William The Streak

My tendency is to belief that things happen for a purpose, that life goes from good to better, that the best is yet to come. If we don't allow ourselves to become 'broken under the wheel of life', if we can steer ourself away from too much time feeling badly for whatever has happened, when we trust that good things can happen, then they do.

That's what happened to William, when he lost his job, and the farmer who was graced by his arrival on the farm. Things turned out better than either might have imagined at the start.

Here's imagining wonderful new experiences -- in unexpected ways -- for you, too. Trust the process.

WILLIAM THE STREAK

by Bob Franke

The sun was arisin' over Amesbury Hill

At the same time tomorrow, rise again it will

On a thin silver shadow leaping over Jack's Creek,

The dog they call William the Streak.

Now, Dick was a farmer sort of through the back door,

Someone gave him two sheep, so he bought thirty more,

And he raised any vegetable a 'Header might eat,

The work was hard, but life was sweet.

And William was a racing dog until he retired,

He got bored by the rabbit, and so he got fired,

But he found a lucky family near Amesbury town,

To adopt before his boss put him down.

Now some dogs are killers in a sheep man's eyes,

And a few dogs get shot, to no one's surprise.

And Dick was a shootin' man, or so went the word,

And the word just made it safer for the herd.

But when William ran circles all around Dick's land,

In the face of his beauty, Dick stayed his hand,

And when Dick's little farm was marked as William's to play,

The town dogs, they all stayed away.

And the streak they called William was bored by sheep,

They were slow, they were stupid, they put him to sleep,

But the groundhogs and woodchucks were a lot more fun,

'Cause William, after all, liked to run.

And the bundles got bigger on the vegetable truck,

'Cause a groundhog chasin' greyhound is a real stroke of luck,

And the smartest of farmers will learn from the land,

And rejoice when a gift-dog drops into their hand.

So be kind to your neighbors, and give them a break,

Chances are they will give you as much as they take,

And if a short-sighted bastard should fire you next week,

Just remember old William the Streak.

For this world turns around, and we all have our place,

And there's more than one job, and there's more than one race.

Just keep your eyes open and stay close to the land,

If you've the sense of a dog, you'll find a plan.

© 1996 Telephone Pole Music Publishing Co.

"Life is a grand adventure, or nothing at all." ~ Helen Keller

Are you Linked In?

by Terrie Osborn, CPRW

If you're looking for a job, you want to have a LinkedIn page, and it's as easy as going to LinkedIn and setting up a page for yourself - http://www.linkedin.com/

LinkedIn has become a very respected, professional (quite a bit different from Facebook) networking site. You can add lots of information into it, but for starters you can just use copy/pasted parts of your resume or put your whole resume on it.

One of the big things that can create an advantage for you on LinkedIn is to add a decent photo of yourself. Doesn't have to be a studio or stuffy photo, just not super casual like you might post on Facebook. 

Use something that makes you look like a reasonable candidate for an internship or regular professional job. Sometimes someone has taken a great photo of you at a wedding or other social event that you can crop/clean up a bit, and use. You want your photo to make you look smart, friendly and capable. 

Once you've created a LinkedIn page, add a link to your LinkedIn page to the bottom of your resume. That way, if someone gets through your resume and is still interested, they can click on your LinkedIn page and see what you look like, and then your resume is not just a sheet of paper or a Word .doc, now the reader can see that you're a real person.

Speaking of Facebook, you need to be aware of and to control what's out in cyberspace about you. Google yourself to see what comes up. Employers, more and more, do that to candidates they're considering for positions. They do it even before they contact you the first time and may decide to NOT contact potential candidates because of what they've found about them on line. Eyebrow-raising stories abound about what employers have discovered about their employees at Facebook, and the varying degrees of damage Facebook revelations have created to employer/employee relationships.

Make sure whatever is on line about you is stuff you'd be okay with a potential employer seeing. You can set constraints in Facebook so that not just anyone can access your Facebook page. 

If there's other stuff that you don't want to be in cyberspace about you, often you can email the site you find yourself at and ask them to take it down and they will. That doesn't always work but usually it does.

Great Networking Ideas for the Unemployed

by Terrie Osborn, CPRW

The unemployed have two challenges; how to find networking opportunities when you’re not in “the loop” anymore and how to successfully network once you find those opportunities.

Here are five ways of creating opportunities:

Don’t just sit there, volunteer! It’s tempting to treat your period of unemployment as a well-earned vacation, sleeping in, catching up on your reading, etc. but unless your goal is to remain unemployed it can be very helpful to get out of the house every single day. One excellent way to get out, keep your skills sharp and meet new people is to volunteer. Pick a cause that you can get excited about and give them a call to see if you can help. Not only will it provide a wealth of networking opportunities, it will add to your references and you’ll feel good about yourself.

Unemployed? Join “The Club!” You’re not alone and perhaps you know other unemployed people. Create your own “Job Club” and you’ll all cover a lot more ground together than you can alone. Pick a day and plan to meet somewhere for coffee and to swap stories and support. Each of you have undoubtedly uncovered jobs that perhaps you weren’t qualified for or know of companies that aren’t a fit for you but could be for someone else.

Have some fun! Resist the urge to be a hermit—you won’t meet new people hanging out in your jammies all day. Go to anything you find even slightly entertaining. Every community has flea markets, poetry readings, open-mic nights and other free events where lots of people gather. You may run into someone you haven’t seen for a while or strike up a fruitful conversation with a stranger.

Spend even MORE time on Facebook! Social networking sites like Facebook are fantastic methods of getting yourself out there beyond the professional networking sites where you’ve already posted your resume. Spend a little less time on Farmville and a little more time looking for groups and individuals from your industry or where you might like to work. Get creative; write a professional blog, offer your professional services as a consultant through Craigslist or other advertising mediums.

Arrange some informational interviews! This is a lost technique from your college days—it still works for grown-ups. Call a manager in a company where you’d like to work and explain that you’re exploring what it takes to be someone in their position. Ask for a 20-minute appointment to interview them. Remember to treat it as if you were being interviewed. Dress the part and put your best foot forward. Before you leave, ask for the name of one of their associates who they would recommend that you speak to in order to enhance your knowledge.

And now here are five ways of maximizing those opportunities:

Dress for success! Never has it been so important to make a good impression—EVERYWHERE you go—than when you’re networking. Place a reminder on whatever mirror you check before you leave your house. A large sign reading, “Would You Hire This Person?” will do nicely.

Leave reminders! The professionals will all advise you not to hand out your resume like candy and that’s good advice. You want to get your message out there but you also want to appear to be a somewhat exclusive property. To accomplish both, create a good old-fashioned calling card. This is a little like a business card on steroids. It can be a fold-over version giving you more room to list some career highlights or your desired title with your skills, etc. Any print shop can help you create and print professional-looking cards or you can use a site like Vistaprint.com that will do it online at a very affordable price.

Don’t be a Party Pooper! We all know that someone who arrives too early and eager at every party, stays too long, can’t take a hint, talks about inappropriate topics, is overly friendly to people they’ve just met, etc. When in doubt about how to conduct yourself when meeting people for the first time, think about meeting someone’s parents. Your language should be pristine, not full of slang or inappropriate words. Your topics should be minus any controversial subjects, and a smile goes a long way toward letting them know you’re happy to meet them.

To be interesting, be interested! It’s a huge compliment to be asked about yourself so as much as you’d like to cut right to the chase and recite your entire resume to your new associates, don’t. Instead, impress them with your curiosity about their lives, jobs, or even opinions (as long as you’re not bringing up politics or religion).

Keep in touch! I have a friend who schedules 20 phone calls each day to just say hello to people she’s met. It’s not a long call and she always finds something to say such as, “I just went by that restaurant we had lunch at and thought I’d call to see how you’re doing.” She also has made a mental or physical note of any topic that’s been an ongoing discussion so she has more to say than just, “How are you?” She might ask about the recent fundraiser they’d discussed or how the visit with their parents went. She does this all the time and I cannot imagine she’d be unemployed for very long if each and every time she made a call she ended the call with, “It’s so nice to catch up with you. Don’t forget, if you hear about any opportunities please let me know!”

How's the job market?

by Terrie Osborn, CPRW

“How’s the job market?” new clients frequently ask. The underlying question is: How quickly do you think I can find a new job?

Those might seem like tough questions. Here’s another one: How is it that many people move swiftly from old positions to new, while others get stuck in between indefinitely?

The answers are that the job market is as good or bad as you decide it’s going to be, and you can change jobs very quickly if you decide to do so.

There are lots of reasons why people leave jobs. Sometimes it’s voluntary – they’re exercizing their right to move on. Some clients leave jobs under less than perfect circumstances—they were, for example, ‘let go’ for whatever reason. That can be devastating!  Even so, here’s the thing: It’s not what happens to us that determines our level of happiness or sadness, it’s how we choose to respond to it.

Lounging on the couch all day in pajamas watching TV is certainly an option, but chances are high the new job won’t simply show up at your door and you’ll never leave the living room.

Using time between positions to research—on the internet, at the library, by talking to others, through a self-evaluation such as is available in the book “What Color Is Your Parachute?” or just by listening to the song coming from your own heart—will begin to magnetize a new job to you. Put the energy out there, and you’re sure to create what you want. Treating the job search as a full-time job—even as a part-time job—at which you spend 20, 30, 40 hours per week, will rapidly bring you and your next employer together.

Like everything else in life, jobfinding is what you make it. It never ceases to amaze me how often people are deep down not surprised that they’ve been let go from a job. They could see it coming, but maybe ignored it. Or they didn’t like the job/boss/industry anyway, so the shock of having been let go is mixed with a great sense of relief.

I’ve also come to believe—from watching happen over and over again—that there’s ALWAYS a new/better job awaiting those who need to (or want to) change jobs. That’s why the old one ended, because the new one became ready for you to make your way to it. You do have to make your way to it, though.

You can track the gloom reports in the news and resign yourself to the couch, or you can approach jobfinding as a great adventure. Choose to believe that what you want IS out there for you and make up your mind that you're going to find it. It's possible that the new job will exceed even your wildest expectations - why not?! It happens to other people, why not you!

Toast Of The Resume Industry Awards

For a resume writer, the big prize is a Toast Of The Resume Industry—TORI—Award. It's a global competition, and resume writers from all over the world submit their best work for review and judging by a jury of their peers. Only nine First Place/Best-In-Class TORI Awards were conferred this year, in October, and I won one..!


Career Directors International hosts the TORI competition, which is recognized as the resume writing industry’s most prestigious and difficult contest.

In a recent press release, the President of CDI, Laura DeCarlo, stated “Winning a TORI Award represents the pinnacle of resume writing expertise within the industry. Being recognized as ‘one of the best’ by your peers is an accolade that very few get to savor. We are proud of the achievements in the resume writing and careers industry, because it encourages our members to strive for excellence.” 



Professional resume writers submitted entries for the TORI Awards in June, and a panel of the industry’s top writers judged the submissions. Up to seven entries were nominated in each category, and CDI officers made the final ruling. Winners were announced on October 16th in San Diego during CDI’s 10th annual convention.

CDI administers continuing education, testing, and certification to professional résumé writers and career coaches, raising the bar and setting new standards for career professionals worldwide.

Have you recently 'lost' your job?

Fired. Laid off. Let go. Downsized. Terminated. Got done.

You ‘got done’ at your job today, recently, last month, last year. You say you still don’t really know why. Or, you do know really why and it’s not fair. And you’re falling into a downward spiral, headed toward the (dreaded) Pit of Despair. Or maybe you’re already there, in the Pit, and can’t figure out how to get out. Can’t think straight. Don’t even know who you are any more.

If it’s any consolation, it happens to just about everybody at some point in their lives.

Why You Shouldn't Write Your Own Resume

Someone asked me the other day, "So, what are the biggest mistakes that people make when they write their own resumes?" My immediate response was "People just have no idea about how to create their own resumes," which I pretty quickly realized wasn't much of an answer. I've been thinking about what the better answer would be, and here it is: