Power Up Your Personal Brand To Land Your Dream Job

Reposted from careerrealism.com

What do Sir Richard Branson and Lady Gaga have in common? The power of an instantly recognizable personal brand. And whether you are aware of it or not, you already have a personal brand. Your personal brand is both what you are known for and the experience people have of you. You might be known for your integrity. People might experience and talk about your outstanding customer service, all of this forms your personal brand.

Your challenge is knowing what your brand is and bringing ‘brand you’ alive in your next job interview. The good news is, unlike Sir Richard Branson and Lady Gaga, you do not need a marketing juggernaut to do this. The simplest, yet most powerful way to articulate your personal brand is through storytelling. Storytelling is a powerful way to communicate your personal brand because stories paint a picture, capture the imagination, and tap into appropriate emotion. Stories help your audience connect with you and your message and can influence action, in this instance landing your dream job.

The stories you share that show you are a team player, have initiative, will both help you stand out from the competition and nail that next interview.

What is an example of a great personal brand story? Even after his passing, Steve Jobs continues to inspire and engage us through the stories around his personal brand. In Walter Isaacson’s best-selling biography about Steve Jobs, there is a story that Jobs used to explain his perfectionist streak:

As a young boy, Jobs had helped his father build a fence around their backyard, and he was told they had to use just as much care on the back of the fence as on the front.

“Nobody will ever know,” young Steve said. His father replied, “But you will know.” A true craftsman uses a good piece of wood even for the back of a cabinet against the wall, his father explained, and they should do the same for the back of the fence. It was the mark of an artist to have such a passion for perfection.

Isaacson explains that Jobs applied this lesson to each and every computer machine, much to the frustration of Apple engineers who were asked to make the chips line up neatly inside a tightly sealed box. “Nobody is going to see the PC board,” one of them protested. Jobs reacted as his father had:

“I want it to be as beautiful as possible, even if it’s inside the box. A great carpenter isn’t going to use lousy wood for the back of a cabinet, even though nobody’s going to see it.”

Brand Steve Jobs stands for perfectionism in all our minds.

So, where do you start when finding stories that capture your brand? These tips will help you get started.

The first is being purposeful with your personal brand stories. Share the stories that meet the criteria the job requires. There is no point sharing a story on how you bent the rules to deliver great outcome if the job requires a stickler for rules. Pan through all your experiences both work and non-work related to find the stories that meet your purpose.

The second is use stories to support your hard data. If you have a figure like ‘I improved delivery times by 15%’, then support this with a story that shows how it impacted an individual customer. Always use both hard data and stories. The two together create a compelling case for employing you over your competitors.

And third all your stories must be authentically true. This is a “VIP,” a very important point.  In your personal life and in traditional storytelling it might be OK to make up or embellish stories but in business we cannot stress enough that your stories must be authentic.  It is simply not worth the backlash on your reputation or credibility in making up or spinning stories.

Finding and sharing purposeful authentic stories, in your next interview that articulate your personal brand, will help you instantly connect with the interviewer and be memorable for all the right reasons. Power up your personal brand using storytelling in your next job interview and you could land the job of your dreams.

Social Do's And Don'ts For Job Hunters

Reposted from informationweek.com

More and more companies are using social media to find and vet job candidates, and more and more often, social media is giving these companies reasons to not hire a candidate.

A survey conducted by Harris Interactive on behalf of CareerBuilder found that two in five companies are using social networking sites to research job candidates, up 37% from last year. Of these companies, 43% have found information on social media that has made them decide to not hire a candidate. On the flip side, 19% of survey respondents said they have found information on candidates' social networking profiles that caused the hiring scales to tip in their favor.   The CareerBuilder study was conducted earlier this year among more than 2,100 hiring managers and human resources professionals. Based on their responses, here are five things you should do on social media when in the market for a new position and five things that you should not do -- or stop doing, pronto.

  Do   1. Convey a professional image (57% of survey respondents said they hired job candidates based at least in part on the professional image the candidates conveyed on social media). 2. Demonstrate that you are well-rounded and have a range of interests (50%). 3. Post information to your pages that supports your professional qualifications (49%). 4. Show creativity (46%). 5. Demonstrate good communications skills (43%).   [ Here are more tips on how to do social right: 5 Social Business Mistakes You're Making. ]

  Don't   1. Post provocative or inappropriate photos or other content (50% of survey respondents said they had declined to hire job candidates at least in part because of questionable content posted on the candidates' social media profiles). 2. Include posts/photos that show drug or alcohol use (48%). 3. Bad-mouth previous employers (33%). 4. Make discriminatory comments of any kind (28%). 5. Get caught in a lie about your qualifications (24%).    

CareerBuilder recommends that anyone involved in or thinking about a job search do a Web search on themselves to see what pops up -- on social media sites and otherwise. You can bet hiring managers are doing the same.   In what other ways can social media help or hurt job candidates? How is your company using social media to recruit new employees? Please let us know in the comments section below.

How to Ace a Phone Interview

You’ve finally decided that you’re ready for the next step in your professional career. You’ve been searching job boards and applying to jobs that sound interesting to you. Finally, a note back from an employer, hoping to get you on the phone for a telephone interview. Woo!

Interviewing is one of the most nerve wrecking tasks, and not being able to see your interviewer face to face can sometimes be even more terrifying. You won’t be able to see your interviewer’s facial cues to your answers and they won’t be able to see you or sense your enthusiasm for the job.  Here are some helpful tips and tricks to get and ace that interview:

• Do your research on the company. You want to find out of this is a company that you’ll enjoy working for, and you want to make sure that it’ll be a good fit for you.  See what the company’s history is, what their stock holdings might be, and any other little tidbits that you can find about their company goals. Also, be sure that you understand the job description and the responsibilities that you will be undertaking. Coming to the interview with some prior knowledge about the company shows initiative.

• Have your resume printed out in front of you.  You might have to reference your resume to explain your duties further, report dates, etc. I suggest having an abridged copy of your resume where you can easily read off your responsibilities rather than reading the prior job descriptions right off your resume.

• Find a quiet place to take the call. Whether you have to lock yourself in your closet (make sure you have good cell signal first!) or you have a quiet working office at home, make sure there won’t be any noisy interruptions.

• Be prepared with questions for the recruiter. Always write a few questions down prior to the interview – whether it is questions about the role or questions about the company’s culture, have 3-4 on hand to ask the recruiter towards the end of the interview. If they’ve answered all of your questions and you don’t have anything else offhand that you can think about, tell them that they’ve done a great job answering all the questions you had.

• Even though you can’t see your interviewer, act as if you’re facing them! You can dress up, smile, and pretend that you’re talking to them instead of speaking through the phone. This will help make you sound more confident.

• Always have a glass of water nearby.  This serves two purposes: quenching your thirst and giving you something to pause and consider questions with.  It’s okay to take a moment to compose your thoughts when you’re asked something! Interviewers prefer a well thought out answer rather than babbling.
• When you are all done with the interview, be sure to send out a thank you note to whomever took the time to speak to you. Not only does it show that you’re appreciative that they took the time out to speak to you, it serves as a reminder of your candidacy. You can even touch briefly on why you think you’re qualified for the job; just don’t brag too much.

By Kristina Mahar
Reposted from mscareergirl.com

LinkedIn Strategies That Keep You Unemployed

Here is another great article full of pointers about how not to use LinkedIn.  I think some of the key points in it can be used in other facets of your online presence, personal brand, and your resume.  Here are some thoughts.

 

People disclosing their age as the reason they do not believe they are being hired.

This does not just go for LinkedIn.  Like the article says - legally an employer cannot ask your age.  That being said, in today’s job market, employers are just looking for a reason to eliminate someone since there is an overabundance of similarly qualified candidates out there.  Do not help them put your name in the reject pile. Do your best to keep your age out of it.  Do not put it on your resume; do not put it on your LinkedIn, Twitter, or Facebook (if these are publicly tied to you).  Some of you will say that the employer can tell from your education and experience dates (or from your photo) what your age is.  This is true, but by you putting it out there (especially in the manner it is portrayed in the article); you indicate to them that it matters to you.  If it is important to you to point out, they may think on it more so than they would have before. 
 

 

Disclosing all the reasons they have heard so far as to why they were not offered a job.

Again like above, do not give an employer any fodder.  First of all, this sort of statement typically comes across as being whiney and/or negative.  No employer in their right mind wants to bring someone into their organization who starts off complaining.  This advice isn’t just for LinkedIn.  We are all guilty of it.  We do not get a job (because, let’s face it… no one gets every job thy interview for) and in our frustration we tell others the why and how of it.  Clearly we are not saying this as a positive thing, and negativity turns people off.  If you must say something, think of a positive spin.  For example, if they say you are overqualified find out what the next step up in the organization is and set your sights on that.  See if someone in HR or the hiring manager can give you feedback on how you can prepare yourself to be an ideal candidate for that position the next time it comes around.  Bottom line - be Proactive, not Reactive.

 

Derogatory statements about HR professionals, recruiters, and hiring managers.

Again, avoid coming off as negative at all costs.  I can’t stress this enough, and neither can the author of the article.  In a professional environment (and honestly, even in personal situations as well), you should be cautious about everything you say.  When a potential employer hears (or sees) you badmouthing a former employer, another potential employer, or anyone at all, they will automatically assume that they can count on similar treatment from you also.  It’s human nature.  If you put across a positive image, you will get one back.  If you put negativity out into the world, you will get it back.  If you are making negative or derogatory comments regarding other professionals, you might as well throw in the towel now.  You cannot ever hope to have an employer think of you as a viable candidate if all they can see is the tension and conflict your negativity will bring to their organization. 

 


The best advice I can give is this… The world is watching.  You no longer have the luxury of speaking your mind and having it stay private.  Everything you put online is permanent.  There is no taking it back, and it is difficult to separate yourself from it once it’s out there.  So be very careful what you say.  Approach your online presence as if you are already sitting in the lobby, waiting for your interview - best foot forward, on your game, and ready to set the world on fire!

5 Things You Must Do Before Applying For A Job

I read this article the other day. What a great reminder regarding cleaning up your online presence.


Never apply for a job without making sure your online presence is as ready to interview as you are. Employers will look at the online version of you before they invite the in-person version to an interview, so make sure what they see helps solidify their impression of you as a candidate. Here are five things you must do before applying for a job:

 

1. Update Your LinkedIn Profile

If you haven’t revised your LinkedIn profile since your last job, it’s time to make some updates. Rewrite your summary to include your current career objective, and ask colleagues to endorse you and provide recommendations that reflect your job search. Make sure your online resume includes all your newest accomplishments. If you don’t have a professional picture to add to your profile, it’s time to have one taken.

 

2. Update Your Social Media Profiles

It’s easy to forget to keep your social media profiles updated, especially when you have multiple accounts. Log on to each of your social media services and make sure your profile photo is current and flattering and your profile blurb is accurate. See if you can make your profiles subtly reflect your professional skills without reading like a job application; “I see your copy errors” is a good line for a Facebook profile, while “I have six years of copy editing experience and am looking for work” is too much.

While you’re at it, untag those unflattering or unwanted pics, and delete any posts or tweets that don’t reflect well on you or your candidacy.

 

3. Google Yourself

You know your potential employer is going to Google you, so go ahead and Google yourself first.
Ideally, your top results are reflections of your work and personality: they should include any articles or print media about your work at previous organizations as well as links to your LinkedIn, Facebook, and other accounts. If you have a professional blog, it should be within the first five links as well and clearly identifiable as your work.

If your Google search turns up negative results, consider a service like Reputation Changer. This service removes negative references and past mistakes on the Internet, leaving your online presence more reflective of your current skills and abilities.

 

4. Make Sure Your Personal Life Is Out Of The Focus

Many people have personal blogs, Instagrams, or Tumblrs. It’s a good idea to use avatars for personal sites in order to keep your name associated with your professional work and your personal life out of the focus.

However, if you do use an avatar or online handle, make sure to disassociate it with anything you don’t want potential employers to see. You’d be surprised how many people use their Twitter handle as their OKCupid name, for example; and even if your interviewer doesn’t search far enough to make the connection, your new colleagues certainly will. Choose anonymous, unrelated handles for dating sites, diet sites, and anything else  you don’t want your employer to see.

 

 

5. Write A Well-Placed Blog About Your Industry

Believe it or not, it’s relatively easy to get published on an online magazine’s blog section. Write a post about a discovery you made while working or your thoughts on industry trends, then submit it to Open Salon or the Huffington Post. If you know your industry reads certain blogs or online publications, submit to them as well. Remember to stay positive and write well of your industry; this isn’t just an opportunity to share your opinions, it’s an audition for future work.
People on the hiring end: how do online searches reflect your opinions of candidates?
Job interviewers: what else have you done to prepare your online reputation before applying for jobs?

Your Resume by Section Part 2 - Objective/Summary

This might seem like a silly section to focus an entire posting on, but if written correctly this might just be the most important section you will write. 

A couple of years ago, the company I was working for was bought out by a competitor.  Obviously there were a lot of duplicate employees, especially in the HR department.  In order to help us all in the transition part of the 'deal' our company made was that every employee would have career counseling available to them.  This counseling was provided by Right Management. This is a great company with a lot of stellar information, resources, trainers, etc.

One of the keys they work on in these classes is to develop for yourself a 30 second commercial.  This is a 3-5 sentence summary of your skills and career goals.  The point of this is so that anytime, anywhere you can immediately recall some impressive things about yourself and give someone an idea of how you would like to use them.

The key points to hit in your commercial are:

• Experience
• Strengths
• Accomplishments
• Why you are looking for a new job (if applicable)
• What are you looking for
• End with a question

 

For example, here is one I have been working on as of late (I've had a bit of a shift in career goals in the past month or so, so it needs updating):

"I am a seasoned administrative professional with several years' experience in various fields including human resources and marketing.  I'm a people person who loves to network and I excel at helping people locate the resources they need to help them achieve their goals.  I am currently seeking different challenges and arenas to assist people in new ways.  Do you know of any opportunities in which I can use these skills to help?"

It's a work in progress, but you can see where I am going with it.

Why am I talking about a 30 second commercial when I should be talking about the Objectives/Summary section of your resume?  Because they are so similar, you can kill 3 birds with one stone.  People struggle with their Objective.  People struggle with their 30 second commercial.  People seldom have a useful LinkedIn summary.  All of these can be similar, and useful in their own ways.  So, once you can develop one, the other 2 will be easier. 

Here are the guidelines for your objective:

• What type of job are you looking for?  (include level [senior, junior, executive], area [administration, finance, etc], and industry where applicable)
• What do you excel at (strengths)?
• What can you do for your next employer?

As you can see, very similar to the 30 second commercial.  Obviously you can use more detail in your objective, but the bones of these are the same.  So pick one, get it down on paper, then develop the other.  Since there is less detail in the  commercial, it might be easier to do that one first.  Then you can elaborate with your objective.  Using the above example, my new objective might read something like:

"Detail-oriented Administrative Professional with over 12 years’ experience in various fields including human resources and marketing.  Demonstrated networking success communicating across department levels and industry channels to discretely handle information, manage multiple projects, and liaise between various groups in order to achieve common goals. Proven expertise in program administration, project management and coordination, information management, team building, business communication, and budget development and tracking. Strong organizational and planning skills.  Currently seeking to take the skills I have and use them in new and innovative ways."

again, a work in progress, but on paper I look pretty good, don't I?  Don't forget that your resume is a fluid document.  It changes as your experience and career goals do.  This section should be reviewed and tweaked frequently so as to maximize its effectiveness. 

Now, you can take both your Objective and your commercial, and either copy and paste one into your LinkedIn Summary section, or combine them to form something new.  See, 3 birds, 1 stone. Simple.

On GPAs and Brainteasers: New Insights From Google On Recruiting and Hiring

 Some insightful information on the hiring process that Google currently uses...

(reposted from LinkedIn)

  

“We found that brainteasers are a complete waste of time. How many golf balls can you fit into an airplane? How many gas stations in Manhattan? A complete waste of time. They don’t predict anything. They serve primarily to make the interviewer feel smart.”

That was just one of the many fascinating revelations that Laszlo Bock, Google’s senior vice president for people operations, shared with me in an interview that was part of the New York Times’ special section on Big Data published Thursday.

 

Bock’s insights are particularly valuable because Google focuses its data-centric approach internally, not just on the outside world. It collects and analyzes a tremendous amount of information from employees (people generally participate anonymously or confidentially), and often tackles big questions such as, “What are the qualities of an effective manager?” That was question at the core of its Project Oxygen, which I wrote about for the Times in 2011.

I asked Bock in our recent conversation about other revelations about leadership and management that had emerged from its research.

The full interview is definitely worth your time, but here are some of the highlights:

The ability to hire well is random. “Years ago, we did a study to determine whether anyone at Google is particularly good at hiring,” Bock said. “We looked at tens of thousands of interviews, and everyone who had done the interviews and what they scored the candidate, and how that person ultimately performed in their job. We found zero relationship. It’s a complete random mess, except for one guy who was highly predictive because he only interviewed people for a very specialized area, where he happened to be the world’s leading expert.”
 

Forget brain-teasers. Focus on behavioral questions in interviews, rather than hypotheticals. Bock said it’s better to use questions like, “Give me an example of a time when you solved an analytically difficult problem.” He added: “The interesting thing about the behavioral interview is that when you ask somebody to speak to their own experience, and you drill into that, you get two kinds of information. One is you get to see how they actually interacted in a real-world situation, and the valuable ‘meta’ information you get about the candidate is a sense of what they consider to be difficult.”

Consistency matters for leaders. “It’s important that people know you are consistent and fair in how you think about making decisions and that there’s an element of predictability. If a leader is consistent, people on their teams experience tremendous freedom, because then they know that within certain parameters, they can do whatever they want. If your manager is all over the place, you’re never going to know what you can do, and you’re going to experience it as very restrictive.

 

GPAs don’t predict anything about who is going to be a successful employee. “One of the things we’ve seen from all our data crunching is that G.P.A.’s are worthless as a criteria for hiring, and test scores are worthless — no correlation at all except for brand-new college grads, where there’s a slight correlation,” Bock said. “Google famously used to ask everyone for a transcript and G.P.A.’s and test scores, but we don’t anymore, unless you’re just a few years out of school. We found that they don’t predict anything. What’s interesting is the proportion of people without any college education at Google has increased over time as well. So we have teams where you have 14 percent of the team made up of people who’ve never gone to college.”

That was a pretty remarkable insight, and I asked Bock to elaborate.

“After two or three years, your ability to perform at Google is completely unrelated to how you performed when you were in school, because the skills you required in college are very different,” he said. “You’re also fundamentally a different person. You learn and grow, you think about things differently. Another reason is that I think academic environments are artificial environments. People who succeed there are sort of finely trained, they’re conditioned to succeed in that environment. One of my own frustrations when I was in college and grad school is that you knew the professor was looking for a specific answer. You could figure that out, but it’s much more interesting to solve problems where there isn’t an obvious answer. You want people who like figuring out stuff where there is no obvious answer.”

An Interesting Spin

Recently I read this article from Inc.com.  It is definitely an innovative way of coming at the hiring process.  As a job seeker though, it is a good way to make sure that you are keeping up with the times in your search, as well as just being some good advice in general.  Here are some thoughts I had regarding her pointers. (read the article first, then come back.  Don't worry, I'll wait!)



Step 1:  Don't post a job; post the problem the employee will solve.

This is a good way to come at your application/interview.  Do whatever research you can to try and determine what the company's main goal is in regard to the position you are applying for.  Tailor your experience on your resume accordingly in order to maximize your chances of getting an interview.  For example, if your research reveals that the previous occupant of the position lacked organizational skills, make sure you accentuate yours in your experience.

Once you get the interview, this is even easier.  Ask the recruiter (or whomever calls to set up the appointment) for some feedback on this.  The company will appreciate your desire to be prepared, and it will help you stand apart from others.  When you do your interview preparation, you can make sure that you hit as many of these areas of concern as possible.



Step 2:  Ask candidates to answer three key behavioral questions. 

• What do you know about our business and industry?
• How did you come to learn that what we do is important to our clients?
• What is your favorite aspect of our business, and why?

I LOVE these questions.  These are questions you should ask yourself before applying/interviewing for any position.  You should have an understanding of who it is you will be working for, and be sure you actually want to work for them.  Additionally, if you have the answers to these questions in your head when you interview, you will be able to answer their questions in a more enthusiastic and topical way.


Step 3:  Ask for their LinkedIn profile, Twitter name, and any other online presence that supports their candidacy.

This goes back to my advice on your personal branding.  Social media is just as important a job seeking tool as any other these days.  Make sure potential employers have something good to see.

and finally,

Make it very clear you do not want a resume or any other materials submitted beyond answering your three questions and providing social profile links.

The importance of this is to act as a reminder to always read the instructions the employer gives.  I can't tell you how many people I have seen get thrown right out of the process because they didn't bother to give the employer what they were asking for.  Be sure and provide everything they want, and nothing more.  Even if it is an accomplishment you are proud of, or you think it gives you an edge.  While it might do just that, you won't have the opportunity to get that edge if your inability to follow directions gets you rejected immediately.  Save it for when you get the interview!


 

How to Find Opportunities in Your Social Network

Topical to the Linkedin post from last week!

By Don Peppers

Reposted from http://www.linkedin.com/today/post/article/20130612135701-17102372-how-to-find-opportunities-in-your-social-network

Thirty years ago a landmark academic study demonstrated that most people who get new jobs through networking with others almost always get those jobs not from their closest friends or colleagues, but from those they didn’t really know as well. This principle, known as the “strength of weak ties,” has become famous as social networks have proliferated and people have struggled to understand how to extract value from them. LinkedIn’s own Co-Founder, Reid Hoffman, referenced the principle in his post last year, about the two types of professional relationships you should maintain: allies and acquaintances.

If you’re looking for a new job (and half or more of LinkedIn members apparently are), then the weak-ties principal is worth paying close attention to. In fact, it’s worth knowing about for a lot of other reasons, also. If you’re a sales person looking for leads, or a venture capitalist looking for investments, or a corporate board looking for new director candidates – knowing how the weak-ties principle works can make the difference between success and failure.

Social networks are actually networks of networks. Your own social graph is connected to many other people’s graphs, but you and your closest friends’ graphs will have a great deal of overlap, because you know many of the same people. It is the connections between more distant, largely non-overlapping networks that are critical to making a network robust and resilient.

Albert-László Barabási, a highly regarded network theorist, used a massive trove of data to examine how easy it would be to disrupt a network. When he and his team analyzed the anonymous call records for a mobile operator serving about 20% of the population of an undisclosed European country, they found something very interesting. You won’t significantly damage a network’s ability to share information throughout the population by eliminating the most connected people. But you can significantly disrupt a network if you take out those who have the most connections outside their own immediate communities – that is, those who constitute the most network-to-network links.

The reason distant connections are more likely to connect you with your next job opportunity is similar: You and your closest friends and colleagues already know about many of the same opportunities. To discover new opportunities that you don’t already know about requires you to reach out to people who are not in your own immediate circle. You need to make connections to other networks, beyond your own.

The weak-ties principle has many implications for how you go about discovering opportunities for your business, beyond just a personal job search. For instance:

• One study of successful entrepreneurs found they were more likely than others to have “deliberately exposed themselves to different sources of information, by striking up conversations on trains, for example, or maintaining a diverse range of acquaintances, to increase the odds of stumbling upon an interesting opportunity.”
• Private equity investors who share information with others about possible investment candidates are able to access a wider network of candidates themselves.
• Venture capital firms concentrated in technology centers (like Silicon Valley, Boston, or NY) do better competitively because they are able to “cast a wide, public net” – in effect, harvesting their weak ties.