Choosing a Career Coach or Guidance Counselor

Maybe you have exhausted all your ideas in solving your existential crisis or repeatedly failing job hunt. Another way to find what you're doing next with your life is to find a career coach (counselor or guide).  Career coaches  can help you find your dream job.

In order to find a career counselor,

1. Ask friends if they have ever used a career counselor and have suggestions

2. Try the telephone book ( Ancient, I know)

3. Use the internet, google search career counselors in your area. 

4. Your college or university's career center (This one might actually be free to students and Alumni!)

Important Questions to ask include

• What is your program?
• Who will be counseling? What is their experience? 
• Do you have a sucess rate? 
• What is the cost for this service? 
• Is there a contract? (please, take it home and read it. Do NOT blindly sign)

Also, fair warning that "Pay me first" packages tend to be  a scam. I have not had experience with any of them, but reading the fine print is important!

If you're frustrated, I guarantee it won't hurt to investigate career coaching and job counseling. 

Dealing with your Feelings while hunting for work

The job search can be a trying time. It's easy to be full of anxiety and nervousness while trying to figure out what job you will do next. It gets even worse when money is tight and it feels like no end is in site. The longer the job hunt goes on, the less money is available for use.  Feelings of unhappiness, hopelessness, and depression are common.  It is very important to deal with these feelings. Richard Bolles, the author of What Color is your Parachute offers a few suggestions for dealing with one's feelings while unemployed.

1. Get enough sleep! If  you are not getting enough rest, your body is not functioning all that well. I know this sounds hypocritical coming from a college student nearing finals week. What it comes down to is that you will feel better if you get enough sleep
2. Live a healthy lifestyle! This includes regular exercise, drinking plenty of water, reducing sugars, and eating a healthy and balanced diet.  
3. Change the physical surroundings around you. Many believe that your physical surroundings reflect how you feel. If they are a messy disaster, you likely will feel like a mess and anxious disaster. 
4. Get out! ( No literally, go outside and enjoy nature daily!) 
5. Focus on other people and their problems. Try volunteering at a place that interests you where you can also help others. Examples include a food bank, a hospital, or an animal shelter. 
6. Go on mini adventures! Explore  the area you live in. Find places you've never been and enjoy them. This will give you a break from obsessing about your unemployment.
7. Expand your mental horizons! Learn to better understand your brain to help heal. If that does not interest you, learn something new that sounds interesting to you. Did you want to play an instrument as a child? Never got around to it? Try it! 
8. Talk to people! Particularly relatives and close friends to release your pent up feelings. This will help you gain power over your feelings. 
9. Get angry! Go the gym or even use your pillows as a punching bag. This will help  you get some of your anger and frustration out. 
10. Keep a gratitude journal. Make a daily list of things you're grateful for. This will help you stop brooding about what is wrong and instead, think about the precious gifts we have. 

Keep your head up, the job hunt will eventually end. The feelings are hard to deal with now, but they will be replaced with different feelings when you finally get the job. All of these recommendations are still good recommendations for when you land a job. 

Do you have a mission?

To find one's mission in life,  a person must define what is unique about them.

Our mission can guide us, telling us who we are, what we want to do, and what we plan to do in the future.  By following your mission you are being something as opposed to just doing things. Having a mission can help one decide what he or she is going to do with his or her time. What is he or she going to accomplish in his or her life? This sounds great,  but what on earth are the parameters for an individual or a companies mission statement?  

Some things to remember about finding ones mission

1.  Your mission exists in your daily life, you just need to find it!
2. Your mission improves the human race is some way of another. 
3. Your mission will be strengthened by using your talents to complete it, in places that are appealing and interesting to you, and will fill a gap society lacks. 

Denise Morrison, the CEO of Campbell's soup, defines her mission statement as follows: She hopes "To serve as a leader, live a balanced life, and apply ethical principles to make a significant difference."
Her mission statement fits all of the parameters mentioned above, it's something that relates to her daily life, improves the world through her management of her Campbell's soup company, and it dictates her decisions. 


It'll likely take time to create a mission statement that you full-heartedly support, but understanding yourself and your goals enough to have a mission statement will guide your future. Don't worry if it's not as short and concise as Denise Morrison's mission statement. 

You Could Be Your Own Boss

It's not easy and there are a lot of ways to fail. Here are some tips to become a successful entrepreneur.

1. Write

Write to figure out who you are and what you want to do. Look at (or create your resume) and find out what skills you already posses, what things you like, and how you can combine these skills and interest to get paid!

2. Read

Learn all you can about running your own business by reading. The author suggests a few places to look into including Daniel Pink's "Free Agent," workingsolo.com, Small Business Administration, A Small Business Expert, Business Owners' Toolkit, Business Owners' Idea Cafe,  Nolo's Business. LLC

3. Explore

Interview and look into others who have started a similar business, find out their mistakes and challenges. You need to figure out what skills, knowledge, and experience you have, what skills, knowledge, and experience you need, and finally what skills knowledge and experience you lack that is required for your business.

4. Get Feedback

Workingsolo.com and checkster.com are websites that ask the hard questions of whether you're cut out to run your own business.  Ultimately, you should discuss your plan with people who are important to you and close to you and see how they feel about it.

In the end, if you decide you do indeed want to be an entrepreneur, know that this involves some risk and that having a plan B if your plan doesn't work is very important. Have a plan b drawn out before you even start your initial plan!

Best of luck!

Finding a Career

Let's face it, in a world full of distractions, obligations, and complex long term decisions, it's hard to decide what to do with your time.

Do  I go to grad school? Do I enter the work force? Should I become a doctor? Will I have financial security? Will I enjoy what career I choose?

In Richard Bolles' book What Color Is Your Parachute? He discusses the numerous way people decide on a career to pursue.

Some ways to explore possible careers include
1. Looking all around the black hole we call the Internet. Sources like the occupation outlook handbook provide information about employment rate of jobs.
2. Through tests that analyze personality and interests like the Dr.Holland's Self Directed Search. The problem with tests is that they sometimes limit people too much to thinking that they have to pursue 1 specific career. The reality is that these tests should provide ideas as to what to do next.
3. Bolles' flower method which analyzes different aspect of one's life, aspirations, and current abilities to find a  dream career.
4. Changing careers in two steps by changing both he field and job you have to what you want. By doing this in two steps you gain experience in the field before getting your dream job.
5. Choosing a job based on what the job market currently needs by looking at projections of future "hot jobs.

The moral of the story is that multiple methods can help decide what career to persue d how to get there.  The adventure is trying the different method and finding a career that interstests you.

Everyone has Handicaps and Dragons

Have you ever met that person that seems like they have everything figured out? They know exactly what they want to do, where they want to be in 5 years, and have the perfect balance of work and play. It seems like there is absolutely nothing that can slow them down.

This sounds great, but does not realistically represent people. People are full of doubt and insecurities. Sometimes we find success, but we still feel like importers.

Handicaps can be physical disabilities, but they do not necessarily have to be.

Some examples include

• I am physically limited and cannot perform certain tasks ( a physical handicap) 
•  feeling like you lack experience or qualifications
•  I don't have the right degree
• I don't fit the "look"
• I'm too young and inexperienced
• I'm too old
• I'm too shy

The best way to approach a handicap is not to treat it as something that is limiting you. Instead, have a positive attitude towards it. This handicap is adding to your charm.

Keep a positive attitude, and do not let dragons prevent you from pursuing a job, a career, or even just an interest. 

Exploring Careers

In Chapter 8 of What Color Is your Parachute, Bolles discusses finding a job that overlaps with one's interests.

The reality, is that finding a job that overlaps with your interest is not always easy.  It also can be scary to make the decision of pursuing one job or the other. There seems to always be a slight sinking feeling that you're missing something by picking one career choice or the other. The hardest part, perhaps is where does one even begin? Do you go left, right, forward? What decisions do you make? It begins to feel a lot like being stuck in a corn maze, but a really large corn maze with no end in sight.

My best advice to the chronic existential is explore your options.  Talk to people in the fields you're interested in and get their takes.  This will also give you a better understanding of what the jobs your interested in entail and make you a more prepared interview candidate and job seeker.

To find out more about a company and feel less stuck in a maze,

• Read published materials from an organization be it from a website or in print
• Look for people to talk to at the organization or similar organizations.
• Look on the internet! Be wary, as I'm sure you know, the internet is vast and full of information.
• The author suggests www.Glassdoor.com, which contains reviews of companies.
• Try a temp agency
• www.Rateatemp.com is  a temp agency directory 
• Volunteer
• www.internships.com
• www.volunteeringinamerica.gov
• www.volunteermatch.org

Finding a career takes time and not letting the frustration get to you is very important. Keep exploring!

The Parachute Way of job hunting

The Parachute way is an alternate way to approach the job hunt that is not just writing a resume and cover letter and sending it out into the world.   Instead of focusing on the job market, you think about yourself, who you are, and what you most want to do and then find an organization that matches you.  I'm a little unsure about this method because it is so different than the traditional job hunting method.

Instead of waiting for the company to have  a vacancy, you should approach the company through a person who knows both you and the company, regardless of whether they're actually hiring or not.

It's worth a try in my opinion, even if it's hard to find your true following. You could end up finding a job that you absolutely love for years upon years to come, and that's pretty incredible.

Dreaded Job Interviews

As a senior in college, entering the real world strikes images of resumes,cover letters, and perhaps the scariest part, job interviews. It's not necessarily because job interviews are scary, but because intelligently talking about oneself in a professional manner can be hard!

In Chapter 4 of Richard Bolles' book,  What Color is Your Parachute? he gives various advice to job hunters embarking on the interview process including:

• A friendly reminder that while amidst in the job hunt, you're going to hear NO, NO, NO, NO, NO, NO, and NO many times before you here YES, YOU HAVE THE JOB!
• Go on interviews having researched the company. Look at their website, search newspaper databases for mentions of the company your interviewing with, and ask family and friends if they know anyone who works at the company. Know what the company does and what you're getting yourself into, which honestly is a good idea with anything you chose to pursue in life.
• Honor agreements between you and your prospective employer
• Realize that both you and the prospective employer are collecting data on each other. You both have to decide if you like each other, it is not a one sided event. 50% of the talking should be you, the other 50% should be the prospective employer. This being said, make sure you feel like you will like the company before you start marketing yourself.   
• Expect to be asked to "Tell me about yourself." Answer this open ended question tactfully. Answer with what kind of experiences, skills, or knowledge,that are relevant to the job you are interviewing for.  Have this answer summarized and well rehearsed.  It's your elevator speech.
• 5 questions that may  be approached in various forms are 
• Why are you here?
• What can you do for us? 
• What kind of person are you?
• What distinguishes you from the other people applying for this job? 
• Can we as a company afford you?
• Appear presentable
• avoid nervous mannerisms like avoiding eye contact, a bad handshake, slouching, or fiddling with your hair.  
• show confidence while interviewing ( Yes, I know, easier said than done)
• Be nice to everyone and thank the employer before leaving. 
• Remember employers are trying to predict your future behavior and how it relates to their company. 
• e-mail and send a hand-written thank you note

The Art of Job Hunting

In the third chapter of  What Color is Your Parachute?, Bolles' addresses the constantly changing job market. He compares job hunting to dating. An employer and an employee meet, try to decide if they have anything to offer the other, if they can get along, and if the relationship will last long term.  Sometimes the relationship lasts, sometimes it does not work out.  The relationship is not one sided. Both the employer and employee have power to affect the relationship.

We are constantly inundated with bleak job market predictions. These do not necessarily reflect the reality. Often we focus on how many people are unemployed in a month as opposed to how many people landed jobs within a month. The point is, it's a matter of perspective. It's easy to be frustrated with one's inability to find a job. Job hunting is an art, you need to sell who you are to your potential employer. The methods to do this are always changing and depend on the technological environment. The process takes a lot of time and effort.

In May, I'd like to remind myself of these facts. Job hunting is a full-time job. It takes time, effort, and luck to find a job.

The Internet Has Parts of Your New Resume (and You Might Not Even Know It!)

Thanks to the internet age, we have an abundance of information at our fingertips. You may be using this internet's  wealth of information to figure out how to properly poach an egg in the microwave at am or to see what your friends,family and complete strangers are up to. It's easy to get lost searching! It's as easy as typing into Google!

Seeing as finding information on the internet is so easy it's not surprise that employers look up their interview candidates too. According to Richard Bolles, in What Color Is Your Parachute, 91% of U.S. employers have visited a job hunters profile on social networks and 69% rejected a candidate based on their discoveries.

This being said, it is important to maintain an online presences that is up to date. LinkedIn is an important site to keep a digital resume. Through a LinkedIn profile, besides just having a photo, job title, past job experience, a summary, and experiences listed you can add more to resume without page  limits! One can link to project sites, blogs, forums, twitter (if it is professional), and YouTube videos within one's expertise. Friendly reminder, your online presence should show who you are, but also remain professional.

Although having an online resume sounds great, it is still important to have a traditional resume. Traditional resumes are not dinosaurs. They are still regularly used, but your online presense can supplement a traditional resume.

Your traditional resume should include segments such as:

• Volunteer, community, and unpaid work
• Education
• Administration, customer service, and accounts
• Responsibilities taken on
• Event planning and management experience
• Memberships
• Technology experience
• Published or presented works

There are not official rules for a resume. The goal is to persuade the person that wants to hire you, to invite you in based on an appealing resume.  Some companies even post resumes of their employees to give an idea of what future employees should expect.

Your best shot of finding a job is writing your resume and sending it out into the world. So, embrace having both an online presence, an online resume, and a traditional resume. To find a job, you're marketing yourself, your skills, and your ideas and with today's standards that involves marketing yourself in few different ways.

What Color Is your Parachute?- The changing world of job hunting

The book What Color is Your Parachute? A Practical Manual for Job-Hunters and Career-Changers by Richard N. Bolles is not what I was expecting.

In college I have become accustomed to reading books that do not have a very good application to the real world; particularly the idea of finding a job upon entering the real world. Yes, I've read Plato and Socrates, and I do value the importance of the ideas of said philosophers.  I however, do not know how well I could use that knowledge to land myself a job in my field that I'm interested in as a biology major with a business minor.


The book lists reasons why the book is a good choice, for me the line "If you are trying to figure out what you want to do next, with your life, this book is for you." resonated with me.

Currently, the job hunt is frustrating.As Bolles points out, employers do not hunt for jobs in the same way as they have in the past. Employers have such a large pool of possible employees that they want the perfect dream employee. They may hold out on hiring  perfectly competent applicants because are not the mythical unicorn the company is waiting for. Similarly, the length of the job hunt has been increasing while the length of time of a job has been steadily decreasing. Many people are taking part time jobs and short time contracts  Job-seekers have also been having more and more trouble finding a middle-class salary.  To even be considered for many of this jobs, applicants are expected to have a college degree, or even sometimes an advanced college degree like a masters, PhD, or a doctoral degree.

We are spending more time hunting for jobs in our lifetimes. Maybe it's a blessing, maybe it's a curse, but we are able to hunt on the internet through various job board outlets.  As social media becomes more of a norm, they can also be used in the job hunt.  The job hunt is different then it was 20 years ago.

Luckily, Bolles argues that  "getting hired today is about who knows the most about how to get hired." To be hired, you need to BE CREATIVE.  Sure he listed expected suggestions like use contacts, don't rely solely on a resume, but he also made of very interesting points.I think all of these ideas are relevant to me as a prepare for a career post college. Bolles suggests job-seekers search for something that they are passionate about as opposed to a nine to five job that leaves one spending most of the day wishing it was five already. To do this, you need to define who you are and find a job that fits it. Don't research the job market, find out what is important in a job to you. Also, know what skills you want to use, where you want to use them, and in what way.

A suggestion I didn't expect was to avoid HR and aim to connect with a contact who has power over whether or not you get hired, HR department aside. He also suggests  asking for the job at the end of the interview. The author argues that it really does work, his readers say so. I think it'd be interesting to survey employers about how they respond if an employee asks for the job at the end of the interview. I'm curious if a study already exists.

My biggest take away from this chapter is that as a soon to be college graduate, I really need to prioritize skills I want to use in my career. They cannot just be skills I have, but hate, but skills I enjoy using. I am excited to continue reading this book as it makes me less anxious about entering the big scary "real world."