Why Redundancy is Not a Dirty Word

Why Redundancy is Not a Dirty Word There’s a lot of it going around. Maybe it’s happened to you. So you’ve been “made redundant” and you are worried about how to explain that to friends and business contacts, and especially to recruiters and potential employers. After all, who wants to hire someone who is redundant, right? Reality Check #1 â€" No-one can make you redundant. This may sound like a rather fine point, but in reality no organisation can make you redundant. Think about it for a moment. Between the day before the redundancy and the day after, what has changed to lessen your skills, acquired experience, intelligence, knowledge and behavioural strengths? Not one thing! Yes it is possible that your skills and knowledge may be getting out of date if you have not kept up with developments in your field, but most of the value you have to offer is still intact, irrespective of the “redundancy”. They can take your job away but they can’t change you. Reality Check #2 â€" Why did you leave? A fair question, which you will run into frequently. You will have to have a confident, positive answer to explain why you have you left or want to leave your last or current employer. To reassure you a little, while there may still be some people around who take a less than positive view of a job applicant who is facing redundancy, most people recognise that most redundancies these days have nothing to do with your capability or performance. Not only that, but most people you meet during your job search will either have experienced redundancy themselves at least once â€" or they will know people who have. What matters is how you handle it when the question comes. It can help to put together a brief statement ahead of time so that you are not fumbling around for words when asked. Many coaches and outplacement organisations would suggest you try to avoid using the word ‘redundancy’ or if you can’t avoid it altogether, connect it to the job not to yourself. Check out these examples and consider which you would rather hear if you were a hiring manager: Example 1 Interviewer:       So, why did you leave Company A? Candidate:         I got made redundant. I guess you could say I was a casualty of the latest cost cuts. (As a recruiter I have actually heard people say this sort of thing!) Who wants to hire a person who thinks and acts like a victim when things get tough?   Example 2 Interviewer:             So, why did you leave Company A? Candidate:         The Company had been under pressure for some time and there was a real focus on costs. As part of this, several roles were made redundant and mine was one of those affected. I see this as an good opportunity to move ahead into a new and challenging role. This sounds like a person who has some resilience, a positive outlook and the will to grasp a challenge and make the best of it. Much more attractive to most employers. Related: 5 Ways to Finding a New Job after Being Laid Off.

Personal Branding Interview Emily Bazelon - Personal Branding Blog - Stand Out In Your Career

Personal Branding Interview Emily Bazelon - Personal Branding Blog - Stand Out In Your Career Today, I spoke to Emily Bazelon, who is a senior editor at Slate and co-editor of DoubleX, Slates site for women. She is also a contributing writer for the New York Times Magazine and the Truman Capote law and media fellow at Yale Law School.   In this interview, Emily talks about how she first got into journalism, the importance of controversy, global freelancing, how she landed her current job and where she believes journalism is heading. How did you first get into journalism and how did you make a career out of it? I worked on my high school newspaper, and then in college on Yales general news magazine, The New Journal. In the spring of my senior year, I had the chance to intern at a local alt weekly, The Advocate, and that experience really made a difference to me. I worked on meaty stories and got to work with extremely talented people who took me far more seriously than I deserved. You have written some controversial articles over the years such as the Hamdan v Rumsfeld trial. How does controversy help your journalism? Controversy is like coffee: It gets the blood flowing and puts me on my toes. When its about substantive debate, and real disagreement about interpretation of facts, then its all to the good I think. Thats not always true on the blogosphere, of coursesometimes, people distort what youre saying, or just get the facts wrong. But when the dispute is fully and fairly joined, then the web is an excellent place to hash it out in real time. You were a freelance journalist in Israel. What was it like covering a different country? What were the cultural differences for you? I was a freelance journalist in Israel in 1993 and 1994, which was an amazing time to be there. The Oslo peace process was getting off the ground and that opened up avenues to all kinds of interesting stories. I think that ideally every journalist would have the experience of reporting from abroad. Its so good for honing ones skills as a cultural translator and for running with ones every curiosity. Its also an excellent way for young writers to offer up reporting that magazines or any publication that relies on freelancers often cant easily get. Israelis are remarkably straightforward, which is a great thing for reporting. And sometimes I think its easier to have critical distance about the problems besetting a different country. How did you land your current gig with Slate? What has that done for your career? I got my job at Slate after freelancing for the magazine for a year or morethats one way to get to know a publication, and for them to get to know you. Ive been a writer and editor here since 2005 and its been a hugely fruitful time. Ive gotten to write about legal issues Im interested in, about my kids, about gender in politics and law. Ive gotten to edit a fabulous roster of contributors. And for me the balance of editing and writing has great appeal. I think Im a better writer for my editing workbetter at structure, at seeing the elements of a story. And I hope Im an empathetic editor because I know what its like to be on the other side of the exchange. Where do you see media headed? How can journalists prepare for the future? Ah, where is media headedthe three-headed monster question of the moment! Its headed toward the web, more and more, to state the obvious. Its headed toward more opinion and less reporting, lamentably, I would say. The most important question, of course, is what forms of journalism will prove to be economically viable. Display and classified advertising are no longer necessarily married to news gathering, as they were for the last half century. And so the old models are crumbling. To be optimistic, for a moment, theres enormous creative energy in the field right now, a real intellectual foment. And so Im hopeful that really good work will still find its way to readers and listeners and viewers. Even if it has to find new ways to get there. - Emily Bazelon is a senior editor at Slate and co-editor of DoubleX, Slates site for women. She is also a contributing writer for the New York Times Magazine and the Truman Capote law and media fellow at Yale Law School. (Yes she wonders if that god of modern journalism is raising an eyebrow somewhere.) She grew up in Philadelphia and lives in New Haven, Conn., with her husband Paul and their two sons, Eli and Simon, who she hopes will forgive her when they figure out how much she has written about them. She has a desultory relationship with Facebook but will friend you back if you tell her youre a fan of DoubleX or the Slate Political Gabfest.

Life After TGIF Getting a New Balance

Life After TGIF Getting a New Balance Ok, you’ve made the leap.   You’ve left the nine to five and started pursuing your own dreams instead of those of some anonymous corporation.   Or, maybe you’re still in the cube, but an enticing promotion means you’re hard at it on weekends, while your usual fun TGIF  buddies are out letting their hair down.   It’s one of life’s transitions that can be pretty unsettling.   Sure, you miss the old routines.   But there’s a whole list of new options and benefits.   Consider these: Shopping Without the Crowd If you’ve ever done some Christmas shopping at 2 a.m. you know what I mean.   The quiet is almost surreal, as you leisurely stroll down the aisles.   It’s almost zen-like!   Well, the same is true of almost any off-peak shopping time, so your new free time schedule will likely give plenty of opportunities and make what used to be a chore much more enjoyable. Deals Everywhere You Look Once you get oriented, you’ll find a virtual smorgasbord of discounts and deals, off-peak specials that are offered by just about every kind of retailer you can imagine.   And don’t overlook air travel, because some of the lowest fares available are midday, midweek. Changing Up the Friend Mix If most of your friends are still in the grind, that doesn’t mean you have to cross them off your social activities list.   Remember all those times you found yourself sitting home on a weekday evening pretending you weren’t bored?   And how you wished SOMEONE would call and say “hey, let’s go do something!?”  Now, you get to be the initiator. Just You and Tinkerbell Ok, maybe not quite that extreme, but you get the idea.     You’ll be able to visit your favorite or fantasy attractions and not have to feel like it’s the crowd at a movie premier.   Imagine that favorite park and it’s just you and nature. As with so much in life, there are   always tradeoffs.   But when your professional life takes you outside the Monday through Friday lifestyle, there’s plenty of high-value benefits.

10 Reasons Why You Have to Manage Your Personal Brand - Personal Branding Blog - Stand Out In Your Career

10 Reasons Why You Have to Manage Your Personal Brand - Personal Branding Blog - Stand Out In Your Career The concept of personal branding came way before social media. Everyone has a personal brand, whether they like the concept or loathe it.   Its inescapable.   The issue most people have once they discover their authentic brand is how to manage it from the big idea to the execution of that idea and then actually protecting and marketing that brand for the rest of their life.   Sure you can call yourself the musical magician or the best doctor in Chicago for baby boomers or the social media surgeon, but without managing that brand over time, it will lose its luster and visibility.   In a sense, without brand management, all of your efforts will be for nothing. Here are the top 10 reasons why you have to manage your personal brand: 1. If you dont manage it, it will be managed for you Taking ownership of your personal brand is extremely important because otherwise, people will categorize you based on a first impression. That first impression might not align to your branding strategy and the brand attributes that you selected might not be displaying.   People can freely communicate about you behind your back and if that word-of-mouth isnt accurately portraying you, then it will be much harder to reposition your brand in their minds.   Brands of all capacities have lost a lot of control online (corporate, product, personal), but they still can stand for something and have a web presence that communicates what they are in business for.   Without any time investment, you will start to find others who are branding you for better or worse. 2. People are searching for people just like you Visibility creates opportunities (and more visibility). If you dont manage your brand, then it will be very challenging to stand out in search engines and social networks, where recruiters, hiring managers and others are searching for people with your experience.   It will be a major competitive disadvantage of you if you are proactively marketing your online assets (no one else will for you unless youre Justin Timberlake who hires people too!).   If you search on LinkedIn or Bing for your name or your concepts name, will you be first?   If you arent, then someone else is landing the clients that you could have and being sought out by the media. 3. The world is changing much to fast to leave it stagnant Just having a personal brand isnt enough because technology, the economy and the world in general are evolving much too fast. Facebook didnt even exist ten years ago, Twitter was launched in less than five years ago and now we have location based social networks this year.   Its very hard to keep up with these changes, as well as figure out how to best use them for your career goals and/or business objectives.   Make sure youre in the loop because getting left out, can put you out of business! 4. It will help you avoid a personal branding disaster A lot of conversations that used to take place in reality are now taking place in virtual reality. If you decide to ignore them, then you might wind up in trouble.   Dominos could have presented excess negative press by already being involved online and monitoring brand mentions.   If people are starting to speak poorly about your brand and you arent there to state facts or confront it head on, then it could severely impact your future, at least with that crowd of people. Knowing where your brand exists, who is talking about it and what they are saying that could impact your brand, is going to really help you. 5. You will miss out on conversations that you can benefit from Aside from a disaster, you will neglect to be part of conversations that might build your personal brand. For example, if two people are tweeting about where to find a home in your area and youre a real estate agent, then you should be talking to both of them.   Another example is if you were an internet marketer and you identify a series of posts within a LinkedIn group with people who are trying to figure out how market their businesses online, then you should be there.   This is one of the reasons why Yahoo! answers and LinkedIns answers are such valuable tools. 6. Your brand will lack expert positioning Competitively, you cant afford to not manage your brand. The second you slack, you may lose your status in the search engines, and your face/name and words wont be seen by your audience.   Remember that when your brand isnt there, a lot of other brands are, which means people may forget about you over time.   By not managing your brand, youre telling the world that you dont care about your future.   Also, its like starting a community and then walking away from it completely.   One of the big ideas with personal branding is to become an expert in your niche, so you can stand out and be recognized.   Once you stop the branding process, you will lose some of that expertise because you wont be talking about what you know anymore. 7. It wont be up-to-date, factual and relevant When you dont take the time to reflect, screen and update your brand with the latest information, then you become irrelevant. I like to use the example of someone who has a LinkedIn profile and decided not to update it with their latest job.   That person is in severe trouble if they get laid off or if they are looking for some kind of career transition or escalation.   The reason is because people are using keywords to search for experts online and if your latest experience (with the keywords to match) isnt there, then you wont appear in the search results! 8. Your competition is managing their brands Smart people know that in order to get ahead in todays information and online driven world, you have to participate or be extinct. Your competition is working hard when youre not and visa versa.   If you want to stay on top then you have to manage your brand.   Competitors can manage your brand if youre not careful.   They can reposition their brand to combat yours if you arent active and they can come out with new content, products and services, while you are neglecting the change in your industry. 9. You decide what content is published and what doesnt Its apparent these days that you have to be in the content game or be left out in the cold. Everything is content, from a tweet to a video to a podcast and a blog post.   It is in your hands to decide what gets published and what doesnt from whats in your control.   Everything else that is created and shared about your brand is based on what you publish or what information gets out there from other sources.   If you only publish content related to your social life, then you are hurting your professional brand.   That balance is important to keep and your profession voice is whats going to build your career (in most situations). 10. Technology evolves and could leave you in the dust From desktop computers, to laptops, to handhelds to phones, who can keep up anymore? Technology is moving at a rapid pace and it cannot be stopped.   This is why being in touch with tech shifts is so significant now.   You always have to be aware of whats going on and if youre smart, youll be ahead of the curve (an early adopter).   If you dont manage your brand, you wont be able to take advantage of technology improvements and you wont know what tech isnt being used anymore (MySpace is dying, etc).

Getting Work As A Freelancer Doesnt Have To Be So Hard! - CareerMetis.com

Getting Work As A Freelancer Doesn't Have To Be So Hard! If you take the step from full time employment to freelancing, there’s a few problems you’re going to encounter that you wouldn’t usually do. Managing your money even more closely will be one, but the main is actually finding the work itself. In the beginning, things are going to be a little hard.It’ll feel like you’re not getting anywhere, and a lot of people actually give up and return to full time work. But we’re here to stop you from doing that.If you tackle the situation right, there’s plenty of work out there for you. Follow our tips below to make getting work as a freelancer a lot easier.Source : Pixabay.com1. Networking YourselfevalevalGetting your name out and about as soon as possible is so important. One of the best ways of doing so is through networking yourself. There’s two major ways of doing this.One of the first is linking up with other freelancers, one we think you might not have thought of. It can either be other freelancers who are starting off new, or ones that are already well established. The well established ones can help to get the word out quicker.Collaborate on them with a piece, and your name will be shown publicized to all the people in the established freelancers network. Another great idea is a coworking space.It gives you an area to work with many different companies, host events, and network yourself with people you wouldn’t usually do. It adds an air of professionalism to it all.Finally, whatever niche you’re in, there will always be events being held regarding it. For example, if you’re a freelance marketer, there’s hundreds of marketing events year round that you can network within. It gives you a chance to meet potential customers, learn more about the industry.2. Build A ReputationThis is the first, and possibly the most important, stage in getting work as a freelancer. In the beginning you might need to do some free work to build up your own portfolio and reputation.To some people, this just isn’t an option, especially when you have no source of income. But the quicker you do it, the quicker you’re going to bring in paid custom. Make sure you’re one hundred percent focused on your work to start with.evalEveryone makes errors, but you really can’t afford to when you’re starting out as a freelancer. Your work needs to be perfect if you’re going to beat the competition that’s around you.3. Take Baby StepsAs much as you might feel as though there’s a rush, the slower you are the better your future with freelancing. There’s so much to learn about going on your own, you don’t want to rush the process and miss vital lessons. Don’t overdo yourself in the fear of never making money.The more you overwork yourself, the more errors you’re bound to make, and the more stress you’ll become. Take on smaller projects to begin with to get used to the freelance lifestyle.

Winter blues How to maintain job search momentum - Hire Imaging

Winter blues How to maintain job search momentum - Hire Imaging I work with clients around the globe. Some are floating on devices in swimming pools as I write. Some probably watching a palm tree sway in the warm breeze. But for many of them living in the colder regions, I’m seeing a slow-down pattern in their job searches. I’ve heard “Going to interviews in ice and snow is for the birds,” and “No one wants to meet me for an informational interview in this frozen tundra!” Believe me; I empathize. Here in Minnesota it’s 15 below today in temp. Last night it was 35 below with wind chill. My poor English Cocker, Ted, limps from ice balls in his paws every time he goes out to do his business and find rocks. It’s true that a job search requires time and energy; it’s in itself a job! And winter can suck that energy. You’re trying to stay warm. You miss the light that you’re deprived of with the short days and long nights. It’s hard to stay motivated. But there are things that you can do to keep your momentum going. Control your self-talk If you realize that you’re telling yourself how hard the job search is, doubting your abilities and chances of achieving career goals right now, stop! Make an effort to change these self-sabotaging messages. It is something you can control. You can’t control whether hiring authorities call you back or offer you the job, but you can concentrate on your vision . You can replace negative thoughts with positive thoughts. Reevaluate your strengths and success stories. When the phone doesn’t ring or someone says “no” to you, dust yourself off and focus on believing in yourself and what you can do in this world! Set goals and make a plan The job search can feel overwhelming, particularly in the midst of a cold winter. Don’t let the combination be an excuse to sleep late and long, or tune out to hours-on-end viewing of movies or television series. Set your goals with a plan. Many of my clients have found it much easier to pace themselves and feel power in gaining momentum when they take small steps And I can’t say this enough. Don’t be too hard on yourself when setting those goals. Be realistic. To say “I’ll be working within the next month” is really putting the pressure on. It may not even be realistic in this market and economy. What you will likely do is set yourself up to be let down. Concrete goals are great, but limit your commitment to those that you can reach, like “I will make seven new contacts this week.” Talk to folks Networking has always been and still is, at the heart of the successful job search. Think of your job as a campaign. What person do you know running for any office or appointment who does not talk to people? Right. Talk. The beauty of today’s technology is that you can talk to people online as well as offline. There is a great deal of networking you can accomplish from the warmth of your own indoor space. Pick up the phone or connect via LinkedIn  or another social media site. If there is someone in your industry that you’d like to know, reach out and ask that person for an informational interview. Everyone loves being asked for advice. When you make it clear this is what you’re after, people really do want to help. Manage stress It’s a fact that the cold winter months can affect your mood. At the risk of sounding preachy, take care of yourself. There’s a real danger here of negative impact to your search. Stress combined with lack of good self-care typically means more stress, less confidence. And if you’re out there talking to folks, even interviewing, is this how you want to be perceived? Stress  often shows in your appearance, your voice, your overall demeanor. Have you checked your voice mail lately? How do you sound? It could give you a boost to redo it with a cheery, upbeat message. Cutting stress means carving out time for you! An exercise class if you know you don’t self-motivate at home. A new haircut or outfit. A energy-boosting breakfast. A good night’s sleep. Time with someone who is supportive in your job search. We have a cabin up in northern Minnesota where the winters can be really long. The town of Crosslake near our cabin has put on Winter Fest for a decade now. Some years are colder and tougher than others. But no matter, the folks come out in droves to sip hot chocolate and homemade soups, warm up by a bonfire, and play outdoor games, turning winter’s advantage into unique entertainment and fellowship. Perhaps there’s a lesson here, to take what’s good and workable. What do we control in our job search? Is winter really getting in our way? Or is it just another form of procrastination?  Photo: Dawn-PinkChick

Best Resume Writing Service - Is It True?

Best Resume Writing Service - Is It True?Are you in search of the best resume writing service? If yes, then it's time to know more about these organizations and which among them is really best. Yes, you can certainly find the best resume writing service for your needs from just a couple of click of mouse.These professionals are also called as online resume submission service and this is basically what they do. They submit your resume online to various resume writing companies. What makes them really the best?If you will get your name on their list, they will start sending the resume to various companies. In fact, you will not get any reply from the companies, but they will at least send some of your resume on your behalf.Another thing which makes them the best is that these professionals will include you in their lists if you get in their lists with good work ethics and which not only get the job but are even accepted to be the next person who gets the same job. These people will alw ays respect the needs of the clients and they can help you become the most suitable person in the place you are applying.They also know how to express your requirements. The jobs they offer are short term jobs and you don't need to apply for a long term position. So if you can fit in these jobs, this will be a good option for you.They also offer other options, such as resuming composition, resume assistance, virtual assistant services, and they can also help you get a job. These services are available as per your preferences and you can get it for free.The writers will have all the information regarding the person they are going to submit your resume to. So all you need to do is to complete the paperwork and these online services will do the rest.When you get a job from a company with such a service, you can even get a percentage for yourself. This is definitely a good opportunity for you should consider all this and also think about your resume writing service.