This weekend I was reading through several articles and noticed this common theme.

For example, Dan Waldschmidt wrote about it this morning in his article titled “It’s not about what you do,” in which he speaks of success not being a series of actions, “but rather an obsession.”

He writes:

Business experts will tell you that if you think hard enough and plan long enough that you can generate ideas and strategies that avoid obstacles and end up leading to your success.  But that’s just not reality. And you shouldn’t waste a second believing it.  The hard truth is that success isn’t a series of actions. It is an attitude.  It’s not about what you do. It’s about who you are.

Recently, inspired by Dan Waldschmidt and Seth Godin, Business Insider’s Vivian Giang recently posted, “This is Why Everything You Have Ever Accomplished Doesn’t Mean a Thing,” in which she writes:

 If brains aren’t going to solve your problems, the only chance you have is developing an obsession for your career that will make you consume, live, and breathe it. It’s “raw courage and guts that allows you to bend elbows and knees and lift yourself from the bloodied canvas you’re lying on.” The more you do this, the more diligent you’ll become at overcoming those road blocks and the faster you’ll get to this thing called “success.”

And the go-to guy himself, Seth Godin recently stated in a live interview:

“Here’s the thing – the recession is a Forever Recession… and here’s the other thing – it’s the end of the industrial age.  It lasted for 80 years” …and now its over.

According to Godin, for years working people were taught to ‘do what you are told’ and an average worker could make an above average income.  That era is gone forever.

Now, in order to be successful, you can’t be an average guy doing average work.  The company will use technology to find someone or something to do it faster, better and cheaper.  “…never mind the race to the top, you’ll be racing to the bottom.”  Or you can look at it this way - if you are an average worker, you’re going nowhere.

However, “if you’re different somehow and have made yourself unique, people will find you and pay you more,” Godin says.  Godin has written 13 books on his observations that can help us understand this position, including, Poke the Box, Linchpin and his latest effort We Are All Weird.

Giang sums it up with this:

Instead of waiting around for someone to tell you that you matter, take your career into your own hands. In other words, don’t wait for someone else to pick you and pick yourself!  If you have a book, you don’t need a publisher to approve you, you can publish it yourself. It’s no longer about waiting for some big corporation to choose you. We’ve arrived at an age where you choose yourself.

Or, I like the way Godin concluded a recent blog post saying, “Once the water is deep enough that you must swim to stay afloat, does it really matter how deep the pool is?”

I look at it this way:

It takes grit and courage to be successful.  It takes guts and fortitude to persevere in the face of change.  And it takes obsession to become the better than the rest and extremely valuable to most.

About Dan Waldschmidt

Dan Waldschmidt is a speaker, author and strategist.  Dan has been refusing since birth to accept business as usual.   He got the usual entry-level job right of college, but then he changed the sales process, earned millions of dollars for the company, and became CEO by the time he was 25.  These days, Dan is a people strategist, a conversation changer and an ultra-athlete.  The Wall Street Journal calls his blog, Edgy Conversations, one of the Top 7 sales blogs anywhere on the internet and hundreds of his articles on unconventional sales tactics have been published.

About Vivian Giang

Vivian Giang is a writer for Business Insider, one of my favorite sources of information on the web.  Previously she was with CBS News Investigative Unit.  She graduated from NYU in 2011 with a Master’s Degree in Business and Economic Reporting.

About Seth Godin

Seth Godin has written thirteen books that have been translated into more than thirty languages. Every one has been a bestseller. He writes about the post-industrial revolution, the way ideas spread, marketing, quitting, leadership and most of all, changing everything.  American Way Magazine calls him, “America’s Greatest Marketer,” and his blog is perhaps the most popular in the world written by a single individual. His latest book, Poke The Box is a call to action about the initiative you’re taking – in your job or in your life, and Seth once again breaks the traditional publishing model by releasing it through The Domino Project.

Links:

Dan Waldrschmidt:  here

Vivian Giang:  here

Seth Godin:  here

Tags:

Average, Career, Godin, Grit, Guts, Obsession, People, Success, Work

Photo Credits:

On the Brink by eprescott on flickr

Change or Die by colros on flickr

/.

Now Hiring!

With research from Talent Technology (www.talenttech.com), Jessica Miller-Merrell summarized the finding of the State of Recruiting Survey for 2012.  In her summary, Jessica states that online recruiting and  Job Boards are the most effective means of hiring – but she (and Talent Technology) includes the professional networking site LinkedIn.com into this category…

Some of her findings:

All signs are pointing towards an improving economy and yesterday’s release of Talent Technology’s State of Recruiting for 2012 supports what many in the industry are seeing. Business is happening. Hiring and adding new staff is in the works with 52% of companies planning on adding jobs in the next 12 months making the importance of a solid recruiting strategy even more important. In case you were wondering, the survey which had 1,100 respondents offered insights mostly from the US and Canada with the majority of respondents coming from US companies between 100-999 employees.

Open positions are taking 45 days to fill with job boards still serving as the primary candidate source. These findings are further supported by SHRM’s announcement that hiring in January will remain weak, and that makes since many organization’s new fiscal years started January 1 and if new positions are taking 45 days to onboard new employees, it’s likely that we will not see an upswing in hiring until March of this year.

Talent Technology provides an interesting look at the state of recruiting in their infographic show below. Their entire findings can be found here. While the data doesn’t provide any earth shattering revolutions it does point to the increase in demand of talent and a likelihood that companies will experience a longer time to fill as the job and candidate market becomes more competitive. In fact, this surge in jobs growth is expected to exceed 12% this year. According to their findings job boards, followed by referrals and internal candidates, and career sites prove to be the top three online recruiting candidate sources. Social media follows resulting in 12.5% of candidates. Let the war for talent in 2012 begin.

See the pictorial infographic and the complete article with active links here.

Tags:

internet recruiting, job board recruiting, online recruiting, recruiting 2012, recruiting strategies, recruiting strategy, recruiting trends 2012, war for talent

Photo Credit:

Now Hiring, Zach Klein on Flickr

/.

You at your BEST

We’ve been taught to sell ourselves at our average

We learned most of our body of knowledge of job search from placement and career offices, starting with our College/Grad school placement office – even High School placement offices teach much of the same stuff.

From the Great Depression up until the end of 2007, there was a valid assumption about job markets – candidate shortages. Even in prior recessions, there were shortages of qualified candidates.

During candidate shortages, employers have a tough time finding candidates with the basic skills they are searching for … so employers search for skills and experience. Doesn’t this sound much like the way we were all taught to write a resume – focusing on skills and experience?

Today’s job market doesn’t describe candidate shortages – it describes job shortages. The current job market features about 5 unemployed workers for every advertised job and 84% of currently employed workers looking for a new job (CareerBuilder estimates) … this means that there are more than 25 times more candidates than jobs.

… but we weren’t taught how to job search during job shortages, remember? We were taught how to job search assuming candidate shortages.  And employers choose who to interview and hire in a very different way during job shortages.

Employers expect candidates to sell themselves at their best

During times of job shortages, especially when so many currently employed workers are competing for openings, employers find plenty of candidates who meet their basic requirements of skills and experience.

Since employers find many candidates with matching skill sets, HR reps/recruiters pre-screen for skills but hiring managers look for superior candidates. When there are many candidates who meet basic criteria, hiring managers look for candidates who have already solved the problems they face today.

How can you show an employer that you’re a superior candidate?

1. Personal Branding Statement: A well-crafted personal branding statement gives a      crystal clear first impression that you are a superior candidate, who has already solved the priority problems the hiring manager faces. Creating a great personal branding statement requires research (beyond publicly available information) and inside information into the hot buttons of the hiring manager. (See here for more information on personal branding statements)
2. Don’t focus on job responsibilities: Focusing your reader on your job responsibilities tells your reader that you think the most important thing about you is that you met the minimum requirements of the job – that you’re an average performer. Focus your reader’s attention on examples of how you’ve already solved their priority problems and how you’ve delivered value to your past employers.
3. Show Subject Matter Expertise: When an employer expects to find many qualified candidates, employers look for candidates with a subject matter expertise that can help solve their most pressing issues. Generalist skills are secondary, even for generalist positions – employers first look for subject matter expertise to determine who they will interview, and then determine ability to apply skills to new situations during the interview. In today’s job market, branding yourself as a generalist is a great way to get overlooked … because it’s impossible to see what makes you superior when you describe yourself as a generalist.

So what do you think happens to your resume when you describe yourself at your average, but your target employer is expecting candidates to describe themselves at their best?

Tags:

Average, Branding, Candidates, Describe, Employers, Job, Search, Shortages, Skills, Superior, Taught

Photo Credits:

Courtesy CareerCentral.com and reCareered.com

.

Helping to Put Magic in Your Job Search

It’s the end of the year and the calendar tells us we have the opportunity for a fresh start, a new beginning and a clean slate for the New Year.  For new job seekers and for people still searching for that right position, this can be daunting.

At Booyango, we are dedicated to helping job seekers find meaningful employment, and helping companies find better talent solutions.

We have put a lot of time and effort into bringing our reader’s valuable content that can help them find a better job, hone their interviewing skills, find resources for their job search and have brought them the wisdom of the experts through our blog postings.

In 2011, we posted 86 articles – our own and others’ – of outstanding content addressing Trends, Tools, Tips and Preparation around employment.  Here is a compilation of the 5 most popular articles is each category:

TRENDS

1. 7 Life-Changing Job Trends You Need to Know About
2. The Relationship of Greed, Slow Growth and High Unemployment
3. A Talent Exodus for the Rest of Us
4. Mastering the New Freelance Economy
5. Beyond the Resume – A Different Approach to Job Search

TOOLS

1. 6 Tips for Using the SIGNAL Feature on LinkedIn
2. How to Prepare a 30 Second Elevator Speech
3. The Long and Short of Personal Branding and Work
4. 9 Key Elements of a Smart Game Plan When Changing Professions Mid-Career
5. Loving your Doubts: Alert, Humble and Hungry

TIPS

1. Three Keys to Success for Job Seekers Born in the 50s or 60s
2. What Information Should NOT be Shared with HR
3. Hidden Gems – Cold Calling and How to Improve a Job Search
4. The Swimming Pool Rules of Networking
5. 15 Basic Resume Tips

PREPARATION

1. 3 Secrets to Holding the Attention of a Hiring Manager
2. The 1^st Step in Landing a New Job – Ignite Your Network
3. The 7 Career Commandments of Dilbert
4. 6 Steps and Recommendations for your Job Search
5. 10 Sure-fire Ways to Boost Your Job Search

We hope you have enjoyed these articles and have found them useful, stimulating or entertaining.  We encourage you to wander around on our site and find other articles that will help you and guide you to a successful search and placement.  And we will continue to bring more articles to our readers in 2012, along with a new Online Talent and Opportunity Network that is different from all others.  We can’t wait to share it with you early next year.

We wish you all health, happiness and prosperity in 2012.

Tags:

Employment, Jobs, Work, Advice, Tips, Trends, Research, Resource, Career, Search, Resume, Interview, Network

Photo Credit:

Top Hat by jcarwash31 on Flickr

©2011 Booyango LLC

Hope Floats

Can we find Economic stability; Career stability, Family stability; Spiritual stability?

We’ve all suffered from the bumps and jostles to our finances, our careers and our egos in the last year – from ridiculously high-unemployment, to the Wall Street Occupation; from the Arab Spring to the Japanese Earthquake and Tsunami; from flat take-home-pay, to slight increases in personal spending; from gridlocked government, to the resurrection of the .com venture-capital and IPO boom.  And let’s not forget the failure of trickle-down economics and the demise of the American Dream.

This last year, we have had to accept that the global economy is not coming back to what it used to be.  It will never again be the ‘good old days.’  Things will not get better in the ways that we once knew.  Uncle Sam’s pockets do have limitations, there is no such thing as a free lunch for anyone, and the only freedom that is universally accepted is economic freedom.

But that doesn’t mean things can’t get better in the future – it means that our definition of ‘better’ has to change with our new reality; it means that our ideas of ‘success’ have to evolve to our new circumstances; and it means that our expectations of the performance of others have to be altered to more timely and currently appropriate levels.

We have a new, long-term normal that we all must learn to live within, learn to navigate, and learn how to master our own destinies.  A new, long-term normal means all the rules have changed.  What was once familiar is now be obsolete.  What we once thought were concrete icons now lie in pieces.

With change comes amazing opportunities for each individual, each community, each nation and all the world.  In the next few years there will be wonderful new opportunities to learn, to grow, to succeed and to flourish.  But we have to first learn to recognize those opportunities, and then we have to find different ways to make things happen.  We have to use different rulebooks, we have to invent new paradigms, we have to modify our attitudes, and - most of all – we have to adjust to our new inventory of tools and building materials.

Yes, Virginia there is still a Santa Claus.  He still lives in our hearts, just as he always has – he is the spirit of generosity.  And yes, America there is HOPE.  But that Hope now lives in our ability to accept change and live within it.

If we can accept the reality of what we once thought was solid is now a fluid, we can also accept that in order to succeed, to whatever our own definition of ‘success’ is, we must learn to float on the tides of our new reality.

Tags:

Accept, Change, Hope, Learn, Live, Opportunities, Reality, Stability, Success

Photo Credit:

Ocean Rainbow by puuikibeach on Flickr

/

Thad Kubis

As a business owner today, you need a clear and concise perspective on offline and online media, interactive and interaction tools, and the latest communication trends and emerging technologies.

Also, you must be able to support your choices with measurable results. Today, in addition to achieving results, prerequisites for any marketer include tracking, return on investment (ROI), accountability, and marketing automation.

The media you select need to be media your customer will actually use. Placing ads, managing an e-mail effort, and running a blog will not guarantee a successful media or marketing effort.  What will turn your marketing effort into a profit center will be the response rates—the conversion-to-sales that will only occur when you have customer-centric media.

Recent data indicate that we have developed into a series of highly specialized demographic-driven segments, known to some as “tribes.” Even the Internet is now being called the “splinternet,” and new targeted social networking efforts like Imagine The Now^tm, Viadeo^tm, and others are being introduced, all designed to challenge the scope and scale of the pillars of social media.

In the past, it was understood that B2B and B2C ate from two plates. Today, demographic and psychographic segmentation has increased to a point that the type of demographics varies widely, as does the need for content to a specific vertical or market.

What does this have to do with you and your marketing effort?  Well, marketing plans that focus only on offline or online media will not provide the sales success needed to survive today. Integration based on your marketing segment or vertical is critical, as are the RIIM (Relevance, Interaction, Integration, and Measurement) of each and every contact made. Remember RIIM = ROI, but first you need to focus on customer-centric communications, by a detailed demographic customer segment.

Step One

Knowing your market is vital, but as your grade-school teacher told you time and time again, “Know your numbers.” Knowing your market is not valuable if you don’t know your numbers.

Numbers have evolved from just measuring results to actually driving the success of a business—profit/loss, cost/benefit, the bottom line, and perhaps the most important of all—ROI. In fact, perhaps the three most important letters in the marketing world today are ROI, closely followed by the four most important words Total Cost of Ownership. Recent surveys indicate that over 70 percent of CEOs do not find marketing to be a compelling need, claiming that the results of any marketing effort are difficult to prove.

Knowing your market will provide you with a great start to improving your sales, but understanding the ROI drivers within your target market is the true golden goose.

Know Your Numbers

Here is an example of determining a program’s ROI before the program is even developed. Let’s call it projected ROI, or PROI. PROI is also known as reverse return on investment, or RROI.

Program: New business generation

Vertical: Medical manufacturing

Estimated program cost: $175,000 (cross-media)

Traditional response rates to this type of program within this segment have run about 1.1 percent, and this rate includes all media used.  Through the use of cross-media, or integrated marketing, we can safely raise the estimated response rate to 3.5 percent.

Based on an average sale of $75,000 with a profit rate of 35 percent, or $26,250, the program would need to achieve 6.6 sales to break even.

Even with a reduced profit percentage—say 15 percent, not 35 percent—and extending the effort over the sales cycle of the program (which can be about 3–18 months, depending on the market/industry), the justification to move forward with this campaign is strong and well presented.

In short, marketing is a profit center.

Actual program results:

Final program cost: $187,500

• Response rate: 3.75 percent, or 562 leads
• Conversion of leads to meetings: 49*
• Sales after three months: 5
• Sales after six months: 4
• Sales after eight months: 2
• Total sales: 11
• Average value of sale: $135,750
• Actual ROI: $530,000-plus

*within a six-month period. During the eight-month sales cycle, there were actually 62 face-to-face sales meetings.

Step Two

Obtain more than a name and address.

Today, demographic and psychographic segmentation has increased to a point that the seller must capture more than the just a name and address. You need to capture information about lifestyle, buying cycle, marketing pinpoints, and potential marketing demographics using a variety of media. It does not matter whether you are a B2B or B2C marketing support firm.  Pieces of data drive the program, and you must control and maintain the data.

What do these new levels of data have to do with marketers?  Well, marketing plans that focus only on single-tier media will not provide the sales base needed to survive. Additional complexity is added to the marketing formula when you look to regional and usage patterns of newly targeted segments, such as the ethnic marketplace.

A marketer needs to address the segments by using the latest in integrated print technology linked with leading media outlets (magazines and traditional offline media). In addition, a marketer must provide a cross-media and multidimensional marketing strategy—a true customer-centric communications platform.  Personalization, versioning, and database management, along with Web 2.0+ technology (social network marketing and mobile marketing are coming of age) must be considered in any marketing plan, not only to generate viable and active leads but also to reduce marketing costs while increasing the ROI.

Aggressive programs tied to existing customers (vertical, horizontal, upselling, or add-on purchasing) must become part of the mix. Past program results and responses need to be data-mined and surveyed to determine whether they hold future potential sales (not leads). You may already have leads, but sales are the true holy grail of marketing.

The marketer must build a valid business case that provides the lowest cost per lead, linked to an after-lead program designed to convert each lead into a sale, followed by an after-sale effort to keep that customer satisfied.  Think sales cycle, not program cycle—think the slow dance at the end of the prom, not the twist.

Each marketing effort needs to start with and include the components of the acronym RIIMR.

• What is the RELEVANCE of the offer to the client?

• How will the program be INTEGRATED with other marketing spend?

• How can the customer INTERACT or start a dialogue?

• Can I MEASURE the success of the program?

• What was the ROI of the effort?

Step Three

Don’t cut the budget; change your strategy.

During times of severe financial stress, reduction of a marketing budget is the common response. What is needed is a shift from high-cost, unproven, or low-response media to targeted and focused programs that measure results online and immediately determine the success or failure of a program.  Cost-per-thousand impressions (CPM) may no longer be popular with ROI standing strongly on stage.

Examining data in real time, perhaps prior to a trade show or event or just after one, can only be handled effectively online while you’re linked to your website and sales, dealer, or distribution network. Do you get the idea? You want customer-centric communications and marketing focused on the needs, desires, and wants of your customer. You do not have customers—you have a customer—hopefully in the form of thousands of single-targeted individuals.

An old adage is that a firm that maintains or increases its marketing budget during an economic downturn will increase its market share;  research continues to prove this to be correct. Versioning, variable data printing, and personalization linked to an aggressive marketing effort are proven tools in the sales of high-end or luxury items. Traditional direct-mail
results are less than 1 percent, yet personalized direct mailings linked to a website are sailing in at 4.5 percent and higher. Ignore this sage advice and suffer the consequences of low-response rates and even lower conversion-to-sales rates.

It’s simple: The more you personalize, the higher the response. If you don’t like the term “personalize,” then use target or touch. Whatever term you use and feel comfortable with, be advised that your customer is looking for a content-driven, personal experience on nearly any level.

Cutting the marketing budget is a knee-jerk response, but the money spent down the line to rebuild the market-share loss (some say you can never gain the market back) will, in many cases, add more to your market spending without adding to the lead-to-conversion factor.

The smart money goes with a plan to allocate marketing dollars with a business case and a market-ready plan in hand. No one wishes to waste money, or rip into the profit base. Profit is hard to come by, but today you you must measure the cost against the return and start the plan with a profit-generating response rate in place.

Still don’t believe it? Call me! I will get you motivated and send you a “Marketing is a Profit Center” reminder.

About Thaddeus B. Kubis

Thad is an internationally acknowledged expert on integrated marketing and the inclusions of emerging technologies into the direct marketing mix. A strong supporter of linking print (offline) with digital (online) and other marketing techniques, Thad also sits on the Board of Directors of The Print Council, The Marine Marketers of America and is a trustee to the Graphic Communications Scholarship, Award and Career Advancement Foundation. Thad offers consulting services targeting new business generation and lead conversion programs, using the latest in metrics and emerging technologies. He is President of NAK Integrated Marketing in New York City.

Thad has been selected by the Direct Marketing Association (the-dma.org) to be one of two industry experts teaching and providing certification to marketing professional in the field of Integrated Marketing.  Thad will host the first training effort in late January 2012.  You can reach Thad at thad@nakinc.com or via telephone at 212.505.9290

Tags:

Customer, Effort, Marketing, Media, Percent, Profit, Program, Response, Results, Sales

Photo Credit:

Thad Kubis at dscoop provided by the subject.

Mac Byrd

I have a friend named Allison Green.  I don’t really know her and I’ve never met her, but I consider her my friend.  Alison is my friend because she doesn’t hesitate to tell me (and all of her subscribers) the cold hard truth from her perspective.

Don’t real friends do that – give you the truth even when you don’t want to hear it?

Well, I thought I knew a thing or two about Job Searching – I mean, heck, I’ve been writing about it here for Booyango, I have personally had over 17 different jobs in the last 40 years (I started working at a VERY early age!), interviewed and hired over 200 people, and helped develop in-house hiring procedures for 4 major multinational companies and a bunch of smaller ones.

Yep, I thought I knew a thing or two about Job Searching.  But then I saw Alison’s November 30 article on 10 Myths About Job Searching.  Some of these I already knew were myths, some of them I believed to be truths.  Let’s see how you do…

I’m not going to include her reasons for believing they are myths or truths – you will have to visit her website and read her complete article to find that out – but view the list below and see how many of these myths you believe to be truths…

1.    You need connections in order to get a job.

2.    No one reads cover letters.

3.    Employers will respond to you right away if they’re interested.

4.    In a crowded field, job seekers need to find creative ways to stand out.

5.    Don’t bother job hunting around the holidays.

6.    Your resume should only be one page.

7.    Lowering your salary expectations will make you a more attractive candidate.

8.    Your interviewer knows what he or she is doing.

9.    If you want to stand out, you need to call to follow up on your application.

10.  Employers will only call the references on the list you gave them.

Think you know which are truths and which are myths?  Visit Alison’s blog here and see how you scored.  I bet you will be surprised…

About Alison Green:

Tags:

Careers, Alison Green, Job Searching, Myths, Truths

Photo Credit:

Alison Green, USNews & World Report/Money/Careers

Danielle LaPorte

Danielle LaPorte has a blog called White Hot Truth.  In it, she writes about her experiences in such a style that it comes as revelations to her readers.

Last week’s blog, although not necessarily about Thanksgiving, did have the setting of a dinner party with a diverse group of people with different interests and different passions.  Kinda sounds like all of our families gathering around the dinner table for a Traditional Thanksgiving Dinner, right?

Well, if you read her story, I’ll bet you can relate back to her title very easily – “Respecting Your Natural Ability and Your Never, Never, Evers” and I’ll also bet you will make the same connection to Thanksgiving that I did.

Her story goes like this:

respecting your natural ability and your never, never, evers.

By Danielle LaPorte, November 25, 2011

So an extreme runner, a baker, and a writer walk in to a dinner party…

I didn’t even know there was such a thing as “extreme runners”. IronMen, yes, but extreme runners? People who run like, ONE HUNDRED MILES at a time. In a day. Over the course of 12 to 24 hours. Without, like, DIEING. I listened to the runner’s personal story, absolutely riveted. When I picked my jaw up off the table, I pummeled him with questions. How do you feel after a race like that, How long to train, How do you push through, What about injuries, How long have you been this insane?

And I think to myself: Never, never, ever. I have no concept of what that natural ability feels like.

And then came dessert.

A sixtroopled layered meringue masterpiece. Layers of cakey meringue propped up with gorgeous goopy lemon curd and fluffy whipped white goodness whispering out of the tiers of scrumptiousness. Blessed with raspberries. And mint leaves.  Placed on a heavy ceramic white rectangular platter. Sprinkled with edible fairy dust. I thought the co-hostess was joking when she said that she made it herself. I swear to the Gods of confectionery pleasure, this is what went
through my head: It would be easier for me to build a bridge then to bake that mother. I was mystified.

And I think to myself: Never, never, ever. I have no concept of what that natural ability feels like.

Then the conversation turned to writing. And the dinner guests say kind things about what I do, how I string words together. And without being smug (one of my least favorite human dispositions), I softly say that, Ya, it comes easily to me. Pure delight. And someone says something like, “I could never write as easily as you. Nope. Never.”

And it occurs to me that we each have our delicious natural joys and our Never, never, evers.

And how beautiful that is.

If you liked this story, share it with your friends.  Or better yet, follow Danielle LaPorte and subscribe to her blog, White Hot Truth.  I guarantee she will inspire you…

About Danielle LaPorte:

Along with her coach and friend, Marie Forleo, Danielle LaPorte conducts workshops called SELLING YOUR SOUL. She also writes a magnificent blog called “White Hot Truth.” LaPorte is a career changer, advocate, guru and modern-day Sherpa for women (and men) to help us get out of our own way. See more from Danielle here…

Tags:

Ability, Blog, Danielle LaPorte, Dinner, Natural, Runner, Story, Thanksgiving, White Hot Truth,

Photo credit:

Danielle LaPorte – White Hot Truth

/

Janine Moon

As the economy has moved from Industrial-base to an information/conceptual/ service-base, the concept of “career” has not shifted to align with the realities of a very different business model.

Although gold watches and retirement parties are almost non-existent, people still look to organizations for the security and the career model of the 20^th century.  (As evidence, consider the numbers of people who see their downsizing from a victim mentality.) People still expect that their organization (manager) will define their deficiencies, pay for their training and education and put them on a career path that proves their worth. Few, if any, within an organization would ever claim ownership of their career. Career ownership has always been the bailiwick of entrepreneurs.

Today’s successful business models require partnership from everyone in an organization. Anything less is inviting disaster; today’s economic environment only rewards those who are agile and able to turn on the proverbial dime. The industrial era model, defined by multiple decision-makers and one-size-fits-all customer service, expected and shaped robot-like behavior in the form of highly-defined job-boxes, multiple levels of supervision and repetitive work tasks. Today’s business models require very opposite behavior from workers: flexibility, initiative, connection with customers, collaboration and innovative thinking—those things that stem from partner-owners who are engaged and aligned with the organization’s mission.

Another model of career management is needed to develop partner-owners, career owners, because the current model is dependent upon the traditional, broadly-accepted characteristics of “employer” and “employee.” Employers provide jobs, provide training, provide pay for work, censure and reward as they choose, often without contract or “at will.” Employees accept the unwritten rules and beliefs that accompany a paternalistic system, and see the employer as economic security. Wanting to believe in the security of the late 20^th century, sheltered from current business reality, and unaware of how to move beyond their assigned role, many employees sit and wait to be picked: for advancement, for a career direction, for training and development, for work that increases productivity or customer satisfaction. They are passive stakeholders whose strengths are wasted as managers rearrange the deck chairs.

Yet another group of employees, those of generational values that embrace technology, change, flexibility and innovation are not a fit within the traditional employee role and yet they recognize their value in the current marketplace. They are not inclined to pay dues in hopes of a career path that aligns with their values. They are eager to follow their own path, moving until they find satisfying work that allows for continual growth and development but that makes marked contributions to a greater good.  Often perceived as fickle and immature, these workers are ready for a career model that acknowledges the value of both partners.

Career owners show up as involved stakeholders and take responsibility for aligning their talents with the organization’s mission and direction. They are actively engaged in the work and consistently looking for ways to beat expectations, increase profit margins and tend to the long-term viability of the organization. While not capital investors, career owners recognize the significance of themselves as assets, the equity they contribute, and so actively partner in the organization’s success.

Partner-owners are hard-to-find in today’s organizations. The Gallup Organization, over the last 15+ years has measured employee engagement across industries, work functions, and organization size and employee demographics. Their surveys consistently show a U. S. workforce engagement level of less than 30%. This means that over 70% of the workforce is not engaged or is actively disengaged: the former are “seat warmers” and the latter are “seat burners.” This is a tragedy for any business, but especially in a fast-paced global economy that demands more and better from all stakeholders.  It’s particularly disastrous in the current unsettling economy as organizations cut their workforces and re-distribute the work to the survivors…survivors whose fear and gloom increases in proportion to their workload.

Gallup estimates that U.S. businesses accumulate over $375 billion annually in lost productivity from unengaged workers.  On the positive side, Gallup also provides extensive business metrics that prove the significant impact of employee commitment on revenues, sales, profit margins, associate turnover and any other business measure that matters. Career owners are committed to their work—they ‘get’ what’s in it for them and care about staying-the-course.

Success is a result of partnership

Both managers and individual contributors in today’s economy are continuing to be pushed to do more with less, often through drastic reductions in employees and reorganization efforts. Managers take on additional responsibilities as hierarchies flatten, producing more paper and juggling more people, leaving less time and inclination to have any kind of employee discussion let alone a career discussion.  Training in “how to manage” has become a victim of expense cuts, leaving many managers uncomfortable or unknowing on how to hold a career conversation. Yet individual contributors, even the survivors, are the very ones whose passion and engagement will create the organization’s success.  A partnering of individuals with the organization and the resulting benefits for both provides the very motivation and support needed to accomplish great things in tough times.

Career Ownership is a model that shows people how to take responsibility for their own careers inside an organization, increase their engagement and contribution, and carve a career path that satisfies both individual development and an organization’s shifting human capital needs. The benefits to an organization that develops a career ownership culture are many and include:

1. associates who take responsibility for defining growth opportunities and career direction that align with the organization’s strategic goals;
2. ability to attract and retain talent that is aligned with and suited to the organization’s purpose and direction;
3. reduction in the high costs of turnover;
4. clear impact on business metrics from the emotional connection that motivates associates to provide discretionary effort and an ownership mindset that drives for success;
5. managers as career advocates who support and retain talent;
6. a defined and secure pool of talent available for leadership openings;
7. alignment of the employment relationship with the realities of a globally competitive world;
8. identification of the organization’s ‘elite’ and focused development resources that provide significant ROI for the present and future.

The benefits to an individual who takes responsibility for his/her own career (inside or outside an organization) include:

1. attention to consistent and sure alignment with the organization’s mission;
2. security of ownership and a true career direction;
3. increase in individual value that as alignment and contribution to the organization increases;
4. clarity of personal foundation and its alignment with work and work environments;
5. clarity of decisions based upon foundational benchmarks;
6. ability to define “success” as it aligns with one’s foundation;
7. partnership and recognized contributions to the organization’s success;
8. greatly reduced stress around job security and political machination;
9. increased confidence and self-efficacy;
10. increased work satisfaction, from a strong understanding of your work’s contribution and value as well as ongoing growth plans.

About Janine Moon:

Janine Moon, a Master Certified Career Coach, has spent thirty plus years mentoring, growing, developing and coaching people—both individually and within organization development initiatives.

A former utilities executive, Janine has directed human resources organizations, developed and implemented human resources strategies, and coached hundreds of individuals to define their authentic work direction and trust themselves to pursue it.

Janine’s work, The Career Ownership Model, is original and unique in its approach to career development inside organizations. The program stems from Janine’s considerable leadership within organizations, her knowledge of economies and productivity, 21^st century global competition, and her deep understanding and extensive experience with what engages individuals to do their best work and connect deeply with an organization’s mission. Career Ownership: Creating ‘Job Security’ in Any Economy was published in 2010.

Janine holds a Master’s degree from The Ohio State University and a Bachelor’s of Science from Bowling Green State University. She has achieved certification as a Master Certified Career Coach (one of five in the country) from The Career Coach Institute where she serves as an Instructor and Mentor Coach. She is a Professional Member of the National Speakers Association, a past President of the Ohio Chapter and a member of the International Coaching Federation. Janine also serves as advisor to Franklin University’s MBA Executive Coaching Program and as an MBA and Applied Psychology Adjunct Faculty member.

Photo credits:

Handshake by buddawiggi on flickr

Janine Moon profile picture on LinkedIn

Tags:

Alignment, Business, Career, Employee, Janine Moon, Model, Organization, Ownership, Work

/

Greed is not good for the economy, the country or employees

What is the real reason companies are not hiring?

Today, the Wall Street Journal published an article titled, “Why Companies Aren’t Getting the Employees They Need.”  In the article, Peter Cappelli references documentation that companies claim that they cannot find qualified talent for the openings that they have.  Cappelli states that the required talent that companies need is readily available, but just not at the discounted, post-recessionary, high-unemployment salary rate companies are now offering.

I believe him.  Having been researching and writing about the American Jobs Market for over 2 years, I’ve come across a lot of advice, statistics, blogs, opinions and a whole lot of spam on this subject.  This aspect of our jobs crisis has legs, data and a resounding ring of truth.

Along with Cappelli, I read a recent Washington Post article by Peter Whorisky exploring the practice of benchmarking CEO salaries against their peers (not their employees), to determine their compensation packages.  This is the practice of paying top executives based on what other executives are paid – regardless of their performance.

Whorisky’s example of Amgen’s CEO deserves a closer look by its board, its investors and perhaps more media coverage.

Whorisky writes:

“As the board of Amgen convened at the company’s headquarters in March, chief executive Kevin W. Sharer seemed an unlikely candidate for a raise.

Shareholders at the company, one of the nation’s largest biotech firms, had lost 3 percent on their investment in 2010 and 7 percent over the past five years. The company had been forced to close or shrink plants, trimming the workforce from 20,100 to 17,400. And Sharer, a 63-year-old former Navy engineer, was already earning lots of money — about $15 million in the previous year, plus such perks as two corporate jets.

The board decided to give Sharer more. It boosted his compensation to $21 million annually, a 37 percent increase, according to the company reports.”

This example of inequity, misconduct and just plain ‘poor performance’ being rewarded while 2,700 families’ future we decimated is exactly why people are Occupying Wall Street.  And possibly why litigation and prosecution may be necessary.

Whorisky continues in the article stating,  “The gap between what workers and top executives make helps explain why income inequality in the United States is reaching levels unseen since the Great Depression.”  He summarizes hi point by saying, “Since the 1970s, median pay for executives at the nation’s largest companies has more than quadrupled, even after adjusting for inflation, according to researchers. Over the same period, pay for a typical non-supervisory worker has dropped more than 10 percent, according to Bureau of Labor statistics.”

Ratio of CEO pay to average worker - by country

On October 7,2011, the CreativeConflictsWisdom’s Blog posted the ratio of Average CEO pay to that of the Average worker in various countries.  What we see is a disproportionate rate for the US that exhibits what a greedy (and blind) nation we have become.  See the original post of the blog and the discussion here.

But I digress.

The point is, what’s good for the CEO is not necessarily good for the company.  In order to keep their double-digit compensation increases, many workers are paying the ultimate career sacrifice – losing their jobs and not being able to find a new job that equals (or betters) their previous compensation. Families are being decimated, dislocated, discouraged and dismissed because of this greed.

And more to the point of discussion – What’s keeping companies from hiring the talent they need?  Read excerpts of Peter Cappelli’s article below, or see the original article with graphics and charts here.

Why Companies Aren’t Getting the Employees They Need

The conventional wisdom is that our education system is failing our economy. But our companies deserve a lot of the blame themselves.

By Peter Cappelli originally published in the Wall Street Journal, October 24, 2011

Everybody’s heard the complaints about recruiting lately.  Even with unemployment hovering around 9%, companies are grousing that they can’t find skilled workers, and filling a job can take months of hunting.  Employers are quick to lay blame. Schools aren’t giving kids the right kind of training. The government isn’t letting in enough high-skill immigrants. The list goes on and on.

But I believe that the real culprits are the employers themselves.

With an abundance of workers to choose from, employers are demanding more of job candidates than ever before. They want prospective workers to be able to fill a role right away, without any training or ramp-up time.

Bad for Companies, Bad for Economy

In other words, to get a job, you have to have that job already.  It’s a Catch-22 situation for workers—and it’s hurting companies and the economy.

To get America’s job engine revving again, companies need to stop pinning so much of the blame on our nation’s education system. They need to drop the idea of finding perfect candidates and look for people who could do the job with a bit of training and practice.

There are plenty of ways to get workers up to speed without investing too much time and money, such as putting new employees on extended probationary periods and relying more on internal hires, who know the ropes better than outsiders would.

It’s a fundamental change from business as usual. But the way we’re doing things now just isn’t working.

The Big Myths

The perceptions about a lack of skilled workers are pervasive. The staffing company ManpowerGroup, for instance, reports that 52% of U.S. employers surveyed say they have difficulty filling positions because of talent shortages.

But the problem is an illusion.

Some of the complaints about skill shortages boil down to the fact that employers can’t get candidates to accept jobs at the wages offered. That’s an affordability problem, not a skill shortage. A real shortage means not being able to find appropriate candidates at market-clearing wages.  We wouldn’t say there is a shortage of diamonds when they are incredibly expensive; we can buy all we want at the prevailing prices.

The real problem, then, is more appropriately an inflexibility problem. Finding candidates to fit jobs is not like finding pistons to fit engines, where the requirements are precise and can’t be varied.  Jobs can be organized in many different ways so that candidates who have very different credentials can do them successfully.

Only about 10% of the people in IT jobs during the Silicon Valley tech boom of the 1990s, for example, had IT-related degrees.  While it might be great to have a Ph.D. graduate read your electrical meter, almost anyone with a little training could do the job pretty well.

A Training Shortage

And make no mistake: There are plenty of people out there who could step into jobs with just a bit of training—even recent graduates who don’t have much job experience. Despite employers’ complaints about the education system, college students are pursuing more vocationally oriented course work than ever before, with degrees in highly specialized fields like
pharmaceutical marketing and retail logistics.

Unfortunately, American companies don’t seem to do training anymore. Data are hard to come by, but we know that apprenticeship programs have largely disappeared, along with management-training programs. And the amount of training that the average new hire gets in the first year or so could be measured in hours and counted on the fingers of one hand. Much of that includes what vendors do when they bring in new equipment: “Here’s how to work this copier.”

The shortage of opportunities to learn on the job helps explain the phenomenon of people queueing up for unpaid internships, in some cases even paying to get access to a situation where they can work free to get access to valuable on-the-job experience.

Companies in other countries do things differently. In Europe, for instance, training is often mandated, and apprenticeships and other programs that help provide work experience are part of the infrastructure.

The result: European countries aren’t having skill-shortage complaints at the same level as in the U.S., and the nations that have the most established apprenticeship programs—the Scandinavian nations, Germany and Switzerland—have low unemployment.

Employers here at home rightly point to a significant constraint that they face in training workers: They train them and make the investment, but then someone else offers them more money and hires them away.

The Way Forward

That is a real problem. What’s the answer?

We aren’t going to get European-style apprenticeships in the U.S. They require too much cooperation among employers and bigger investments in infrastructure than any government entity is willing to provide.  We’re also not going to go back to the lifetime-employment models that made years-long training programs possible.

But I’m also convinced that some of the problem we’re up against is simply a failure of imagination.  Here are three ways in which employees can get the skills they need without the employer having to invest in a lot of upfront training.

Work with education providers:

If job candidates don’t have the skills you need, make them go to school before you hire them.

Community colleges in many states, especially North Carolina, have proved to be good partners with employers by tailoring very applied course work to the specific needs of the employer. Candidates qualify to be hired once they complete the courses—which they pay for themselves, at least in part. For instance, a manufacturer might require that prospective job candidates first pass a course on quality control or using certain machine tools.

Going back to school isn’t just for new hires, either; it also works for internal candidates. In this setup, the employer pays the tuition costs through tuition reimbursement. But the employees make the bigger investment by spending their own time, almost always off work, learning the material.

Bring back aspects of apprenticeship:

In this arrangement, apprentices are paid less while they are mastering their craft—so employers aren’t paying for training and a big salary at the same time. Accounting firms, law firms and professional-services firms have long operated this way, and have made lots of money off their young associates.

Of course, a full apprenticeship model—with testing and credentials associated with different stages of experience—wouldn’t work in all industries. But a simpler setup would: Companies could give their new workers a longer probationary period—with lower pay—until they get up to speed on the requirements of the job.

Promote from within:

Employees have useful knowledge that no outsider could have and should make great candidates for filling jobs higher up. In recent years, however, an incredible two-thirds of all vacancies, even in large companies, have been filled by hiring from the outside, according to data from Taleo Corp., a talent-management company. That figure has dropped somewhat lately because of market conditions. But a generation ago, the number was close to 10%, as internal promotions and transfers were used to fill virtually all positions.

These days, many companies simply don’t believe their own workers have the necessary skills to take on new roles. But, once again, many workers could step into those jobs with a bit of training.

And there’s one on-the-job education strategy that doesn’t cost companies a dime: Organize work so that employees are given projects that help them learn new skills. For example, a marketing manager may not know how to compute the return on marketing programs but might learn that skill while working on a team project with colleagues from the finance department.

Pursuing options like these vastly expands the supply of talent that employers can tap, making it both cheaper and easier to fill jobs.  Of course, it’s also much better for society. It helps build the supply of human capital in the economy, as well as opening the pathway for more people to get jobs.

It’s an important instance where company self-interest and societal interest just happen to coincide.

Dr. Cappelli is the George W. Taylor professor of management at the Wharton School and director of Wharton’s Center for Human Resources. He can be reached at reports@wsj.com.

Tags:

Apprenticeship, Candidates, Companies, Employees, Employers, Greed, Hiring, Job, Skills, Training, Work, Workers, Wall Street Journal, Peter Cappelli, Peter Whorisky, The Washington Post, Amgen, Kevin Sharer

Photo Credits:

Greed by Paul G on Flickr

Ratio of Pay – CEO to AVG Worker by CreativeConflictWisdom.wordpress.com

,