunter wants to work as an aviation mechanic, the job hunter goes to an airport or airplane factory.

Job hunters decide what concessions or compromises to make.  A job hunter who is willing to live anywhere will have more places to apply for a job.  Job hunters who accept contract, full-time, part-time, or temporary work increase the number of jobs for which they can apply.

Job hunters take a direct approach to get a job with a specific company.

  1. They create or expand their list of contacts who work for the company or have worked for the company.
  2. This list has no value if job hunters do not use them.  Job hunters introduce themselves or ask other people to introduce them to people who work for the company.
  3. Through these introductions, job hunters build professional relationships who can help them know more people at the company.
  4. They work with these relationships to get recommendations for the job they are seeking.

Building relationships in job hunting takes time.  Some trails lead nowhere.  Job hunters track more than one opportunity at a time.

Job hunters know that no matter how many relationships they make at a company, pursuing a career at that company may just never happen.

  1. Yet there are always other companies and realizing when a trail is a dead-end is discouraging but helpful information.
  2. Relationships at a company along a dead-end trail are sometimes the relationships who lead to the next opportunity.
  3. Job hunters look for opportunities within opportunities.  As their contact list grows, they look for overlaps in connections.  A person who cannot help them can connect them with the person who can.

Job hunters take action.

  1. Job hunters call people.  If a job hunter needs to speak with someone, the job hunter picks up the phone and calls that person.
  2. Job shoppers send emails asking people to call them.
  3. Job shoppers are passive.  They feel no need to be resourceful.
  4. Job hunters are fearless and aggressive.  They do not ask other people to take action.  Job hunters act.

Not everyone needs to become a job hunter.  The role does not fit everyone.  However, there is a whole world of opportunity that exists only for the job hunters.

Tis the Season to Get a Job!

Jobs are always in season.  I have had applicants accept offers on nearly every day of the year. There are holidays year round.  If hiring managers have a need to hire a person, they continue the recruiting process until they make that hire.  If you going through a lag in activity, you can do things to create more activity in your job search.

Register with temporary agencies.  Many temporary jobs become careers. I have made permanent hires that started as temporary referrals.  I have a friend who started in a temporary job seven years ago.  He did a great job.  The company then funded his job as a full-time job.  He is still working for the same company.  He is in a larger role.

Look for seasonal jobs, part-time jobs, and full-time on the Internet.  There are listings for part-time work at all levels.  You can search Google for “part-time executive jobs,” “part-time director jobs,” and “part-time manager jobs.”  You will find listings for part-time work for nearly every job imaginable.

Continue to contact people right through the holidays. Most people are still working. Whether they are working or not, nearly everyone is reading email either to stay ahead at work or simply from habit.

Reconnect with your recruiter network.  Remind them that you are still out there.  Add new recruiters to your list of contacts and connect with these recruiters.

Expand your connections through referrals.  Remember to ask for referrals from each contact you make.  People do not always think to offer help with referrals.  However, some people will be very helpful to give you names of contacts who can help you.

Work with your career team.  These are the people you really know.  These are co-workers, bosses, people you have managed, friends, and family.  If you call them to give them updates, they may have ideas that will land you a job.

Review your resume and online profile for keywords. Use action words and nouns. Action words show your accomplishments.  These words are verbs.  Nouns are names.  Search engines look up names.

Remember that no matter what the season, you are responsible for your career.  There are jobs out there in a very competitive market.  The people who work the hardest at getting jobs are the people who are most likely to get a job.  In you are in a period of inactivity, you can create activity with the suggestions above.

If You Do Not Know What to Wear to a Job Interview, Dress Like the People Who Are Doing the Job.

What to wear to a job interview:  this situation causes a bit of confusion.

Many companies have a casual dress code. People wear slacks, skirts, button shirts or blouses. A lot of workers wear boots, sneakers, athletic shoes, sandals, flats, loafers, or boat shoes. Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook founder, wears a t-shirt to work.

If you are interviewing with any company for an office job, dress like the women and men on ESPN SportsCenter.  Some of them wear plaid or striped shirts or blouses. You might even dress more conservatively than these broadcast professionals and wear a white shirt or blouse.

What strikes me about the broadcasting team at ESPN is that they dress up for work in a field where many of the athlete stars  dress down by wearing warm-up suits and sweats on the way to work.  The broadcast team at ESPN present themselves as professionals and authorities at a level equal to or above other professionals in broadcast news.

I have seen people go to a job interview and wear what current employees were wearing on the job.  However incongruous or unfair, I have seen these job applicants fail to the job for not wearing a suit.  I remember one instance in which an applicant interviewed at a sales meeting where everyone was in casual attire.  The meeting was over a weekend.  The applicant wore a Hawaiian shirt.  The business manager who interviewed the applicant wore suits and white shirts to work, but dressed casually the day of the meeting.  That manager passed on the applicant for wearing what the manager considered a vacation shirt to a job interview.

Once you get the job, dress like the boss. If all your coworkers are wearing jeans and the boss is wearing khakis or a skirt, dress like the boss. Always dress for the role that you want, not the role that you have. If you dress like the senior managers in the company, you will be more confident when you meet these people. Give senior managers the chance to see your potential through your performance and your appearance.

Skilled workers need to dress one level above the level of what they wear in their trade.  If their trade workers wear coveralls or  jeans, skilled workers should wear khakis to an interview.  If a skilled worker is more comfortable wearing a suit to an interview, there is certainly no harm in their wearing a suit   However,  a suit is just not necessary.  Skilled workers should dress comfortably in neatly pressed pants, skirts, shirts or blouses, and shoes.

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