Career stuff you should know

The one about professional behavior

noreply@blogger.com (Darryl Stevens) — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 06:41:00 +0000

So, one of my colleagues comes into my office today and tells me that an academic advisor has asked for copies of our handout on professional behavior. We do not have one. So, I responded, "Well, what does she mean by professional behavior?" The ensuing conversation careened across the landscape as follows.

I know you think you know what I mean, but I don't think I mean what you think.
Pretty cut and dry here. We have the full range of recruiters and companies visiting campus. Some are incredibly laid back, wearing polo shirts and chinos, while other sport $500 suits. What one sees as professional behavior, the other sees as overly casual behavior. Yes, there are a few standards that we will discuss below, but the fact remains that the range of meaning surrounding the term "professional behavior" is broad to the point of ambiguity. My recommendation to any erstwhile candidate is that he or she become familiar with the culture of any company or organization with which they might interview. This is where all that gnarly networking is so important.... knowing people that know the culture is primo.

There is no such thing as fashionably late... there is just late.
Let me start by saying that I drive my entire family crazy by my desire to be not just on time, but a few minutes early. Let me add to this, I hate waiting in line for anything. Fifteen minutes is my limit, even at a 5-star restaurant, so you can imagine how I feel when someone is late for an appointment. Once, a client with a 30 minute appointment showed up 20 minutes late and said, "I hope I am not too late." I replied, "Not at all, there's still 10 minutes left." We went to my office where I talked about the impact of being late on job interviews and first impressions. I don't care how casual the recruiter or hiring manager might be, the last thing that you want is to be one of the top two candidates and have your competition remembered as "the kid from Orange County" and you remembered as "the one who was late." Bottom line: It is professional behavior to be on time no matter where you work.

Excuse me while I take this call.
Back in the day, when cell phones were the size of shoe boxes, I would watch folks screaming into their cellphones and I remember thinking, "If you are THAT important, why aren't you important enough to have somebody that answers your calls for you?" Perhaps if there is anything that upsets me more than someone who is late for an appointment, it is someone who answers their phone during an appointment. I will say that it is probably okay to have your phone ring and apologize while cutting it off, but it is never (Get that NEVER) okay to actually answer the phone.

A friend told me about being in an interview with his boss. The candidate's phone rang and he said, "Excuse me," and then said to the caller, "I need to call you back. I am in a meeting." A few minutes later, the phone rang again. He once again said, "Excuse me," and this time said, "Let me call you back in about 30 minutes, I am in a meeting." The boss stood up and said, "Nah. Go ahead and take the call, because the interview is over." Take it from me and the poor slob in this story, whether it is an interview or business meeting, cut off the phone.

Yo, dude. How's it goin'!
I live in California, so I call a lot of folks "dude" and I get called "dude" a lot as well. I still remember, however, the first time a subordinate called me dude. It was followed throughout the day with "homes, brah, and man" occasionally prefenced by "Yo!" At the end of the shift, I told my young charge that I would prefer it if he would simply call me and the other supervisors by our names. His reply? "Sure, dude. No problem."

The other vignette that falls under this rubic occurred when I taught in Alabama. In the halls and in talking with students, I almost always referred to my colleagues as Dr. Martin or Dean Roberson or Ms. Young. In their offices or when we were in meetings, they were David, Terry, and Jenny.

How you refer to people with whom you work is important and is a direct reflection of your respect for them and the organization. Follow the lead of those around you. As a safe rule of thumb, think about it this way. Most people do not mind being called Mr. Jone or Ms. Lopez, but some will object to being called "Cuz."

Here, let me get that for you.

Being at a university is sort of like be in a giant sociological fish tank. There are always crowds of animated, bright young adults moving from one location to another underwritten with incessant chatter and lots of laughter. The most intriguing things that I have noticed occurs at the ingress/egress of buildings. You know, doors. I have two experiences, one is holding the door for a student or students who blow right past without a word... like I am the doorman. In fact, that is not exactly correct because when I enter or exit a building that has a door person, I always say "Thank you." While this behavior is not unique to Gen-Y'ers, it does seem to proliferate in that group. I will guarantee you that if you are on an interview or the new person on a job and someone holds the door for you, they will remember if you do not say, "Thank you." Not the way you want to be remembered, dude.

The runners are at the starting line.

My other experience with doorways is what I call the cattle chute. The cattle chute occurs when two (or more) people approach a doorway at the same time and one (or more) of them try to squeeze through. (The variation on this is when one of them speeds up a bit so as to hit the portal first.) I would have to say that the generally accepted behavior is to give right of way to the other, even if it results in "You go first. No, you go. No, you go." Again, you will be remembered for your courtesy. BTW, as an old dude, I think you should always let us go first, because old dudes almost always say something witty like, "Nah, you go first. I'm in no hurry to get to work." I might add that you should NEVER EVER say, "Age before beauty." Not simply because is has not been funny since the Eisenhower Administration, but us old dudes are pretty sensitive about that kind of stuff. The easy take away here is, hold the door and wait for others to go through.

Répondez, s'il vous plaît

This is what RSVP means. It is French for "I need to know if you are going to be here and if you say you will be here you have made an actual commitment to come, so be there or let me know if you have to cancel." That is a loose translation. I have been very surprised at the number of people who seem to believe that RSVP means, "Hold a place for me in case I decide to show up." We always (Get it? ALWAYS) hear from employers when students who have reserved spaces do not show up and do not cancel. Most places ask for an RSVP because they are planning food or there is limited space. If you decide to no show, they spend money on food that goes to waste or someone does not get a seat to the event. It is so not cool. Sure there are exceptions to this rule, but they involve hospital stays and alien abductions. I know no other way to say this than to say if you reserve your place for an event... SHOW UP.

Hmmm. I've seen that somewhere before.

Does any of this sound familiar? It should because it is the same stuff your mom and your kindergarten teacher tried to jam into your brain when you were five. Professional behavior is, quite frankly, mostly common courtesy. Listening when others speak and not cutting them off. Being respectful of others. Observing organizational and cultural norms. Referring to others with formality unless they give you permission to do otherwise. Opening doors. Saying please and thank you. Recognizing others achievements. The list goes on. It really is not rocket science. Doing the professional thing is generally doing the "nice" thing.

The one about tough times....

noreply@blogger.com (Darryl Stevens) — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 22:29:00 +0000

I work in a university that operates on a quarter system, so we are just starting to be deluged by returning students. My colleagues who work on the semester are about three weeks ahead of me when it comes to responding to the chaos of the current marketplace, but I am not sure that they are any less overwhelmed than my shop... nor do I think the coming months will make thinks appreciably better. This has put me by way of think about what students can do that will help them weather the next (probably) two years while the economy gets better.

First, as I indicated in an early post (Look Now), now is not the time to relax. Career Centers have seen an interesting phenomenon over the last few months... fewer students are coming for services. While the number of first and second years seeking part time jobs has picked up noticeably, third and fourth years have dropped off. The feedback we have been getting is that they have decided that "because there are no jobs, there is no sense in attending events." This is exactly the wrong approach. Students (and alumni) should be availing themselves of every opportunity to get information, grow their network, and create the possibility that they might find a "hidden" opening. That cannot be done hangin' in da crib with your buds. It requires energy and enthusiasm along with a modicum of forethought.

Second, what you do now directly affects the options you have in the future... both near-term and far-term. Students, in particular, should be willing to convert Xbox and PlayStation time to additional time for volunteering or a pro bono internship. Come on! You are already not making any money, so which do you think will impress a prospective employer more: those extra 14,000 zombies you knocked off in Gabby's Revenge or the fact that you helped organize a symposium for the History Department. (I'm going with the History nerds here.)

Third, ask anybody who has been on the job market recently and you will likely find that it took them two or three months to just to settle into the "looking" process. There is actually a pretty steep learning curve regarding how to construct a well-tailored resume, what jobs are actually viable, how to answer that "Tell-us-a-little-bit-about-yourself" question, and how to handle rejection. Waiting until you need a job in three weeks is a painfully bad idea in an economy that requires three months for a well-run job search to bear fruit.

Fourth, please do not listen to anyone about the job market... maybe not even me. I have found that most people are either too optimistic about the economy or far too pessimistic. Neither side of the coin will be helpful. Get your own information. Read the Wall Street Journal and CNN Money. Talk with decision makers in business and industry. Develop some savvy about where market segments are headed and either get on or get off the train they are own. (For instance, if I were majoring in communications right now, I would be preparing myself for internet-based career paths as opposed to print journalism)

Fifth, if you are thinking about hiding out for a couple of years in graduate school, think again. Grad school applications are up and admissions have become more competitive. So, if you think the competition is tough on the entry-level job market, just imagine how difficult graduate school applications will be when you are competing with applicants who have been out of school for three or four years and have saved up enough money to actually pay their own tuition, and because they HAVE three or four years of experience, they will grab the plum jobs on and around campus.

What then can you do amidst all this doom and gloom? Well, first, be serious about steps one through four, then think about the following.

Whether you are a first year or fourth year, do one "career-related" thing each week. That can be as tangential as looking up "careers in glass-blowing" on the Internet to something as direct as going to a career fair or signing up for your school's On-Campus Interview program.
Talk to your peers about what they are doing about job-hunting. Not subtly. Try something like, "Dude, I'm freakin' because the parents are gonna cut me off soon and I was wonderin' what you were doing about find a job." (If they say "Nothin' Dude, I'm gonna go to grad school... point them to this blog.) Find out what people are doing and steal their best ideas.
Talk to your family. Let them know what you are thinking about. Most parents are more than willing to help motivate and sustain you as long as they know you are doing something. (A helpful hint here... now is not the time to be too proud to accept help, if your mom when to school with Warren Buffet's daughter, allow her to introduce you or at least forward your resume to her.)
Everything in moderation. I have posted many times before that the worst mistake that job hunters make is putting too much energy and time into the job hunt. Understand your limitations and work within them. For some folks, pursuing leads and completing applications three or four hours a day seven days a week may be doable, but most of us are likely to need time and space for other activities. A couple of FOCUSED hours four or five days a week should suffice.
Persistence pays. This is the corollary to the above. Having a schedule and pursuing it consistently is most likely to pay off. This is primarily because a consistent schedule helps you (and your support network) hold yourself accountable and actually measure how much you have done.

Yes, times are tough, but challenges are what provide the sparks for growth and it is time to grow.

The one about not working...

noreply@blogger.com (Darryl Stevens) — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 15:02:00 +0000

After far too long a hiatus, I have returned. There is a good explanation for my absence that has to do with new domains, websites, etc., but ultimately I needed some time, so I took it. During this interregnum, I thought a bit about the ways that not working seems to help working... just like not blogging was supposed to help my blog. Today's post is about not working.

First, you should know that for years, we have know that rats engage in a behavior known as "play fighting" in which juvenile rats tussle and spar with one another. Likewise, it seems that most, if not all, mammals do this. If rats are prevented from play-fighting, they typically suffer from serious deficits in social behavior, have more stress-related problems and appear... well, depressed or anxious. (For the record, males play-fight more than females, but I will let someone else carry that standard forward.) As the rats mature, they play fight less and less, I suppose because the grind of the old ratty 8 to 5 begins to squeeze out play time. In a over-simplification of hundreds of articles, it would appear that playing (and play-fighting in particular) as a juvenile makes a more stress-resistant and social adult rat and makes it more likely that the adult rat will engage in playful behavior which inhibits stress.

Everybody needs a Saturday... even on Wednesday.
I am sure that many people are like me with regard to the weekend experience. Friday evening is a time of rapid decompression. Almost like someone has let the air out of a balloon. Saturday begins with virtually no thought of work or work-related issues. We have projects or destinations or uber-naps to undertake. By mid-day Saturday, there is no work, there is only Saturday. At some point in the afternoon, work begins to creep back into our consciousness and by Sunday evening, we are beginning to mentally rehearse our schedule for the coming week. Imagine life without a weekend. Brrrr. I don't even want to go there. The simple fact, however, is that many folks have that condition. Intriguingly, when I was a college professor I lived life without a weekend. One of the disadvantages of having a flexible schedule is that it seldom contains specified, sacred time off and I believe that expectation of time off is as important as the time off itself. One of the tricks that I learned was that I had to "designate" a day off... even if it was Wednesday. I measured time between Wednesdays and sometimes when I was grading a stack of papers and tests on Sunday, I knew that Wednesday was only two days away. Set aside a day. Make it inviolable.

Sleeping is not playing.
A few years ago, I said to my wife, "My sleep thing is broken."

She looked at me a bit quizzically and I added, "You know, that part of your brain that lets you sleep until 11 or 12 on Saturday. I can't do that anymore."

She smiled and agreed that, indeed, her sleep thing was broken, too. I assumed that this was a normal function of aging, until I began to discover that there were people who managed to stay in bed well past mid-morning on their days off. When I questioned them about it, they generally indicated that they were "recharging" their batteries. I'm pretty sure this doesn't work. First, sleep is not cumulative, so there is only so much sleep that one can get in a specified amount of time. It is not restorative to live on five hours of sleep a night Monday through Friday and then try to jam in an extra eight hours on Saturday and Sunday. Likewise, sleeping through the morning erodes the amount of time that one has left to play. Get up. Do something.

Working is not playing.
I know what you are thinking, but this has to be said. This past weekend, I put together a kayak to store my boats outside, I built a lattice screen to protect me from the prying eyes of my neighbors (or them from me), I designed a raised bed for strawberries, made a huge pot of gumbo, and cleaned out the garage. The only part of this that I considered work was the cleaning the garage part. The rest was recreative and restorative. The first thing that I did this morning was to go to the patio to look at my lattice screen. These days email and other electronic tendrils can creep into your weekend and create stealth work. You barely know you are working until the project has consumed your whole weekend. Do not work. Ever.

Scheduling inhibits playing.
Simply put, you gotta have down time. Most of us run by wire from Monday through Friday. I will be the first to admit that I have zero idea where I am supposed to be an hour from now without consulting one of the three electronic calendars that contain my schedule. It is not unusual for me to be sitting in a meeting and have my cellphone gently buzz in my pocket alerting me that I need to be somewhere else in 15 minutes. When I set up my electronic calendar a few years ago, I selected the preference choice for "Start Week on Monday" and "Do Not Show Saturday and Sunday." Part of this was to make the days larger so that I could see them without my glasses, but part of it was philosophical. Saturday and Sunday are my MY days and if someone if silly enough to schedule work on those days, I don't even want to see it.

In one of the little ironies that life supplies from time to time, I broke my watchband on a business trip and have yet to have it fixed. I have discovered that during the week, I am pretty tuned in to the time, but on the weekend, not only do I lose track quickly, but the days seem to be a little longer. The clear message to me is that being on the clock is working and not fun, while being off the clock is playing and (usually) fun. Don't schedule anything. Except restaurant reservations.

Playing hooky is not playing.
In my rather lengthy work history there have been only a small handful of times that I have used the infamous "mental health holiday." It's not that I am particularly ethical and honest, rather I think that I had judiciously used my time off on weekends and vacations to recharge and recreate. Generally speaking, when I am supposed to be at work, I am at work. When we "play hooky" we spend most of the time we are away from work thinking about how much work sucks. Contrast this with meaningful, productive planned time off, during which we seldom even think about work... let alone think about it with dread and dismay. If you are routinely using sick leave to sneak away from work, you should reconsider your vocational choice.

Vacation.
There's little else to add here. Let work get on without you for a more than just a weekend. Don't "hang out" at the pad. If you cannot afford to get a cabin at the mountains or a condo at the beach, then go to a museum, travel to another city for lunch or dinner. Order a Pawley's Island Hammock, go to Home Depot and buy some concrete mix, a precast footing, and a couple of 4x4's. Plant those suckers in the ground and string up your new hammock. Buy a used bicycle from Craislist and spend the week rehabbing it and actually ride it somewhere. Google "state historical markers" and the name of your home state. Guess what? Almost every state has an official site and there are dozens of unofficial ones. Put together a day tour that takes in three or four markers and lunch at an out of the way bistro or tavern. (Turns out that there are 24 within 30 miles of my home!) If you haven't taken an extended vacation, do it.

Go away and play, so that work is palatable.

Advice from Dad about grad school

noreply@blogger.com (Darryl Stevens) — Fri, 15 May 2009 21:24:00 +0000

Okay, this is not completely blogriginal. It was a contribution to another online community that I habituate, and someone asked that I blog it. Since I have been struggling to finish two other entries, it made perfect sense. So, here it goes.

My oldest son is graduating from UCLA in a few weeks and will be entering graduate school in the fall in Musicology/Ethnomusicology. He understands well the bleak job market for PhD’s in the humanities and also understands that a career in higher education is fraught with problems in the best of times. My wife and I are both proud of his accomplishments thus far and are pleased that he had several graduate programs from which to choose. Following is the advice that I gave him as he prepared applications and then made a decision about which program to attend. I hope that it will be of help to those of you who are still in programs.

1. Do not leave undergraduate school for a humanities degree without substantial training and background in quantitative research methods. I deal with PhD students and graduates who have not taken a course in math or statistics since their sophomore year in college. I recently worked with a newly graduated PhD in English who had not taken a math class since her junior year in high school which was in 1996! She had NEVER taken a statistics course at all. She was frustrated that many of the higher ed administrative jobs she was considering wanted a background in data analysis. My son decided to double major in Music and Sociology because the Soc major would give him access to two research methods courses he would not have otherwise been able to take as a Music major.

2. Do not leave graduate school with a humanities PhD without substantial training and background in quantitative research methods. At some point after his first year, he has to decide on straight musicology vs. ethnomusicology. I have encouraged the ethno choice largely because a certain amount of ethnographic research training is mandatory in the program. I have pointed out to him that he will likely have gobs of tuition credits during his time and he should avail himself of that funding to take classes in multivariate analysis, assessment, and research methods from either sociology or psychology. (I used some of my “free” tuition to take courses in the MBA and social work programs)

3. Do not leave graduate school without some sort of “external” experience. He will be attending a program in Southern California and there at numerous museums, social agencies, and business/industry opportunities around. I am pimping internships/part-time jobs in market research or business development in the recording industry along with summer fellowships in federal and state agencies.

4. Demand to be taught to write and publish. He is still ambivalent about whether or not he wishes to become a “professor” upon completion of his degree, but he realizes that the training is largely geared to produce faculty and the missing component in almost all disciplines is mentoring in the process of producing academic publications. We discussed this two years ago while he was still an undergraduate and he approached two faculty at UCLA, before the third agreed to mentor him. It has been a good two-year apprenticeship that resulted in a published article and an understanding of what it takes to give birth to one, tiny published piece. He has already begun to hint to the faculty who have not officially seen him that this is one of his primary goals.

5. Always know where you are and never get too concerned about where you are going. One of the frustrations that I have in working with any client, but especially PhD’s, is that they cannot stay grounded in the present. They are always “out there” in the future. So much so that when the future gets here, they are not prepared for it. The way that I put it to him was, “Don’t spend all of your time planning for a job or future that may not exist when you finish. Grab opportunities that interest you now, even if they may entice you to leave your program or change your mind about what you want to be.” I shared that the best thing that ever happened to me was doing an internship in a hospital while in my religion graduate program that convinced me that I wanted to be a counselor or psychologist and not a priest or philosophy professor. I left the graduate program and eventually ended up where I am today.

6. Have an active Plan B. I have a clinical license that I have seldom used recently, but it was great in tiding me over when fellowship money was tight. During my last two years of graduate school, while my classmates were eating ramen noodles and living on $15,000 a year, I was working as a contract therapist eight hours a week on Tuesday and Wednesday evenings for $50 an hour and providing clinical supervision at a community clinic for another 4 hours at $75 an hour. I was able to give up my TA assignments in the last year of my program so that I had much more time to write and collect dissertation data. He has already lined up gigs with public music entities which will pay a modest amount and give him contacts in arts commissions in SoCal and he will complete his teaching credential next month.

So there you have it, more useless advice from Dad.

Career Development Made Easy!

noreply@blogger.com (Darryl Stevens) — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 20:10:00 +0000

I will readily admit that I am not a big fan of books that have the purpose simplifying the complexities of life. Whether it’s Fulghum’s “Everything I needed to know I learned on Star Trek” or Blanchard’s “One Minute Emperor of the Universe” or Covey’s “Seven Habits of Reasonably Laid Back Slackers.” Before we go further, I would like to add that I have, in fact, read multiple titles by all three of these guys and from time to time recommend them to emotionally and cognitively stable people who will not believe them to be the distillation of centuries of consciousness. They do not, however, substitute for being an acute political and sociological observer of your workplace. Today’s post.

Shortcuts may get you there quicker, but that simply increases the chances that the waiting room will not be open.

This may sound like my post from a few weeks ago about slowing down, but I assure you it is not. Human beings are very interesting creatures who are constantly looking for quicker, simpler way to do things… particularly repetitive tasks. Albert Einstein became famous for his seminal work in physics in trying to develop a formula for everything. It is important to note that he also became depressed, withdrawn, and just a little bit whacky later in life trying to find achieve this goal. So, I am here to tell you that there is no unified theory of career development. No golden plan that will assure your dominance in the world of work. No easy way to the top. I can, however, offer to you, a few variables that you should attend to in charting your course.

There are no foolproof systems, because fools are so damned ingenious.

Elegant solutions are like good software. That is, they are the product of extensive study, intensive engineering, and thousands of lines of highly detailed programming code. The result, however, is a pretty little piece of technology with a very simplified interface and the more simple the interface, the higher its “user-friendliness” rating. Decision-making within an organization often functions the same way. That is, a committee will devote time to looking at many possible outcomes, survey stakeholders, pilot several programs, before recommending a protocol.

Just as software is subject to obsolescence when new operating systems arrive, so too, our decision-making templates at work become obsolete as new challenges arise. One caution here… In the software world, applications will simply refuse to work when confronted with a new operating system. Humans, however, are much less likely to recognize that the system in which they are working has changed.

A great example of this is a department that I worked for a few years ago which kept reams and reams of paper application forms filled out by students long after the forms had migrated online. Students would fill out the forms online and then highly paid professional staff members would complete several blanks in the form by hand. Duplicates of the forms were kept in another office in another building and each office maintained seven years of these forms, even though the institutional document retention policy had changed to five years, either online or in hardcopy. Once a year, the two departments would get together and spend several days reconciling paper files because from time to time there were differences in the forms. At the end of the year a report to the funding agency was required. This report was generated from the online forms with the push of a button. To the best of anyone’s knowledge, the paper forms had not been used for the report in several years. After these changes were pointed out to the two offices and their personnel it still took over six months to eliminate the storing of seven years files, the annual reconciliation meeting, and the maintenance of paper copies.

Look for evidence that inertia, not good sense, guides decision-making in your organization and seek to change it. Remember, however, that it will be an uphill battle and by the time you change things, there will be other things that need attention.

I go to school, but I never learn what I want to know.

This was uttered by Calvin back in the days when there was a Calvin and Hobbes comic strip and life had actual meaning. It is reminiscent of something that happened in my first teaching job. I had put the Fall Semester to bed and was beginning the process of prepping lectures for the Spring. Walking through the administration building one day while students were still on break, I heard my name being called by the provost.

“Darryl, Darryl. Student class evaluations are in. Can we talk for a moment?”

“Uh. Sure. When?” I replied in a tone that clearly communicated my fear. What on earth could I have messed up this time.

We walked the long, dark hall to her office and entered a room that had stack upon stack of manila folders full of class evaluations. She surveyed the piles for a moment and eventually located the “psychology” stack. After few seconds, she found it.

“Here it is!” she said as she thumbed through the evals. “Here. Read this one. Pay particular attention to question seven.”

I breezed by questions one through six and focused on question seven. I forget exactly what it said, but the gist of it was, “What changes could the instructor have made that would have enhanced the learning environment?” On the particular evaluation that she had handed me the student had written in a very precise, symmetrical style,

“Dr. Stevens was not fair at all. He expected us to learn stuff we didn’t already know.”

I looked at the provost who was smiling broadly and said, “I suppose this is a good thing, huh?”

“Yes. It is a very good thing.”

Folks, here is my ultimate wisdom for the day. Not knowing is the beginning point for knowing. The primary reason that I hear for wasteful or stupid procedures at work is “We’ve always done it that way.” If I am ever the absolute monarch of my country, I plan to make it a capital offense without appeal to say, “We’ve always done it that way.” (WADITW) Here’s the deal. Somebody you work with is going to say this to you. You may even slip up and say it yourself. Spend some of your time at work ferreting out the WADITW situations and begin a subtle, compassionate effort to change them. Understand that WADITW is highly resistant to change and WADITW adherents will tend to see you as an invading force when you recommend change. Do not expect to be successful. Pick your battles by reaching for the low-hanging fruit first.

It’s only work if somebody makes you do it.

Okay, Calvin and Hobbes aficionados will realize this is my second quote from the strip today. I’m generally a bit more low-key with such stuff, but it fits today’s thread. This will be quick and to the point. If the only thing you ever do at work is what you are required to do, you will hate it. Like many other geezers my age, I have gotten to the station in life where I can simply start a project because it interests me. When I was younger and I realized to my horror that I would be doing this work stuff for another 40 or 50 years, I freaked out. Luckily, I worked with a guy who had been around for a long time and he gave me the best advice I ever had. It went something like this:

Every once in a while, look around at work a make two lists. The first list should be things that obviously need to be done, but no one is doing them. The second list should be things that other people are doing that they obviously hate doing. Choose one thing from each list and ask if you can do them.

Over the years, I have developed a small arsenal of skills that include website design, network maintenance, statistical methodology design, report-writing, event-planning, etc. all because I asked. The best part was that these were things that either nobody else wanted to do or nobody else knew how to do, so I was seldom bothered and was allowed to develop things in my own way. A side benefit has been that I am generally seen as an independent worker who can be trusted with complex tasks. Sometimes, I feel a bit like Brer Rabbit begging not to be thrown in the briar patch. Ultimately, if you step up and ask to do the things you like doing, it will squeeze out more of the things you do not like doing.

If you are not being criticized, you may not be doing very much.

I cannot believe that I am going to end today’s post with a quote from Donald Rumsfeld! He is, however, correct. I am quite suspicious of anyone who manages to go to work 40 hours per week 52 weeks per year and somewhere in that mountain of 2080 hours of work does not get at least a little blow back from something done poorly. We all begin our careers from a position of ignorance and ineptitude. If all goes well, we move from being criticized and questioned fairly often to being criticized and questioned less often. I make it clear to the folks who work for me that I expect that if they are trying new things and taking risks, I expect a reasonable number of setbacks.

Think about these things.

If you are avoiding potential failure, you are also avoiding possible success.

If you are waiting for others to tell you what they want you to do, you are never doing what you want to do.

Doing things the way they have always been done assures you will never learn anything new.

Simple solutions only work for simple problems.

The 59th Street Bridge Career.

noreply@blogger.com (Darryl Stevens) — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 17:14:00 +0000

I am old enough to remember the tune "The 59th Street Bridge Song" as a Simon and Garfunkel song. There have been several covers over the years, so folks in their 40's will remember it as somebody else's song. The twenty and thirty-somethings will only remember it if they happened to catch the Simpson's episode that featured it. For those that remember it in any of its many incarnations, one phrase stands out...

"Slow down, you move too fast.
You got to make the morning last.
Just kicking down the cobblestones.
Looking for fun and feelin' groovy."

While I don't begrudge the fast charging, high achieving types, there is some wisdom in slowing down just a bit as a way of solidifying your career development. I won't guarantee that you will be feelin' groovy all the time, taking time to consolidate the things that you are learning will act to instill personal self-confidence in your skills and abilities.

Renovate or Innovate?

A few years ago, I was working with a colleague who was a few years younger than me. I was in my early forties, she in her mid-thirties, but about 10 years of experience in the field separated us, even though we were peers within the organization. She was bright, focused and driven and most often a pleasant collaborator. At some point, she came to me with a question about a project she was working on that just seemed to get no traction and was not yielding the kind of results she (we) had expected.

As we discussed why she was approaching things the way she was, it became increasingly apparent that she had been a part of a similar project only once and, therefore, had only seen it done one way before. She had taken the template from a similar project and was renovating it to fit our needs. Eventually, I convinced her to take some chances and try things from three or four similar projects that I had done over the years and synthesize them to fit her needs. I only say about three reasonably intelligent things each year, so I pretty much remember every credible statements I have ever made. This was one. I told her, "When you are doing a major project, your choice is always to renovate what was done the last time or actually innovate and do something new."

Later in the week she came to me again and said, "Thanks so much. You're really smart with this stuff."

I was wise enough to accept her thanks, but to also add, "I'm not that smart... I've just been doing it for 12 more years than you. Give it time. It will come."

I see this in college students in two ways, both of which can be very destructive to one's self-confidence. The first is what I would call the “Expectation of Elevation.” This occurs for the student who has always excelled in the classroom. You know the type. Student body president, good athlete, 4.2 GPA in high school. The first shot to the ego in college occurs when they are surrounded by a veritable sea of 4.2-president-athletes. If they recover from not being the only one to know the answer in class and do reasonably well in college, they are then faced with entering the job market with the expectation of a $50K to $60K salary and a management position, only to find out that sea of 4.2-president-athletes has transformed into an ocean of students who did reasonably well in college. (I'm sure I don't need to add that the economic downturn has exacerbated this situation.)

I am not saying that these students would have been better off to adopt a slacker approach to life. Expect less and avoid disappointment. Rather, I am suggesting that mentors should be sensitive to young professionals who are comparing themselves unfairly to seasoned veterans who have been at it for decades. Likewise, young professionals should remind themselves that the best project management assessments that we have tell us that the design, construction, and final inspection of Rome exceeded a day's expenditure of effort and energy.

Guidelines for Career Development Sanity.

Take a day for yourself.
One interesting phenomenon that I have witnessed routinely over the years is people, who have copious vacation time, taking a sick day that is very “wink-wink, nudge-nudge.” Everybody knows they are not sick, but nobody actually says it out loud. The problem with this is that when one returns from the one day junket, they are forced not to talk about any really cool stuff that they did because, remember, they were sick. I would hasten to add here that I think this also becomes a habit over time and people forget that they can just take a day because they have earned. That, in fact, gives us the subtitle to guideline one, “Take a day for yourself: You've earned it.”

Watch a more experienced colleague do their (your) job.
I had the good fortune when I entered the counseling field to be a setting in which I spent a great deal of time with Bruce Crawford. Bruce pretty much my age, but he had been doing counseling for a decade by the time I walked into my first therapy group. The goodest part of my good fortune was that Bruce naturally understood that whatever skill advantage he had over me was solely a matter of experience and practice and he reminded me of this constantly. There was a great deal of “Trust the Force, young Skywalker” early in our relationship. Most of what I know about counseling I did not learn in my graduate training... I learned it just watching him. Thanks, Bruce.

Volunteer to help with a coworker's project.
Seriously. Offering to do something on a project will give you cred with your colleagues, but it will also allow you the freedom not to have any freedom. Does that make sense? I hate it when I am in charge of a project and I cannot leave until it is done and the end is drawing near and I have four or five people who have pieces of the project and they are behind schedule because they have other things to do and those things are more important to them than the stuff they are doing for me. The Nerve! Working on somebody else's project and doing it their way may not build leadership lines on your resume, but it will take some of the pressure off and give you some insights about how those around you work. It will probably make you a bit more understanding about others' limits of endurance when they are helping you. An additional benefit is mentioned above... they will owe you.

Say No.
Yeah. I know it will make the boss like you more, but take it from me. Say No once in a while. It's that simple and doesn't need explanation, right?

Un-schaden Your freude Once in a While.
Do not even try to tell me that you NEVER feel some satisfaction when somebody get it. You know you do. Remember when Katie Couric left all those folks on the Today Show and took the big bucks to read the news for CBS? Admit it. You were a bit tickled. Here's the deal. Be a good sport. Walk down the hall and congratulate your biggest rival on his/her latest successful project. You'll survive. You don't always need to be #1. (Okay... so you DO need to be #1. Give it up for a day.)

Ask for advice.
There is something about asking for advice that scares the beejeebers out of folks. When I was a professor, I remember lecturing about dense, complex constructs with nary a query about the nuances of the lecture. Nobody wanted to appear stupid. Of course, many of these students would come to me after a test and complain that I had not addressed this or that in the lecture, to which I would reply, "When I did the lecture on physiological responses to threat, I ask if anyone had any questions and no one did." Asking question may jeopardize your reputation for omniscience, but actually having the answers may serve you well later.

Slow down.
This is where we started. Slow down. Do not except the fact that you must ALWAYS work overtime. Act as if you do not believe that the organization will crumble without you. Take an extra fifteen minutes for lunch once a month. Go for a short walk in the afternoon. Make a personal phone call on occasion. Relax. You'll last longer.

The West Coast Early Morning Tease.

noreply@blogger.com (Darryl Stevens) — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 14:46:00 +0000

Okay, the holiday weekend turned out to be more action-packed than anticipated. Generally, I have three or four posts sketched out by Sunday. I did nothing this weekend. However, yesterday after my Advanced Resume Workshop, one of the participants walked back to the Center with me and we talked about his career plans. More on that later today. He did, however, ask one of those simple questions that has a simple answer that changes every time you think about it. Here is my first hit on the question and I would like to encourage everyone to leave a comment/answer or send the answer to me at 17.things@cox.net.

The Question: How did you know when you had finally found the right career?

My first answer: It was the day that I realized that I was no longer simply looking for a better-paying job, but was trying to figure out what steps I should take to move towards my boss's job.

To be a bit more explicit. I worked in the insurance industry for almost four years. I then went back to school with a coin-toss decision to become a priest or a lawyer. Somehow, along the way I ended up working at a large group home for gang kids from Southcentral and East LA because I needed a temporary job to pay graduate school expenses... I never intended to stay. In my previous jobs, I had spent most of my time planning my escape, but in this job I started thinking about the things that I could do that would change how the program was run day-to-day. Likewise, instead of vacillating between studying law or philosophy, I began to think about getting more training in counseling.

The biggest single difference, however, has been that most of my job dissatisfaction since that time has been situational. That is, due to budget or staffing shortfalls, changes in management or resources, or the realization that I need to be doing more. In my earliest jobs, I simply wanted out.

You might say that in my earliest jobs, I too busy trying to get out to spend anytime appreciating the surroundings. I knew I was on the right career path when I started picking up the litter on the side of the path.

Let me tell you why I am here.

noreply@blogger.com (Darryl Stevens) — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 20:37:00 +0000

My correspondent in Bucksnort reached out with a question about relocation. While I addressed relocation in a general way in a post a few weeks ago, I think this question hits at a slightly different area. Bubba writes:

What are some tactics for a job search that will require relocation? It's not like Google is hosting a job fair in Bucksnort, TN any time soon.

Should I get a dummy phone line in every city in which I'm looking? Get a friend in that city to agree to let me use his address and have things forwarded?

With the job pool being what it is, it seems foolish to let the phrase "local candidates only" preclude my applying to an otherwise perfect position in terms of job requirements, description, and pay. But it also flies in the face of not applying for positions that don't allow me to meet the posted requirements.

Is this where you tell me that networking, online and personally, is vital?

Yes, Bubba this is where I tell you that networking is vital. In fact, I will not belabor that point and will assume that if you are interested enough in a career blog, you've probably adopted a "network first" mantra of some kind. Following are a few things that you should weigh when seeking work elsewhere.

As the blog's title suggests, it is important to let prospective employers know why one of their top applicants has an address in Uzbekistan... or Bucksnort. It has to be something other than "I really hate Tennessee and can't wait to leave this carnival of doom." If you don't like where you are now, what indication do I have that you will not ditch me the same way your did the Volunteer State? Likewise, you should probably not lead with "ailing parents." Does that mean that you will be completely consumed with their care until they pass, at which time you will move on? In short, your relocation should be based on positives about the organization and not negatives about your current life.

Likewise, you should cite your professional goals first and any connections to the area second to support the belief that you are a viable candidate. When I relocated to Alabama a few years ago, I shared that I loved California, but wanted the opportunity to be a part of a smaller university system that would allow me room for growth. I pointed out that I had family and friends in the area to make the transition smoother, but it was not given as a primary reason for my seeking employment there. From talking with one of the decision-makers in my hiring, I know that they chose me as a finalist because my goals were aligned with the position and only considered my attachments to the area as a secondary selection issue.

You're not from around these parts are you, stranger?

There are a number of reasons that a company might want to limit their recruitment to local candidates only, but most of them would violate some labor law or code somewhere. As a result, it is increasingly uncommon to see the "local candidate" restriction on job announcements. It sometimes cleverly masquerades under such guises as:

Candidate must be familiar with Goosecreek County regulations regarding hamster tossing.
Seeking applicants with a thorough background in Dutchess City renovation projects.
Qualified candidates will have a well-established network of contacts in the Tri-City area.

Clearly, if such requirements are enforced, and you are hamsterless, you are not likely to be competitive in a job search in Goosecreek County, but making your case is an important step in getting past the screen. In the long run, one should not decide not to apply for a position simply because a job announcement seems to indicate provinciality as a requisite. The world has grown increasingly smaller and you may need to remind a prospective employer of that fact. In a difficult job market, it is too easy for an employer to be overwhelmed by marginal local talent that will not have to relocate, so your making it clear that you understand the "lay of the land" is vital to serious consideration.

I work in an industry (higher education) in which recommendations are part of the recruitment process from its earliest stages. It is not unusual at all for letters of recommendation to be a required part of an initial application. On the other hand, I know of students who are given job offers that are contingent on good recommendations, meaning that references are not even requested until there is an offer on the table. If you are applying outside of your home turf and you know someone in the vicinity of the "new job," consider having them submit a recommendation for you early in the process. Certainly if you know someone at the prospective workplace have them write or speak to someone on your behalf. (I am always surprised at the number of times I hear someone remark that they knew a supervisor or director at an organization at which they had applied and they never spoke with them about their application.)

The Proviso

After the forgoing, allow me to offer one proviso: Don't go any place where you feel unable to live for five or more years. Ironclad, lockdown rule. Five years minimum. Although most initial jobs seldom last more than two years, life becomes unbearable when you plan on sometime taking two years to mature and time conspires against you. Several years ago, I worked with a young couple whose job search was a massively huge net of openings that included literally all of the continental US of A. I will not get into the logic of why broad job searches work so poorly, but they do. He got an offer for a position in a portion of the South that I knew quite well. I cautioned him to tread lightly and get information about the surroundings, adding that it was a very rural area and would be much different than he was used to in Southern California and perhaps waiting for more familiar territory would make sense. Had he waited this would not be a compelling story at all because three weeks after he moved to the South, he had an offer closer to home. He felt (appropriately) that he should honor his commitment to the new organization and stay. A year into his time with them, while home on vacation, he paid me a visit and told me how miserable he was in the new place. The great irony was that as he looked for another job and was having difficulty for two reasons: employers on the West Coast were leery of hiring someone from Arkansas and concerned about the fact he was looking for another job so soon after starting.

Relocation signals flexibility, but it should be flexibility... not desperation.

The One About Growing Up

noreply@blogger.com (Darryl Stevens) — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 14:54:00 +0000

I see college students everyday. Big ones, little ones, short ones, tall ones, smart ones, ... uh, really smart ones. From my position of security inside my own personal career bubble, I am sure that I am a bit more smug than I would be if I were still trying to find my way in the world. Putting my own smugosity aside, I would like to offer a reflection for parents around the world. This post goes out to both parents and adult children. It is for anyone who believed that one day they would be allowed to find meaning for themselves, only to discover that their search for meaning in the world was but a continuation of their parents' journey. It is also for parents who struggle with how much to say or do when it becomes obvious that your child has chosen a path that you absolutely, positively know to be crazy.

I'll take, "Things That Alienate Your Kids" for $500, please.

Since my sons did not agree to be a part of this blog, I will keep identifying information to a minimum, but I should tell you that part of the developmental process that my wife and I have experienced as parents has always been a bit sketchy around the principle of "letting them go." They have chosen colleges that we would not have chosen. They have chosen college majors that we would not have chosen. They have also chosen an array of experiences that we would not have chosen. While our voice has been ever present as they have made these choices, in the end it was they who chose college, major, and other experiences.

An example of this is one son's recent decision about whether or not to change his major or add a second major. My advice had been to change to the second, more flexible major and not think about a double major because it was too time-consuming. After consulting with his advisor and a faculty person, he decided to keep his original major and add a minor in the other area. His general reasoning was "Because it seemed like what I wanted to do." Although it took me a few hours to reorient myself to his decision, I realized that this event signaled two things. First, he was thinking enough about the present and looking enough at the future to engage in a discussion with several people about what he is studying while in college. The second thing is that his final decision was based on information from several sources and it was executed in a manner than seemed to integrate their wisdom, but remained HIS decision.

It is hard enough to make rational, thoughtful decisions about any aspect of our lives without our parents second-guessing us, but decision-making about career becomes more complex and painful still. I am sure that my chemical engineer father felt more than a bit dismayed that his two sons studied music and psychology and at one point, we were both college professors in our chosen fields. Don't get me wrong, I think he was proud of us, but I think we hit our fifties before he gave up hope that we would come to our senses and retrain as chemists. The occasionally difficult interrogatories during my twenties and thirties were designed so that he could learn what I was doing AND to allow him a bit of a pulpit to subliminally funnel information to me about alternative career choices.

Although gold dust is precious, when it gets in your eyes it obstructs your vision.

According to those who know such things, Hsi-Tang Chih Tsang said this sometime in the eighth century. It's one of those sayings that transcend time, but seems related to a Warren Buffet quote, "Price is what you pay. Value is what you get," and (if I do this right) a Jimmy Buffet lyric, "We are the people our parents warned us about." I realize that in talking about values (ideals) I am not talking about value (worth), but based on my interactions with folks over the past few years, somebody has not gotten the memo. While this is based on my experience with undergraduate and graduate students, I think the issue extends well beyond that population to older workers, non-college educated careerists, and those yet to enter college.

One of the most difficult parts of my job is sitting with a student who is doing poorly in his/her major and is ashamed to tell anyone. For them the solution is to change majors and the conversation goes something like this.

I was thinking 'bout changing my major.

What were you considering?

Uh. I dunno. What do you think would be a good major for me.
(Before I go any further, let me assure you that I am asked at least a hundred times each year by students I have never, ever seen before, what major I think would be a good one for them.)

Well, I'm not sure I can actually answer that. What do you want to do after you graduate?

I dunno. You know. Something that makes money.

Well, pretty much everything makes money. What do you enjoy?

Huh? Whaddya mean? I thought you were talkin' 'bout where I wanted to work.

I was. Got any ideas?

Yeah, but they don't include stuff I enjoy, though. My parents want me to have a good job.

It's actually okay to enjoy your job.

I guess so, but I need to make a lot of money.

I'm sure everybody wants to make a lot of money, but we still don't know what you enjoy.

Yeah. You know, the only job I ever had that I really liked was working as a tutor, but you can't make any money at that. If I major in history, what's the best job I can get?

I would like to acknowledge that I do not make "a lot of money." I make "pretty good money" or "enough money" and despite my father's head scratching, he was generally okay with the fact that I was doing something I enjoyed. As a sort of maudlin side note, until I started seeing the hordes of young adults who needed to make a lot of money, I never really appreciated how much freedom my parents had given me in the career decision-making arena. The most ironic thing about this issue is that it seems that it is parents who only make "pretty good money" or "enough money" and who are generally okay with that for themselves that are culturally stimulated to want more for their kids.

I also understand quite well that this is a horrible generalization and is fraught with numerous problems that include gender and cultural issues, economic class differences, and all manner of variables that explain why a parent pushes their offspring to excel. (I know that somewhere a Darwinian devotee is castigating me for suggesting that this behavior is anything other that the manifestation of our struggle to preserve our gene pool.) I remember the first time someone said to me, "Well, you're rich. You don't know what it is like to not have everything." I have to remind myself that because I am making "pretty good" money, I sorta understand rich, but I have a tough time with poor.

It's never about the Benjamins.

I honestly wish that I could make this a law...

"The universe constitutes it to be felony, punishable by fines, upbraidings, and public humiliation for any adult to inform any minor about the salary or compensation for any occupation know to exist in this quadrant of the galaxy. Likewise, it will be deemed a misdemeanor if a parent requires that any individual to pursue a specific course of study other than that which the student him/herself deems to be interesting or fulfilling. Violations of this statute will be considered whether the student is a minor or of legal age."

Don't get me wrong, I don't think that all offspring make excellent decisions all the time. Nor do I believe that all parental units give lousy advice all the time. I go back to my own father, who gently let me know what he thought would be a stable career path, but allowed me to navigate by my own rules. I made my own decisions and sometimes they were poor decisions. They were, however, MY mistakes and I was much more invested in fixing them. I know this... I always wanted to be completely grown up and thought that would happen when I settled on a job or career that I felt was of my own choosing. The thing that my parents gave me was the freedom to choose, not once, but over and over. I did not need to grow up... I just needed to keep on growing.

Happiness is neither virtue nor pleasure nor this thing nor that but simply growth,
We are happy when we are growing.
William Butler Yeats

Salaries Redux

noreply@blogger.com (Darryl Stevens) — Sat, 04 Apr 2009 16:55:00 +0000

Dear Career Stuff Guy,

One thing I did not see (I might have missed it) in your blog post - what to do if they ask for salary requirements in the application materials. The way I was told to address that was with a statement in the cover letter something like this:

"My salary requirements are negotiable and depend on the nature of the full compensation package."

If others have heard differently or have better advice, I would be very interested in hearing it.

Signed - Salary Gal

Dear Salary Gal,

No you didn't miss it... I did. First, let me say that the advice you proffer would be adequate. I might rephrase it a little and say something like,

"Given my understanding of the current salary market for Widgeteers, I am certain we will be able to arrive at a total compensation figure that is suitable for me and ABX Widgets."

It is increasingly rare to see such demands upon initial application, but not uncommon for a request like this after the first paper screening. As I indicated early, the mere appearance of such requests should be a red flag for applicants. Organizations that are doing well and are committed to hiring the "best talent" seldom worry about salary until the offer stage is reached. Asking for salary requirements is an upfront indication of operations based on budget projections and not achievement.

Hope this helps.

Salary? We don't need no stinking salary.

noreply@blogger.com (Darryl Stevens) — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 23:21:00 +0000

Two questions that create the most panic in a jobseeker are requests for salary history and requests for salary needs. On a rare occasion, these fears meet in one jobseeker with definitively contradictory concerns. For instance, sometime last year Bubba came to see me about an upcoming interview. Prior to his interview, he had been asked to supply both a salary history and current salary requirements. Bubba was soon to receive his PhD in Physics, but was completely baffled by how to solve his dilemma. He was afraid that if he listed his actual salary as a PhD student (just over $17,000/yr) that he would not be taken seriously, on the other hand he was fearful that listing salary requirements that were too high would result in his be eliminated from the pool based on that alone. He approached the problem with a strategy that I recommend for most applicants. He did not get the job, but we were both satisfied that his denial had nothing to do with his response to the salary questions and for the record, he did get an offer a few weeks later that met his salary needs.

Today's entry? How to tell an employer what salary you need, even if you have never had it before.

Those who do not learn from history are probably just tired.

This part is really pretty simple. When someone asks you for your salary history, you give it to them. Bubba's big concern was that he was going to list his $17,000 salary and the $60,000 jobs for which he was applying would simply blow away. Last year the average starting salary for a newly minted bachelor's level grad was between $39,000 and $42,000. During the previous four years, most of them had salaries between diddle and squat and yet companies were more than willing to hire them anyway.

The other concern that I often hear raised is something like, "If my salaries have been low over the years, then the company will lowball me and I will not get a legit offer." We'll discuss a couple of resources below that should keep this from happening, but generally speaking salary equity exists in either an informal or formal manner in most organizations. More problematic than listing a salary history indicative of poverty is listing one that makes the prospective employer leery of being able to "afford" you.

A few years ago, I interviewed for an administrative position that was three miles from my home. At the time, I was commuting about 45 miles each way on a daily basis. The interview went quite well and it was clear that I fit well, but the dean called me a few days later to tell me that the committee had gone with another candidate because I was currently making $150 more per month than they could offer. He shared that he had "gone to bat" for me with HR, but they were unwilling too budge. Sadly, I pointed out to him that my monthly commute cost me in excess of $500 per month, so taking a $150 pay decrease would have been the equivalent to a $350 raise... not to mention the two hours of daily commute that I would save. His silence was eventually broken by a rather contrite, "Oh. Maybe we should have talked to you before just looking at your salary history." Duh.

When an application process requests your salary history either directly or indirectly, be sure that you share it in a way that they will understand. I pointed out to the grad student mentioned above that his $17,000 assistantship was technically for 30 hours per week (even though he generally put in 50 hours) and included another $12,000 in tuition and fees for a total of $29,000 for 30 hours per week for a 10 month academic year, or about $28 an hour for the 990 hours he worked during the academic year. Instead of listing a $17,000 or even $29,000 per year salary, we listed a $28 hourly wage. The other tip here is just because the blank you are asked to fill in on a job application requests an annual wage, you don't have to be an obedient sheep. Give them an hourly rate with an approximate number of hours worked each week.

Of course I will need that new 72" plasma screen, as well.

While I have worked with professionals such as established attorneys, physicians, MBA's, and senior management types over the years, my current gig puts soon to complete graduate students in my office. While they are stumped about how to list salary history, the fact is that history is what it is. So easy even a PhD can do it. When it comes to the dreaded, "What are your salary requirements?" questions, their reactions make one wonder what they have been doing for the past five or six years.

To be fair, whether secondary, post-secondary, or graduate, little of what occurs in formal education prepares new job seekers for the world of work. I always get a little chuckle out of students entering or re-entering the job market. For years, they have been living on Top Ramen and cold pizza purchased with the proceeds of coin scavenging expeditions conducted on pants pockets dredged out of the laundry baskets. When someone asks them what kind of salary they require, their extrapolations begin with, "Hmmm. If I move into a house with only four other people instead of eight and get my clothes at Walmart instead of the Salvation Army Thrift Store, I would probably need another $6,000 or $7,000 a year......." I have seen students so awed by the fact that they will be earning $18 an hour, that they don't realize that they will be making $37,000 a year, or $2000 below the average starting salary for a new graduate. Since Uncle Sam and (in California) Cousin Arnold will be taking about 25% of that total, their operating capital will be about $27,750. While we should all be realistic about constraints in the current economy, we should also be realistic about what our REQUIREMENTS are. Following is a basic template for you.

Equity and Market Value. The first and most basic element of understanding what we are worth on the market is understanding what others in similar jobs are earning. There are several online tools to assist in determining this, but remember that all of these tools will give you average salary, not necessarily entry-level salary. Bottomline is that there is no reason that you should not have a fairly good picture of what the going rate is for occupational titles.

Salary.Com - A fairly robust site that has both free and paid services. In general, the free salary calculator gives a very good idea of what you can expect to earn in broad job categories in various geographic areas.
SalaryList.Com - Takes a different approach. Instead of simply aggregating all salaries in general job category, SalaryList gives very specific information about very specific jobs with very specific companies. While I would not use this site without an aggregator site such as Salary.Com, it is an incredibly helpful data mining tool, especially if you can find a salary for the exact position you are applying for at the exact company that you are applying with.
GlassDoor.Com - This may be the most intriguing site I have seen recently. If you are a student and have a ".edu" email address, you can get a one-year free membership. If not you have to give them profile information about your current work situation, salary, and benefits. The information is kept confidential and it is possible to "disguise" yourself enough to feel comfortable. I gave them the requested information and got access to their salary database. Like SalaryList, it is possible to see what a specific job title at a specific company is earning.

Obligations and stuff. I spoke with a young man a few weeks ago who is still in his first job out of college. His primary concern was how to get rid of the gas-guzzling sports car that he bought right after he started his job. The monthly payment seemed to fit his budget, but as time went on, he realized that he had not really charted his course well and now the least of his "necessities" was a two-seater convertible that got 18mpg and had a six-year note at $299 per month. If a company asks "What are your salary requirements?" Rather than simply saying, "Uh. About $45K," try actually knowing what you are talking about. I would submit something like the following.

Housing	$1500/mo (2BR APT near work)
Car	$200/mo
Transportation	$450/mo (gas, insurance, maintenance)
Food	$400/mo
Entertainment	$400/mo
Savings/Retirement	$200/mo
Professional Dues	$50/mo
Medical Costs	$100/mo
Miscellaneous Exp	$400/mo
Total All Exp	$$44,400/year

I am not suggesting that these specific amounts are correct for anyone, but the general categories are the minimums that you should take into account. Do not ballpark anything. Sit down and crunch the numbers.

A final word on value. I am worth more in California than I am in Alabama. (My wife would tell you that neither place is probably rushing to acquire me for their collection.) For instance, if I made $40,000 in Irvine, CA and managed to live well on that, I could probably keep the same lifestyle on just $30,000 in Birmingham, AL. You can make this calculation with one of the many online Cost of Living calculators. I typically use Sperling's Best Places.com, but there are others that you can Google. For the record, having lived in both Irvine, CA and Birmingham, AL, I can tell you that the calculators tend to overestimate high-end places to live and underestimate low-end places to live. The difference that most calculators give between these two regions is 53%. I my personal experience is that the difference is probably closer to 30-35%... still a dramatic difference.

You talkin' to me?

I suppose the last piece of this is what people need to know and when they need to know it. As a rule of thumb, I recommend that applicants not bring up the subject of money until a basic offer is in hand. If you know that widget makers generally $10/hour and you are interviewing for a widget maker position, it is realistic to assume that you will be offered $10/hour. When an offer is finally made, should it less than $10/hour then you should say, "Dude. I was expecting $10/hour," or maybe something a little more tactful.

If you are asked in a face to face interview before an offer is made what your salary expectations are and you haven't followed my instructions, so you don't have a spreadsheet handy and you don't know what widget maker earn, then try this.

"You know, I have tracked ABX Widgets and found out that you are one of the top widgeteers in the country. I am assuming that your salaries are competitive with other widgety companies in the area, so I believe that if an offer is made that we can find a salary that will suit both of us."
If they persist and say that they cannot make an offer without knowing your position, simply indicate that you would like an opportunity to put some numbers together so that you can give them a fair assessment. As with many other aspects of job-hunting, however, the mere fact that this is occurring is a bad sign and should serve to make you somewhat nervous about signing on with them. Tacky, bullying behavior should be used as a negative screening mechanism.

I ain't afraid of no ghost!

Scared to talk about money? Who you gonna call? Here's the deal. The primary reason that people freak out about salary discussions/negotiations is because they have not prepared themselves for the market. Our observation is that the majority of jobseekers under-estimate what they actually need and over-estimate what they believe they will be offered. Spending a little bit of time organizing your research about salary and expenses will keep you from getting slimed when you actually get a job offer.

What do employers want?

noreply@blogger.com (Darryl Stevens) — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 20:06:00 +0000

I am quite sure that if you do an internet search for "What do employers want?" you will get thousands of returns. Here. Let me do it for you. Google=7680 entries. Yahoo=44,800 entries. MSN=77,000,000 entries (Hmmmm. Now I know why I use Google and Yahoo so much.) My point is that there is a huge amount of information on the Webernet telling you what employers want. Some empirically researched, some not. I do not want to add to either end of the pile today, what I would like to do is dispel one giant myth about what employers are looking for. Oddly, the myth is that employers know what they looking for. That's right. The best way to give a prospective employers what they want is to assume that they do not, in fact, know what they want.

I thought I was wrong, but I was mistaken.
Let me clarify one thing before we go further with this post. I am using paradox as a literary device to get my point across. (I am hoping to use onomatopoeia too, but I haven't yet figured out where to work it in.) To varying degrees employers understand the experiences that might give a candidate a better chance of performing well in a job. Likewise, they have an idea of how they wish a specific position to take shape. The fact remains, however, that there are many qualified candidates for every position out there (particularly in this economy), but I am never surprised, good or bad economy, when a recruiter or hiring manager says to me, "I can't find anybody to fill this position."

The reason for this is that a job description is not an actual person, nor is it the description of an actual person. Job descriptions are often the result of an over-zealous HR representatives who want to be nothing is left to chance. I think I have mentioned before the University of California job descriptions that include the requirement, "Squat - occasionally; Bend - frequently." I find it difficult to believe that a hiring manager ever ponders an applicant's "squatibility" or "bendiness". That does not mean that a job requiring "high-throughput protein expression clone synthesis and validation" will ignore the candidate's lack of laboratory experience and training. So, what is the dividing line between requirements that are "drop dead" requirements and those that are less essential?

Minimally, I prefer these qualifications.
The first rule of thumb that I use for whether or not to apply for a job is, "Never turn down a job you have not been offered." The surest way of doing this is to not apply in the first place. Before I hear the sad, sizzling sighs of despair (There! Onomatopoeia!) because you now think you should have applied for that Secretary of Commerce position, let me hastily add that when you KNOW you are not qualified for a position, then you use the second rule of thumb for whether or not to apply for a job, which is, "Don't." If you remain unsure about rule one and rule two, perhaps these five guidelines will help a little.

1. When job announcements are divided into "minimum requirements" and "preferred requirements," you will want to apply if you meet all of the minimums, even if you do not meet all of the preferred. If you do not meet the minimums, don't bother. Move on the next application.

2. Anytime a job simply lists qualifications without telling you which are minimals and which are preferreds and you know that you meet most of the list, take a moment to rank order the list. For instance, actuarial positions typically require a thorough background in statistics and a college degree. My assessment, however, is that extensive statistics training would probably rank higher than a college degree. The emphasis here is on extensive training, not "I took a stat course once and didn't fail it."

3. As a corollary to the above, experience will often trump other formal qualifications or requirements. For the past twenty years, I have been hiring counselors in clinical and career development settings. I learned early that simply having a graduate degree in counselor did not make someone a good counselor. Heck, it did not even make them a good student. Applicants with extensive experience working with people, however general signifies that they are capable of handling the ambiguity of interpersonal interactions.

4. With lengthy job announcements that have more than ten or twelve qualifications listed, I typically recommend the 60/70 rule. That is, if you have between 60% and 70% of the qualifications, go ahead and apply. I was on a search committee a few years ago that included 22 separate qualifications. It was impossible for me to keep things straight from application to application. Additionally, it was very clear that we all had slightly differing opinions about which of the 22 qualifications were most important.

5. Contact the source if you have genuine, legitimate questions about the job announcement. This is getting increasingly difficult to do. The Web has become a giant buffer around recruiters and hiring managers, so good luck in actually talking with someone. Contrary to popular opinion, there is no law or rule that forbids a candidate to ask questions clarifying a job announcement. So, if an email address is all you can get, then send questions via email. Be advised, however, that there is also no rule forbids a recruiter to be rude to people who ask questions. J/K. Even when they turn down your request, most HR folks are polite about it.

The most important thing.
One of my favorite quotes is from Kurt Vonnegut.

"We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be."

I can't tell you how often that my counselors and I hear a student say something like, "I want to be sure that my resume matches their job perfectly." I understand this and, to some degree, we have created it. We tell students and job aspirants to be mindful about tweaking their resumes and cover letters to address the needs that employers appear to have. We seldom think about the impact our words are having as we create a world in which employers have highly specific requirements and they are eliminating the unqualified from their candidate pools with surgical precision. That is simply not the case.

Most employers want employees who are capable, dependable, articulate, and persistent. I think that the reason that they like college graduates is because higher education is one of the most chaotic, disorganized, out-of-touch environments on the planet. Anyone who can manage to complete a degree, whether in four, five, or nine years deserved to be considered for any job out there. Employers want employees with whom they can comfortably converse. They are looking for candidates who understand when team cooperation is necessary and when acting on one's initiative is ticket to success. Employers want us to be comfortable being ourselves. If we have to pretend to be someone to be successful on the job, then a good employer wants us to like who we pretend to be.

In the long run, being ourselves is the surest way of finding out what an employer wants.

Planning Backwards.

noreply@blogger.com (Darryl Stevens) — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 22:39:00 +0000

Most of us assume that we know how to plan, even when we do a lousy job of it, we will make the excuse that we could have planned better, but had let things get in the way. I would like to suggest that we don't, in fact, know how to plan and, therefore, we cannot do a better job of planning. The following exchange that I had with a brand new first year PhD student is typical of the problem that we have in planning our careers.

Me: So, how do you see your plans shaping up for you?
PhD: Well, I hope to graduate by 2010 and postdoc for a couple of years and then get a teaching job.
Me: When in 2010?
PhD: Huh?
Me: Well... June? August? December? You know. When?
PhD: Oh, yeah. I suppose June.
Me: So, when will you defend your dissertation?
PhD: Huh? Well, maybe May.
Me: Is that when people usually do it? The month before they graduate?
PhD: Uh... I dunno. Is it?
Me: I'm not sure. How long will it take to write the dissertation?
PhD: I don't know.
Me: When do most people start their dissertation?
PhD: (Somewhat scared and frustrated) I don't know.

Just to let you know that I am not a complete jerk. We spent the rest of our hour talking about the fact that she was planning pretty much the way everybody else planned. That is, she had a starting point and an ending point, but none of the stuff from the middle. She was going to take things as they came and likely adjust her completion time based on unforeseen complications that were sure to arise because all she had planned was the beginning and end of her journey. What follows is a planning matrix that should be suitable for planning everything from a shopping trip to major life goals.

1. Choose beginning and ending points with no dates or time constraints.

Think about it this way. When I drive to Santa Monica from my home, I know that it is 54 miles away and on average, it takes me about 90 minutes to drive the distance, even though it is theoretically achievable in an hour. I have learned over time that there is a two-mile stretch around LAX that always takes 20 minutes to transit instead of three or four minutes. If I am traveling someplace unknown, I can only begin with my starting and ending points.

2. List all the tasks you can think of associated with your plan.

On my drive to Santa Monica, I might have to refuel my car or take an alternate route to pick up supplies or drop off passengers. With PhD students, I routinely ask how long it takes to: Defend the dissertation, write the dissertation, collect data, draft a prospectus, form a committee, prepare for qualifying exams, complete coursework, etc. Typically they conceptualize it as, "I start and I finish."

3. Determine which tasks are "anchors" and which are "collaterals". Anchor tasks are those that are necessary to complete before another can begin. (Data must be collected before the results section can be written.) Collaterals are those that may occur alongside another task. (Forming a committee should not inhibit the beginning a literature review for the proposal or prospectus... but it likely will affect the completion of the prospectus.)

4. Put the anchor tasks in chronological order. Obviously, one must write a dissertation before he/she can defend it. This should be one of the easier parts of this.

5. Assign rational time frames to each task.

Lets go back to my drive to Santa Monica. I suppose that I could drive 90MPH all the way there and arrive in 35 or 40 minutes... but it is incredibly unlikely. I always recommend that new PhD students speak with several postdocs about how long different aspects of their project took to complete. For instance, my dissertation was written quite quickly... less than a year, but that was because data collection was completed four months ahead of the time that I had anticipated. It was sorta like drive to Santa Monica at 3:00AM and knowing that all of the Highway Patrol cops were on break.

6. Set the tentative completion date for the ending point and work backwards through tasks.

I want to arrive in Santa Monica at 5:00pm.
I know that the stretch from the Santa Monica Freeway to the Promenade will take me about 15 minutes, so I need to be at the 405 and the 10 by 4:45 if I want to be on time.
Likewise, LAX to the 10 will take me about 20 minutes, so I should be passing LAX by 3:25.
The 710 to the LAX area seldom takes more than 20 minutes, so I will be at the 710 by 3:05.
My wife drives the 25 mile stretch from our house to the 710 everyday in all sorts of weather and traffic and it generally takes her between 35 and 40 minutes, so we'll be conservative and say that in order to be at the 710 Freeway in time to make the rest of the trip work, I will need to leave my house at 2:15.

Last things first.

Look at the goals you have set for yourself and plans that you have made. Have you inventoried the tasks and allocated reasonable time and resources for them? Do you clearly understand which tasks are requisite to others in order to establish priorities? Does your plan include periodic evaluations to correct its course? Even a well-planned trip to Santa Monica sometimes requires that you get off on Sepulveda and drive over to Venice Blvd. to avoid that sig alert on the 405.

Shotgun or sniper rifle?

noreply@blogger.com (Darryl Stevens) — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 18:09:00 +0000

So, my content advisor suggested that I opine about whether one should apply for anything and everything or just specific types of positions... shotgun or sniper rifle. In some respects my post from March 17th (Intensity of Focus... not activity) was about that very issue, but since I have actually gotten two other emails about this, so I will be a touch more definitive about it.

When asked by an interviewer whether he worked out or exercised, Neal Armstrong said:

"I believe that every human has a finite number of heart-beats. I don't intend to waste any of mine running around doing exercises."

Career development in general and job hunting in particular fit this metaphor. One of my areas of responsibility is managing the Letters of Reference Service for the university, so I have a fairly good idea of the number of reference letters that go out for grad school and med school applications as well as applications for teaching positions. Two or three years ago, I was approached by a graduate student who asked if we would consider giving her a "bulk rate" for her requests . Thinking that she might be sending out 25 or 30 letters, I replied that we had little margin in our charge and it would not be feasible for us. She became quite adamant and said,

"I have already sent out 82 applications and I have another 70 ready to go. I don't want to let a single position get by me without applying for it."

I shared that I had been in higher education for 20 years and I could never remember a time when there were 150 positions available in her discipline of Asian Studies. Her quick response,

"Oh, I'm not applying just for Asian Studies positions, I am applying for Sociology, Anthropology, Ethnic Studies, and Chicano Studies. I'm also applying for anything that has humanities or diversity in the title."

Her rationale was flawless. Asian Studies was a subset of Ethnic Studies and Ethnic Studies departments had formed on most campuses in Sociology or Anthropology departments. She had majored in history as an undergraduate and since her mother was Latina, she should be considered for Chicano Studies. I saw her on campus several more times over the next couple of years and she told me that she had maxed-out at 320 applications before she could not sent out another application and need to get back to the dissertation that she had fallen behind on. I held my peace, but remain convinced that her shotgun approach kept her from putting an appropriate amount of effort into positions that she might really enjoy, relegating all jobs to the same degree of watered-down effort.

During my first application frenzy after graduate school, I will admit that I threw out a lot of paper... nothing approaching 320 or even 150 for that matter. It only took two horrible trips... one to a small coal-mining town in the hills of Virginia and another to a long-forgotten cattle town in West Texas, to get me to rethink what I was doing. During the dying weeks of that job campaign, I zeroed in on positions that I knew would fit me and my family. Since that time, I cannot remember a time when I had more than two job feelers out at a time. (Several years ago, when the university I was working for closed four departments, including mine, I sent out only one resume in a four month period, got an interview, and took the job as a transition to my current job which I found out about from a friend... not because I was looking.

Friendliness is next to Jobliness.

For the record, my last three jobs came to me in the following fashions.

Weeks ago I told the story of moving to Alabama to accept a teaching position and then realizing that I really, really needed to stay in California. After I handed in my resignation, I began to contact department chairs and deans to see if there were any part-time teaching slots available. One guy in particular dodged my every attempt to make contact, until he foolishly picked up the phone one day and got me. We chatted for a few minutes and he was very negative about the possibility of having any teaching for me. At that point I mentioned talking with a friend at the University of North Alabama. He asked who I knew there and, of course, we both knew the same person. The next day he called and offered me two classes. I got four more classes a week later when a friend of mine at San Jose State was in town and introduced me to his college room mate who was a psychology professor getting ready to leave for sabbatical. Midway through the year, I was offered a permanent slot at one of those schools.

I was commuting 60 miles to this job and it was okay, but I would have preferred to be closer to home. One day at a U12 soccer game, I ran into one of my old professors from my Masters' program... his grandson was playing on the opposition's team. We chatted for a while and I told him that I liked my job, but that the commute was brutal. About three weeks later he called told me about a position that was open in another department to be in charge of a Career Counseling Masters' Program. I was not looking for a job, but it was 10 miles from home. I took the job when offered.

This was the infamous job that was foreclosed along with three other Masters' programs. That was the bad news, the good news was that one does not simply cease an academic program, the current students have to be "taught out", which we decided would take two years. During that time, the university offered me a couple of slots, but I declined them as not being exactly what I wanted. One afternoon, my friend Lea Beth (Who I swear I will call, because I know she reads my blog and I feel all guilty and stuff about not calling her weeks ago!) called me out of the blue. She said,

"I was thinking about you yesterday because there is a position at UC Riverside that would be perfect for you."

I told her that I was not looking to commute 40 miles away. She paused for a minute and said,

"Okay, it's like this, I have a friend on the committee there and and they are really looking for a specific person, which I promised her was you, AND I promised her that I could get you to submit a resume."

Anyone who knows Lea Beth knows that when she's on a mission, she does not give up easily. I sent my resume and the rest, as they say, is history. All three of these jobs were secured in a reasonably casual, low-key fashion. I went through a formal application process and was not the only qualified applicant. I doubt I was the unanimous choice and I don't think that my "source" was able to exert any influence over the selection process. The deciding fact is that I was able to focus on the positions before the interviews and do well because I didn't have 320 other applications crowding the stratosphere for me. Yes, it is important to have an active, evolving network, but it is equally as important to have time to exploit that web of relationships.

The other day I suggested that focus was more important than activity, but perhaps what would clarify that recommendation is this restatement.

If all of our energy is spent on the mechanics of researching postings, revising resumes, crafting cover-letters, or designing elaborate ruses to "network" with others, then we will have no time to let those "best fit" opportunities find us and little time to research and prepare a strategic self-presentation.

What color is a chameleon?

noreply@blogger.com (Darryl Stevens) — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 20:08:00 +0000

House, MD is one of my favorite TV shows. Having done psychiatric diagnoses for years, I appreciate the fact that his final decision is built on mistakes and “rule-outs.” Often the process for determining what something IS centers on determining what it ISN’T. My biggest single frustration as a career development professional is contending with people who come to us with the belief that there is a single thing that they can be… one perfect job. I tell people all the time about the interactions I have with students and alumni who seem convinced that I am hiding jobs and careers from them and if they just ask in the right way, I will ceremoniously retrieve their long-lost career path from its hiding place and they will never have to worry about this decision again. Today’s post? What color is a chameleon on a pane of glass?

Running with the pack.

When I was younger there was something oddly comforting about dressing the same way as everyone else, although I really didn’t want to put that much thought into things. Jeans and sneakers (there were no cross trainers back then) would have been fine, but there was that whole peer pressure deal and this extended to how I saw my future. My father was a chemical engineer, my friends were generally smart kids, and my teachers thought I should be something important… like a doctor or lawyer. So, when I went to college I started as a pre-med student and found out that I freakin’ hated the funky smell in the labs and was not particularly fond of the fact that memorizing the 206 bones in the body seriously cut into football and beer drinking time. So, I switched to pre-law.

In point of fact, I just changed my major from biology to political science, because apparently the only difference between a pre-law student and a political science student was that the pre-law student would actually TELL people he/she was pre-law. Imagine my happy surprise when I discovered that I could major in English and just continue to say that I was pre-law and it was exactly the same. Cool, huh? The bottom line is that what I claimed as aspirations were largely configured by others’ expectations, as opposed to interest on my own part. I became a career chameleon in college, just choosing protective colors that matched the background.

Give me that test that tells me what I am good at.

I will spare you all the gory details, but my freshman year I took a career inventory called The Kuder Occupational Interest Survey, that told me that the occupation with which I shared the most interests was… farmer. I have tried several things over the years, but farmer has never been among them. Perhaps I would have been satisfied as a farmer, but the fact is that I have not suffered great discontent in my rambling journey to where I am today. You can imagine, then, how I feel to be on the receiving end of the following question:

"I’m having trouble deciding on a major and my mom told me come here and ask if you had that test that tells me what I am good at. So, do you have that test?”

One summer when I was doing parent orientation for incoming freshmen, I ask the 200-300 parents that were assembled that day for a show of hands for those that thought their son or daughter would benefit from a test to measure their interests. I would estimate that 250 hands went up. I then asked how many people in the room had taken such a test and saw about 25 hands. When I asked how many people were satisfied with their current career, again I got about 250 hands. Asking them to keep their hands up, I asked all people who had taken an interest inventory to raise their other hand. Of my original 25 or so, only half were included. The unscientific survey does not suggest that interest inventories do not work, but that people do not pay attention to them unless they get the information that they wish to get.

Yeah. I can do that… I think.

I will also suggest another hypothesis; we are highly unlikely to attempt anything that pushes us past what we think we are good at. Some of us have wildly over-estimated our ability to succeed, while others of us are crazy low in our estimates. The counseling literature is awash with research regarding this where it is referred to as perceived self-efficacy. There is some pretty cool research, but generally it does not push us much beyond the intuitive notion that we are much more likely to try things that we believe we will be good at doing. The source of these believes range from things as simple as “My father did it, so I should be able to do it, too,” to the much more complex cultural determinations of what is “women’s work” or “men’s work.” Ultimately, we are like little career chameleons changing our color and appearance so that we do not stand out too much, because birds only gobble up the lizards that they can see.

A chameleon on glass.

Very early in my career as a clinical supervisor, I was working with a group of novice counselors discussing a case in which the client seemed to adapt his personal style to match those around him. He drank heavily with one group, was racist in another group, and even acted “dumber” when around a group of friends that he considered “dumb.” Intriguingly, with the counselor, he had deep, rich insights into his behavior and seemed to understand the things that he was doing that were self-destructive, but as soon as he left the session, all that insight evaporated. The counselors very quickly picked up on the fact that he was a chameleon and most of what he did was reflexive and for self-protection. They were surprised when I pointed out that he also mimicked the counselor and they asked if the counselor should “mirror” this behavior to the client. In one of my rare moments of lucidity, I said,

"No. It’s not the counselor’s role to mirror anything. The counselor should be transparent, like glass… no purpose, no opinion, no bias. What color is a chameleon on a pane of glass?"

This led to a hearty discussion about the purpose of counseling (which I will spare you) and eventually branched off into thinking about how hard we as human beings work to be what others want us to be. I have grown to believe that one of the most salient challenges that we face daily is that of being ourselves, largely because we spend so much energy trying to accommodate others. Don’t think, by the way, that this is a completely bad thing. Much of the truly good stuff I have done over the years is because I did what I thought my wife and kids wanted me to do, and most of the truly bad stuff I did when I ignored their wishes for me. The only thing that astounds me more than how often people are wrong about me, is how often they are right.

Sadly, when the dust settles, there is no test that tells you what you are good at because you are the only one who will ever really know that. You have two basic choices as you make decisions about life and career… you can be the chameleon on the wall or the chameleon on glass. The chameleon on the wall is safe and secure with no real highs or lows. Imagine that chameleon on glass, shifting from one color to another, trying to figure out how to do “clear.” Sooner or later, its stops with its “real” color.

In case you missed the comments section...

noreply@blogger.com (Darryl Stevens) — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 16:28:00 +0000

Often the comments section in blogs are reasonably personal comments that I appreciate, but am not sure that everyone else will. One came in today, however, from Katharine Hansen that gives a bit different view point than mine on informational interviewing. Katharine is actually the author of that huge list of questions from Quint Careers that I referenced. Since I have entrusted hundreds of students and clients with Katherine's list, I thought her opinion should get some airtime as well. Here is her comment.

Thanks for the shoutout for my collection of informational interview questions and tutorial. Informational interviewing is such a fantastic technique, especially in these tough times. I don't totally agree with you about the interview NOT being a way to get a foot in the door or about not bringing a resume to the interview, but these are perfectly valid viewpoints that lots of professionals share. I think it's OK to ask an informational interviewee for a quick resume critique -- IF you've established excellent rapport with the interviewee.

I'll have to say that I agree on the rapport with interviewee, but am probably a bit more adamant about maintaining boundaries in most informational interviews.

Please check out Katharine's book, A Foot in the Door at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Borders, or any other online book seller. Chapter 18 is a much more thorough treatment of informational interviewing.

Katherine Hansen, A Foot in the Door, ISBN 1-58008-140-1 51495

Can We Talk? Informational Interviews.

noreply@blogger.com (Darryl Stevens) — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 15:23:00 +0000

About fifteen years ago, when I was the clinical director of small mental health agency, I answered a phone call from a graduate student at a nearby university who asked if I would mind give him some time to discuss how I got into the field of counseling. I was very flattered and immediately began to rehearse in my head what wonderful insights about a life in counseling I would share with him. As I recall, he asked exactly one question about me and then the interaction descended into "I-need-a-job Hell." It was over a decade before I did another informational interview and it was very difficult for me to recommend info interviewing as a means of finding out about a field. I have recovered somewhat and will occasionally grant time to someone who makes such a request. What follows are a few pointers for those of you considering added info interviews to your career development arsenal.

Foot in the door... NOT!
This is the starting gate of this post and I wish to inform you clearly and unequivocally that an informational interview should never be about getting your foot in the door. Your visit should be fairly structured with a definite time limit. Here's the deal. The person you wish to talk to is likely to be at least moderately successful or you wouldn't even want to talk to them. If they are moderately successful, they are likely to be moderately busy as well. Respect their time and schedule by being organized and thoughtful.

This is not to say that these interviews do not sometimes become networking adventures, but that is rare and should never be the primary purpose of the meeting. I encourage interviewers to not take resumes or CV's with them. If the interviewee asks to see your resume, politely say, "Thank you, but I did not bring it with me today because my primary purpose was to talk with you about this field and get an idea about whether or not I would find it a good fit. I would be very happy to email it to you later for your feedback." This actually accomplishes three things. First, it makes you appear to be a principled person of your word... you asked for an interview and that is what you came to do. Second, it gives you a reason to contact him or her later. Finally, it creates a context for real networking.

Where do I find these folks?
In many of our career workshops, I do recommend info interviewing in passing and inevitably someone will stay after and ask how to find people to interview. On one hand, it is very easy and on the other hand, very difficult. I am on the gregarious side and talk to complete strangers all the time, others break out in a cold sweat at the idea of asking a cashier for change. So, if you are like me and want to interview an architect, then you plop open your MacBook, Google "architects," and start calling and emailing.

If you are at the other extreme, talk with your family members and ask if they know an architect. Another strategy might be to put together a group email from some of the folks in your email address book and send out a simple message like:

Hi! I have been considering several important career decisions lately and would like to know more about architecture and design, but I cannot think of anyone with enough of a background to help me in my process. I am hoping that some of my friends and family might know of someone in the field who would be willing to talk to me to answer some basic questions about how one prepares for a career in architecture or design. If you know of someone, I would be very grateful for a shove in their direction. I have a list of 10 questions to ask and would not take up more than 30 minutes of their time. Thanks in advance. Sally Job Hunter

I guess you could Tweet this if you can figure out how to get it down to 140 characters, but Facebook and MySpace work equally as well. (For the record, I quickly scanned my LinkedIn Page, Facebook, and my email address books and came up with four architects.)

If you are a college student or an alum, many colleges and universities have alumni career networks that try to match students or alums with graduates in specific fields. The UCR Career Center routinely brings in panels of individuals in a variety of fields for this very purpose. Many other career centers do the same thing. Alumni are almost always welcome and sometimes guests are allowed to attend on a limited basis.

Professional associations are another good source of referral. For instance, the American Institute of Architecture California Council website has a page devoted to "becoming an architect," an extensive directory of architects, and listing of county associations which have more local information. The side benefit to searching through professional association websites is that they have a ton of information that would answer many questions long before you secured an interview.

When, what, where, how?
Since my first disastrous info interview, when people contact me about an informational interview I always say, "Because my time is limited, it will help a great deal if you could send me an email with some of the questions you will be asking. That way we can make the most of our time together." A few years ago, one of my students wanted to interview a university dean and sent an email request with questions included to four or five deans in the surrounding area. Only two scheduled time for her, but one other actually took the time to answer her questions even though he could not set aside time for her.

This is one of those areas in which the World Wide Tubes comes in so handy. I could give you a list of questions to ask, but Quintessential Careers has already done a superb job of putting toget a throng of when, what, where and how questions for you. Go to Quint Careers Info Interview page and harvest questions from there. (Heck, their whole informational interviewing tutorial is pretty darned good, too!)

Two heads are better than one.
My path to my current career was not very straightforward and the stops along the way configured how I do what I do and how I see what I see in the field. My time in the insurance industry makes me more tort and risk aware than more career counselors and my time as a psychotherapist and professor has made me more clinically focused than many career counselors. If you only talked to me about career counseling, you would have a very one-sided view. Find at least two people who seem to have had different paths and ask your questions.

The Myth of the Hidden Job Market

noreply@blogger.com (Darryl Stevens) — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 15:00:00 +0000

Depending on who you decide to trust, either 20% of jobs never posted (Seneca) or 80% of jobs are never posted (Career Intelligence). With a statistical gap that large, it seems to me that we are better off just assuming that neither are correct... other than the fact that there are jobs that are not advertised. Although we have no clue about the exact percentage, it would seem that there are SOME jobs that are not advertised and perhaps there are some strategies that would help erstwhile jobseekers as they careen through the chaos of job hunting.

Why does it matter?

One reader commented on my post on INTENSITY OF FOCUS a couple of days ago,

I like what you have to say about job searching, especially as it reinforces for me that it's not silly to only apply for jobs that I actually want ... But I do find it a bit frustrating to hear things like, don't look where you're "supposed" to look, because I don't know where the other places are or how to look there.
Also, what about all those job listings that exhort applicants, in all caps, not to call please? Should one call anyway?

Allow me to do a Zen commando thing for a moment. If we have are convinced that there is a single path that we are supposed to take, we will take it and do only those things we are supposed to do and look only where we are supposed to look. Doing this, we will find only those things we are supposed to find. The person who understands that supposed to is an illusion will look in places that he/she is not expected to and will find things he/she is not expected to find. There are no hidden jobs. There are unexpected jobs.

Several years ago, a young scientist came to my office. He was winding down six years of graduate study during which he had amassed prodigious skill working as a molecular biologist with proteins. When asked about his future, he said he'd really like to work in vaccine development, but lamented his lack of experience. As we began to talk about his specific job search, he showed me the labs to which he was applying and I commented that none of them did anything that was remotely connected to vaccine development. His response, "Well, I've never done vaccine work, so I figured that I should just stick to the labs that might need my kind of training." I asked him where he would want to work in if he didn't have to stick to labs that needed his kind of training. He named a medical research center on the East Coast, but quickly added that they would never take him.

We surfed out on to the website and began looking in places we weren't supposed to be looking. Suddenly he said, "I know her. I went to school with her." As it turns out, a former classmate was a scientist in one the labs in the Center. She was not doing vaccine work, but she was there. I tasked him to contact her and get information about how she had landed there and when he came back two weeks later he told me that he had spoken with here and had sent her his CV. At this point, he became a bit glum and said, "She was gonna give it to the guy in Infectious Disease that does the vaccine work and he hasn't called, so I guess he is not interested." While he was wallowing in his self-pity, I quietly went to the website and got the guy's number and at some point mid-wallow, I asked, "So. Do you wanna talk to him?"

Long story, short. We did call and the guy did not have room for him, but thought someone else might. He put the phone down (not on Hold... he put the sucker down and you could hear postdocs laughing and talking in the background) and apparently walked down the hall to talk to the "other guy" who not only had a place, but was specifically looking for someone who knew protein translation and synthesis. Boy meets lab. Boy marries lab. Boy becomes vaccine researcher.

What is YOUR Supposed To?

Finding unexpected jobs is all about finding your "supposed to" and stepping outside of it.

The Specific Requirement Supposed To. For the last twenty-plus years I have watched people develop "kitchen sink" job descriptions. Those are the ones that include every possible skill under the sun that might be used in commission of the job. (One of my favorites was a job description at a sister university for a management position that included: Squat=Occasionally. Bend=Frequently. I envision an interview in which a seasoned manager in his/her mid-forties is asked to squat and bend for the selection committee and then the committee members would hold up scorecards like they do for Olympic diving competitions.) Applicants will invariably read the 22 item requirement list and say, "I can't apply because there are two things on the list I have never done."

The 3-5 Years Experience Supposed To. If you are a 21 y/o recent college grad and you have never had a full time job please do not run off and apply for jobs that require 10-12 years of experience. If, however, you are finishing college and worked full time and part time for three or four years while in school, you might think seriously about positions that request 3-5 years of experience. I don't think three years of part time work is the equivalent of 3-5 years of experience, but with the right sort of experience showing advancement and progressive responsibility, you might fit the bill. I would let the hiring manager make the decision. I have hired people who have had years of experience only to find out that the experience had not prepared them for the position that I was trying to fill. Ultimately, if you decide not to apply for a job because you have two, instead of three, years of experience, you are turning down a job that you have not been offered.

The They Don't Have Any Openings Supposed To. Back in the day, we used to say, "If you are only looking in the newspaper, you will never find a job." These days we say, "If you are only looking at the newspaper and online job boards, you will never find a job." You at some point, you have to go directly to company websites and bricks and mortar buildings. Several years ago, I visited an organization's website and saw that they were seeking a part-time personal counselor and a part-time career counselor. It took me about two days to find out who the hiring manager actually was and made direct contact. I told him that I would be able to do both jobs and could save them a significant amount of money in benefits and administrative time and even submitted a written plan showing how both positions could (and should) be combined. I got an offer for a pretty cool job that did not exist that I got to create myself.

The I'm Just Using My Network Supposed To. To go Zen again, you have to master the art of finding without searching. My very first part time job in California came about when I was at a party with friend. One of his friends worked at a local men's store and at some point during the evening, I said I was looking for a seasonal job. About three days later, I hear, "Hey, Dude!" and looked up to see the partygoer and an older guy. We stopped and chatted and he asked me to have lunch with them. During lunch, he remembered I was looking for a job and turned the older guy and said, "Lee, when are we gonna hire our Christmas staff." Lee said that even though they had not posted the jobs yet, he'd hire me right then, if I wanted to start before Thanksgiving and I started two days later. Now, I realize that a Christmas job is not a career position, but the concept is the same.

Part of the problem about constantly being on the prowl is that we forget what people actually want in a co-worker... somebody they enjoy being around for eight hours a day. One of the things we tell students in interview skills training is, "Employers do not interview you to see if you can do the job in question. They already know that from your resume, application, and references. They interview you to make sure that they can sit with you eight hours a day five days a week." If you make every social gathering an opportunity to recite your 30-seconf elevator speech or whine about your fruitless job search or talk about all the interviews that you have had, you will quickly find a large empty space around you at parties. It's okay to mention that you are looking for a job. It is okay to answer a question or two about your job search, but keep it low profile. Ask people what THEY do. Ask what they like and dislike about their jobs. Ask how they found their jobs. But don't ask, even jokingly, if they know anybody who is hiring. If they like you and feel confident about your abilities, they will let you know about openings that exist.

Thinking outside the supposed to.

I believe this brings us to that final question:

"What about all those job listings that exhort applicants, in all caps, not to call please? Should one call anyway?"
I refuse to give a definitive answer on this one, but here's my sketchy advice. If you have a genuine question to ask, then call. If your idea is that by calling you might be able to exert some Svengali-like influence over the hiring process, then don't call. Thinking outside of the supposed to does not include willy-nilly ignoring others' wishes, it is about stepping outside of our typical habits and finding unexpected opportunities.

The Perfect Resume.

noreply@blogger.com (Darryl Stevens) — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 19:26:00 +0000

Okay, before this gets out of hand let me say that there is no such creature as a perfect resume. Better yet, if you go to Amazon.Com and type in "resume writing" you get no fewer than 5,782 options, while Barnes and Noble.Com renders a much more discriminating 817 entries. My job requires that my counselors and I see literally thousands of resumes each year, which range from exceptionally professional to awesomely awful. With few exceptions, each student will say, "I really want my resume to stand out and be seen." As a result, we see resumes on pink paper with magenta-colored type, tiny pictures of the job aspirant, bullets in the shape of smiley-faces or pointing fingers, horizontal rules with elaborate arabesque curly cues, and high-fashion fonts that make a resume look like the entree menu from a 5-star French bistro. After years of this, my one request is "Make It Stop! Please!"

Bottom Line at the Beginning.

For those of you tired of wading through my manifestos, let me give you the bottom line at the beginning. Most recruiters tell us that they do not particularly care what a resume looks like as long as they can easily read it and figure out what you have been up to and whether what you have been up to fits their needs. Additionally, they tend to think that the pink paper, arabesque rules, and pointy fingers are over compensation. In other, those tactics may make you stand out, but in the wrong way. Bottom line formula is: simple+professional = effective.

Paper. I have never chosen interview candidates based on fanciest paper. I have sometimes wondered how a candidate's paper got wrinkled and messy, but I seldom attribute that to the applicant. I generally go with the sort of "standard inkjet" grade of paper, but if you want the high cotton fiber bond with the custom watermark... knock yourself out.

Font. It has to be readable so getting below 10 points is pushing the limits. Likewise anything above 12 points is a bit over the top. I am a sans serif guy. I really like plain, simple Helvetica or Arial, but I know confirmed serif freaks who love Times and Times Roman stuff. Once again, I pay little actual attention unless its some freaky cartoon or cursive font and then I toss it.

Complete Sentences. Hate 'em. Don't want to read 'em. Keep it brief. To the point.

Bullets. A little controversy here. I don't particularly care for them, but I see them all the time. Many of my colleagues love them. Ultimately, if it is professional looking and communicates your experience, it will be okay. (For the record, smiley faces are only professional if you are applying to Clown College.)

Contact information. I know you see examples all the time with home and business contact information. I even have industrious graduate students who will list home, departmental office, and laboratory information. In a bad economy, when I have hundreds of highly qualified applicants for every position, I am looking for reasons to exclude candidates from the pool. If you make me choose from three or four numbers, I know what I am going to choose... No. List one address and one phone number.

Action words. I guarantee that if you type "action words resume" into any search engine you will gain immediate access to hundreds of lists with thousands of action words. Use them.

Examples. What can I say? Most college and university career center websites have hundreds of examples online. Try ours if you wish. Go to our Virtual Career Center and select "Resume Writing." Not only are there online examples, but there are streaming workshops to help. They are among the few things that you don't have to be a student to use. The public website that I use most often is Quintessential Careers.Com where you can find a good mix of free and fee-based resources... I like the free stuff.

Resume Services. I suppose there are times when paying for someone to help you craft a resume would be worth it, but I want to add a proviso. When you pay someone else to pimp your stuff, you do not learn how to do it yourself. Then, when you are in a pinch, it is tough to shoot from the hip and create a resume or cover letter on the fly. For folks who absolutely have to spend money, then check out community education options or buy one of the 5,782 books available on the subject. After you get your first draft, invite a friend who routinely hires people to a working lunch to critique your resume. If you are gonna drop cash on this, you should at least get a cheeseburger out of it.

Can I have a little success with that?

noreply@blogger.com (Darryl Stevens) — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 15:23:00 +0000

Remember that whole Peter Principle thing from a few years back. You know, we rise to our level of incompetence. I get daily reminders that it is a plausibly accurate description of world of work. I would like to add two corollary to Peter’s observation and then a few pointers on how you can measure your career success while accounting for both phenomenon.

The Perpendicularity Corollary
Somewhere, lost in the archives, is my dissertation research on clinical supervision. The clinical supervisor is the person who meets with counselors, psychotherapists, and social workers to consult and advise on their approach in specific cases. Sort of like House, MD. As footnote to our research, we found that people were given clinical supervision posts, not because they were good clinical supervisors, not because they had additional training in supervision, and not even because they were particularly good at counseling or psychotherapy. They were given supervision posts because they were the most senior staff, hence the Perpendicularity Corollary… He/she who remains perpendicular to the floor for the longest period of time gets to be boss. The importance of understanding the Perpendicularity Corollary has to do with a common yardstick for measuring success… being the boss. Even being in charge, however, is subject to the chaotic rules of social order.

The Dr. John Corollary
Some of you may be seasoned enough to remember the Dr. John song, "Right Place, Wrong Time." The opening lyric is,

"I been in the right place
But it must have been the wrong time."

Early in my career, I worked at a residential treatment facility for adolescents. Like most people in the non-profit world, I was grossly underpaid, but committed to social change. One day my boss told me that I was being promoted to Assistance Counseling Team Supervisor. He clapped me on my back and said,

"We're all very proud of your success. You've made it to Assistant Counseling Team Supervisor faster than anyone except Bruce! Congratulations."

I was quite proud and chanted my new title over and over, "Assistance Counseling Team Supervisor, Assistance Counseling Team Supervisor, Assistance Counseling Team Supervisor." It conveyed power and majesty. Then I ran into Bruce... the only person to become an Assistance Counseling Team Supervisor more quickly than me.

"Bruce, I just got promoted! Cool, huh?"

"Dude. Check it out. Who is on your team?" he asked.

"Uh, me Ann and Bill."

"So, you're, like, assisting supervising one dude, right?"

"Uh huh. But I got a raise, too," I said, at this point, clearly expecting another shoe to drop.

"Yeah, about that. You used to be, like, a non-exempt dude and now you are, like, an exempt dude, which means you used to get overtime, but now you don't. You're, like, screwed, dude."

Bruce was, like, right. My take home pay dwindled as my time at work increased. The source of my rapid rise? Three people resigned the week before. Had they not left, I would not have been successful. The Financial Times of London has suggested that "successful entrepreneurs" are no more successful than I was. That is, experience has little to do with having the insight to start or fund a "successful" business plan. A significant amount of luck is involved. As Nick Brisborne says, "It is not possible to learn how to win the lottery."

Tenacity and Luck.
So if bossing is your measure of success, be advised that bossing is often conferred based on the length of one's tenure with an organization (Tenacity) or how quickly those ahead of you bail for greener pastures. If this is a less than satisfying way to measure your own success, let me suggest a few others.

Expertise. I would say that a person is successful if he or she can make the following statements about their skill set.

I am pretty good at what I do and understand what resources are necessary to be effective.
My colleagues and peers at other institutions seem to respect my opinion on professional matters.
My supervisor/boss values my input on new projects or my feedback on problems.
I have been able to mentor others who are new to my field.

I get a kick out of somebody asking my thoughts about a new project or plan and while I would rather have more money, I try to use these occasions to remind my boss of my value. That may be the subtext here. If someone taps you for advice, information, or guidance, be sure that the person you report to knows about it. I have been doing some things for the University President's Office and you can bet that I have shared that with my boss and it will also appear on my end of year self-appraisal.

Innovation. As above, I would say that a person is successful if he or she can make the following statements about their creativity and openness to change.

I am an early adopter.
I am up to date with current trends and techniques.
My co-workers presume that I understand technology and ask for help.
I Facebook, blog, Tweet, Email, PowerPoint, etc. (and even if I don't, I'm not afraid to!)
I call the Tech Department often because I tend to push technology to its limits.
I don't like change, but I enjoy the challenge of change.

Perhaps the secret here is the openness to change. I have been knocking around in the workforce for more than two decades now and I remain flabbergasted at the folks my age who steer clear of technology and change. A few months ago, I contacted someone to tell them about changes in our programs to correct misinformation that had been given to students and alumni. The response I got was, "You can tell me, but if it is more than 50 words, I will probably just keep saying what I am saying, 'cos I have been doing this for 18 years and changing is just too hard now."

Leisure time. I would say that a person is successful if he or she can make the following statements about their leisure time.

I have enough time away from work to act as a supportive parent or spouse.
I have been able to develop interests that are different from my work (Day trading doesn't count if you are a broker.)
I have volunteered for several different community programs or projects.
I am able to take a nap without feeling guilty or anxious.

In one of my sociology classes years ago, the professor made the point that an indigenous tribe in the Amazon was the most successful culture because they seldom had to work for more that two or three hours a day to supply food and clothing for their village. (I somehow think that all that was being counted here was the time the men spent hunting and fishing and not the women's tasks of cooking, sewing, gardening, birthing babies, etc. I will leave that for another post.)

A few days ago, I shared that I had initially been in the insurance industry and opined that if I were still there that I would likely be making more money. However, by choosing the path that I did, I got in more fishing, camping, and hiking, had more time with my kids when they were younger, volunteered more frequently as a coach, teacher's aide, board member, etc. I will also add here that I have friends who have very time-consuming, high pressure jobs who still find the time to do most of the things I did. Success in this arena is not measured by the raw amount of time one contributes or relaxes, but the degree of fulfillment that one realizes from these efforts.

Making it up as I go along.
One of my favorite counselors was a young woman, named Maria, fresh out of her Master's program. She worked as an intern counselor in a couple middle schools doing family interventions to help stabilize student performance. After two or three particularly difficult sessions with a family, she and I decided that my direct observation might help her figure out what to do. We actually collaborated for two sessions and things turned around pretty quickly.
"How do you do it?" she wanted to know. "Why are you so successful at this?" I thought about it for a while and said, "I'm not sure, I think a lot of it I just make up as I go along."

This is, I think, a key element in anyone's success. The openness to change mentioned above girded with the occasional willingness to improvise will create opportunities for you to see yourself as successful. While I am sure that some people "earn" their success, I think that many of us are more able to accept and see the moments of success that we stumble into.

Intensity of Focus... not activity

noreply@blogger.com (Darryl Stevens) — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 17:43:00 +0000

Sometimes I am not so clear. Okay. Often I am not so clear, but I occasionally I realize it and am able to redact my comments into a more comprehensible offering. Today is one of those days. A few days ago I offered the suggestion that rejections in a job hunt are depressing and they tend to make us slow down our process. (March 8th, "Perhaps you have noticed the economy spinning out of control") Comments from a couple of people have made it clear that I did not make it clear. So, here is the clarified version with a few additional insights.

Frequency, Intensity, Duration.

When my work life consistently mostly of doing psychotherapy and supervising psychotherapists, I realized that most people came to counseling because the solutions that historically worked for them had begun to be less trustworthy. Likewise before they appeared for counseling, they had typically adjusted the solution by application of the Frequency-Intensity-Duration Triad. I am sure you know this gambit. What I am doing is not working because I am not doing it often enough... So, I obviously need to increase the Frequency with which I do it. What I am doing is not working because I am not doing it hard enough... So, obviously I need to increase the Intensity with which I do it. What I am doing is not working because I am not doing it long enough... So, obviously I need to increase the Duration with which I do it. It really is a basic human flaw that we seldom sit back and accept that the solution doesn't work because it is the wrong solution.

Don't bother me, I'm busy applying for jobs.

I was reading a few of my favorite blogs the other day and I ran across a post by Peter Bregman on the Harvard Business Blog Site. I've always like what Bregman says, but was struck by the title of the post: Need to find a Job? Stop Looking so Hard. I encourage you to read his post because I am about to give a very condensed and far too trite a version of it. In essence, what he says is that when we devote very intense energy to our job hunt (and I suppose career development) we create an environment in which we are more likely to miss those "out of the blue" job offers. Think about it. The more time and energy you devote to a job search, less time and energy you will have to prioritize what you really want out of life.

I worked with a PhD student last year who had sent out hundreds of CV's and cover letters. The student told me that she would spend 18 - 20 hours each week researching and following up on positions.

"So," I asked, "how much time is left over for teaching and completing the dissertation?"
"None of that will make any difference if I don't have a job," she said with grim determination and added, "I've sent letters to every state except Hawai'i and every kind of campus"
"Gee, that's a lot of work. Have you ever visited any of the campuses?"
"It doesn't really matter, you know. A college is a college."

Ultimately, when the first offer finally trickled in, it was in a very small school in a remote area of the Midwest, that did not even have a department in her major. The student looked at me and sighed, saying that the salary was so marginal, that it barely boosted the teaching assistant pay she was now receiving. Worse was the realization that a colleague had heard about, applied for, and secured a postdoctoral position at a nearby college and he would not have to move in order to take the position. When I asked if she had applied for the fellowship she said,

"You're kidding, right? I was way too busy trying to get a real job and never saw the announcement."

This student had absolutely no priority targets. Harvard and Klamath Community College were all the same in her book and she devoted the same amount of energy to applying for each. She had made the fundamental F-I-D Triad error, mistaking energy output for discipline.

Priority Targets.

Let me start by saying that it is very easy critiquing others' job searching techniques from the position of having a relatively secure job that you like. I don't envy the daily angst that is part and parcel of the hunt. Having said that, one should think in terms of having priorities that help apportion the energy outlay. Following are a few ideas that can be starting points.

Time frame. Bregman is right about one thing. "At most spend 1-2 hours a day." I have watched one job aspirant after another burn out long before the job announcements do. I will add to what he has said by offering that it is not only important to limit your activity to a couple of hours, but to do it at a time of day that makes sense. During my last "real" job search a decade ago, I realized that I while I worked better late at night, if I had questions about a recruitment, offices were oddly closed at 11:00pm. Shifting the bulk of my searching to early afternoon meant I could ask questions... which is the second idea.

Ask Questions. About twice a week, I will have a student who wants me to review a cover letter or resume or some other "supporting documentation" for an application. As I get into the meat of the request, I will ask, "So, what are they looking for?" Almost universally students answer either "I don't know," or they will hand me a hard copy of an online announcement. When I suggest that they actually personally call to find out, they respond, "Can I do that?" Here's the deal. With much of the job posting and announcement process having migrated to the Internet, it is increasingly difficult to find the appropriate person to talk to about the position. Difficult, but not impossible. When you have a question or are unsure about a job announcement, spend five or ten minutes locating a sentient human being rather than twenty minutes fretting about all of the possibilities.

Stereotypical quick story. Two years ago, a student told me that he had seen the perfect job in a lab in another state, but applications had closed two days earlier. I suggested that he call, which he decided was far too much effort. Two months later, he ran into the researcher at a scientific conference and shared that he had considered applying for the position but that it had closed the week before he saw it. The researcher said, "Wow. That's too bad. We had a devil of a time filling the slot and kept applications open until a couple of weeks ago. We finally hired somebody last week." Call. Ask questions.

Look under the cushions. Our fancy DVR has a big remote... a VERY big remote. One that is far too big to get stuck in the cushions of the sofa, but inevitably when I am freaking out because I cannot find it, my wife will say, "Have you looked under the cushions?" Which, of course, is where it always resides. Do not rely on the Internet as your sole purveyor of jobs. Jobs and promotions often hide in the most curious of places, so if you are continually where you are "supposed" to be looking and never looking under the cushions, you'll miss the good stuff.

Cleverosity rules. John Krumboltz is simply one of my favorite "career guys." I wrote a little bit about his "Happenstance Theory" a couple of weeks ago (Feb 28th, Not only are your friends wrong... I'm wrong, too.) His basic precept is that we sort of stumble into our successes and while he does not say this, I think our failures result from uber-planning... like sending out 121 applications each week for jobs we don't really want.

Here's the deal. If good things happen when we least expect it, the clever person will cultivate moments when he or she is more open to follow through with an "Ah hah! Moment." You can increase your cleverosity quotient by being available to listen, instead of being buried in the process of redesigning resumes or crafting perfect cover letters. I said Peter Bregman was right about one thing... well, he is actually right about many things another is...

Don't waste this time. The job search. The client search. Do it. But do it in a way that excites you. That teaches you new things. That introduces you to new people who see you at your natural, most excited, most powerful best. Use and develop your strengths. The things at which you excel. The things you love.

The one about goal setting...

noreply@blogger.com (Darryl Stevens) — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 20:02:00 +0000

As promised, this is the one about career goal-setting. The four questions that I asked are essential to configuring career goals and moderating your satisfaction along the way. I have discovered over the years that we have a knack for setting goals that are at the extremes of two axes: One is anchored by goals that are either very specific or very general and the other with goals that are easily attainable or well out of reach. Worse, we seem to forget that the nature of goals is that they exist in the future and yet we aspire to things with the most relevance to the present.

Case In Point.

Several years ago, during a career counseling graduate class, I asked the class to explore the difference between the terms “job” and “career.” They readily understood that career was a dynamic process, while job was nominal construct. One differentiation that I appreciated was “career is what we do all the time, job is what we are doing right now.” The question came up about how counselors should go about the process of choosing job, so I asked the students how they had decided on their current job. One student said, “I really liked my last job a lot better than the one I have now, but I wanted a better car and bigger apartment, so I jumped ship. I hate my job now, but I was able to get a new car and we are in a three-bedroom.”

After some discussion, it became apparent that she hated her new job because she never left the office and the reason that she had wanted a better car was because she had previously been in the field all the time. Likewise, her she had wanted a bigger condo because she wanted more space at home, and ironically, the new job kept her at the office longer. She easily attained her very specific goals, only to discover that they left her a bit dissatisfied. Perhaps she would have made a different decision if she had thought about the four questions we posed last week.

1. Where do you want to be living five years from now? (Ten years, if you are under 35.)

A couple of weeks ago, I made the point that the willingness to relocate was terribly important to increasing your job prospects. Embedded in that advice was the notion that leaving your home grounds may be important to the possibility of doing WHAT you want WHERE you want to do it. When I first sit with career seekers, I pose this question a bit more obliquely by asking, “Where do you want to be five years from now?” I do this intentionally because I realize that most people will interpret it as career process question and they give answers like: “I want to be a professor,” or “I want to be a manager with ABC Widgets.” I then say, “No. I want to know where you want to be GEOGRAPHICALLY,” explaining that if they wish to be living in Minnetonka, Minnesota and they wish to be a nuclear physicist, they will likely have to rethink the where they wish to be or the what they wish to be.

I grew up in small towns in the Southeastern United States and while I remember those small towns as warm and welcoming, from early in my life I loved our trips to big cities. After twenty years in the Los Angeles metro area, I moved back to teach in a small college in an even smaller town. I had a great job that I loved with colleagues that I really liked, but I found myself constantly driving to “the city” for entertainment, culture, and the vibe. I lasted less than two years. It became very apparent to me that I having a great job in a place that didn’t fit me made it… well, not a great job. I have managed on my return to Southern California to find a great job and I get to be in a place that fits me well.

Where you do what you do is incredibly important… as important as doing what you do.

2. Do you REALLY want to complete another degree?

This has become much more salient in the past 18 months. As the economy faltered and failed, more and more students are coming into our center and asking about going on to graduate school. They do this for two reasons: Some think it will increase their chances for that “dream job,” but others are simply trying to ride out the storm in school. I am not sure that either serves as a good reason for pursuing an advanced degree. This is a prime example of my suggestion that we often set goals that are relative to the present rather than the future. Having been in higher education for the past two decades, I have been surrounded by folks who set the goal of a graduate degree with very little planning beyond that. I consistently see PhD students who are approaching the end of their degree program only to realize that they will not be able to stay in the area because the jobs are elsewhere (see #1 above) or they will be thrown into a system which is highly unpredictable (see #3 below). Worse, they find that while they have been in school living as a starving student, friends have begun careers and families and are several rungs ahead of them on the corporate and social ladders.

The essential questions to ask about further education have to do with the extent to which it is requisite for one’s career path. Certainly if you really want to be a doctor or lawyer, education past a bachelor’s degree is a mandatory, but if you are drawn to a career in corporate logistics and planning, it is not as clear that an MBA will be of benefit. Likewise, if you are seeking a career in social work or counseling, it does not appear that a PhD will add any flexibility or earning power to your Master’s of Social Work or Counseling. (Indeed, one of my fondest memories is that of a PhD colleague who chaffed at the fact that the director of county mental health that we worked for only had a master’s degree and made twice as much money as he did.)

The other thing to remember is that graduate degrees, particularly in professional fields, cost a great deal of money. For instance, if you pursue an MBA at a relatively decent school, expect to spent between $40K and $50K per year. (MBA Costs) That means between $80K and $100K to complete a two-year program. While MBA programs claim their degrees increase one’s earning power, it appears that holds true only for the top twenty or so full-time MBA programs. I would suggest that anyone who can get into Harvard, Wharton, or Haas, was likely headed up the corporate ladder anyway, so it is always difficult to say how much a person’s earning power has to do with their MBA and how much should be attributed to their skills and abilities.

Education should be an investment, not an encumbrance.

3. What is more important to you... salary or stability?

This one is quite simple. When I graduated from college, I went to work in the insurance industry. I am quite convinced that had I stayed there (perhaps earning an MBA along the way) I would be making considerably more than I do now. However, during my first three years, I was transferred four times, spent almost thirty hours a week traveling, and was pretty much at the beckon call of my corporate office. This was not how I wanted to live my life. Since then, I have pursued a path that has been offered me more independence and stability. I own a lot fewer suits and ties, but I make considerably more of the decisions that affect me on a daily basis. I have moved during that time, but primarily because I wanted to, not because I had to. I once sat down and figured that these things were probably worth about $20K a year to me.

The biggest myth that people adhere to when setting career goals is the mistaken belief that more money means more stability. Certainly poverty is inherently unstable, but more money is not causal to stability… ask the four or five-thousand investment banker who are looking for a new career because of the current economy. I am not suggesting that financial security is not important, nor am I recommending that you never select based on monetary considerations. What I am saying is be sure when you begin to set your goals that money is not the ONLY consideration.

Although the value of lifestyle is largely intrinsic, it is worth exercise to set it's value concretely.

4. What are the three most positive and negative aspects of your current job?

Here, I’ll model this one for you.

Starting with the negatives.
1. I work for a large institution and that makes change and innovation difficult.
2. Because we are a public institution, resources can often be difficult to come by.
3. The day to day waste is very frustrating for me.

The positives are as follows.
1. I am given a great deal of independence in basic decision-making.
2. The people that I work with on daily basis are bright, creative, and pretty darned cutting edge.
3. Continued education and training are highly valued and generally supported.

Notice that both the negatives and positives issue from the fact that I work at a large institution of higher education.

In some respects, we cannot have the positives without the negative and this understanding is critical to setting goals.

What Does It All Mean?

When I left the insurance world thirty years ago, I violated every single point that I have made in this post. I didn’t think about where I wanted to be, I just thought about where I didn’t want to be. I just assumed more education would help me, instead of calibrating the actual need for education. I made choices based on making money, instead of thinking about the lifestyle that fit me best. Instead of focusing on both the good and the bad of my insurance job, I sought to eliminate the bad. My first real job was in a very small non-profit agency, with very little protocol, that let me wear sandals and shorts to work. After a couple of years, I realized that all of the other pieces were important, too.

As you look to the future and begin thinking about goals, remember to do them holistically. I sometimes remind students that the present only exists as the intersection of our past and future… the plans we make based on the experiences we have had. Change is inevitable, so it makes sense that our goals and expectations will change as well. Better yet, our goals must be created so that they are concrete enough for us to aspire to them and flexible enough to change when the wind comes from an unexpected direction.

Oh yeah. About that tree thing. I'm pretty sure I would be a magnolia tree.

Career Goals - An exercise.

noreply@blogger.com (Darryl Stevens) — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 00:58:00 +0000

It's Friday and for all you poor suckers who don't live in SoCal (where it is currently 77 degrees and not a cloud in the sky) I would like for you to do something for yourselves. Set a goal or two.

The problem that most of us seem to have when we set career goals is that we use career-speak to formulate them. Let's try something a little different this time. Answer the following questions.

1. Where do you want to be living five years from now? (Ten years, if you are under 35.)

2. Do you REALLY want to complete another degree?

3. What is more important to you... salary or stability?

4. What are the three most positive and negative aspects of your current job?

5. If you could be a tree, what kind of tree would you be?

Okay, #5 is BS, but the rest are very important to establishing long term goals. What I want you to do is spend the next two days thinking about them and my next post will focus them for you and help you use them as touchstones for setting career goals, not only now, but ten, fifteen, or twenty years from now.

Have a cool weekend, dudes.

Let me put it this way... NO!

noreply@blogger.com (Darryl Stevens) — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 17:16:00 +0000

Early in my career, when my daily requisition of energy and ideas far exceeded the number outlets supplied by my workday, I thought it made me a loyal and valued employee if I simply did everything that I was asked to do and then some. Certainly, when I began to supervise others, I favored the Energy Junkies (EJ's)over the Energy Vampires (EV's). In time, however, I found that I was almost always having to deal with the EJ's in a frenetic manner to help them complete the multiple commitments they had taken on, while the EV's were often plodders who, in fact, did what they said they were going to do in about the time frame they said they would require. Don't get me wrong, I would rather have a colleague who steps up and solves problems before they become crises or does things without being asked, but there is a fine line between genuinely agreeing to help and saying "yes" because "no" is not in your vocabulary.

I recently observed two of my younger colleagues handling their work day and realized that one of the things that I had finally gotten better at in my old age was something that they struggle with. It is the seemingly simple, yet ineffably difficult challenge of saying, "No." In honor of the fact that NO is such a short, teeny-tiny word, I am committed to making today's post likewise short... not teeny-tiny, just short. Today's Topic? No.

Of course I can.

Several weeks ago, I was in a meeting and one of committee members asked if I could impose on someone in my office to complete a specialized task. I agreed to ask, joking that I had immense powers of persuasion. In reality, I was quite senior to this individual and when I asked the favor, the answer was, "Of course I can." I asked if they were certain and that it shold not be seen as a priority. Again, there was resounding confidence that they would "do it for [me]." Over the next few weeks, it became increasingly obvious to this person that there was simply too much on their plate. Afraid to let me down, they approached another senior administrator to help figure out what to do. He quickly answer, "Just say no." Had she said something to me, I would have said the same thing, perhaps not as quickly, but I would have said the same thing.

I tend to forget that when I was just starting out, I almost never said no. Much like my brief skiing career, I never met a run that I wouldn't take... until I was halfway down. It is doubly hard as a young professional to disappoint a mentor or superior who obviously has faith in your because they asked you to do something. There is a lesson here for both mentor and protege. The lesson is the same for both: It is very hard to say no to your boss.

Come on down!

The second episode occurred as one of my counselors was walking in from a meeting. Her next appointment was sitting in the waiting room and as she passed him, she said, "Hi! Come on down." The student followed her to her office an she sat down, without catching her breath or organizing her thoughts and started into her consultation with the student. Exceptional customer service, right? Well, maybe not. I spoke with her later about it and suggested that it was alright to acknowledge the student and instead of saying "Come on down" she could say, "Hi. Give me a minute to unpack and I will come back and get you."

In the same way that it is difficult to say no to a senior colleague, it is tough to say no to a client or customer. On most occasions, creating a boundary for a client also creates value. Think about it this way, if you always say yes or drop everything you are doing to deal with my issues, why should I worry about what you may or may not have on your schedule? On the other hand, if you are not always able to attend to me at a moment's notice, then maybe you have other things do... like you have a life and stuff.

Five easy pieces.

Here are five ways to start building your resistance to reflexively saying yes.

For whom the annoying electronic beep tolls. Do you know anybody who carries a PDA that beeps when they have an upcoming appointment? They are really dorky at meetings when they pull out their little stylus and squint at the screen and say, "No. Can't do it then. Nope. Not then either. Wow. Can't do it then."? Do you ever wonder how many of those dates would be open if everybody could see their screen? I am an iPod dork. I have my calendar on my Touch and I will almost never commit on the spot. I say things like, "That date looks open, but I don't know if Elizabeth has scheduled something else for me. Let me get back to you." Once you have time to think about it, you can then say yes... or no... from the relative safety of your office.

Can I get change for the meter? Dealing with the boss is much different than dealing with your peers. You can tell your co-worker no and there are few repercussions. Not so easy to do with the boss. If you are asked to take on an assignment, ask, "What priority should this have with my other projects?" Bosses seldom remember everything you are doing, so they will likely say, "Top priority, of course" to which you reply, "Okay, I have the Clay Feet Project and the Infinite Circle meeting that were due by the day after tomorrow and the Giant Green Bug planning meeting for the first of next week, should this move ahead of those?" One of three things will happen, you will be told to move the previous projects lower on the list or move the new project lower on the list or someone else will be enlisted to help you. (If the fourth thing happens, which is "Get them all done at once" you are working for an idiot and you should begin looking for another job. Now.)

Mr. Postman is there a letter in your bag for me? This is sort of a corollary to the above. Anytime I am asked to take on new tasks and juggle old ones, I will send a quick email that reads something like this...

Thanks for talking about the Skynet System Report with me today. Per our conversation, I will reschedule the green bug planning meeting for early August, ask Sheila to assist in completing the Clay Feet project on time and I will indefinitely postpone the Infinite Circle Meeting until after our other two projects are complete.

This functions as a reminder to both of you and is darned near as good as a well-intoned "no" in the long run.

Are you talking to me? My counselors will tell you that my pet peeve is managers from other units who approach my employees directly to perform tasks for them. They have all been empowered to say, "Gee, you should really talk with my supervisor about that." This works well internally. If a co-worker asks for you're help, just say, "Sure, let's clear it with Darryl first." You will be surprised how many requests dissipate when you present them with a less amiable target.

Just say no. With apologies to Nancy Reagan, this is really the end all. The variations are: I really don't have time right now. I am am close to swamped and this would negatively effect the quality of all my projects. Depending on the source of the request, you can also say: That's just not a priority for me (my unit) at this time. I realize it is important to you, but it will take more time (resources, money, etc.) than I have available. You have to set the limit, because no one else will.

So here we are at the end and despite my promise to keep it short and I have failed. I hope that you will forgive me, but at least I said "no" to teeny-tiny.

Negotiation skills during an economic downturn

noreply@blogger.com (Darryl Stevens) — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 23:12:00 +0000

Counseling is a very odd profession. Odd because we are largely given the societal task of being experts at broad range of things at which we are unlikely to actually have expertise. If you want proof of this go to an online bookstore and type in “parenting” and look at the hundreds of how-to books that you will be given. I am always amused when I go to a career development conference that there will be no fewer than five presentations or seminars on building the perfect resume… all different, but all guaranteed to “make your application stand out.” (We’ll get to this topic next week sometime.)

The same can be said for negotiation. Dozens of experts claim to have the foolproof method for getting what you want from anybody. Adding to this problem is a fable that seems to be drifting through our culture that any job offer is a lowball offer and should be countered. Nothing could be further from the truth, but that does not mean that you should never ask for more. The question is what “more” should you ask for. First, a cautionary and true tale. The names and places have been changed for standard reasons.

When I was in graduate school, my friend Norbert went to Sheboygan to complete his predoctoral internship. As you are aware, Sheboygan is a town rich in academic history and as his internship was ending he secured and interview and eventually an offer with a well-known university. He was happy, they were happy, everybody was happy. Okay. Not exactly true. His advisor, upon hearing that Norbert had accepted the job without any negotiation scolded him and told him that he ought to at least ask for moving expenses. Norbert is one of the kindest, gentlest people that I know, so I am certain his request was likewise kind and gentle. The department chair told him he would have to talk to the dean and he would get back to him. Two days later, Norbert received a letter from the chair and the dean expressing their great disappointment that he would ask them for more money after their generous package of salary and benefits and rescinded the offer of employment. (Did I mention that this was very late in the game and that Norbert had already turned down two other offers? Brrrrrr. Chilling, huh?)

Today’s lesson? What can you negotiate in a very, very bad economy?

Please sir, can I have some more?

First allow me to dispel a common myth about job offers. Most entry-level and mid-level job offers are made “on the nose.” That is, typically what you are offered is what you are going to get salary-wise. This is particularly true in large organizations where pay ladders and job categories are tightly controlled. Universities are horrible about advertising a pay range of $36,000 to $48,000 for an entry-level professional position when they know that they will be limited to offering $38,000-39,000. Any wiggle room is quite minimal.

This is not the case for seasoned mid-level and senior managers. Most often, these salary ranges will be posted as “Commensurate with experience.” One word of caution here. The current economy has made the candidate pool for these jobs much more competitive, resulting in less room to negotiate.

So, am I saying that only more experienced applicants should negotiate? Absolutely not! There are, however, a few ways to prepare yourself before you do ask for more.

Knowing is understanding.

The single most important fact to have at your fingertips is the typical salary for the position for which you are applying. The most commonly used these days seems to be Salary.Com. It takes a little tweaking, but I finally managed to get a reading for my current position and found that I am at about the 80^th percentile. (About what I would expect.) For broader ranges, you could use either O’Net or California Career Zone (Even if are not in California), both have decent salary snooping tools. If possible call a few HR departments even before you begin your job search and find out the going rate for a widget salesperson.

This also goes for knowing your “salary requirements.” A common question that we get is whether or not listing a salary that is too high will result in you not being considered for a job. I always respond with the flip side which is, “What if your requirements are too low and they offer you what you ask for. Spend time making a list that includes car payment and insurance, rent/mortgage, groceries, annual clothing expenses, entertainment, medical payments, charitable gifts, etc. You don’t want to be resenting your boss a year from now because you screwed up the math now.

Compensation vs. salary.

Story #2. A few years ago a colleague at the university asked my advice about an offer her husband had received. It was about $250 more per month, but they were unsure about the company compared the large well-known company where he was currently employed. I asked about medical coverage (didn’t know), paid time off (wasn’t sure), commuting distance (30 miles further), and retirement (didn’t know). I said that I didn’t have enough information to make a decision, but it didn’t sound like a good idea. My friend then shared that he had already accepted the offer.

Over the next few weeks they found out that the new company made no contributions to the employees retirement, while the old company matched contributions up to 8% of their salary. Since he made about $4200 per month, this amounted to as much as $320 per month in additional contributions. The medical coverage was more expensive by $70 per month and did not take effect for 90 days. The additional commute time and distance cost them 15,600 additional miles on their car and between $2000 and $2500 per year in additional gas and maintenance. Finally, left a job that gave him three weeks of vacation for one that gave him two weeks, but only after he had worked a full year. Adding all of this up, his $3000 annual raise was offset by $6680 in lost benefits from his previous job.

Do a full inventory of compensation or compensation necessities before entering into negotiations with a prospective employer.

What’s on the table?

Let’s assume for a minute that salary is not on the table. Certainly, if it is within 5% to 7% of the average for the position, it is not likely that it is on the table. Following is a short list of things that you should put into play before you even begin working for your new employer.

Time Off. Many places have set standards for differentiating between sick time and vacation time. One earns x hours of vacation per month for years 1-9 and x+4 hours per day for 10+ years. If you are offered two weeks of vacation and are told that salary is non-negotiable, ask if it would be possible to have an additional 4 or 5 days of paid leave each year.

Professional Memberships and Educational Leave. Several years ago, I attempted the gambit above and was told that it was against the organization’s policy to give additional vacation time. I asked if I could have 4 or 5 days per year for “professional development” and it was granted. I have also had my professional memberships paid by my employer and consistently seek out continuing education to roll off on the boss.

Technology. This can include a range of things from smart phones to laptops. I have been a MacIntosh user for 15 years and at every job since 1995, I have negotiated the replacement of my foul Windows box with a Mac. Likewise, I have asked for laptops instead of desktops. Think about cool toys that will make you more efficient and ask for them up front.

Medical coverage. Most companies will not pay you to decline coverage, but some will. My wife works in the healthcare industry and we have exceptional coverage through her job. At two previous stops, I have negotiated to have the company’s contribution that would have otherwise gone to my policy given directly to me.

Schedule. Over the years, I have worked an assortment of flexible schedules for a number of reasons related to family, hobbies, or community involvement. In fact, I currently work a 7:30 to 4:30 day which puts me on the freeway before absolute ground-zero traffic conditions. Other options include a 9/0 schedule which is 9-hour days with every other Friday off or a 4/10 which is 10-hour days with every Friday (or Monday) off.

Telecommuting. For five years while working for one employer, I had a monthly report to write which I did from home. It gave me the flexibility of one day off per month and I generally wrote the report during two or three late evening sessions. I have a friend who has negotiated ten days a month of work from home. His roundtrip commute is 110 miles, so his ten days saves him 1100 miles of wear and tear on his car and gives him back 20 hours (1/2 week!) that he would otherwise be on the road commuting.

What’ll you give me if I eat that whole thing?

Story #3. My best friend in college was Allen. He was constantly scamming and knew every way under the sun to get money. He sold blood regularly, knew the places to take textbooks to get the best prices, and was always on the prowl for a score. The local truckstop had one of those monster steaks… 42 ounces or something… that they would give to you free if you ate it in less than a two hour sitting. One night we went in and Al ordered the steak. When it arrived, it was mountainous. Before he started, he stood up and asked everybody to come look at its towering majesty. “What’ll you give me if I eat that whole thing,” he asked everyone there. Most people just went back to their seats, but four or five offered $25 dollars if he could do it. I held their money and his, while he gnawed away at muscle, fat, gristle, and French fries. Al finished the meal with about 10 minutes to spare. As we were walking through the parking lot, he waved his newly won $125 dollars at me and said, “I probably couldn’t have finished it if it weren’t for the motivation.”

If you ask for more money or vacation or benefits and are denied, ask your new employer what you have to do to be worth the extra. Get it in behavioral terms. “Start a new program with the elementary school” or “Double the billing on the Blankenship account” or “Pass the CPA license exam.” Then get a time frame. At you first convenience send a note or email that goes something like this.

Thanks for talking with me today about my role in the organization. It was very helpful. In particular, I appreciate your willingness to reconsider my request for additional time off and professional dues after I complete my CPA exam.

Print and save this document for your first performance evaluation to jog your boss’s memory.

Here’s the deal. When it comes to getting paid it’s not just about the Benjamins.