By Sandy Prock M.Ed., JCTC, Co-Owner of www.ExpertResume.com and  www.ExpertExecutiveResume.com

As an executive or manager, you are used to handling tough problems. Use that same skill when you approach your job search. You understand that defining a problem is half the solution. The same applies to your job search.

When you find a company, you are interested in dig in and do your research. Understand the company and their potential problems and then design potential solutions using your key skills and abilities, especially those skills and abilities driven by your passions.

Passion comes across in interviews. If you can tap into your passionate answers to their issues, you are well on your way to landing the job. You will also help to create for yourself a better position for negotiating your salary and benefits.

You want to be in the position where you are by far the best candidate and the company wants you! The more prepared you are and the more facts and figures you have about the company the better able you are to present your answers to their problems.

Executives and managers are visionaries and problem solvers. Visionaries often are great observers. You can be a great observer when you do the research. Yes, this takes time, but its time well spent! You did not get to where you are without effort.

I heard an advertising executive say once that there are very few talented people in advertising. Sometimes talent is overrated. Hard work is rarely overrated. Often, the person who puts in the time and effort is the one who shines.

If you put in the time and effort to understand your potential employer, it can benefit you in terms of new employment and place you in a better position to negotiate the salary and benefits you want.

Part of a successful executive/managerial job search must include a great resume and cover letter. Make sure you shine and stand out from the crowd!

Bob Prock won a national resume writing contest. If you have any questions about your resume, cover letter or other job search documents, feel free to call Bob at 1-864-292-5288 or email him at ExpertResume@yahoo.com

Bob and I wish you the best in your executive/managerial job search!

Sandy Prock M.Ed. (Masters in Education – Vocational Guidance and Counseling), JCTC (Job and Transition Coach), Co-owner of ExpertResume.com and www.ExpertExecutiveResume.com

What do you do when you have lost your passion for your job? Consider re-imagining your work potential.

What would happen if you paid attention to your dissatisfaction? What if your dissatisfaction was prompting you to reach out and find or create a new job?

What if feeling dissatisfied was a gentle nudge to help you fly out of your comfort zone and into new territory and new challenges.

Change is sometimes initiated with dissatisfaction or loss of interest and passion in your job. After all, why would we change if we didn’t have to?

It is never too late to change. Brain scientists have discovered the plasticity of the brain. They discovered that just about anyone could change if they want to. You can change no matter how old you are.

Re-imagine your life. What do you find no longer works for you? What do you want your life to look like in five years? Do you want to work more or less? Do you want more time to travel or time to pursue other interests? Do you want to downsize your life to open up time for other things? What would your best day look like? Where would you be working? Whom would you work with? When would you start your day? What days would you work? What would your duties be? What are your strengths? How can you work more hours using your strengths? Start asking questions. What comes up for you? Explore and see what may want to emerge.

In our culture, we are used to the idea of moving up the ladder - What if you wanted to change ladders.

People are starting to re-evaluate always wanting bigger and better. Listen to your heart and hear what it is saying to you now. Dissatisfaction can be a signal from a wise part of yourself knocking on your door. Open the door and begin to re-imagine your life from the new potential that may be waiting to reveal to you new ideas if you will consider listening, looking and learning.

Make sure your resume, cover letter and other documents reflect your change of heart. Go after what will bring you happiness and career/life satisfaction.

Bob Prock is an award winning resume writer. Feel free to call Bob at 1-864-292-5288 if you have any questions about your resume, cover letter or other job search documents. Or if you prefer, email Bob at ExpertResume@yahoo.com

Bob and I wish you the best in your career development.

Sandy Prock M.Ed. (Master’s in Education –Vocational Guidance and Counseling), JCTC (Job and Transition Coach), Co-Owner of www.ExpertResume.com

• Try different approaches and think outside the box.

• Refuse to give up and persist even when things are tough. We can learn from these mavericks about going through as many doors as needed until we succeed.

• How can you use your imagination in creating a new job opportunity?

• How can you be active and inventive in your job search?

• What unconventional paths could you take in your job search?

• How can you take informed and proactive risks in your job search?

• What lessons did you learn from your past employment experience that you can take forward with you into your next position?

• For an entrepreneur and anyone looking for work, imagination, risk taking, unconventional thinking and courage are essential ingredients for greatness and for success.

Life can be pulled by goals just as surely as it can be pushed by drives.
Viktor Frankl

Misfortunes often sharpen the genius.
Ovid

Try not to become a man of success but a man of value.
Albert Einstein

Make sure your resume is sharp and represents you well.

Bob Prock is a national award winning resume writer. If you have any questions about your resume or cover letter, feel free to call Bob at 1-864-292-5288 or email him at ExpertResume@yahoo.com

Bob and I wish you the best in your job search.

Sandy Prock, M.Ed., JCTC, Co-Owner of www.ExpertResume.com

By Sandy Prock M.Ed., JCTC, Co-Owner of www.ExpertResume.com

If you are out of work, you may feel the need to accomplish something every day at the same time you may most likely feel feelings of loss and grief. When you lose your job (whether it is your choice or not), feelings of loss are natural, even healthy. Losing a job can feel like a death.

You may think you need to get yourself into gear and start to kick yourself in the rear. Talk with that voice in your head that wonders what you are doing. Your first goal is to feel your very real feelings of loss and grief. If you do not deal with your feelings, they will deal with you. Painful feelings of loss and grief are normal and inescapable. Commit time every day to deal with your feelings. In the beginning of your transition – it is important to feel your feelings. This is the wise way to move through your grief and loss. When you make it a goal to feel your feelings and gain understanding – you are more likely got get on board with transitioning from your job loss and into your job search.

Here are some tools you can use you to work with and through your feelings:

• Talk or share with a trusted friend or colleague about your thoughts and feelings. In the beginning stages of loss and grief, it’s important to choose this individual wisely. Choose someone you trust. Choose someone who will provide a safe environment. Choose someone who can handle your difficult feelings. Choose someone who will let you talk and not give you advice. The time for advice is later, not at first. Feelings of loss and grief are painful, difficult and uncomfortable. However, stick with your process. It will pay off for you. If you don’t have a trusted friend or colleague, or you feel overwhelmed - feel free to find a therapist. This investment in yourself is wise. Feelings have a life of their own and if you don’t deal with them, they will deal with you.

• Write in a journal or on a computer your thoughts and feelings. The healing and restorative aspect of journaling requires you must write with the intention of understanding and learning. Research proves the act of self-expression, with the intention of learning and understanding your experience, eventually creates clarity, understanding and boosts your immune system. For more information read, “Opening Up – The Healing Power of Expressing Emotions” By James Pennebaker.

• Exercise - This is probably not new information for you. Exercise creates hormones that soothe and help you literally feel better.

• Do mundane tasks such as organizing, cleaning, and yard work – anything that you can physically accomplish each day, while allowing your mind to rest, and wander. Letting go of intense thinking allows you time and space for your intuition to jump on board and generate ideas and insights.

• Have fun – schedule in some fun time every day. Be with your friends and family. If you schedule these activities, you can cross them off your list when you accomplish these invigorating goals. Meet your achiever needs while enjoying others and having fun.

• When you are ready, start organizing your job search campaign. Review your accomplishments. Update your resume and other job search tools. There has never been a more important time to create documents (resume and cover letter etc.) that put your best foot forward. Set timelines for your goals. Make your job search your full-time job (most people don’t do this - take the reins of your job search). This way you increase your chances of landing a job. You may even land a better job. Read books and hone your interviewing skills.

• Meditate or Pray or do both. Meditation and Prayer are two more resources proven to heal and calm you during times of stress.

• Enjoy a Massage or Take a hot bath. Relax, relax, and relax. Relaxation is not only healing during times of stress, it activates well-being and allows time and space for your innate intuition to arise.

Change is a necessary part of healthy growth, development and life. Most people dread change. Manage your job loss and change. You will achieve results. Learn from your experience. Commit to the process of feeling your feelings. Learn from your experience and you will move forward stronger - with greater self-knowledge.

Go for it; utilize your innate talents. Move forward in the direction of your choice. Create an even better life experience for you and your family.

We wish you the best. Bob Prock is a national award winning resume writer. If you have any questions about your resume, cover letter, or other job search documents, feel free to call Bob at 1-864-292-5288 or email him at ExpertResume@yahoo.com

“Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.” Goethe

Sandy Prock M.Ed (emphasis in Vocational Guidance and Counseling), JCTC (Job and Transition Coach), Co-Owner of www.ExpertResume.com   

By Sandy Prock M.Ed., JCTC, Co-Owner of www.ExpertResume.com

Let your hook be always cast. In the pool where you least expect it, will be fish. (Quote by Ovid)

So often life offers us just what we need if we are willing to do the ordinary in new ways, creating extraordinary experiences.

Clint Eastwood learned this kind of wisdom from his father.  It served him well. Here is a quote from an interview with Clint in the “Costco Connection” magazine:

“When I was a kid, I remember going out looking for jobs, and I would ask him how I could figure out much I would make. He told me to not worry about that, tell them what I could do for them and that I wanted to learn everything about their business and become a great asset to the company. It’s an old fashioned, Mark Twain approach: Show them what you can do. The rest will take care of itself. Not many people live by those words today. I was fortunate to be raised in that era.”

Clint Eastwood followed this advice in his career when he wanted to direct a movie. He landed the job by offering to work free – this launched his directing career. Not only was this a great move, this was casting his hook in a pool and this time where others least expected there was success…his! He showed them what he could do.

You may be thinking, well that is okay for a young guy, just starting out…however, the great news is that Clint did this again, much later. He wanted to direct the movie Mystic River and ran into so much opposition. He again, offered to work free because he really wanted to do the film. He ended up receiving the minimum Directors Guild pay, and a percentage, so if the film did well, he would come out OK, and if not he said he would just go on to the next film.

Great advice if you ask me. Do you have a favorite company, where you would love to land a position? Consider taking Clint’s experience and his Dad’s advice to heart. It worked for Clint Eastwood, why not you? Consider casting your hook in the pool of your choice. Consider volunteering your expertise for a time and work free. Show them what you can do, while learning the ropes from the inside. Consider taking an entry-level position, gain insights into the company and grow your expertise. “Let your hook be always cast. In the pool where you least expect it, will be fish. (Ovid)”

Consider taking full charge of your career and consider Clint Eastwood’s masterful approach to achieving the job you want and reach your long term goals, while learning along the way and expanding your knowledge of the company and growing your skills and abilities. What could be better than that!

You may even land a job more quickly than others who take the standard job search path. We wish you the best in your career development. Remember to give yourself your best shot when you interview. Present to your potential new employer what you can do for them – make sure your resume, cover letter and other job search documents make you stand out from the crowd and are in expert form! Give yourself the gift of the best!

Bob Prock is a national award winning resume writer. If you have any questions about your resume, cover letter or other job search documents, feel free to call him at 1-864-292-5288 or email him at ExpertResume@yahoo.com

Sandy Prock M.Ed. (Masters of Education – Vocational Guidance and Counseling), JCTC (Job and Transition Coach), Co-Owner of www.ExpertExecutiveResume.com

By Sandy Prock M.Ed., JCTC, Co-Owner of www.ExpertResume.com

Do You Know How to Find Joy and Strength in Your Career? Pursue what you enjoy. When you are engaged in tasks you enjoy, time flies. You feel energized. You feel strong. To succeed in anything you do, you need persistence. Do you drag yourself to work every day, or would you rather fly? The wings of joy are what you need to fly.

If you are out of work, or you can’t stand your job, then it may be hard to bracket those feelings and move toward what you enjoy. However, the journey is worth it. Most people don’t love what they do. Become one of the few people that do love their work. Receive all the benefits in health and well-being when you pursue work you love and enjoy.

What would you do if money were not an object? What tasks are you doing when you lose track of time? What are you doing when you feel strong? The answers to these questions are clues to your passions.

Passion is the fuel you need to pursue your career goals.

Follow the trail of your natural abilities. Build your day utilizing your strengths. How do you know when you are tapping into a strength – you feel strong. You know you are tapping into a weakness, when you feel weakened.

Notice and write down on a pad of paper when you feel energized doing a task. Write down what you love to do. Write down when you feel strengthened. This will give you clues to your innate gifts. In the book “Now, Discover Your Strengths” by Marcus Buckingham, you will receive access to a test and descriptions of different strengths. He also wrote a new book called “Find your Strongest Life.”

Bob and I wish you the best in your career development. Bob Prock is a national award winning resume writer. Feel free to call him if you have any questions about your resume or cover letter or other job search documents. You can reach him at 1-864-292-5288 or email him at ExpertResume@yahoo.com

Sandy Prock M.Ed., JCTC, Co-Owner of www.ExpertResume.com

 By Sandy Prock M.Ed., JCTC, Co-Owner of www.ExpertResume.com 

“Sometimes problems have to be faced from different perspectives in order to find solutions.” This is an anonymous quote from a little book by David Baird called “A Thousand Paths to Happiness.”.

You may already know the truth of this statement. However, if you are facing job loss you may temporarily forget to apply this wisdom to yourself and your job search.

One of the problems of either being out of work is that it can cloud the minds of even the best thinkers; in fact, this is true for almost all human beings when faced with change, whether it is radical or planned. So don’t feel alone, just recognize you are normal and consider your problem from a different perspective.

Consider hiring yourself and working full time at your job search. You will feel empowered, lift your spirits and beat the competition. Very few people put that kind of effort into their job search. Place yourself in the top percentile of job seekers who commit to their job search and treat it as a full-time job. Bone up on your interviewing skills, master your Internet search, research companies you want to work for, design your best life, deal with your feelings in an effective manner (don’t shove them under the rug - they just pile up and one day you will trip over them), and go for it.

Hire yourself right now and work full-time at your job search - consider going for the job of your dreams – go for it. Some studies indicate that an individual that is out of work gives 4 hours a week to their job search process. Increase your chances by working more hours at the job search. Just think - if you give 30-40 hours per week to your job search, you multiple your chances of landing the job you want.

We wish you the best in your job search and do not forget to make sure you stand out from the crowd with top-notch job search documents. Make sure your resume and cover letter help you stand out from the crowd. A resume and cover letter represent you. It is imperative for you that they shine, as you do.

Bob Prock is a national award winning resume writer. If you have any questions about your resume, cover letter or other job search documents, feel free to call him at 1-864-292-5288 or email him at ExpertResume@yahoo.com

Sandy Prock M.Ed. (Masters Degree in Education-Vocational Guidance and Counseling, JCTC (Job and Transition Coach), Co-Owner of www.ExpertExecutiveResume.com

Job Search Change and BHAG'S – Big Hairy Audacious Goals

By Sandy Prock M.Ed., JCTC, Co-Owner of ExpertResume.com

You may have heard the saying that change is the only constant in life. It’s true.

I remember the day I decided to study the art of change. After feeling stuck for too long, I decided, I had to discover ways that I could follow my life’s hints for change and growth.

In a book by Harvard Business Review, called “On Change” I discovered a useful idea called BHAGS – "Big Hairy Audacious Goals." Companies who set “Big Hairy Audacious Goals” beat all the odds and achieved their BHAG'S. British Airways – the worst airline became the best airline. British Airways set their "Big Hairy Audacious Goal." It worked. They became the best.

What did this tell me? Anything is possible. If you create small steps and daily goals, you can achieve YOUR “Big Hairy Audacious Goals.”

• Take the reins of your personal and professional life.
• Observe where you are then decide where you want to be.
• Participate in the creation of change in your life.
• Life offers us hints about our potential for growth and development.
• Listen and you will hear.
• If you don’t listen, life may hammer you. I know this from experience!
• Life naturally offers us continual growth and development.
• Nothing is static, except death.
• Good news – you have more control than you may think.
• Go for the Gold.
• Go for your personal and professional BHAG’S.

Tools and ideas for setting small goals to reach your BHAG’S:

• Find time to relax.
  • Relaxation provides space for your intuition to reveal new ideas.
• Ask yourself “I wonder what I could do to (fill in the blank with your personal question)
  • Use the words, “I wonder….”  

• When you use the words “I wonder…” you invite your unconscious genius to collaborate with your conscious mind and hand deliver great ideas designed just for you.

• Say to yourself, “I want more of the feeling I had with…(fill in the blank with the feeling or situation you want) or better.”

• When you discover the “feeling,” you want in a situation, set your goals to include those specific feelings.

• Allow the feelings you want in situations to arrive in small, big and surprising ways.

• Create small steps. Move daily toward your "Big Hairy Audacious Goals."

o Daydreaming is a great way to discover what is important to you.

§ However, daydreaming will not create what you want.

• You must also take concrete action.

o Work your job search goals every day.

• Keep moving forward and allow for the twists, turns and the surprises of life.

• Feel free to readjust your job search goals if you receive new information.

• Then keep moving forward.

If a tool resonates, give it a try. If not, try something else. The choice is yours.

Set your “Big Hairy Audacious Goals.” Be the person you want to be. Land the job of your dreams. We wish you the best in your career and job search.

Bob Prock is a national award winning resume writer. Feel free to call him if you have any question about your resume or cover letter at 1-864-292-5288 or email him at ExpertResume@yahoo.com

Sandy Prock M.Ed. (Vocational Counseling), JCTC (Job Transition Coach) Co-Owner of ExpertResume.com

Transform What Could Look Like a Flaw into an Asset.

By Sandy Prock M.Ed., JCTC, Co-Owner of www.ExpertResume.com

In a short Harvard Business Review article, they talked about turning a product flaw into an asset. They gave the example of a hotel with no air conditioning and bugs flying around, yet it is popular with the eco crowd. A perceived flaw turned into an asset.

Why not do the same for yourself. Let’s look at some things that some people may have perceived as flaws and reframe these same things as assets.

• Perfectionism – reframe as conscientious, detail oriented and great follow through – accountable

• Demanding – reframe as meeting high standards and drawing the best out in the company and people

• Not communicative – reframe as a great listener and objective observer

• Cautious – reframe as seeking thorough information before making a rash decision

• Radical – reframed as adventurous, willing to take risks and open to new ideas, producing success

• Confrontational – reframed as willing to meet problems head on and find workable, mutually respectful solutions

You are getting the idea. Almost every perceived flaw can have a silver lining if met with moderation and a different view, one that is more positive and takes in the whole scope of one’s skill.

Real mistakes can be addressed and need to be addressed. However, because someone may have had a different view or does not understand the full benefit of a particular skill you offer, they may have unfairly labeled you. The world is full of opinions, some correct, some not.

It is important to be open to change and work continuously to grow and learn from your mistakes. However, equally important you need internal awareness of what is true for you and what is not true for you. With that skill, you can sail through even the toughest interviews.

Make sure your resume, cover letter and other job search documents highlight your best strengths, skills and assets. We wish you the best in your career search. Land the job of your dreams.

 Bob Prock is an award winning resume writer. Feel free to call Bob at 1-864-292-5288 if you have any questions about your resume, cover letter or other job search documents, or email him at ExpertResume@yahoo.com

Sandy Prock M.Ed. (Masters Degree in Education – Vocational Guidance and Counseling), JCTC (Job and Transition Coach), www.ExpertResume.com