A. Further education

A bachelor degree is just a basic qualification nowadays; additional relevant certifications will help in gaining a competitive edge. Of course, if you don’t have a bachelor degree, then need to plan in studying for it.

Do take note of the following issues when intending to go back to school,

1. The school must be accredited

No use paying even a single cent for paper from degree mills.

2. The certification or degree is preferable to be relevant to your profession and job market at large

You don’t need a certificate to show competence in your hobbies.

3. Always look for financial assistance whenever possible.

Nothing is free. But there will be financial assistance available from own company, educational institutions, unions, scholarships, or simply any low interest loans.

B. Greatly increase social networking skills.

The rule of thumb when it comes to surviving and excelling in outside world has been and always will be good social networking skills.

1. Be open about talking and establishing rapport with strangers.

While we need to be wary of when communicating with total strangers, exchanging conversations with strangers and business conferences and seminars, including joining professional organizations as a member will help a lot to develop a wide range of contacts for future employment and business.

C. Indispensable is why people are paid a lot

If you are very dispensable, be prepared for layoff even if you are first class honors. Here are 4 tips to make yourself less dispensable, though no one is 100% indispensable.

1. Be a good team player

In employment, as much as in business, no one works alone to get things done. Always keep a positive attitude and avoid associating yourself with people who keep complaining. Be nice to everyone, be a trustworthy person to get things done.

2. Ensure that skills are kept current.

Unless you are working as a construction worker or toilet cleaner, there is no doubt that knowledge in your field will not remain stagnant there.

Subscribing to trade magazines and reports, observe changes in technologies and legislation in own field.

Most importantly, learn any new softwares that can enhance efficiency, this is especially for engineering.

D. Be remembered for a person to be depended on

There are meetings and projects, deadlines for them also. What is crucial is that 9 out of 10 of them, you have done homework and well prepared.

1. Widen skill sets

Lifelong learning is essential, fulfilling and can be fun too. There exists a possibility that other skills can be beneficial to current career.

2. Map out a career path

Everyone got a dream job and everyone is at one time not in their dream job. As a result, it is time to create a road map to get there.

Document skills required and monitor progress in acquiring those skills along the way.

3. Create more value out of natural inclined skills and interests

Do what you love and money will follow, do what you love and you are not working. I know you hear these words before. But what you enjoy doing and good at can sometimes be transferable to current job position.

4. Do something now, while still got a job and income

In today competitive job market, one does need the right skills and paper qualifications for any positions that are not of sweeping the floor and cleaning toilet bowls.

Instead of waiting until get fired, now is the time to do something to improve your skill sets.

Related posts:

1. How to fall in love with your job again
2. Career Advices for people over 40 years old
3. The Great Online Job Search

Due to the high number of emails received about what to do after graduation from colleges and specific tasks to do in seeking employment.

I list down 3 very basic steps that one need to do first in landing that dream job unless, well you got the attributes of a hot blonde and can sleep your way up. (Corporate ladder)

1. Resumes

The first thing that one needs to do is to prepare a generic resume that one can send and listed on various job search portals. Creating a slightly different one or a customized version for a specific company can be done later.

Nevertheless, the purpose of a resume is to show potential employers what are your potential contributions to them.

As a result, some elements will always be there, as listed below and what you need to include in it.

a. A brief summary of education

Although employers in general are not hiring bookworms, but if you got a string of As from the time you enter to school to the date that you leave school. Then you will gain competitive advantage if you list them on resumes due to economic signal of hardworking and/or intelligence.

But if your case is the other way round, then it is better that you only list the educational institutions attended.

b. Employment Experience

If have worked in any part time and temporary jobs before, it will be wise to list all of them as more job experiences means social skills and problem solving abilities are better than those with less even if they are not closely related to current position apply for.

c. Qualifications

Any short courses, other than a formal college degree will also be good to list as it shows that you got more skills than others of same level of educational qualifications.

2. Cover letter

A cover letter is simply a letter with words; send with a resume to express interests in a job position, as well as potential contributions.

You may write a general cover letter for a specific job type because you intend to apply to more than 100 employers in current economic climate and customize one for a job that you really like and prefer, due to salary and work location issues.

3. Interviews

I have not known of any white collar jobs at least, that do not require job interviews.

As a result, job interview is something that cannot be avoided if you want to land a job unless you are the boss’s son.

Being called up for interview means that there is a chance of being employed and I elaborate on this in future posts of how to excel and impress during job interviews sessions so that you can get the job.

Related posts:

1. What every resume must have
2. Top 6 Tips for Prospective Fresh Graduates Job Search
3. Career Advices for people over 40 years old

Let us now look at all the elements that every resume must have regardless of whether got outstanding achievements.

1. Personal data

Things like name, email address, physical address and contact number must be there.

Otherwise, first class honors and Dean List’s for every semester also no use, how do you expect potential employers to contact you?

It is not necessary to include age, sex, height, weight and size of bust unless you are applying for a social escort position.

2. Career Objective

This one you really need to be creative, the career objective is usually one or at most two sentences describing what you want to achieve with the job position applying for.

The problem is that most are probably applying for more than 100 jobs by sending their resumes here, there and everywhere. It is almost impossible to write a customized career objective statement for each individual application.

Too general will be meaningless and does not differentiate yourself from the competition and too specific may not be suitable for most other jobs apply for.

Think of some career statements somewhere along these two extremes for sending in to 100 over applications, and then customize a few for some specific jobs if possible.

3. Education obtained

It is customary to list out all the formal schools attended, dates that you attend them. The areas of major, types of degrees earned.

You should only list grades obtained if and only if your grades obtained is good.

4. Job Experience

Without impressionable grades, but with impressionable experience working in other jobs, it is still possible to make an impression with HR personnel looking over a stack of resumes if got a list of working experiences.

List the following items under this section,

a. Organizations worked for
b. Community service done
c. Activities participated in schools

For each item, do include dates involved, specific results and accomplishments achieved if there is any.

5. Achievements

Do list out that you represented your country for Olympics if got; the purpose of this section is to signal potential employers your ability to produce outstanding work.

Any honors and awards got, please put all of them even if they don’t relate to position applying for.

You can also list whatever hobbies and interests have if and only if they relate to jobs.

However, please don’t mention that you like to surf porn during free times.

6. References

These are basically names of people who can verify what is written in resume. It is not necessary to include them in a typical resume though it will be good if you do as it shows that you are not bluffing.

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It will be worse for those aged 40 and above. This group of people belongs to the sandwich class because they are like the meat being stuck at the centre.

Upside got aging parents; downside got schooling kids waiting to go college. Basically, this translates into huge financial liabilities as everyone within the family is essentially waiting for his/her income.

In addition, in today highly competitive global economy, a middle aged professional also have to complete with young 20s something with good college degrees and job experiences also.

The following are some advices for middle aged employees to avoid getting fired and those who are already fired to get back to work.

1. Social networking

Unless you are damn good in your field and capabilities, networking has been and always will be an important component to survive and excel in this world.

No matter how busy you are, establish deep rapport and connect deeply with those that you already know will definitely bring new ideas and insights.

Remember that creativity in problem solving is in the most basic sense, recombining existing elements like current ideas and insights found elsewhere.

2. Great adaptability

Employers like people with great adaptability. It means that you can easily do and complete tasks assigned to you.

The only constant is change and change brings opportunities. Changes within company mean that there are chances for you to work in different departments.

Traditionally speaking, people in technical field like engineering would always like to move on and move up the management field because that is where the higher paycheck lies. Organizations seeking to expand business overseas will need new people in management that will also have technical knowledge involved.

The best insurance policy for future employability will be taking on new roles, gain more insights in other job functions.

For fresh college graduates without jobs, taking on jobs on contract basis and totally unrelated in your field of studies is a good show of your adaptability.

3. Creating value

The purpose of doing both mental and physical work is to create value so as to increase the overall wealth of humanity. I don’t see anyone knocking his head against the wall for nothing.

Enterprises need to provide physical products and intangible services of value. If not, they won’t exist for long.

Similarly, employees need to create something of value for their organizations. The greater the values, the higher the income will be in future, all other factors like office politics skills being constant.

Customers are looking for value in products and services. Employers are looking for value from potential and current employees too.

Retrenchments for middle aged professional because size of their paychecks exceeded amount of contributions and value added and their companies can simply find replacements at lower prices for same amount of contributions.

This is like if you are working on low end menial jobs like doing simple repetitive tasks in factories and cleaning the toilets. Don’t expect whatever employers to increase pay over decades, there are millions of low cost workers from developing countries that can replace you at a fraction of your last drawn salary and work harder than you also.

As a result, discover how whatever skills and experiences you have and mentioned how they can add value to a potential job both in cover letters and during job interviews.

4. Developing skills and acquiring knowledge

Most people simply ignored and forget about further developing additional skills that can further enhance their specific niche areas when comfortably working within their job scopes.

Having additional skill sets that can assist you in excelling within your industry is another assurance for employability.

Related posts:

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2. Business Tips for online career portals
3. What every resume must have

As a result, what you use to rekindle your love can also be used for “falling in love” with your current job.

1. Excitement

At the first stage of every job or love affair, there will only be excitement and nothing else. No one feels bored or irritated by other spouse when they first meet, but of course, couples may get sick of each other 20 years later.

In one sense, a fresh graduate just working on his first job is like first love. The novelty of first time working, combined with first time receiving pay check leads to some sort of euphoria.

This novelty keeps you happy and energy high. High happiness leads to high productivity and vice versa.

The job may present some unpleasantness but since you love the job/person, you don’t mind. As the old age saying, love is blind.

2. Reality

After years or even months into the relationships, quarrels began to occur.

Then reality sets in irritations and difficulties from the job begins to surface, though you still enjoy the work you do.

There seems to be countless deadlines and almost impossible to meet also and discover yourself staying late, arriving early to finish off the work.

Excitement and novelty of new job begin to wear off.

3. Disillusionment

Just like in love, or even marriages, the third and final stage is disillusionment.

You realize that both the love relationship and job are illusions, and start focusing on negative thoughts.

Maybe I feel better with that hot chick; maybe I could earn more money working at company ABC, maybe no need to work so hard there also.

Rekindling love for job,

Innovation is all about applying concepts found in other totally unrelated places to a specific area concerned.

What you used to rekindle your first love can also be translated and use to rekindle love for your current job that has been held for years already.

Make a list of good reasons why you ended up at current job in the first place. This is like why you ended up marrying him or her.

These reasons will assist in getting back the thrill felt when first began your job/started relationships.

5 Practical “stay in love” tips,

1. It has been said that breakfast is the most important meal of all. A good breakfast is needed to give you all the energy and protein needed.

2. Dress well with pride like you did on your first date/first day reporting for work.

3. Begin each day with cheerful and motivated people, not those who believe that the world is going to end tomorrow. Talk about good things in life, like still can eat, sleep, fuck and masturbate.

4. Do those unpleasant tasks first. Every career and job has them. After settling them, the rest of the day will end sooner than you think.

5. Reflect and document a list of what you accomplished, what you learnt, both in job and social skills. Basically journal your thoughts and feelings about various things like contributions to company, relationships with fellow workers, what you feels most happy about.

There are many ways, other than mentioned here, to keep both love relationships and job rewarding and challenging.

At the end of the day, whether you have a happy life depends on how good you feel about at work, in love and in daily living.

As a result, it is up to you to keep yourself happy so that you spend more of life moments in happiness.

Related posts:

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2. How to enhance ability to earn income as employee?
3. 4 Tips for those out of work

With today globalized economy, there is a good chance that one is going to change jobs in double digits range during the whole course of his working life. In other words, one is going to search for jobs online every now and then. Whatever applying through recruitment agencies or directly at the company websites, you need to be aware of many job scams available. These people never think twice about making quick buck from unsuspecting job seekers, who usually just been retrenched recently and not much money already.

Job scams in job advertisements usually falls under these 5 categories.

1. Request your money before employing you

I only heard of need to pay money first when enrolling at universities or learning something at some educational institutions. My university is damn good at collecting bills, quick to collect student tuition fees and slow in reimbursing payments for projects.

No legitimate company seeking employees will require them to pay them first. Please take note of that even if you are desperate for a job now.

2. Going for job interviews only to find out that it is a multi-level marketing or pyramid selling schemes.

This scenario most probably occurs to each of us at least once. Multi-level marketing and pyramid selling schemes often occur together but they are different. Nevertheless, both involve telling you to sell something which usually is selling some vitamin C that worth $20 for $200 to your friends and relatives. (For network marketing)

They got no basic pay, if got, I don’t mind joining them and do nothing, and get the basic pay at the end of the day. That’s why; Multi-level marketing and pyramid selling schemes are not usually but will always invite any Tom, Dick and Harry for “job interviews”. This is not Citibank only inviting First Class Honors to interviews for the post of investment banking.

If you are damn good at talking, you can still sell oil to Arabs and ice to Eskimos. If you are not, you better sell water in a desert.

3. Get your resume to sell you insurance

In very offline career fairs, not only online, there will always be people asking you to deposit your resumes. Getting contacts from job seekers in career fairs or even from legitimate online recruitment agencies is one standard way that every insurance companies and insurance agents do to expand their clients’ base.

While I agree that everyone needs some forms and amount of insurance coverage, one does not need more than is necessary as this will reduce current consumption and funds for investing in other instruments that will bring higher returns.

Getting insurance offers instead of job offers when you are worry about next month living expenses is really irritating.

4. Email addresses used are not company-owned email addresses but are those free web-based public email addresses.

This is one sure sign of sending your personal information to data mining companies, resulting in identity theft and a host of other problems.

Be sure that your email address is going to receive so many spams that you feel like deleting the account and apply for a new one if you do so.

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While I totally agree with what he says, there may be some misinterpretations, especially by younger people. Eventually, Steve Jobs is the exception rather than the norm.

Translating this into another question, it means is it better to earn higher income doing what you don’t really like and achieve financial freedom faster and earlier, freeing up time to do what you like or do what you like right from the beginning, with less income and financial freedom much later if there is.

The issue here is the assumption of either or with regards to like and dislikes, less and higher income. In reality, a job that pays $10 000 per month may not be something you really hate and a job that pays $1000 per month may not give you 100% passion.

Don’t forget that passion and natural inborn talent are not necessarily the same.

Jet Lee once mentioned in a newspaper article interview that he joined the National Martial Arts Team when young in China so that he can have rice to eat. Martial Arts are not really a passion for him but he is exceptionally talented in it and makes millions from his talent and not really passion. Numerous examples can be found in other physical sports as well. Of course, this does not mean that he dislikes martial arts.

It will be perfectly “Do what you love and money will follow” if you are interested in biological/life sciences and able to get into medicine.

If your aptitude and inclination is in math and science, likes creative problem solving, engineering may be a better option than simply majoring in math and pure sciences. Simple because, it is much more statistically possible to make your first million through patents than through Nobel Prizes.

One does need to know that life is a compromise. Most of the times, you cannot have the best of both worlds. It is like balancing risk and returns in making an investment. Just like in investing, you have to compromise lower returns with lower risks and vice versa.

Sometimes, there is some career that you do not necessarily really dislikes 100%, or have 60% passion, but it may give you high income, allowing you financial freedom earlier, so that you can find something that you have 100% passion with lesser income.

When people says that “Do what you love and money will follow”, have to consider the fact that life is not either or, you may not necessarily dislikes a job (or only gives you 40% passion) that gives you $10 000 per month. It won’t be wise to give up that job for another one that gives you 60% passion and $3000 per month. This is for the case of career as in employment; it will be different if you are thinking of starting a business.

Even in business, it will be useless if products or services you have passion in producing don’t have market demand.

As a result, 3 key factors are needed to be considered in choosing and deciding on your career, and remember that there are varying scales on each factor as mentioned; it is not 0% or 100% for these 3 factors in whatever chosen field.

1. Passion

2. Talent

3. Potential income

Find the most economical intersection, depending on relative percentages in each for a particular chosen field.

In conclusion, let us look at what the sage of Omaha says and ponder over his views on this issue and ask your heart.

“There comes a time when you ought to start doing what you want. Take a job that you love. You will jump out of bed in the morning. I think you are out of your mind if you keep taking jobs that you don’t like because you think it will look good on your resume. Isn’t that like saving up sex for your old age?”

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With more jobs disappearing into the horizon and unemployment numbers increasing in value by the day, the World now needs to brace itself for a tough year ahead.

As someone that has experienced being unemployed before, I have a few tips for those who are presently got nothing to do or  going to do nothing soon.

1. Re-order your priorities in life

The good thing about capitalism system is that it leads to greater wealth for humanity but the bad thing is that it resulted in people working too hard such that it become a bad habit.

Much time and energy have been sacrificed in the name of providing a good life for their families, now is a good time to ask yourself – are those long working hours worth it?

Your children would rather see you more often than to come home from school to see an empty landed property.

2. What are your core competencies?

I can tell you that more than 90% of working adults see their jobs as something that is needed to pay their bills. This is the best time to deeply reflect on what you want to do with your life. Remember time is life, you should not feel unhappy about having too much of it.

Much has been said about if you do what you love, money will follow. Why not take this chance to list out all skills you have and what you really enjoy doing and think about building a business around it.

3. Risk, return and business opportunities

Numerous success stories have been told about how people who launched their businesses after been kicked out of their jobs.

Of course, not every startups went off, but the only guarantee in life is that if you do nothing, you will get nothing.

4. Spend more time with loved ones

If tomorrow is the judgment day, no one is going to spend the time today to earn money.

Instead of cursing the boss who retrenched you, have a good meal with your family and old friends.

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Don’t say hired, getting noticed in the first place might already be a problem in a recession dominated climate where people seeking for jobs far exceeds that of the vacancies available.

If you think that emailing resumes to online job portals like JobsDB.com and directly at corporate websites is more than enough, then you are seriously wrong.

Read on to discover how you can differentiate from other job seekers and get that dream job, or just any job.

1. Transform boring resume into a multimedia machine

Traditional resume consist of usual standard elements in Word or PDF document. It is dead and boring.

Why not try VisualCV.com, this wonderful website jazz up your resume with sildes, spreadsheets, images, videos and audio clips to build up a complete multimedia experience for your prospective employers.

If you have any special skills, you can always demonstrate them and upload it in a video. Not only this, before presenting yourself in front of the interview, you can in the first place do a good presentation for them to see in videos.

Identity theft and stalker is totally not an issue if you are like a pretty woman walking down the street, there are security settings to allow one-to-one sharing instead of broadcasting all your private information to the whole world.

Most importantly, it’s free!

2. Leverage = less effort to achieve same result

The age old saying that networking is leverage in achieving things. There is no doubt that using some online networking sites like LinkedIn, which is for professionals, not AdultFriendFinder.com, assists greatly in securing for yourself a good job in these tough economic conditions.

Having a profile page on LinkedIn is a must, as it not only increases your exposure to prospective employers but also can be used to find business opportunities. It is like an online CV permanently there for employers to see.

Here are 4 simple tips to get more benefits out of LinkedIn,

a. Thoroughly complete your profile page. All employment details and history are recommended to be included regardless of whether they are relevant to the job applying for or not. This is simply because employers value those with more social and work experiences.

b. After you are done with the above, do add your previous bosses and colleagues provided you are in a good relationship with them before. If you due to some reasons, cork up working relationships with some previous bosses and co-workers, please do not be dumb enough to add them.

c. Give and you shall receive. Once you have added them, write a good recommendation for them and ask in a demanding polite way to write a similar one in return. Of course, if one of them is trying to be funny and write the recommendation in such a way that no one in the right mind will hire you, you can always don’t approve. Just like Friendster.com.

d. Last but not least, you have to leave an email address that is checked frequently. Otherwise, what is the use of having an impressive resume and CV and at the end of the day, no one can notified you to go for an job interview.

3. Free career advices are over there

There are many career blogs dispensing useful information to help you get a job. I can tell you what they have is really insightful and enlightening.

The following 3 blogs are my top choices should I need to look for a job now.

a. careerealism.com

This is by far the best website giving unique and quality advices on career that I have ever come across.

Other than the usual blog posts, what sets this apart from others is the educational and entertaining videos on on the same subject.

After getting a job, there is also tips on giving interesting presentations which is one of the important things that you need to do regardless of your chosen professions.

b. personalbrandingblog.com

This blog touch on an area that is neglected by most other websites but it is nevertheless important.

Once inside a job, it is not the end of the story. What happens next is actually an endless series of challenges to excel at your profession.

If you got a business, distinguish your products and services from others is essential to gain higher profitability.

Similarly, in the workplace, having a “unique selling position” and develop your own personal brand to differentiate yourself from others is also the key to advancements and higher incomes.

This blog totally focuses on this subject of “personal brand”.

c. http://blog.penelopetrunk.com/

The fact that her career advices appear on over 100 newspapers and even the prestigious Time magazine already tells you that you will not waste time reading it for good advices on career.

But sometimes, I find the words hard to swallow yet at the same time practical.

Related posts:

1. Top 6 Tips for Prospective Fresh Graduates Job Search
2. What every resume must have
3. How to make yourself safe from online job searches?

Read on to discover how you can save more time and effort in securing for yourself a good job in this current economic turmoil.

1. The door of opportunity is wide open if you are prepared

In applying for more prestigious courses like medicine and lawyer after getting your high school results, you won’t even have a chance to go for interview if all you have are Cs and Ds even if you can excel in interview sessions.

Similarly, having a chance to go for job interview in the first place requires a well written resume and cover letters. Of course, it is good to have some testimonials from past employers and certificates showing your past achievements and whatever skills that you have. Being a president of some societies or clubs during high school and college days definitely helps a lot in differentiating yourself from others.

Always explain in your cover letter that you are good team players and get along well with people regardless of what types of jobs you are applying.

2. Do research on company

There is a time lag between being notified to go for interview at the company and the actual interview. As a result, it is a good practice to use the time productively during this period of time to at least find out the culture and visions of the company and how your job is going to add value and help the company achieves its visions.

Take note that there is a good chance that the HR personnel are going to ask some questions regarding the company.

3. Presentation and interview skills

When all is said and done, all that matter is during the actual physical interview. Other than dressing well and projecting a good image of you, what is also equally important is to well prepare for some highly possible interview questions.

Most of the questions asked during interview will fall under 4 main categories, namely on your work history, stuffs about you, about the job itself and last but not least, questions about your future in this job.

The following websites lists out and summaries all the typical questions that will be asked during interviews for most types of jobs,

http://jobsearch.about.com/od/interviewquestionsanswers/a/interviewquest.htm

4. Failing to plan means planning to fail

Being organized is important in job search. Most probably, there a few channels for you to work with in securing yourself a dream job or just any job.

Classified ads in local newspapers, posting your resume online, going on career fairs organized by your colleges, just to name a few, is what most people does nowadays.

You must map out a strategy in these times of uncertainty. It is good to dream big but it is more effective to be practical. If you know that you have no really good academic credentials coupled with no other outstanding achievements all the way from primary school until now, and then it is better that the first job you applied for is the one that least people of your age and educational qualifications are likely to apply for.

5. Keeping Track of your job applications

Since and most probably you are going to send your resumes and cover letters to all the companies here, there and everywhere, there is a good chance of the following scenarios happening to each one of us.

Future Boss: Hello, can I speak to Dill Gates please?
You: Yes, may I know who this is?
Future Boss: I’m calling from Macrosoft, I have received your resume and was enquiring if you were free to come down to Macrosoft today for an interview, today?
You: Ok, but en, which job, I applied to so many different places . . . . . . and which position did I apply for?

Consider that job 3/4 gone.

6. Gather all the interview questions

Whatever questions asked during interview and whatever questions that are being asked to your fellow friends during interview, do take note of them and prepare some good answers in case you still need them in future when changes jobs and if you are not successful in current round.

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2. What every resume must have
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