The 16 Things That Happen on Your First Day of a New Job

The 16 Things That Happen on Your First Day of a New Job Its your first day of work at your new job. Youre up early, youve eaten a hearty breakfast, and youre ready to go. The thing with first days is that youll never know exactly how its going to go. But from watching Peep Show religiously, we  can only guess it will go something like this 1) You wake up in the morning, feeling like this: 2) You eat a  hearty breakfast of Cornflakes for people who cant face reality: 3) You walk into the new office, meet your colleagues: 4) But it all goes wrong when your true awkwardness comes out: 5) You meet your new manager: 6) You get assigned a new project, that you have no idea how to do: 7) You try and introduce a bit of humour into conversation, and it fails: 8) Youre introduced to the new potential love of your life: 9) You try and impress them  with some vaguely interesting facts about you: 10) Back to your desk, where you go  through the antsy, unrest stage of the day, where youre not sure whats going on: 11) Time for lunchwoohoo! 12) You meet the office idiot 13) ..and youre finally feeling relaxed enough to get some work done: 14) Youre invited to the afterwork drinks.. 15) which you try and wholeheartedly enjoy. 16) Now finally, home relax, recuperate, and reflect. Bliss. How does the first day at a new job usually go for you? Tweet us your most embarrassing moments at @UndercoverRec on Twitter!

Boost Engagement for Your Personal Brand with Facebook Campaigns - Personal Branding Blog - Stand Out In Your Career

Boost Engagement for Your Personal Brand with Facebook Campaigns - Personal Branding Blog - Stand Out In Your Career A presence on Facebook is an essential element to building your personal brand. Creating giveaways and other special offers is also good for building a fan base, but these can be easily forgotten with a lack of engagement. So how exactly can your brand create a winning campaign? The process is simple once you put the right strategy in place. Facebook campaigns are great for brand visibility and growth online. It is important to note that a trial run of one campaign is not enough to build a successful momentum and reach the most fans. In order for your personal brand to experience the full benefit of these campaigns there are a few simple strategies to follow. How to get the most out of Facebook Campaigns Here are several ways you can use Facebook Campaigns to effectively build your personal brand. • Create a call-to-action Facebook fans love posts where they can answer questions and share their opinions. A great way to do this is to write open-ended questions that provoke a response such as fill-in-the-blank, trivia, and agree or disagree. Use hashtags that appeal to a special campaign like #FreeBookMonday or #FanFriday, which will also generate more ‘likes’ and shares on your Page. • Offer regular giveaways Depending on what your personal brand has to offer, consider creating a campaign on Facebook that will be a weekly or even a daily giveaway of a product or service. Not only does this attract new fans, but will keep your existing audience coming back for more. • Use kudos and give them value You can supercharge your colleagues as well as promote your own brand through cross-sharing Facebook campaigns. Offer something of value to your followers, and be sure to mention and thank others for participating. • Give out free tips and advice While many personal brands have their own eBooks and an active blog many may not be taking advantage of sharing important tips and advice from these to their audience. This is a great way to encourage your fans to check out your resources, and to give them something they can use and learn from in return. Try this out as a campaign on a regular schedule so that your fans eagerly anticipate the next installment. Facebook is a place where you do not want to miss out on promoting your personal brand through targeted and well-planned campaigns. It is beneficial to your audience if conducted on a regular basis, which will not only attract more fans, but sell your products and services for you without having to create a sales pitch. dolphfyn / Shutterstock.com

The portfolio career To find fulfillment try simultaneous careers

The portfolio career To find fulfillment try simultaneous careers Recently, Aaron Karo performed stand-up comedy in a string of sold-out shows. He also bills himself as an author, a public speaker, and a sitcom actor. Karo has always juggled a few careers. After college, he went to work for an investment bank. But he was also writing a weekly newsletter that had tens of thousands of subscribers. And he wrote a book. About ten years ago, British management guru Charles Handy predicted that people would replace the idea of one, full-time job, with several different part-time occupations. He called this the portfolio career, and Karo provides a good example of how this trend is taking shape. A portfolio career is not the same thing as holding down three bad jobs and wishing you could figure out what to do with yourself. Rather, it is a scheme you pursue purposefully and positively, as a way to achieve financial or personal goals or a mixture of both. This new type of career choice can include several highly skilled, professional posts, often mixing employment with self-employment, and volunteer work or learning work with fee-based work. While there has been scattered adoption of the portfolio career among baby boomers, the idea is gaining a lot of traction among younger workers, even though they never use the term. The Electronic Recruiting Exchange reports that as many as a third of new workers are looking for alternatives to full-time employment. For people in their twenties and early thirties, a portfolio career is a means of self-discovery, hedging ones bets, and protecting their quality of life. Most people have skills that cross into more than one profession. And if you take any one of the popular personality tests offered by web sites and career counselors you will find that peoples personalities do not fit neatly into one type of profession either. So the idea of having to choose one single profession is frequently unappealing. Ezra Zuckerman, associate professor at the MIT Sloan School of Management, told me, A lot of people feel alienated when thy feel there is more to themselves that they have not shown [in their work]. Young people are particularly drawn to the idea of a career as a vehicle to fulfillment and self-actualization, so they are less apt than Handys generation to settle into one, narrow career. The arguments for a portfolio career at the beginning of ones adult life are clear. Professor of psychology at Harvard, Daniel Gilbert, told me that the best way to figure out what will make you happy is to try it. A portfolio career gives you the opportunity to try three or four types of work at the same time, and to keep switching out choices until you come up with a portfolio that you like. Karo, for example, dropped the banking career when he stopped liking the daily suit-and-tie routine. And when I ask him when his next book is coming out, he hems and haws and its clear that the career as an author is not so appealing at least right now. The trick in all career decisions is to figure out the intersection of your skills and your passions. This is an ongoing process, not a final destination, so a portfolio of part-time careers is more conducive to this path of discovery than a single, eight-hours-every-day career. Andrew Zacharakis, professor at Babson College told me, Passion is something you have to look for every day of your life. Your passion is likely to change over time but finding your passion is good practice. Part of the search for you passion should be a search to know what your skill set is. Ask parents, mentors, and friends. Try to mach skills you have with your passion. The problem with a portfolio career is that you run the risk being a jack-of-all-trades and a master of none a problem in terms of both money and fulfillment. The most secure portfolio careers are with people who have a fairly solid skill base that people will pay for, says Ian Christie, career coach and author of the Bold Career blog. You have to hang your hat on something. Either a functional skill, like accounting and you can be, say, a personal trainer at home. Or you need to find a market niche and provide a lot of services, such as training, development, outsource contracting, etcetera. And you probably need a creative outlet in your portfolio. When we are involved in creativity we feel that we are living more fully than in the rest of life, says, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, professor of psychology at the University of Chicago. Any work can include creative thinking, but, he told me, if you want to be creative then you must learn to do something well, To excel at something requires you to challenge yourself continually. Achieving high skill level at something is an important step toward fulfillment because, most people want to think they have explored the limits of their potential. Karo says he receives a lot of email from people asking how they can follow their creative dreams. And his advice is, appropriately, the Instant-message-length version of Handys book-length theory: Youve gotta do it on the side. Diversify your revenue streams. Do what youre passionate about.

Should You Write a LinkedIn Summary in 1st or 3rd Person

Should You Write a LinkedIn Summary in 1st or 3rd Person LinkedIn is a great website and a necessary tool for getting yourself noticed with candidates and clients. A lot of key people take time to get their profiles updated, including the CEOs of Fortune 500 companies. This shows that LinkedIn is not only used by recruiters but also managers and executives who may be looking for potential candidates to take under their wing and train. Therefore, ensuring you have a complete LinkedIn profile to push your career forward has never been more important! No Concrete Steps to Building a Profile: The only difficult thing about LinkedIn is that there is no prescribed way to get your profile done. There are so many bits of information required, including an area that requires you to write a summary of your life in 2000 characters or less. This stumps most people, and even turns some away from creating a profile on the website. Here are some tips that you could use to make the exercise much easier: Be yourself â€" the summary is to give people an idea as to who you are, not what you have done in the past five years (that’s what the bio-data is for). Call on your creative juices and try to make a personal connection with your readers within the first two or so sentences of your summary. Be concise â€" you are given two thousand characters to use when creating your summary, and that translates to roughly 500 words, give or take a few. Do remember though that the people viewing your profile are not doing so to kill time. They would be businessmen, and would have a limited amount of time to check LinkedIn. Shorten your summary, but don’t leave anything important out of it! Avoid overkill â€" in 2012, the most overused buzzwords were identified. Among these were: creative, effective, motivated, innovative and analytical. All employees are expected to have these traits, and announcing them would be a waste of space. Thinking out of the box and demonstrating this while creating your LinkedIn profile would be a better way of proving that you are innovative and analytical. Close the deal â€" whenever you get into a sales situation, you try to close the deal as many times as you can. A LinkedIn view is a potential sale, and your profile is the sales pitch. Be sure to offer a close at the end of your summary, and that would be in the form of a recommended action such as “Do reach out to me should you want to talk about baseball, football, or improving your sales program.” RELATED:  Do Yourself a Favor and Spruce Up Your LinkedIn  Summary! First Person or Third? What most people ask (and what this article was first set out to do) is whether the summary should be written in the first person or third person point of view. There is a comic I read in my childhood wherein one character said that great people refer to themselves in the third person. Using the third person does have a certain appeal to it, and it does make you feel as if you are praising someone else and not building a shrine to yourself. However, using the third person does not create that personal feel. In the end, it would really be up to you and how you feel about it. It would be best though if you do take ownership for all the things that you have done to make yourself a cut above the rest. Yes, it will give you a bit more difficulty in the terms of trying to sound humble and proud at the same time, but once again, they are your actions. Own up to them, especially if they are good things. That would get people to read your profile even more, and you might get more offers that you would even expect. READ MORE:  Stop Writing  Your  LinkedIn  Profile in the 3rd Person! Image: Shutterstock

How to Include Writing Article in Resume

How to Include Writing Article in ResumeThe question 'how to include writing an article in resume' is one of the most frequently asked questions that people have when it comes to job seeking. This is a legitimate concern as it could be seen as a form of an advertisement for a new career opportunity. It is also a form of the CV as the resume can serve as a representation of your career in the organization. In this article I would like to suggest the correct way to write an article in resume.There are two components that need to be considered when writing an article in resume. The first is the content and the second is the layout. The content is very important as the content will decide how well you write in this format. The content should be as brief as possible and should be in writing format.The next question to ask is how to present the resume. When you read resumes, your eyes are drawn to the writing in the form of the name and position of the person who will be getting the offer. You can avoid reading about the other details of the candidate by putting only the information that matters. For example if you are trying to get a position as an operations manager, the details must include the name, title, duties, salary and history. But do not write the same information for each person who is on the list of applicants.The format of the resume is extremely important. Make sure that the format and layout is appropriate. If you do not know the format, try looking through several examples on the internet. Also look at the samples in Word or Microsoft word so that you can follow it exactly.Also be sure to include a cover letter. Make sure that it is good and that you use the same format for the letter. As a matter of fact, you should also write a profile of yourself in the cover letter. The profile will help you convince the hiring manager that you have knowledge in the required field.The last thing that you should consider is the order in which you will introduce th e resume. Remember that it is very important to give importance to the section that is most significant and useful. If you have the required skill then it is the resume that should carry it. However, if you have no skills at all, then include a section for skills.Another good tip is to include an introduction and conclusion. These two sections are important as they help in organizing the whole resume and help in presenting it as well. Also use this format to present yourself. Give your main points and then give a summary of what you have to offer in the interview.There are many different ways in which you can present the resume. So do not lose hope as there are many tips that can be used.

Mistakes to Avoid in the Hiring Process - CareerAlley

Mistakes to Avoid in the Hiring Process - CareerAlley We may receive compensation when you click on links to products from our partners. Hiring staff to work at your business is one of the most important decisions that you can make as a company owner. After all, they are going to be the ones who represent your organization and make many key decisions. But if you find that you always seem to hire the wrong people for the job, there are many reasons why this is the case. In this blog post, we are going to discuss a few of the possible mistakes that you may be making in the hiring process so you can avoid repeating them in the future. Hiring Only in Desperate Need If you hire a new member of staff only at the point when you desperately need them, you are much more likely to panic and end up with someone who doesnt fit the role well. Hiring high-quality employees takes time and there is nothing wrong with being on the lookout throughout the year. Also, if you instigate a longer notice period when current members of staff want to leave their role, you are more likely to give yourself the breathing space that you need to replace them properly. source Not Using Your Internal Resources When you start using external job sites, there is always going to be an element of risk as you dont properly know the candidates. However, if you promote from within, you already have a good idea of the person and how suited they would be to the role. If you dont want to go down this path, you could always ask your existing members of staff for any recruitment recommendations. You could then offer them a bonus if the new team member turns out to be a success. How does the recruitment process work? It depends on the company and what methods the company uses to find applicants for employment. However, most large and some small employers have a formal process that it follows to recruit and hire new employees. thebalancecareers.com Not Using a Formal Hiring Process A formal hiring process should be used to ensure that the hiring process is standardized and more likely to succeed. Think about what it is that you are looking for when you start looking over the resumes in the first place. It may be that you start sourcing candidates by going through recruiters such as Executive Search. Once you have your pool of potential staff members, you may then want to screen them with an initial phone interview. Following on from this, you may have a formal interview with some pre-selected questions, before making your final decision. source Not Training Your New Team Member Properly The hiring process should continue once you have the right person for the job. After all, you want to keep hold of them for as long as possible. When you have your new member of staff, you should get them up to speed as quickly as possible. Mentoring, technical assistance, and general day-to-day support should all be made available. The best hiring processes are the ones that end with the perfect member of staff staying with your organization for the longest time possible. Job search is an art. In addition to the traditional search (job boards, headhunters, etc.) that EVERYONE is doing, you need to think outside of the box and look for opportunities where fewer people are likely to look. Leverage your search engine skills. Tweet This So, if you have spotted that you are making any of the above mistakes, now is the time to try to change things. The Effective Hiring Manager Price: $25.49 The Effective Hiring Manager offers an essential guide for managers, team leaders, and HR professionals in organizations large or small. The author’s step-by-step approach makes the strategies easy to implement. Buy Now from Amazon We earn a commission if you click this link and make a purchase at no additional cost to you. Last Updated: March 2, 2020 What's next? Ready to take action? Choose the right tools to help you build your career. Looking for related topics? Find out how to launch your career. Subscribe and make meaningful progress on your career. It’s about time you focused on your career. Get Educated Contact Us Advertise Copyright 2020 CareerAlley. All Rights Reserved. Privacy Policy + Disclosure home popular resources subscribe search

Tis the season... to job search - Sterling Career Concepts

Tis the season... to job search Tis the season to job search Whenclients mention theyre going to put the brakes on their job search now that the holidays are approaching, I jump on my soap box and give them reasons to reconsider. I recently shared my thoughts with Lee Miller ofThe Star-Ledgerbutwanted to spend more timeon the subject with you: It canbe a great time to pick up some temp work as companies try to complete projects by year-end or need help filling in for staff on vacation and it goes without saying that getting your foot in the door by temping can be a smart move. They get to meet you, you get to meet them. Its a great introduction! With it being a popular time for vacations, you can get lucky sometimes and the hiring manager may pick up his/her own calls if their assistant is out on vacation. You can increase these odds by calling first thing in the morning since a lot of execs will arrive by 8 or 8:30 and their assistants may not start til 9. There is still hiring during December.Theres no rule that says itstops.Sometimes a department or group is at risk for losing the headcount if they dont fill the spot by year-end or sometimes its budgeted for this year and they dont want to risk losing the funding so they remain focused on filling spots through December. How do I know this? I placed multiple candidates during the month of December every year while in executive search. Our office never came to a stand-still. You canmake the week between Christmas and New Years work for you. It can be a very quiet week at many companies so if you take the time to call people that week, if theyre in the office, theres a greater chance theyll have time to speak with you. Its a great time to schedule informational interviews if your contacts are in the office. Take advantage of others downtime by not turning it into downtime in your own search! People who are relaxed and in good spirits at work will be more amenable to speaking with you and trying to help you out. And if you believe nothing else, realize the numbers are on your side. Since so many job seekers do slow down their searches at this time of year, so if you stay out there, youre cutting through less chatter and youre giving yourself better odds. Think about it this way: if someones going to get through to the hiring manager or make strong strides on scheduling informational interviews, it should beyou! While I admit it can be tempting to take a breather during the holidays, keep it in moderation.The time between Thanksgiving and New Yearsisa great time to network, schedule informational interviews, and work on speaking with hiring managers directly. Now get shopping and get to work! Tis the season... to job search Tis the season to job search Whenclients mention theyre going to put the brakes on their job search now that the holidays are approaching, I jump on my soap box and give them reasons to reconsider. I recently shared my thoughts with Lee Miller ofThe Star-Ledgerbutwanted to spend more timeon the subject with you: It canbe a great time to pick up some temp work as companies try to complete projects by year-end or need help filling in for staff on vacation and it goes without saying that getting your foot in the door by temping can be a smart move. They get to meet you, you get to meet them. Its a great introduction! With it being a popular time for vacations, you can get lucky sometimes and the hiring manager may pick up his/her own calls if their assistant is out on vacation. You can increase these odds by calling first thing in the morning since a lot of execs will arrive by 8 or 8:30 and their assistants may not start til 9. There is still hiring during December.Theres no rule that says itstops.Sometimes a department or group is at risk for losing the headcount if they dont fill the spot by year-end or sometimes its budgeted for this year and they dont want to risk losing the funding so they remain focused on filling spots through December. How do I know this? I placed multiple candidates during the month of December every year while in executive search. Our office never came to a stand-still. You canmake the week between Christmas and New Years work for you. It can be a very quiet week at many companies so if you take the time to call people that week, if theyre in the office, theres a greater chance theyll have time to speak with you. Its a great time to schedule informational interviews if your contacts are in the office. Take advantage of others downtime by not turning it into downtime in your own search! People who are relaxed and in good spirits at work will be more amenable to speaking with you and trying to help you out. And if you believe nothing else, realize the numbers are on your side. Since so many job seekers do slow down their searches at this time of year, so if you stay out there, youre cutting through less chatter and youre giving yourself better odds. Think about it this way: if someones going to get through to the hiring manager or make strong strides on scheduling informational interviews, it should beyou! While I admit it can be tempting to take a breather during the holidays, keep it in moderation.The time between Thanksgiving and New Yearsisa great time to network, schedule informational interviews, and work on speaking with hiring managers directly. Now get shopping and get to work!