The Asia Pacific Headhunter

You're No Longer An Employee - Can You Be A Business?

Seriously, you're a business like every other business now. The world of work has changed to the point where if you just judge yourself as just an employee at some point you'll be disappointed that people treat you like a business. 

So what does this mean to you? It really empowers you. It means you can decide the training and development you need. It means you can decide where you invest in your business, and it means you can decide your target market.

At the same time it opens you up to the same kind of treatment you currently give other businesses. You vote with your feet and money; your own customers can do the same. You need to hustle to keep them and to provide them with reasons to stay with you, in the same way the businesses that sell to you do.

So as an employee try asking the following, if you can answer them then you're thinking like a business:

1. How much money has the company made this month and was my role important in delivering that?
2. How much profit did we make and what was my role in delivering that?
3. What am I uncertain about at work that makes me worse at my job?
4. What can I influence to make myself a key part of the business?
5. What do the customers think of our business and of the part I play in delivering it?

And one little extra to think about:

1. If my company went bust tomorrow would my personal brand currently be good enough to convince a current customer to work with me personally?

 

How to Build a Better Boss and Why It's the best recruiting tool

Link: New York Time's: Google's Quest to Build a Better Boss

What's the new next thing in leadership? Nothing quite so new, but definitely some reaffirming qualities that should be focused on (but usually aren't focused on enough). Leave it to Google to mine through tens of thousands of their own HR data - employee feedback, surveys, performance reviews, promotion nominations, etc. to come up with a succinct 8-Point Plan. Their findings in a nutshell: deeper technical expertise is not as important as it was thought. Being a good coach, empowering and stretching your employees and showing genuine interest in them as people makes a team that is happier and performs consistently better. 

Why is a headhunter writing about this? Because when I work with clients, I need to be confident that they are, indeed, a good company people like working for: a company with happy employees that perform well. That's my leverage in getting the best people for that company. It's known that hard-to-find/highly-sought-after people (like at Google) leave their jobs for three most common reasons: 1) they don't feel a connection to their company or their own purpose 2) they don't get along with colleagues, and 3) they have a bad manager.  What's interesting with Google's Project Oxygen, is that they found the the last reason - how employees viewed their manager, had the most impact on employee happiness and performance. Happy employees are the biggest recruiting tool a company could ever use. If you want to hire the best, make sure your current employees have a great manager or team leader. 

 

NZ Business School Sex Education

 

Okay this made me laugh this morning. The Times of India obviously love a great headline to grab attention. But at the same time check out the Google Ads just beneath the title. It's a ad for the University of Auckland. I guess for some people it might be attractive to get sex education while they study business.

It's important to note that this is NOT really Business School in the way it's used globally to mean post graduate MBA study. It's for undergraduate classes so really this doesn't amount to much more than an article about sex education on campus. Something that is fairly normal throughout the world. 

 

Making Shift Happen

I find most people characterize events in their life in basically two ways, things that happen to them, and things they make happen.

 Normally you'll find the bad things are the ones that happen, while the good are the ones they made happen.

 A major illness happens to them, being made redundant, that happened to them, the recession happened to them. 

On the other hand they got the raise, they got their MBA, or they made a million dollars. 

The language is subtle, but specific. 

One points to themselves and the other points away from them towards somewhere else, although where exactly we usually can't tell.

When it comes to being happy at work I'm going to suggest you stop using any term that describes things happening to you. 

Even up to the point of ridiculous. 

Why? Because I think that sometimes when we describe things happening to us, we forget about our ability to react to what happened.

That's where I see a problem. Your reaction is your chance to make things happen. 

Don't throw that chance away, open your mind to the fact that there is a real opportunity there for you. 

When you tell yourself you want to be great at something what does life give you? Does it make you great, or does it give you chances to practice being great? 

When you tell yourself you want to be someone people respect, does life give you that respect, or chances to do things people will respect you for doing?

When you tell yourself you want to be rich, does life give you money, or chances to work hard and earn it?

Are you starting to get the picture?

Some time soon at work life is going to give you a chance to be the person you want to be, wise, wealthy, intelligent and successful. 

At the time you're almost guaranteed to NOT think that life is giving you a chance to be those things, you're more likely to think it's kicking you in the ass.

But when you have that moment try open your mind, relax, be with it. And then react, right at that point it's going to be what you make happen that makes the difference.  

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Are you a software developer in Auckland, want to be happier at work? Click here!

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Forget Career Success What About Some Career Happiness!

I've spoken to a lot of people about success in their career, but more often I speak to people who are straight up unhappy. They haven't lost interest in being successful in their career but they know they aren't happy where they are right now, or happy doing what they are doing. These are smart people so if you quiz them on career success they'll answer intelligently about what they want to do and where they'll be when they succeed. Unfortunately, they rarely get that success because the real problem is that they aren't having any joy in their journey.

What's more important career success or career happiness? I've decided it's the latter and so I've started advising my candidates and clients that they need to spend some of their time really investigating where they find the joy and happiness in their career. For some of them focusing on this area has helped them engage with jobs they thought they were sick of!

So, how do you focus on finding more joy at work? Sometimes a problem defined is half way to solving that problem, so you need to investigate yourself in order to find job happiness. Asking the following questions might be a nice way to start exploring your thoughts:

1. What are the jobs/projects you've done in the past that you've felt the most engaged in?
2. When do you feel most happy at work?
3. Why do you think you felt engaged when doing those job/projects you identified?
4. Why do you think you felt most happy in the times you did?
5. What are the obstacles to me doing more work like that?
6. What are the opportunities to doing more work like that?

Good luck with finding that happiness at work, it'll make a huge difference to your life.

Working Women Discriminate On Appearance

U.S. working women see appearance as key: survey | Lifestyle | Reuters.

According to a survey conducted by PINK magazine women in senior leadership positions see appearance as key to their success at work. A more eye-opening result was that one in five female executives say they have withheld a promotion or a raise due to the way an employee dresses.

That kind of discrimination is hard to believe especially coming FROM women who face discrimination themselves when it comes to leaving work to raise families and in other areas. I think there is a fair number of woman who feel they have to show a tough persona to succeed at a high level in business, I wonder if surveys like these reflect the result of taking on that persona.

Recruiting Software Overview

A lot of businesses, small and large alike, are turning to applicant tracking systems to make the recruiting process a little easier, faster and more cost-effective. But have you ever thought about just how secure those recruiting software systems are?

 

Cytiva Software Inc., which provides on-demand talent management solutions, recently released a free white paper that explores ATS security and offers tips for vendors.

 

Most SaaS applicant tracking system vendors are able to provide levels of security that most organizations can't match internally, but some ATS users mistakingly believe that all vendors can offer the same amount of data security.

 

“Ask any applicant tracking vendor about security and you’ll get a laundry list of security measures, mostly concerning their physical data center,” Cytiva CEO Jason Moreau said. “But security is an ongoing process that involves not only your data center, but the code base of your application and the execution of ongoing policies and practices to make sure your application, your servers and your security systems remain secure in the face of an ever-evolving threat.”

 

Every company should be focusing on the importance of security, with more and more cases of it being compromised cropping up. Since early 2006, there have been about four to six HR data breaches per month, according to HR Privacy Solutions.

 

One problem is that privacy laws vary from state to state. On top of that, employers are often required to notify any affected parties, even if they only suspect that some data may have been compromised.

 

In example, in 2009, Aetna had to notify 65,000 job applicants that their personal data may have been accessed in a suspected security breach; in 2007, the Gap announced that a laptop containing Social Security numbers of some job applicants was stolen from the company's third-party vendor; and in 2007, Monster.com announced that 1.3 million users had personal information stolen by criminals who hacked into the Web site.

 

So what should you look for to make sure the software you're getting is secure. First of all, make sure the data center can offer you 24-7 secure entry, secure cabinet and cage space, round-the-clock technical staff, data-grade HVAC, advanced fire suppression system and optimized and redundant power supplies.

 

You also should make sure your software provider has the right hardware and software protections in place, which include everything from firewall protection to enforcing strong passwords to server monitoring.

 

In addition to everything else mentioned, your software provider should be able to offer you regular updates and provide new features to avoid any potential security risks.

Is Your Business or Contracting Work Feeling a Slow Down?

An old friend of mine Andrew Baird has run a successful IT business for over 6 years. Now his passion has taken a different direction. He is a business coach and seminar speaker who works closely with small to medium businesses to get them more clients and more cash profits by working less so they can enjoy life and have more fun. He is running a free telephone seminar that I thought some readers may be interested in. Here are more details from Andrew:

- Would you like to make more money in your business with less effort?

- Does business seem slower than a year ago?

- Would you like to learn from someone who has helped people double their income, for free?

If you answered “yes” to any of those questions then you should read on to find out how I can help you to make more money in less time with a lot less effort.

I am running a Telephone seminar (like a conference call) called “How to Flourish Your Business During Tough Times.” I have secured for the tele-seminar a very special guest speaker that rarely does tele-seminars. He is International Speaker and Author Brendan Nichols.

I’ve personally seen Brendan help people start Businesses that are profitable immediately and take business owners, struggling or not, and show them how to put more cash in their pockets.

Full price tickets to this event are $197 but we’re offering Free tickets to the event for just a couple more days.

If you are sick of struggling or just want more cash coming into your business, then click on the link below to find out more.

Details of the Call:

Date: 16th of September 2008

Time: 8:30pm New Zealand time or 6:30pm Sydney time

Click here to find out more and to register and secure your place now:

http://boldurl.com/UrVZrhmj

Use the Promo Code “SK” when you sign up.

I look forward to having you on the call.

Warm Regards,

Andrew Baird