May Hope Rise Again In You

Dawn as seen from space

As the new day

Lightens over the earth

Waking from the darkness

Of the day past and gone;

As your eyes open

To new possibilities,

Rising from the twin of death,

May hope rise again in you.

It is today:

Rise.

-Victoree

Victoree is celebrating Resurrection Day this week. Have a blessed Easter season and we will meet again next week.

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Marketing Your Career: Bring In the SWOT Team

 

INTRODUCTION: Marketing. Not just for shopping mall stores any more.

Just as we sat and kicked some ideas around about professional image, we will do the same with marketing a career. To begin with, let me take you all the way back to this: You are not a product. You are a person. You use your talent and skill to produce a product. You are the sole proprietor of You.com or You LLC, whatever. There is a title available called, You, Inc. which you may purchase through amazon.com.

When mention of marketing comes up, it calls forth images of retailing behemoths like Macy’s, Bloomingdale’s, and Marshall’s. The terms in a discussion about personal career marketing do come from product marketing.  That is no surprise since the “new job search” method means to approach the job search  as if mounting a  marketing campaign. When businesses want to consider a new direction, they “count the cost”. Businesses do an analysis of what they have, what they have to gain, and what they may stand to loose called a SWOT analysis –Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. 

To provide a fast and dirty crash course, we will begin our discussion with this article, personal career  marketing and  a YouTube video  professional marketing plan -Rich Alexander.

You know me. I’m all about the knowledge and the learning. More later.

My First Pink Slip

My career chose me long before high school and it was dead on correct. My heart made no mistake in answering the call of pen and paper. (The only thing I regret is not attending a University with a Journalism School like Columbia:  connections I could hook into and ride to Mars; good mentors; chances to breathe the same air with the profession’s greats, like Walter Cronkite…

I was about 23 and just got my  shiny new BA. My first job was as an advertising copywriter at a radio station that was changing formats from all news to top 40 rock and roll. I started work in this old New England city far away from home  in the waning days of a brilliant autumn. I was the last person served in the  unemployment filing line on the third of July half  a year later.

The station manager and the sales manager called me into the office, discussed my “failure to fulfil the expectations of the job” and gave me the option of signing a letter of resignation. At the end, with a little offhanded laugh, they said, “maybe it’s because you’re from the south”.

The school transcripts were stellar, but my work was less than expected. Without a clue why I failed I collected my stuff from all the desks I borrowed (can you imagine a writer never having her own desk?) and departed. Behind the door of my first apartment on the second floor I screamed so loudly, the neighbors thought they were audio witnesses to murder. Thus ended my first professional job where I got my very first pink slip.

Now as I hear the stories of the job losses, I relive the pain. Thoughts come in the night about how much damage my supervisors’ derisive giggles and that first pink slip did over thirty years ago –not only to my career but also to my soul.  To you who have just lost your job today: be very gentle with yourself. May you be comforted in your grief and come through stronger and wiser.

-Victoree

Get A Freelance Gig

In the search for information, a job seeker will encounter articles (bloggers and columnists!) that advise about surviving between jobs. They will toss “get a freelance gig” over their shoulder as if jobs of the kind lie on the ground like fallen leaves in October.
“I will not have you ignorant brethren”. Freelance “gigs” (term borrowed from the music world) don’t happen that way.

There seems to be a whiff of disdain for freelancers as if they are somehow lower in the table of occupations than people who hold so-called “real jobs”. Definitions run like this: Real Jobs: held by employees–35-40 hours per week/at corporation owned by somebody else/salary and benefits-9-to-5. Freelance: former employee who is only “on her own” a little while and is doing this to make some money until another “real job” comes along.

Before you take to heart any advice from these articles about freelancing or any of its sisters including consulting, have this basic understanding: freelancers are enterpreneures. They are independent service providers who contract with other businesses by the project or by term. This is not a lark. This is very hard work.

A freelancer procures business, markets services, and negotiates fair prices herself. A freelancer keeps books, makes collections, pays taxes, and makes her own Social Security contributions. A freelancer researches and buys the best health insurance plan for herself. The cost of vacations and rest days are at her own expense, so when she is just too tired and sick to work, she makes her own chicken soup. Some freelancers would swear that it is much like art: you do not choose it, it chooses you. Freelancers are business organization model “sole proprietor”. They may do business under their own name or a business name– a “d.b.a.”, “doing business as”. They may work out of an office carved out of a space in the home or another rented space.

In other words, freelancing is a viable way to make a living but only for they who have the self discipline, tenacity, dedication and patience. As the Gatorade ad says, “is it in you?”

Unemployed 6 Months Plus? Take A Holiday!

Articles about caring for the body, soul and spirit while unemployed are becoming more plentiful as the current economic crisis drags on. More people seem to need counseling for depression, anxiety, and general illness at a time when work-associated health insurance may be no longer available and funds for services like community mental health clinics have been severely cut.

The longer the time of unemployment, the greater the danger that  job hunting will overrun your life like English ivy. Recognize the symptoms: meals forgotten; sleep ignored; worship neglected; relaxation–what’s that?!  Then one day, while shouting at your spouse or throwing something or weeping for no reason, you realize that job hunting has been allowed to suck the joy out of living.

It’s time to seek out sources of encouragement: find motivational books at the local library; see the sky at least once per day; do something that is just plain fun. Since looking for work is a job, may I suggest taking the occasional “sick day”?  It is  important to mental health to “take a vacation” from job hunting occasionally. Give yourself a gift:  permission to go window shopping, to take a long, hot bath, or read something else beside another book about resumes. You will come back sharper, more refreshed and more able to focus on the task.

Stupid Things To Say In an Interview

If you read enough books about interviewing, you will acquire quite a collection of stellar “Stupid Things Candidates Say At Interviews” stories. (If you’re shaking your head or covering a smirk you just have not been through enough humiliating bombs of interviews.) Of course, fearing you will bomb at an interview because you have no clue how to prepare insures that you will–lesson #1. You will have a mighty harvest of your own stories to tell. Believe that. Before you say something stupid, may I recommend something from Drs. Ron and C. Krannich, folk who have with Nelson Bolles and John Crystal become favorite authors of mine. It’s called,”Nail The Interview”. They handle the subject of interviewing from a victorious mindset in a straightforward, deadly honest, shoot from the hip style with surprisingly classy dry humor. You may just love it so much as to wander over to some of their other books about career choice and handling “red flag issues” in your experience like “job hopping” and “been fired”. If nothing else, it will knock out some of the fear of the unknown. If  extended unemployment has you in the place where buying books is a no-no or you’re just plain frugal, borrow this gem at your local public library.

Looking For Work At Chain Stores?

In 2003, having just recently arrived in the state of Maryland, the most pressing need, of course, was for income. I love to shop, therefore the first thing I do upon arriving in a new town is seek work at places where I am inclined to do business. So, I cruised the shopping mall nearest to home looking for “help wanted” signs to answer. To distill my experience for anyone approaching temporary employment this way, allow me to warn you about certain practices in retailing: Many chain outlets including Rite Aid Drugstores, CVS Drugstores,and Card and Party Outlets always seem have “help wanted” signs posted as a matter of practice. The store may or may not have any immediate interest in hiring at that specific location. The parent corporation uses their stores to harvest applications unto a time when a store needs to hire. Then, they dip into their “barns”. I went to one store, just knowing I could have been hired immediately only to have the personnel tell me point blank that the available position will most likely be filled by one of the staffers who was at that very moment unpacking merchandise on the floor! Cruise the malls, my unemployed brothers and sisters, but take some announcements you will see with a pinch, or you will be in for a lot of heartbreak.