With health care costs, food prices, and the unemployment rate on the rise, you need to do everything you can to protect yourself - and your career - from the danger of recession.
Take a look at this ARTICLE from MyEduSeek on 5 Recession-Proof Industries that Pay.
As the impact of the economic crisis takes hold, employees from Wall Street to Main Street are feeling nervous about their jobs, and with good reason. As of September, 760,000 jobs have already been lost this year, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. And a quarter of U.S. employers expect to make layoffs in the next 12 months, according to a recent report by consulting firm Watson Wyatt.
But which industries will suffer the most? Experts say certain sectors are more vulnerable to layoffs than others. To read which ones, click HERE to get the full article from CNN.com
Be sure to check out this week's tip on YouTube by clicking HERE!
Last week I showed you how to add value (and job security) to yourself by learning how to solve four types of problems. Hopefully you've had a chance to put some of that knowledge to use.
This week we want to focus on helping your organization make money.
You've probably heard of entrepreneurs. These are people who start their own businesses, often at great risk, for the reward of having control and being able to make dreams come true. Entrepreneurs (and I know this from being one) are forced to think critically about every dollar that's spent and make the most of each opportunity to try and make money.
Even if you're not up for this rollercoaster ride, you can still use principles we use and become an INTRApreneur! I know that terms sounds weird, but it makes total sense. To add value, you have to think of your organization as YOUR company. Here are some suggestions to get your INTRApreneurial spirit engaged:
I know these seem like they should be the responsibility of someone else, but if your own job security is on the line, don't you think you might want to step up? Remember, job security is never a guarantee with the same company, but if you can do the four steps above, you'll learn some powerful techniques that will make any organization a success.
And who knows, maybe someday that business you're protecting will be your own!
You can view this posting on YouTube by clicking HERE
It seems as though each week the economic news gets worse. The unemployment numbers continue to rise as the news from Wall Street worsens. More and more of my clients are beginning to question their own job security. Everyone wants to know if their position is safe.
With that in mind, I thought I'd put together a mini-series on how to have job security for life.
Now I know that sounds a little over-the-top.
Perhaps you'd expect to hear a statement like that from TV pitchman Billy Mays
who pitches must-have products like Steam Buddy and the Hercules Hook.
It's really not though. Having job security for life means that no matter what the circumstance, you'll either be retained in your current position or be extremely marketable for other positions. Let me give you an example.
Let's say the New York Yankees ownership made a few too many bad investments on Wall Street and wound up completely bankrupt. If the team needed to be disbanded, how long before Derek Jeter, Alex Rodriguez, and a host of other superstars from the Yankees found other teams to pick them up? Not very long. And here's the reason. It's not because they played for the storied Yankees, it's because they perform at a superstar level for the Yankees.
You too can be seen in that same category. The key is to continually add value to your organization. You do that in 3 ways:
It's simple stuff. You do that on a continual basis and continue to grow and progress professionally and you'll have job security for life!
Now the big question is HOW?
Over the next few weeks, I'll give you simple steps to follow that will help you grow your self and your career to superstar status. All you have to do is implement to process. Do we have a deal?
We're finally at the end of my
series of 10 Principles of Success. I think we saved the best for last,
but as a reminder, let's take a look at the previous 9:
The last principle is for anyone who
has found early frustration in life:
Each of the people above embody my
last principle of success: Never Quit!
All of us have experienced
failure. It’s inevitable. Failure is even more likely if we
continue to try new things and become more determined to achieve our goals.
Failure can eventually paralyze us if we let it. Soon, we’ll quit trying
something new. Worse, we’ll begin quitting things we’re already
doing. Before you know it, the slippery slope of failure will turn us
into wallowing wimps, content only to complain about what we don’t have and
become envious of those who seem to have everything.
Don’t let it happen to you!
All the celebrities mentioned above worked beyond theirs and society’s
expectations of them. It doesn’t matter where you start, only how you
make the best of what you have and finish in a better place.
This week, if you start facing
failure, quit doing the "self-fulfilling prophecy" thing and change
your mindset. If you can't possibly figure out that math problem, get
help and get it done. If you think you'll fail if you go in to ask your
boss for a raise, get in there and do it anyway. There are plenty of
people who will tell you to quit. Hang around with those who tell you it
can be done.
The 10 Principles to Create Breakthrough in your Personal and Professional Life can now be found in my new book Endeavor to Persevere. If you found this series helpful, I'd encourage to got right now to my website and pick up a copy! If you know someone who needs some breakthrough in their life right now, why not get them a resource.
Life is too short to consistently
fail. Take the 10 principles above and put them to work in your life!
I don't know about you, but I'm a little (well, ok a LOT) tired of the endless stream of bad news regarding the economy, politics, food shortage, and the high price of gas. The stress hasn't gotten to me, but I'm sure it's affecting most people.
What to do?
I found this posting on a colleague's blog. Her name is Rita Watson and her blog is a pretty good one. I think you'll enjoy it.
Sure, you know that your mood is better after you’ve had a good laugh, but did you know that your health may improve, too? Depression is a major risk factor for heart disease and so it is good to both exercise and laugh.
A low tech solution to mild to moderate depression — aerobic exercise – can be as effective as psychotherapy. Both exercise and laughter help the heart. Futher, reports from a team at Loma Linda University in California, show that laughter prompts changes in the body that may help the immune and endocrine systems to function better.
Laughter increases the number and activity of cells that help us fight disease and decreases stress-related hormones.
The nice thing about laughter is that it’s contagious, according to Robert Provine, Ph.D., of the University of Maryland. When you hear other people laugh, you tend to laugh too. Provine suggests that laughter does something special to our brains to trigger the laugh sounds in us.
So for the sake of your health, exercise, laugh, and maintain a positive attitude.
Have a great week!
An unemployment rate at 5% used to be called full employment. Today it's considered the sign of a recession.
But when the Labor Department gives its March employment report this Friday, April 4, it's important to keep in mind that the relatively low unemployment rate isn't telling the whole story about the weakness of the U.S. labor market.
Economists surveyed by Briefing.com are forecasting a loss of 50,000 jobs from the nation's payrolls in the month. That would mark the third straight month of job declines.
The unemployment rate is expected to jump to 5.0% from 4.8% in February. But some economists point to other readings, which show that the market is much weaker than the unemployment rate would suggest.
A new article on CNN.com highlights another area of concern: Underemployment and dropping out of the job hunt. You can find that article HERE.
Now I for one am about tired of the daily bad news on the job front. Let me give you some advice:
If you want and need a new job, get off your tired, depressed ass and go out and get it!
There are still jobs out there now. Yes, the competition is stiff and getting even stronger with more people out of work, but SOMEBODY has to get those jobs. Why can't it be you?
If you compete with the BEST resume and deliver an OUTSTANDING interview, you'll be hired, period. Your competition may be down and depressed and if so, it's going to show in the interview. No employer wants damaged goods. Your attitude matters.
Be positive, be optimistic, and most of all, be professional. I can help you out if you need a coach, but ultimately you need to commit right now to giving 100% to this process!
| Click the Play button to hear the Coach! |
We took a break last week from our series on
10 Principles for Personal and Professional Success,
but since I'm sure everyone is back to work this week, let's dive right back in.
As a review, here are the principles we've covered so far:
This week, let's go one better. Actually, this week's principle is to GET BETTER!
Do you remember the hot toy this past Christmas? Of course you do, it was the Nintendo Wii. There was a little buzz about the Wii early in late summer, but by the time the holidays came around, the rush was on. Every big box electronic store had a run on the gadget and EBay sellers were listing them at over $700.00. They were nearly impossible to find. Nintendo struck gold on this one.
Now, if the execs at Nintendo were smart, they would carefully plan a similar marketing strategy this year using the Wii based on last Christmas's sales right? Of course not! We've all been around long enough to know that hot products last only one season. After all, the Christmas before had the PS3 and that creepy Elmo doll as the rage. The year before it was the Xbox 360. Before that, the PSP. If you think back, it's always been something new each year. Any company wanting to make money and increase market share has to make a strong commitment to have a new, innovative product each year. In other words, they have to commit to simply GET BETTER each year!
What about you?
All of us need to think in the same terms. Each year, we must do something more incredible, remarkable, or marketable for our careers so as to not get stagnant or find ourselves on the short end of a layoff. Our best this year will be mediocre next year, and possibly unacceptable the following year.
As of today, the U.S. economy is "on the ropes" with steady bad news pouring in nearly every day. Right now, employers seem to be holding steady with new hires and a few are beginning layoffs. If the trend continues, it's possible many folks could lose their jobs. The new buzzword in my circles is "recession-proofing" a career or job. If you want to do that, make a commitment today to get better! How would we do that? Here are some suggestions:
Tomorrow is a good day to get started on your GET BETTER plan. Remember, we're only as good as our last success. If we commit to creating a win each day, there's no telling what great opportunities will come from it. I'm excited to find something new tomorrow to get better at. I hope you are too!
For the past few weeks I've taken you through several success principles. Most of those principles require individual action. We need to define success, dream big, set good goals, get rid of assumed constraints, and commit to continuous learning. The next principle takes some help. You'll find it nearly impossible to have personal and professional success without the help of others. Networking is a major key to success.
We can have all the dreams in the world and educate ourselves past a PhD, but we'll only get results if we leverage the power of others. Left on our own, we have limited capacity. There's nothing wrong with individual effort, but if we can't reach out to others to connect us outside of our circle, we'll simply grow huge in a tiny pond. Success comes from venturing out.
So what is networking? Simply stated, it's engaging and connecting with other people. It means talking to others about our goals and asking for their assistance. It also means doing the unthinkable and actually meeting strangers. Here's where so many people fall short. Networking can be quite scary. So why do it? You need access to as many networks as you can. You'll get your power through the power of others.
In 1967, a researcher named Stanley Milgram performed what he called a "small world study" to test the power of connectedness. His experiment requested 160 people in Omaha, Nebraska to get a letter to an obscure stock broker in Sharon, Massachusetts. The results reported that "chains varied from two to 10 intermediate acquaintances, with the median at five." Any person appeared to be able to reach another person with an average of six jumps--the empirical basis for the famous phrase "six degrees of separation." Now this study has been subsequently poo poohed by other researchers and scientists, particularly since its renaissance by the "Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon" (where all Hollywood actors are linked somehow with Bacon through a maximum of six connections) and Malcolm Gladwell's book The Tipping Point, but I'm still convinced using networking is a key factor to success. Why?
You can't possibly succeed without the help of others. Others will not succeed without the help of you. We have to connect to each other if we'll ever achieve our goals. We need access to the people others know and they need our connections as well.
We know that 60-80% of jobs come through networking. Most of us are now My Space, Facebook, or Linked-in users. We join professional associations and attend Chamber of Commerce meetings. All of these are designed to connect to others. Even if we don't do it intentionally, by default we reach out. Why not make a concerted effort at it?
This week, make it a goal to connect with at least 10 new people. Get to know them, and, here's the best part, ask how YOU can support THEM. It's so much easier to contact strangers when you have something to give. Build new relationships based on serving others and you'll reap the benefit of the connection. Don't be surprised when your efforts are reciprocated. Zig Ziglar's most famous line is "You'll get everything you want in life when you help others get everything they want in life. I firmly believe that and have not yet ever been disappointed. If Milgram is correct, and I believe he is, we truly live in a small world. Let's all work hard this week to get to know it.
Have you ever been to the circus and seen the elephants standing in the paddock? Most often you'll find them shackled on one leg and connected to a post in the ground. I don't know about you, but it seems to me if that 19,000 lb elephant was ticked off enough, it could yank that stump out of the ground and come after you.
But it doesn't. Do you wonder why?
Most likely, when that elephant was very young, somebody shackled it the very same way onto a stump in the ground. Not knowing any better, that elephant yanked and pulled against it, causing that shackle to cut into its leg. Because an elephant never forgets, it realized the pain would be there no matter how big and strong it grew. Consequently, as an adult, it no longer pulls against the chain. We call that phenomenon an Assumed Constraint.
Assumptions can be dangerous - particularly if we make them without current data. If we listen to them, we'll think of every good reason why we won't succeed. Assuming we can't get past a sticking point in our life guarantees we won't, no matter how hard we try. Henry Ford knew this principle when he penned his oft-quoted line "If you think you can or can't, you're right."
Assumed constraints begin subtly enough. We make an attempt at something and fail. Then we begin to identify the reasons. After gathering that data, we start looking at the causes and most often link that to a previous failure we, or someone close to us, experienced. Before long, we start justifying that failure and immediately lower our expectations and goals. Why keep trying if I (or someone I love) tried and failed too? Not everyone can be successful or wealthy. Somebody has to finish in second place. Maybe I shouldn't expect too much, that way I won't be disappointed.
What a bunch of crap!
Who says you can't achieve that goal? Why CAN'T you finish in first place, get that dream job, or earn that college degree? We spend so much time justifying our failures that we leave no time to build the knowledge or skills to achieve the goal! This world is filled with so much opportunity yet most people give up way too early.
This week, why not take some time to look at every piece of negative self-talk that goes through your head or leaves your lips. Instead of telling yourself why you can't, try asking yourself how you will. Life is too short to fritter it away with a bunch of regrets. I'm up for some real success this year. I hope you are too!
Recent Comments