Career Planning | Mike McRitchie | Resume and LinkedIn Profile Writer | Telecom Marketing Content Writer

The Tell-Tale Signs It’s Time To Leave Your Job

October 29, 2018 by Contributed Post Leave a Comment

When is it time for a job change?

We can all go through bad phases at work every now and then but, thankfully, these are usually days or weeks that get us down. These bad patches never seem to last for more than a couple of weeks. Once you get over yours, you’ll feel comfortable in your role at work again. But what happens when that doesn’t happen, and your bad patch seems to continue for a few months? In this case, it might be time to start looking for a better job elsewhere. Of course, that is just one sign that it might be time to quit your job. Here are some of the other tell-tale signs.

You’ve Got A Terrible Boss

How is your relationship with your boss? This is the most important relationship you will experience at work, and if things don’t work out between the two of you, it could be extremely difficult to settle into life at their company. In some cases, a bad boss might even try to prematurely terminate your contract or harass you. If that is the case, you will need to consider the laws dealing with employment as you might be within your rights to take your employer to court. And that could gain you a lot of compensation!

You’re Not Interested In The Work Or Company

How do you find the work you have to carry out on a day to day basis? If you are always bored at your desk, then you need to move on to a job that better suits your interests and passions. One reason for this might be that you have no interest in what the company does. If this is the case, then it really is time to find a company to work for that you have a lot more passion for.

You Aren’t Financially Stable

The whole point of having a job is so that you can gain an income and financially support yourself. However, if your job is quite poorly paid, then your finances might not be in a good position at all. As a result, might be in a difficult position in life, but that could be greatly improved if you decide to look for a better-paid job elsewhere.

It’s Made Your Health Worse

We can all get a little stressed at work from time to time, which is entirely normal. However, if your work is extremely stressful, and you find that it starts to bother your overall health, then it is high time you got out of there. Find a job that isn’t as stressful so that you can relax a little and enjoy a healthier life.

You Can’t Improve

Every job needs to have a path that you can follow to work yourself up through the company. If yours doesn’t, then you won’t be able to experience any personal improvement, and your career will be stagnant for the whole time you are with the company.

Does one of the above signs sound familiar to you? If so, then you might want to start job hunting!

3 Effective Tips for Simplifying Your Professional Life

October 25, 2018 by Contributed Post Leave a Comment

Simplifying Your Professional Life

It often seems that our professional lives run away from us and end up being vastly out of control. In fact, it would be hard to argue that this wasn’t the norm experienced by the vast majority of professionals in the world today, including employees and employers alike, and spanning all industries.

When you’re working hard — and particularly in the fast-paced and hyper-connected modern business environment that we all find ourselves operating in — tasks just add up, things seem to go wrong, and issues build up at a rapidly accelerated rate.

Things become too chaotic — or, in other words — things become too complex.

And, as the authors of the hit productivity book, The One Thing, point out, your success in business is influenced to a large degree by your ability to focus your energies on core goals, rather than having to put out fires everywhere, all the time.

Bearing that in mind, here are some tips for simplifying your professional life.

Use scheduler services to organise meetings without fuss

Organising meetings, booking rooms, and ensuring that important discussions are had at the right time, and at the right place, with the right people — in a way that creates the right impression — is a major element of virtually all forms of business today.

The thing is, the process of organising all of this can quickly become chaotic, wildly complex, and may take a lot more time and energy out of your day than you would otherwise like to spare.

Room scheduler services exist, in large part, to help take care of this task for you and free up some of that priceless time and energy for you to spend elsewhere.

Timeblock your day as much as possible for essential tasks, and say “no” wherever possible

Whenever a survey is done of the success secrets of influential figures in business, a recurring theme emerges. All of these people are very good at setting aside significant chunks of time during their day to devote to a particular, pressing issue, and they’re all very good at saying “no” to things of lower importance.

In fact, a quote attributed to Warren Buffet states that “the difference between successful people and really successful people is that really successful people say no to almost everything”.

Focus on your top priorities for the day, and schedule a substantial block of time for them. To the greatest extent that you’re able to, say “no” to less pressing tasks.

Keep your to-dos organised with the help of a task and project management system

You simply cannot expect to remain on top of things if you don’t have an effective system for gathering today and weighing the importance of your to-dos, as well as managing your projects. Doing it all on the fly is untenable — you’ll constantly be playing catch-up and the chaos will likely overwhelm you.

David Allen has created the “Getting Things Done” method, which is famously used by high-ranking business professionals all around the world.

Adopt that, or an equally effective task management system, to really get a handle on things.

Make a Youtube Channel into a Video Resume to Boost Your Job Search

October 17, 2018 by Andrew Jordan Leave a Comment

Job Seekers must Persuade and Making a YouTube Channel Does This

Persuasion skills exert a far greater influence over others’ behavior than formal power structures do. – Robert Cialdini

Job seekers who persuade the best get interviews and hired. According to a University of Minnesota survey, presentations with visual aids are 43% more persuasive than unaided presentations. This is because video enables job seekers to project confidence and likability. Facts do not persuade. What we feel about someone determines how we view the facts related to them.

In the words of Scott Adams, the Dilbert guy,

People are more influenced by visual persuasion, emotion, repetition, and simplicity than they are by details and facts – Win Bigly

With a black on white resume, you will have a hard time persuading. With a video resume on YouTube, you can sell yourself with passion and emotion on your face. Our brain and eyes naturally draw us to faces and eyes. Nassim Taleb says in Fooled by Randomness,

Because when you gaze into someone’s eyes, a different part of your brain, the more emotional one, is activated and engaged as a result of the interaction.

Making a YouTube Channel Shows You Are Creative

The difficulty lies not so much in developing new ideas as in escaping old ones – John Maynard Keynes

Companies are desperate for creative individuals at every position in the role hierarchy – even if hiring people don’t know it. Most companies have several competitors. The only way to lesson competition is to successfully solve problems in a new, better way.

Hiring managers and recruiters can and should look for candidates who are able to think through old problems in different, logical ways. A candidate who literally shows his skills by making a YouTube channel is doing this. He is making himself a standout candidate in a way that both makes sense and is useful to him and the recruiting team.

Of course everybody is an individual. There may be hiring people who don’t see the value in a candidate with the creativity to make a YouTube channel. This a blessing in disguise. Companies that don’t value creativity or who have recruiters who don’t value creativity are dying and should be avoided. It is the responsibility of upper management to evaluate hiring practices including looking at the resumes of the candidates who where not hired. I recommend targeting your job search to creative companies.

Make a YouTube Channel to Learn Skills that help Co-Workers and Customers

Once you stop learning, you start dying -Albert Einstein

While everybody in an organization has different responsibilities and titles, there is often a large amount of overlap among co-workers. As a result, it is common for colleagues to teach each other things they are strong in but their peer co-workers are weak in. By making YouTube videos, co-workers can show each other exactly how to do a task and give constructive feedback. The feedback can be about the quality of the explanation, the effectiveness of the task, or digital high five for making an awesome explanation video.

For marketing and product development, making videos for YouTube is an even more valuable skill. Passionate video sells products better than any other digital method. There are several reasons for this according to Hubspot. One of the reasons is that video of product in action shows that a product and company can be trusted. Companies that are happy to show their product working BEFORE it is purchased believe in their product and consumers know this.

Lastly, customer service is greatly enhanced with video tutorials and troubleshooting guides. A consumer survey by Nuance Enterprise showed that 67% of respondents prefer self-service to speaking with a company representative. The same survey shows 91% of respondents would use online knowledge bases if they were available and tailored to their needs. This makes video tutorials a win-win for companies and consumers as the cost video production is far lower than customer service personnel.

Become known as a Passionate Expert in Your Field by Making a YouTube Channel

If opportunity doesn’t know, then build a door – Milton Berle

The first step of marketing is getting attention and getting a job is a numbers game. It takes many rejections to land a job. Job boards are a poor way to go about this. ERE says corporate job openings attract on average more than 250 resumes. By making a YouTube channel into a video resume, you can become the person who stands out. Hiring people want candidates who love their job. They don’t want people who just want a pay check. You can be the only candidate that shows skills and passion by making a YouTube channel.

Make a YouTube Channel as a Not-For-Profit Project and Be seen as More Helpful

The best way to not feel hopeless is to get up and do something. Don’t wait for good things to happened to you. If you go out and make some good things happen, you will fill the world with hope, you will fill yourself with hope. -Barack Obama

Yes, the article is about how to make a YouTube channel that will help you get a job and help your career. Having said this, helping others in your industry is a great goal by itself. Giving increases happiness. In a survey of two groups, the group that spent money on others showed more correlated happiness than the people in the group that spent on themselves.

Also, volunteering increases health and life span. Older people who volunteer are physically and psychologically healthy than peer who do not volunteer. Those who volunteer late in life were much more likely than other to have volunteered in their youth. You can make a YouTube channel as a form of late life preventive medicine if you are young or middle aged.

Furthermore, Not-For-Profit activity helps job seekers get the attention of hiring people. Anne Fisher, a writer for Fortune says,

82% of interviewers told Deloitte they prefer applicants with volunteer experience, and 92% say volunteer activities build leadership skills. Yet, the report says, only about one in three (32%) of job seekers mention unpaid community-service experience on their resumes. and

People who’ve put their professional skills to work for free — say, a marketing person who’s developed a social media campaign for a charity — have a slightly bigger edge with hiring managers, Deloitte found, than those whose volunteer work was unrelated to their roles at work. About 85% of the job interviewers said skills-based activities made candidates better at communicating, and 88% praised those applicants’ “strong character.” Somewhat fewer (77% and 84%, respectively) said the same for volunteers whose unpaid work didn’t use their career skills.

Making a YouTube Channel into a Video Resume is EASY

You can do it. I made videos that will show you how to make a YouTube channel. Click HERE to get started.

Love Travelling? These Careers Could Be Perfect For You

October 17, 2018 by Contributed Post Leave a Comment

Travel with your Career

I believe the secret to career happiness is choosing a job that you’re passionate about. The best way to do this is to think about what you love, and then pursue a career related to it. Today, I’m bringing you three career ideas that are perfect for travel enthusiasts. If you enjoy travelling, then these careers could be excellent for you:

Photography careers

Do you love taking photos? If so, then this presents a brilliant career opportunity for you. Imagine being able to travel the world taking pictures of different things? As a professional photographer, this dream becomes a reality. There are loads of different areas of photography you can specialise in to travel a lot. The two most obvious that spring to mind are sports photography and wildlife photography. As a sports photographer, you will go to different places taking photos during matches. One sport that’s really good for photography is tennis as you will literally be taken all over the globe. Wildlife photographers often go to some of the most amazing places on earth to capture animals in their natural habitats. If you’re interested in a photography career, then this article may help you https://www.learnhowtobecome.org/photographer/.

Various aviation careers

Careers in the aviation industry are very diverse. However, a lot of them focus on travelling the world and moving from place to place. As it shows here https://www.aircharter.co.uk/about-us/news-features/blog/top-10-aviation-courses, there is an abundance of courses that might be worth considering. Naturally, one that springs to mind is a course that helps you become a licensed pilot. This would be perfect as it means you literally get to spend your life flying to different countries. Even if you’re part of the onboard plane team, you still get to see different parts of the world and stay over there for a few days during each trip. Aviation careers aren’t for the fainthearted, but they’re ideal if you love travelling.

Become a travel blogger

Lastly, we have a very 21st Century career idea! Becoming a travel blogger is literally the perfect job for someone who enjoys travelling. It can be tough to get started as you need the money to travel, along with setting up your travel blog. Essentially, you will create a blog that focuses on travel and delivers different tips or tricks to other travelers. Or, you can post reviews of specific places, along with video logs of your trips. This type of blog is very popular, and you’ll earn money from adverts and plenty of brand deals. Don’t expect immediate success, but if you do things right and hit a niche, then you could have a brilliant career on your hands.

What I love about this list is that there are three completely different careers for you to consider. Each one allows you to travel a lot and enjoy new experiences from around the world, but the day-to-day activities are remarkably different. If you want a job that lets you see more of this planet and quench your thirst for travel, then these ideas could be ideal.

Avoid Financial Disasters In The Farming Industry

October 15, 2018 by Contributed Post Leave a Comment

You might be surprised to learn that a lot of people these days are entering the agricultural industry. Why is this? Well, the farming industry has been facing a massive shortage of business owners and employees in recent years. This has left the job market wide open for people willing to take a little risk for the potential of large profits. To get started farming, you just need to purchase some land that can be used. There are various options that you can consider for how to use the land you purchase from typical crop farming to tree farming.

While there are certainly profits to be made in the farming industry, there are also major financial issues that you must avoid to keep your business healthy. Let’s look at a few of these and make sure they do not impact your model.

Illness And Disease

This will be particularly relevant if you are farming livestock but it can impact various other types of farms as well, and an example of this would be tree farming. Similar to animals, trees can develop diseases. The issue here is that it can wipe out your stock, which will ultimately cost you thousands. Don’t forget that while it’s tragic when animals get ill, you are still running a business. You do need to consider the financial implications as well.

So, how do you prevent diseases impacting your farming business? Well, for tree farming, it’s a matter of making sure that the trees are maintained and managed effectively. This is not a hands-off business model. You will need to check them every day and deal with the signs before they start to spread.

For animals, this is largely due to how you manage and keep your livestock. Keeping animals indoors as is common in an intensive farming model does increase the likelihood of animals getting ill and the disease spreading.

Damaged Equipment

When you set up your farming business, you will need to invest in a range of expensive equipment from machinery to collect the crops or machines to take care of your livestock. It is important that the equipment you invest in does not get damaged as this will lead to expensive repairs or worse, replacements. You can avoid this often by making sure you have the right setup. If you visit this website, for instance, you’ll find that you can purchase support platforms for cone-bottom tanks that are necessary for storing farming chemicals and supplies safely.

Fines

Finally, do make sure that you are running your farming business ethically. It’s important that you do abide by local laws and regulations and it is worth speaking to a legal adviser during the initial set up of your farm. Farming businesses will often live and die by costs, and a fine can push them beyond the point where they are manageable.

We hope this helps you deal with some of the financial issues that you can encounter when running an agricultural company.