Every Job Seeker Needs Business Cards

We’ve all seen the Vistaprint commercials or received their emails in our junk mail.  Most people delete those emails but before doing that, consider this; all job seekers need business cards. You’ll need a resume of course but what will you do if you attend a networking event or what if a neighbor asks for a card so that he can pass it along to a friend?

I am not a spokesperson for Vistaprint but I just placed my second order for their business cards.  I was running low on the first bunch but more importantly, I wanted to change the wording on my cards to better reflect my brand and services.  Creating a card is easy and Vistaprint guides you through the process.  My advice before moving forward is to think about what you stand for. What kind of work do you do? If it is traditionally a “professional” position, stay away from flashy fonts and pictures and stick with the traditional coloring for your cards.  If you are looking for a more “creative” position, you may have more options in terms of colors and backgrounds.  Regardless of the colors, pictures or fonts that you use make sure your card holds the following details:

1. Your name and contact information.  Include your phone number and a professional email address.  A professional email address is your name or initials, not a flashy or cute email address (i.e. catlover.com or momofacheerleader.com).  Save those email addresses for your personal accounts. You do not need to include your address. 

2.  Any certifications if you have them.

3. Your job title or the name of the type of position for which you are qualified (i.e. Project Manager, Customer Service Specialist, Chef, Licensed Beautician).

4. A brand statement.   To give you an idea, here’s what mine says, “Plan, Prepare and Launch your Career Flight Plan”.  Write out a short sentence describing what you offer.

Right now Vistaprint  is offering 250 free cards (from 45 background options).  If you don’t like any of these you can select another background for a very low cost.  You’ll also have to pay for shipping.  I chose the cheapest delivery option and should expect my cards in 14 days.

One last hint, Vistaprint will guide you along in your creative process by providing boxes where you can write your content.  Just because a box says Address or Fax Number doesn’t mean that you have to put that exact information in there.  You can add your bog or website address or even leave them blank.

Dressing for an Interview

It sure is a spectacular view.

When I was younger I worked across the street from the Short Hills Mall, an exclusive mall in New Jersey.  On countless lunch breaks my co-workers and I would run over there and pretend that we could afford the high priced goods at these very high end stores. Since there was no such thing as a “business casual” dress code back then, we were dressed in our suits, heels and pearls. We looked like we fit in and the sales help would flock to us with dollar signs in their eyes.  I remember going over to the same mall on a Saturday when I was dressed in jeans and sneakers. No sales person attacked me; no one even bothered to come over. It opened my eyes to how people make snap decisions based upon our looks and clothing.

Let’s flash forward to February 16, 2013.  My husband and I took a trip to a local IKEA to look at some kitchen displays and storage cabinets for our destroyed Hurricane Sandy home.  Dressed in a sweatshirt, leggings and sneakers I was ready to haul heavy boxes if need be.  While we were there I suggested that we take a look at a wedding reception venue that was in the same area.  Our daughter was recently engaged and was interested in the pricing of some of the local, northern NJ venues. I realize that we should have called first but when we asked for a brochure in one of the exclusive restaurants, we were shown to the door with a yellow sticky note containing an email address. Again, first impressions are lasting and this restaurant host must have thought that we were two homeless souls looking to get out of the cold.

What does this have to do with the job search? Since first impressions continue to be what people remember, you must dress properly for your interview. Too many hiring managers have automatically discounted someone who doesn’t make an effort to dress in a clean, pressed manner.  It helps to find out what the dress code is in an organization and dress above it.  By dressing professionally, you have crossed the first hurdle and will be remembered for the contributions that you might make to the company rather than the joker who showed up in the wrinkled, stained or inappropriate clothing. 

Valentine's Day and the Job Search

Maybe it is because our daughter got engaged this past week-end.  Maybe it's because it is Valentine’s Day.  Either way, let’s take a look at the top five reasons to love yourself during your job search.

1. Identify your strengths. Write down the job tasks that you enjoy and rank them as high, medium and low.  The areas that received high marks are your strengths. Any areas that you ranked as low or medium may be your weaknesses.
2. Write out examples of your strengths. Now that you have identified your strengths, explore them by defining specific examples (what, when, where, why).
3. Correct the weaknesses.  Look for free or low cost classes or other ways to improve your weaknesses.
4. Write an Elevator Speech and practice it. When you create an Elevator Speech you note an area where you excel. Look in the mirror and say your speech out loud. Not only are you validating your strength(s), you are preparing yourself for using your speech flawlessly.
5. Count Your Blessings. Contact your networking contacts and thank them for their help with your job search. It may remind them to keep you in mind if they learn of an opening.

Sure, all this may sound corny but liking yourself is contagious and it allows you to be more optimistic, affirmative and upbeat and those are skills that are necessary in any job search.

Resume Planning Worksheet

In my last blog post I was telling you about some of the questions that you can ask yourself when planning to write your resume.  It's really hard to pull out your past accomplishments and I'm pretty sure that any help to gather that information would be welcomed.  

Here is a worksheet that I put together for an upcoming resume writing workshop.  Feel free to use it for your own resume prep work.   Is there a special tool that you use to help you write your resume?

Questions to Ask Yourself When Planning Your Resume

Project or Task Name:                  

Company that this Project or Task Occurred and Approximate Dates it Occurred:

What was the purpose for completing this task or project?

Did you complete this ahead of schedule, budget or any other measurements? Explain.

Who benefitted from this project or task for (internal or external clients, your manager, your team, etc) and why?

What makes this project or task so special or remarkable?

Other Considerations:

Who was involved?

What were the steps you followed?

When did this occur?

How did you complete this task or project?

How did you know you were successful?

Copyright 2013 Blackbird Learning Associates

Once you answer any of the questions, you might remember other details.  Remember, a company wants to see your accomplishments and then relate those to their own organization.  Your resume will demonstrate what you can do for them and should not read like a job description.

Resume Hint

I am working with wonderful client who is looking for a new position preferably inside his current company.  He hasn’t had to write a resume in eight years and has found out that much has changed in the world of resume writing.  He also has a lot more competition than he would have had in 2005.

The major area where this client and others have stumbled is defining their contribution(s) to the organization. When I ask them to specifically let me know their accomplishments, they usually send me a laundry list of their tasks.  This may shed some light on what they do on a day-to-day basis, but it does not showcase any of their successes and everyone has had some type of success on the job.  This is what I ask them:

1. If you must write out a task, ask yourself, “What did this result in?”
2. Who was involved, what happened, why did it happen, how did it happen and what was your role in this activity?
3. If the above steps don’t work, ask yourself, “So what?” What is so special about this activity?
4. Looking at your job, what have been your major accomplishments?
5. Pull out or think back on past performance appraisals and look for your accomplishments.

Today’s job seeker is competing with many others and first-rate positions are very hard to come by.  A well written resume that can answer the question, “Can this employee do a similar, excellent job for us?” is the first step to getting in the door for an interview.  Why take a chance?

Interviewing for Students

My soon to be 20 year old son has a job interview this afternoon.  He is a sophomore in college and this job would be perfect for him since he is burning through money by living off campus.  Last night I gave him some tips about interviewing for this particular job and today I sent him a few more about social media.  Here is what I said:

      Google the position.  My son is interviewing for a server position in a chain restaurant.  The qualities for a server job include:  an outgoing personality, ability to take orders and remember detail about the orders, customer service skills, a pleasant personality, a team player and others. I asked him to come up with examples from either school or other jobs where he had to demonstrate these qualities.  I also suggested going to the company website to read the job description and think about how his skill set matches these.

Note: If the position description says, “Greets guests and builds rapport”, how should you greet the interviewer? 

How would you answer the question “You haven’t been a server in a couple of years?  What makes you think that you could pick it up again with our restaurant?”  In the past few years, my son has been a lifeguard.  I asked him to list the qualities of a life guard (working with people, customer service, friendly and helpful) and align those with the server skills.

Be prepared to answer any questions about strengths, weaknesses and the ever famous, “Why would you want to work here?”  My son needs to come up with examples from school or past jobs to explain his strengths.  As far as weaknesses he needs to select a weakness that doesn't have to do with server skills and talk about he is doing to eliminate it.   For the “Why work here?” question, he suggested saying that he’s been going to this restaurant since he was a kid and he always thought that while it looked like a lot of hard work, it also looked like a lot of fun too and that he has the type of personality and skills that should allow him to fit right in.  Good answer.

Social media. I told him to Google himself and if he sees anything that might not look so good for him, to eliminate it.  This includes Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.  He also needs to have a voice message that clearly states his name and message.

Dress nicely.  Wear a pressed collared shirt and slacks and wear socks with your polished shoes. Lay off the cologne for the day, too.

It’s getting to the time of year when the college kids are going to start looking for jobs for the summer.  Taking a few steps to be prepared and show that you care can help ace the interview.  

Your Social Media Presence

I was contracted to help an organization write their Employee Handbook.  Luckily for me they wrote most of it and wanted my help with editing and checking to see if they included all of the things that should be included.  I noticed that they didn't have a policy addressing social media so I wrote up some guidelines.

Today I was looking at some comments within one of my Facebook groups.  It happens to be a political group and I know better than to make any comments; I just like to read the updates. Someone made some very derogatory comments on the page so I did a quick Google search on their name (for the purposes of this blog) and I could see where they worked.  Ooops!

What do these two subjects have in common other than sharing social media (social media can include LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube, MySpace, blogs, wikis and others.)?

1. Your comments, especially in social media may be seen by your company, your clients, your vendors and suppliers.  If you are looking for a job, an organization can easily Google you and see these very same comments. 

 2. The photographs that you post on many of these sites may also be visible to others.

You can Google yourself by putting quote marks around your name in the search box like this, “Nancy Range Anderson”.  If you have an active social media presence, you’ll quickly discover your words and photos. 

Should you stop commenting? That’s up to you and your personal and professional needs.  Just be mindful of what you say and post because it can come back and bite you. Many companies have policies about the use of social media so you have to be very careful where you tread.