Why Video Résumés are a BAD Idea

“First Impressions Video”, “Video Cover Letter”, and “Video Résumé” all sound like creative and unique ways to be remembered by hiring managers. Before you whip out your Sony handheld, have you ever heard of Aleksey Vayner? As a senior at Yale, he created a video résumé entitled, “Impossible is Nothing” for potential investment banker hiring managers, and he never dreamed of the results.

He included clips of his weightlifting expertise, some dance moves that would make Baryshnikov blush (the dance moves – or the outfits – or maybe both), and his own unique diatribe about the ingredients for attaining success in the working world. One of those hiring managers emailed the video to his friends, and from there it went to YouTube, where it instantly went viral.

The media and bloggers everywhere ran the story, thereby making Mr. Vayner’s humiliation total and complete. You might find some YouTube parodies of Mr. Vayner’s video, but the original has long since been removed. Wikipedia and Google have documented Mr. Vayner’s self-absorbed career strategy beyond the video résumé and it makes for an interesting read. A wild and crazy guy for sure.

Besides the video résumé being an ineffective medium for getting a hiring manager’s attention (do you think attractive people might receive a different level of consideration vs. less attractive candidates? Wouldn’t you want to be evaluated on your expertise instead?), Mr. Vayner mistakenly believed that a résumé was about him, and not how his skills, knowledge, and experience could be positioned as the hiring manager’s problem solver.

I think the grammatically incorrect title of the video résumé should have been a clue to its contents – or maybe a warning.

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Want to receive a free copy of my Career Strategy Tip Sheets? You get 5 bundled tip sheets (PDF) for career strategy, cover letters, résumés, job interview, and salary negotiation. Just let me know your thoughts on this or any blog post–or let me know of a career topic you’d like me to discuss from the hiring manager’s perspective.

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Former Fortune 500 hiring manager Donn LeVie Jr. is the author of Strategic Career Engagement (September 2015), and the book that reset the rules for successful job and career strategies:  Confessions of a Hiring Manager Rev. 2.0 (June 2012, Winner of the 2012 Global eBook Award and Winner of the 2012 International Book Award for Jobs/Careers). He leads career strategy seminars at conferences, business/trade schools, colleges and universities, and U.S. military veterans organizations.

Does your conference need a keynote speaker or a career strategies seminar for conference attendees? Donn’s 2016-2017 engagement calendar is starting to fill up…contact him directly at donnlevie@austin.rr.com.

Don’t miss out on Donn’s blog posts…follow him now on Twitter @donnlevie and join in the jobs/career conversations at the Strategic Career Engagement LinkedIn discussion group.

5 Ways to Up Your Interview Chops

Look, not all of us have that Tony Robbins charisma when it comes to speaking to crowds or even one-on-one in a job interview. But we all have the capacity to rise to the occasion when it’s in our best interest, especially when it’s to avoid negative consequences. I have a friend whose picture is in the Whos’s Who of Introverts, but can reason and persuade like William F. Buckley when it comes to talking himself out of a speeding ticket. He rose to the occasion to avoid  a very expensive ticket and taking a hit on his car insurance.

Interviews are no different. The negative side of doing poorly in a job interview is not continuing forward in the hiring process. That’s pretty strong incentive to put on your game face if you’ve made it as far as the job interview. It’s not about trying to be someone you’re not; it’s about stretching more out of your own comfort zone to embrace the opportunity. Just adding some slight vocal inflections and facial expressions adds enthusiasm to your statement “I have the necessary skills and background to help add value to the team” (or something like that). A genuine degree of enthusiasm helps convince the hiring manager you are interested in the position.

Here are 5 suggestions for upping your interview chops:

1. Embrace the fact that no one knows YOU and your expertise better than YOU. How can someone without the knowledge you have of your accomplishments, skills, and knowledge get the best of you? Only if you let them.
2. It’s OK if you’re a little nervous, but try to eliminate any fear of failure. The highly skilled concert pianist may be nervvous as he or she walks out on stage, but the audience is on the artist’s side – they want the event to be successful. It’s the same with hiring managers – they have thought highly enough of your background to invite you for an interview; it’s in their interest to want you to do well.
3. The best antidote to nervousness is knowing your résumé and accomplishments backwards and forwards. You can’t get tripped up by anyone regarding your work history if your résumé serves as your talking points; letting fear control your emotional response to an interview situation might, however.
4. Ask questions about the project work, challenges to be addressed, or specific tools to help you control any sense of being in the witness box. When there’s a two-way exchange of information, a conversation happens, which is a lot less threatening than an interview.
5. Have a sense when the interview is over. When I have interviewed quiet, introverted candidates, many just didn’t have any sense of timing when the interview was concluded. There’s that embarrassing pregnant pause and stillness in the room as if  the candidate is waiting for someone to call him or her out of the room.  I’ll often toss out the cue, “Do you have any other questions for me or about the position?” That’s usually a signal that we’re done if you don’t have any questions.

With solid preparation and going in to an interview to have a conversation about how you are the hiring manager’s problem solver, you’ll  eliminate the competition “from top to bottomus.”

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Want to receive a free copy of my Career Strategy Tip Sheets? You get 5 bundled tip sheets (PDF) for career strategy, cover letters, résumés, job interview, and salary negotiation. Just let me know your thoughts on this or any blog post–or let me know of a career topic you’d like me to discuss from the hiring manager’s perspective.

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Former Fortune 500 hiring manager Donn LeVie Jr. is the author of Strategic Career Engagement (September 2015), and the book that reset the rules for successful job and career strategies:  Confessions of a Hiring Manager Rev. 2.0 (June 2012, Winner of the 2012 Global eBook Award and Winner of the 2012 International Book Award for Jobs/Careers). He leads career strategy seminars at conferences, business/trade schools, colleges and universities, and U.S. military veterans organizations.

Does your conference need a keynote speaker or a career strategies seminar for conference attendees? Donn’s 2016-2017 engagement calendar is starting to fill up…contact him directly at donnlevie@austin.rr.com.

Don’t miss out on Donn’s blog posts…follow him now on Twitter @donnlevie and join in the jobs/career conversations at the Strategic Career Engagement LinkedIn discussion group.

Recognize These 8 Career Blind Spots?

We all have blind spots in our personal makeup. Sometimes we need feedback from others to bring them to our awareness. Blind spots result from poor self-awareness and self-knowledge, and might manifest as saying one thing and doing another. Blind spots can be a liability to your career strategy when mistakes made and shortcomings possessed fail to produce a change in awareness or knowledge of them.

Peak performers are not without their deficiencies; however, peak performers are aware of them, can improve on them, or can partner with others who possess the competency they lack.

Admitting to mistakes or shortcomings can be a difficult proposition for some. “Saving face” always backfires, as does having others assume an “Emperor’s New Clothes” attitude, colluding with your denial. It’s never a good idea to obscure the truth as that only prevents real gains in productivity or effectiveness.

Here are eight blind spots* that anyone on any rung of the career ladder can possess:

• Runaway ambition: Winning at all cost, exaggerates accomplishments, arrogant
• Unrealistic goals: Sets overly ambitious, unattainable goals for group; unrealistic about effort required
• Relentless striving: Compusive overachiever who sacrifices everything else, vulnerable to burnout
• Drives others: Catalyst for burnout of others, prefers to micromanage rather than delegate; abrasive, insensitive
• Power hungry: Seeks power for self-interest rather than organization’s; exploits others for personal gain
• Recognition hound: Addicted to glory, takes credit for others’ success; short on follow-through
• Preoccupation with appearances: Style over substance, concerned more with image than results; craves prestige
• Need to appear perfect: Visibly angered by criticism; blames others for failure; can’t admit mistakes/weaknesses

When your self-awarness and self-knowledge are healthy, blind spots are more often than not behaviors or patterns you’ll recognize yourself. However, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t seek honest feedback on how others perceive you and your actions.

*(from a study by Robert E. Kaplan and also referenced in Daniel Goleman’s book, Emotional Intelligence.)

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Want to receive a free copy of my Career Strategy Tip Sheets? You get 5 bundled tip sheets (PDF) for career strategy, cover letters, résumés, job interview, and salary negotiation. Just let me know your thoughts on this or any blog post–or let me know of a career topic you’d like me to discuss from the hiring manager’s perspective.

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Former Fortune 500 hiring manager Donn LeVie Jr. is the author of Strategic Career Engagement (September 2015), and the book that reset the rules for successful job and career strategies:  Confessions of a Hiring Manager Rev. 2.0 (June 2012, Winner of the 2012 Global eBook Award and Winner of the 2012 International Book Award for Jobs/Careers). He leads career strategy seminars at conferences, business/trade schools, colleges and universities, and U.S. military veterans organizations.

Does your conference need a keynote speaker or a career strategies seminar for conference attendees? Donn’s 2016-2017 engagement calendar is starting to fill up…contact him directly at donnlevie@austin.rr.com.

Don’t miss out on Donn’s blog posts…follow him now on Twitter @donnlevie and join in the jobs/career conversations at the Strategic Career Engagement LinkedIn discussion group.

The Myth of Momentum

Sports figures, sports writers, and fans all talk about the importance of momentum and the role it plays in a team or individual’s success. But truth be told, the evidence for the effect of momentum on performance has been elusive. You can’t get it in a sports drink, from butting helmets with your teammates on the sidelines, or verbally taunting your opponent from the safety of your side of the playing field.

In truth, psychological momentum depends on an individual’s desire to succeed, and that desire increases in the presence of more success and decreases in its absence. The equation graphic  above has it all wrong.

With the “hot hand” theory, randomness doesn’t care about how many consecutive baskets a player has made or the relative importance we may have assigned to them. The next shot the player makes still has just a 50/50 chance of going in the basket – regardless of how many consecutive baskets he made before. Bookies make lots of money on the hot-hand theory and casinos rake in big bucks on people’s misunderstanding of randomness and probability.

Sports psychologists state that an individual’s belief in their own ability to succeed is significantly related to subsequent success.Your solid goals (and belief in your ability to achieve those goals) + repeated successes along the way = MOMENTUM (see the revised equation graphic below). One success builds upon the other to bring you closer to the next step in your career. Momentum isn’t some ethereal substance; however it is a label that is used to define what happens when working toward clearly defined goals creates repeated successes.

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Want to receive a free copy of my Career Strategy Tip Sheets? You get 5 bundled tip sheets (PDF) for career strategy, cover letters, résumés, job interview, and salary negotiation. Just let me know your thoughts on this or any blog post–or let me know of a career topic you’d like me to discuss from the hiring manager’s perspective.

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Former Fortune 500 hiring manager Donn LeVie Jr. is the author of Strategic Career Engagement (September 2015), and the book that reset the rules for successful job and career strategies:  Confessions of a Hiring Manager Rev. 2.0 (June 2012, Winner of the 2012 Global eBook Award and Winner of the 2012 International Book Award for Jobs/Careers). He leads career strategy seminars at conferences, business/trade schools, colleges and universities, and U.S. military veterans organizations.

Does your conference need a keynote speaker or a career strategies seminar for conference attendees? Donn’s 2016-2017 engagement calendar is starting to fill up…contact him directly at donnlevie@austin.rr.com.

Don’t miss out on Donn’s blog posts…follow him now on Twitter @donnlevie and join in the jobs/career conversations at the Strategic Career Engagement LinkedIn discussion group.

Use Project Metrics to Highlight Your Expertise

In my career strategy books and seminars, I emphasize the critical importance of being able to track (or ask for) key project metrics to gauge the value of your contribution. If you want credibility with such statements as “I have a proven track record of accomplishment” then you should have some metrics to back up that statement. Quantified accomplishments always speak to hiring managers.

When I worked in the oil industry as an exploration geologist, there were always plenty of project metrics available to assess the value of oil and gas drilling prospects I generated.  If the exploration project was successful, then the metrics of interest would be barrels of oil or thousand cubic feet of gas per day the completed well would yield. That in turn became a line item (in bold typeface) on my résumé.

When I or my team wrote B2B eCommerce proposals, it was easy to determine the value of contracts awarded to my employer; when I participated on a feasibility project team to determine the perceived cost savings to convert from print documentation to XML database publishing, the cost savings estimate was an important element of the proposal. Those quantified accomplishments became highlighted bullet list items on my résumé.

If you improve a some work process by 20%, you may be able to determine the value of the time and/or costs saved (maybe with the help of the finance department). Or, an honest ballpark estimate may suffice as well as long as you disclose it it an estimate.

If you don’t have access to such financial information or your position doesn’t address such types of measures, shift the duty/responsibility to an accomplishment by asking these questions after every bulleted list item:

• And what exactly did this duty/task/responsibility result in?
• What was the bigger picture that my duties and responsibilities contributed toward?

You still have to ask the question: “Do these individual items, as worded here, make me stand out from the competition with similar experience?” and you can begin to see how to differentiate yourself from others.

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Want to receive a free copy of my Career Strategy Tip Sheets? You get 5 bundled tip sheets (PDF) for career strategy, cover letters, résumés, job interview, and salary negotiation. Just let me know your thoughts on this or any blog post–or let me know of a career topic you’d like me to discuss from the hiring manager’s perspective.

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Former Fortune 500 hiring manager Donn LeVie Jr. is the author of Strategic Career Engagement (September 2015), and the book that reset the rules for successful job and career strategies:  Confessions of a Hiring Manager Rev. 2.0 (June 2012, Winner of the 2012 Global eBook Award and Winner of the 2012 International Book Award for Jobs/Careers). He leads career strategy seminars at conferences, business/trade schools, colleges and universities, and U.S. military veterans organizations.

Does your conference need a keynote speaker or a career strategies seminar for conference attendees? Donn’s 2016-2017 engagement calendar is starting to fill up…contact him directly at donnlevie@austin.rr.com.

Don’t miss out on Donn’s blog posts…follow him now on Twitter @donnlevie and join in the jobs/career conversations at the Strategic Career Engagement LinkedIn discussion group.

The Power and Necessity of Constitutional Hermeneutics

“The Constitution, or any text, should be interpreted [n]either strictly [n]or sloppily; it should be interpreted reasonably.”

Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia

(This post is quite different from my usual career strategy musings, but I have discovered that even with advice for job and career success, we subconsciously interpret and evaluate that information through a variety of filters that influence which advice we accept and/or reject . As an admirer of Justice Scalia and his wit, insight, and opinions – in addition to being a student of hermeneutics – I felt that his recent passing warranted a brief look into the factors that influence Constitutional interpretation. I hope you find that this post sheds some light on the difficult task that confronts SCOTUS. )

The late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia was a towering Constitutional scholar of the highest degree. He has been called an originalist, which is someone who subscribes to the principle of interpretation which views the Constitution’s meaning as fixed as of the time of enactment. The term hermeneutics has been traditionally defined as the discipline that deals with principles of interpretation (most often associated with biblical interpretation) used primarily for ancient documents.

Judicial interpretation comes in two forms: Constitutional and Statutory, and has several rules of interpretation as well as a half-dozen theories of interpretation that usually pit Living Constitution proponents against those favoring Original Intent.

While the majority of us have never taken a course in hermeneutics (or heard the term before), we’ve been using hermeneutics all our lives as we read newspapers, blogs, or analyze some event. The everyday use of hermeneutics involves a complex, unconscious blend of language and history. Our understanding is limited by our familiarity with language or facts presented to us. Imagine an astrophysicist trying to have a conversation about gravity waves with a homeless person on the subway! As we’ve seen on cable news or late-night comedy shows, people who fail to keep up with history or domestic political developments won’t be able to comprehend political cartoons or op-ed pieces.

The problem is compounded when a document or event is separated from the interpreter by time, language, and culture (a term called distanciation). For example, reading Shakespeare with a contemporary linguistic filter often obscures the true meaning of a passage as it was written at the time. In Othello, Iago uses the term “a foregone conclusion” in addressing Othello. In contemporary linguistics, the meaning is “an inevitable result.” However, in Elizabethan times, the expression meant “a previous experience.”

The complex integration of time, history, and language has given rise to what is called grammatico-historical exegesis, which suggests the significant role grammatical and cultural context have in which the text was written. This term is rarely used outside of the field of biblical/ancient document interpretation; however, it captures the very essence of the challenges Constitutional interpretation presents. Major influences for interpretation include the literary setting, the history of interpretation, present significance (the application of the text vs. its meaning), authorial intention, and others that involve careful analysis of grammar, logic, and presuppositions.

If the Constitution is considered the foundational document of law for the United States, and adopted as the model of law for other countries, a “reasonable interpretation” requires the careful application of hermeneutics. Recognizing and acknowledging the overburden of time, language, history, and culture brings the interpretation as close as possible to original intent.

Justice Scalia respected the idea that the Constitution’s meaning was fixed as of the time of enactment. Extracting that original meaning is the challenge. The most important work required today is to know when a reasonable, legitimate interpretation goes beyond the intent of what the author(s) have revealed in the original paragraphs. To interject an unfiltered explication is to clothe a passage in contemporary attire to serve other interests, much the way the Greeks consulted the oracles of their day for their own personal service.

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Former Fortune 500 hiring manager Donn LeVie Jr. is the author of Strategic Career Engagement (September 2015), and the book that reset the rules for successful job and career strategies:  Confessions of a Hiring Manager Rev. 2.0 (June 2012, Winner of the 2012 Global eBook Award and Winner of the 2012 International Book Award for Jobs/Careers). He leads career strategy seminars at conferences, business/trade schools, colleges and universities, and U.S. military veterans organizations.

Does your conference need a keynote speaker or a career strategies seminar for conference attendees? Donn’s 2016-2017 engagement calendar is starting to fill up…contact him directly at donnlevie@austin.rr.com.

Don’t miss out on Donn’s blog posts…follow him now on Twitter @donnlevie and join in the jobs/career conversations at the Strategic Career Engagement LinkedIn discussion group.

HR Trends in Hiring You Need to Know

As social networking sites become more attuned to the needs of employers, research suggests that HR departments will change how they use video résumés, social and networking sites, and cover letters.

A study from 2009 found that:

• 46% of employers (HR departments) prefered to receive résumés via email (41% attached; 5% embedded), 38% uploaded to the company web site (34% résumé copied in entirety; 4% in sections), and 7% preferred a paper résumé. None of the employers preferred to review a candidate’s résumé on a candidate’s own web page.
• Companies with fewer than 100 employees preferred to receive résumés via email than larger compaines.
• 71% of employers preferred the traditional chronological résumé format (21% prefer text format)
• 56% of employers preferred a cover letter to accompany a résumé.

A 2015 study by the MacroThink Institute found that employer preferences were not projected to change for next two years. However, the use of video résumés was found to be a statistically significant change indicating a steady increase in the number of employers who will want to use video résumés two years from now.

The 2015 study suggested use of cover letters to decline over the next two years, but despite the expected growth of video résumés and decline of paper cover letters, the expected preference of cover letters is still nearly double that of video résumés.

Most practices and tools used by HR will remain relatively unchanged for the next couple of years, but social and professional networking, video résumés, and application tracking systems will become more prevalent.

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Want to receive a free copy of my Career Strategy Tip Sheets? You get 5 bundled tip sheets (PDF) for career strategy, cover letters, résumés, job interview, and salary negotiation. Just let me know your thoughts on this or any blog post–or let me know of a career topic you’d like me to discuss from the hiring manager’s perspective.

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Former Fortune 500 hiring manager Donn LeVie Jr. is the author of Strategic Career Engagement (September 2015), and the book that reset the rules for successful job and career strategies:  Confessions of a Hiring Manager Rev. 2.0 (June 2012, Winner of the 2012 Global eBook Award and Winner of the 2012 International Book Award for Jobs/Careers). He leads career strategy seminars at conferences, business/trade schools, colleges and universities, and U.S. military veterans organizations.

Does your conference need a keynote speaker or a career strategies seminar for conference attendees? Donn’s 2016-2017 engagement calendar is starting to fill up…contact him directly at donnlevie@austin.rr.com.

Don’t miss out on Donn’s blog posts…follow him now on Twitter @donnlevie and join in the jobs/career conversations at the Strategic Career Engagement LinkedIn discussion group.

Playing Powerball: What the Numbers Say About Us

Playing Powerball tells us a lot about how some people use math, rationality, and education in general when buying lottery tickets. (source: The Week, February 12, 2016)

• 54% of ticket sales come from 5 percent of players who tend to be poor and uneducated.
• “Buying lottery tickets exacerbates the very poverty that purchasers are hoping to escape,” Emily Haisley, financial expert.
• In most states, 60% of ticket revenue goes to jackpot, winners surrender 40% in taxes, lottery company and ticket retailers get a cut, and the remainder – about 25 to 30% go to the state’s coffers.
• State governments use lottery proceeds for the general fund, despite the promise of state officials promising to pour proceeds into education.
• People with household incomes below $25,000 spend an average of $583 a year on the lottery; people with household incomes over $100,000 a year spend $289 on the lottery. (1999 Duke University study)
• College dropouts spend about $700 on lottery tickets; people with degrees only $178.
• Studies show that poorer players are 25% more likely than richer players to consider a lottery ticket a genuine investment and to greatly overestimate their chance of winning.
• State lotteries have become viable sources of state’s budgets whereby lawmakers consider it political suicide to do anything that interferes with that revenue stream.
• “Politicians view lotteries as a victimless source of revenue,” says tax expert David Brunori.

But if you must play…

Here are some suggestions on maximzing your chances of not having to share the jackpot if you do get lucky:

• Don’t pick numbers between 1 and 31 (something about the statistics favoring higher numbers)
• Don’t pick obvious combinations, such as 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6.
• Be sure to check your tickets: $2 billion worth of prizes went unclaimed in 2015.
• Create a Limited Liability Corporation (LLC) to avoid having to publicly identify yourself as a lottery winner and avoid the harrassment from long-lost friends and relatives, financial “advisors.”
• Buy early in the lottery cycle so you can “extend the pleasure of anticipation.” I could say more but I have to finish entering the HGTV Dream Home Giveaway…

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Want to receive a free copy of my Career Strategy Tip Sheets? You get 5 bundled tip sheets (PDF) for career strategy, cover letters, résumés, job interview, and salary negotiation. Just let me know your thoughts on this or any blog post–or let me know of a career topic you’d like me to discuss from the hiring manager’s perspective.

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Former Fortune 500 hiring manager Donn LeVie Jr. is the author of Strategic Career Engagement (September 2015), and the book that reset the rules for successful job and career strategies:  Confessions of a Hiring Manager Rev. 2.0 (June 2012, Winner of the 2012 Global eBook Award and Winner of the 2012 International Book Award for Jobs/Careers). He leads career strategy seminars at conferences, business/trade schools, colleges and universities, and U.S. military veterans organizations.

Does your conference need a keynote speaker or a career strategies seminar for conference attendees? Donn’s 2016-2017 engagement calendar is starting to fill up…contact him directly at donnlevie@austin.rr.com.

Don’t miss out on Donn’s blog posts…follow him now on Twitter @donnlevie and join in the jobs/career conversations at the Strategic Career Engagement LinkedIn discussion group.

Do You Suffer from “Twitterhea”?

You know how some pop music radio stations play your favorite song so much that you quickly get sick of it? When that happens, that song becomes the punch line of a joke. I remember when “Hang on, Sloopy” was such a big hit in the ’60s, and then the DJs ran it into the ground so much that the joke became, “Hey did you hear what happened to Sloopy? She let go…”

Well, I may be stirring the pot here, but the same thing can happen with too much of a social media presence. Many people suffer from it but are afraid to admit it. It’s a virus that affects the center of the brain that controls the compulsion for attention on social media like Facebook, but often shows up on Twitter. Nevertheless, some Twitter pundits recommend “3 to 5 Tweets a day” as a good healthy balance but it’s not the number of daily tweets that determines if you suffer from Twitterhea: it’s the number of daily Tweets that offer no content of value to others. That’s just a compulsion to be seen and heard.

Sure there’s a proper balance, but what determines that balance is the value of  your content. The value of YOUR content is what separates you from others who simply retweet the content of others all day long. But even if you tweet your own high-value content, there’s still something to be said for “less is more.”

Using 140 characters to get out a message is just about as long as people’s attention spans can stand before they start thinking about their next meal (or their next Tweet). If you’re trying to build brand equity, first ensure what you put on social media is weighted more with your own insight and knowledge than totally forwarding the words of others. Mix it up but leave it heavier with your own wisdom and expertise.

You know best what your goals are for social media. Remain aware that building your brand relies more on your thoughts and ideas rather than echoing those of others (though there can still be value there too).

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Want to receive a free copy of my Career Strategy Tip Sheets? You get 5 bundled tip sheets (PDF) for career strategy, cover letters, résumés, job interview, and salary negotiation. Just let me know your thoughts on this or any blog post–or let me know of a career topic you’d like me to discuss from the hiring manager’s perspective.

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Former Fortune 500 hiring manager Donn LeVie Jr. is the author of Strategic Career Engagement (September 2015), and the book that reset the rules for successful job and career strategies:  Confessions of a Hiring Manager Rev. 2.0 (June 2012, Winner of the 2012 Global eBook Award and Winner of the 2012 International Book Award for Jobs/Careers). He leads career strategy seminars at conferences, business/trade schools, colleges and universities, and U.S. military veterans organizations.

Does your conference need a keynote speaker or a career strategies seminar for conference attendees? Donn’s 2016-2017 engagement calendar is starting to fill up…contact him directly at donnlevie@austin.rr.com.

Don’t miss out on Donn’s blog posts…follow him now on Twitter @donnlevie and join in the jobs/career conversations at the Strategic Career Engagement LinkedIn discussion group.

 

A Simple 5-Step Job/Career Strategy Cycle

In Confessions of a Hiring Manager Rev. 2.0 (Second Edition), I write of a simple 5-step cycle for keeping a job and career strategy sharp and in focus. Here are those 5 elements:

1. Review your current goals and aspirations and how your present job or career addresses them. Can you get there from where you are now? Are they realistic and attainable?
2. Reassess your job/career to determine whether it is aligned clearly with those goals and aspirations; if you are unemployed, how did your most recent job align with your goals? Do you need a course adjustment or a complete change of direction? Are you really doing what you want to be doing for a career?
3. Rethink your experience, skills, and knowledge; what do you need to do to remain in your current profession or career that will help you move closer to your goals? Or, which skills and knowledge can transfer to other professions or industries? What other skills or knowledge do you need to acquire to move forward?
4. Reconstruct your tactical approach (cover letter, résumé, and interview preparation) for selling your expertise to hiring managers. Understand their need for a problem solver, solutions provider, and solid team player who can contribute to the higher strategic objectives of the organization.
5. Renew this information on a regular basis so that your documents reflect your current job, responsibilities and accomplishments. The best time to look for a job is when y0u have one. It is also easier to send a current résumé instead of updating one that is years out of date – especially when the opportunity of a lifetime presents itself today.

Because this approach is a cycle, you can start anywhere in it and move on to the next step.

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Want to receive a free copy of my Career Strategy Tip Sheets? You get 5 bundled tip sheets (PDF) for career strategy, cover letters, résumés, job interview, and salary negotiation. Just let me know your thoughts on this or any blog post–or let me know of a career topic you’d like me to discuss from the hiring manager’s perspective.

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Former Fortune 500 hiring manager Donn LeVie Jr. is the author of Strategic Career Engagement (September 2015), and the book that reset the rules for successful job and career strategies:  Confessions of a Hiring Manager Rev. 2.0 (June 2012, Winner of the 2012 Global eBook Award and Winner of the 2012 International Book Award for Jobs/Careers). He leads career strategy seminars at conferences, business/trade schools, colleges and universities, and U.S. military veterans organizations.

Does your conference need a keynote speaker or a career strategies seminar for conference attendees? Donn’s 2016-2017 engagement calendar is starting to fill up…contact him directly at donnlevie@austin.rr.com.

Don’t miss out on Donn’s blog posts…follow him now on Twitter @donnlevie and join in the jobs/career conversations at the Strategic Career Engagement LinkedIn discussion group.