Solve the important problems to get ahead

If you only do one thing for your career today, watch this video from Stanford's Entrepreneurship Corner. There are some solid nuggets of career advice in there, but the main one we're talking about today is what I call "solving the important problems", otherwise known as "how to get promoted."

The job description that you responded to initially, interviewed, and negotiated your salary for is the bare minimum that is expected from you. If your employer just wants that particular job done, they probably considered hiring a contractor. If you have a full time job with benefits, then your employer is hoping and betting that you will grow your skills and abilities to solve tomorrow's problems. In other words, if you simply do what is asked of you, your tenure at that position is likely to be short. Managers can't afford to hire someone each time the job requirements change and their employees have "topped out" their potential.

What this means for you is that your job description is the bare minimum to pull a paycheck. If you want to be promoted and offered new responsibilities, then you need to show that you:

1. Already handle the stuff you were hired to do,
2. See new problems that need to be addressed (your boss' or boss' boss' problems), and
3. Take action to propose a solution or solve those new problems.

Notice that I said "Propose a solution or solve" in #3. Seeing a problem, calling it out, and shrugging your shoulders doesn't help you much, and it may get you the reputation as a Negative Nancy (or Negative Nate). People probably know how bad it is. They generally haven't left it that way on purpose.

Show your employer that you're ready for the next promotion up, and you're more likely to get it. If you don't, then you have a real-world example to show your next employer when you leave to seek the next step in your career.

Annual Career Check-up

It's almost April. Where are you with your career goals for the year? Have you set them yet? It's time to take stock of your career and job. Sure, you can use the traditional "Annual Review" process, but that tends to fit a pre-determined format that may not meet you where YOU are in advancing or changing careers. Annual reviews are also often limited because:

1. Annual reviews tend to be focused upon your performance on a job you may or may not actually care about.
2. Career ladders and promotions are focused on limited opportunities within an organization or companies.

In addition, it's difficult to get solid, objective feedback from the people you work with. Research has shown that once humans make an initial impression, we seek data to support our impression (Hamilton & Sherman, 1994). We don't do so well taking into account data that challenges a position we already hold. Making your career choices dependent upon some one's subjective opinion of you can be a recipe for future problems when you find yourself in a new organization or sidelined by a surprise lay-off.

You should do a "Career Checkup" each year in a job and ask yourself (or your partner):

1. What marketable skills did you learn last year? If you didn't learn anything, is that because of a dead-end job or lack of motivation on your part? Be honest. How do you know those skills are marketable?
2. What marketable skills are you going to learn this year? How will you do that? What books will you read? What talks will you attend? What will you try?
3. Where is your current job heading in terms of new opportunities and new skills? I was talking to a friend recently who decided to leave his job because he couldn't see what he would learn in the next year. That's a bold move, but it paid off almost immediately when he began learning new technologies and increased his responsibilities.
4. Where can you best use your new skills? Will someone pay you more or give you more opportunities to stretch yourself at a new company? 

After your self-assessment, you should be able to clearly articulate what you learned last year, what you're going to learn this year, and how you're going to learn these things. Write it down. Talk about it with someone close to you.


Next time we'll talk about making your plans into reality.

______________

Hamilton, D.L. & Sherman, J.W. (1994). Stereotypes. In R.S. Wyer, Jr., & T.K. Srull (Eds.)

Handbook of Social Cognition (2nd Ed., Vol. 2, pp. 1-68). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.

Do you really want that job?

In the midst of a job search, we can fall into the trap that any job will do - that is, any job that pays the bills and isn't terrible. After all, that is what work is about, right? Enabling your lifestyle for those hours when you are not in the office? Or is there more to a job and career that survival?

As an employer, I want to hire someone who is passionate about the work. This passionate person is going to work harder and longer than someone who is doing it for a paycheck. Who do you think is going to care more about the end result - the person who loves the work or the person who tolerates it?

As with most things in life, this isn't a black and white issue. You might grow to love a job or be able to tailor the job to fit your skills and strengths. But do you want to go into a job hoping from the beginning that you will be able to change it? You could be stuck in a job you hate and then have to face the morning commute dreading the day in front of you. Is this the kind of life that you want?

I often get asked, "how do you decide between a high paying job that is boring versus a job that you love that cannot pay your mortgage?" The truth is that all jobs have times when you dread them, if you do them long enough. I have yet to meet someone who can honestly say that their job is all smiles all the time. The key is to go into the job search with your eyes open and learn to trust your instincts. Does this job feel reminiscent of the last job you hated? How much of your time will be spent doing activities that bore you? Where is the room for growth?

Of course, salary requirements can put us into a bind if our lifestyle will take a significant hit by working in a dream job. In this case, you should seriously consider what your happiness is worth to you. Can you cut back on dining out and drive your car a few years longer in exchange for a lower paying but more exciting position? Or would the pay cut be so large that you need to move, and your commute eats up most your day? Also consider whether your work performance would improve in a job that you enjoy - that could lead to getting promoted faster and possibly surpassing the salary at the less-than-ideal position.

In many cases, people I have worked with ultimately found that the money could not replace those 60 hours a week, 240 hours a week, those 3000+ hours a year. Others have found that they could find tasks within their existing job that made it easier to accept the parts they dislike. Consider your options carefully and find out what is lacking in your job or career field before making a big move.

Keep interviewing, but no job offers!

Dear Career Guru,

I'm a recent graduate and I desperately need to find a job! My loans will start coming due soon, and I don't have any way to pay for them. I have been to my university's career center, built a resume (which I hear is good, just never know though) and I've had some interviews. The problem is that I never get a job offer! It's so frustrating to go through the whole process, and then get nothing out of it. I really don't want to move back in with my parents. Should I redo my resume? Help!

- Jobless in the OC

Hi Jobless,

The good news is that your resume is probably fine, because it's doing its job - getting you a phone interview/in person interview. At that point, your success in getting a job is most dependent upon how you are presenting yourself. The question is, what is happening in those interviews? It sounds like you're getting a bit frustrated with the job search process, and that can sometimes comes out during an interview. Desperate candidates can come across as angry otherwise unpleasant to work with. That will definitely hold you back from getting a job offer.

Your career center would be a great place to ask for a mock interview. Ideally, they would video tape your interview so you can see how you actually come across in person. If you cannot get back to your school, ask yourself these questions:

1) How did I feel before, during, and after the interview? If you recall feeling really anxious or unhappy during the interview, then chances are your employer picked up on it. Some anxiety tends to make people perform better, but above a certain threshold, high anxiety affects your ability to think clearly.

2) What did you wear to the interview? Did it match the office environment? As in, don't go into a corporate job wearing jeans, but don't wear a suit to interview at a surf shop...

3) Did you answer their questions? Did you have sufficient knowledge about the company, its vision, and products?

A great video that covers the basics in interviewing is here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S1ucmfPOBV8

Good luck!

Where are the jobs?

Everyone is complaining about the lack of jobs. I work with college students and recent graduates, and the lack of local jobs that can support the cost of living in Southern California is a constant complaint. Recently out of college it's acceptable to share a room with someone, but that gets old quickly when you really want to get your life started. A lot of times, an enhanced dorm experience just isn't as much fun as you had imagined.

So you have your degree, about $25,000 in college debt (roughly the average) and you don't want to move in with your parents. What do you do?

I advise people to follow their dreams, explore your talents and strengths, and then make a move. This move might mean a physical move out of the area. If you have a good resume and interview well, but are still not getting offers of gainful employment, it may be time to seek your fortune elsewhere and return when conditions are more hospitable. According to the Orange County Workforce Indicator 2011-2012, your household needs to bring in $53,080 per year to afford a 1 bedroom rental. If that is outside of your salary range in the next few years, you might be better served building your career elsewhere.

The thought of leaving your family, friends, and beach is very frightening. I won't minimize that. But I cannot begin to tell you how many people I counsel who get "stuck" in their careers and watch their financial and living situation deteriorate because they choose not to make a move. After all, hoping for an economic turn around or that the Career Fairy will bestow the perfect job on you, after making your best efforts, is not a viable strategy. This is akin to playing the lottery, laying out your financial planning based upon winning the jackpot, and waiting for your ship to come in. Take control of your life, seek out some changes, and take a chance that can turn into something worthwhile.

Boring resumes.

As a career counselor at a private university, I spend a lot of time teaching how to make good resumes, reviewing resumes, and seeing what works and what doesn't with employers. Today we're talking about how to get yourself noticed. I mean, that's the point of all that work you put into the document, right?

We're not talking about formatting, spelling, or whether you should use square bullets or round ones. There are a million opinions on how layout your resume, and everyone has their opinion. Just make it consistent and check spelling to catch 'their' versus 'there'. Spell check won't catch that, and your resume will look sloppy. Besides that, what matters?

What matters to employers is that they see what they're looking for. That's really all there is too it. If you hide or otherwise obfuscate the material they want to see, you won't get The Call. And we all want The Call (or The Email), when an HR representative contacts you to say they want to schedule an interview.

Think about your resume as an exercise in self marketing. Which it is. If I am shopping for soap, what do I want to see? Information that helps me find the best soap. Is the soap going to get the engine grease off my hands? Is the soap soft to my skin? Liquid or bar? Your mind makes those calculations and comparisons among brands as you quickly scan the aisle, and your employer does the same thing when he looks at resumes. Knowing that hiring managers spend 10 - 15 seconds looking at your resume, how are you going to sell them on the product of YOU?

The good news is that employers tell you what they want to see. It's called a job description, and when combined with your research about the company's culture (we'll talk about that in a later post), you basically have an open book test. Easy, right? Here is what you do:

1) Read the job description. Find key words and themes that appear throughout the posting. Write these down. Note how things are phrased.

2) Think about your experiences and background. Do you meet or exceed these requirements?

3) On your resume, in a summary section near the top of the page, state that you meet the requirements. Preferably use the words that were on the job posting. For example, if the posting says "Must have 5 years experience managing teams" then your summary should say "5+ years managing teams."

Rise, wash, repeat for each key theme. The point is to speak the language that your employer wants to speak, so they don't have to go digging through your resume to see if you meet the requirements. Who has time to dig through your resume when there is a stack of equally qualified resumes right after yours?

Almost famous...

Summer is here and it's time to make a move to jump-start your career. If you're not sure how to do that, leave a question in the comments, and we'll get to it.

Today we're looking at a question from a recent graduate - how to become rich and famous in Hollywood?

~~~~~~~~~
Hey Dream Builder-
I'm a 23 year old female who recently graduated from a private college in Southern California. I paid my way through school with modeling jobs, and now that I have school done, I want to break into acting. I love the red carpet lifestyle and celebrity culture. I like Dolce & Gabbana, but right now I can't even afford a shoe (not a pair, just one shoe!) I don't want to be one of the poor actors who waits tables and works in lame commercials while waiting for someone to "discover me." How do I break in and become famous?


- Pretty Pamela
~~~~~~~~~

Dear Pretty,

I have some good news and some bad news. The good news is that dreams do come true every day in Hollywood!

Now the bad news. The bad news is that most of the time, it simply doesn't happen. Each year literally hundreds of thousands of beautiful people come to L.A. to "make it" in the industry, and most leave a few years later completely broke and dejected. There simply aren't that many people who make a decent living by acting.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics collects data on all occupations, including salary ranges for actors. From the site we see that the median hourly rate is $19.14, which works out to just less than $40,000 a year. This means that to "make it big" you need to be in the top 5% of all actors, which would bring you $187,199 a year. Sure the big name stars make millions of dollars per year, but how many top billing stars can you name? 10? 20? There are roughly 60,000 actors in the United States, so you need to beat out the other 59,990 to make it to the top.

If you still think you have what it takes to make it, then you better start meeting the right people. Success in every industry is enhanced by knowing the right people, and entertainment careers are no exception. You need to get organized and make a plan for success:

1) Nail the basics. Headshots, demo reels, agents, etc. need to be in place to show potential employers that you are serious. You don't want to get asked "what have you done" and you don't have an answer ready.

2) Know the right people. You need to be on a first name basis with people in positions to offer you the roles. Find some way to rub shoulders with the right people. Attend film festivals and screenings when the directors and actors are present, and think outside the box to find a way to stand out.

3) Deliver results. One of the largest complaints from producers and directors about actors is that they're notoriously unreliable. Downright flaky. Show up on time, know your lines, and be flexible. You can't start acting like a diva until you earn the RIGHT to be a diva. This is one of the reasons why the same actors work with the same directors and the same types of films. It is just too risky to take a chance on an unknown quantity (you) when they can work with someone else they trust to show up.

4) Good looks and charm aren't enough. Everyone trying to make it in LA has that, or at least they pretend they do. There is always someone younger and more attractive. What makes you unique?

It's a really tough market out there for actors on the ground in LA. Consider grabbing some friends who specialize in different aspects of production (lighting, sound, editing) and putting together a short You Tube video. Then promote it like your future depends upon it, and see what comes out of it.

Good luck out there. Break a leg.

- Dream Builder