3 False Beliefs College Grads Have

Do your thoughts affect your job search?
You better believe it!
1. “I deserve a job because I worked hard to get my degree”
Many college grads on the job hunt believe that they are essentially entitled to employment because they worked long and hard for their degree. It is indeed true that dedication and hard work go a long way – but that guarantees a student graduation, not a job. Some students say that their excellent GPA, extra-curricular involvement, internship experience, or even their degree’s major entitles them to a good-paying entry level position at a Fortune 500 company. All of these are factors that may help you in your job search, but none are golden tickets towards employment. This kind of thinking makes a college graduate a passive job seeker which is the last thing anyone wants to be.
Instead, job seekers should write down their past experience, skills, and qualifications and see how they can best brand themselves. Then, they should use job interviews as opportunities to explain to hiring managers why they are indeed the best candidates for the position.
Stop believing: “I deserve a job because I worked hard to get my degree”
Start thinking: “How can I show companies that I am the best possible candidate for this job?” Continue reading …
New Grad Life is the only blog solely dedicated to providing free resources to recent college graduates or soon-to-be grads for topics such as job hunting, resume/interview help, networking tips, money management, and more.

Keeping Your Job

“If you’re not the lead dog, the view never changes” – Anonymous
I’ve spent so much time providing advice and leads to people looking for a job that I’ve actually not thought about those who want to keep the job they’ve got. If you’ve worked long enough you’ve seen someone (or know someone) who has lost their job. If the company goes bankrupt, not much you can do, but there are many things you can do to keep from going to the top of “the List”. Some people implode, explode, lose their edge, lose their ambition and lose their job as a result. Downsizing is a difficult process to live through (and survive), but even in the best of times there are people who lose their jobs for the wrong reasons and for wrong actions (or lack of action) that could have possibly kept their jobs had they focused on a few basics. Yes, many times nothing you do is going to help, but it helps your state of mind if you’ve done everything you can to keep your job. And who knows, maybe these tips will help you keep the job you’ve got.

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7 Cover Letter Mistakes You Make When Applying Via E-mail

How many times have you replied to a job ad via e-mail by shooting them a copy of your resume and cover letter? I’m going to venture a guess and say at least 20 (but more likely hundreds of times) if you’ve been searching for any significant length of time. Here are some of the most notorious mistakes we’ve seen–and what you can do to greatly improve your chances of being noticed.
Attaching the cover letter to the e-mail.
What’s wrong with that, you ask? Most hiring managers aren’t going to open the cover letter and read it. They’ll go straight to the resume instead. Want to ensure your cover letter gets read? Copy and paste it into the body of the e-mail. Whoever received the e-mail will be much more likely to read it if it’s already right there in front of their face.
Writing your whole life story in the body of the e-mail.
Don’t go overboard with details; keep it short. The hiring manager won’t be willing to invest a lot of time reading your e-mail. Keep it short and to the point.

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Handling a Bossy Co-Worker

I’m willing to bet that most people have, at some point in their careers, encountered a co-worker who thinks she’s in charge. And I know from experience that depending on this person’s actual locus of control, she can make everyone’s lives miserable. So, Kathi Elster and Katherine Crowley advise going against the natural tendency to take this person down a peg and instead try soothing her savage breast with the music of compliments and praise.

Handling a Bossy Coworker — www.AskK2.com from K Squared on Vimeo.

Katherine Crowley, a Harvard trained psychotherapist, and Kathi Elster, a management consultant and executive coach, create the yin and yang of their company, K Squared Enterprises. Bestselling authors, educators, public speakers, executive coaches, and veteran consultants, Kathi and Katherine are seasoned guides in the area of professional fulfillment through self-awareness and self-management. Together they have written Working For You Isn’t Working For Me, The Ultimate Guide To Managing Your Boss and the national bestseller, Working with You Is Killing Me: Freeing Yourself from Emotional Traps at Work.

Factors [That] Influence Your Website’s Ranking on Google

How to Get Your Website Ranked on Google’s First Page
Getting listed on Google’s first result page is the goal of every webmaster. Unfortunately, many webmasters still do the wrong things to improve their rankings and fail to realize the best possible performance for their
website.
The thing to remember is that it’s not possible to get top 10 rankings on Google by focusing on a single strategy. Getting listed on Google requires you to work on all elements of your website. Here are the top 5 factors that influence the position of your website in Google’s search results:
Ranking factor 1: website accessibility
It doesn’t make sense to optimize your web pages if search engines cannot access your web pages:

• Your robots.txt file should allow search engines to visit your web pages. If your robots.txt file contains errors then many search engines won’t list your website.
• The HTML code of your web pages should be error-free and your web server should return the correct response code. The contents of your web pages should be readable to search engine spiders.

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Article by, David Amerland and courtesy of Associated Content, Inc.

Gain Attention and Profits for Your Business by Podcasting

Podcasting is a very powerful, profitable medium for reaching your audience and brining in new clients. Out of 22 million adults who own an iPod or a
MP3 player device, 29 percent of the people have downloaded a podcast. With so many people relying on the Internet for the daily content, podcasting has become a popular way to receive information or entertainment while on the go.
Podcasting is a great way to gain attention to your products and services as well. While they’re meant to be free, they can be a powerful marketing tool for gaining the attention of new clients and profiting from them.
So what is the trick to gaining attention and creating a successful podcast series in a timely manner for profit?
The best way to gain this attention is to give away a taste of your product or service information for free. Giving away the first few lessons of your information program for free is a great way to gain attention and to retain those customers for future profit opportunities. Offer a free lesson a week when they sign up to your weekly podcast. You can use this opportunity to continually provide information and to up sell your primary products for profit. People love free information and by providing a series of informative podcasts you have a great chance at gaining, retaining and profiting from new customers. Continue reading …
Article by, Michael Perez and courtesy of Associated Content, Inc.

Don’t Ask For a Job

The LinkedIn InMail went like this:
“Dear Ms. Strayer, I am looking to relocate back to [your] area and was interested in opportunities with [your company]. Would you have some time to speak with me?”
My gut reaction? No. And here’s why.
When someone asks you for something it is human nature to want to be able to respond to their request. So when someone asks you for a job, if you don’t have one to give, your reaction is likely to be negative. You might reach back and say “well, we don’t have any jobs open” or you might just send them to your company’s careers site.
After all, they didn’t ask for anything in particular, or reference your personal expertise so it might just be easier, right? I don’t know this person and there was no reference to how the person found my information.

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3 Myths About Google Profiles and 2 Reasons to Have One Anyway

Your Google Profile is a very important part of your online identity.
[Disclaimer: Vizibility.com is a Personal Branding Blog sponsor]
USA Today published a survey last week from The Creative Group about evaluating candidates for marketing and advertising jobs. In it, 72% of respondents said they would conduct a web search using the candidate’s name while 59% said they would look at a profile on LinkedIn. For those of you with questionable content on your Facebook pages, take heart in that only 44% of prospective employers said they would look there.
This survey, and others like it, reinforces where we go for trusted information. Google is one of the most trusted brands in the world. A user-produced profile on LinkedIn is valuable but for an unbiased, uncensored look at someone’s background, “Googling” and being “Googled” have become the standard practice.

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Top 3 Cover Letter Mistakes

Cover letter mistakes you’re probably making
As a career coach and professional resume writer, I’m often asked “How important are cover letters to my job search?” My answer is, “It depends on how long you want to search for your next job.” If you are in no hurry to get interviews, then don’t worry about your cover letter.
The fact is I’ve never met a job searcher who wants to have a painfully slow job search. The whole point of sending out resumes is to get multiple interviews as quickly as possible. But many job seekers still unwittingly sabotage their efforts by using substandard cover letters. Instead of helping you, your cover letter may actually be hurting your job search. Continue reading …
New Grad Life is the only blog solely dedicated to providing free resources to recent college graduates or soon-to-be grads for topics such as job hunting, resume/interview help, networking tips, money management, and more.

There’s good news and bad in outlook for salaries

Is there hope for salary recovery after the recession?
No one is certain how long the current economic downturn will last, but if that weren’t bad enough, economic experts are starting to ask the hard questions that come afterwards. For example, will the job market return to normal — or will we have to settle for a “new normal”?
It’s beginning to seem a bit like an earthquake: the 30 seconds of shaking that gets your attention, followed by the long-term damage discovered later. The recession has shaken everyone up, and now there’s a lot of scrambling to figure out if workers are going to have to adjust their expectations for a long time to come.
One of the hottest topics is salary, and Glassdoor.com just tackled the issue, saying:

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