You’ve probably noticed by now that the key to career change in the nineties was to take a very proactive, make-it-happen type of approach and people would storm gatekeepers with their talent. If you could prove that you could make a buck for them – they might create an ‘opening’ for you.”
My business is to coach you at this and I got VERY good at it – but times have changed and what worked then does not necessarily work now.
Nowadays you still have to be very proactive in understanding what people are looking for, so that you can pick the people you want to work for, speak their language and sell your future. You also have to present yourself as an expert in whatever it that you do and what ever that is - MUST solve a problem.
4) Career Change – Beyond Networking
Have you ever noticed anyone racing around the room with buffet sandwiches and Samosas on a stick dishing out their business cards like a pudding? Hands up who has done this or OK, seen people do this. “Have you got an opening in your company?” People are being inventive hiding from you? You catch a couple in the act and can never walk in the same street, again. Wrong. Poor technique.
Friends and relatives don’t like being imposed upon. You can burn up your network rather than cultivate it.
5) Career Change – Leaving Self ‘Open to Anything’ That Turns Up
We were speaking earlier about career change individuals flinging open the windows in an energetic manner and believing that if they tried every avenue they would conquer the job market. The sister-mistake and perhaps in many ways THE BIGGEST mistake of them all is to think that your chances are much GREATER if you are open to everything.
When applicants come to me and tell me that they are not sure about what they want to do, they say: “I want to see what’s out there.” Or “I’ll get a job on the checkout at Aldi if I have to.” I tell them they must be confusing their ‘career change with dating.’ You can meet some nice people in a single’s bar but the serious partners you meet elsewhere.
Twenty first century career change is personal, specialised, sophisticated and if you want a long-term relationship – it is going to take some serious research, decision-making and promotional flair.
The key to a great job is to get in on the ground floor in competitive niches before everybody starts doing it; develop a specific area of knowledge and expertise that will be in demand now and in the future or lock-in an opportunity to take a mature industry to take it to the top of it’s class. You can’t stay wide open and hope to be discovered.
Career change individuals waste huge swathes of time masterminding this bombardment of the media and it really is like winning the pools (lottery). Only a small percentage of these ads are REAL and they have a large CAPTIVE audience.
It is even harder for employed career change artistes – they need to structure their job search or they’ll never find time to complete it. Career changers at home with the cat feel that they have all day to do easier things than career change slavery.
A good career change has four elements:
- A strategic intent, carefully thought out methodology, preparation, research and sequence of skilful actions.
- A daily regime that keeps you focused on what you are trying to achieve.
- Dedicated space and equipment with phone, voice mail and word processing equipment and children who are trained to answer the phone politely or not at all. (My two year old daughter once answered the phone to a job offer and told the MD ‘That I couldn’t come to the phone because I was doing a No 2.”)
- It can be tempting to hide under the covers – use a good career coach or competent job-searcher to keep you motivated and on track.
There is virtually no IMPORTANT realm of life where you don’t enlist the help of experts.Your parents can’t teach you, your teachers can’t teach you – what they know about looking for a job outside teaching can be written on the back of a stamp. (“I listen to the Archers.” said a teacher mate of mine)
You go to a doctor when you become ill (although I think you should stop paying him when you become ill). You go to the dentist for your teeth (although I heard yesterday that the woman in the bakery waited for nine hours to be seen in Birmingham Dental Hospital. You go to a lawyer for legal matters (they tell me about their careers and bill me for their coaching time) You go to night class to learn car maintenance, driving, dancing, calligraphy – all the important stuff.
What do you do when you are faced with a career change – you buy a book from Amazon (that is by the length of time it takes to publish – already two years old.)
There is no longer any need to keep your career change a secret. You do not have to prove yourself self-sufficient.
One wrong career change can lose you ten percent of your salary. Two wrong jobs can cost ten to one hundred thousand pounds in lost earning and unemployed time. One mistake in salary negotiation can cost between eight and twenty five thousand pounds and after five years in that job, you will have lost between forty and one hundred thousand spondulics. (technical term)
Invest in yourself and buy the best expertise you can afford – peanuts and monkeys ain’t in it.
8) Career Change – Not Knowing Your Market Value
If you have done your focusing homework you will already know the companies and people you want to meet and how MUCH you are likely to earn
Employers always ask you about money at a too EARLY stage, because they are automatically compartmentalising your status – you are still a number to them at this point. Beware, their only motive is to screen you out.
If you do not immediately fulfil their preconceived notions of person, package, personality you may find yourself ‘out the door’ before you have had a chance to understand what they really want or they, to understand what they really need. “Next!”
So hold on to your carefully researched ‘What you are worth’ information. Resist revealing that information until you have been OFFERED and get a GOOD coach to help you brush up your salary negotiating skills. After all, one simple rehearsal can add thousands to your take home pay and invariably does.
9) Career Change – No Such Thing as a ‘Free’ Lunch
Thinking of courting a few Headhunters? Treating them to a nice lunch? Think again.
If you spend your career change-time lunching recruiters then you may entirely scupper your job search strategy. Think of it like this – Recruiters work on behalf of corporate clients to find the best staff to fulfil their business requirements. The recruiters fee (their ‘bread and butter’) for finding you varies between 10 and 33 percent of YOUR first year’s annual remuneration.
When a company asks the recruiter to search their database for a likely candidate they will receive the LOWEST fee for the MOST expensive job of keeping an up-to-date database of career change talent. (Strange, but true) Naturally they’d much rather have the larger fee of say 25 percent for placing an advert and magically finding you as a result of this expertise. (“We need to ensure a wide selection of applicants” – Yeah right)
If a recruiter presents you, you’ve just added thousands of pounds to your prospective employers housekeeping because they have to pay the middleman. If your recruiter chappie takes your CV to a company with the argument that ‘They really out to do a comprehensive search of the marketplace before settling on any one candidate.” – You may have just destroyed your unique availability and promoted your competitors. Aaaargh!
10) Career Change – ‘Please Give Me a Job’ – The Dating Game
Once out of professional stupidity I invited this client’s wife to attend one of our early sessions without finding out what she was like first. Doh! How could I have made such a beginner’s mistake?
After only the one session we had made significant progress and he was focused on attacking the job market with a well-structured promotional career change campaign.
Along comes Rita and she has all the answers. “All Colin needs to do is ring people up and say “Give us a job!” She kept repeating this until I veritably started to think about the joys of prison vegetable gardening.
Think of it like dating. I was never very good at it because I could not understand (for myself) why the most sort-after person was the one who was most unavailable. So I made a bit of a study of it. “You mean to say that “I am doing my hair,” is more attractive, than “I’ll meet you tomorrow for a coffee. Yes, yes,” my clever girlfriends insisted and they were right.
Do you realize that the only time in our lives when we like to get old is when we're kids? If you're less than 10 years old, you're so excited about aging that you think in fractions."How old are you?" "I'm four and a half! "You're never thirty-six and a half you're four and a half, going on five!
That's the key.
You get into your teens, now they can't hold you back. You jump to the next number, or even a few ahead.
"How old are you?" "I'm gonna be 16!" You could be 13, but hey,
you're gonna be 16! And then the greatest day of your life . . you become
21. Even the words sound like a ceremony . . YOU BECOME 21. YESSSS!!!
But then you turn 30. Oooohh, what happened there? Makes you sound
like bad milk! . He TURNED; we had to throw him out There's no fun now,
you're Just a sour-dumpling. What's wrong? What's changed?
You BECOME 21, you TURN 30, then you're PUSHING 40.
Whoa! Put on the brakes, it's all slipping away. Before you know it,
you REACH 50 and your dreams are gone.
But wait!!! You MAKE it to 60. You didn't think you would!
So you BECOME 21, TURN 30, PUSH 40, REACH 50 and MAKE it to 60.
You've built up so much speed that you HIT 70! After that it's a
day-by-day thing; you HIT Wednesday!
You get into your 80s and every day is a complete cycle; you HIT
lunch; you TURN 4:30; you REACH bedtime.
And it doesn't end there. Into the 90s, you start going backwards; "I
Was JUST 92."
Then a strange thing happens. If you make it over 100, you become a
little kid again. "I'm 100 and a half!"
May you all make it to a healthy 100 and a half!!
HOW TO STAY YOUNG
1. Throw out nonessential numbers. This includes age, weight and
height. Let the doctors worry about them. That is why you pay " them "
2. Keep only cheerful friends. The grouches pull you down.
3. Keep learning. Learn more about the computer, crafts, gardening,
whatever. Never let the brain idle. " An idle mind is the devil's
workshop." And the devil's name is Alzheimer's.
4. Enjoy the simple things.
5. Laugh often, long and loud. Laugh until you gasp for breath.
6. The tears happen. Endure, grieve, and move on. The only person who
is with us our entire life, is ourselves. Be ALIVE while you are alive.
7. Surround yourself with what you love, whether it's family, pets,
keepsakes, music, plants, hobbies, whatever. Your home is your
refuge.
8. Cherish your health: If it is good, preserve it. If it is
unstable, improve it. If it is beyond what you can improve, get help.
9 Don't take guilt trips. Take a trip to the shop, even to the next
county; to a foreign country but NOT to where the guilt is.
10. Tell the people you love that you love them, at every
opportunity.
AND ALWAYS REMEMBER:
Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments
that take our breath away.
Wouldn’t it be marvellous if someone told you that you could dispense with all those overpriced creams and treatments that allegedly promote youthfulness, increase weight loss, remove cellulite, wrinkles and saggy, baggy skin? And that the reason you could discard all these gimmicks, whose only effect has been on your wallet, is because you could achieve greater results for free.
What’s the catch? I hear you ask. Nothing comes free these days does it? Well, actually, yes it does. And, as the saying goes, “The best things in life are free.” Unless you put a price tag on the ten minutes per day that you would need to allocate in order to fight old age and illness.
Zone Therapy is a quick and simple technique of touching and pressure, the principles of which are based on the scientific fact that the body is an electromagnetic field. When this field is upset, illness and ageing can result. Zone Therapy is a recognized therapy that has been around for years and is not a passing ‘fad’.
The world guru in Zone Therapy is Joseph Corvo, a Yorkshire-born practitioner, who has practised his techniques on film stars, Royalty and top politicians.
The body is divided into ten zones – five on the left side of the body and five on the right - which incorporate every organ in the body. Since ageing and illness is caused by a decrease in the electro-magnetic currents running throughout the body, Zone Therapy enables these currents to run freely again and remove crystalline deposits around the nerve endings.
The news that will be of interest to many women, is that by devoting just ten minutes a day to a few simple facial exercises can make you look more youthful, more beautiful and more healthy! In fact, these exercises can be performed anywhere, although it might cause a few odd stares if you carry them out in public! This is not just a question of vanity. Strangers initially judge us by our faces, unfair as that may seem. During interviews, for example, your face is under constant scrutiny and it stands to reason that if you feel confident about the way you look, you will exude an aura of confidence and
The Face Plan
Exercise One
Pucker your lips tightly, leaving a small hole as though you were about to whistle. Shut your eyes and continue to force your lips forward as though you are trying to reach an object in front of you. Hold this position for twenty seconds.
Exercise Two
This exercise involves doing the reverse of the above exercise. Open your eyes wide and raise the eyebrows. Open your mouth as wide as possible, stretching it to its limit and concentrating on pulling every part of your face away from your mouth. Hold this position for twenty seconds, then repeat exercises one and two alternately for two minutes.
Exercise Three
Close your mouth and clench your teeth, then force the corners of your mouth down towards your chin, so that all the muscles in your neck are taut and stand out. Hold this position whilst to keep the upper part of your face relaxed. Next bring the chin muscle upwards, causing the corners of your mouth to contract towards the centre of your face and hold. Do four very slow movements, then eight fast. This exercise improves the jawline.
Exercise Four
Tilt your head back as though you were looking at the ceiling. Next place the palm of your right hand in the centre of your forehead. Try to bring you head back to its normal position whilst resisting with your hand, as though someone were pushing your head back against your will. Repeat this exercise six times in total.
Exercise Five
Bring your head forward onto your chest and place the palm of your right hand on the back of your head. Force your head back up whilst resisting with your hand. Repeat six times initially and then alternate this exercise with exercise four. These two exercises build up the muscles in your throat and neck.
Exercise Six
Puff out your cheeks, as though your mouth were full of water and purse your lips as tightly as you possibly can. As Joseph Corvo says, “Squeeze your mouth to the size of a pea.” Following this, slap your face with both of your hands for two minutes. This might sound rather masochistic, but it works wonders!
For maximum benefit, the above exercises can be used in conjunction with the ten-minute facial massage, which concentrates on key points on the face and will be detailed in part two.
These exercises will do more for your face than any number of expensive creams and potions and the real beauty is that you can practice these whilst watching TV, doing the ironing or undertaking any other task when you are not in public view and risk being arrested!
Finally, I guess you'd like to know whether this really works? Well, I'm always being told that I look ten years' younger than I am, although I have to admit that I don't practise these exercises as regularly as I should. However, by practising them even a couple of times a week, I have noticed a definite improvement in the firmness of my facial contours and my skin has developed a more youthful glow. Why not give it a go? It costs nothing after all.
If you are ready for an EXTREME CAREER MAKEOVER including how you look, how you talk and what you say: Call me Now on 0845 2020244 /+44 121 706 1623 or email development@careersnet.com
ANNOUNCING THE NEW BUILT-IN ORDERLY ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE DEVICE, OTHERWISE KNOWN AS THE BOOK!It's a revolutionary breakthrough in technology: no wires, no electric circuits, no batteries, nothing to be connected or switched on. It's so easy to use even a child can operate it. Just like it's cover. Compact and portable, it can be used anywhere--even sitting in an armchair by the fire--yet it is powerful enough to hold as much information as a CD-ROM.
Here's how it works: each BOOK is constructed of sequentially numbered sheets of paper (recyclable), each capable of holding thousands of bits of information. These pages are locked together with a custom-fit device called a binder which keeps the sheets in their correct sequence. By using both sides of each sheet,
manufacturers are able to cut costs in half.
Each sheet is scanned optically, registering information directly into
your brain. A flick of the finger takes you to the next sheet. The
book may be taken up at any time and used by merely opening it. The
"browse" feature allows you to move instantly to any sheet, and move
forward and backward as you wish. Most come with an "index" feature,
which pinpoints the exact location of any selected information for
instant retrieval.
An optional "BOOKmark" accessory allows you to open the BOOK to the
exact place you left it in a previous session--even if the BOOK has
been closed. BOOKmarks fit universal design standards; thus a single
BOOKmark can be used in BOOKs by various manufacturers.
Portable, durable and affordable, the BOOK is the entertainment wave
of the future, and many new titles are expected soon, due to the surge
in popularity of its programming tool, the Portable Erasable-Nib
Cryptic Intercommunication Language Stylus...
Reprinted with kind permission of Paul Tronson Master Bookbinder
NEXT PAGE>>>>>>
NOTE: Don't forget to add "www.careersnet.com" to your whitelist or address book in your e-mail programme, so that you have no trouble receiving future issues!
