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February 5, 2008

Careers: Without Questions

How much time do you spend coming up with questions that you want to ask the interviewer? Is it something you put a lot of effort into or do you typically ask basic questions like “What’s a typically day like?” or “Do you have a formal mentoring program?” Time after time, recruiters tell me the questions people ask (or sometimes don’t ask) during the interview can be the difference between them and other candidates.

When coming up with your questions, there are two things to keep in mind—audience and quality. Audience is important because you’re typically going to want to gear your questions to the position of the person you’re interviewing with. For example, when speaking with someone in human resources, a lot of your questions will likely be around training and the hiring process. In that case, it’s okay to ask about the mentoring program. If you’re speaking with someone in a senior-level position, most of your questions will be about big picture, strategic initiatives. Meaning, you wouldn’t want to ask a vice president of the company about the number of vacation days you’d get.

Equally as important as your audience is the quality of your questions. Interviewers want to know that you’ve done your homework. Take what you learned from your research on the company and industry, and incorporate that information into your questions. For example, if you are interviewing with a company in the energy sector, you might ask how they’re positioning themselves in the marketplace to end users given the high price of gasoline. Or, if you are speaking with someone in the pharmaceutical industry, you might ask how they continue to grow and innovate given existing and future Medicare and Medicaid regulations.

Of course, you can also use the Q&A portion of the interview as a chance to incorporate things you might have forgotten to mention earlier. It can happen to the best of us: even when we’re over-prepared and on our game, there are always a few things we fail to highlight. Look for opportunities to wrap them into your conversation.

Don’t let the questions you ask hurt your chances of getting an offer. Spend time coming up with ones that show the interviewer that you’ve done your homework and that you understand the business and industry they’re in. And, the same holds true when you’re evaluating interviewees. Although only a small portion of the overall interview process, the quality of the questions they ask can speak volumes.

And don’t waste time asking about a typical day because there’s no such thing.

Shawn Graham is an Associate Director with the MBA Career Management Center at UNC's Kenan-Flagler Business School and author of Courting Your Career: Match Yourself with the Perfect Job (courtingyourcareer.wordpress.com).

Posted by Shawn Graham at 9:18 AM

January 31, 2008

Dell Hell Revisited and Personal Branding

Remember “Dell Hell.” That’s when Dell learned – or should have learned – the power of consumer anger. Blogger Jeff Jarvis reamed Dell for its shabby customer service and the story was amplified into a “blame Dell” crusade across the ‘Net.

Well, now it is a few years later and you would have thought the computer behemoth would have learned about the power of word of mouth and personal branding. I’m here to report that Dell has moved up one notch, but only a notch, and now qualifies for purgatory.

I recently had a significant problem with my Dell desktop (still under warranty) and warily called Dell customer service. After spending about 15 minutes between being on hold and providing information to a rep, I was told that Dell’s system was down. No one could help me until the system was back up and I should call back later. I have no clue why I wasn’t immediately told that the system was down.

Believing that system down or not, I was still entitled to help, I decided to exercise Consumer Rights Principle Number One: Seek out a higher authority -- and asked for a supervisor. The supervisor explained that Dell was actually being helpful by not helping me because the system’s being down meant that the company couldn’t confirm my identify. When I reminded him about Dell’s inglorious past and mentioned that I planned to blog about the company, he offered to have someone call me back as soon as the system was back up.

A rep in fact called me back within a half hour and proceeded to spend an hour on the phone with me without fixing my system. I don’t blame the rep but the fact that computer diagnostics by phone is sort of like witch doctoring. The rep usually doesn’t have a clue what the cause of the problem is and goes through the usually incantations. What I was left with was a choice between two evils: replace the hard drive or the operating system though for all I know neither is the problem. Any computer experts out there want to make a house call?

Meanwhile, all of this reinforces the need to realize that every customer’s opinion counts in building both a consumer and a personal brand.

Love to hear your thoughts and experiences?

Posted by Wendy Marx at 9:36 AM

January 30, 2008

Birthday Pinging

Everybody likes to be remembered on their birthdays and that's why they are a pinging staple. I have birthdays logged at the top of my Outlook schedule so I can call or email that day when I have a few moments. Birthdays are a great time to let people know that you care about their success. Here's an email I sent one of my best employees on his birthday:

Take a deep breath today and really ask what you want to feel like one year from now. What do you want to be doing, etc. Then, make a commitment to get there and tap into the resources who care about you like me and others in the office and outside and those you know. The point is let's make this year one when you breathe easier and spring out of bed in the am. to do what you do! Happy Birthday.

Posted by Keith Ferrazzi at 1:35 PM

January 28, 2008

Careers: Assessing fit

We hear it all the time from colleagues: “At the end of the day, it’s about fit.” “If you were stuck in an airport, would you want to be stuck with that person…blah blah blah.“ Full disclosure—I’m not a big fan of “the airport test” (was it obvious?) mainly because the phrase is so overused by recruiters. But, all kidding aside, as interviewers, it is our job to assess the dynamic fit for each candidate. And, I think we’d all agree that there’s no single “best way” to evaluate it. With that being said, here are a few key indicators I’ve used in the past to consider the fit of a candidate.

Personality. This is something you can usually determine within the first few minutes (sometimes seconds) of the interview. I think we’d all agree that if there’s one indicator of who would pass that always popular airport test, it would have to be personality. Do you find yourself easily building rapport with the candidate right off the bat? Or are you painfully watching the seconds on the clock tick by as you anxiously wait for the interview to end?

Work style. Some companies are looking for in-your-face go getters with a “take no prisoners” mentality. Others are looking for something much different. To what degree is your organization looking for collaborative team players versus those who prefer to work independently to deliver results? During the interview, ask for examples of projects they’ve worked on and their roles. Did they seek input from others or work unilaterally? And how does that fit with your culture?

What motivates them. Recognition? Achievement? Social prestige? Look for rewards that motivated them in previous roles and determine whether or not those same rewards exist at your company. If recognition is their thing, but recognition at your firm only goes to senior management, there’s a good chance he or she isn’t going to work out.

The team dynamic. How would this person fit with your team? Do they have the right skill set, personality, and work style for the group? Try to imagine this person as a member of a team presentation, or participating in a team meeting. If your scenario yields an ugly picture, that might be a good time to cut the interview short.

Things get a little bit trickier when you’re hiring someone for a specific office; offices in different cities often have their own unique “personality.” You have to walk a thin line between finding someone who is a great fit with the overall organization and also with a specific office and a specific group of people.

What are some of the criteria you’ve used to assess fit? Post a comment.

Shawn Graham is an Associate Director with the MBA Career Management Center at UNC's Kenan-Flagler Business School and author of Courting Your Career: Match Yourself with the Perfect Job (courtingyourcareer.wordpress.com).

Posted by Shawn Graham at 4:04 PM

January 25, 2008

Study: Do Social Networks Improve Your Life?

Ever wonder what those millions of other people joining social networks plan to do once they're there?

Beyond throwing sheep on Facebook or becoming a fan of hip-hop stars on MySpace, many people join social networks to better manage and expand their circle of personal and professional relationships. Some people hope to find a date or search for lost friends. Others join just to see what the buzz is all about.

As a journalist & researcher I want to know: Do social networks help you both personally and professionally? Can they help advance your career? Are they more entertaining than video games? Are they a better match for you than dating sites?

I'm pleased to invite you to participate in a comprehensive study called the State of Social Networking 2008. The survey is free, fast (about 10 minutes) and confidential. No one will sell you anything. And the study makes it easy to rate the social networking sites you use most often for business or pleasure.

Completing the survey enters you in a drawing for an Apple iPhone (or equivalent value prize) from an Apple Store.

I look forward to studying the data and sharing it with you. For research wonks: the recruitment drive behind this study is limited to social media such as blogs, community forums, StumbleUpon and social networks. Please feel free to spread the word to your social network contacts about this study - your participation is greatly appreciated! To complete the survey, please visit http://s-kf7uz-25818.sgizmo.com/.

Rusty Weston, My Global Career • San Francisco, Ca • http://www.myglobalcareer.com/ •

Posted by Rusty Weston at 7:37 PM

January 24, 2008

Personal Branding and the Candidates

As a self-professed political junkie, this campaign season has been a bountiful cornucopia of riches not to mention a national stage for personal branding. Spending gobs of money on advertising and image building, the presidential candidates can tell us a lot about what to do --- and not do about branding ourselves. There’s a fascinating article in this week’s New Yorker by George Packer about the different visions for the country of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama: Clinton as executive, Obama as visionary. Ultimately, it’s a choice of leadership styles: hands-on vs. inspirational. Or in the candidates’ lingo, “experience” vs. “change.”

Like a tagline in a branding campaign, these descriptions of the candidates resonate deeply and become symbols of their personalities. Fairly or not, one official quoted in the article says about each,

“When I’m with her, I feel she wants to impress me. When I’m with him, I feel he wants to know what I have to offer him.”

Like it or not, perception and image are reality in a political campaign – and for that matter in our professional lives. In private life, Clinton’s personality is said to be very different from her “all business” public persona. Tellingly, a Simon & Shuster editor says about Clinton, :Clinton’s personality is refreshingly sharp and clear – but she can’t show it.”

Clinton despite all her years in public service is still something of an enigma. “In her personal life, she’s always seemed like she had something to hide,” the article quotes Dee Dee Myers, a former White House press secretary under Bill Clinton, saying of Hillary Clinton. On the other hand, Packer presents Obama as more comfortable with himself and consequently more open. He suggests that Hillary hasn’t quite connected her heart with her head in her public pronouncements.

As we work to brand ourselves, there’s an important lesson here in the importance of integrating our personal brands with our sense of self so we come across as authentic. Otherwise, there’s a disconnect in our presentation and our words remain cold facts that could be uttered by anyone.

How do we connect our passions with our beliefs and knowledge? I’d love to hear from you.

Posted by Wendy Marx at 9:44 AM

January 22, 2008

Careers: The New Leader Honeymoon Period

I was meeting with a colleague recently to help him prepare for an upcoming interview. As I pulled together questions, I wanted to make sure I asked him about how he would approach his first 30 days on the job. When being considered for leadership positions, being able to effectively answer that question will not only help you get through the interview process, but it can also determine whether you hit the ground running or just end up hitting the ground. Although the answer will vary slightly by industry and company, there are generally a few key ingredients to a successful plan.

During the first month, assess performance of the business and your team. Seems simple enough, but without that baseline information, you could end up just chasing your tail. Determine what’s working and what isn’t. Assess whether the performance measures in place are adequate or if they need to be refined. Once you know this information, building metrics will be a whole lot easier.

Meet with key players. Well, first you have to identify who the key players are but that’s generally not hard to do if you just look around. They’re usually dressed the nicest (the fancier the cuff links, the better) and they usually have a window office. Assess their expectations. Get a feel for where they’re headed and where they think the organization is headed. Armed with that insight, look for opportunities to work together.

Make sure employee roles are clearly defined and that you are all on the same page with expectations. If you need to realign staff responsibilities to put them in a better position to be successful, talk it through with them and get their input and buy in before making any final decisions. While you’re at it, make sure everyone has established, and is pursuing, a personal development plan.

Finally, schedule a strategic planning session with your staff. This will give you a chance to work together as a team to chart the direction of the business for the near term. Plus, the session will give you a chance to get everyone involved and that will almost always help to open dialogue and secure buy-in from the team. And, I don’t know about you, but in my opinion nothing says strategic planning like a little SWOT analysis amongst friends.

Once you pass the first 30 days, your focus is implementation. During the strategic planning process, you will have identified some number of improvement projects. Work with your team to execute those projects. Establish year end goals with staff input. Keep track of all ongoing projects and establish periodic check points to discuss how they’re going. During that discussion, it’s also a good idea to talk about how individual projects are feeding into the overall strategy as it’s often easy to lose the big picture perspective when you’re running 100 miles an hour with your head down on a project or goal.

Are you a new kid on the block? What are some strategies/best practices you’ve employed during your first few months on the job?

Shawn Graham is an Associate Director with the MBA Career Management Center at UNC's Kenan-Flagler Business School and author of Courting Your Career: Match Yourself with the Perfect Job (courtingyourcareer.wordpress.com).

Posted by Shawn Graham at 5:30 PM

January 17, 2008

Careers: Hillary Clinton and Personal Branding

It’s easy to be cynical about Hillary Clinton’s statement about finding her voice in the snowy streets of New Hampshire. For heaven’s sake, here’s a 60-year-old woman who has been in public life most of her life just discovering who she is – Geeze.

"Over the last week, I listened to you, and, in the process, I found my voice,” she said in her New Hampshire victory speech.

Yet, I think Hillary was reacting to the over-scripted reality of political life. She was saying that she finally could let a little of her personality show beneath her tightly-controlled public image. The public “ice lady” had melted a little. And, boy, it felt good.

Politicians normally are masters of personal branding. Their campaigns are slogan-ridden (tag lines in branding terms), and personality- and message-driven. Hillary’s problem has been that her softer side often got lost in her endless thrust to stay on message. It’s an important lesson for personal branding. No matter how professional we are and what we do, part of how people evaluate us is based on our personality. It’s often said that people hire people that they like – that their gut says will work out.

Regardless of how wise that is, the fact is that people make decisions, conscious or not, based on how they relate to us. It’s a simple fact of human nature. The important point is not to contort your personality into something you’re not. And you always want to maintain a professional image. But at the same time don’t be afraid to let people see some of your personality. It’s what makes you human and what got you where you are today. What do you think?

Posted by Wendy Marx at 9:56 AM | 7 Comments

January 16, 2008

Careers: Bank of America Hires an Avatar

When I get a warm and fuzzy feeling about a bank it's usually because I'm watching a tearjerker TV commercial. Some bank has rebuilt a blighted neighborhood or loaned an underprivileged mom the dough to build a bakery.

Until recently, I never saw a commercial that made me want to work for a bank. Between the mortgage crisis, the falling dollar, bank consolidations, and layoffs, the financial services field seems just as appealing to me as military service.

Upon learning that Bank of America had acquired Countrywide Financial, the nation's largest mortgage lender, for the bargain basement price of $4 billion most people would have called their stock broker or sussed out the situation on Yahoo! Finance. Not me, I checked out B-of-A's careers site.

So why is this banking giant tugging at our heartstrings? Here's something you might not have considered in view of its layoffs: the giant bank is talent constrained.

You can tell Bank of America has invested a few bucks to create one of the better career sites in the financial services field. I recently interviewed the SVP in charge of the operation. You would think I was probing him about the New England Patriots' playbook for all the answers he gave me.

"It is meant to connect the candidates to the culture," reveals the possibly gregarious Thomas Becker, SVP of Talent Sourcing.

Becker wouldn't tell me what adding video to their site had done, except to say it had done good things. He was non-responsive about any of the following post-video changes:

• Site traffic (percentage increase)?
• Resumes (percentage increase)?
• Better candidates?

Despite Becker's reluctance to discuss specifics of his careers site, here's what I like about it:

• You're greeted by a video-based avatar of an actual bank employee who introduces you to the site. Despite the otherworldliness of an avatar, it has a warm feel to it.
• The site has tools designed to push candidates who don't know the bank very well to target specific lines of businesses and locations.
• The site features interview tips, including a recommended note back to the interviewer. This approach makes sense, particularly for Gen Y candidates who are unfamiliar with the process of applying for corporate jobs.
• There's a separate part of the site for college students - where the bank harvests many of its entry-level workers.
• The site includes global jobs not just those in Charlotte or San Francisco but also in Antwerp, Dublin, Madrid, and Milan.

Of course, the careers site is just one part of the bank's initiatives to tap the global talent pool. "It is the preferred method," allows Becker. To the bank's credit they have managed to apply both scale and a bit of 'culture' to the job applicant's experience. Other career sites will surely follow.

Rusty Weston, My Global Career • San Francisco, Ca • http://www.myglobalcareer.com/ •

Posted by Rusty Weston at 11:44 AM

January 14, 2008

Careers: Pain-free Performance Reviews

Thanks to those of you who shared your thoughts on some of the drawbacks of creative resumes and cover letters. Many of you commented that, because of the sheer volume of applications and the fact that readers prefer that they fit into a neat little box, instead of getting noticed by a line manager or someone who would appreciate your creativity, there’s a pretty good chance creative applications will get bounced by HR. Good observations.

But let’s move on. Performance reviews sometimes sneak up on us without much advanced warning, showing up as an unexpected Outlook meeting request in our inbox. If you’re anything like me, then you probably start to rack your brain to think about the things you’ve done over the last quarter or half of the year (depending on the boss), so you can make sure you have your ducks in a row before that big meeting.

Something a public relations professor once told me has proved incredibly valuable and is something I use to this day to take the pain out of performance reviews. His sage advice? Keep track of what you accomplish on the job as it happens. Back then, before he had one of those “new fangled computers,” he kept a tablet in his right top desk drawer for the sole purpose of keeping track of projects, accomplishments, and anything else he might have to refer to later. I don’t know about you, but I would much rather do that than to try to pull everything together on short notice.

I created a simple Word document that I maintain throughout the year. It contains my performance objectives outlined during my previous review, my accomplishments, my personal development goals and strength and development areas, and a snapshot of what’s working and what’s not.

I’ve been lucky enough to work for some great bosses and they have done a great job of capturing my accomplishments, but there’s always a chance something could get missed. And that something could have an impact on my review. To keep that from happening, I usually make note of anything that I think could add value and then go back and delete anything I feel isn’t relevant. As you keep track of accomplishments, note what you did, what that involved, and what the outcome was—the more specific the better.

If you’re lucky, your boss will work with you around your personal development goals and strength and development areas. Put some thought into opportunities to expand your existing skill set and how that might benefit not only you, but your team and your department. Think about your strengths. Are there things you’d like to get involved in that would play to those strengths? Just remember to keep your “wish list” manageable and realistic: this isn’t the time to add 42 new projects to your plate just to impress the boss.

Finally, come ready to talk about what’s working and what isn’t. I say this with one huge caveat—only discuss what isn’t working if you trust your boss is open to that feedback. “What’s working” is the easy part. Your answer will likely be a combination of what’s working for you, the team, and what your boss is doing that he or she should continue to do. The “what’s not” is often the one that will make you a little nervous. Don’t be afraid to give some constructive feedback but, when you do, try to focus on things that don’t involve individual team members. For example, if you’ve noticed a little friction between staff, it might make sense to mention it without going into specific details—more of a general observation. And, if you’re offering your boss supervisory advice, refer to specific actions, not personality traits. Also, leading with a compliment never hurts: “I really appreciate the way you open our staff meetings with updates from last week; but, it might help if the updates tied a little more directly into what you’d like us to do in the future.”

Whether you use a legal pad, Word doc, or a cocktail napkin, keeping track of your accomplishments, development areas, and what’s working and what isn’t can make prepping for your next review a lot easier. And it can likewise make your life easier as a manager if you use a similar approach with the accomplishments of your staff.

What are some things you’ve done to take the pain out of your performance review?

Shawn Graham is an Associate Director with the MBA Career Management Center at UNC's Kenan-Flagler Business School and author of Courting Your Career: Match Yourself with the Perfect Job (courtingyourcareer.wordpress.com).

Posted by Shawn Graham at 3:46 PM | 5 Comments

January 10, 2008

Careers: The Marketer's Personal Brander

It’s a funny thing about marketers. In my experience, many are savvy, hard-hitters when it comes to marketing everyone but themselves. In a sort of a replay of the shoemaker’s children story, these idea-a-second folks shoot blanks when it comes to their own marketing.

Then there’s Tom Anderson, CEO of Anderson Analytics, a two-year-old Stamford, CT-based market research company that does all sorts of heavy lifting, including data mining and text analytics, to help companies make sense of huge chunks of data. Tom, besides being a top flight market researcher, is one of the best marketers of his own business that I know. In just two years he has built his company from the ground up to where he and his four employees service 18 clients, including big name firms like Unilever, Starwood and Yahoo.

He’s built his business without a drop of advertising but a lot of smarts and personal branding. This includes networking the heck on social networking sites like Linkedin. Where many of us – and I count myself among the number – dawdle on the site – Tom has 1600 linkedin contacts – even with being discrete about whom he agrees to join his network. Beyond that, he sends out newsletters he writes and designs about twice a year. Not content to just send Christmas cards, every two months or so he emails custom-designed cards for Thanksgiving, Columbus Day and other holidays. The cards, while often humorous, reinforce his brand and remind the recipient of what he’s about and why anyone should care.

A few times a month, he issues press releases on research he’s done touting the results. Google the name Anderson Analytics and you’ll see the company is all over the Net. Having a common name like Tom Anderson can be a bit problematic. Tom gets around that since his given name is Tom H.C. Anderson though some references to him use the vanilla Tom Anderson. It’s not always easy but those of us with more common names should try in this search engine-driven world to encourage people writing about us to use our middle names or initials as well. Otherwise, we risk being lost in the search engine sea.

Tom furthers his personal brand by speaking at five to six conferences throughout the US and Europe in his quest to build a global network. Even though he works a zillion hours a week, he still has time to volunteer with organizations like MENG and the Stamford Historical Society, where he serves on the board of directors as membership and marketing chairman.

He is also smart about partnership relationships and partners with folks like SPSS, a statistical company and speaks at several of their conferences.

Here are some ideas from Tom on building a personal brand:

• Think differently. Study what your competitors do but see how you can then go one better.
• Work with smart people. Hiring low-rent people costs you in the end. Far better to pay a little more upfront and get trustworthy, top flight workers.
• Give back. Volunteer and you’ll find you get back more than you give.

Posted by Wendy Marx at 8:57 AM

January 9, 2008

Careers: Who Wants to Be a Political Pundit?

A political pundit is a thankless job - when you're right it was obvious and when you're wrong everyone points a fickle finger at you.

But unlike a weatherman, who studies meteorology, science and maybe broadcasting communications, political pundits take divergent paths to become gurus. Some wags are old pols; some are TV talking heads with varying degrees of "insider" knowledge. To the untrained eye, it appears the chief qualification is writing off candidates the way a carpenter turns a screw.

The pundits who wrote off the presidential campaigns of Senators McCain and Clinton before New Hampshire are having an especially bad day-after-the-primary.

"When the pundits declared us finished, I told them, 'I'm going to New Hampshire, where the voters don't let you make their decision for them,'" McCain told his supporters Tuesday.

Of course, political prognostications are even more haphazard than weather forecasts. Often, a pundit's harshly premature judgment is built upon poll numbers that turn out to be wrong. Well, the pollsters weren't wrong, really, they were just talking to the wrong voters. Then again, maybe the voters were to blame for changing their minds in the voting booths?

There's plenty of blame to go around.

Still, for sheer chutzpah, it's hard to top this one: A visit to the Drudge Report today spotlighted a survey that asks "Is Hillary Finished?" (Shortly after 2 p.m. ET, however, the survey itself seemed kaput.)

If the political pundits can't shoot straight, possibly the pundits will devour their own.

"No matter what you think about Hillary Clinton, no matter how this campaign turns out, there is undeniable satisfaction in watching the pundit class being forced to eat the words of its premature obituaries," wrote Marty Kaplan, a USC Professor turned blogger in the Huffington Post. Kaplan is a former speechwriter for Vice President Walter Mondale.

Is there such a thing as a neutral political pundit? No, and that's what makes them entertaining - and wrong - as often as not. But being wrong about New Hampshire is yesterday's news. There are always more elections to get it right - or wrong - again.

Rusty Weston, My Global Career • San Francisco, Ca • http://www.myglobalcareer.com/ •

Posted by Rusty Weston at 2:24 PM

January 7, 2008

Careers: Should Candidates Get Creative?

This is a question job seekers often ask. Especially when they’re considering companies that pride themselves on innovation and imagination. And with so many options at their fingertips, the temptation to create an outside-the-box application, resume, cover letter or Facebook page to grab the attention of employers can be hard to ignore.

Being creative is always a risky proposition because you never know how the application reader is going to react: What one person thinks is super cool might be seen as totally unacceptable to someone else. For example, I’ve heard some experts suggest things like sending a bag of candy to a recruiter around Halloween with a note that says “It would be a treat to work with you.” In an unscientific poll of eight people I know, nine thought that was a bad idea.

I’ve discussed the creativity question at length with my career counselor peers. Most of us advise job applicants to err on the conservative side because the benefit of risk-taking is often outweighed by the greater likelihood of falling flat on your face. I, however, chose to ignore this advice.

Back in my undergrad days, I wanted to work for Ben and Jerry’s corporate office. Maybe it was because of their corporate culture, or maybe it was the thought of all that ice cream. They seemed a little unconventional, so I racked my brain on how to present my resume and cover letter in an outside-the-box kind of way. I ended up, with the help of my local Kinko’s, creating tie-dyed paper that I used for my resume and cover letter. The result? After about eight weeks, I received a rejection flyer that instructed me to check their website for future openings. I was hoping my creativity would get me a phone interview; I would have settled for a personalized rejection letter.

Although my first try at creativity was unsuccessful, it wasn’t my last.

The creative bug bit me again a few years later. This time I wanted to work for World Industries, a skateboard manufacturer. I employed my limited graphic design abilities and superimposed my resume and cover letter onto a skateboard deck. I think the project cost me around $100. Again, an interview would have been great, but I assumed they’d at least say they thought it was cool. After not hearing anything for four weeks, I followed up. They said they had received it and that they were going to keep it on file. How do you file a skateboard? Do you have special skateboard filing cabinets?

I’m sure creativity has worked in certain situations, so I’d love to receive feedback from those in a hiring position: Do you think applicants should get creative? And if so, what’s acceptable and what isn’t? “It would be a treat” to hear some of the creative approaches (good and bad) candidates have used to get your attention.

Shawn Graham is an Associate Director with the MBA Career Management Center at UNC's Kenan-Flagler Business School and author of Courting Your Career: Match Yourself with the Perfect Job (courtingyourcareer.wordpress.com).

Posted by Shawn Graham at 11:11 AM | 7 Comments

January 3, 2008

Careers: Personal Branding Excuses

I got hit by the old “blame it on the state” routine this holiday weekend. We were skiing at Whiteface Mountain, near Lake Placid over New Year’s, and unfortunately, my husband hurt himself the first day out, fortunately, not seriously. I didn’t want to ski after he got hurt (I had only done two short warm up runs), and quit for the day. When I asked “guest services” about getting a refund for the day, I was told I could fill out a form and it would take a good three weeks for my request to be “adjudicated.” And, the guest services representative added, “It’s the state of New York so I’m sorry but I wouldn’t count on anything. It’s not the same as a privately-run mountain.”

OK. We all know government is a bureaucratic rat’s nest. But come on. Adjudicate a simple refund request? The mountain can immediately tell by scanning my ticket how many runs I had skied. They can also easily confirm my husband’s injury in one quick check. What a ridiculous waste of time not to mention lousy customer service.

I can never understand why government can’t adopt some of the marketing and accountability of the private sector. Are citizens lower level folks than stock or equity holders? It also makes you wonder at the morale of government employees if they are shackled by the great manacle of the state anytime they try to help someone.

Of course it’s easy to point the finger at someone and find fault. The fact is that we all are guilty to some extent of handcuffing ourselves and not taking that extra step. It’s very easy to blame our not doing so on a million and one things: “The information wasn’t available.” “We couldn’t reach the person and gave up.” “We were told ‘no.’ ” “I’m tired.” I’m a firm believer that there is often another way around the bend and it’s up to us to steer the vessel of our lives so we get where we want to be. We will never succeed in branding ourselves if we take the easy way out.

Wishing you a wonderful New Year with much success branding yourself along with determination, pluck and a little luck tucked along for good measure!

Wendy Marx, Personal Branding and Corporate Public Relations, Marx Communications

Posted by Wendy Marx at 9:33 AM | 2 Comments

January 2, 2008

Careers: There's a New Sheriff in Town

16.

That’s the percentage of respondents to a recent poll by the Center for Creative Leadership who said their best working relationships were with their managers. With everything that’s been written about managing up, down, and sideways, that percentage really had me scratching my head. But, with a new boss starting this week, I need to spend less time head-scratching and more time getting my ducks in a row so I can make sure I’m not part of the 84% club.

It’s likely my new boss, as bosses typically do, will want to meet with everyone on the team one-on-one within his first few weeks on the job. And that meeting, as well as other early interactions I have with him, will set the tone for our working relationship. So I’ve got to be on my best behavior because the way I present myself early (both good and bad) could typecast me for months to come.

Everybody approaches working with a new boss in his or her own way, but I’ve found a few things to be particularly helpful over the years. Before that first one-on-one meeting, I take some time to think about my role, what I’m responsible for, some key projects I’ve managed or completed over the last few months, and anything else I think he or she might find helpful. That way, I avoid sounding like the guy from the movie Office Space who ends up yelling “I have people skills” because he couldn’t explain his job to some outside consultants. Not a great first impression.

Role clarity and expectations are huge. During our first meeting, we have to make sure we’re both on the same page. What’s his role? What’s my role? What does success look like for him, me, the team, and the department? This is also a great time to talk about what’s been working and what’s not (without unloading or throwing anyone under the bus).

I want to be myself, but not completely…at least not right away. I’m an extroverted extrovert. For some, that can take some getting used to. During my first interactions with a new coworker (whether a boss or peer), I try to tap my inner introvert. I want to spend more time listening and learning about the new person and making sure I am doing whatever I can to make sure the onboarding process flows as smoothly and seamlessly as possible.

And finally, we can’t forget about management style. How does he or she typically manage people, processes, and projects? It’s good to talk about management style early so you can adapt, if need be, to avoid any surprises a few months down the road.

Adjusting to a new boss can be both exciting and stressful. But, I know one thing for sure: a little prep and open communication on my part will go a long way toward reducing the stress and helping me positively manage our working relationship.

And this way I won’t have to do any yelling. I have people skills!

Shawn Graham is an Associate Director with the MBA Career Management Center at UNC's Kenan-Flagler Business School and author of Courting Your Career: Match Yourself with the Perfect Job (courtingyourcareer.wordpress.com).

Posted by Shawn Graham at 5:32 PM

December 27, 2007

Careers: Personal Branding Wishes

Wishing you and your family a joyous, healthy and prosperous New Year! May you find imaginative and successful ways to differentiate yourself. May you dream big, may your personal brand soar and may your business and career resound with the sounds of success!

Posted by Wendy Marx at 9:19 AM

December 20, 2007

Careers: Personal Branding No Nos

I got stood up this week. My new hire, Chris, left me a voicemail one hour before he was to begin his first day on the job to tell me he wasn’t coming. He had accepted another job for more money and benefits.

It’s not a new story. I’m sure most people in a hiring capacity have similar tales of woe to report. But it’s a good lesson in personal branding. Chris certainly burned his bridges with me besides failing Ethics 101. While it’s certainly important to further your career, there’s no advantage doing it at someone else’s expense. Chris surely didn’t get his offer one hour before he called to kiss me off. No reason he couldn’t have called me the week before. Not that the outcome would have been different in my case; but it would have made a world of difference in my opinion of him.

Rule Number Two in personal branding and career management is not to burn bridges. The person you write off today could be in a position to further your career tomorrow. Rule Number One is to behave ethically. Sure, you can get ahead by stomping on others – and history of course is filled with villians who have profited off of other’s misery. But, in the end, beside behaving like a heel and hurting others, you’ve stained your own good name.

In the spirit of the holidays, let’s remember that in business as in life, giving is what makes us human and enobles our souls.

A warm and wonderful holiday season and a New Year filled with promising new opportunities and the continual joy of self-discovery and helping others.

And much personal branding success!

Wendy Marx, Personal Branding and Public Relations, Marx Communications

Posted by Wendy Marx at 9:36 AM | 11 Comments

Careers: More Dazzling Than Dull

The Wall Street Journal says being a motivational speaker is a high-paying gig. Actually what they say is it one of the five most overpaid jobs in the country.

Apparently that's a bad thing.

For some of us, overpaid is ample motivation. But you really can't make a name for yourself on the lecture circuit until you write a book.

And if you're going to write a non-fiction book, quite often you need a novel thesis or - barring that - a gimmick.

Alas, cleverness is a technique which some authors push too far. Take, for example, a book that arrived in my mailbox this week called Release Your Brilliance. The book promises to deliver "4 steps to transforming your life and revealing your genius to the world." And I thought that's what blogs were here for.

Previously unknown to me, the author Simon T. Bailey once worked as a Disney executive but left it all behind to become a motivational speaker. I have no idea how well Bailey motivates people, but he sure has a way with conceits and affirmations.

I am skeptical of affirmations. Oh sure, sometimes I give myself a pep talk, but usually it's on the tennis court where respectability is my aspiration, rather than say brilliance. But I digress. Bailey's book offers an exercise he calls The Brilliance Continuum. Let me know if this works for you.

"Dazzling of course is what you're striving for," he writes. "Draw a vertical line to indicate where you believe you are right now on the Brilliance Continuum."

Dull < --------------------------------|---------------> Dazzling

I'm going to place a vertical line where I think I fall on this continuum today. You'll see that I'm slightly more dazzling than dull, but that's because I haven't finished reading this motivational book yet.

Bailey includes helpful sidebar comments, which he calls Gems. I'll share one with you now. "Everything you need to be brilliant is already inside you," writes Bailey. If that's the case, you need to choose wisely about whether a book will help you unlock your inner brilliance. It stands to reason that people who don't take this advice to heart run the risk of having their brilliance bottled up so tightly they will never find it again.

Bailey is a busy guy, but he takes time each morning to "guard his energy and protect his spirit" with a "personal Hour of Power ... twenty minutes of meditation, twenty minutes of exercise and twenty minutes of reading out loud."

Hard to knock that advice, although I'm unclear on the reading aloud thing when you're alone. Should you read aloud with inflection, you know, expressively, or just in a flat 'let's get through this' kind of tone? Maybe it depends upon what you're reading. For a motivational book I suggest you read it as loud as possible - it's therapeutic.

I leave you today with one final Bailey gem: "If you want to expand your brilliance, expand your thinking."

Rusty Weston, My Global Career • San Francisco, Ca • http://www.myglobalcareer.com/ •

Posted by Rusty Weston at 1:16 AM | 2 Comments

December 17, 2007

Careers: 7 Steps to Managing Your Brand

When’s the last time you evaluated your personal brand? I’m not talking about a little five minute introspection following an annual review, I’m talking about a top to bottom look at how you are seen and how that differs from how you want to be seen.

Whether you’re an entry-level employee or a mid-level executive, what we do can and will shape how we’re seen by others. To successfully manage your brand, steal a page from brand management 101 and ask yourself the following questions:

1. What are you trying to accomplish? A question you should ask yourself multiple times throughout the day. Whether it’s how you word a follow up email to an angry customer, or positioning yourself for a promotion, you can’t get out of first gear if you don’t first know what you’re trying to accomplish.

2. What’s your value proposition? Chances are there are dozens of equally qualified people just like you within your department, company, and industry. What’s unique to your brand? What can you do that will add more value than someone else?

3. How are you packaging yourself? From how you dress, to the role you play with your work group, your packaging occurs on many levels. To get a feel for how well you stack up, observe how others in the organization are packaging themselves.

4. Who are your competitors? People that you are directly or indirectly competing with as you climb the corporate ladder. Knowing your competition is a must if you’re going to be able to effectively differentiate yourself when you’re gunning for that big promotion.

5. What’s your brand promise? What do you want to stand for? What is it that you say you’ll do? As will come as no surprise to those who know me, responsiveness is a big part of my brand promise.

6. What’s your tone and manner? People make snap judgments based on how you present your ideas and respond to situations. Are you someone who flies off the handle or are you someone who remains calm, cool and collected? Do you approach issues using wording that will promote dialogue or are you abrasive and standoffish? Something as little as “Have we thought about going in this direction” versus “You need to go in this direction” can make a huge difference.

7. Is your brand strategy working? A question you should be asking more than once a year. Look to feedback from 360, quarterly and/or annual reviews. Pay attention to verbal and non-verbal cues from coworkers and make adjustments as needed.

Our brand matters. And, unlike large corporations, we don’t have a team of marketers behind the scenes telling us what to do and how to act on the job. Don’t leave your brand to chance, dedicate time to evaluate and manage it every day.

Shawn Graham is an Associate Director with the MBA Career Management Center at UNC's Kenan-Flagler Business School and author of Courting Your Career: Match Yourself with the Perfect Job (courtingyourcareer.wordpress.com).

Posted by Shawn Graham at 6:38 PM

December 13, 2007

GE: What a disappointment

"I'd rather pick out the stuff between my toes and lick it off a Q-tip than go and work in that place." That was the enraged response from Jane when she went for a job interview. Jane (not her real name) used to work for me as a researcher when I was writing my first book, THE NAKED TRUTH so I know her work. She's smart, diligent, reliable and observant and I trust her response.

The company she was talking about? GE. Yes, the much-awarded, self-congratulatory GE. Being a researcher, she'd done her homework and approached with high hopes. It sounded like such a good fit: a commitment to training, to leadership, even (since Jack Welch) to diversity. But the reality was different.

Continue reading "GE: What a disappointment"

Posted by Margaret Heffernan at 9:08 AM | 2 Comments

Careers: Personal Branding and Values

I just read an excellent interview with Bill George in Strategy & Business, whose ideas of leadership I blogged about last week and continue to be struck by his emphasis on a "personal compass." By this he means a set of values that helps you stay on course -- and help steer you back if you veer off.

As we go about creating our personal brands, our businesses and what we do almost by definition will evolve. However, at our core, we all need a set of values that are part of our personal brand. This can be anything from providing the best customer service possible to knowing when not to cross the line. During this holiday season when it's so easy to get caught up in the commercialization of the gift giving, I recommend giving a gift to ourselves of self-reflection. To take a little time to be sure our values are aligned with our work and that we're headed in the right direction. I know I'm going to take a dose of my own medicine and do a little soul-searching. In my own case, I've been working too many hours and believe I can work smarter and more productively.

How are you defining your values? What are you doing to stay true to them? I'd love to hear from you.

Wendy Marx, Personal Branding and Public Relations, Marx Communications

Posted by Wendy Marx at 8:40 AM | 1 Comment

December 10, 2007

Careers: 5 Things Politicians Can Teach Us About Job Interviews

Is it just me, or do politicians rarely answer the questions they’re asked during a public debate? Instead, candidates answer the question they would have LIKED to have been asked - typically with a carefully crafted sound bite that reinforces their political agenda. How would that same approach play during a job interview? You’re posed a question, and your response is a two minute sound bite full of spin doctoring and legalese. As Presidential hopefuls jockey for position with voters (possibly the biggest job interview imaginable), I thought I’d focus on 5 things they can teach you that will make you a better interviewee.

1. Don’t dodge and deflect. As mentioned above, ask a politician a question on a hot button issue and you’ll typically get a response not to that question, but rather to the question he or she wants to answer. During a job interview, if you’re pressed for your view on a particular topic, don’t take the easy way out by giving a generic answer. You don’t have to bare your soul, but you should provide an example that addresses the question asked.

2. Pause. Tim Koegel, author of The Exceptional Presenter, encourages public speakers to pause for a few seconds before jumping into an answer. As is evident from the YouTube debates this year, those who typically did well were able to connect with the audience by appearing to give a thoughtful answer to the question asked; they didn’t jump into a response before the moderator or user-generated video was even finished. During an interview, there’s nothing wrong with pausing for a few seconds to give the impression that you put some thought into your answer before you respond.

3. Pander. Okay, so I really don’t think you should pander, but you’ve got to play up what you have to offer the company and how you might add value different from other candidates they are considering. In order to pander effectively, you need to understand the role, the company, and what you have to offer. In other words, know your constituents.

4. Dodge and deflect. I couldn’t resist talking out of both sides of my mouth with all this talk about spin doctoring, legalese, and pandering. But all kidding aside, there are some questions you should try to dodge. For example, if you’re asked about a negative situation or everybody’s favorite “What is your biggest weakness” question, you want to minimize the negative and quickly move to the positive. If you’re asked if you were up for promotion and you weren’t, it’s okay to say so. “Unfortunately, I wasn’t tapped for a promotion. It was a highly competitive selection process and only three out of 10 were chosen.” That’s much better than completely avoiding the question.

5. Don’t sling mud. Whether it’s your competition, a former boss, your spouse, your company, or even your hair stylist, there’s no need to trash talk anyone during a job interview. Even if you had a totally miserable experience, there is still probably something positive you were able to take away.

Politicians know better than anyone how to differentiate themselves from the competition. Regardless of your political affiliation, consider incorporating the tactics above during your next job interview. And who knows, maybe we’ll see you on stage at a future debate chatting with Anderson Cooper.

Shawn Graham is an Associate Director with the MBA Career Management Center at UNC's Kenan-Flagler Business School and author of Courting Your Career: Match Yourself with the Perfect Job (courtingyourcareer.wordpress.com).

Posted by Shawn Graham at 1:39 PM

December 7, 2007

Talent is Everywhere (if you know how to look)

I spent last summer working in a laundry. No, I hadn’t lost my mind; I was filming an episode in a reality TV series in the UK, coming soon to ABC in the US. It’s called The Secret Millionaire and, in it, a millionaire goes ‘undercover’ to find great people or organizations they want to give money to. In my case, I went to Nottingham, known as the Gun Capital of Britain. I saw a lot that made me think about a lot but chiefly what I saw left me wondering how much talent we overlook.

The Bright Waters Laundrette, where I worked, is a community laundry. Staffed by volunteers, it is led by one paid manager, Joanne Brodsky. Now, Joanne is not what most people would identify as management material. She didn’t get much of an education, her grammar isn’t gracious, her presentation isn’t brilliant, she’s blowsy, has a rather blue sense of humor, smokes too much and can be quite rude. All of those surface qualities would probably have her out of most offices in the twinkling of an eye.

Continue reading "Talent is Everywhere (if you know how to look)"

Posted by Margaret Heffernan at 12:11 PM

Careers: Rain Falls on Social Networking Parade

I wander through life empowering experts to deal with chronic problems such as product safety, cancer, poverty and Internet privacy. Like taxes and dry cleaning, I often don't want to know the nitty gritty of how things get done.

Don't worry, that still leaves me plenty of issues to wring my hands over, like finding a job, a new client or perfect business partners. Yet when it comes to the Net I'm hands on enough to protect my personal data - and I favor penalties for firms that exploit vulnerable people. Privacy intrusions could lead to regulations that wreck the party for all of us.

Those of us who use social networks to help manage or advance professional relationships have paid rapt attention lately to rapidly evolving privacy policies on Facebook among other social networking sites. Facebook is the wild frontier of cyberspace.

Why do I say that? I don't want other sites reporting to Facebook what I have purchased - or whether I'm looking for a new job, a house or a car. That's nobody else's business - information I'm not planning to release to my social network contacts.

Here's 99% of what you need to know about privacy policies on social networks, job boards or blogs. You are the decider! You want to be the one who decides which contacts view or gathers information about you. Anything short of an opt-in by you is a non-starter.

On the other hand, if you opt to publish information about yourself - and I choose to subscribe to it - then I applaud social networks for helping to propagate this information exchange.

Continue reading "Careers: Rain Falls on Social Networking Parade"

Posted by Rusty Weston at 1:33 AM

December 6, 2007

Careers: Personal Branding Leadership

I read a wonderful profile of William Styron by his daughter, Alexandra Syron in The New Yorker. Styron was not an easy man to have for a father, given his extreme moodiness and withdrawal, but the author nevertheless loved her father. What makes the article so poignant is that the daughter ultimately finds her father in the pages of his novel, "Sophie's Choice," which she first reads late in life. However, she is never able to share what she has learned with her father.

By now you're probably wondering what all this has to do with personal branding. Bear with me for a minute. I've also been thinking a lot about leadership and how that relates to personal branding. The Wall Street Journal has a fascinating article about a new book, "True North," by Bill George that analyzes what defines a leader.

In an interview with the Journal, George says,

"What we learned was that leadership is not about traits and characteristics. What really stood out was (the leaders') life stories. That's where they found their passion to lead -- their experiences. That's what gave them the authenticy of leadership. A lof of the inauthentic leaders got pulled off by trying to be something different than they were."

Or as George quoting GE CEO Jeff Immelt, says, "Leadership is a long journey into your own soul."

The same qualities apply to personal branding. The best personal branders become leaders in their field. While we don't need to write our memoirs, we all on some level need to undergo the personal excavation Alexandra Styron did. Only by data mining our lives will we have the "right stuff" to be personal branding exemplars.

Wendy Marx, Personal Branding and Public Relations, Marx Communications

Posted by Wendy Marx at 8:29 AM

December 5, 2007

Careers: Double Vision

Fill my eyes with that double vision
No disguise for that double vision
Ooh, when it gets through to me, it's always new to me
My double vision always seems to get the best of me

Lyrics from the song Double Vision by the band Foreigner

Okay, so maybe I listened to Foreigner’s greatest hits this weekend. And maybe the song stuck in my head. But more than just some cheesy lyrics, if you’re going to nail your next interview, you’re going to need a case of double vision—an understanding of the existing vision of the team, division, or company and, your own vision for where things will and should be headed under your leadership.

Rearview vision. As a candidate, it’s easy to try to sell the interviewer on sweeping changes that you’d make if you were hired for the position before you have a solid understanding of why things were done a certain way in the past. And, in some cases that can be just what the doctor ordered. But in others, you could unwittingly step on the toes of those who worked hard to forge and implement that vision. Moreover, you may suggest plans that have been tried and failed. No one wants to hear about rehashed failures. These are often two of the most difficult aspects of coming into a new position because, as an outsider, you don’t always know if the person you’re replacing left a legacy or a disaster.

So, how do you respect the past while also bringing a new vision to the table? During the interview, listen for verbal and non-verbal cues. If you talk about carrying on the things that went well from your predecessor and the interviewer rolls his or her eyes, that’s likely a not-so-subtle cue that you should move on and talk about how you’re going to involve the team in charting a new course. Speaking of which…

Futuristic vision. No, not a scene from some new Sci Fi movie or action thriller starring Will Smith; rather, your view of what the job, department, and/or division could achieve under your leadership. Whether you’re the CEO or a junior employee, manage one person or 10,000, if you’re going to be a difference maker, you need to have a vision for the role.

Interviewers want to hear you talk about how you’d get your team involved in the process of redefining, or if necessary overhauling, the strategic vision. There are always going to be things that are working that you can build on and things that aren’t that you can improve upon. Scratch below the surface to identify opportunities that aren’t always obvious. Before your interview, talk to people inside and outside of the organization to get the lay of the land.

Most companies aren’t looking to hire candidates who will come in and continue with the status quo. The real rock stars are those who are able to understand and articulate their double vision. And, when they do, they not only showcase their understanding of the role, the company and the industry, they often walk away with the offer.

Shawn Graham is an Associate Director with the MBA Career Management Center at UNC's Kenan-Flagler Business School and author of Courting Your Career: Match Yourself with the Perfect Job (courtingyourcareer.wordpress.com).

Posted by Shawn Graham at 3:31 PM | 1 Comment

November 29, 2007

Careers: Why a Job Interview is Like a First Date

Have you noticed any similarities between your dating experiences and your job searches?

What these two puzzle parts have in common is a quest for better relationships. Granted, for some of us, both of these personal quests are fraught with frustration.

But in Shawn Graham's new book Courting Your Career, he spins the metaphor in amusing and insightful ways. Networking is matchmaking. Career fairs are akin to clubbing. Cover letters are like pick-up lines. And job boards are linked to online dating (and about equally successful).

Graham, a fellow Fast Company Experts blogger, has served as a career counselor at UNC-Chapel Hill where he field-tested this metaphor and found that it resonated well with students. When you're looking for a job you want to work with amiable people, right?

Yet, how do you know if a job is "your type"? Why naturally you date around! Although dating in this context may be informational or job interviews and internships. A sturdy metaphor, Graham even compares group interviews to group dates. "Sometimes, what started out as a romantic, one-on-one date can unexpectedly turn into a group outing without warning," he writes. "The same holds true with job interviews." He recommends having extra copies of your resume on hand in case this happens because you will appear well prepared.

The key to a successful interview is a good two-way c