The UPS man just rang my doorbell to deliver some books I ordered. He knows me because of my addiction to Amazon.com, so instead of saying "Have a nice day!" he asked me what I'm writing today. My answer was, "I'm not sure yet. Something about how to do your job better or how to enjoy your work more...something positive for the people who feel trapped in jobs they don't love by the economy."
He said he couldn't help me because he loves his job...which, by the way, shows in how he does it. I asked him why? What makes being a UPS driver the perfect job for him?
"If I do everything the way I was trained, the way the company set it up, I am sure of spending my day talking with happy customers. I've worked for companies where I spent the whole day apologizing for bad company policy or shabby service, where the only time I got to use my own discretion was when I was breaking the rules. With UPS, you just do your job and at the end of the day, you feel proud of what you did."
Wow.
Don't we all want to work in a job like that? A job where company policies tell us how to make the customer happy, instead of preventing us from giving the customer what they want? A job where the people we meet smile at us, instead of complaining? A job that we look forward to doing again tomorrow?
Lucky UPS man.
Saturday, January 31, 2009
Friday, January 23, 2009
Search Engine Optimization
If you've got a website, you've probably already heard about SEO. This is the next big thing that fledgling business owners have to care about if they want to be successful, or so the twenty-odd persistent sales pitches I've received would have me believe.
Just in case you haven't incorporated recently, or registered for a sales tax certificate or joined your Chamber of Commerce or rented office space, I'll explain SEO. Search Engine Optimization is basically doing things inside your web page's code that aren't visible to your visitors but ARE visible to the programs Google, Alta Vista and all the other search engines use to find your page and decide when to include in their search results.
As an example, I entered "consulting skills training" in Google just now. There are about 27,000,000 results for this search. Our site, www.consultingstance.com , does not appear on the first page. Shocking. Oh, wait. We haven't paid $1,500-$5,000 to an SEO consultant to optimize our website so that it will appear on the first page. In fact, it appears on page 6 (61-70 of about 27,000,000). If you're a casual visitor who is shopping for some training, the sites on page 6 aren't any more likely to attract your attention than the sites on page 106, right? We might as well not have a website at all. So we'll probably pay for SEO.
But here's my question: What happens when 60 other companies who sell consulting skills training also pay for SEO and we are back on page 6? What if they already did and our investment is wasted? How can we possibly expect to compete in a business where we have 26,999,999 competitors?
Seriously. I'm asking. The answer to that question would be worth $1,500 to me.
Just in case you haven't incorporated recently, or registered for a sales tax certificate or joined your Chamber of Commerce or rented office space, I'll explain SEO. Search Engine Optimization is basically doing things inside your web page's code that aren't visible to your visitors but ARE visible to the programs Google, Alta Vista and all the other search engines use to find your page and decide when to include in their search results.
As an example, I entered "consulting skills training" in Google just now. There are about 27,000,000 results for this search. Our site, www.consultingstance.com , does not appear on the first page. Shocking. Oh, wait. We haven't paid $1,500-$5,000 to an SEO consultant to optimize our website so that it will appear on the first page. In fact, it appears on page 6 (61-70 of about 27,000,000). If you're a casual visitor who is shopping for some training, the sites on page 6 aren't any more likely to attract your attention than the sites on page 106, right? We might as well not have a website at all. So we'll probably pay for SEO.
But here's my question: What happens when 60 other companies who sell consulting skills training also pay for SEO and we are back on page 6? What if they already did and our investment is wasted? How can we possibly expect to compete in a business where we have 26,999,999 competitors?
Seriously. I'm asking. The answer to that question would be worth $1,500 to me.
Monday, January 19, 2009
Career Management Tip - The Master Resume
The new Information Age environment (mentioned in previous posts) means we change jobs more often than previous generations and, more importantly, we make no effort to hide that fact. Changing jobs is often the only way to get a promotion or keep your salary in line with the market.
For many, the only "chore" associated with changing jobs is producing a new resume. A resume is required whether you are applying for a new role within your current company or planning to move to a new one, and consultants need resumes even more often, since they are often submitted when a project is in the staffing phase.
I've found a solution to the resume challenge. I keep a "master resume" in a Word file. Every time I change jobs, learn a new skill or complete a project, I add it to the master resume. Every organization I've ever joined is listed. I've even maintain my address history in it, ever since I had to complete the background check to work in the gaming industry. (You wouldn't believe the amount of data required to get approval even if you are just being hired to provide IT advice.)
When someone calls me with a lead on a job that I might want, I can easily go into my master resume, make a copy, and delete all the items that do not apply to the new job. When a recruiter says, "send me an updated resume", I can do it in five minutes instead of hours. (I'm including procrastination time when I say "hours".)
Start your master resume now. No matter how far along in your career, it's never too late to start. As you think of special projects or additional details about a job from your past, go into the master resume and add them. Before you know it, you'll have 20 pages of raw material and you'll be ready for the next opportunity.
For many, the only "chore" associated with changing jobs is producing a new resume. A resume is required whether you are applying for a new role within your current company or planning to move to a new one, and consultants need resumes even more often, since they are often submitted when a project is in the staffing phase.
I've found a solution to the resume challenge. I keep a "master resume" in a Word file. Every time I change jobs, learn a new skill or complete a project, I add it to the master resume. Every organization I've ever joined is listed. I've even maintain my address history in it, ever since I had to complete the background check to work in the gaming industry. (You wouldn't believe the amount of data required to get approval even if you are just being hired to provide IT advice.)
When someone calls me with a lead on a job that I might want, I can easily go into my master resume, make a copy, and delete all the items that do not apply to the new job. When a recruiter says, "send me an updated resume", I can do it in five minutes instead of hours. (I'm including procrastination time when I say "hours".)
Start your master resume now. No matter how far along in your career, it's never too late to start. As you think of special projects or additional details about a job from your past, go into the master resume and add them. Before you know it, you'll have 20 pages of raw material and you'll be ready for the next opportunity.
Friday, January 16, 2009
The Consultant's Ultimate Test
The US Airways pilot who saved all those people with a perfect, precision landing on the Hudson River yesterday was Captain Chesley B. "Sully" Sullenberger III. Captain Sullenberger has spent the last 40+ years honing his skills as a pilot, first as an Air Force fighter pilot and later flying gliders and commercial aircraft. He is also a consultant who has advised NASA, the National Transportation Safety Board and the FAA on safety guidelines and procedures.
His consulting company, which is called Safety Reliability Methods, Inc., works with other industries to apply safety techniques that he has developed to their procedures. He teaches classes and provides traditional consulting services in his particular specialty. According to the Web site of his company, Sullenberger was "instrumental in the development and implementation of the Crew Resource Management course used at his airline, and has taught the course to hundreds of his colleagues."
Yesterday when birds turned his jet into a giant glider, he proved that he is not just an advisor when it comes to safety matters. He is a real expert in every sense of the word. He executed the landing perfectly and Mayor Bloomberg said he “walked the plane twice after everybody else was off to verify that there was nobody else on board, and assures us there were not."
Cool in a crisis. Extraordinarily prepared and skilled.
Most consultants believe they can execute their own recommendations flawlessly, but how many of us would pass the test with such spectacular results?
His consulting company, which is called Safety Reliability Methods, Inc., works with other industries to apply safety techniques that he has developed to their procedures. He teaches classes and provides traditional consulting services in his particular specialty. According to the Web site of his company, Sullenberger was "instrumental in the development and implementation of the Crew Resource Management course used at his airline, and has taught the course to hundreds of his colleagues."
Yesterday when birds turned his jet into a giant glider, he proved that he is not just an advisor when it comes to safety matters. He is a real expert in every sense of the word. He executed the landing perfectly and Mayor Bloomberg said he “walked the plane twice after everybody else was off to verify that there was nobody else on board, and assures us there were not."
Cool in a crisis. Extraordinarily prepared and skilled.
Most consultants believe they can execute their own recommendations flawlessly, but how many of us would pass the test with such spectacular results?
Monday, January 12, 2009
Job Insecurity
For consultants, changing jobs (projects) every few months is a way of life. This can be a source of stress if you are the nesting sort, rather than an adventurer, because part of a consultant's responsibility is to eventually work himself out of a job. The goal is to leave a happy client behind and once again find yourself looking for work. I call this "job insecurity".
I had lunch with my friend, Dave, today. Dave is an extraordinary consultant who has been experiencing this job insecurity for nearly ten years. He pointed out that he was better prepared for the stress than many consultants because he was involved in the movie industry before he became a highly-paid and widely-respected IT consultant. (Okay, there were a few steps in between, but not as many as you'd think.)
Dave is right. There are many parallels between, say, Tom Cruise's career and mine. (Stay with me, here.) I've done a lot of different kinds of projects all over the country. Some were unexpected hits, some received critical acclaim, and some were complete bombs. Each one had a clear objective when we started and my role was fairly clearly defined, though I was allowed a certain amount of creative freedom during production. Before each project ended, I had already started looking for the next one.
The difference is that Tom Cruise gets paid a fixed amount for each movie, where I am usually paid an hourly rate for my participation on a project, regardless of how long the project lasts or whether it is ever completed. That, and the noticeable shortage of paparazzi at Comdex.
I had lunch with my friend, Dave, today. Dave is an extraordinary consultant who has been experiencing this job insecurity for nearly ten years. He pointed out that he was better prepared for the stress than many consultants because he was involved in the movie industry before he became a highly-paid and widely-respected IT consultant. (Okay, there were a few steps in between, but not as many as you'd think.)
Dave is right. There are many parallels between, say, Tom Cruise's career and mine. (Stay with me, here.) I've done a lot of different kinds of projects all over the country. Some were unexpected hits, some received critical acclaim, and some were complete bombs. Each one had a clear objective when we started and my role was fairly clearly defined, though I was allowed a certain amount of creative freedom during production. Before each project ended, I had already started looking for the next one.
The difference is that Tom Cruise gets paid a fixed amount for each movie, where I am usually paid an hourly rate for my participation on a project, regardless of how long the project lasts or whether it is ever completed. That, and the noticeable shortage of paparazzi at Comdex.
Sunday, January 11, 2009
What's Your BHAG?
Jim Collins and Jerry Porras (Built to Last and Good to Great) first talked about BHAGs in the Harvard Business Review in 1996 in an article titled, "Building Your Company's Vision". They proposed that an organization needs a Big Hairy Audacious Goal (BHAG) to strive toward. Specifically, they said, "A true BHAG is clear and compelling, serves as unifying focal point of effort, and acts as a clear catalyst for team spirit. It has a clear finish line, so the organization can know when it has achieved the goal; people like to shoot for finish lines."
I think people, even more than organizations, need BHAGs. You can say that you plan to lose ten pounds, pay off your credit cards or get that promotion. Those are respectable goals that require planning and effort to achieve. You'll feel great when you reach any one of those goals, and anything you want to achieve is more likely to happen if you have a clear goal.
When you decide on your personal Big Hairy Audacious Goal, you are admitting that you can do more than change your own life. You can change the world.
My BHAG is to change the way people think about their role in the workplace. I'm starting with consultants.
I think people, even more than organizations, need BHAGs. You can say that you plan to lose ten pounds, pay off your credit cards or get that promotion. Those are respectable goals that require planning and effort to achieve. You'll feel great when you reach any one of those goals, and anything you want to achieve is more likely to happen if you have a clear goal.
When you decide on your personal Big Hairy Audacious Goal, you are admitting that you can do more than change your own life. You can change the world.
My BHAG is to change the way people think about their role in the workplace. I'm starting with consultants.
Wednesday, January 7, 2009
Skills for the Information Age
A bunch of different bits of info have presented themselves to me over the past 24 hours and they are working together in my brain to create a new perspective. I want to share and see what happens in your brain, if anything.
In The 8th Habit, Steven Covey talks about the fact that the Industrial Age is over in American business and the Information Age is here. One point he makes is that the single most important contribution management made during the Industrial Age was to increase the efficiency of the worker fifty times over, with automation and standardization and efficiencies of scale.
This reminds me that the ISO 9000 flurry was an effort to standardize decision-making to ensure the every person would make the exact same decision as every other person in the same circumstances. It removed the need for creative problem-solving and eliminated individual discretion, which is a huge advantage in an Industrial Age organization. It doesn’t work so well in an Information Age organization that relies on information-workers (better educated, highly skilled thinkers) for productivity.
If your standard processes do not allow the employee to be creative and exercise his own discretion and judgment, he’ll exercise his creativity to circumvent the process at his discretion because he trusts his own judgment more than the collective intelligence of the organization.
And he’s right to do so.
An Information Age employee has more free time, more inclination to develop his own abilities, and access to more information than an employee did fifty years ago, when the Industrial Age was at its peak. The Information Age employee has a greater sense of empowerment because he has had multiple jobs (not dependent on the employer for survival), has read at least one professional or personal development book (i.e. Covey, Carnegie, Buckingham) and is more likely to have advanced degrees. He takes responsibility for his own career development and training. Of course he trusts his own judgment more.
I’m not sure which is cause and which is effect, but this transformation of the employee into an independent, thinking entity plays perfectly into the new Collaborative Cooperation environment that is superseding traditional Command-and-Control management structures.
Here’s a speaker explaining the difference in a way that makes it easy to understand. (Also, I like his delivery style and would like to be able to present info like he does.)
http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/clay_shirky_on_institutions_versus_collaboration.html
My new favorite quote as the answer to many, many questions is “It doesn’t matter because that’s not the right question.” I plan to use it often.
Anyway, here’s the result of all that thinking. Our mission might be to equip people [with the soft skills needed] to work in the new Information Age - Collaborative Cooperation environment. In other words, the same skills that consultants have used for decades to get things done outside of a traditional employer-employee relationship are much more important now.
In The 8th Habit, Steven Covey talks about the fact that the Industrial Age is over in American business and the Information Age is here. One point he makes is that the single most important contribution management made during the Industrial Age was to increase the efficiency of the worker fifty times over, with automation and standardization and efficiencies of scale.
This reminds me that the ISO 9000 flurry was an effort to standardize decision-making to ensure the every person would make the exact same decision as every other person in the same circumstances. It removed the need for creative problem-solving and eliminated individual discretion, which is a huge advantage in an Industrial Age organization. It doesn’t work so well in an Information Age organization that relies on information-workers (better educated, highly skilled thinkers) for productivity.
If your standard processes do not allow the employee to be creative and exercise his own discretion and judgment, he’ll exercise his creativity to circumvent the process at his discretion because he trusts his own judgment more than the collective intelligence of the organization.
And he’s right to do so.
An Information Age employee has more free time, more inclination to develop his own abilities, and access to more information than an employee did fifty years ago, when the Industrial Age was at its peak. The Information Age employee has a greater sense of empowerment because he has had multiple jobs (not dependent on the employer for survival), has read at least one professional or personal development book (i.e. Covey, Carnegie, Buckingham) and is more likely to have advanced degrees. He takes responsibility for his own career development and training. Of course he trusts his own judgment more.
I’m not sure which is cause and which is effect, but this transformation of the employee into an independent, thinking entity plays perfectly into the new Collaborative Cooperation environment that is superseding traditional Command-and-Control management structures.
Here’s a speaker explaining the difference in a way that makes it easy to understand. (Also, I like his delivery style and would like to be able to present info like he does.)
http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/clay_shirky_on_institutions_versus_collaboration.html
My new favorite quote as the answer to many, many questions is “It doesn’t matter because that’s not the right question.” I plan to use it often.
Anyway, here’s the result of all that thinking. Our mission might be to equip people [with the soft skills needed] to work in the new Information Age - Collaborative Cooperation environment. In other words, the same skills that consultants have used for decades to get things done outside of a traditional employer-employee relationship are much more important now.
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