34 Jokes About Careers Job Search

34 Jokes About Careers Job Search Heres a little list of workplace jokes that made us laugh. Well, at least smile. If you can think of more, please let us know in the comments and we can add to the list! I just lost my job as a psychic. I did not see that coming. Hard work pays off in the future, laziness pays off now. Im looking for a job where I am politely ignored and left to my own devices. With unlimited Internet access, doughnuts, and coffee. If a jobs worth doing, its too hard. I quit my job working for Nike.  Just couldnt do it anymore. I love being a maze designer. I get completely lost in my work. I worked very hard to get to where I am in life.  An unemployed university graduate. Inspecting mirrors is a job I could really see myself doing. Sure Im willing to work longer hours at work. As long as theyre lunch hours. I think my job interview to be a bug sorter went well. I boxed all the right ticks. Interviewer: Whats your biggest weakness? Me: I dont know when to quit. Interviewer: Youre hired.  Me: I quit. Then I worked in the woods as a lumberjack, but I just couldn’t hack it, so they gave me the ax. After that, I tried to be a tailor, but I just wasn’t suited for it. Mainly because it was a so-so job. Next, I tried working in a muffler factory but that was exhausting. I wanted to be a barber, but I just couldn’t cut it. Then I tried to be a chefâ€"figured it would add a little spice to my life but I just didn’t have the thyme. Finally, I attempted to be a deli worker, but any way I sliced it, I couldn’t cut the mustard. My best job was being a musician, but eventually I found I wasn’t noteworthy. I studied a long time to become a doctor, but I didn’t have any patients. I became a professional fisherman but discovered that I couldn’t live on my net income. Thought about becoming a witch, so I tried that for a spell. Im aspirin to be a chemist. I wanted to be a tree doctor but I faint at the sight of sap. I managed to get a good job working for a pool maintenance company, but the work was just too draining. I got a job at a zoo feeding giraffes but I was fired because I wasn’t up to it. Next, I found being an electrician interesting, but the work was shocking. After many years of trying to find steady work, I finally got a job as a historian until I realized there was no future in it. I applied for a job in Australia but seems I dont have the right koalifications. Being friends with co-workers is like having pet tigers. fun in theory but you still wonder when they will turn on you. I had a job at MinuteMaid orange juice. I got fired because I couldn’t concentrate. I used to be a postman until I got the sack. I worked at the bank as a teller for a while…until I starting losing interest. I wanted to be a baker, really  kneaded the dough. I focused on being a photographer, but nothing ever developed. RELATED: Top Interview Blunders on Twitter.

How To Clean Your Engagement Ring Lil Wayne Style

How To Clean Your Engagement Ring Lil Wayne Style Anyone want to travel back in the day and read the title of this post like Lil Wayne?! Bling! Bling! Every time I come around your city, BLING BLING! Thanks!  That was nice. Anyway, I think of that song every time I look at my beautiful engagement ring.  There are two things you can do to make your bling, well BLING! First, nothing sets off a pretty ring, or jewelry for that matter, like a manicure.  I love a good manicure.  I prefer THE GEL. If you have not tried one, they-are-the-bomb.  Truth.  As a teacher I wash my hands and tables like every five minutes.  A manicure does not stand a chance against such conditions.  Then, I found the gel manicure.  Some salons call it no chip.  I call it, the best thing ever, amen.  I can get a gel manicure and go a solid two weeks without any chips, peels, or problems. What nail color do you use to emphasize your favorite jewelry?  My color choice today was bright apple red.  It is such a happy color that reminds me of teaching, like a big red apple on a teachers desk. (Ironically enough, I have received many lovely gifts from students but have never recieved an actual apple from a kiddo.) I also chose the bright red because I had gone a few months in the black/nearly black nail color family and wanted a change.  Love the red.  Bling, bling! I have to say that there is nothing better than a fresh set-o-nails!  They make me smile.  So, back to the Lil Wayne reference.  Ever since getting engaged I made it a top priority to get my nails done (way more than necessary, I assure you).  Having a fresh mani makes me look at my beautiful ring even more.  I look closer and closer until I feel a crazy desire to clean the bling. The second way to make your ring bling is to clean it.  How do you clean your rings/jewelry? I love to use Windex Vinegar spray.  I spin my ring around so the diamond is in the palm of my hand.  I spray five or six times.  Finally I use an old, soft bristle toothbrush to get in all the nooks and crannies.  It clears all the gunk.  Bling!  Bling! If I have a little more time, I use the ultra sonic machine my husband got me when we got engaged. Cheers!

Remodeling Referral Services Why You Shouldnt Use Them

Remodeling Referral Services Why You Shouldnt Use Them Im a proud supporter of small business.  After all, for two hundred years its been the backbone of American growth and innovation.  I was  involved in the remodeling business myself.  So I know the hard work and long hours thats required to make a go of it.  And thats true  in not just contracting but just about any business.  So I get a bit miffed when I see the ads for referral services. Referral services typically advertise on television.  They usually have friendly-sounding names.  Thats to make it easy for you to think theyre just a concerned man or woman who wants to help you from getting ripped off.  But theyre also part of your local big box home improvement store business model.  Some even charge fees to you, the consumer, and then promote their own paying advertisers first. Remodeling Referral Services:  What They Do No matter whether its the ones that have tons of television ads or the operations of big box retailers, the real mechanics are simple.  They hook you up with a local contractor.  And they can skim off ten to twenty-five of the labor charges as a referral fee that comes out of the contractors pay.  You dont ever see that part of the transaction, but thats how it works.  On the surface, they may either claim or appear to be doing their service out of the goodness of their hearts.  It might look like there is  no cost to you. Whats happening is that this middle man is getting paid for being a middle man.   And the contractor is seeing his or her profit margins cut significantly.  For a contractor, it can be the difference between just making a living and being the owner of a successful business.  Personally, Im all about helping people achieve success in their small business ventures. There are some contractors who legitimately use these referral services to keep their calendar full.  But if everyone stopped using the referral services and went directly to the contractor, their calendars would be just as full. What To Do Instead Lets say you want to remodel your bathroom.  Dont call up the referral services or let the big box store provide one.  Instead, invest a few minutes and find your own contractor.  With the amount of consumer ratings and recommendations that are easily found online, you can do pretty much the same thing the referral service does AND help keep the profits where they belong:  In the pockets of those who do the work.  So youll want to Check the Better Business Bureau Search for consumer ratings, both negative and positive, online. Check with your local city, county or state for proper licensing. Once youve done that, youre ready to find materials you like.  Taking that bathroom as an example, break it down into pieces and make categories of items to shop for.  Youll have the following: Cabinets.  The new cabinet may be big or small, or you may decide to forego it altogether and go with a minimalist theme. Tile.  The bathroom retile  can be the messiest part of the job.  But it will be part of the central focus of your new room.  There are virtually hundreds of kinds of tile, including  porcelanosa tile, true porcelain, ceramic, and even natural stone. Fixtures.  Gone are the days of just a handful of drab choices.  Todays fixtures can be as exotic or futuristic as your imaginations and desires, like those offered by Zuchetti USA.   Theres no reason you cannot achieve that same luxurious look youve seen in resort suites.  And once you have your material and a contractor selected, youll be on your way.  And, youll be helping small business and your local contractors to keep doing what theyve been doing for hundreds of years.  Making and keeping the American economy vibrant and strong. Image credits Contractor     Main  

BeKnown To Be Found - A Monstrous New App - Personal Branding Blog - Stand Out In Your Career

BeKnown To Be Found - A Monstrous New App - Personal Branding Blog - Stand Out In Your Career There is a “New Kid on the Block” in the tremendously popular and widely used professional networking arena. That “New Kid,” who has the potential of soon being the “BIG Kid on the Block,” is a new application known as “BeKnown,” released June 25th by giant online job hunting site Monster.com. The application has been designed and engineered to run inside Facebook, thereby providing users the potential of building professional connections with the nearly three-quarters of a billion users currently on Facebook. As a result of that potential, BeKnown is expected to easilyâ€"and quickly!â€"take a key position alongside the current giants of LinkedIn, ZoomInfo and Jigsaw. (NOTE: Facebook does NOT endorse BeKnown, or any other applications designed to be run within Facebook, for that matter.) In essence, BeKnown will bring the worldwide leader in connecting people to job opportunities (Monster) to the world’s largest and most active social network (Facebook). Any way you look at it, this should be huge, both for job seekers and hiring companies! Let me count the ways Why should you even care about this new social network? Let me count the ways. In recent blogs we have strongly and repeatedly emphasized that, for purposes of properly BRANDING yourself, it is very critical that you be . . . Findable Desirable Contactable Selectable When it comes to finding a new job, for years the adage has been, “It is not WHAT you know but WHO you know.” As I’ve mentioned several times in recent blogs, today it’s “not WHAT you know but WHO you know, who knows YOU and can you be FOUND?” What this means Whether we like it or not, there simply is no longer any job stability. Loyalty to a single employer, and likewise, loyalty from a company to its employees, are quaint concepts. This does not mean, however, that you should jump ship for every opportunity that comes along. What it does mean is that you need to be constantly . . . Ensuring that you are making your company money or saving your company money. Quantifying those accomplishments and achievements in terms of dollars, numbers and percentages. Building and enhancing your professional networks so you can be found. Notice in the last bullet point above I used the plural of the word “network,” as in “networks.” Certainly you should already be on LinkedIn, ZoomInfo and Jigsaw. Today I am strongly recommending that you also quickly come up to speed and be among the first to exploreâ€"and take advantage ofâ€"what looks to be another major professional network, BeKnown! In upcoming blogs I will be exploring BeKnown in greater, more specific detail, but for now, I suggest you go to www.beknown.com and download the application. Play around with it and experiment. (I’ve already done this and it was fun and exciting) Obviously, that’s the starting point for being able to tap into the vast network of professionals currently on Facebook The advantage of the network Here are just a few of the many advantages I have already discovered on BeKnown: •By downloading the app, you are able to build a professional network inside Facebook that will be separate and distinct from your personal connections. (In other words, BeKnown connections will be separate and distinct.) BeKnown enables you to reach out and build a network among 750 million people (nearly 70 percent of whom are between the prime professional ages of 25 and 54) vs. LinkedIn’s 100 million. Upon launching your BeKnown app, you will be able to invite all of your LinkedIn contacts to join BeKnown. A great starting point! Strong privacy settings will allow you to control what information is shared with others and easily manage your data. BeKnown integrates professional networking with access to jobs, patented tools and resources available only from Monster. The downside The only weakness of BeKnown that I have thus far found is that you can’t search for people using keyword searching. You can only add people by searching for names. One would hopeâ€"and expect, actuallyâ€"that Monster will soon add additional searchable technology to the app so that one can more quickly and easily build a targeted group of connections. Even at this early stage of development, what I have seen thus far of BeKnown has me quite excited. It should have you quite excited too! Author: Skip Freeman is the author of “Headhunter” Hiring Secrets: The Rules of the Hiring Game Have Changed . . . Forever! and is the President and Chief Executive Officer of The HTW Group (Hire to Win), an Atlanta, GA, Metropolitan Area Executive Search Firm. Specializing in the placement of sales, engineering, manufacturing and RD professionals, he has developed powerful techniques that help companies hire the best and help the best get hired.

In Digital Transformation, HR is Your Most Trusted Friend CareerMetis.com

In Digital Transformation, HR is Your Most Trusted Friend â€" CareerMetis.com Source â€" DepositPhotos.comWhen we hear about corporate digital transformation projects, we usually imagine massive undertakings on an organizational level. What we don’t often discuss, however, is that these seemingly large projects are actually several small transformations that occur concurrentlyacross different teams and departments.Most organizations today work under strict hierarchies that divide not just responsibility and authority, but also communications and interaction between teams. This unfortunate status quo creates siloes across organizations that limit day-to-day efficiency, but also make undertaking company-wide projects a nightmare when there is no cohesion.Even though digital transformation projectsâ€"adding digital communications, integrating new tools, and moreâ€"are meant to help collaboration and improve overall efficiency, they can fall flat when they’re not coordinated. This is where your Human Resources team becomes crucial. Thanks to their unique posit ion, HR teams can act as bridges between teams and ensure that digital transformations are smooth and successful.Silo Walls Are Hard to Tear Down evalevalIt’s not uncommon for organizationsto structure themselves into neatly divided silos. Rapid growth and expanding responsibilities for different departments make it easier to keep every group focused on their own work, separate from the bigger picture. Indeed, silos do offer some benefitsâ€"the ability to focus on a single issue at a time, better intra-team communication, and a clearer hierarchyâ€"but they create more problems than they solve.Consulting firm McKinsey estimates in a recent study that less than 30% of digital transformations succeed, while only 16% have markedly improved performance. The problem is also worse as companies grow, with small organizations Nevertheless, while digital transformations are broad undertakings, they are stressful times for smaller teams. Here, HR’s role is to support each team and understa nd how their needs fit into the larger scope of the project. By coordinating at multiple levels, HR also helps ensure that the digital transformation’s goals and needs link up.Perhaps most crucially, then, HR’s role is to break down the walls each team has built for its silo and create better communication between teams during times of synchronized evolution.Organizational Change is Hard but PossibleCreating the right basis for a successful digital transformation is no easy task. From ensuring you have the resources you need to actually carry out a complex plan, it requires an immense effort. However, keeping your teams walled off from each other can only make things harder for you.By entrusting HR to take the lead and build communication channels that can support this massive undertaking, you can improve your odds of success, and more importantly ensure that your investment will pay off with sustainable improvements.

Your Future Is In Big Data

Your Future Is In Big Data Data Science and Analytics, or DSA What if there was one skill set you could acquire that would help you secure a new job across every industry and in almost any occupation? Companies are screaming for employees with talent in this field and it doesnt (yet) require a four-year degree. What is it? Data Science and Analytics, or DSA Data science is the study of data. It requires an understanding of mathematics (especially statistics) and may also require familiarity with information from machine learning, how to mine data or visualizing data. The interesting thing about DSA skills is that they fall across multiple occupations and industries. In other words, youll find these skills used by corporate leaders, human resource managers and even front line managers who are now required to analyze vast amounts of data to make strategic and operational decisions. Data Science Jobs Are In Demand There is a growing need by employers to fill DSA jobs, as the number of openings continues to climb. By 2020, there will be 2.72 million postings for data science and analytics roles, according to Investing in America’s Data Science and Analytics Talent by PwC and the Business-Higher Education Forum. There is a shortage of qualified candidates with these skills. In a poll by Gallup for the PwC and Business-Higher Education Forum report,  only 23% of college and university leaders say their graduates will have those skills. The good news for you is, 69% of employers expect candidates with DSA skills to get preference for jobs in their organizations by 2021. Due to the scarcity of these skills, in many instances, the bar to entry has been lowered in order to meet demand. Image via PwC  Investing in America’s data science and analytics talent Hot Industries Titles To Watch DSA jobs most frequently appear in the finance and insurance; information technology; and professional, scientific and technical services industries, according to the report from PwC and the Business-Higher Education Forum. The report cited these industries also had a need for DSA skills: health care and social assistance, retail trade and manufacturing. Image via PwC Data Analysis Skills Needed At Every Level Youll also see titles requiring DSA skills within finance, marketing and information technology divisions. Be on the lookout for titles such as financial analyst, business analyst or intelligence analyst. If you have a technical background, set your target on database architect or business intelligence architect roles that will tap into your knowledge of databases and programming. Image via PwC Image via PwC Acquiring DSA skills can help you become more valuable to employers, which translates into job stability. And because every company needs these skills, youll be able to transition to new industries should you decide you want a new environment or culture. Where To Find Training and Education Opportunities If data science and analytics interests you, you may want to begin by honing your math skills first. These skills will provide the foundation to help you understand how to analyze data. Colleges and universities have been slow to add the requisite skills to their curricula, but community colleges, partnering with local businesses, have begun adding certificate programs. Youll also need to learn how to use software associated with extracting and analyzing data. Software-specific training is available through a variety of mediums and software companies sometimes offer online training themselves. PwC and IBM both offer employees training to help equip them with these hard-to-find skills. In fact, PwC has made their DSA courses publicly available on the Coursera online learning platform- Data Analysis and Presentation Skills: the PwC Approach Specialization. The entry-level courses cover data analysis and visualization skills. The New Collar Jobs Traditional white-collar and blue-collar jobs are no longer the only options. New collar jobs are new jobs that rapidly emerge from new technology. These jobs rely on experience or vocational training and typically dont require a four-year college degree. IBMs CEO, Ginni Rometty used the term new collar jobs for USA Today, where she wrote, As industries from manufacturing to agriculture are reshaped by data science and cloud computing,  jobs are being created that demand new skills â€" which in turn requires new approaches to education, training and recruiting. According to Rometty, new collar jobs include titles such as cloud computing technicians and services delivery specialists. Doing More To Bridge the Gap Experts agree that the best way to bridge the skills gap is through partnerships. Companies and colleges that align can mutually benefit and determine how well this gap gets filled. IBM has designed high school programs combining community college courses to instill these skills, according to Rometty in USA Today. Self-study is another option. Stay up to date by reading industry publications, attending industry events and attending training sessions. The bottom line: Investing your time and energy into learning a new skill set will help you stand out and hold on to your job. This post originally appeared on US News World Report On Careers

The most important thing a job seeker can do -

The most important thing a job seeker can do - Being able to tell your story and to tell it well is one of the most important skills a job seeker can have. My friend, Ken Revenaughs blog, Fast Track Tools, shares information about how to tell good career stories. He reminds us that being a good communicator relies on collecting factoids and being able to share them with an audience. Another resource for job search storytelling is fellow Career Collective member, Katharine Hansens book, Tell Me About Yourself. You may not have realized that interviewing is mainly about being able to tell a story well. The most important thing for job seekers? Learning how to SHOW, not just TELL. This applies to the resume, all written correspondence, networking meetings, online profiles any place where you have an opportunity to detail exactly how you can help the organization solve its problems. Maybe you can touch on problems the organization does not even know that it has? If you can network your way into a company, you have a chance to show why they need you. A great example of how to show, not tell is the OnStar commercials. They say, Whether you need help to get to where youre going, or want peace of mind with safety and security in an emergency situation, OnStar has your back. But, they dont leave it at that. Their commercials vividly recount situations when having their system made the difference between life and death. I admit that most of the commercials give me goosebumps. (No, this is not a sponsored post!) Take a look at their latest ad and think about how you can do a better job of being the person your target organization cannot do without. If you want to learn how to look for a job today, check out The Career Summitmore than a dozen online presentations to help you land that next job!