Archive | Career Success Tips

YES and GO

Background:  My life has been `framed’ by two simple and challenging words of attitude and action – YES and GO.  During high school, I helped start a Youth Employment Service, and annually, we found part-time employment for over 500 (and also met the needs of my Midwestern neighbors for yard work, babysitting, cleaning and other services).  Community residents poured their milk from cartons and heard various radio ads with a message promoting YES services.  Today, I serve you by providing documents for your job search as well as career, employment and interview coaching services under the banner – GO for the job.

How do we use these two powerful and positive words  in our conversations, lives, workspace, and job search?  Following are some reflective thoughts:

Yes is “used to express agreement, consent, affirmation or confirmation”.

Is the glass half full or half empty?  This idiom is used to explain how people perceive events and objects.  Frequently, we approach conversations, challenges, and choices with different perceptions and then reactions.  Some of us suspend belief, come with questions and raise objections and concerns … reflecting our personality.  Some of us approach with wonder, hope for the very best, and believe until proven wrong.  Then, we often use unconscious, non-verbal language to signal our reaction and answer.  Yes reflects a positive attitude – positivity.

Do you express  a `yes attitude’?  frequently?  How do you express it?  How effectively do you express it when networking and interviewing?

Go is “an indication of motion with or without reference to a destination or point of departure”.

Where are you and where are you going?  Have you done your preparation and planning?  Are you taking aim … getting set?  Are you taking action?  What actions are you taking?

What is your career direction?  What jobs(s) are you seeking?

Yes, you should know and understand your strengths, success attributes, competence, and capability as well as their benefits.  Go share them!  You also know that networking is the best way of finding that next position/job.  Go meet folks, ask for their assistance and ideas asking:  Who else?  What else?  and, how else?  Most importantly – offer to help!

Yes, you understand that everyone has some `hurdle’ to overcome.  Go and overcome yours by focusing on your strengths!  We are naturally born to be free, interdependent, contribute, and pursue happiness.  Go and enjoy the journey with preparation, persistence, and positivity!

20-60-20 Work Improvement Principle

Recently, a client called and told me that his wife was facing the following situation at work.  Her employer was in the midst of reducing payroll and one of the plans (in addition to reducing hours) was to have her become the supervisor of two departments and lay-off a number of people (including a fellow supervisor).  Quite naturally she was concerned for those losing their positions and for her increased workload.  My client had recently read that all of us are actually working at only 60% of our capacity (in spite of the productivity improvement statistics); and he was encouraging her to assume the new responsibilities with `you can do it’.

We met and discussed the 20-60-20 work improvement principle.  She agreed that she `can do it’ and is doing it!  Following is a description of this principle with a hope that it will give all of us a reminder of the possibilities and opportunities we have each and every day.

Working at “110%” sounds good, but is it realistic?  Alternatively, Working with purpose and a focus on improvement seems a better choice.

How do we spend time at work?

Background:  For over a hundred years, industrial engineers [Frederick Taylor was a pioneer] have conducted `time-in-motion’ studies and summarized their observations of numerous workforce efficiencies with a basic conclusion:  

We [individuals, teams, and organizations] spend 60% of the work day/month/year – performing our jobs (the duties and responsibilities from job descriptions).

What about the other 40%?  Is it wasted time? water-cooler chat?  inefficient, excess payroll? non-valuable work?  No, or not necessarily so, when individuals, teams and work units understand and embrace the 20-60-20 `improvement’ principle:

20% is about Going from and `letting go‘  … it is work and activity that could or should be Discarded, Transferred and Delegated to someone else, or Automated and changed.  Perhaps some of your work is redundant and/or obsolete and is a candidate for change and improvement.  Think about what your customers truly need and want (as well as what others expect of you);  then consider some low-hanging fruit (tasks, time, methods) to:  discard – stop doing;  delegate and/or transfer – provide others with an opportunity to learn and with a new challenge; and automate – using either technology or a different method.  Reviewing your past week, what could you have discarded, delegated, or automated?  Start making a list of these things … and take action!  Does it work?  Years ago, General Electric launched a company-wide program called “workout” – they targeted 10% for `letting go’.  They achieved dramatic success with productivity gains and increased profitability.

60% is about Doing your job … it is your primary purpose and activity at work.  Learn it, understand it, and do it well.  The challenge for all of us is to do it well and to work effectively and efficiently and to improve.

20% (the balance of time) is about Going toward … it is the `exploration and a new journey’.  It begins with observations and questions:  what else? How else? Why? How about?  It is about Inquiry, Discovery, and Invention.  Many `high-tech’ firms such as Google assign `mandatory’ time to being `creative’ and brainstorming and developing `new’.  While many of us are not inventors, we can observe, ask, learn, and take on new responsibilities (e.g., unburdening some tasks from others).  We can consider, try, and choose another way.

Consider that 20-60-20 is a powerful framework with application for personal time management and improvement and productivity as well as for teams and organizations to make improvements and produce results that exceed expectations.

By looking at work activities, processes, and time in these three `blocks’, you and your employer will see value.  You will discover opportunities to make your job more empowering, satisfying, interesting and rewarding!  And, you will gain significant improvements to your bottom line by being both more efficient and effective.