Pods4Jobs

In the past year Conner, who is 7 year old has found both of his parent’s laid off and looking for jobs. In this video he lays down some advice of his own for job seekers. While there are a lot of so-called “Career Experts” on the market, I bet none of them are offering this simple perspective from an optimistic kid whose parents both lost their jobs and whose personal UCL and passion is hanging out with his puppy Samson… Have you been laid off and had to talk to your kids about it? What did you say? How did they respond?

If you’re considering career retraining, it’s important to understand and acknowledge why you’re considering changing careers and what you want in a new career. If you remember back to when you chose your current career, there were certain things about that career that attracted you. Perhaps, you were keeping it “in the family” and following your parent’s footsteps, or choosing a career that paid a good salary or you may have taken the career that required the least amount of schooling. Lastly, you may have really wanted that career at that time but have changed your mind as time went by. Whatever your reason, now that you have the desire for career retraining, the sky is the limit.

Before you decide on a specific new career choice, do some research on the job so you know what you’re getting into. Career retraining can involve a lot of money, time and training so make sure this is a choice that will be lucrative for your career. In other words, don’t choose a career that millions of others are also choosing now or you may be in the unemployment line for a long time waiting for that opportunity to come along. Here are some questions you may want to ask yourself before you begin your career retraining:

- Is your goal to earn more money?
- Do you want to stay with this career until your retirement?
- Do you want to have a variety of choices of work or are you focused on one job?
- Do you want to have the choice of where you live or are you willing to relocate?

Once you have the answers to these questions, you’re going to be ready for your career retraining and you’ll have a better idea of what your options involve. Many people make the mistake of career retraining for something that doesn’t fit into their current lifestyle, which they have no intention of changing. For instance, if you live in a small community and have no intention of moving, keep this in mind when you choose a new career. You don’t want to spend a lot of time retraining for a job that will never be available in your hometown. Keep this in mind when you choose a job career: availability in your location.

Career retraining is something that many individuals are choosing today with the wide choices that are now available in the job market. The internet has made it very easy to find educational institutes to help you earn your degree for your chosen career. Whether it’s individual courses you need or a Bachelor’s Degree, research will find something for you in your chosen field. Career retraining is something that can be very exciting once you’ve decided what you’re interested in doing. However, if you’re going to spend money and time on this new career choice, make sure this is definitely what you want to do for the rest of your life so you don’t end up choosing a career as a full-time student.

Every graduate who takes free career advice from a friend or family member needs to look beyond the advice to determine motivations. Your graduation from university will be accompanied by dozens of loved ones and colleagues offering free career advice without solicitation. Your desire to be polite to every career advisor should not lead to an acceptance of free career advice without some analysis. There are multiple criteria you can apply to career advice to determine the tips that are best for your young career.

The professional background of an advice provider is important as you consider free career advice. A lawyer offering advice on specific areas of legal studies to pursue in postgraduate education is a valuable resource. A retired police officer who provides tips on success in IT sales may not offer the best advice available. You should ask what an advisor does for a living to place free career advice into context.

The substance of free career advice may not be effective if the presentation style of your advisor is unorthodox. This advice does not need to be provided through a PowerPoint presentation but it should be provided with a certain sense of decorum. You should not take free career advice from an individual who is promoting a specific company, criticising a specific company and using inappropriate language during their advice. The quality of free career advice is only as good as the person presenting the advice.

The best free career advice comes from an experienced professional with anecdotes to back up his suggestions. Your recent graduation from a university should leave research and methodology courses fresh in your mind. You would not draw assumptions in philosophy, biology and other fields without sufficient evidence. You should apply this same standard to free career advice.

In contrast, the worst career advice comes from people who think that one-size-fits-all platitudes help in every situation. A relative who says that the secret to any job lies in a single characteristic or action cannot be regarded as a trustworthy source of career advice. There are few professions where one piece of advice is sufficient to guiding a professional toward profit and happiness. Your quest for advice on building a successful career should take into account multiple points of view. These tips can help you develop relationships with trusted advisors who can offer help throughout your career.

Job hunting is a lot like fishing. You might get lucky and land the big one on your first attempt. On the other hand, you could invest a lot of time and effort casting out numerous applications and end up having nothing to show for it. No one can guarantee either will happen, but there are ways to improve your chances.

When I was a kid I did a lot of fishing in my summer holidays. For years it was all about luck. Find some water, bait a hook, cast the line … and hope. When an uncle of mine started joining us on our holidays, he taught me how to be a bit smarter about my fishing. Later, as a recruitment consultant, I realised that much of what my uncle had shared with me is relevant to the typical job search.

1. Be clear about the job you want

Effective fishing means using the right bait with the right equipment – especially the right-sized hook – for the type of fish you are trying to catch. The same applies to job search.

The tone of your application letters, the detail and emphasis in your resume, the way you dress for, and answer questions in, the interview. All of these will be different, dependent on whether you are going for a CEO role or a junior administrative role, or something in between.

Target specific industries and companies

My uncle taught me the importance of finding good spots to fish: rock-pools, deep water channels, sheltered areas, and so on. Job hunting is the same: the more targeted you can be, the more chance you give yourself of landing the ideal role.

Find out which organisations are most active in your desired industry and approach them. Read trade magazines to become familiar with what is going on and who’s who. Apply directly to your ‘dream’ employers: whether they are actively advertising or not.

Ask around

Perhaps the most important thing I learnt from my uncle was the importance of local knowledge. We were always asking the locals where we should fish. Sure, they may have sent us to the second-best place and kept the best to themselves, but we were still better off than all those ‘random’ fishers.

The lesson: don’t be afraid to ask. Ask former colleagues, customers and others in your industry what they know. Ask people who report the news in your industry. Ask friends and neighbours.

Advertise yourself

Fishing was a topic of camping conversation whether we were actually fishing or not. My uncle would always be chatting to people and he would always, in these chats, turn the conversation to fishing. Nearly every time, he was able to glean additional local information as a result.

You can use a similar strategy when searching for a new job, particularly if you’ve been made redundant. The important thing is not to keep your situation to yourself. Let people know, when the chance arises, what your situation is. Your local community, former bosses, pretty much anyone. When you do this, you effectively gain an army of job search assistants and increase your chances of finding out about  the plum job that hasn’t even been advertised.

5. Use technology to help

Walk into a modern fishing supplies shop and you’ll realise that the pastime has moved well past the era of a hook hanging from a stick. While it’s easy to go overboard, the fishing experience can be made much more pleasant through use of some quite inexpensive, readily available tools.

The modern job hunt is no different. There are job search websites, networking tools like LinkedIn and Twitter, and all sorts of resume-building and personality-testing widgets out there to try. You may not use them all, but do spend some time getting to know what’s there so you can make a considered decision about where to invest your time.

Job hunting need not be a completely random hit-and-miss affair. By using the proven strategies of others, you’ll greatly increase your chances of catching a prize-sized job in a short time.

If you find yourself searching the internet for How To Find Your Dream Career more often than you’d like to admit then this article could be the very answer you’ve been longing for and assist you in finally figuring out what you want to do with your life.

It is very likely that there are various reasons why you are still searching for How To Find Your Dream Career and not actually pursuing your perfect path yet, however, by the end of this page that may no longer pose as a problem for you.

I want you to ask yourself something and answer as honestly as you possibly can.

Do you REALLY want to know how to find your dream career or do you silently wish you could be in business for yourself or work from the comforts of your own home?

There is no wrong answer to this question and whether or not you answered yes or no, the solution will still be available throughout this article.

I have discovered that most people I talk to are dissatisfied with working for somebody else at a set salary and constantly keep searching for that ideal career when what they want deep down is to be in their own business. On the other hand, I have talked to hundreds of people that have no idea what they want to do with their lives and others who know exactly what they want but don’t know how to go about making it happen.

Which one of these three predicaments do you find yourself in?

I want to be blank but I don’t have the money for college.

I want to work from home but don’t know how to begin.

I honestly have no idea what I want to do.

Let’s go over each one of the above individually and see if we can’t come up with the ultimate answer you were hoping to uncover while searching specifically for How To Find Your Dream Career!

A1. My best friend Anica has know since she was 6 years old that when she was all grown up she would strive to be a Veterinarian. Immediately after graduating High School she attended a low cost college and completed her Vet Tech Program. A Vet Tech is half way to becoming a Veterinarian so Anica knew she would still need to attend 4 more years of College and come up with $100,000.00 to cover her tuition. She had to work while attending college to cover her daily living expenses such as food and rent which made it hard for her to devote a decent amount of time to achieve the great grades that the Veterinary Schools require. Anica applied to all 28 of the Colleges around the world at $100.00 an application and was heart broken when she did not received one acceptance letter. For almost 5 years Anica completely abandoned her dream career of being a Veterinarian until we put our heads together and worked out the perfect plan to get this girl accepted into the Vet School of her choice. Anica already spent $2,800.00 in application fees to apply for these schools, still owed $28,000.00 in existing loans and feared that it would not only be a waste of money to try and apply again with her grades but that there was no way she would come up with the money for tuition even if she did get accepted.

Have you picked up on how Anica prevented her own dream career from happening even though she knew exactly what she wanted which was to be a Veterinarian? The answer will shock you like it did us and once we figured it out and you’ll be happy to hear that Anica has finally achieved her life long dream career!

As much as Anica said she wanted to be a Veterinarian, she was silently hoping to herself that she would not get accepted into any of the schools she applied for because she feared there was no way she could pay to attend anyway!

We had to laugh to ourselves when we discovered that she was wishing away what she wanted with her fears but we were able to figure out a successful solution once we realized what the root of the problem really was.

Just like Anica, millions of people allow money to be the driving factor in determining their dream career. Rule # 1 for How To Find Your Dream Career is to never let money keep you from living the life you love! I know that last line probably had you thinking like it did Anica, “Well where the hell am I going to get the money that will make it possible for me to peruse my passions”? You have every right to ask this question and because you have read this far you I am going to reveal the answer the answer to you now!

First thing we did was wrote down every single dollar Anica would need to pay off all of her current debt, determine exactly how much the tuition would cost to attend the college of her choice and factor in a figure that would cover her living expenses while away at school for the next 4 years. We came up with the exact amount of money should would need and then participated in a program that made it all possible.

There is a proven program that I personally use along with Anica and over 48,329 other ordinary, everyday people who have experienced extraordinary financial gains from over a very short period of time. With this system that most people have never even heard about before, I was able to make more money in 1 year then most people make in a lifetime and enabled Anica to pay off all of her existing debt plus pre-pay for her tuition which made it impossible for Vet Schools to deny her application. “Where there’s a Will There’s a Way” I always say and you can learn all about this incredible system at http://www.lazy-way-to-wealth.com. The safe, stable and secure system that will be revealed to you at this website can be implemented by anyone, anywhere in the world! The only thing that is required is reliable internet access and at least 30 minutes a day to monitor your account. Everybody is entitled to the wealth that makes living life to the fullest possible and now nothing need stand in the way of funding your dream career!

A2. I spent several years searching online and local libraries for How To Find Your Dream Career but always felt deep disappointment because in the back of my mind I truly desired to be my own boss. I heard the expression before I turned 20 that J.O.B. stood for Just Over Broke and dreaded locking into a life-long career that could only lead me to a desperate destination. Besides, the though of being able to write my own paycheck excited me more then anything else in the world!!! Don’t get me wrong, there are thousands of exciting careers that pay exceptionally well which we will be going over in the next section of this article but I had it in my heart that being my own boss would be the perfect path for me. The very moment that I decided to work for myself and work from home, rather than seek out a career with a corporate company, all of the pieces came together that allowed me to accomplish just that.

I didn’t just desire to make money from home for the sake of not working for someone else but I asked myself a specific question and agreed to set my current financial circumstances aside while making my selection to assure that the answer I came up with would also give me a great sense of personal satisfaction. In a moment I am going to ask you to ask yourself the very same question I asked myself five years ago that led me to doing what I love for a living. This one simple question could very well lead you to discovering your dream career but it may take some deep contemplation on your part and will require that you cast your current income out of your mind while asking yourself for the appropriate answer.

Once you have eliminated your current income from the equation and committed to coming up with an answer, ask yourself:

“What One Activity Would I Love To Get Paid To Do Everyday”?

Do not dismay if the answer doesn’t instantly reveal itself and do not down play the answer when it does arrive with self sabotaging thoughts like “I could never make enough money to support myself doing this” because if it excited you at a cellular level then it is exactly what you came here to do and the appropriate pieces will come together for you as well when you decide that you are going to act on that answer!

The answer I instantaneously came up with was writing. I could barely sit still when I thought about getting paid well to write about things I was already passionate about and knew that getting the chance to do this every day would make me a very happy person. Even though I never excelled at English in high school and had no formal writing experience whatsoever, I did not let that stop me from writing 3 exclusive e-books that sell very well 7 days a week, publishing dozens of optimized articles for the World Wide Web like the one you are reading right now or approaching a popular Publisher about signing me to a distribution deal. I am almost finished with the final details of the book that I expect to be on the Best Sellers List around the world with the help of this popular publisher by March of 2007.

The only reason why I am living the life that I love today is because of Rule # 2 for How To Find Your Dream Career which is never talk yourself out of being in business for yourself if that is what you really want and always believe that “Where there’s a Will There’s a Way” regardless of what anyone else chooses to believe about themselves. YOU can accomplish so much more than you could ever hope for by agreeing with the answer that arrives and resolving to see that answer through by taking inspired action immediately!

If you are interested in seeing one of my e-books in action or determined to make money online yourself, feel free to go to http://www.lazy-way-to-wealth.com and click on the Work From Home button for step-by-step instructions about earning Six-Figures from the seat you are sitting in at this very moment.

A3. If you honestly have no idea what you want to do as far as finding a career with a corporate company goes then there are several online resources you can turn to for free assistance. I located an awesome website that contains hundreds of exciting careers and lists then in alphabetical order from A – Z. You can look through this interesting list by going to http://www.texasmentor.org and clicking on the Career Center section. I am confident that Texas Mentor’s list covers every career you could think of and hundreds more you may have never even heard about before. Due to the ever changing nature of the internet, if this website is no longer active you can always do a Google search for “Free Career List” and thousands of other similar websites will appear.

Another technique that can help you hone in on How To Find Your Dream Career is to ask your friends and family what they think your strengths and talents are. When I asked my friends and family what they thought almost everyone said writing because I always took the time to write something special in my cards to them. They couldn’t have picked a better career for me and I haven’t regretted this career path for a single second! My sister use to say that she knew me better than I knew myself and that was why I turned to her for my dream career advice. You’ll be surprised at how helpful friends and family can be when it comes to identifying a great career and it will make them feel fantastic that you asked for their advice. Give it a try and see what comes up frequently from your friends and family members.

You may find taking a free career test and personality profile very helpful. Just for fun I took one of these free career tests at http://similarminds.com/career.html and answered 58 quick questions in less than 10 minutes. I was pleasantly surprised with the career outcomes this free service site returned because I have considered almost all of them before deciding to be in business for myself. In addition to writing, I also love Bookkeeping and Money Management which were two of the twenty potential careers that came up after answering all the questions. Again, due to the ever changing nature of the internet, if this website is no longer active you can always do a Google search for “Free Career Test” and thousands of other similar websites will appear.

Rule # 3 for How To Find Your Dream Career is to put the time and attention it takes to define what you love to do in life and passionately peruse that path because you were born to be great at something specific! Confucius has been quoted as saying, “Find a job you enjoy, and you’ll never work a day in your life.” When you take the time to find out what excites you and turn that joy into a job then work will always feel like play which is the key to succeeding at anything.

Please feel free to e-mail me anytime at theprovenpath@optonline.net if you think that I can further assist you on How To Find Your Dream Career.

May all your career dreams come true from this point forward!

Jamie Briggs