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12/14/17 – Master Your Mindset to Land Your Next Job

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Written by Mary Beth Huffman

Keynote

Master Your Mindset to Land Your Next Job

Vered Kogan 

Change isn’t easy.

Mindset. A mindset is a belief that you hold; a thought repeated over and over, even if completely false. Some mindsets empower us and others don’t. Master your own mindset in your own abilities. All of you have a great mindset or you wouldn’t have gotten here.

To shift any belief, you become what you believe. The meaning you give to any experience becomes your belief. By 35 years old your brain controls 95% of what you think and do. The conscious mind is 5%, just the tip of the iceberg. The subconscious mind holds all of our beliefs and this controls 95% of what we think and do. How you tie your shoe is even controlled by your subconscious. Remember when you learned to drive, you were conscious of everything. Now you drive and don’t remember how you got there.

The Mindset Cycle book
Maybe you have a belief that LinkedIn is the worst way to do a job search. Every thought controls your emotional state. When preparing for an interview, have an empowered mindset going into the interview. Think positive, think you can, be aware of your posture – sit up straight, be engaged, talk confidently, be energetic, and tell the truth because they know.

4 Step Mindshift Process

  1. Desire – Clarify your Outcome
    It is important to clarify what you want to achieve. You must have a clear, specific and compelling goal . Identify what you really want. Your brain is a goal achieving machine. It will help you identify the target. The catch is to give very clear instructions. Every thought is an instruction for your brain to achieve and your subconscious mind to capture. You will become what you believe. Your RAZ – Reticular Activating System helps you become aligned to your goal and achieve it. When you start looking for a new car and want a specific car, then you see that car everywhere.
    Write your goal in the present tense. Include how you’ll feel when you achieve it.
    It is ___________________ (future date) and I have ____________________ (your outcome).
    I feel __________ (positive emotions).
  2. Belief – Shift Your Beliefs
    Identify your limiting belief. What is holding you back from achieving your goal? Say, “What I believe about my goal is…” This is a free judgment exercise. “I want this, BUT….” Or “I can’t BECAUSE…” and notice what comes up. Now review your beliefs and chose just one limiting belief that gets in your way and keeps you from reaching your full potential. My limiting belief is ______________.
    Then cross out that lousy belief and immediately flip it with an empowering belief with something aligned with your goal, followed by the word “yet”. Ask yourself if this is always true without a shadow of a doubt? What if the opposite was true? My new empowering belief is _________________.
  3. Focus – Align Your Thoughts
    When you first awake, think about 5 things you are grateful for. Then read your goals from step 1 of the process aloud. With your eyes closed, visualize yourself having achieved them. Your brain will start coming up with all sorts of buts. I want this but…this career is too risky… What happens is that consciously you want something, but subconsciously you don’t believe it’s possible. When you notice a negative or limiting belief arise throughout the day praise yourself and find more positive meaning. Focus on happier thoughts and memories to shift your emotional state. Think about your goal and say, “I want this, BUT… – or – I can’t do this because…” These contradictory thoughts, limiting beliefs, will come up. Once you identify a belief that is really holding you back, and then weaken that belief. Is this belief always true?
  4. Action – Align Your Behavior
    One action that I will take this week to move me closer to my goal is _____________.

Mindset: The Psychology of Success by Carol Dweck

Then, come up with supporting statements that support your new belief, even if you don’t believe it. Then program it into your brain. Focus to Align Your Brain: Every day repeat your goals. Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill demonstrates this concept.

The Ritual
Every day, as soon as you wake up, think of the 5 things you are most grateful for to train your brain to be more positive. Then, create your future! Have your goals written out and read out loud. Visualize those goals and play that movie in your mind, everything you are going to see, hear, and feel that will happen when you achieve your goals. Everyday be mindful of your thoughts. Find meaning, even in the bad times. This is one thing you have to do for yourself. If you do this you will empower your transition. You will change results. You become what you believe…and now you have the process to change your beliefs!

Vered is offering a group MINDshift™ coaching program. Go to www.veredkogan.com for more information.

Take the time to master your mindset. It is the foundation of everything that you create and achieve. It is the best investment you could ever make.

Hiring Companies

Varsity Tutors
Tyler Kinnie, Senior Recruiting Manager

Varsity Tutors, is a platform that supports learners of all ages with personalized instruction to achieve any goal. They seamlessly connect tutors with students and are changing the way people learn all across the world. Varsity Tutors is expanding with sales leadership, supervisor through account management, customer care team, managers, and directors. Check out Varsity Tutors’ Corporate and Tutoring opportunities. Corporate openings include General Manager – New Business Ventures, HR Generalist, Tutor Engagement Manager, Account Manager, Sales Rep, and Sales Trainer.

Vanguard

Michael Marchese, Senior Talent Acquisition Consultant

Vanguard is a savings and investment firm with locations in Scottsdale and worldwide. Their organization will take you from where you are into the field. Vanguard hires individuals that really want to do the right thing, help individuals, and they can help you learn the finance side. If you are already in the field and have your certification, then they have higher level opportunities. Careers cover a range of areas from Client Services, Finance and Accounting, HR, IT, Investment Management, Legal, Sales and Management, and Operations. Find current openings here.

Staff Logic

Deanne Desautels, President

Accounting and Finance Professionals (AFP) focuses on accounting and Staff Logic, sister company, is more general, but both specialize in growing relationships with clients. They want to help you find what you’re looking for, but they don’t always find something for everyone. They help with relocation opportunities. Whether you’ve been searching for a few months or if you are new, Staff Logic and AFP can help you. View Staff Logic and/or Accounting & Finance Professional openings for further details.

Freedom Financial Network

Heather Marcom, Head of Talent Acquisition

When Freedom Financial Network started in 2002, they helped people overcome debt so they could achieve financial freedom. Today FFN helps people enjoy freedom in more ways than ever. View openings at Freedom Financial Network.

Resources
Career Connectors offers many services to assist you with your search: Resume Review, Hiring Company Networking, Business Portraits, LinkedIn Coaching and Educational Opportunities.

4/13/17 – Developing and Living Your Personal Brand

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Developing and Living your Personal BrandWritten by: Daniel Tetrick

When we think of a brand, we traditionally think about a business or product. Companies work very diligently to craft and protect their brands. After all, a strong brand ties together the perceived value and emotional satisfaction that a consumer receives from purchasing or using a product or service. The concept of a brand, however, also applies to individuals. A job applicant needs to convince hiring managers they will obtain value and achieve emotional satisfaction upon hiring the applicant.

Keynote

Developing and Living Your Personal Brand
Michael Seaver, @michaelsseaver

Michael Seaver is an executive coach and leadership consultant. He is a Certified Professional 12 Driving Forces® Analyst, a Certified Professional Behavior Analyst, and a Thunderbird School of Global Management MBA. Michael sees personal branding as “connecting your life’s narrative into direction.” This entails a concept he calls storypathing, or integrating past experiences into your future. Lessons learned and knowledge gained from past experiences are the building blocks for building a personal brand for the future.

Entrepreneurship
Employment does not have to mean working as an employee for a business, government, or non-profit entity. Employment can also mean entrepreneurship and contract work, and job seekers should consider seriously starting and running their own businesses. Many job seekers have skills and experience gained from their career paths that could be applied successfully to starting their own businesses. Why don’t more job seekers consider being an entrepreneur? A common reason is fear of failure. But as we shall see, failure should be embraced, not feared.

Celebrate Failures
It sounds antithetical to how most of us feel after failure, but failing to achieve one’s intention should be celebrated and rewarded. There is no success without taking a risk. Inaction results in nothing. Everyone hopes to achieve success, but even if you fail after taking action you have gained valuable insight. And those lessons learned are the building blocks for developing your personal brand for the future. For example, while job hopping is not criticized as much as in the past, some hiring managers may question an applicant about recent short-term stops listed on his or her resume. In such a scenario, the applicant should convey the circumstances, acknowledge the mistake, and articulate the lessons learned. For additional information on overcoming mistakes Michael suggests Brene Brown’s book and TED Talk “Daring Greatly”.

Individuality
Individuality is what makes each person’s brand unique, and that individuality is influenced by our various social groups. You are the average of the five people that you spend the most time with outside your family. Think of those five people. What are their characteristics? How are they different? That composite profile is likely a core component of your personal brand.

The Hero’s Journey
Superheroes in movies today follow a common a path:

Introduction of Characters > Bad Guy Wins > Superhero Works to Resolve > Superhero Wins

The journey a superhero takes to overcome failure is not unlike the journey everyday people take to overcome great challenges. And the lessons learned from failure and overcoming challenges are the basis for a personal brand of the future. Here is how to apply the Hero’s Journey to build a personal brand:

1) Take the DISC Assessment to identify behavioral traits, talents, and motivators

2) Past: analyze past experiences

Past by Michael Seaver3) Present: assess current interests and activities

Present by Michael Seaver

4) Future: identify goals and desired outcomes

Future by Michael SeaverCompleting the four steps will result in the discovery of patterns and themes. These can be used to build the guiding statements of a personal brand:

Guiding Principles by Michael Seaver

Using a Personal Brand
• Use branding statements on resumes and LinkedIn profiles
• Tailor communication to fit your personal brand
• Color can play a large role in branding. Blue conveys stability and trust. Red conveys excitement and boldness.
• Body language sends a nonverbal message about a personal brand
• Take a strategic approach to building an online personal brand

Living Your Brand
Need a jumpstart on creating a personal brand? Michael suggests sending an email to those who know you and your work well to ask for their input on your top three strengths and to provide an example when one was displayed. Look for commonalities in their responses. You may have found the start of your personal brand. Finally, remember that personal brands are largely derived from the lessons learned and knowledge gained from the journey taken to overcome obstacles and failures. These lessons often occur during times of great transition: around ages of late twenties and then again around age fifty. Wouldn’t it have been helpful to gain insight from someone who has been through the struggles? Be the person you needed when you were younger.

Hiring Companies

Varsity Tutors
Adriana Martinez, Recruitment Manager
Varsity Tutors provides tutoring, test prep, and other educational services to students of all levels. Its vision is “to connect experts to learners in any subject, anywhere, any time.” With its headquarters in St. Louis, MO, and a local office in Scottsdale, Varsity Tutors provides its services either online or in-person on over 700 subjects. Technology is a priority for Varsity Tutors as it looks to expand its subject list and expand internationally. The typical office attire is casual: jeans and a t-shirt. Current open positions include Sales Representative, Sales Trainer, Sales Manager, Customer Care Specialist, Software Engineer, Tech Support Specialist, and Human Resources Director. Get further information and apply on Varsity Tutors’ website here. Interested in being a tutor? Click here.

Arizona Office Technologies
Octavio Duarte, Corporate Recruiter
Arizona Office Technologies (AOT), a wholly owned subsidiary of Xerox Corporation, is Arizona’s largest consulting firm specializing in workflow optimization. With its headquarters in Phoenix and offices in Tucson and Prescott, AOT provides services and technology related to print and document management. Benefits at AOT include: medical, 401k, PTO, life insurance, corporate discounts, and eligibility to qualify for the President’s Club trip. Job seekers looking for opportunities in sales, administrative, field technician, and warehouse operations can find open positions and apply on AOT’s website here.

Modis
Courtney Cassano, Recruiter
Modis is a subsidiary of The Adecco Group, the largest staffing agency in the world. Modis specializes in placing IT and engineering professionals in temporary, direct placement, and contract-to-hire positions. Benefits that Modis offers its contractors include: medical, dental, 401k, short-term disability, and term life insurance. Modis also provides its contractors with professional development resources and training from its SkillBuilder application. Modis is proud of its recognition and retention programs with its associates. Job seekers looking for positions in application development, project management, data management, web and content development, architecture, or IT infrastructure management can search jobs and submit a resume here.

Resources

Goodwill of Central AZ
Carter Ellis, Professional Career Advisor @GoodwillAZ
Goodwill works with all job seekers. Its services are free to both job seekers and companies. Goodwill maintains a job board with many internal leads from companies across the Valley. In addition, Goodwill provides resources to job seekers, such as career advice, resume preparation and mock interviews. Please reach out to Carter Ellis with any questions.

Closing

Jessica Pierce concluded the event with some final thoughts and reminders:
• Check out Career Connectors’ Career Advice Blog for insight and suggestions to empower and energize your career search
• Take a free DISC assessment courtesy of Career Connectors and Top Talent Consulting
• Utilize the available resources offered by Career Connectors at each event: resume review, career coaching, LinkedIn coaching, financial/insurance coaching, and business portraits
• The West Valley Healthcare Career Expo is April 19, 2017, from 10:00 am – 1:00 pm at The Colonnade at Peoria Sports Complex

Next event is Tuesday, April 25th, 9:00 am in Gilbert: “Start Strong, Finish Stronger: Your Best Self in Your Next Chapter”

1/12/17 – Rise Strong from Adversity

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internalGPS Paula ShoupWritten by Chris Layfield

Keynote

Paula Shoup, Coach, Facilitator, Consultant

Paula Shoup believes we can all rise stronger from adversity.  The most resilient people in the room are able to reckon with adverse situations through raw story-telling including all the negative emotions.  They control the critical voice inside their head, and they get curious about what they can learn and understand about themselves and others in the situation.  They continue to make stories out of this reckoning process, and they seek out empathetic listeners.  Resilient people own their history of vulnerability, and it becomes a sign of courage and strength.

How can you start down this road?  When you have a “Fall” (an “oh shucks” moment), write down your story in raw form with all the negative emotion – don’t hold back from blame, judgment, anxiety, perfectionism, humiliation, nostalgia, guilt, etc.  Create some space for creative reflection on the story by practicing slow breathing and keeping the critical voice inside your head in check for a while.  Ask yourself what you can learn and understand about three parts of the story: the situation, the others in the situation, and yourself.

Watch out for traps that can get you stuck:

  • Shame is a sure way to get stuck – instead of focusing on how you feel about your identity, focus your stories on how you feel about your behaviors in a given situation – you can change those
  • Negative emotions are the most powerful and long-lasting emotions – you need to notice sources of positive emotions in a 3:1 ratio to the negative ones to achieve balance
  • Imagining you don’t deserve to feel struggle because others have it worse than you stops the processing in its tracks – compassion and empathy are infinite, and you can find others willing to listen
  • Don’t fall into the trap of thinking the inner critical voice inside your head is you – it is trying to protect you, but it is not you.  Give it a name, notice the scripts it likes to repeat, and keep it in check, so you can process creatively

Hiring Companies

Allstate

Traci Whitley-Rose, Recruiter

Allstate has a regional office in Tempe with sales and marketing, product, corporate relations, claims, and IT professional opportunities.  The company is looking for a variety of backgrounds; Traci says telling your whole story, both inside and outside work, helps recruiters tailor opportunities to you.  Given the company’s national reach, there are also numerous flex/telecommuting opportunities.

Search jobs on Allstate’s career website.

Allstate is also looking to grant exclusive agencies to candidates with at least $100K in start-up capital, a track record of success, and an entrepreneurial drive.  Each policy an agent writes generates residual income, and there are no fees since this is not a franchise.  In addition to a wide product offering and national branding, Allstate provides a ton of local support including  training and consulting for your agency’s sales and marketing, product management, and corporate relations.  Even if you are not interested yourself, if you refer Traci someone who opens a business, Allstate will pay you a $10K referral bonus.

Varsity Tutors

Joanna Szewczyk, Regional Sales Director

Varsity Tutors just opened a location in Old Town Scottsdale (Camelback and Goldwater) on September 9.  They are a young company with lots of funding, strong technology, fast career growth, and a great vision of online delivery for test prep books, subject-specific apps, and a tutoring interface.  The culture is results-oriented with fun, and they are primarily hiring for sales, customer care, and training roles.

Check them out online.

Tech Finders / HR Finders

Kirsty Bach, Vice President

Staffing firms can create an advantage for candidates by getting to know them, presenting opportunities tailored specifically to their profile, and providing them behind-the-scenes, candid context that they may not hear through formal channels.

Tech Finders / HR Finders has been matching talent to roles since 1998.  They are currently seeking roles across multiple disciplines:

  • Tech: Database and Systems Administrators, Backend Principal Engineer, Java Developers, ERP Implementation Specialist, VP Sales and Marketing
  • HR: Healthcare Recruiter, HR Manager, HR Generalist, Recruiter
  • Finance: Sr. Accountant, Tax Supervisor, AP Specialist, Tax Compliance Specialist, Garnishment Specialist, Assistant Controller

Kristy also encouraged the group to consider contract roles as a stepping stone to permanent opportunities – contract roles open a lot of doors.

Get acquainted at www.aztechfinders.com.

Cenlar

Rebekah Long, Recruiter

Cenlar is a mortgage and loan-servicing provider with 2 Arizona Locations, both in Tempe (one at Warner and Kyrene and another at S. Hardy Drive).  Open roles include an HR Generalist as well as agents and supervisors in customer care and collections.  The company offers a full benefits package and encourages community involvement.

More information can be found at www.cenlar.com/careers.

Resources

Coder Camps

Tom Fisher 

Coder Camps is a 12-week coding skills program to transition people into an industry that currently has a 2% unemployment rate.  Learners can choose a full-time immersive course or a nights and weekends track; both have online and on-site options.  If you aren’t sure you are ready to commit to the full course, start with “Coding From Scratch” for a $100 application fee; it gives learners a basic overview of HTML, Java, CSS and more.

Visit them at codercamps.com

Closing

Jessica Pierce, Executive Director of Career Connectors, announced that the Career Connectors plan for 2017 is in place.  Career Connectors events can be a great next step for your to meet people, to get advice, and to connect with hope.

Veterans are invited to the Military Career Event on February 22 10am-1pm at North Phoenix Baptist  Church Conference Center in Phoenix, AZ.  This free networking and hiring event is open to all military- active, retired and reservists- as well as their spouses and significant others.

Additionally, Career Connectors is always looking for volunteers with photography, writing, and/or A/V skills.