Jobs Articles

Whether you want to find a new job, increase your salary, work fewer hours or get promoted, effective preparation can make achieving your goals easier - a lot easier.

Here are a few things to consider:

1. Be realistic
After thoroughly reading thousands of CVs i am sure that more than 90% people set career goals without really knowing how they are going to achieve them, or how long it will take. Make sure your career goals are compatible with your current abilities, and practical enough to reach in a reasonable amount of time. Also If your skills are not enough than what are you doing for achieving your set goal.

2. Dos and Donts Listing
Start by making a list of what you do and don’t like about your current career. Include everything from the basics, like whether your work-life balance needs improving, to more specific issues like whether your current employer encourages innovation, and use it to decide which areas of your career require attention and which don’t.

3. Check your motivations
While it may seem like a nice idea to follow other people’s career dreams for you, take some time out to think about what you really want. Is getting promoted to impress your friends worth working longer hours and spending less time with them? Check the motivations behind your career goals to ensure that you’re not pleasing others at your own expense.

4. Get organised
When it comes to successful, stress-free career goals, organisation is crucial, so it pays to identify the steps required to make things work for you. Revise your list of what you want to achieve this year and then use SMART goals to ensure that your ambitions are specific, measurable, attainable, realistic, and timely.

5. Know your priorities
In order to make the most of your time you'll need to work out which career goals you want to tackle first and which can wait. Things to think about include which career goals you can break down into smaller, more manageable steps, and in what order you should work towards each step to achieve your major goals.

6. Assume success
Think about how achieving your career goals will improve your life. Will being more dynamic result in a pay rise that will let you enter the property market? Or will learning to say ‘no’ result in more free time to spend with your family and friends? Take time out each day to visualise the pleasures you’ll gain from your success.

7. Take active steps
Remember, your career goals won’t happen by themselves. The best way to achieve them is through commitment, action and sheer hard work. Also, the more structured your career goals are, the greater your chances are of pulling them off, so, where possible, follow your plan to a tee.

8. Review your progress
With your career goals under way, it’s important to monitor your progress to ensure that when you're ready to move onto the next step in your plan, everything that needs to be done beforehand has been done. If you can, evaluate your progress weekly for best results.

9. Ask for help
Is your motivation waning? Enlisting the support of other people can boost your energy levels and help you feel more driven. Consider hiring a career coach, or if professional assistance is not an option, seek positive feedback from family and friends.

10. Celebrate your achievements
Finally, don’t forget to reward yourself for each milestone you reach. No matter how small it is, you're one step closer to achieving your career goals.

Right after financial crisis plays itself out across global markets, many of the job professionals became job seekers once again. And while it's only natural to feel apprehension about IT job security, some are discovering opportunity in the wake of unemployment. Following are To Do List if you lose your IT job.

1. Get Smart: Learn New Skills
2. Jumpstart A New Venture
3. Get In Shape
4. Spend More Time With Friends, Family
5. Volunteer To Help Others

A disgruntled job seeker sent a nasty email to the HR department of a company he interviewed at. It's understandable how dehumanizing a job search can be during a recession, but a negative email can only come back to haunt the sender. Believe it or not, HR managers know each other, and you can bet your life that emails like this get laughed at -- then emailed around.

Additionally, many companies are owned by a single holding company, so when you kill your chances with one HR team -- you automatically kill your chances with their parent company. At a minimum, the email will get filed under your name in the client's applicant tracking system, and you will be tagged as a jerk long after the HR manager has been eliminated in the next round of job cuts.

But there's good news: If you are a good sport about the hiring process, there's a potential benefit in that, too. Being civil to HR managers and recruiters spreads good karma. Really. So the next time you get rejected, send the HR manager a thank you letter or email saying ... "Thanks for the opportunity to meet with you. I'm so sorry things didn't work out. If your situation changes and you see an appropriate role for me, please let me know."

Consider these tips for staying on track and safeguarding your financial well-being and sanity during your time off. First, try not to panic. It's natural and normal to experience a period of grieving after losing a job. But don't let yourself dwell on worst-case scenarios. Instead, recognize that you're going to survive this, and focus your mind on productive solutions.

Second, remain clear about what you bring to the table. Negative thinking and speaking can hurt your job search. Most employers want to hire energetic, upbeat people. Rather than giving off an air of desperation on job interviews, be confident about ways you can help the employer succeed. That way your overall message will be, "Here's how I'm able to help you".

Third, be open to new kinds of work. If you've lost your job as a white-collar worker, you can harm your chances of finding employment if you're only willing to seek out the exact same type of work or the exact same pay. Consider working for smaller companies, and don't view service-sector or blue-collar work as beneath you - especially if money is very tight. After all, no job has to last forever.

Make sure that your resume well represents your skills. The way that you tell your story could make all the difference. Highlight skills you have that are wanted in that particular job. In the interview, know how to articulate your skills and experience. Practice with a an associate, friend or career counselor.

Do your research and be prepared to show an employer that you have done your homework about the company. Use the employer's Web sites and hunt down published articles about its business. Be able to tell the employer why you want to work there and what makes you a great match for its organization.

Network effectively. Carry your networking business cards all the time. Tell everyone you know that you are looking for a job, and also have them network on your behalf with people they know. Be flexible with your salary stipulation and geographic job-location preferences. In this tight job market, you may need to move to the job and take even less money than you think that you deserve.

Posting your resume in a public database can dramatically increase its visibility -- but it also increases the possibility that your current boss will see that you are job searching. The last thing you need to have happen when job searching is for your employer to accidentally find out that you're looking for a new job. It could jeopardize both your current position and future references from your employer.

When you don't want your current employer to find out that you are job hunting, there are steps you can take to keep your job search confidential. Here are some suggestions on how to effectively job hunt on the sly, so that the wrong person doesn't find out that you are looking to make a move.

Do not use your work email address for job hunting. Don't use your employer's computers or phone system. Be careful on how you post your resume. For example, if you post your resume on Monster, you can make it confidential and your contact information and references won't be displayed. You can block your present company's name by entering an end date of present for your current position. Other sites offer a similar services so be sure to look into it and investigate your options before you post.

What is a Sample Resume
A sample resume is resume that has the proper format suitable for your type of job. Depending on whether you are a fresher or experienced person and whether you are looking for a job in marketing, finance, technology or BPO, you will need to use a specific format for your resume. A good resume sample shall have the format that is best suited for you.

Moreover sample resumes have indicative points like how to capture your educational achivements, how to demonstrate the different aspects your job etc. Hence resume samples help you think about different points that you should include in your final resume.

Why to use sample resumes
Resume samples should be used as a starting point for the preparation of your resume. They make the process of preparation of your resume more efficient as you do not have to worry about the formatting. However do not send out the sample resume verbatim to HRs. That is the biggest mistake you can make.
A really good sample resume
Observe the usage of 2 column header to preserve space, usage of bullets in the the resume sample. Also see how I made important points bold to attract the HR persons attention to those points.
Write to me at zainansari@live.com if you want the word copy of this resume sample.
Danger of using Resume Samples
Be careful while using a sample resume to prepare your own resume and guard against the following potential issues.

1. Everyone else is using the same resume format The problem happens when you pick up the first sample resume available on Google. To avoid the issue, use other search engines like yahoo or msn. Better still pick up an image result and prepare your resume using that. I know it is comparatively difficult. But that is what ensures that no one else will use this resume format.
2. You forget to change some information on the sample resume like father's name or residential address. The solution is to mark the entire resume red before you start. So if you do not change any information, it continues to be in red. I have discussed many more resume mistakes that may be resulting in you not getting the interview calls.


In this site we shall provide you with

* A number of really good resumes for your use
* Advice on how to select the best resume suitable for you
* Common blunders that people make while using resume samples and how to avoid them

Personal Branding

Personal branding is the process of marketing and selling yourself as a brand in order to gain success in business/jobs. Personal branding is a continual process just as knowing yourself is a continual process. As you grow, so does your brand. The need for personal branding arises from the fact that globalization has increased competition in the workplace. As the wheat is separated from the chaff, if you are left standing, you are left standing with others of good caliber. The playing field is now that much more challenging since your competition is as good as, or better, than you.

"If we were to classify people based on aptitude, they are As, Bs, Cs, and Ds. Because of globalization the Cs and Ds have been outsourced. They're gone. All that's left is you. You are now in competition with a bunch of As and Bs. You are now clamoring for attention amongst a talented group of people. How do you now get noticed? How can you shine and be recognized for additional opportunities? How can you be successful when everyone around you is just as talented, or more so, than you? If everyone around you is capable and of A or B caliber, how do you compete with that?"

You build a personal brand and sell it. You sell not just yourself, but your brand, to your superiors, or clients in the case of contractors and consultants.

The same reason people buy Coke instead of Pepsi. The public perception of the company's product is created and marketed in such a way as to enhance the product, or even be the product. Soda is soda, pop is pop for those of us with less-sensitive taste buds. The similarities end, however, when you compare Coke versus Pepsi. Even taste tests are meaningless; it's the brand that sells it.

Checklist

1. Know what you want
2. Be able to articulate what you do
3. Elevator pitch
4. Be positive
5. Have a blog / website / MySpace, or other online presence
6. Business card
7. Multiple e-mail addresses
8. Phone
9. Signature
10. Logo
11. Personal logo
12. More than one resume
13. Mentor
14. Networking outlets / contacts
15. Wardrobe style
16. Multiple IM accounts
17. Alias
18. Mantra
19. Speaking and PowerPoint template
20. Passion

Let's start with some brief definitions.

Checklist Definitions

1. Know what you want: Identify what you want, and start walking toward it.
2. Be able to articulate what you do: When someone asks what you do, answer them immediately with a clear, concise, and confident response.
3. Elevator pitch: Be able to describe who you are and what you do in the time it takes to ride an elevator.
4. Be positive: Be positive.
5. Business card: A 3x5 piece of paper or mini-CD that has your personal contact information clearly printed on it.
6. Have a blog / Website / MySpace, or other online presence: Get your brand online.
7. Multiple e-mail addresses: Get more than one e-mail address.
8. Phone: Get a phone.
9. Signature: Your signature is who you are, your title, and your contact information. You should put this on everything you touch.
10. Logo: A visual image that positively identifies your brand.
11. Personal goals: Set goals for yourself that help you reach what you want.
12. More than one resume: Customize your resume to the potential employer or client.
13. Mentor: Find a guru and have them teach you.
14. Networking outlets / contacts: Continually develop your network by attending industry meetings and conferences.
15. Wardrobe style: When you are going to be near people who you wish to sell your brand to, dress to impress.
16. Multiple IM accounts: Get more than one IM account.
17. Alias: Obtain a positive nickname.
18. Mantra: Collect sayings that enforce your brand.
19. Speaking and PowerPoint template: Speak about what you do and have a hot-looking PowerPoint template to show.
20. Passion: Love what you do.

I want a job. I am not sure about the pay even i don't bother to read the required skills just let me in.

Is this your volley of fire against the current job crises scenario?

Let's admit it: This is one of the tough time we ever thought of. There are more job-less skilled applicants than ever before, trying to grab the limited seats over the industry globally but most of them failed.

I have learned from my professional life that,

Instead of counting jobs, Count on yourself for truly understand your skills first then JOB will count you.

Many job applicants have a basic question in their mind. Is their any tip on how you can stand out from the crowd and win the job away from the competition?

My article is not about the Job crises or Job Tips. My article is all about Professionalism and i am sure Once a person become professional he don't need the tips and even he don't care about the crises. How? let me clear.

I strongly believe in professionalism and professionalism, and they can attained by thinking positively. Following are some points which i have learned from my professional life since last 7 years of job experience.

• Always attached with your profession.
• Always try to achieve the maximum perfection in your profession.
• Ability to express that your skills are most perfect and relevant for clients/employer.
• Never underestimate the market.
• Learn and implement the market standards quickly and efficiently.
• Your name will be a sign of profit in the term of monetary standards instead of a merely waste expense.
• Think clearly and establish your goals
• Spend lot of time in research
• always define the scope, never make lists of uncompleted tasks with daily basis additions such tasks can never be completed and worthless in case of late completion.
• Time is money, waste it and it will waste you.
  
• Say no to reinvent the wheel, pick existing one and work onwards
• Work with dedication and loyalty
• Never compromise the quality

These are some i have learned. I know this list might be uncountable and i have picked very few, but i am sure you will share your experience as well and let me think about some more proficient points.