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Getting an Advanced Degree

When your sitting there, trying to decide what to do with your career — what is it that makes you decide for or against getting an advanced degree?

Say for instance you have a Bachelor’s degree and you find a school that is sort of convinient and offers Master’s degree programs. What would you decision process be to decide whether or not you wanted to get the Master’s degree?

Timing — Surely timing is a factor. Can you enroll and get admitted in time for the next semester or quarter to begin?

Location — Is there one close enough to your office or home to allow you to study easily?

Pricing – How are you going to pay for this? Is the student loan process frightening?

Ability — Its been a long time since you were in school, are you able to actually study and learn and pass the tests to get the degree?

Duration — It isn’t a quick thing getting another degree. Do you have the time it takes to invest into studying and committing to going to school to get the degree?

Benefits — Will the benefits of being able to perform at a higher level with the additional education and the higher salaries that may be associated with the degree outweigh the costs?

Good questions, all of them. What about you? How do you decide these things?

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What can you do when you think your career is becoming outdated?

There is this neat little article out today at Yahoo Education where they list out 10 careers that you probably haven’t heard about that potentially have a bright future. I like these little surveys.

Basically I know that for a lot of us, going back to school to learn to be a medical transciptionist (like you see on tv late a night) is not possible, but still reading these and hearing about these kinds of jobs is a good thing. If you look at these lists you can see trends - kind of where the market for jobs is going, and can then perhaps you can use that to get an idea of what type of jobs you’ll have in the future and try and migrate yourself towards those types of fields in the future.

Whew … that’s a mouthful! Basically, if you see that jobs are becoming more internet driven, and your not good with the Internet, then you can do several things. Next job change, move towards the type of job you are seeing the world become. So a job that doesn’t require all the Internet skills, but dabbles in it a little so you can get the job, and get your hands into that “new” part a little. Then take classes and learn as you work. Within a year or so you can move to the next job which is heavier in Internet skills - because you are doing that. Then the next one you change to could be entirely Internet and you’ve migrated yourself into a more open career field.

The other way you can use this information is to simply see where things are going and get the education. Whether it is getting books on the subject and reading them yourself (highly recommended) or getting books/lectures on tapes and listening to those on your way to work. Whenever you see training class opportunities in the area, take them. And most importantly, when special projects or opportunities to work in some of the “new” areas arise, take it. Do it. You learn by doing, and by getting better acquainted with things.

Change is nothing new, its been going on for years and years. And it will do you go to experience a little change first hand!

Some of the more interesting ones on the list - Personal Chef. I mean, who’d of thought! How about welders? Welding is a fast growing field? Wow…! And how about becoming a Carbon Management Consultant?

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No Internet At Work

I’m sitting at work today and suddenly nothing works. Outlook doesn’t work since it is connected remotely to the server in our home office. The Internet doesn’t work. MSN Messenger doesn’t work. Nothing works. All that works is the local network drives. So I can pull data from the servers, work on local applications but that’s it. There is nothing else.

Try to do a little in Excel and the answers are on “online help”. There aren’t any manuals here, no books on the subject. I’ve always relied on the Internet and forums for help. I can’t even call because our office phones work on VOIP - which requires the Internet to work.

So, I fall behind in my work since it can’t be done. Sit here and realize that once I’ve completed the little bit of work left on my desk all I can do is play Solitaire. Tasks and files are stored in Outlook which I can’t open. The solutions to other problems are online.

It’s a sad state when so much of what I do (and probably a lot of you too) relies on a little wire and communications with the outside world. Tom Barlow, of Wallet Pop, wrote an interesting post on the subject and how to do a little bit of backup, but only for the short term.

Do we have backup plans? I’d hate for a network or two to go down long-term and the company to realize they need to shutter our office or move us to the home city (I wouldn’t go). I can’t dig ditches… Frightening thoughts!

What would you do if you have to totally change the way you work?

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Tips To Become A Morning Person

One of the things about looking for a job is that it is important to get “up and at ‘em” as it were. That like the addage says, “The early bird gets the worm.” But many people, and myself included have a hard time being a morning person. This article in the International Hearld, by Melinda Beck of the Wall Street Journal, details how you can learn to live like an Early Bird.

My take on all this is that yes, it is very important to be a morning person, to get to work on time or early and to function well. It is true that the people who get up early do rule the world. But, also I recommend that you try and live within yourself as well. If you just really can’t do it, that is get up and out and alerty function in your job on time, then you shouldn’t try to do it. Why show up for work at 7, when your dead … and you don’t function well. Sure, others might not be there and mightnot really notice, but your work performance will suffer. So if you can’t, then don’t force yourself.

For those of us in the other bucket, the “maybes”, then you should at least give it a very good try. I might could adjust myself to become a morning person.

In all fairness, whatever way you try to be, definately work on your job search IN THE MORNING. It is important to start communicating and working on fiding that good job before noon. And if some of these tips help you accomplish that, then my job here is done - I’ve helped you get started earlier and that’s a good thing.

I really loved her joke about sleeping to the crack of noon! I died laughing!

So — read the little article, learn from it. Get up a little earlier, or at least try to. And a thing of advice from me. If you go to bed, and tell yourself convincingly that “I will wake up in the moring on time and alert and full of enery” you’ll be surprised what really happens!

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What Do You Want in a Job?

Good question isn’t it? Obviously, for me, and probably a lot of other people the gut response to that question is lots of money! After all, the more money you have, the better your life will be, right?

Won’t it?

Perhaps… But if you stop and consider it, what do you really want from a job. Is it really just money — or is it, like I’d probably say, being well paid AND … then list some other desires.

Read the rest of this entry »

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Keep Learning - Now Cheaper & Easier!

One of the ways that you get and keep better jobs is that you know stuff. That you are highly educated in things that matter and you know how to use those on the job. Having a degree is a way to verify that yes, you do have the stuff it takes. Unfortunately for many of us there is obstacles. Time, family obligations, money, etc. Those all can get in your way and keep you from learning.

However, with a little determination, you can learn new things. The Internet is chock full of courses and tutorials on all sorts of things. And now, through an initiative called OpenCourseWare at MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) you can download the exact courses that their students take. Lecture notes and all. So in effect you can learn everything you would if you were there as a paying student. Devote yourself and there is no limit to what you could learn doing this.

Don’t particularly want to learn the courses at MIT? Maybe you’d prefer Yale. Or John’s Hopkins. There are now over 100 schools that are putting their courses online. Some of the material can be found through Apple’s iTunes software. Others through YouTube.

Of course, there is no homework that you have to do, no football or basketball team you can try out for, not fraternities or sororities, and sadly, there is no graduation since you can’t get a degree for your efforts.

Should the fact that you get no credit stop you? No! If you need to learn things learn them any way you can. If you can afford and have the time to devote to classes, either full time or in the evenings, then do that and get the credit, but the fact that you learn things will build your self-confidence. And that self-confidence will show on the job. It will not hurt if you take courses that directly apply to your job, but learning - and learning anything - will make you a better person.

So check it out. Learn and better yourself! You’ll be glad you did!

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New Year’s Job Resolutions

I stumbled across the main page of Yahoo this evening and noticed that one of their promo spots featured HotJob’s articles about resumes and the new year and finding a good new job.

Jeannie Kim writes one of the pieces, Arm Yourself With a First-Rate Resume, which talks about the importance of a good resume right off the bat! How you need to put clear contact information, relevant information, make sure you talk in an active voice, and so on. It would only take you a few minutes to read and if you put into practice the stuff she talks about, well, you will find yourself with a first-rate resume! The extra bit at the bottom about keeping a text version on hand for online applications is a terrific tip!

The second article, by Caroline Levchuck, Four Ways to Make Job Resolutions Work, is a great little article about how you can go from what may very well be your New Year’s Resolution (getting a new, better, or higher paying job) and making them actually work for you. I would very much hate to see you sitting here on December 31, 2008 and remembering the resolution you made and didn’t keep! So, check out her words of advice. They are good to know!

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Hello world!

Hello everyone! Welcome to my new blog. I’m going to help you figure out how to go about finding that great job.

You know, a job is important. Keeping that job is also important. But, don’t you think that it would be a lot easier to keep the job, and to be interested and enthused about the job if you actually liked it? Isn’t that an odd thing!

That thought comes from the suggestion that someone told me years ago: “If you do something you enjoy you’ll never have to work a day in your life.”

Unfortunately for me, I’ve already had to “work” a few days! But there is no reason that we can’t all up and get new jobs that we enjoy and have fun at what we do for a living.

So with that in mind, please check back for the tips and suggestions and the know-how to find that great job for you!

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