Oh L0rdy asked:


I am finally interested in something & I’m thinking of going back to school. I was thinking of doing the whole Child Development thing.
I would like to know tho, about how long does it take to finish? Also, would it be easier to do online classes?
I just want to do Child Care or Pre-School. Nothing like Social Worker. Just something a bit more simple.
And if you have experience in Child Development how do you like it? Etc.
Thanks!

Neil

NYCchic asked:


I would like to know how to get started in event planning or meeting/conference planning. It seems like they all require previous experience, but how do I get that experience? ((Sigh))

Brody

Suzanne Freiberg asked:


Is your career all dried up? Do you feel as if you are wandering in a professional desert? If this describes you and your career, then this article was written for you. You are a desert traveler. There are seven reasons your career has dried up, and there are seven solutions.

Reason #1, there is one specific area, which stands out more than others, in which you have allowed your career to get off track. You must identify this area where your career is all dried up. I know, for some of you, it feels as if your entire career is going nowhere, but there is a root cause. Try to take a 10,000-foot overview of your career and find the one area that is in the most need of repair and start there. If you are having trouble identifying this area ask others whom you know and trust. Believe me, they have noticed that you are wandering in a desert and they will have opinions as to why.

Reason #2, in addition to the specific area that has you feeling dried up; there is a specific difficulty. You need to identify and resolve your specific difficulty. There are four difficulties and four solutions that are common to people who are wandering in a professional desert. Those difficulties are doubt, disinterest, discouragement and dissatisfaction.

Reason #3 is doubt. Doubt is insidious and can grow quicker than you think. It takes on two forms, one being self-doubt and the other is external doubt. Self-doubt may begin with a slight hesitation when you start a task you have previously completed without a problem, but then you hear a little voice that whispers “what if.” What if you mess this up? What if your skills aren’t as sharp as they were in the past, before you began to doubt yourself? What if your strategy worked before, but now it is outdated? Once you start listening to the voice that is saying “what if”, you have entered the desert and are on your way to being all dried up.

External doubt is self-doubt projected onto your circumstances. Maybe your little voice is saying that your career is all dried up because your boss doesn’t recognize your potential. Maybe you think your boss recognizes your potential, but your boss hasn’t made the connection as to how your potential will benefit the company. Or, maybe you have convinced yourself that your career has stalled because your particular market or profession is slow. Circumstances and challenges exist for the sole purpose of being overcome. You can choose to blame your current circumstance on external factors or you can choose to overcome whatever you face.

If doubt is your difficulty, then your solution is belief. Sounds simple enough and the solution is simple. You need to choose to believe in yourself more than you believe in your doubt. You’ve been successful before, and you can be successful again. You still have the skills you had when you started your career, choose to believe in your ability. If you doubt your current strategy, work with a career coach to develop a new strategy. You can be the voice that tells yourself “I can.” When you tell yourself that you can do something, you are washing away your self-doubt and quenching your thirst with a drink of cool water from a fresh stream.

If you have succeeded in externalizing your doubt, i.e. blaming it on others, then you need to step up and take control. If someone isn’t recognizing your potential, you need to point it out to him or her. If someone isn’t recognizing your benefit to the company, you need to point it out to that person. If your market is slow, then you need to be innovative and find ways to overcome this challenge. You can take the power and you can overcome your doubt.

Reason #4 is disinterest. If your difficulty is disinterest then the root cause probably lies in one of two areas. Either your motivation to succeed is based on selfish pursuits or you are simply bored. Selfish pursuits are great motivators to start a career. After all, having a designer wardrobe, or simply having plenty of cash to support your life style are great motivators and keep everyone interested in moving forward, at first. However, interests that only benefit you and are superficial only last for a short time. After awhile everyone needs a greater purpose in life. If you are finding that doing your job is not as fulfilling as it once was, then maybe you are doing your job for the wrong reasons.

It’s pretty easy to determine if you are bored. If you just aren’t that excited about your career and you can find more reasons for staying home than going to work, chances are you are bored. Maybe you aren’t challenged, maybe you have mastered your job or maybe you have simply been doing the same thing for way too long. If any of these sound familiar then it is safe to say you are in the desert and you are bored.

Did you discover that you are more disinterested in your career than doubtful? If this is your reason for your career being all dried up, then you need to reconnect and commit yourself to a higher cause. It is when we are committed to something greater than just ourselves that we get re-energized. You need to know that you are really making a difference. If the company you are at is not making the world a better place then you can commit to making the lives of those people you come into contact with a better place. Make a difference! Or, finally find a cause that you can rally around. Not into making your co-workers lives better? Then find a cause you believe in and start contributing either monetarily or with your time. The energy you will generate from participating in a greater cause outside of yourself will carry you out of your desert and bring new life to your career.

Reason #5 is discouragement. Discouragement is a real difficulty for many desert travelers. The two main symptoms of discouragement are envy of others and, a focus on how things were in the past. Discouragement begins when you are feeling a little bit down, but it really has its’ roots in envy and lack of focus.

If you have found yourself looking negatively at your peers or others who have already been promoted, moved forward, or have surpassed you in some way then you are envious. You may be finding one thousand and one reasons why they are better or one thousand reasons why they had an advantage, but if you are convincing yourself that others have something you don’t, then you are envious.

Maybe your discouragement is rooted in external factors. Are you convinced that the leads used to be better, there were more opportunities in the past, or the competition knows something that you don’t? If you have convinced yourself of any of these, then you are discouraged and on your way to being all dried up in the desert.

Is discouragement the cause of your feeling all dried up in your desert? If you found that you are discouraged because you are being envious or are lacking focus you can be cured. Go back to basics.

What is it you were doing before you began wandering in the desert? Make a list of the basic skills you leveraged to get your career started, then go back and start applying them all over again. Next, make a list of what it takes to move beyond where you are in your career. One by one start applying those skills until you have moved from simply wandering around to a point where you can see your promised land straight ahead.

Reason #6 is dissatisfaction. Finally, dissatisfaction is often at the root of a career that is off track in the desert. Dissatisfaction is all about impatience and a feeling of just not being happy with your circumstances. If you find yourself spending less time doing your best and more time finding short cuts then you are dissatisfied. If you find yourself doing enough to get by and are being passed by, then you are dissatisfied. Dissatisfaction simply takes away our motivation to try harder and do better.

If dissatisfaction is the culprit that made you loose your way you can get back on track. First, acknowledge that you aren’t pleased with where you are right now. Know that it could take a while to get to your goal, but you can begin the journey right away. Switch your focus from feeling dissatisfied to instead focusing on “this is what I can do to be satisfied.” Make a plan and stick with it until you get to where you are going. Focus on what works and make it happen.

Reason #7 is your reality. Now that you know your desert and have identified your specific difficulty, along with its’ solution, you can determine your reality. Make a decision to reject the reality of your past and substitute it with a new reality starting today. Your desert will get bigger and wider if you focus on the lack of the past, but if you choose to focus on new possibilities, and an abundant future, you will begin to feel like a freshly watered garden whose waters never fail.

Remember, deserts are necessary, because without them we become complacent. When we are complacent we do not grow. Make the decision to bloom in your desert, instead of being all dried up.

If you would like more information about developing your own self-awareness in the work place and finding new ways to make different choices, then contact one of our SmartWork Career coaches @ 805.376-1906 or e-mail Suzanne@smartworkcareercoaching.com . Our coaches will help you to become more self-aware, develop clarity, and create an action plan to get from where you are to where you want to be in your career and in your life. You may also visit our web site at www.smartworkcareercoaching.com .

© Copyright 2006 Suzanne Freiberg. All Rights Reserved.



Elsie

Mary Gormandy White asked:


Career Development: Recommended Reading to Make the Most of Your Career

By Mary Gormandy White

No matter where you are in your career, you can always benefit from keeping up with the latest literature related to career and professional development. Whether you would benefit from learning how to land the job of your dreams, how to get a promotion, or just how to function more effectively in your current career, there are excellent career development books that can be of great benefit to you.

As a professional it’s important to continue learning and growing throughout your career, and keeping up with the latest professional development literature is a great way to stay ahead of the curve. The time you spend reading career development books is an investment in your long-term career success.

Reading career development books enables you to learn from leading experts in the field from the comfort of your own home. No matter what professional or personal challenges you face related to your career, you’ll be able to find books that can provide valuable insights and tips regarding your employment-related concerns.

Suggested Topics Include:

The following list includes a selection of current career development literature. These books are great tools for individuals seeking to grow as professionals. They are a great starting point, but just the tip of the iceberg in terms of the many publications that can provide guidance for building the career of your dreams.

Career Advancement: Whether you are just starting out in your career, seeking a promotion, or are thinking about taking your career in a new direction, you will benefit from the practical tips and suggestions in Stepping Up: 12 Ways to Rev Up, Revitalize, or Renew Your Career by S. Gary Snodgrass.

Take Charge of Your Career: Have you ever been faced with a difficult career situation that literally seemed to come out of nowhere? I Didn’t See It Coming: The Only Book You’ll Ever Need to Avoid Being Blindsided in Business by Nancy C. Widmann, Elaine J. Eisenman, and Amy Dorn Kopelan is a unique career guide designed to help professionals anticipate and effectively deal with these types of situations.

Personal Branding: Career Distinction: Stand Out by Building Your Brand by William Arruda and Kristen Dixson explains how to position yourself for career success by building your personal brand. The book provides readers with step-by-step tips for improving your career karma by building and managing your own brand.

Success Secrets: Too many people unintentionally sabotage their career success potential because they don’t understand how to position themselves for success within their organizations. Help! Was That a Career Limiting Move? By Pamela J. Holland and Marjorie Brody is a practical guide designed to help professionals recognize and understand workplace behaviors that negatively impact their ability to get a ahead. This is a must-read for people who find themselves being overlooked for promotions or who want to be sure that this never happens to them.

Your Career is Worth The Time

Keep in mind that becoming a successful professional involves more than just getting the basic training you need to enter the workplace. Successful professionals who want to fulfill their potential invest time and energy in learning how to grow in their careers. The time you spend learning how to improve your ability to advance in your career can result in exponential rewards.



Jeremy

Shailendra Singh asked:


Resource Datamine provides reasonable On Demand software solutions for staffing and recruiting companies to run their entire business with one simple, integrated, web-based system software. Resource Datamine’s flagship offering, Staffing, combines email, applicant tracking, CRM, job management, accounting, human resource management, and reporting into the industry’s first all-in-one software system. Resource Datamine helps its clients automate processes across all business functions, allowing them to generate more revenues and profits faster and easier while providing unparalleled client service. For more information about Resource Datamine , please visit: www.Resourcedatamine.com

Resource Datamine is the most versatile and integrated staffing software and recruiting software system in the industry. It is the only recruiting solution that combines Applicant Tracking, CRM, Email Accounting, Online Timesheets and Invoices, Human Resource Management, Business Intelligence and more.

With Resourcedatamine’s all-in-one recruiting software, you don’t need any other system to operate your business. It makes it easy for you to organize, build and strengthen every relationship and allows you to view the relationships between your contacts, candidates, companies and job orders regardless of where you are in the system. It allows you to track, search and place more people in the right jobs, quickly and effortlessly.

Attracting good talent is the requirement of every business, regardless of the size of business. Considering the talent crunch, most organizations have a career website or a section in their corporate website to display the vacancies and allow the candidates to apply online. A smart enterprise can reduce its cost by connecting this with a recruitment automation system without changing its corporate branding, at a fractional cost.

Big enterprises can afford to keep dedicated people for managing their websites, doing regular posts to the career section of website and to make the career section attractive for prospective candidates to apply.

Resource Datamine, a recruitment solution, supports a back end system, offered as a SaaS linked with the career section of the websites. This gives an enormous advantage to the organizations, irrespective of their size. They need no dedicated person for their career section, and job postings done by them as a part of recruitment process are visible on their career section. Prospective candidates can view the details of the job and apply against the positions online. This recruitment tool itself offers great advantages by providing search based on various criteria.

A research based study shows that recruiters spend a lot of time in interacting with candidates, collecting their resumes, formatting them, etc. Resource Datamine saves recruiters’ time by at least 40%. It reduces the task of the recruiters by automating emails, collecting resumes in a central repository and providing speedy search on resumes of candidates. Providing a career section powered by Resource Datamine, further improves the efficiency by providing self service modules to candidates.



Jessie

Raju S asked:


I have 8 + years of experience in software development.(VB,ASP,Oracle,SQL server, Coldfusion etc.) I would like to know it would be better to move to datawarehousing field by under going some training.(in Keysoft, Bangalore)
Do you think this will be a better move ?

Bobby

Mary Askew asked:


Parents help us discover the gifts and the callings that God has for our lives. Parents help children and teens discover their vocational interests and the motivational gifts. Parents identify the steps and resources that are necessary to develop the qualities and talents that children and teens possess.

Parents know that children and teens receive the vocational interests, abilities, skills, and talents in a seed form. These seeds will develop into careers, jobs, tasks, assignments, or ministries. Then, the talents and gifts will produce earnings, wages, and spiritual rewards as the children receive pleasure from knowing that they are fulfilling the callings that God has placed on their lives.

The Goal of a Parent

A parent receives direction from Proverbs 18:16, Proverbs 22:6, and 1 Peter 4:10.

Proverbs 22:6 Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.

1 Peter 4:10 As every man has received a gift, even so minister the same gift one to another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.

Proverbs 18:16 A man’s gift makes room for him, and brings him before great men.

To learn about abilities, interests, and motivational gifts, parents have many tasks:

Assess children’s and teens’ vocational interests, abilities, skills, beliefs, and values.

Discover potential careers that are linked to children’s and teens’ identified interests.

Help children and teens choose the suitable post-secondary education and training.

Provide resources that help children and teens utilize their vocational interests, abilities, skills, beliefs, and values.

Understand the relationship between education, training, and specific occupations.

Introduce experiences that meet career, cognitive, emotional, and behavioral goals.

Present information on the current and future labor market.

Introduce problem-solving and decision-making strategies, and

Solve career issues, conflicts, and concerns.

The Steps Towards Completing Career Exploration Process

Step One: Preliminary Assessment

Parents must gain access to computerized, online, or paper/pencil career assessments. From these assessments, parents, teens, and children gain knowledge and understanding of our abilities, ambitions, aptitudes, identities, interests, life goals, resources, skills, and values. During this assessment period, parents will evaluate children’s and teens’ readiness for career planning.

Gary W. Peterson and others of the Center for the Study of Technology in Counseling and Career Development University Center, discussed the differences in career planning readiness. Children, teen, and adults can be categorized as:

Decided

Decided yet needing a confirmation

Decided yet not knowing how to implement their decisions

Decided choosing to avoid conflict or stress

Undecided

Undecided with a deferred choice

Undecided yet developmental unable to commit to a decision

Undecided and unable to make a decision because the individual is multi-talented

Children, teen, and adults transition from indecision to decisiveness when they complete the following steps in the career decision making and planning process.

Step Two: Educational and Occupational Exploration

Parents, children, and teens gather information about:

Educational choices

The benefits of educational achievement

The economy or labor market

Occupational choices

Specific occupations and programs of study

Training opportunities

The relationship between work and learning

Positive attitudes towards work and learning

Personal responsibility and good work habits

A typical working day for a specific occupation

Career exploration systems

Step Three: Problem solving

Parents, children, and teens solve career problems by:

Identifying educational and career planning obstacles

Creating solutions or courses of action

Setting achievable goals

Resolving conflict and tension

Making a commitment to reach our God-given potential

Problem solving should take into consideration personal values, interests, skills, and financial resources. Big problems are broken down into smaller, more manageable steps. Achievable goals result in the production of new competencies, attitudes, solutions, as well as educational and training opportunities.

Step Four: Goal Setting and Decision Making

As individuals, parents, children, and teens:

Set, formulate, prioritize, and rank goals

Clearly state our vocational interests, abilities, and values

Derive plans or strategies to implement the solutions

Make a commitment to complete the plans

Understand decision-making processes

Evaluate the primary choice

Consider a secondary occupational choice, if necessary

Decision-making processes include:

Developing learning and career plans

Identifying suitable occupations

Selecting appropriate educational programs

Figuring the costs of educational training

Considering the impact of career decisions.

Step Five: Implementation

While implementing and executing our learning and career plans, parents, children, and teens translate vocational interests, abilities, and skills into occupational possibilities. Parents, children, and teens do reality testing through interviewing current workers, job shadowing, part-time employment, full-time employment, and volunteer work. Parents, children, and teens obtain skill training, for example, social skills, resume writing, networking, and preparations for interviews.

Career Planning Resources

In order to assess gifts, talents, and abilities, parents, children, and teens need career resources. Career planning resources include books, videotapes, audio-tapes, games, workshops, self-assessment inventories, career exploration web-sites, and computer-assisted career guidance programs. These resources are found at libraries, community colleges, and resource centers.

The basis for most of the resources is the National Career Development Guidelines. In 1987, the National Occupational Information Coordinating Committee (NOICC) developed The National Career Development Guidelines. The guidelines were organized into three areas: Self-knowledge, Educational and Occupational Exploration, and Career Planning.

Self-knowledge deals with our self-concept, interpersonal skills, growth, and development.

Educational and occupational exploration reveals the relationships between learning, work, career information skills, job seeking, skill development, and the labor market.

Career planning includes self-assessment, career exploration, decision making, life role formation, goal setting, and the implementation of career choices.

Conclusion

We are each significant, different, and special. Yet, God knows our gifts, talents, and abilities. God has chosen us for special positions and tasks. Our occupations should reflect the callings that God has placed in our lives. Our vocations represent the gifts given to us by God. Our destinies come from God. Parents help children and teens discover God-given talents, abilities, and interests so that children and teens can fulfill God’s purpose for their lives.

As parents, we will use prayer, the Word of God, other books, videotapes, audio-tapes, games, workshops, training materials, self-assessment inventories, career web-sites, computer-assisted career guidance programs, and resource centers to assist us in helping our children, and teens.

References

Miller, Juliet V. (1992) The National Career Development Guidelines, Eric Digest ED347493, ERIC Clearinghouse on Counseling and Personnel Services, Ann Arbor, Michigan

Peterson, G., W., Sampson, J., P., Jr., Reardon, R., C., and Lenz, J., G. (1996) A Cognitive Approach to Career Development and Services, Center for the Study of Technology in Counseling and Career Development, University Center, Suite A4100, Florida State University, Tallahassee, Florida 32306-1035, http://www.fsu.edu/ ~career/techcenter/html



Leo

Doo.ri asked:


I did many things and yet not finished anyway, I found later it beyond my abilities or boring or I find it it’s not the best jobs to do.

I did computer programming
music: guitar, piano
stock
furniture making
writing
cooking class and training
currently into law degree

Some guy above my age, gave an advice to me: Just do one thing, many things just will make you confuse, and finally you’ll give up everything.

Nevertheless,
Now I beginning to understand, that I could do any one of above or any one of other things, and like it, I could begin to like any job given to me after a month or so.

So do I like the law degree I take now? the answer is yes, but I always have this thing in mind: I’m not be able to throw away the thinking that I could rely only in one thing, so I need backup. Is this the right thinking, should I now who currently in law degree, but does other thing too? At least only 1 other thing.
Give me simple solution, or any simple solution as how to choose career, when motivation is not the one factor of problem, what any other easy factor would be a good consideration?

Jay

Abhishek Agarwal asked:


Have you started to think about your career or about college? If so the correct advice for you to plan your career is to join a school and then proceed to college. All teens and young ones can follow this. Well, there is a rumor in rounds saying that choosing one career path is just as easy as you choose your major at college.

But in truth, it is not the case. Planning your career is instead a complex and a tough process and hence care should be taken in it. In other words, planning your career can be considered as a program to be executed which consists of various steps that are to be followed with great attention. Various programs have been developed by universities and companies to help the young job seeker to filter his choices and find a good career path that yields success. Guides on such programs are distributed the universities to the public members as well as the students. Descriptions about the different career paths are very well explained in the guides. They also aid assist the student and guide them to focus more on heir career. The job seeker can spread his career paths as well as filter them by following well developed programs. But the students are never sure where there choice would land them by following these guides.

The job seekers and college students are advised by the experts in the area of teenage counseling and career counseling to choose their career path soon based on their personal skills and interest. These advices to students who are shaping their career are sometimes being forced to change them from a good one. They lose a best career but it depends whether they are fit enough to proceed with it. The college students are offered various jobs that are too good and many of them come from industries who offer a good pay. Choosing a good job is never automatic and the students must understand this. So while choosing a career path it is best advised to for the teens to choice a good college program and a career path that best fits him.

There is a common conception on choosing a career path would leave the individual stick to the same for the rest of his life. But this is a rumor every individual comes through while crossing his phase of career planning. Changing careers are also witnessed among people. Some even change their careers on a regular basis. So it is a misconception that an individual is always stuck with a career that he chooses with his college major or the training course he followed as the base. Further, it is also reminded that the college major that you choose is always never a base for choosing a career path.



Sarah

madiha tasneem khan asked:


Don’t wait to long while planning for your careers. In many HR departments career planning and career counseling are relatively new terms but now companies are realizing their importance for the success of the company , for that  their HR department are providing career education and career counseling. With out career planning employees are seldom ready for the career opportunities that arise. How do I advance my career? Do company training programs enhance my promotions or do I need a degree for getting that job? Are promotions based on luck? Is that an easy way out for upgrading my CV? Nearly everyone ask himself these questions while during his or her working life, and careers. Our career consist of all jobs during our working life but some people thinks that it just a factor of ” luck” planning careers merely guarantees success it is not a hard activity or to be dreaded rather it’s an activity that should fulfilling, providing goals to achieve in your current career or plans for beginning a transition to a new career. Don’t wait to long while planning for your careers. In many HR departments career planning and career counseling are relatively new terms but now companies are realizing their importance for the success, their HR department are providing career education and career counseling. With out career planning employees are seldom ready for the career opportunities that arise. Once you begin regularly reviewing and planning your career you’ll find yourself better prepared for whatever lies ahead in your careers. HR in banking industry gives little support to career planning and their  career planning seldom occurs the reason of that is it is considered to be as an ” individual matter”  When employer encourages career planning they are mostly  considered that are likely encouraging to set their own  goals but these goals are encouraging employees towards career education and career counseling HR professionals in career planning should always keep the question in their mind that what employees really want? Career planning and development helps employees’ career path led him or her to their goal of becoming “something” in the company.

In a nutshell don’t wait to long while planning for your careers. With out it employees are seldom ready for the career opportunities that arise. With out it employees are seldom ready for the career opportunities that arise.

 

 

 



Ida