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Shweta Shrivastav

10/19/17 – You’ve Got This!: Real, No-Nonsense Ideas for Mentally Regrouping After a Layoff

October 25, 2017 by Shweta Shrivastav

Written by  Shweta Shrivastav

Keynote Speaker

Bridgett McGowen-Hawkins

Bridgett is the CEO and Founder at BMcHAWK Talks, LLC, a public speaking coaching firm. She has presented at various conferences, universities, colleges, student organizations, and corporations and gets her energy from being around others who are passionate about the work they do and how it propels others to be their best. You can find more about her work here.

As a job seeker, we have a lot of ideas but do we know how to mentally regroup and charge ahead after a layoff? It is one thing to work on our resume and another thing to work on our mindset.

The objectives of the presentation are to:

  1. provide practical, real-life techniques
  2. examination of your “why”
  3. strategies for the neutral zone

When we think of someone who is incredibly confident, what qualities do we associate with them? Happy, positive, energized, go-getter? The fact is that all of us came to the world as confident beings. A baby is always happy. As we grow up and as we interact with others, we imbibe their opinions of us as our own and we lose our confidence. Similarly, when a company sends us a rejection letter, we think that something is wrong with us. Bridgett says, “A company does not define you or what you are good at.” So, she suggests the following steps to gain your confidence back and make your job search a success.

  1. Make a statement of your worth – Start with two realities (__and __), present a problem (but), and then present what you do (therefore).
    • Example: It’s hot outside and it is important to stay hydrated in this kind of weather. But conveniently getting a quality beverage made from the freshest of ingredients can be a challenge. Therefore, I operate a lemonade stand that offers a refreshing homemade beverage with great service and a smile.
  2. Get comfortable with displaying awesomeness – Being humble is a great quality to have but this is not the time to be humble. As a job seeker, we need to be proud of our achievements and the difference we can make. So toot your own horn and let the world know what you can do.
  3. Do something that excites or scares you – like returning to school, starting a blog (ex. WordPress), collaborating with someone on a project, selling a service (ex. Thumbtack.com) or starting a business.
  4. Get (more) uncomfortable – Once you start doing something exciting or scary, challenge yourself to get more uncomfortable. This moves you away from the despair over rejections and helps you focus on something positively creative and stops you from brooding.
  5. Be ready with a response – When people ask about your job search. You might say something like, “I am good at what I do. I know my industry. I will be fine.” Use positive and powerful words. Share how much you are comfortable sharing.
  6. Mark the past – Captain Hernan Cortes landed in Veracruz for his great conquest in 1519. After arriving he ordered his crew to burn the ships. Similarly, as job seekers when we are looking for a new role we should take steps to mark the past and get ready for a new chapter in our life. It could be having coffee with your boss, cleaning the closet or traveling.
  7. Respect the past – The last job provided you with great returns but it is a thing of the past now. Though it was fun while it lasted, now is the time to keep moving by taking one step at a time to reach your target of finding a great new role.
  8. Avoid burning bridges – The world is a connected and small place. Don’t spoil your relationship with your last employer. Part on good terms. You never know who from the company might reach out to you. If they decide to burn the bridges, you be the bigger person and keep your side of the bridge.
  9. Burn some bridges – Clean up some toxic connections and make space for more awesomeness in your life. You might also decide to suspend some connections for the time being and decide to get back to them later.
    • Take a minute to make two lists:
      • the people, thing, and ideas you need to keep
      • those you need to toss
  10. Constantly use power words –
    • I hope this will work vs. I know this will work.
    • I might be able to do that vs. I can do that.
    • If we can meet, then we can share more ideas vs. When we meet, then we can discuss more ideas.
    • I believe that I can make that happen vs. I am confident I can make that happen.
  11. Give great eye contact – When talking to someone looking them in the eye displays confidence. Either as a speaker or listener, eye contact is essential. Here is a trick to stay focused in a conversation and to give a great eye contact. When talking to someone first look at their one eye, then the other eye, and then the nose.
  12. Avoid giving reasons for actions or decisions – Say you spilled wine at a restaurant dinner table. Instead of saying “My bad. I am sorry” and moving on if you decide to explain how you think that the wine glass was too close to your plate or how the waiter had placed it incorrectly, it is to no avail. You don’t need to explain. If someone specifically asks you, then you give them an answer, a strong one, filled with power words.
  13. Respond to criticism only when/if necessary – Maybe you find yourself in a situation where someone you know criticizes you for your career decisions. Try and get out of that discussion as soon as possible. That might mean diverting the discussion or responding to it briefly. If you give it too much time, you get sucked into their black hole.
  14. Don’t just talk about it; be about it – The purpose here is to constantly move and keep growing instead of being stuck in a negative mindset. So, make a plan and stick to it. The list of things which excite you or scare you, work on them. Make moving a habit. Make your plan and work your plan.
  15. Make others feel incredibly important – It gives you a sense of achievement and helps you build your confidence. It also takes the spotlight away from your situation and helps you manage your energy in a positive way.

Hiring Companies

Arizona Department of Health Services

Key Bentley, Sr. Healthcare/Administration Recruiter at Arizona Department of Health Services presented about key job opportunities at Arizona State Hospital (ASH). Some of the available jobs are for nurses, behavior health technicians, and administrative positions along with many other roles. You can find all the ASH jobs by going here and in the agency field select “Department of Health Services” and hit search. She suggested reaching out to her in case an applicant has a follow-up question about their application.

Accounting & Finance Professionals, Inc./Staff-Logic Inc.

Deanne Desautels, President/CEO at Accounting & Finance Professionals, Inc./Staff-Logic Inc. talked about some of the roles they generally get which are in IT, Accounting and Finance, Marketing, Legal, Healthcare, Customer Service, and Light Industrial / Warehouse. Staff Logic has ranked #1 for 5 years in a row for direct hire placements. They are also a preferred vendor the State of Arizona jobs. Please visit their office to register as a job seeker so that they can match you with a suitable role.

Allstate

Jill Romanowski and Allison Chafin presented about the opportunities at Allstate. Allstate is one of the most recognized brands in America helping to educate and protect consumers from life’s uncertainties. The SW region (AZ, OK, NV, NM, & UT) is growing and they have new roles added every week. Some of their current roles are Claims Analyst, IT, Small business owner, Licensed Sales Professional and Agency owner. Find all of their open positions here. Allstate is currently offering a referral bonus of $10,000 for referring a small business owner for their Agency owner position.

Resources

Goodwill of Central and Northern Arizona

Jezreel Ramirez, Employer and Community Relations at Goodwill of Central and Northern Arizona. Jezreel described that Goodwill put 90 cents of every dollar they earn from reselling the donated goods toward helping job seekers in the community. They have career centers all over Arizona. You can find the nearest one here. They have five divisions – Commercial Maintenance, Corporate Careers, Retail, Workforce Development, and Warehouse/Transportation. Open positions in all the divisions can be found here.

 

 

 

 

Filed Under: Event Recaps Tagged With: AZ Dept of Health Services, Bridgett McGowen-Hawkins, Allstate, Goodwill of Central Arizona, Staff Logic

9/26/17 – Salary Negotiation-Make More Money

September 28, 2017 by Shweta Shrivastav

Salary NegotiationWritten by  Shweta Shrivastav

Keynote Speaker

Jack Milligan SPHR, GPHR, SHRM-SCP

Jack has a BS in Labor Economics and an MA in Organizational Behavior. He has been in the field of HR for almost 50 years. He has been part of the hiring process of nearly 20,000 candidates. He has seen both sides of the negotiation process. He has recruited for various companies as well as helped job seekers negotiate efficiently. His book “Make More Money” which came out earlier this year, is available on Amazon and has a wealth of information for job seekers.

“All jobs are different and all jobs are temporary.”

Average job tenure is 3.75 years. If you think about this, it means all jobs are basically “temp” jobs. If the job seeker approaches the job search from this mindset, they will have more courage. Courage and patience are the tenets of a successful salary negotiation process.

Nearly 75% of job seekers do not negotiate their salary when joining a new role and only 25% do. Out of this 25%, only 10% of the people do it correctly.

There might be various reasons to why job seekers don’t negotiate a job offer.

  1. They might think they don’t have a leverage
  2. They might be relieved to have an offer
  3. Gender differences – Men are more likely to negotiate than women

Your package has a cumulative effect on your long-term financial well-being. You are losing 100’s and 1000’s of dollars if you don’t negotiate. Your upward mobility depends on the package you accept. Most salary packages have wiggle room, don’t settle for less.

During the employment process, the employer is in charge until they make an offer. As soon as the candidate receives an offer, the tables are turned. There is only one simple rule to salary negotiation: Never ever accept a job offer as it is.

Here are three legitimate ways to negotiate salary. The first two ways have a relatively high degree of failure.

  1. Ultimatum: (!) Might work for someone who is a passive candidate, well situated and well rewarded. Ex: “Thank you for the $90K offer, it is going to take $130K to get me to move!”
  2. Demand: (.) More sincere and reasonable in amount and attitude. Willing to walk away if the demand is not met. Ex: “Thank you for the $90K offer, I need at least $100k.”
  3. Requestive: (?) Asks a question, implies flexibility. Creates a positive environment for negotiations. Ex: Do you have any room to negotiate/is there any flexibility?

Employers never rescind an offer just because a job seeker asks if there is any room to negotiate. This Requestive Channel Negotiation (RCN) has a success rate of 91%. Even if you are in the 9% who get to hear a “no”,  the “no” comes along with a polite, almost apologetic explanation. There is no downside to this method, just a great chance of success. Even if the answer is negative, you still have the original offer.

RCN does not work for all kinds of jobs. There are two types of jobs – rated and ranged.

Rated jobs are those jobs which have fixed hourly, weekly or monthly rates. Irrespective of the qualification and intelligence of the candidate the rates are fixed so there is no room to negotiate. Ex: Teachers, many Healthcare professionals, fast food restaurant workers. 40% of the jobs are rated jobs.

Ranged jobs are those where the compensation is not fixed. Big companies have a range of all roles where they have set a minimum, a maximum and a midpoint of the salary range. Smaller, more entrepreneurial companies don’t have such detailed compensation structure but they still have a range.

The chance of success of salary negotiation is highly unlikely in rated jobs. One should still give it a try. Ranged jobs have a high chance of successful salary negotiation.

So, how is it done?

  1. The offer: The employer/recruiter contacts you with an offer.
  2. Inject some ambiguity: Thank them for the offer and probe for clarity. Ask for some time to consider all alternatives. Employers don’t take ambiguity well. At this point, they were looking forward to closing the position as soon as possible. Since you asked for time, they are already thinking you would join immediately if they come up with a higher salary package.
  3. Create your NISL: Get clear on what you want to negotiate and create your Negotiating Items Shortlist. Basic compensation should be last on your NISL. If you are a senior executive, base pay should be the second last thing, after security pay. Ex: I am coming to you with 10 years of experience. I used to get 4 weeks of paid vacation at my last employer but your company is offering only 2 weeks. Would you consider giving me 4 weeks of paid vacation?
  4. Call back: and pose your question about wiggle room. There are two probabilities, one they will ask what do you have in mind and negotiate or the second, they will say no. If no, you get a reason why.
  5. Negotiate for tomorrow: Asking for an accelerated/half yearly performance review is also something you can ask for in case the employer says that they don’t have flexibility in the package right now. This way you end up getting a raise sooner than the usual one-year appraisal.

Even if you get a no for an answer, you will have peace of mind since you tried.

Hiring Companies

Codigo Connect

Paul Quinn, VP

Codigo Connect provides services in Technical professional development, Recruitment and Project based work. Currently, they roles such as Python Developer, Business Center Rep, Java Developer, Tax Accountant, Sales Professional and Machine Learning Engineer open. Job seekers can send their updated resumes to careers@codigoconnect.com for consideration. Codigo Connect is also offering a referral bonus of $500.

Here is a list of their open positions.

Northern Trust

Leo Ibarra, VP, Recruiting Manager

Tom Barnella, Recruiting Consultant

Northern Trust is a Financial corporation which provides asset management, asset servicing and banking services to individuals and companies. They take pride in providing work-life balance, professional development and diagonal movement to their employees. Some of their open positions include Technical Coordinator, Team Lead, Investment Performance Analyst, Bank Loan Trade Analyst, HR Admin Assistant, Risk Analytics Consultant and Associate Economist. For a list of their open roles please click here.

State Farm

DeAnne Prigmore, Recruiter

DeAnne has been working at State Farm for the last 20 years. She credits the development opportunities available at State Farm as the reason for her long tenure. State Farm offers great pay, time off, work-life balance, and training opportunities.

DeAnne invited job seekers to visit the retail space under State Farm’s Marina Heights office to get a feel for the company. There is free two hour parking for visitors.

Check out their open roles here, including Attorney, Claim Associate, Java Developer and iOS Developer.

Vanguard

Ralph Kimbrough, Sr. Recruiter

Vanguard offers great work-life balance, growth and retirement investment plans to its employees. They are a big name in investment and every $9 out of $10 invested is invested through Vanguard. They have openings from entry-level to managerial level positions including Wealth Financial Advisor, Internal Sales Consultant, Brokerage Operations Manager, Advanced Analytics Specialist, and Editor. Find out more here.

Resources

Coder Camps

Jason Jones, Sr. Admissions Advisor

Coder Camps offers 12-week boot camps in various software technologies. They have a Coder for life program which means any student is able to come back anytime after they have completed their course to take up any other courses for free.

They are a provider under the WIOA act and for those not eligible for the WIOA act, they have the option of payment plans if needed.

Students have the option of taking either on-campus or online course. Check out their course offerings here.

Closing

Jessica graciously thanked all company representatives, job seekers and volunteers for their time and participation.

The next event is at the Phoenix location on Wednesday, October 4th. Please register here.

Please find the list of all upcoming events here.

 

Filed Under: Event Recaps Tagged With: Codigo Connect, Northern Trust, Coder Camps, Vanguard, Jack Milligan, salary negotiation, State Farm

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I want to follow up with you about the position I had hoped to get. I got it! And thanks to Jack Milligan’s Salary Negotiation talk, for the first time I didn’t feel like an idiot when I accepted a job. No one else offers that kind of information.  Thank you for all you do. I appreciate your efforts to bless others.  May you and yours be blessed every day. Thank you for everything,
Cheryl
Navigating the world of career transition can be an overwhelming experience.  In addition to the mechanics of transition (updated resume, career search strategies), there is the deeper need to connect to people who are in the same situation as you are.   For me, all of this was answered by Career Connectors!  Had it not been for this organization, I might still be sitting in my house, wondering what to do next!  At just one Career Connectors meeting you can be inspired by great speakers, … Read more
Iris M.
Thank you for all you do! I’ve been nine loooong months looking for a full-time position and Career Connectors was a real life-line. I was pretty discouraged by the time I found your organization on-line and first visited. The speaker provided some great information but most importantly, encouragement and hope. The panel discussion on resumes was incredibly helpful! Last month I had the opportunity to sit with Brenda and she suggested I really pare back all but the last 10 years of experience an… Read more
Robin C.
I own a Leadership Company, and have enjoyed attending the Career Connector events. With gratitude I listen to the speakers you line up… they offer phenominal and practical information. What has struck me each time has been the audience. My heart hurts for them. They are in a desperate place in their lives. I have had the opportunity speak with a few of the people in attendance, and they have shared their stories… I walk away thankful to God for the opportunity to meet these people and they … Read more
Bonnie M.
Thank you, Jessica. Although I wasn’t able to meet you personally, I was able to see you working with another applicant and was impressed with your efforts and the excellent platform that your team presented. Thank you very much.
Luis R.
I just wanted to let you know that there’s a reason why I haven’t come to any recent Career Connectors events. It’s because I found a job! This past week, I started working as a data scientist for a technology startup in the financial services space that’s based in downtown Phoenix. It’s an ideal opportunity for me to break into the data science industry with an exciting company. I wanted to thank you and your staff for putting together all of your fantastic networking events and bringing … Read more
Chris M.
I am profoundly grateful for all of the support Career Connectors has provided during my recent job search – from the exceptional speakers to the participating employers, LinkedIn experts (Ted Robison is amazing with his individualized approach), resume experts, photographers, and of course the great opportunity to network! I felt like I had an army of support with me every single day. I appreciate all the time and effort invested by many and am particularly grateful for Jessica! You have a fi… Read more
Cindy G.
Good news. I have landed. Thank you for your support throughout my job search journey. You and your organization has lots to offer besides the positive energy, uplifting of self confidence and immense networking opportunities. I am very appreciative of the efforts and time put forward by you and your team.
Kirtida A.
Fantastic! Good variety of roles, Obvious interest in quality candidates, really good solid leads. Great investment of time.
Alicia
Career Connectors offered me a one-stop-shopping capability for all of the coaching, resources and connections I needed to perfect my job searching skills.  The package of services, and support I found while attending these workshops over the past 7 months was unique to, and more productive than any other networking venues I attended. I am thrilled to share that I’ve landed with B/E Aerospace in Tucson.  I recommend to all Job Seekers to find out what works for you, and exploit it for best r… Read more
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