Wednesday, September 17, 2008

Smart Career Resources For Tough Times

"We never thought it would get this bad." Words from one employee affected by the changes that are hitting Wall Street this week.

Most are in shock but realize action is necessary to weather the storm effectively. If you are looking for support and advice, here are sites I've found useful:
--Collection of career advice from expert career coaches and authors
--Free career how-to videos on finding a job during tough times, landing a recession-proof job and acing a job interview
--Tips from the NYTimes.com if you're Out of Work on Wall Street

My advice, take this as a wake up call - focus on your passion and your unique strengths and the money will follow. And I walk the talk.

I made it through the Andersen debacle by doing a soul search BEFORE the job search with the help of career coaching. I found the process so helpful, I got certified as a coach and started helping all my Andersen friends with their careers. Now 7 years later, I'm my own boss helping people get out of the rat race and into careers they would do for free (but get paid well to do.)

It's your turn to take control of your career and find opportunity in challenge.

Join the conversation with your comments and let's all get through this together. What are your thoughts on what's happening on Wall Street? What advice you want to share for those impacted?

4 comments:

Matt said...

Here's a video series I found about "How to Write a Resume": http://www.monkeysee.com/play/3738-how-to-write-a-resume

The expert is one of the nation's leading resources on resume writing, so it's really good. They have a ton of quality how to videos on this site, so definitely worth a look.

Maggie Mistal said...

Thanks for the resource Matt. Just checked out the resume writing video. Very insightful and useful!

Anonymous said...

I had a similar experience to you and a similar reaction too - I escaped the corporate rat race and want to help others to do the same.

I imagine it is much easier to make the decision to jump than be pushed,even if the push is cushioned by a severance deal.

Rosalyn

Anonymous said...

Hi Maggie -

Concerning the new job seekers from Wall Street, I have a post on my blog which encourages people to build a significantly wider network. In my experience, too small of a network will doom any well meaning job search.

It can be found at: http://quixoting.typepad.com/spin_strategy/2008/09/how-many-plates.html

My job search strategy is called Spin Strategy.

As I was in the middle of a recent job transition, plate spinning struck me as a compelling analogy for job search. So I started to think about plate spinning as it related to my own efforts to find that perfect next position. In the analogy, each plate represents the different sources of information or resources used to network (I call them micro networks). How many plates was I spinning and how often was I going back to each one?

After a quick review, I found that I had too few plates spinning and was re-spinning the same ones way too often. Sound familiar? I was inefficient by definition! I also found that I had my favorite plates, many of which were really fun to spin but were either not very effective or didn’t respond to extra spinning.

I hope that this concept gives folks a new way to think about their search strategy.

Tim

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