Career Management Alliance Blog

This is a criticism of critics. Just a tiny bit of irony, in that! I was reading Newsweek today,  and found a review of war films, written by Caryn James.   She is a well-known movie critic.  I don't want to pick on her, she's probably a very nice woman, but she does serve up food for thought about all critics.   She was reviewing the new series about World War II,  by Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks.  And she had nothing good to say about it.  She also had little good to say about The Hurt Locker, the film which just cleaned up at the Oscars.   She said that Kathryn Bigelow's dazzling filmmaking "doesn't pause to let you realize that suspense and bravery are everything here."  I thought the film was about nothing else but. I went to watch it twice, because I was so entranced with her examination of the virtues and defects of such bravery.  ("War is a drug.") Continue Reading »

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Kelly writes: I’ve been using an executive recruiter to find a new job, and it has worked well. I just came back from an interview for a job that is perfect for me, and with a company I want to work for. I immediately called my recruiter and told him how I felt. Should I still write a thank-you letter to the employer? I don’t want to upset my recruiter by going around him. What do you think I should do?

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The Career Doctor responds: I’m glad you wrote me this question because I don’t get many emails about working with recruiters (also referred to as headhunters), and they can be a valuable addition to your job search. There are recruiters for just about every profession/industry and location. The relationship is often stronger when a recruiter contacts you, but job-seekers — especially those with several years of experience — should at least research potential headhunters when undertaking a job-search. A couple of other pieces of information. Recruiters work for the employer, and they get paid when they place someone in the position. Job-seekers never have to pay a fee to reputable recruiters — because the employer pays the fee. That all said, yes, you should always tell your recruiter exactly how you felt about a particular prospective employer - especially when you are as sure as you seem to be. It’s then the recruiter’s job to push your candidacy with the employer. However, working with a recruiter does not suspend basic job-search etiquette, and you most certainly should write thank-you notes to all the folks you interviewed with. Doing so will not undermine the recruiter. For more information and articles related to using headhunters, please go to this section of Quintessential Careers: Recruiter/Headhunter Resources, Directories & Associations Finally, check out these Sample Job Interview and Career Thank-You Letters published on Quintessential Careers.

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For a quick video packed with job search and career tips, visit my web site and click on the video player in the lower left corner. Continue Reading »

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I keep Wiley's job postings on my RRS feeds and ran across something very interesting this morning. The Indianapolis office is seeking someone to convert its print materials to electronic formats. Check it out: Responsible for assisting with the production of all eContent produced by the Indianapolis Composition Services department. This will include conversions from the page layout application directly to eContent such as XML, ePub, Kindle, etc. It will also entail the usage of XSLT to transform exported content into the appropriate format for compliance with Wiley’s version of XML and other eContent requirements. In addition, this position will assist with training people in eContent conversion methods as needed. Continue Reading »

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Most of my work day is spent writing — creating personal marketing communications for my executive clients, blog posts for my 2 blogs, guest-blogs and articles for various other blogs and websites, and my own business and career marketing materials. I love words and I’m always interested in resources to improve my writing. Recently I came across Wordnik. According to their site, Wordnik is billions of words, 300 million example sentences, 4.7 million unique words, and over 180,000 comments, 87,000 tags, 74,000 pronunciations, 22,259 favorites and 22,819 lists created by 29,177 Wordniks. Continue Reading »

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Last summer I ripped my calf pretty bad in a sports accident.  Well, the accident was that I was a out-of-shape dude playing capture the flag with a bunch of eight year olds. I hobbled around on what I thought was a pulled muscle for a week.  At the end of that week I lept in a heroic effort to save my almost 3 year old from burning herself when she got something out of the microwave. That leap did my calf in. I went to urgent care to learn I had ripped it probably 30-60% (can you imagine having your calf ripped 60%??), and that this was common in men my age, even if they are active. Continue Reading »

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I’ll be honest – 2009 was a little foggy for me. Ninety-nine percent of the time, I’m one of those eternal optimists always looking for the silver lining, but the year had some tough spots that slowed me down. It did finally begin to shift in October with a wonderful 10-week class I took called “Prosperity Plus, a New Way of Living”. Not only did I have to look at myself and my beliefs under a microscope, I had to commit to listening to audios, doing written exercises in the workbook, and generally changing my approach to things, at least for the length of the class. Four months later, I find myself still incorporating many of these things into my daily activities. Continue Reading »

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So I’m now writing for AOL… I’ve written a few posts/articles, and today one of them was good enough to hit the “welcome screen,” which means quiet a few people might see it.  Quite a few = lots. Continue Reading »

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There is a wild conversation going on in the Chief Financial Officer Network group on Linked In around whether CFOs are extroverts or introverts ... and who is better! WOW!!

There are certainly some interesting observations and a few, like these, that defy logic and belief:

--In the end a successful CFO of a medium or large organization has to be extrovert.

--From my point of view, and with my experience (of course), an extrovert CFO is trustworthier than an introverted CFO.

--We are all here, so we must be all extroverted to some extent. Its the ones that are not here may be less so. Continue Reading »

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The winter Olympics are almost upon us in snow-challenged Vancouver. So what better time to introduce you to a blog on figure skating? If you want to get some expert analysis of the competition from a true fanatic and meticulous historian, check out State of the Skate. This week, blogger Kelli Lawrence has been running a series to help us "every four years" fans get up to speed. Continue Reading »

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