Guest Blog: Value Added Skills

I got a POKE the other day from a contact of mine on LinkedIn - chastising me for not having updated my blog since last summer.  :)

Nice to know people are actually wanting more, or care to hear what I have to say!

I threw it back at him to write me a guest blog - or at least give me some ideas - and he took the challenge! 

Les Iharosy, is a very well rounded professional in the Transportation industry... who loves to solve challenging and complex Transportation and Logistics issues.  Check out his LinkedIn profile for a full understanding of his background. 

He penned the following from the candidate perspective; feel free to post any comments or rate the value of these types of blog entries for us below.  - Thanks!

Value Added Skills

There may come a time when it becomes necessary to make changes in your professional career path and you are faced with searching for new or alternate employment. 

As you search through the various job banks looking for your next position, take a little time and reflect upon what you may have already accomplished in your work life.  Particularly, if you have been fortunate and accumulated extended periods of tenure, you no doubt have also gained significant experiences and perhaps unique skills along the way.  Now would be a good time to look back in retrospect and identify those experiences and skills.   This can be an excellent opportunity to enhance your marketability to prospective employers.  You may have taken numerous courses over the years, been part of significant projects, or been tasked with implementing cost reduction initiatives.  You may have more skills than you first thought.

Your unique skills and tapestry of experiences may set you apart from the many other candidates vying for the same roles that you are interested in.  This may be enough of an edge to position your own candidacy to make the short list, something we all want when career change is contemplated.

In my own experience, twice now I have been able to significantly leverage added skills to roles and expand positions with positive results. 

Present your skills and talents to the best of your ability, the results will always be worth the effort.

“ …do better if possible, and that is always possible…”

 

cuppa java please!!!

Wake yourself up with a cuppa delicious brew - then get down to business.

As I am sure many of you do, I use my BlackBerry as my alarm clock... which is awesome, but also very dangerous.  I tend to hit the "disarm" button, (ok... maybe the snooze button a few times first!) and then look at the little red star, symbolizing my neverending stream of emails. 

I have made a rule for myself - not to lay in bed and browse through them, as I can not commit to remembering everything I have looked at and hence had a tendency to forget what was already read, and what I needed to atend to. 
For the job seeker - especially the not-working job seeker - the temptation of laying in bed, surfing the web and "phonemailng", can be extremely tough to say no to... but try the alternative:

•   Get up and put some real pants on!    LuluLemon just announced that their famous Luon Pants are being recalled, as they are nearly sheer!  (this is no attire to be conducting a job search in!)
•   Get to your stations!   Set up an area in your house that is seperate from the TV, bed, and any other loungy area in your home.  It doesn't have to be a hard wooden chair, but somewhere you feel like you can focus.
•   Plan / Organize the day!    This is a key step - you can quickly get distracted in this land of social media!  With the number of different ways to communicate with people, and the variety of distractions, block off time for the important things;
• check emails and flag which ones you need to respond to
• checking job boards
• setting up email alerts
• connecting with key folks on LinkedIn
• thank you emails - to those folks helping you in your searc
• phone calls - plan who you want to try to reach out to that day, and set time aside for it to prepare for the calls
•   HYDRATE!   This can be coffee, tea, or whatever you fancy; never underestimate the power of a great coffee shop to kick-start your energy levels, and motivate you to try harder to find that dream job!