Old Thinking?

I attended a webinar yesterday about how job searching has changed and was REALLY surprised by some of the old thinking of some of the attendees. Some of them had never heard of the Applicant Tracking Systems! That was frightening.

I have been writing and rewriting and rewriting my resume and then tweaking each resume to use terminology and highlight my past achievements to match every job description for each role I apply for.  I’m trying to crack the code for the ATS every time I apply. It’s time consuming and can be frustrating to try to second guess the systems that screen you before a human ever sees your resume.

That’s why I’m networking so furiously. Some days the networking is fun – I’m loving catching up with people I worked with during my agency career in New York. Some days it’s just hard – and I get it. People are busy with their own work, their own families, their own passion projects and spending time letting me pick their brains is far down the priority list.

So this isn’t much of a throwback, but I’m hoping if anyone ever reached out to me for help in a job search, I at least tried for you. I think I have – but if I ever let something fall through the cracks, I apologize here and now. Pay it forward people – if you have an opportunity to impact someone’s career and life, please take it!

Mental Health – Decluttering

You can always tell where I am mentally by how clean my house is. I tend to be a clean freak – but when I’m stressed out or down, I stop cleaning. Apparently that isn’t uncommon. And I often find that cleaning will lift my mood. Right now, the house is pretty good – but today is the start of Lent and I’m diving into the 40 Bags in 40 Days declutter challenge.

I did this a few years ago and it was fabulous mentally and for my home. All you do, is every day during Lent, target an area of your home and fill a bag to either sell, donate or throw away. It encourages you to have discipline about some extra attention to your home – and gets rid of a LOT of clutter. OCD person that I am – I’ve made a simple spreadsheet to track what I clean and what I’m doing with my bag every day.

Don’t freak out – the bag can just be a grocery bag. Or it can be a Waste Management bagster if you need an industrial size bag! But at the end of Lent, you’ll have a clean house and a leg up on Spring Cleaning. And I bet you’ll feel a lot better without the clutter too.

Need some more info about this kind of challenge? Check out these links!

Rewriting my resume…

My big to-do today is to rewrite my resume. Again. I met with my outplacement coach yesterday and we went through my resume. I thought I had done a good job updating it but BOY did she point out some places that need improvement. So I have work to do….

I’m also deep networking again. I spoke with a friend of mine yesterday that did a career change a couple of years ago. He’s in a good place now but says it was rough. I’m still all in on marketing but I always think it might be a good idea to get a project management certificate. I’m generally VERY organized, deadline driven and love to write presentations so project management always seems like an attractive alternative to marketing. I just can’t give up my love of figuring out how to connect a brand and a consumer though!

If I had my life to do over though, I’m wondering if I should have followed my first career ambition and went into physical therapy. The therapist at the hospital where I volunteered might not have done me any favors when he told me I was too petite to be a therapist. And life happened with my Mom passing away so going to college for business administration/marketing seemed like the right thing to do at the time. But it isn’t illegal to wonder is it?

OK – gotta go. I have a deadline to get my resume back to my coach!

New Week – New Start

So the weekend was kind of a downer – I got not one but TWO automated “thanks but no thanks” emails on job applications on Saturday night. What’s up with that? The automated systems just want to ruin our weekends? 

So now it’s Monday and I just certified for unemployment for the first time. That was weird. I’m still VERY uncomfortable with the whole unemployment thing. I want to work, not collect. Sigh….

And because it’s a new week and I’m logging the “no thank you” emails, I’ve opted to put all my job search activity into a spreadsheet this morning instead of the notebook I’ve been using. Nothing like a little digitizing to get my week off on a good note? 

I’m the queen of organizing. I’ve color coded my new spreadsheet to reflect what version of resume I used and I’m toying with using a drop down menu to make logging the source of the job lead easier. It’s certainly going to be easier to use the spreadsheet to track the followups I’ve been doing. So now I’m off to start my weekly follow ups – wish me luck please?

Throwback to skills training

I filled out an application for a job yesterday where one of the job requirements was the ability to present to multiple levels of audiences. That made me think back to my days at Young & Rubicam in New York. 

Y&R had a fantastic training program. You went into the program the day you started and you left it the day you left Y&R. At the beginning, my training was purely focused on the skills needed for the job. So as a Media Planner, it was all about media math and the mechanics of media planning/buying. But when I was promoted to Senior Media Planner (all of about 4 months after I started), the presentation skills workshop I was required to take, is branded into me.

LOVE this!!!! Practice is really important.

Presentation skills was multiple weeks of sessions on how to speak without being afraid – nervous is one thing, but the point was to take fear out of a presentation. We had to prepare multiple types of presentations – demonstration, persuasion, establishment of facts, etc – and they video taped us each time.

It was PAINFUL watching the tapes while the entire group critiqued you. But I learned so much from going through it. Amazing experience and I would recommend it to anyone no matter how humiliating it could be in an isolated moment.

Later in my career, I worked at Bates USA on the Wendy’s account doing field marketing. I was responsible for as many as 20 franchisee co-ops local advertising. So I presented A LOT. The presentation training I received at Y&R was one of the reasons I was very successful in that role. 

I remember presenting for my Wendy’s franchisees once in Indianapolis. The group was in a ballroom at a hotel and I was presenting competitive information at the front of the room. The unfortunate thing was that I was directly under an AC vent that was just blasting – and I was wearing contact lenses. As I presented, my contacts were getting more and more dry. I was fighting my way through it but about half way through my presentation, a lens peeled right off my eye. I felt it going and stuck a hand out to catch it. As I caught it, the second one peeled off as well. So I’m standing in front of about 50 people holding my contacts in my hands, blind as a bat. The room burst into laughter and we had to take a quick break for me to find my glasses and continue. I probably was as red as a tomato but in the end, we all laughed – and my franchisees teased me about it for a long time. But that taught me I could get through ANYTHING in a presentation. 

Have you had any odd presentation experiences? Tell us about them in the comments!

Wellness Wednesday – Steps

Welcome to Wellness Wednesday and today I’m thinking about how many steps a person really needs. The rule of thumb is supposedly 10,000 steps a day – which for me translates to about 4 miles/day. That’s easy to attain right now while I’m on my “corporate hiatus” but what about when I start work again? Is 10,000 steps really the right amount for me?

The Mayo Clinic says that the average American walks around 1.5 to 2 miles/day – or maybe 4,000 steps. According to a study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, suggests the better number might be a minimum of 7,500 steps to see health benefits. Although of course the health benefits increase as the number of steps increase.

Here’s what I can tell you from my personal experience. I started walking a minimum of 2 miles a day last August and I am a faithful Apple Watch wearer so I have solid statistics on my step count and other health metrics. In July, I averaged 6,967 steps/day and in January, I averaged 11,462 steps/day. In July, my resting heart rate was 53 beats/minute – which was good for a woman my age. But now? It’s 46 beats/minute. Generally, a lower heart rate at rest implies more efficient heart function and better cardiovascular fitness – which can help translate to a better, longer life.

And while I’m still struggling to manage the weight I have gained over the last few years (thanks menopause!), walking is helping me burn a lot of extra calories. Apple defines “active” calories as energy burned over and above what you need when you’re at rest and in January, I averaged 503 active calories/day. I’m using this information to help me figure out what my calorie consumption can be to lose weight. According to my watch, at rest I burn about 1,600 calories/day. Add the 503 in active calories and I can consume 2,100 calories a day without gaining weight. 

My extra steps translate to hundreds of extra “active” calories/month – and with a pound of human fat equaling around 3,500 calories, those extra steps can translate to lost pounds quickly. So join me for the cardiac, weight loss and mental health benefits of walking. GET THOSE STEPS!!!

Image from Prevention Magazine

Personal branding

I’ve spent almost 2 hours waiting for my computer to update this morning! Good grief! It’s REALLY cutting into my to-do time! 

Yesterday, I took the advice of my outplacement coach and did an exercise around personal branding. There was a worksheet with a list of descriptive attributes and a list of skills and I had to pick from them to describe me and what I’m best at doing. That was the easy part – putting them together into some semblance of sense that I think sums me up in one sentence was a challenge.

I took myself out for a walk with my lists – almost 5 miles later, here’s what I have come up with:

I am an endlessly curious marketing collaborator who is dedicated to solving brand/consumer problems.

I’d love any feedback – please comment?

One day at a time

The week is off to a good start I guess – I FINALLY got unlocked on the Illinois Department of Employment Services website and I’m finished with everything for unemployment. Ah the joy of verifying that I’m really me!

Next up, proving I’m me for healthcare.gov so I can see what my insurance options are other than COBRA. COBRA is nearly $800/month for me! There must be something on the exchanges that isn’t that expensive right? Let’s hope so!

I took Friday off from the job search as a little mental holiday. I had my first appointment with my outplacement coach Thursday afternoon and everything got a little overwhelming again. Job search is a roller coaster – and Friday was a low so I took the day to get myself back on track. It’s amazing what giving yourself permission to be low does. And a morning out. I took myself to Dunkin Donuts, had a REALLY sugary donut and a cup of coffee and started reading a good book. Then I went to the library and got a library card. I haven’t had one since I was a child! But the library here has some really great programs – and what they call a Maker’s Room. They have sewing machines, Cricut machines and all kinds of great craft goodies. I can’t wait to start going to their monthly Maker event! 

Last night, my college roommate called and we had an almost 2 hour gabfest while watching the Grammy’s together. I highly recommend an almost 2 hour phone call with an old friend to get your head back in the game. And I also highly recommend Billy Joel’s new song that closed the show. Go listen to it while I get back to work at finding a new professional adventure!