Career Coach eNewsletter
Issue No. 28 - July - 2004
1. Editorial: Human Resources + HotBot
2. Career Development Notes: New Special Report: Surviving the Redundancy Rollercoaster
3. Success Stories: Find a Job That you Love and the Money Will Follow.......
4. Career Development Notes: Networking Skills - Practising Empathy & Altruism - Masterclass by Margaret Stead
5. Just for a Laugh!: The Language of the European Commission
6. Last Month's Contents
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BREAKING NEWS! Next - Careersnet Forum 'Maximise Yourself - Send Us Your CV' - Fr*e Forum Thursday's - (12 - 1pm GMT)
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Web site: http://www.careersnet.com/
Editor: Margaret Stead, margaret@careersnet.com
Welcome to this issue of Career Coach - a free newsletter for those interested in using coaching to improve their career performance. Please share this newsletter with colleagues and contacts that will benefit from reading it.
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1. Editorial: Human Resources
An HR Manager and his wife are awakened at 3 o'clock in the morning by a loud
pounding on the door. The man gets up and goes to the door where a
drunken stranger, standing in the pouring rain, is asking for a push
"Not a chance," says the husband, "it is three o'clock in the morning!"
He slams the door and returns to bed.
"Who was that?" asked his wife.
Just some drunk guy asking for a push," he answers.
Did you help him?" she asks.
No, I did not, it is three in the morning and it is pouring out!"
"Well, you have a short memory," says his wife. "Can't you remember about
three months ago when we broke down and those two guys helped us?
I think you should help him, and you should be ashamed of yourself!"
The man does as he is told, gets dressed, and goes out into
the pounding rain. He calls out into the dark, "Hello, are you still there?"
Yes," comes back the answer.
Do you still need a push?" calls out the husband.
Yes, please!" comes the reply from the dark.
Where are you?" asks the husband.
"Over here on the swing!" replies the drunk.
Ed's Notes: HotBot Speaking of persons in 'exuberance of spirit' you might like to take a look at a photo of my son Ed (19) on his holidays in Corfu. I think what started out as a 'Good place to have our photogaph taken' turned into (with the help of an overenthusiastic Greek waiter and a bottle of barbecue fluid) a bit of a hot spot!
Speaking of being 'At the top, in a bit of a hotspot,' you'll be pleased to learn that our nine years of site popularity, footling around with keywords and obsessing about reciprocal links has paid off - our site at www.careersnet.com is officially front page at Google and Yahoo UK, Alexa, Altavista, MSN, AOL and HotBot and many more for the keywords: career change, job search and outplacement portal! Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah!
2. Career Development Notes 1: New Special Report: Surviving the Redundancy Rollercoaster
Life in the 21st Century seems to be more and more characterised by constant change, upheaval and instability, and in our careers, our professional lives, more and more of us increasingly find times when we are facing the threat of redundancy.
However based on the work we have done over the years with our clients, we have found that our best opportunities lie in the middle of what might seem like tremendous challenges, and often it takes coaching for us to be able to uncover what those opportunities might be? What direction we should go in? What steps we should take to move forward in our career?
With this in mind, we have been busy at Careersnet collecting information based on extensive research over the years into the subject of redundancy and have just completed our new Special Report: Surviving the Redundancy Rollercoaster.
We have decided to extend a special offer to those of you who might be interested in finding out more about career coaching, what a career coaching programme would entail, and how a programme could help you to the next stage in your career.
How to secure your copy of this FREE special report
To secure your copy of this FREE Special Report, all you have to do is call Gemma at our offices on 0870 232 9932 / +44 1564 779932 to arrange a date and time to visit our office for a FREE, no obligation, informal chat about your career and to learn more about career coaching.
There are no hidden charges and no costs for this meeting. (Fully in line with the Chartered Institute of Personnel & Development, Code of Professional Conduct for Outplacement & Career Consultancy) This is our chance to find out more about you and vice versa and there will be plenty of time to get some coaching done too.
After you make the call, we will arrange for this special report to be sent to you immediately, via email.
Further bonus 30 Minute Interview CD to the first 50 callers during August
In addition we would like to extend a further bonus to the first 50 people to respond to this offer - after you've visited with us and found out more about career coaching, we will also provide a free bonus CD, there and then, in which Margaret Stead was interviewed about career coaching.
The special report and bonus CD are our gifts to all of you who decide
the time is right now, to find out more about career coaching , and are yours to keep even if you decide for whatever reason that a career coaching programme is not for you.
Call Gemma now on 0870 232 9932 to secure your appointment to find out more about career coaching, and also receive your free special report via email; p.s. don't forget the bonus CD for the first 50 callers.
We look forward to hearing from you very soon.
3. Success Stories: Find a Job That you Love and the Money Will Follow
Robina Chombe has found her vocation - she has combined her passion for cleanliness and healthy living with her natural business development skills - to save lives. Now, I've been worried for ages about deodorant and anti-perspirant potentially being responsible for br*ast anomalies, (because I once tried some non-label product that burnt though my favourite cashmere!) and I am sure there has been some work in the US on this topic. Robina has taken the concern we have all must have about the overuse of chemicals one step further by looking at the impact of toxicity in your household and what you can do about it.
We are delighted to showcase the first issue of Robina's Newsletter - Did you know that indoor air pollution is 54 times more likely to kill you than outdoor pollution?
"No? Neither did I. Being me, I want to live forever and have over a million children (yeah right!), but then I got to thinking - when I got older, what diseases would I NOT want to have? Well, cancer was one of them so I started reading up on articles and information about other toxins found in the home. The information was shocking! So shocking that I never, ever, ever want to keep it to myself so here goes..."
http://www.careersnet.com/default.asp?page=newsrobina
4. Career Development Notes 2: Networking Skills - Masterclass by Margaret Stead
Part 1. Practising Empathy
A vital part of your networking skills is your ability to build rapport quickly and effectively with others. To build rapport successfully with another individual you need to understand 'where' they are coming from and have 'empathy' with them.
People often think of empathy as a mystical commodity, a special, almost uncanny ability to experience the thoughts and feelings of someone else. In fact 'empathy' is quite simply applied imagination and only requires a little exertion and discipline.
The next time you are sitting in a room conversing with three or more people, try this very simple activity:
Temporarily remove yourself from the conversation. Be very quiet for a few moments. Pay particular attention to the person doing the most talking. Imagine the following things:
q Imagine the physical sensations the speaker is experiencing. Mentally place yourself in that person's body, sitting or standing in a particular position, eating the same food, drinking the same drink. Mentally become that person. Do you feel energised? Tired? Irritated?
q Imagine what kind of day the speaker has had - using all your knowledge about the speakers' day. If you know little about the person, guess. Continue to imagine yourself as that person. How does your day colour and affect what you are saying?
q Imagine the person's relationship's to everyone in the room - including yourself. Continue to mentally be that person. What kind of feelings are generated by the people around you? How do they affect the things you say?
Now step back into yourself and rejoin the scene. Does your own role in the conversation feel different?
Empathy, like memory is a creative act, not a mystical property and it requires imagination and practice. It lies within the grasp of all of us.
Part 2. Practising altruism
The 'Golden Rule' occurred in the Greek and Chinese cultures thousands of years before the Christian era: "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."
The spirit of the Golden Rule is one of generosity and altruism and is at the heart of any personal networking and 'right' living. Ralph Waldo Emerson said 'To have a friend, you have to be one', and his words are as true today as they ever were.
You can test this out yourself by completing the following simple exercise:
List ten people you know best:
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After each name, write an 'H' if the person is happy, or an 'N' if the person is not happy.
Then write an 'S' if the person is selfish or a 'U' for unselfish.
Rimland in Psychological Reports (51); Brain/Mind Bulletin 1983 defines 'selfish' as "A stable tendency to devote one's time and resources to one's own interests and welfare - an unwillingness to inconvenience oneself for others."
In his experimental study the 2000 individuals who completed this exercise reported very few individuals who were both happy and selfish.
The findings represent an interesting paradox. Selfish people are, by definition, those whose activities are devoted to bringing themselves happiness. Yet at least as judged by others, these selfish people are far less likely to be happy than those whose efforts are devoted to making others happy.
So the Golden Rule in networking, as in life is if you think about the other person rather than yourself, not only is that going to increase your empathy/rapport skills but it will make you a much more attractive person to know and be a magnet for personal happiness.
5. Just for a Laugh!: The Language of the European Commission
The European Commission has just announced an agreement whereby English
will be the official language of the European Union rather than German,
that was the other possibility. As part of the negotiations, Her
Majesty's Government conceded that English spelling had some room for
improvement and has accepted a 5-year phase-in plan that would become
known as "Euro-English".
In the first year, "s" will replace the soft "c". Sertainly, this will
make sivil servants jump with joy. The hard "c" will be dropped in favour
of "k". This should klear up konfusion, and keyboards kan have one less
letter.
There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year when the
troublesome "ph" will be replaced with "f". This will make words like fotograf 20% shorter.
In the 3rd year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be expekted to
reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible. Governments
will enkourage the removal of double letters which have always ben a
deterent to akurate speling. Also, al wil agre that the horibl mes of the
silent "e" in the languag is disgrasful and it should go away.
By the 4th yer peopl wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing "th" with
"z" and "w" with "v". During ze fifz yer, ze unesesary "o" kan be dropd
from vords kontaining "ou" and after ziz fifz yer, ve vil hav a reil
sensibl riten styl. Zer vil be no mor trubl or difikultis and evrivun vil
find it ezi tu understand ech oza.
Ze drem of a united urop vil finali kum tru. If zis mad you smil, pleas
pas on to oza pepl. Zen ve vil rul ze world!!!
