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#JobSearch : Lost Your Job?  First Steps First. Great Ideas to Get Through the Unemployment Period.

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Nothing is more worrisome than being out of work and dreading the bills coming in the mail that you can’t afford to pay.  Scarier yet is not having funds for job shopping (gas money or interview clothing).  Here are some ideas to help you get through the unemployment period and make time without a job work to your advantage.

Your full-time job while unemployed is applying online for jobs. Once you lose your job, you should immediately research your state’s unemployment benefits options.  In some states, a two-week waiting period must be reached before application; in other states, you may be eligible on the first day of unemployment. You must file for the benefits. In most states, you may do so online via an Internet-based application. The state will require forms completed pertaining to the circumstances leading to the job loss. Be truthful. If you were fired, state the honest reason. Not all states deny unemployment benefits for being fired unless the termination was for extreme reasons (e.g., embezzlement, equipment destruction, theft, avoidable OSHA-related safety incidents, or vandalism).

 

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What Skill Sets Do You have to be ‘Sharpened’ ?

Did you know?  First Sun Consulting, LLc (FSC) is celebrating over 30 years in the delivery of corporate & individual outplacement services & programs to over 1200 of our corporate clients in the U.S., Canada, UK, & Mexico!  

We here at FSC want to thank each of corporate partners in the opportunity in serving & moving each of their transitioning employee(s) rapidly toward employment !

 

Article continued …

Regardless of the waiting period, the employment commission in each state is one of the best places to search for a new job.  Many companies post job openings to comply with the EEOC mandate for the 3-5-day public posting of positions, and they can do so for free. The state also supplies job listings within an easy commute to your city and surrounding areas.

Apply directly to public job openings – some companies will allow resume uploads into their Automatic Tracking Systems (ATS), even if there are currently no job openings (this is called ‘resume farming’  by recruiters). Alternatively, apply online by uploading your resume to proprietary resume databases, e.g., Monster.com, CareerBuilder.com, Indeed, or USAJobs.gov (resume loading for the job seeker).

You don’t want a blank space on your resume where you were unemployed if you can avoid it. Recruiters are not fond of seeing extended periods of unemployment (the UNNA syndrome – Unemployed Need Not Apply). However, after the 2009 housing crash and the COVID pandemic, they are more used to seeing these phenomena of long periods of unemployment. The good news is that there are two rich opportunities to add content to your resume, allow you to meet new people, and network for new employment opportunities.

First, offer your time or assistance to non-profit organizations or obtain training to enrich your job skills. Many small non-profit organizations (NPSs) are desperate for grant writers, volunteers, mentors, and specialists. There is a shortage in these skills for many small NPOs who can’t afford to pay salaries for these job skills – your local paper may run lists of NPOs needing assistance.

Second, if you can’t do the education or training and can’t offer assistance as a volunteer, the next best activity is to go into business for yourself as a consultant. Shop the market for companies needing your skill set as a 1099 consultant (a local city business license may be less than $50).  You never know when your skills sets may turn into a more realistic method to replace that lost salary.  Recruiters will note you didn’t let the dust settle after a job loss and view you as a more viable candidate.

While you are unemployed, get the training (or education) you didn’t have time to take while you were working, and add industry or trade certifications to the achievements on your resume. Take classes to advance your education beyond the courses or degree you last achieved.  There may be inexpensive adult education classes in your city that provide insight into a fresh new topic for you. Computer skills are one of the hottest training needs in any industry. If you gain insight into how software or a process works, it will move you ahead of the job’s competition.

As you achieve the training, education, or volunteer work, add it to your resume as the most recent ‘employment’ activity.  The longer you are unemployed, the more obvious the non-productive activity and the less viable a candidate you become to recruiters.  Filling that gap with volunteer activities, education or training, and/or part-time consulting work demonstrates you are still a viable and highly qualified candidate.

FSC Career Blog Author:  Dawn Boyer, Ph.D., is an associate of First Sun Consulting, and the owner of D. Boyer Consulting – providing resume writing, editing, and publishing consulting services. Reach her at: Dawn.Boyer@DBoyerConsulting.com or http://dboyerconsulting.com.  

Bio: Dawn D. Boyer, Ph.D., manages and operates a consulting firm in Norfolk, Richmond, Colonial Beach (Dahlgren), and Gloucester, VA.  Her background is 24+ years in the Human Resources field, of which 12+ years are within the Federal & Defense Contracting industry.  She is the author of 940+ books on business, human resources research, career search practice, women’s studies, genealogy lineages, and adult coloring books.  Her books are listed on Amazon.com under her author’s page for Dawn D. Boyer, Ph.D.

 

FSC Career Blog | September 19, 2022

 

#JobSearch : Déjà Vu All Over Again – Good News, Bad News for Employers and Job Seekers.

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I remember…  with trepidation … the market events in the fall of 2008 caused the real estate crash in 2009 and the resulting rise in unemployment with hundreds of thousands of workers losing their jobs. (I was one of them. As a HR director, I had to write my own layoff letter!)  The recent pandemic is not quite the same, but the impact is eerily similar and much worse for workers who are now unemployed. With luck, this time, the economy will swing back quickly once folks get back to their office or location work sites as cures, vaccines, and plasma infusions are deemed safe and made available to inoculate the general population.

When economic crisis upheavals create market impacts and job losses, it’s best to be prepared for the ‘what ifs?’

In 2009, the bad news was employers laid off, terminated, or furloughed workers with no known return-to-work date.  This was a crisis for the company and its workers. The events affected stability, growth, and/or revenue for the business, but also provided a unique opportunity to enrich the workforce and gain more valuable employees in the long run.  Companies initially targeted ‘slackers,’ ‘redundant,’ or unskilled (untrained) employees in the mass layoffs. Workers able to do the work of others had to cross-train, or who were more productive were more likely to be retained.

Use the lessons learned from the 2009 economic crash to preparing for the current pandemic-related crisis, and/or future events with equitable impact on worker’s careers.

Those laid off or terminated were often the workers with the lowest return on investment (ROI) for the business model.  Unfortunately, it was also a great opportunity to drop what the company determined were ‘troublemakers,’ ‘high maintenance employees,’ and those who had reached a salary ceiling for their job level.

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What Skill Sets do You have to be ‘Sharpened’ ?

Continue of the article:

When the economy picked up again, the company had a choice of rehiring the furloughed workers. In some cases, companies found more productive replacements for the past terminated workers.  Some businesses chose to continue to pay unemployment taxes on furloughed workers and hired fresh employees to train to higher standards and productivity.  This may happen again in 2020. If fresh, new workers can provide a higher rate of productivity after training, the companies could turn a higher profit, faster, and decide not rehiring the furloughed workers is worth the business risk.

The good news is some workers ‘sent home’ during this pandemic event may not have been fired.  Companies recognized some work (telework) could continue if workers had the right equipment and access to work-related applications from home.  The scramble to set the employees up to work from home may result in long-term and increased ROI based on lower overhead costs. This event may help business leaders see the opportunity to keep workers, monitor productivity, and simultaneously reduce overhead costs by continuing to keep employees working at home.

It is bad news for the workers who are permanently laid off or furloughed. The economic crisis does provide opportunities for those who lost their jobs to go back to school, take more technical or trade training, and refresh their resume(s) for more practical or higher-level educational opportunities.

The good news is, even though the furloughed worker may have been highly productive, this is the perfect opportunity to use one’s advanced experience and skills to search for a new career position. Shop for that new job with companies who terminated the ‘redundant’ workers and are looking for that higher productivity employee.  When an employee is laid off it’s the perfect timing to refresh their resume to identify their strongest skills and their greatest weaknesses.

It is vital to showcase on the resume the job seeker’s achievements and accomplishments to document the metrics and capabilities of the worker in past and potentially future work environments.  Review the education section to decide when, where, and what to add to skill sets by taking online classes, going back to schools (colleges, universities – online courses where available), or targeting technical schools for updated trades training.

When economic crisis upheavals create market impacts and job losses, it’s best to be prepared for the ‘what ifs?’ in one’s career path.  Use the lessons learned from the 2009 economic crash to preparing for the current pandemic-related crisis, and/or future events with equitable impact on worker’s careers.  Keep updating one’s work skills, ensure your productivity at work is at its high level and makes a profit (or reduce overhead expenses) for your company. Continue to learn or take training in a variety of skills to make yourself non-expendable to your employer.  If you are not constantly improving yourself, you will not survive or do well in the worst-case economic scenarios of the future.

FSC Career Blog Author: Ms. Dawn Boyer, Ph.D., owner of D. Boyer Consulting in Hampton Roads and Richmond, VA – provides resume writing, and editing / publishing / print-on-demand consulting. Reach her at: Dawn.Boyer@me.com or visit her website at www.dboyerconsulting.com.

 

FSC Career Blog| April 14, 2020

#Leadership : Follow the 70-20-10 Model to Train Your Employees … Only 32% of Employees in the U.S. are Engaged, Involved in, Enthusiastic about & Committed to their Work & Workplace, according to Recent Surveys by Gallup. That means More than Two-Thirds of Employees are Not Engaged.

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Today’s rapidly evolving workplace requires employees to constantly upgrade their skills. They must be equipped to find knowledge quickly, be proficient with technology and be able to interact and collaborate using a variety of communication tools.

Leader3

 

The new reality of training is the 70-20-10 model, in which learners get 70 percent of their knowledge from job-related experiences, 20 percent from interactions with others and 10 percent from formal educational events.

Forward-thinking training initiatives can help employees be successful in a rapidly evolving environment. Yet many companies continue to use old-school training methods that have failed to keep pace with major trends affecting the workplace.

A survey by Boston Consulting Group found that companies spend tens of billions of dollars globally each year to train employees, but the money often is wasted because “the training is not geared to drive business results.” It also discovered that business leadership training and talent development often overlook frontline leaders, who create value for customers and that the training employees do receive often doesn’t have a meaningful impact on business results.

According to “The Impact of Employee Engagement on Performance,” a 2013 report by Harvard Business Review Analytical Services, having a highly engaged workforce “not only maximizes a company’s investment in human capital and improves productivity, but it can also significantly reduce costs, such as turnover, that directly impact the bottom line.”

 

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Yet only about 32 percent of employees in the U.S. are engaged, involved in, enthusiastic about and committed to their work and workplace, according to recent surveys by Gallup. That means more than two-thirds of employees are not engaged.

Meanwhile, Millennials and Gen Xers are a growing majority of the workforce. Millennials last year surpassed Gen X as the largest cohort of the U.S. labor force.

These trends are driving many companies to take a hard look at costly, ineffective and time-consuming traditional training – the kind involving daylong workshops and “death by Powerpoint” presentations. Today’s employees want opportunities for on-demand, on-the-job training and feedback.

Progressive companies are opting for a more immersive, interactive and ongoing training approach that typically involves technology. Toward this purpose, many are utilizing microlearning – delivering training content in a bite-sized, on-demand format.

Microlearning can include anything from simple methods, such as directing employees to research topics online and reporting what they discover, to customized digital libraries that offer leaders and employees on-demand access to a constantly evolving set of topics.

Companies that utilize microlearning effectively focus on providing rich content in a variety of formats so learners can focus on the right knowledge and skills in multiple ways. Here are some tips for building more agile, effective and efficient training.

Offer flexible options.
Learners are no longer tied to their laptop or PC. They use Twitter, YouTube, Pinterest and other social media networks to get information. Give them specific skill-building content they can use in a moment of need via social media or other online tools.

Provide both short and long learning opportunities.
These can range from a 30-second video available on their phones, focusing on a specific job challenge, to in-depth e-learning courses and one-on-one coaching.

Make it practical and interactive.
Effective training shows employees the connection between what they are being asked to do and why. It should connect them with the specific skills and information they need to do their jobs, and give them opportunities to learn, practice and get feedback.

Make it social, and fun.
Including a social element that involves community sharing and learning, and perhaps gaming elements, will intrigue learners to return frequently.

The new reality of training is the 70-20-10 model, in which learners get 70 percent of their knowledge from job-related experiences, 20 percent from interactions with others and 10 percent from formal educational events.

I expect interactive, on-demand, on-the-job learning solutions will remain critical to helping companies remain agile and adapt to rapidly changing business environments, though the form of these solutions will undoubtedly continue to evolve. Be open to experimenting with new modalities to ensure learners get what they need.

 

Entrepreneur.com | July 5, 2016 | Amy Fox

#Leadership : 9 Places to Learn Leadership Skills for Free…Check Out these Free Online Resources for Leadership Training.

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Some of these courses are graduate-level university courses from institutes such as MIT. If you’re thinking of diving into the MBA pool, these free courses will give you a good taste about what the expectations and style of learning would be.

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