Careerhacker

The Plum Book is regarded as “essential reading for anyone interested in pursuing public service in the executive branch of government.”

The book represents a compilation of appointed jobs from all federal agencies, such as agency heads and their immediate subordinates, policy executives and advisers, and aides who report to those officials. It reveals salaries, who’s currently got the jobs, and whether the job requires Senate confirmation.

You can find the whole thing online for free at http://www.gpoaccess.gov/plumbook/2008

“Research shows that employees are willing to leave their job for a pay raise of 20% or less,” according to Armando Gomez Career Advisor for AskMen.com. However, how can you raise your value at your current job? Mr. Gomez and eHow.com provide the following suggestions.

See:
Climbing the Corporate Ladder. [Armando Gomez – AskMen.com]
How to Climb the Corporate Ladder Effectively. [eHow.com]
The George Castanza Philosophy of Work. [DeeKnow’s Grotto Blog] – DON’T DO THIS!
Tips on Climbing the Corporate Ladder. [Raj Gupta]
Five Tips on Climbing the Corporate Ladder. [Gary M. Stern – HireDiversity.com]
Don’t Slip When Climbing the Corporate Ladder. [Eve Tachmincioglu – MSNBC]

DNL Global
provides a short online test to asses your ability to thrive in a ‘global’ career:

DNL Global, Inc. invites you to evaluate your global readiness using the
following free self-assessment test. The questions below represent a sampling
of our “Global Ready” assessment process. This evaluation utilizes the results
of the firm’s global management soft-skills research and our practitioner’s
findings of more than seven years in the global talent acquisition space.

Global
Readiness Assessment Test. [DNL Global]

Workforce Vision * Post: Bill Inman * Human Capital * Contingent Workforce * Globalization * Trends * Outsourcing

Is it possible that you could be making a bad impression with your colleagues,
superiors, clients or potential employers and not even know it? In times of stress,
during a busy work day and even during times of reflection many of us have unconscious
habits that appear. These habits might include:

• Swearing
• Touching or picking at your body (especially your nose)
• Playing with pens or doodling
• Twitching or shaking legs
• Cracking knuckles
• Chewing your fingernails
• Destroying water bottles or paper cups

At first these things might just be annoying to others (or possibly even disgusting)
but over time continued emergence of these habits could hold your career back
or lose you consideration during an interview. Start by becoming conscious of
these habits. Then add reminders or tactics throughout your day that will help
you stop. For example, if you are always tapping your pen during meetings then
write a reminder to stop the habit at the top of a legal pad before the meeting.
If you swear throughout the day add a dime or quarter to a glass on your desk
each time you catch yourself doing so. In any case track your progress with
the tactics you choose to use to raise your consciousness and stop the habit.

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Career Hacker * www.careerhacker.com * By Bill Inman * www.billinman.com

A recent article in SIReview revealed some startling statistics on workers spending and savings means and habits. Here are some statistics:

* 40% of workers live paycheck to paycheck.
* 55% say they would need to earn more than $500 per paycheck to live comfortably.
* 21% do not set aside any money for savings.
* 37% of workers have 1 income households.
* 16% work more than 1 job to make ends meet.
* 58% of workers have a set budget but 21% spend over their alloted amount.
* 14% of workers save $500 or more per month, 28% save $100 or less, 16% save less than $50.
* 25% of workers do not participate in their company’s 401K, an IRA or other retirement plan.
* 19% of workers that earn $100,000 or more annually often or always live paycheck to paycheck! 18% of these people save $1000 or more a month though, 30% save $250 or less, 12% save $100 or less, and 7% save nothing.
* 47% of women say that they live paycheck to paycheck, 36% of men say the same.
* 26% of women do not set aside savings each month, 17% of men do not.

Workers Live Paycheck to Paycheck. [SI Review, June 2007]
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Career Hacker * www.careerhacker.com * By Bill Inman * www.billinman.com

This is a dynamic list of content from Digg generated through a search for “Career Success” on the site. This list is updated hourly and displays the most popular articles/news/web pages at the top of the list. To reach each entry click on the corresponding Digg.com link. NOTE: RICK CLICK ON ANY ‘DIGG.COM’ LINK AND SELECT OPEN IN NEW WINDOW OR TAB TO VIEW CONTENT.

Career Hacker * www.careerhacker.com * By Bill Inman * www.billinman.com

Do you ever wonder how other successful career minded professionals schedule and invest their time? Computerworld offers an short yet insightful look into the schedule of a prominent healthcare Chief Information Officer. John Halamka as CIO at both Beth Israel Deconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School has seemingly achieved career success retaining a position of high responsibility. Here is a look into a recent workday’s schedule for Mr. Halamka, as outlined in by Computerworld :

Thats roughly 11.5 hours of work, 1.5 hours of personal appointments, 2 hours with family, and 1-2 hours of personal time (hobbies). For some that may seem like a heavy commitment, but consider that the average CIO makes about $165,00 annually (click here for more information).

A Day in the Life of a CIO. [Computerworld]

Also see:

Tapping the Power of Your Morning Routine

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Career Hacker * www.careerhacker.com * By Bill Inman * www.billinman.com

Sarah Needleman of CareerJournal suggests the following four tactics to remove workplace clutter, which should increase your performance and job satisfaction:

1) Eliminate Distractions - Set and monitor your personal career goals and if your job duties don’t support them then discuss delegating them or moving out of that role with your manager.

2) Resolve Conflicts - Plan to resolve and eliminate conflicts. Place conflict resolving action items at the top of your to-do list, after breaking these actions down into smaller readily achievable pieces.

3) Eliminate Email Overload - Quickly respond to non-priority emails with an ‘I’ll get back to you ASAP’ email, place them in a follow-up folder and get to them when you can.

4) Spend Less Time with Chatterboxes - Tell workplace ‘talkers’ that you have deadlines to meet (assuming you do) and steer clear of them if possible. Save these conversations for break times if they are unavoidable.

Read the entire article here.

Declutter Your Career and Make Way for Success. [CareerJournal - Sarah Needleman]

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Career Hacker * www.careerhacker.com * By Bill Inman * www.billinman.com

“The most satisfying jobs are mostly professions, especially those involving caring for, teaching and protecting others and creative pursuits,” said Tom Smith, director of the General Social Survey (GSS) at the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago. LiveScience provides us with a look at the Most Satisfying Jobs in their recent research report.

THE MOST SATISFYING JOBS

THE LEAST SATISFYING JOBS

Survey Reveals Most Satisfying Jobs. [LiveScience - Jenna Bryner]

Penelope Trunk discusses “How to get your company to listen to your ideas” at her Blog Brazen Careerist. Penelope states that “most employees don’t sell their ideas to their company properly.” “When you have an idea, sell from the perspective of the people who can make or break your outcome. Think about what obstacles would stand in the way for the decision maker, and then you do the work of making a plan to overcome them,” says Penelope.

In her blog post Ms. Trunk introduces Jeff Snipes, CEO of Ninth House, an online training company. Snipes presents the following 3 tips to presenting your ideas to your corporate decision makers in an ‘emotionally intelligent’ manner:

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Career Hacker * www.careerhacker.com * By Bill Inman * www.billinman.com