Maintaining a Business – Be Reasonable!

Can we be reasonable here? As I write this I am on a business trip to Europe. The trip is designed to bring together leaders from our practices and business units around the world. We will learn from the best practices across our organization. We will also eat, drink and attend cultural events. Are we doing something wrong? Some would argue that this is an unnecessary trip. We could save money by not doing this. We could hold webinars or conference calls. The world around us is in turmoil and we are spending money on learning and development. Granted, we are not the same as AIG, but so many companies today are afraid of sponsoring travel for training, sales, or customer events. In USA Today, there is a full page ad from Las Vegas saying that conventions and business meetings are important and the economy of that city depends on such meetings. They are, well, a big part of how we do business. Places like Las Vegas, Orlando and many others live by tourism and convention business. So, yes, AIG was way out of line taking billions and then doing a lavish corporate outing. Bad form! But cities like Las Vegas and companies like Maritz (a leader in the incentive and motivational travel and events business) don’t need to suffer because companies are afraid to hold sales or customer events. It is ok to motivate and incent people to perform – especially in difficult market environments. It is absolutely ok to reward top clients – or put on a good show for prospective clients – in order to grow business. It is how we compete. So, can we be reasonable here? If you are taking billions from the government it makes sense to cancel or downsize events. For the rest of us, do the things that we do well to grow our businesses. Hold events to train people, to motivate sales and service people and to reward clients and customers. It keeps and creates jobs. It stimulates the economy. It is good business and it is a good thing to do. Kevin Pallardy

Job Security

http://tomdispatch.com/post/175041/jill_fraser_a_farewell_to_jobosss is a link to a thoroughly depressing article by Jill Fraser. Much of what she says is undoubtedly true. It’s a worthwhile read and very provocative. A central theme to her article is that none of us has “job security” anymore. It’s gone. Vanished. No longer in existence.

I disagree. You just have to know were to look before you can find it.

What’s gone is a time and place in the economy when we could look to our employers for job security. We must simply accept – as a fact of current life – that jobs with large, traditional employers are no longer secure nor are they really “ours” to own. But what we do own is something that can be truly liberating. We must now own our career, our jobs and the effort required to maintain a current, marketable set of skills. In other words, it’s up to us. Each one of us has the obligation to accept full responsibility for the success of our own careers. I find this acceptance liberating.

If we look at hiring and economic trends and recognize that senior management can simply slash jobs at will – with absolutely no consequences – then we need to accept the corollary of that truism. That we own them nothing, and we only owe ourselves and families a duty to build the best career we can build. So, if our next job looks like a dead end, with little to no hope of real professional and personal satisfaction, we need to accept that we have a duty to leave that job behind just as quickly as possible. But this requires us to take full responsibility for keeping our skills and interests in line with the market and current state of the world. We can’t act quickly to seize new, great opportunities if we let our skills fall behind.

So if you want to see the source for true job security – go look in the mirror. There’s your source. Are you ready to accept this responsibility? If so – I applaud and commend you. If not – I sincerely hope you can come to grips with the reality of the job market today. Nobody can look out for you and your family’s best interests better than you. I’d advise you to figure out how to do that right away.

Are There Jobs Out There?

In a word, yes. The daily bombardment of negative news can be overwhelming – no doubt about it. But we are seeing our transition clients land interviews and jobs all over the US. Here’s what we see in most successful searches.

1. Patience and Persistence. It’s easy to forget a very important fact. Your search is not the targeted employer’s search. Recruiters, HR professionals and hiring managers are not deliberately ignoring qualified candidates. But they certainly aren’t rushing to the phones either. The bottom line is that many organizations are being very deliberate in filling open positions. It is a buyers’ market, and the buyers aren’t in a big hurry. So it’s important to keep your cool, maintain your professionalism and make sure your follow-up is timely. But do not let yourself fall into “stalker land.” In general, ensure that your follow-up reflects consideration for your contacts’ schedules and the reality of the competitive market. Give people at least a full week between communications, and that not all of your communications are solely about you. Keep your interest in the organization apparent and be brief.

2. Active Networking. Job search experts have extolled the virtues of networking for years, but it’s never been more important than in this market. Clients are landing in large part, because they have been working with multiple contacts to explore a variety of options. In fact, many of the people we’ve spoken with that landed found jobs that were not posted, and they found them simply because their network was active and engaged. Explain clearly and succinctly what you want to do, what sort of organization interests you, and that you are in touch with key contacts every couple of weeks.

3. Clear Message. People looking for work who can stay on message and remain focused on how their value proposition meets current market needs are having more success than people who are looking for multiple types of jobs or offering a message that ays, “Ican do a lot of things.” Versatility is a good thing, but it’s not always a great message in a highly competitive market. It’s those job seekers who can effectively zero in on a specific need and match that to their value proposition that seem to be landing.

4. Market Awareness. There are segments of the economy doing better than others. Government, some IT sectors, and health care are adding some employees. It will be very interesting to see how the economic recovery package impacts other segments such as clean energy organizations, “green” product manufacturing, telecommunications (high speed Internet), etc. will fare as these billions of dollars begin to make their way into the broader economy.