jobs

Are You Unemployed – Take action – ANY action

February 4, 2012

Many years ago, the U.S. economy was suffering through a recession. It was not as bad as many previous recessions, but to be honest, if a recession has affected you, the size of it isn’t really important. Whether unemployment is 5%, 8%, or 10%, if you are unemployed, it is 100% for you. During that recession, I remember articles about the lengths unemployed people will go to to get jobs. I was impressed with the guy who volunteered at the YMCA a few hours a day to stay busy. I loved the guy that decided to help out at his church, or simply the woman who contacted her kids school to read to little children. The one story that really impressed me was the unemployed executive. This unemployed executive reportedly spent more than a million dollars of his savings to cover his and his family’s expenses while he was looking for work for more than a year. That million dollars represented all of his savings. When the article was written, he bemoaned the fact that if didn’t find a job in a month, he would be out of money, have to cut back, and put his house on the market.

IT is hard, but why is Retail IT So Much Harder?

January 25, 2012

I have been in IT for my entire career, and I love it. Right out of college, after studying computer science at Indiana University, I got my first programming job in a hospital, and I loved that job. I loved writing programs and watching my users’ faces light up when I made their lives just a little easier. I loved a clean compile after days of cleaning up bugs and syntax issues. Yes, I love IT. Throughout my IT career, I worked in several different industries. I worked in healthcare, insurance, distribution, manufacturing, and retail. Mostly, retail. I held many different technical positions during my time, ranging from the help desk to programmer, and eventually to the top position, called the Chief Information Officer (read that while letting the words echo ceremoniously in your head). The CIO is the big cheese. Each industry in which I have worked, has its own challenges, and its own rewards. In healthcare for example, it seemed we had endless access to great doctors, nurses, and technicians. I remember once telling a doctor, while eating lunch in the cafeteria that I had a pain in my neck, and he scheduled me to come by that

Do you always live your values?

January 14, 2012

Do you always live your values? Now that is a difficult question to answer. What are your values? Wikipedia says that values can be defined as broad preferences concerning appropriate courses of action or outcomes. As such, values reflect a person’s sense of right and wrong or what “ought” to be. “Equal rights for all” and “People should be treated with respect and dignity” are representative of values. Values tend to influence attitudes and behavior. For example, if you value equal rights for all and you go to work for an organization that treats its managers much better than it does its workers, you may form the attitude that the company is an unfair place to work; consequently, you may not produce well or may perhaps leave the company. It is likely that if the company had had a more egalitarian policy, your attitude and behaviors would have been more positive. Many people have two sets of books where values are concerned. One set of books contains the values they live with their family, in front of their spouse, and their children. They are “God fearing” people who have a clear sense of right and wrong. They live in a

Your boss’s dog house

January 13, 2012

Does your boss have a dog house? No, not the kind that he keeps his Black Lab in. I mean does he need to keep someone in the figurative dog house all the time – the one you go into when you are in trouble? Woof I have worked for several bosses that keep a dog house. They seem to need to keep someone in the dog house to stay focused. They target a person or an area of the business with all of their energy, and as long as someone is in the dog house, everyone else is just fine. Sit! I remember working for one such guy. He was one of the meanest people for whom I’ve ever worked. He was belligerent, insulting, and had a very short fuse. When he would get upset with anyone, they basically went in and stayed in his dog house until someone else messed up. I remember spending almost all of my spare time working to stay out of the dog house. What a waste of time, but it did make me better. So, how do you stay of out of the dog house? First, keep to your commitments. If you sign

Take charge and don’t name drop

January 12, 2012

I have been in business for some time now. I love business and I love management. I have had my fair share of challenges, but I have learned something from each one. Some years ago, as a new manager, I had a bad tendency to drop my boss’s name anytime I had to deliver bad news. I used to say “Ken said we need to work overtime” or “Ken said that we need to improve our quality.” In my mind, I was not the bad guy, so that would make my staff love me. I never had a problem delivering good news, only bad. One day, after a particularly tough meeting, a meeting I probably dropped Ken’s name 15 or 20 times so to avoid being the bad guy, I had a visit to my office shortly after the meeting had ended. Tena came in, sat down and sheepishly asked if I had a minute. I had a good relationship with Tena, so her visits were normally pleasant and I invited her in. I could tell from her body language that this was not a normal visit. YOU are the boss! She began by telling me that she really liked me, and enjoyed working with me, but… A

Persistence – Don’t leave before the miracle happens

January 7, 2012

I learned the hard way that the primary key to success is not talent. It isn’t brains, looks, or education. It isn’t any of the things that you are taught growing up. No, the key to success at any level is persistence. To succeed, one needs to continually strive to get what they want. And when I say continually strive, I don’t mean work harder, etc., I mean picking yourself up when knocked down and continuing the fight until you get what it is you want and to expect and learn from your failures. Some people call it suit up and show up. When I was a freshman in high school in 1776, I played soccer on the school’s soccer team. I didn’t go out for soccer because of some deep love of the game. No, as an American I played soccer because I knew it would force me to get into excellent physical condition for my first sport love, basketball. Even then I understood my own shortcomings and knew that if I didn’t have someone or something driving me to workout, I would not have been in good enough shape for basketball. Before each practice, our soccer coach made

Chain of Command

January 3, 2012

I spent four years in the United States Navy. I learned a great many useful life lessons during that time, but the most significant lesson I learned was to respect the chain of command. In a military context, the chain of command is the line of authority and responsibility along which orders are passed within a military unit and between different units. Orders are transmitted down the chain of command, from a higher-ranked soldier, such as a commissioned officer, to lower-ranked personnel who either execute the order personally or transmit it down the chain as appropriate, until it is received by those expected to execute it. In general, military personnel give orders only to those directly below them in the chain of command and receive orders only from those directly above them. Thank you sir, may I have another? The concept of chain of command also implies that higher rank alone does not entitle a higher-ranking service member to give commands to anyone of lower rank. For example, an officer of unit “A” does not directly command lower-ranking members of unit “B”, and is generally expected to approach an officer of unit “B” if he requires action by members of

I am sooooo busy!

December 30, 2011

“I am sooooo busy! I can’t stand it. I can’t get anything done.” Have you ever said that? I have. Many times in my career I have allowed other people’s deadlines or their lack of planning to affect me. There used to be this little saying some years ago called the 5 P’s. The 5 P’s said “Piss Poor Planning on your Part, does not constitute an emergency on my Part.” We are usually our worst enemies when it comes to productivity and time. We rarely honestly tell the boss how long something will actually take. When they say “I need it today.” We say ok, so they assume that because we didn’t counter that we can’t do it by then. And because you felt that you were not empowered to counter, you felt as if you had to comply with his order. And then what happens? You stress out, try to work faster, make mistakes, and drop it off just as the boss is leaving. Ugh!!! You don’t have to live that way. You have eight hours each day to work. You cannot mathematically fit 10 hours into 8. If you do work ten hours a day, but everyone

Are you ready for your Interview!?!

December 28, 2011

So, you've spent hours and hours searching job boards for openings. You contacted all of your friends, joined social sites like LinkedIn, and expanded your network. You've read my book "The Professional Guide to Creating a Killer Resume" and tweaked your resume to the point that you are really happy with it. And you've sent it out more than a dozen times. All that hard has work paid off and you've finally received a call back. They want you to come in for an interview. Yikes! Are you ready?

Divide and Conquer Management Style

December 23, 2011

I guess you could say that all managers can be put into general management styles. Some are funny. Some are yellers. Some are dictators. Some manage by committee. Some never communicate face to face, but via email. So I suppose that since people are different, so should there be a variety management styles. One of the most dysfunctional management styles I have seen is what I call the Divide and Conquerer, aka the D&C. The D&C is a manager that chooses to have no structure in his life. He conducts no staff meetings, no structured one on one discussions, any meetings that are scheduled are without an agenda and normally called at the last minute so you can’t prepare. The D&C likes to walk around a facility and get his information by talking to staff, junior managers, or in some cases, complete strangers. He asks for opinions and tries to piece together the “truth” much like I would imagine a cold war era CIA agent has to get his information from a variety of enemy sources named Natasha and Boris. He never believes anthing his staff tells him and pits one against the other.He never gets the whole picture, but

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Career and Management