Posts By virtuscareers

The Job Search Step You’re Missing

· September 23, 2015 · Job Search, Strengths

Most job seekers begin their search with updating their resume (CV, for international readers). If that’s your approach, I hope to convince you to take a step back, because it can make all the difference.

From the time I started working at “the golden arches” at age 16, I’ve held exactly 13 positions. In 27 years, every interview I’ve had resulted in an offer, yet it’s notbecause I was the most qualified candidate. I wasn’t. Not once, in fact. I’ve had two hiring managers tell me I wasn’t technically qualified, but they wanted to hire me anyway. Why?

I know myself. My mother is an Executive Coach, and she’s had me take every assessment known to man. I know what I can’t do (and what I can), and I only compete for jobs where I know I’ll succeed.
I can articulate my strengths. Because I know myself, I ‘m able to easily demonstrate to an employer how and why I will do a job with excellence.
Peter Drucker was a leadership genius way ahead of his time and was a pioneer in the conversation on strengths. Really it was more of a monologue, because the conversation had not yet begun in the corporate world.

Here are two of my favorite Drucker quotes:

“Most [people] do not know what their strengths are. When you ask them, they look at you with a blank stare, or they respond in terms of subject knowledge, which is the wrong answer.”

“It takes far less energy to move from first-rate performance to excellence than it does to move from incompetence to mediocrity.”

If you don’t know your strengths (your actual strengths, not trendy buzz words sprinkled throughout your resume) you are taking a shot in the dark. Your cover letters, resume, networking conversations, interviews, and over-all branding, will be substandard to what could have been.

StrengthsFinder

In my experience, the most insightful strengths assessment is the Clifton StrengthsFinder, created by the Gallup organization. It’s an assessment based on a 40-year study, and is a catalog of the 34 most common talents in people.

Why do strengths matter?

According to Gallup, 1 in 33 million people share the same top five strengths. This means your job performance will have a unique approach. You won’t accomplish the job the same way as another candidate.

It’s your job to explain that your approach is better. Simple awareness of your approach is compelling and powerful.

Also, working within one’s natural talents impacts productivity, stress, and quality. If you know your strengths, you can target roles that will use them. Your stress will decrease, and your productivity and quality will rise. Awareness of your natural talents equips you to be intentional in using them every day. When you play to your strengths, your work is energizing.

Where do your strengths lie?

In addition to knowing what your strengths are, you can learn where your strengths lie. There are four thematic buckets for the 34 strengths:

Relating Themes – These themes explain how you build connections with other people

Impacting Themes – These themes explain how you motivate others to action

Striving Themes– These themes explain what pushes you toward results

Thinking Themes – These themes explain how you analyze the world

Knowing where your strengths lie not only reveals your advantages – which you should leverage and develop – it also highlights blind spots, which enables you to target strengths you can use to compensate. I do this all the time. Most of my strengths are Thinking Themes (Strategic, Learner, Intellection, and Input).

I can’t impact people or build relationships if I live in my own head, which is the tendency of Thinking bucket dwellers. To avoid this, I rely heavily on my Impacting Theme: Maximizer.

StrengthsFinder advises people with Maximizer: “Seek roles in which you are helping other people succeed. In coaching, managing, mentoring, or teaching roles, your focus on strengths will prove particularly beneficial to others.”Hmm…That’s interesting. My desire to help people succeed draws me out!

I have a client who told me she was in a job interview last week and was asked what words she would use to describe herself. How convenient! I had created a one-page summary of her assets based on the assessments she’s done. She pulled it out and summarized her results for them, something like this:

I’m committed, accountable, independent, trusted, and conscientious.(Responsibility)

I’m a problem solver, troubleshooter, and I find improvements and solutions.(Restorative)

I’m always learning and I catch on quickly. (Learner)

I grow talent in others, and enjoy helping others succeed. (Developer)

I’m a negotiator who sees both sides of a situation, enabling me to arrive at consensus. (Harmony)

You can bet the employer was impressed!

I know my top five strengths. Now what?

First, become intimately acquainted with your strengths.

The true value of your strengths is the interpretation. Too many people take the assessment, read their strengths, and place the report in a drawer. This is a missed opportunity. Transformation comes through the powerful narrative of knowing who you are and how you operate.

I have a client that has Communication as her top strength, and her next two strengths are Discipline and WOO (Winning Others Over). I explained to her that when WOO and Communication are working together, she’s the life of the party — she’s networking, making friends, building connections.

However, when Discipline and Communication are locking arms, she is communicating policy, standards, and ensuring people are following guidelines. One of those presentations of her personality is very task-oriented (Communication + Discipline), while the other is relationship-oriented (Communication + WOO).

Understanding how she’s perceived has enhanced her emotional intelligence and increased awareness of her effect on co-workers, who may be confused by shifts between the two personas. This is the kind of insight that can have great impact in your life.

Second, ask yourself some questions:

How do your strengths impact your current, or a desired, role?
What are some ways your strengths are unique in how you approach your work?
Are you able to identify potential gaps between critical strengths a role requires, and your strengths?
How might you leverage your other strengths to meet those gaps?
Finally, take action:

If employed, explain your strengths to your manager so they can find better ways to leverage you.
Be mindful of strengths when setting goals (you’ll perform better).
Look for special projects that need your strengths (it’s a chance to shine).
Keep strengths in mind when identifying your next career step.
Embed strengths in your networking pitch, interview answers, cover letters, and resume.
Practice discussing your strengths. It’s a language — the more you practice, the more fluent you’ll become.

All the best to you!

Help! I Hate My Job! (Part 2)

· September 23, 2015 · Career Transition

Welcome to part two of the article! Read part one.​

In part one, I shared three steps to help identify career options if you are in a role mis-match. In part two, we’ll look at a decision-making process I call a feasibility/desirability matrix.

We’ll continue to use Mary to create an example. You’ll recall Mary identified financial planner, public tax accountant, and personal banker as top career choices from the 3-step exercise. Upon further reflection, and input from others, she adds lawyer to her list. How should she choose between these options?

First, she creates a simple table with three columns:


In the first column, Mary lists each job. In the second column, she writes the gap in qualifications she’ll need to close based on internet research (e.g. a particular degree, certification, exam, work experience, etc.) In the third column, Mary lists her feasibility of pursuing the qualification.

Things to consider when assessing feasibility are resources at your disposal, such as finances and time, and possessing needed prerequisites. You’ll also want to research if your choices are growing or retracting professions, since you’ll want to find employment when all is said and done. www.onetonline.org is a good resource to research future outlook on jobs (hint: occupation quick search in the upper right corner of the site).

Lastly, Mary ranks her choices by highest to lowest feasibility, and selects a feasible option that has the highest desirability for her. In this example, she chooses Financial Planner, because it has Medium-High feasibility, and is her number one career interest.

I hope you find this a helpful tool in simplifying potentially daunting decisions.

All the best to you!

Why You Shouldn’t Post Content Directly on LinkedIn Publisher

· September 23, 2015 · Networking & Social Media

​I’ve written over 70 articles on LinkedIn, and I often like to provide people with links to my articles when they ask me questions about certain topics. I post links on my blog back to my articles on LinkedIn. Here are two reasons why I must stop writing directly on LinkedIn publisher, and will instead post content on my blog, and simply provide a link back to MY website within the LinkedIn publisher container.

1. The links stop working over time and point to the current top article on LinkedIn instead of mine. I’ve tested this on over a dozen articles. I click on a URL that  I’ve put on my blog that points back to a LinkedIn article, I see the URL is correct when it hits LinkedIn, and then the page refreshes and I’m taken to the top article that is currently on Pulse, with a message that my post is “no longer available.” Once working links just stop working. Something is not working under the covers for LinkedIn publisher. I am now having to post all the articles directly into my own blog and use those links to send to people, instead.

2. LinkedIn doesn’t do search optimization well, or at all.  My husband has tried to search for articles on LinkedIn with exact ​terms he knows are in the article, and nothing comes up in search. I tried it by pasting a unique sentence from an article. He’s right…Nothing came up. So I tried searching by the exact title. The search results had similar titles, but nothing that had my unique title. My article did not even show up in search results, yet other results that didn’t match showed up. What this means for you is you aren’t being found. That’s bad.

Bottom line, if you want to be able to send links to your articles, or be found in search, post your content on your own website or blog, and then push the link to your article on LinkedIn, but don’t put your content there.

I hope this helps you! I found out the hard way and now I’m having to paste the content of 70 articles into my blog.

All the best to you!

Discover Your Character Strengths

· September 15, 2015 · Strengths

This is a free assessment ​to discover your top character strengths. It helps you have a more rounded self-awareness, which is critical to your success!​

What Body Language Says in an Interview

· September 15, 2015 · Interpersonal Skills, Interviewing

You can learn a lot about an interviewer by observing their body posture and gestures, and an interviewer can also learn a lot about you, because 55% of communication is nonverbal.

When I was a hiring manager I tried to be conscious of my body language in interviews, and I watched the gestures closely of those I interviewed.

We learn to control and mask our facial cues more than any other part of our body, so the most unmasked, truthful body language is observed at the extremities. 

Below are some body language considerations to take note of while interviewing.

Non-verbals of the Feet and Legs

When someone turns their feet away from you, either both feet or one foot turned away creating an “L” formation, this means they are ready to depart the conversation. They may even swivel their chair so their lower body and torso is pointed away from you.

Alternatively, when a person’s feet (and torso) directly face you, this is a sign of engagement.

When a person has crossed legs, and begins bouncing their upper foot, this can be a sign of discomfort or lack of interest.

If you notice someone disengaging from the conversation with their legs and feet, make note of your body to ensure you’re not initiating their discomfort with your non-verbals. After the interview, perhaps you can determine what you were saying when you noticed a change in their body language.

Watch what your feet and legs convey:

  • Keep your ankles uncrossed. Crossed ankles suggests insecurity or discomfort. I’ve seen many interviewees do this.
  • Don’t jiggle your legs. It projects nervousness and anxiety.
  • Keep your feet pointed directly at the interviewer.

Upper Body Non-Verbals

People tend to lean back and away from someone in an interview when they are not connecting with them. However, this can also be a territorial posture when coupled with splayed legs (usually in men). Conversely, we lean into people when we are comfortable with them.

Arm crossing is a protective gesture. When someone blocks their upper body with crossed arms, it’s an indication they’re being guarded toward you. Gripping the arms while crossed is an elevated sign of discomfort.

Watch what your upper body conveys:

  • Don’t allow your shoulders to rise up. Keep them pulled down and slightly pulled back in proper posture. Shrugged or slumped shoulders displays lack of confidence.
  • Leaning forward slightly is preferable to leaning back, or sitting stiffly, as it displays approachability and comfort with the interviewer.

Non-verbal hand gestures

When an interviewer is leaning in toward you and has interlocked fingers with their thumbs pointing upward, this is a comfortable, open, conversational position.

Watch for hands in pockets, especially if they are leaning back in their chair. This is a dismissive posture.

Watch what your hands are saying:

People tend to wring their hands, or rub their palms together when they are nervous. Pay attention to how you use your hands in an interview. It will be noticed.

Women are especially guilty of touching their hair in an interview, whether pushing away their bangs, or tucking it behind their ear. It’s distracting, and comes across unprofessional. Consider wearing your hair in a style that reduces the chance you’ll touch it if this is a habit of yours.

Another hand consideration is to avoid wiping yours after shaking hands with the interviewer, either with your other hand, or on the side of your pant leg or skirt.

 One of the most confident hand positions is steepling your hands, finger tip to finger tip. You can have them steepled on your lap, or rested on the table in front of you. Try not to appear wooden — no need to keep your hands in one position the entire interview.

Loosely interlocked fingers are a comfortable alternative if you aren’t quite ready for steepled fingers. 


Facial cues

Some negative non-verbals from the face include:

  • Furrowed eye brows
  • Tightly pursed lips, with or without the corners of the mouth down-turned
  • Squinting
  • A delay in opening the eyes after closing them
  • Polite smiles where the corners of the mouth move out toward the ears, instead of curving up toward the eyes

Watch your own facial cues to ensure you’re not projecting these negative non-verbals. In addition, avoid licking your bottom lip. If you’re nervous, you may do this to soothe yourself unconsciously. 

When you smile, ensure the corners of your mouth are upturned, exposing your teeth. Smiles with closed lips often appear forced.

A slight head tilt is also positive sign. People convey openness and receptivity with this gesture. People don’t tend to head tilt if they don’t like you.

Have you observed telling or interesting body language in an interview? Please share with readers in the comments.

All the best to you!​

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