Reinke Faces Life

http://www.making-ripples.com/2007/04/clueless_law_fi.html

04/12/2007
Clueless law firm takes client JL Kirk down the chute

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JL Kirk is the kind of executive recruiting firm I would warn readers to avoid at any costs. Their operating procedure is to interview you and charge you thousands of dollars and help you write a resume and then hopefully place you. You pay first and then hope that they place you. Wow! Isn’t that a great business model?

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The reported 4.5k$ demanded for “placement assistance” is a joke. You probably could “buy” the best resume writer’s first born child at those prices. Heck, big old turkeys are available at one tenth the price. Hard to believe that after not making the “sale”, the bozos got lawyers involved.

My bet is that this will be like gasoline on a wildfire across the net.

http://www.lewrockwell.com/north/north524.html

Misunderstanding Higher Education
by Gary North

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WRITE YOUR WAY IN

If you are not good enough to write your way into your calling, then you need to read more. Then you need to write more.

Start a blog. It’s free. Start here.

You can create a website after you have mastered blogging.

Begin with posting book reviews. Then, after a hundred or two hundred published book reviews, start writing annotated bibliographies.

Once you have put a large number of reviews on-line, start specializing in one topic. Create another blog site. Keep up to date with whatever is going on inside this field. Do handy summaries of the latest publications.

Save readers time. People want to save time. They want others to do their leg work for them. Word will get out if you’re any good.

Then write a book. It need not be creative. It can merely introduce newcomers to a field. Post it on your blog site for free in PDF format.

Make copies available in printed format by using Print on Demand technology. If you can get sales, a third-party publisher may pick it up.

The book becomes a calling card in your career plan.

Then write another. Write enough books in a field, and you will establish your reputation. Even self-published books are impressive to a prospective employer.

Add CD-ROMs, screencasts on YouTube, and DVDs.

This was how I made my reputation. I started writing for The Freeman magazine and a dozen other magazines to put myself through graduate school. My Freeman articles got me my first full-time job: at the Foundation for Economic Education, which published The Freeman.

My Ph.D. degree got me nothing. I never had a single job offer based on my degree. I even wrote my way into the one full-time academic job I ever had. It was in a different field from my degree.

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Here’s a road map that really makes sense. I’d recommend the strategy to all the complacent “paycheck drawers” out there. Use your “breathing room” to “become” a recognized expert. It can’t hurt.

As a side note: I still remember the one fellow who interviewed with me for a job and left me a copy of his book on the topic we were looking for help with. He didn’t take our offer; he took a much higher one. I have never forgotten the impact of that tactic. I’m planning to use it next time I am out. I hope to have 4 choices by the time the axe falls. AND, it always does.

FROM AN EMAIL EXCHANGE WITH A FELLOW ALUM

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>I googled my name and your website came up.

It’s always a good idea to google yourself to find the “digital dirt” that’s out there. I counsel out of work execs to do it and get out in front anything there. Even if it’s not “you”, it has to be addressed.

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I even have search strings saved that post to special mail accounts that watch for the use of “my name”. How paranoid is that?

In a discussion with a fellow turkey, I “opined” that one should have:

(1) a professional blog like Kent Blumberg’s http://kentblumberg.typepad.com/;

(2) a jobsearch related blog that pushes the value propositions that you are trying to sell like Mike Sansone’s http://www.converstations.com/;

and

(3) a personal one like Gretchen Rubin’s http://www.happiness-project.com/.

I think each are a unique exemplars of blogging. One can have and stand behind each without being “hurt” in the other departments of one’s life. Where people get in trouble is when they try and use one blog to service different value equations.

imho

http://www.jibberjobber.com/

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I like this service. Not at 500$, but at a 100$ it’s a bargain. Or, you can always be a monthly. Of all the ideas that I have seen pitched to those in transitions, this certainly is one of the best. I can tell you that this is not some type of scams aimed at separating the newly out of work from their savings.It surely won’t get you a job, but it will force you to be disciplined about your activities.

Can you duplicate it on your own? Maybe. Can you do without it? Sure Can you exploit it to you benefit for 100$? Absolutely.

Disclaimer: I’ve been one of Jason’s “critical testers” for a few months now in response to a mutual friend asking me to “kick the tires”. As Jason will attest and as I have blogged here, I kicked pretty hard! Some of the features, he put in in response to my “suggestions”. Some, he ignored. All I can tell you is I like it, the wheel don’t fall off when you use it, and you can get your data out of it if you change your mind.

If a new transitioning turkey, or one of those complacent “I gotta job” people, asked for a list of things they could spend money on to aid in their current or future job search, this would be one of three things on that list.

###

http://www.ziggs.com/apps/profile/bio.aspx?uid=17380

This is mine.

http://www.americasjobexchange.com

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AmericasJobExchange.com as a successor to America’s Job Bank (AJB). America’s Job Exchange will provide National Labor Exchange services to employers, job hunters and organizations without any interruption when AJB ends in July 2007. The launch of America’s Job Exchange marks the beginning of this transition, and the Company is committed to providing unmatched employment assistance through this new portal.

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I think you should peak in before it becomes the replacement and lots of folks will be hitting it.

A discourage turkey wrote and I responded belatedly

Dear So and So,

{Woosh, TurkeyMaster rushes in to “help”. Yeah, I know, a little late. But, I didn’t notice the message.}

I see that LaneC is on the task.

I’d love to be able to “help”. Lane probably has the “help” well in hand. (Right Lane?)

So allow me to comment for the others out there who are “feeling” similarly.

(1) You must discharge all the negative “static” electricity around your circumstances. When I interview people, take networking meetings, or just “chat”. I can detect when someone is carrying emotional baggage. SO for example, to pick upon XXXXXXX, “Í was severed” just drips with pain. I can feel it. Been there, done that, and have the tshirt with scars for it. But, that’s not accurate, descriptive, or helpful. (Other than to get everyone’s attention.) One has to have an emotionally neutral way of describing your circumstances so as not to give away that you were fired for “stealing the pens, getting drunk at your desk, and bonking the boss’ secretary” (as we used to say at AT&T, describing the three things that could get you fired in those days) How about “A major energy company in Chicago area and I separated when my IT management/Customer Relationship management role was relocated.” “Or, reorganized.” “Or, downsized” “Or, Offshored”. See emotionally neutral. See the difference?

(2) When you ask for help. Be easily helped. “Can someone take a look at my resume” is not “easy to do business with. I’d say something like: This fat old white guy turkey would like you to look at my resume at http://tinyurl.com/22onnq and comment by email at http://tinyurl.com/2rlpef“. See the diff? Make it easy for people to find what you want them to help with. imho

(3) Yes, it is a numbers game. “I’ve been applying regularly and have gotten quite a few interviews and although close I did not receive any offers.” Well, I would be interest in how you are measuring things. “applying regularly” could mean every day I submit on one job I find on Monster. “Quite a few interviews” could mean 10, 100, or a 1,000? “Close” makes me cringe. It’s like “try”. There is no close. There’s only “yes” or “no”. So for example, I can tell you the last search I did — after accepting my current job but before I collected my first paycheck — I send out 40 items with my Resume Version 18 & 19 resumes and Cover Letters 38 & 39 and that, within 14 days, RV18CL38 received an 80% response rate! RV19CL38 got 30%, RV18CL39 got 0%, and RV19CL38 got 0%. I liked CL39 but clearly it has a problem. Shredder for that one. See the diff. I know I’m an injineer and I like to measure things. The glass can be both half-full and half-empty. But it can’t be “close”, “a few”, or “regularly”.

Sorry I wasn’t here promptly when you needed it, but hopefully this will be of some assistance. I invite you, or anyone, to visit my “turkey farm” http://tinyurl.com/lxu93 for my view of “transition”. And, if you drop me an email, I have some stuff I’ve created that might help. http://tinyurl.com/2lo4hw

Again, sorry to be late to the party, I myself am being reorged. And, have been busy, surfing “the dangerous winds of change”. As some smart Chinese fellow observed about “Opportunity rides …”

Hope I can help,
Fjohn
The Big Fat Old Turkey

I am always amazed how people use their employer’s email for “jobsearch”.

For example, LINKEDIN.

If you suddenly become a newly minted turkey (i.e., get nuked from your current job), then do you really want your LinkedIn account tied to your old employer’s email address?

I’d suggest “no” is the answer to that one.

Also, but slightly less passionately, just slightly, I would assert that you don’t want your ISP to control your email.

There’s a reason they give you and your family free email and it’s not for your benefit because they are “nice guys”. Account control! You can’t easily change ISPs if they have control of “your” email address. Intelligent Designer forbid, you can even use their “free” webspace to put your content under their control. That’s another barrier to changing.

(It’s really bad if your employer is your isp. But, that’s a different discussion.)

Nope, I suggest that you buy your own domain and hang your email off that.

If you really want to use your ISP’s email, you CAN forward the email from your domain email at the WSP to your ISP email account. BUT, I suggest that you “route” all your email thru “your” email account at the WSP.

Don’t give anyone a chance to lock you in. Buy internet access from your ISP. Buy webspace from any reputable WSP.

[Mine is 1and1 http://www.1and1.com/?k_id=9113251 and disclaimer I get a pittance if your sign up from this link. It’s no big deal to me if you do or don’t.]

You should get lots of truly free email addresses with your webpage service provider.

Use your domain email to prevent “lock in” to your ISP and (more importantly) “lock out” from your employer’s email should you get fired or quit.

http://www.jibberjobber.com/
blog/archives/473

http://tinyurl.com/37hrth

Know What We Do Around Here All Day?
March 22nd, 2007

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Well… we’re not quite sure! :) But one thing we have as a top priority is making things better for you. That’s why you see improvements in JibberJobber on a regular basis. A couple of days ago we slipped some new features in and we wanted to make sure you knew about it. They may seem trivial (we have a huge – HUGE enhancement coming out in April/May) but they are nice “finishing touches” for you.

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Thing 3 – plays nice with TinyURL

At the bottom of the Add Network Contact page we have “services” … this is where you can say someone’s instant messenger is MSN (or IM), and their handle is hounddog@hotmail.com. Or their Skype ID is hounddog. Or their Yahoo handle for chatting is hounddog@yahoo.com.

Big thanks to John Reinke (who has a really, really good blog) for suggesting we add the ability to put in a TinyURL.

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Jason Alba has been listening to me whine about what I think a “seeker’s pim” should have. He generously credits me for his design of TINYURL and URL displaying. He’s very kind. I just told him what I didn’t like; he and his team incorporated that feedback. It’s a pleasure to have my whine be more than just a whine. All to often, it’s like the wolf baying at the moon. I guess the wolf feels better. But it doesn’t make the moon run away.