Wednesday, April 29, 2020

3 Tips to Succeed in Your Career - Hallie Crawford

3 Tips to Succeed in Your Career While maintaining and reaching goals in jobs and careers can be a challenge and sometimes overwhelming, it is possible to succeed! Many times success comes from maintaining a positive attitude and staying focused on what you want to accomplish. Consider the following three tips to help you reach your career goals. Conduct informational interviews. The best way to find out about what is needed to reach your career goals is to talk to someone who has already done it. Investigate in your network or organization to see if you know someone who has the job position you would like to have. Contact them and ask if you could conduct an informational interview to discover what is needed to reach your goal. Ask for support. If you find it’s hard to stay positive and focused on your own, ask a family member or friend to help you. Ask them to help you avoid negative thinking and to help you set timeframes for your goals. Schedule a coffee date or a phone call at reasonable intervals to discuss your plan. They will most likely be glad to have an accountability partner as well! Avoid “Negative Nellies.” If you find certain coworkers, friends, or others tend to be negative about their careers or your reaching out to do more, that can be toxic to your career growth. Instead, try to spend more time with those who are positive about doing more and have reached their career goals. If you need some inspiration to stay motivated, consider our client Lara. She recently wrote and shared the following: “Our new employee, that I had to fight for, started earlier this week. Several of my employees have given me random notes of encouragement one even brought me flowers.  We had something happen that could have ruined an entire partnership that weve built that would have canceled an entire six-week training and I was able to navigate it, while painfully, well enough that I think were still on track. AND, I somehow got a promotion. Im no longer an Assistant Director, I am a Director. Thanks for working with me, having confidence in me, guiding me behind the scenes to be more confident and self-aware.” If you are interested in career coaching, visit our career coaching packages page or sign up for a free consultation! We would be glad to help you find success in your career.

Sunday, April 19, 2020

How to Use Free Modern Resume Templates For Word

How to Use Free Modern Resume Templates For WordThere are many free modern resume templates for word that are available online. The purpose of this article is to teach you how to use these free resume templates for word to get your resume done in the least amount of time possible. It is important to use these free modern resume templates for word in order to not waste your valuable time on completing your own.One of the first things that you will need to do is to find out which templates are the best suited for you. You will find different ones available online, and you will be able to find the one that fits your needs the best. You should not worry about how much the template costs because they are free. Just remember that they are all free and you can use them to get your resume done in no time.The next thing that you need to do is to make sure that you find a resource that has these modern resume templates for word for free. Once you have found one, you will be able to access the necessary information that you need to get started. Most of the websites that have these templates for word on their site offer you some sort of a trial period where you can try the free template for a limited amount of time.One of the basic thing that you should remember when using these templates is that you should be familiar with the basics of a resume. This is important because these templates have the same template that you are going to use in your own resume. In fact, some of these templates have the same information that you are going to use in your own resume. Make sure that you know the basics in order to complete the task that you need to do.In order to make sure that you get these templates for word the way that you want them, you will need to download them so that you can start working on them right away. There are several free resume templates for word that you can find online. In order to get these templates, you will need to get them from a site that has them.Now tha t you have these templates for word, it is time to learn how to utilize them. You will want to know that most of these templates do not have any color options. Some of the templates even have some fonts that will be used instead of the ones that you will use in your own resume. You will need to know how to change the fonts of these templates if you want to use them in your own resume.Lastly, you will want to make sure that you use free modern resume templates for word for your own resume. They are easy to use and they will help you get your resume done in no time. If you want to learn more about these templates for word, then you should take a look at the resource listed below.

Tuesday, April 14, 2020

A Harvard Junior Who Got Internship Offers From Google, Apple, Facebook, and More Shares Her 7 Tips to Ace an Interview

A Harvard Junior Who Got Internship Offers From Google, Apple, Facebook, and More Shares Her 7 Tips to Ace an Interview Jessica Pointing knows how to interview. The Harvard University junior received internship offers from companies including Google, Apple, Facebook, Microsoft, McKinsey, Bain, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley. A computer science and physics major, she has received offer letters for roles in software engineering, data science, product management, consulting, investment banking, trading, and quantitative finance. How does she do it? She credits being prepared and relaxed with her string of successful interviews. Pointing published her best interviewing tips on her blog, the Optimize Guide, which features educational and career advice for high school and college students. Business Insider has shared her tips below, with permission. 1. Do your homework Pointing made sure to hit the books before interviewing. “I treated the internship interviews as a class â€" I studied material from books and did practice problems before the test (aka the interview),” she said. “There is usually a go-to book for each industry.” These books help prepare job candidates, covering likely interview topics and even featuring practice problems. For example, for software engineering interviews, she recommends “Cracking the Coding Interview” by Gayle Laakmann McDowell, while people going for consulting gigs should brush up on “Case in Point” by Marc Cosentino. 2. Develop a structure for problem-solving The stress of interviewing can make it pretty easy to blank when you’re speaking to a hiring manager. That’s why Pointing says it’s important to adopt a problem-solving mindset. Here’s the structure she used for answering questions in her software engineering interviews: Repeat the question to make sure that you understand it and have all the relevant details. Clarify the function input and output. Check assumptions. Give an approach to solving the problem. Discuss the tradeoffs of the approach. Code the solution. Test the solution with a normal test case. Test the solution with some edge cases. She also broke down the approach she uses for consulting interviews: Repeat the question to make sure that you understand it and have all the relevant details. Explain the objectives of the case and ask if there are any more objectives. Ask any clarifying questions. Generate ideas and a solution. Organize and structure the answer. For calculations, give insight into what the calculated number means. Summarize the case at the end. “These structures ensure that I hit almost everything I need to mention for a successful interview,” Pointing said. “In consulting, giving insights into a number you just calculated separates a good candidate from a great candidate.” 3. Practice and strategize “It is very important to practice in an interview setting before the interview,” Pointing said. “If your college offers mock interviews, take them! Some companies offer mock interviews, too. There are other services out there, such as Refdash, that give you free mock interviews. Do a practice interview at every opportunity.” If at all possible, Pointing recommends scheduling your “dream interview” last. That way, all of your interviews before can serve as practice sessions. 4. Have a backup plan Interviews can be pretty stressful. So how can you keep your cool when the stakes are high? Pointing advises having a backup plan in mind. You should always have an alternative path to pursue if your job or internship opportunity falls through. “If you are interviewing for the summer and you go into an interview with no plan for the summer, then you will probably be way more stressed,” Pointing said. “Instead, if you already have an offer or a vague idea of something you would do in the summer (e.g. travel), then the stakes for the interview aren’t as high. The more options you already have, the more relaxed you will be in the interview and the higher your chances are for the job.” So take some pressure off yourself and make sure to sketch out a backup plan. 5. Invest time The interviewing process isn’t just about setting time aside to talk to a bunch of hiring managers. You’ll need to devote time to reading, practicing, and perhaps even traveling. “I traveled across the country more than six times in 12 weeks for my interviews and spent approximately 80 hours in planes,” Pointing said. “Make sure you have enough time in your schedule to invest in your internship search process. You should dedicate a few hours each day practicing for interviews. I scheduled time in my calendar for interview practice for every morning (after my regular morning routine).” 6. Create a question bank Pointing recommends that after each interview, job candidates write down interview questions and solutions, as well as their own strengths and areas they could improve on. “In one of my software engineering interviews, I missed a particular data structure that would have allowed me to have given a more efficient solution, but I made a note of it, and in another interview later on, I ran into a question where I could use that data structure,” she said. “After doing enough cases and problems, you will start to recognize patterns, and you will become more confident and quicker in solving problems.” 7. Don’t skim over behavioral questions Don’t just focus on industry-specific questions. Pointing says that interviewees must also come prepared with answers for common behavioral questions. “Behavioral questions usually fall under several categories: leadership, teamwork, challenges, and successes,” she said. “You should identify stories in your life that fall under each of those categories. You should also write down those stories and all the details. Writing down your answers to behavioral questions before the interview is important.” This article originally appeared in Business Insider.

Monday, March 16, 2020

How to Keep Your Resolutions in 2019 - TheJobNetwork

How to Keep Your Resolutions in 2019 - TheJobNetworkMaking entschlieungs each January is the easy part. Sticking to them beyond, say, February, thats the tricky part. Its notlage necessarily the goals themselves that are failing you, thoughit could be the way youre situation them, and the way youre setting yourself up to implement them. googletag.cmd.push(function() googletag.display(div-gpt-ad-1467144145037-0) ) Lets look at some key strategies for crafting and keeping resolutions for a happy and productive 2019.5 Ways to Keep Your New Years ResolutionsWrite them downYour goals and resolutions may be top of mind for you, and you may understand intuitively what they are and how you want to achieve them. But no matter how well you think youll be able to keep them in mind, write them downon a Post-It, in your phone, in a spreadsheet it doesnt matter how or where. Just put it in writing.The act of writing helps make your resolutions official. And if you put them somewhere youre likely to see them often (like at your desk or on your fridge), youre less likely to lose track of your intentions when youre back to the daily grind after the holidays.Be realisticThis is probably the most important part of creating actionable and achievable resolutions. Think better self, not necessarily best self. Losing 20 pounds or being fluent in a new language within a year sound great. But how likelyare those to happen?If your goal is vague and lofty, be specific about what you want to achieve and think hard about whether you can achieve it with the time and resources youll realistically have available to you throughout the year. Maybe15 pounds by September is a more realistic goal. Perhaps you can take on one hour of French practice with an app every week. The more you think about your real life and what it will take to achieve your goal, the better your resolution will be at the outset.Break them downIf you break your resolutions down into pieces throughout the year, it gives you a series of smaller goals that you can accomplishmaking it easier to stay on track for the big goals. For example, if your main resolution is to get a new job this year, consider the components of that. Youll need to update your resume, start looking for job openings, apply for job openings, upgrade your interview outfit, etc. Each of those steps is something you can do in the meantime, and feel good about checking each one off as you complete it.Small wins add up to big wins. And even if you dont ultimately hit your main resolution by the end of the year, you can look back at these smaller tasks you completed and feel accomplished at what you did and how you did it.Set a time frameIve got all year, so Ill deal with this later. Thats a fatal mindset for any resolution, but especially professional ones. If youve already got a job or youre caught up in daily routines, it can be harder and harder to push out of that comfort zone and do the things you need to do to maintain action towa rd your resolution.Setting specific due dates for yourself creates accountability, even if youre the only one who knows they exist. And like breaking your goals down into manageable chunks, timing helps make your goals more achievable on a daily, weekly, and monthly level. Say your goal is to build your professional network throughout the year. Set milestones each month add two people to your LinkedIn connections set a coffee date with a different former work colleague each month deutsche bundespost a new update each week about your professional activities. Or if youre looking for an upgrade at work (new job or a promotion), set interim milestones like having an updated resume by March, doing comprehensive salary research by April, etc.Reward yourselfAchieving your goals is a reward unto itself, sure. But yknow whats also a reward? Treating yourself for hitting those milestones. Think ahead of time what would be an incentive for you to make progress on your resolution. Spa day? An a fternoon off and tickets to see your favorite sports team play? It doesnt have to be huge or expensive, just a gift to yourself for the work youve done throughout the year. Anything that helps you keep your interest when things get busy or frustrating, thats what you want to use as the carrot in front of you.New years resolutions can be a great way to reset your thinking and refresh your goals. However, if youre not approaching them in a way that will help you keep your focus and your interest, whats the point? The more effort you put into setting yourself up now, the more likely you are to stick to your resolutions, and grow as much as you can in 2019.

Wednesday, March 11, 2020

Fostering Inclusivity and Saving the Earth May Sound Ambitious But This Companys Way Ahead of Us

Fostering Inclusivity and Saving the Earth May Sound Ambitious But This Companys Way Ahead of Us We often set ur sights on our dream job a position that strikes a balance between the job title, career field and work-life balance we wish to achieve. But what about the idea of a dream company? A company with a mission that aligns with our values, making our jobs and lives all the mora fulfilling?To create a dream company wed probably add inclusivity, diversity and environmental consciousness to our must-haves list and at VMware, we can. Not only does this company consistently aim to close the gender gap in tech, but theyre also committed to cultivating an inclusive work environment that celebrates the diversity of their employees. And they dont stop there.VMwares renewable energy projects, sustainable development projects and dedication to energy efficiency demonstrate its commitment to protecting the world, and changing it for the better.Below are three reasons women should apply t o this fast-growing company.1. VMware actively seeks top-female talent and forges a place in the tech industry to support women.In April, the company hosted the fourth annual Women Transforming Technology (WT2) conference at its headquarters in Palo Alto, California. WT2 is an event where organizations in the industry, non-profit and academia sectors join together to discuss the fruchtwein pressing issues for women in the workplace, specifically in the tech industry.Attendees had the chance to break out into smaller sessions centered on Diversity Inclusion, Emerging Leadership, Executive Leadership, and Technical, and actor and activist Ashley Judd also made an appearance, explaining the importance of vulnerability and listening without being triggered to the 500+ people in attendance.2. VMware values the diversity of its employees and the inclusivity of its work environment.For VMware, diversity and inclusivity go hand-in-hand. Its initiative, VMinclusion, holds business leaders a ccountable for fostering inclusive work environments, starting with an Inclusion Survey theyve designed to aid leaders in this commitment but not ending there.In order to create a safe space for all employees to listen and learn, the company also provides Power of Difference Communities (PODs), which are employee-driven groups that enhance VMwares inclusive culture and geschirr the power of human difference.Building a more diverse workforce is a journey, according to the companys talent website. We believe we cannot solve this challenge alone and must work together with our industry partners to drive systemic change. We are dedicated to sharing our journey to remain transparent and accountable. And that they do.3. VMware is committed to creating environmental impact through long-term sustainability goals that include achieving carbon neutrality and reaching 100% renewable energy in its operations.We committed to clear and ambitious goals for the year 2020, including becoming carbon neutral across our global operations, said the Vice President of Sustainability Strategy, Nicola Acutt, Ph.D. Through the VMware 2020 initiative and adherence to The CarbonNeutral Protocol, they reached that target two years ahead of schedule.Additionally, theyre revolutionizing the way businesses use power and energy through virtualization technologies that make IT infrastructure dramatically more efficient. This technology prevents their customers from releasing tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.And as a testament to their environmentalism, they even made a goal to power 100% of their operations with renewable energy and join RE100, which they achieved an entire year in advance.If VMware sounds like a good fit for you, apply, apply, applyFind a job there today

Friday, March 6, 2020

Tips for Writing a Solid Resume Career Summery: No Longer a Mystery

Tips for Writing a Solid Resume Career Summery No Longer a Mystery When writing a resume, do not neglect to include the quantity of years youre working as what your title says. You are earning a career change. A strong summary statement at the peak of your resume can increase the probabilities of them noticing what youve got to offer from the beginning. Writing a strong and compelling resume summary can dramatically increase your odds of being called in for in interview, so its vitally important you know how to make yours stand out from the crowd. Despite how such skill is applaudable (since not a lot of folks have the confidence to talk in front of big audiences) if it isnt relevant, skip it. Tips for Writing a Solid Resume Career Summery Secrets That No One Else Knows About As stated above, a career summary isnt a career objective. Your career summary also has to be specific and relevant. In essence, it must be forward-looking. At length, you have to remember to proofr ead your career summary like the remainder of your resume. Based on your degree of experience and the jobs youre applying for, what you decide to concentrate on in your resume summary can fluctuate. No matter whether youre on the lookout for an entry level job or larger career advancement, you most likely already understand how important your resume can be in your search to discover the ideal job. The absolute most important element of a fantastic career summary is its tailored to the job that you are applying for. The Principles of Tips for Writing a Solid Resume Career Summery You Can Learn From Starting Right Away Now you have a strong LinkedIn profile summary, think about the expert summary on your resume. The aforementioned list just offers you a notion of the elements that could build an excellent career summary. 1 A resume summary is a brief, snappy introduction paragraph that offers a summary of your very best work. At this time you ought to have a crystal clear pi cture of what things to aim for with your career summary. Ideas, Formulas and Shortcuts for Tips for Writing a Solid Resume Career Summery The significance of a career summary is to clearly show your value to the provider. Whenever your resume is updated on a normal basis, youre all set to pounce when opportunity presents itself. An excellent career summary is basically a glimpse of your skill set and the value youll be able to bring to your possible employer. Finally, it focuses on your ability to offer value to the company. By highlighting a number of essential abilities and your existing objectives, you give the recruiter or hiring manager a taste of whats to come in the remainder of your resume. When writing a resume, make sure every product included is pertinent to the location youre targeting. Writing a strong professional resume might seem to be an intimidating job. Writing a great career summary doesnt need to be an intimidating experience. When writing your stat ement, it is necessary to contemplate where youre in your professional progression.

Thursday, January 2, 2020

Why You Shouldnt Work When Youre Sick (Even Remotely!)

Why You Shouldnt Work When Youre Sick (Even Remotely)Why You Shouldnt Work When Youre Sick (Even Remotely)1You wake up with your head pounding, or with that telltale sore throat that heralds the beginning of a bug. But instead of taking the rare employer-sanctioned and fully paid opportunity to take a day off of work and recover, you find yourself instead heading for the shower and getting ready to go into the office like its any other day.If that sounds like you, youve got quite a bit of company. A 2017 study found that one out of four employees wouldnt call in sick to work unless they were in the hospital While some bosses worry that you might call in sick when youre well, it seems the bigger concern is getting people to stay home when they are legitimately sick, and likely also contagious.Working from home plays an interesting role in this era of always-on work mentality. If your employer is among the many that allow work-from-home arrangements, you may feel compelled to keep teth ered to people and projects in the office even when using one of your precious sick days. This isnt really fair to you, since the point of taking a sick day is to allow you some work-free time to recover, not to stay engaged and stressed out with the same things in the office that youd be dealing with if you were well and there in person.Job hunters face a similar conundrum, since showing up sick to a job bewerbungsinterview means that you likely wont perform at your best, and youll also jeopardize the health of your potential new employer/hiring team.As Kim Dawson, director of employee engagement atYouEarnedIt, says Its no secret that many offices have cultures that encourage the always-on mentality- meaning that employees at these organizations can find it difficult to ask for time off when theyre sick, and are often encouraged to work from home instead.If you find yourself struggling to simply take a day off to rest when youre sick, feel the pressure of your companys culture to k eep working either in the office or from home, or arent sure what the right approach is when you fall ill during your job search, try the following strategiesMake contingency plans before you need them.Once youre sick, its late in the game to scramble and come up with a backup plan for covering your work while youre out. Thats why Dawson advises thinking these things through in advance of feeling symptoms that warrant a sick dayIts important for employees and managers to have these types of conversations before they happen- proactively working with your manager about expectations during sick days can help prevent an undesirable situation in the future.However, she emphasizes that if you find yourself out sick and havent had a proactive conversation about sick day expectations, you should be transparent about how much work, if any, you are able to accomplish. If you cant produce high-quality work- even from the comfort of your own home- when youre under the weather, relay that messag e to your manager. If they value your contributions and are a good supervisor, they will understand and step in to help until youre feeling better.Dawson suggests additionally having a separate conversation with your manager once youre feeling better, letting them know of your work preferences when youre sick and implementing a plan for similar situations moving forward.Recognize the long-term effects of your decisions.While pushing through when youre feeling sick may seem to be the easiest way to handle the situation in the short-term, its important to see the big picture. By making yourself keep working when your body wants to rest, youre not only exposing everyone in the office to germs if you go in, but youre also setting yourself up for exhaustion and burnout even if you do the work from a home office.Instead of taking a sick day, more and more employees opt to work from home when theyre under the weather, instead of taking time off completely to rest, explains Dawson. And whil e this doesnt seem too alarming, this always-on mentality is actually hurting workers in the long run, causing them to burn out quicker- both physically and mentally. Instead of leaving yourself and others vulnerable to these possibilities, figure out who in your department can cover your projects while you rest completely.Think about impressions during your job search.If youre trying to figure out whether to soldier on to an interview when youre sick or let the hiring team know about your health situation, it can help to think about the impression that you want to make during your meetings. If you have an interview scheduled (even by phone) and you spend half of it coughing and sneezing, youre not likely going to be the candidate who the team wants to hire. Yes, youll look like youve prioritized making the interview happen at all costs- but that isnt what every manager wants to see.If you feel that your performance will be hampered by your cold, then do the right thing and reschedu le your interview. The initial disappointment that the team may feel in needing to change the date will quickly be replaced by gratitude at not catching whatever you have.The moral here is that youre better off recovering when you dont feel well, rather than hurting your performance, getting run-down, or making others sick too.