By Larry Goldsmith, CWDP, P.E.T.
Does it sometimes feel that as if you are in the world described by the 1999 Matrix movie where humans are living in an artificial world and that the world is not quite what it seems to be and a menacing conspiracy is at work against you? How do you unplug from the matrix and bring logic to your job search and life?
For whatever reason this thought came to mind as I prepare my final lecture for the semester. What final wisdom can I leave my students? We have been together already (online) for 12 weeks. {SLS 1301 Career and Life Planning} The measured outcomes for this course are based on a student’s ability to identify aptitudes, interests, values and personality as related to their career decision-making and their personal life.
First I like to ‘ring a bell’ and remind my students to view their instructor (and other authoritarian figures) not as the sage on the stage but rather their guide on the side? Greater longer lasting success is achieved in the classroom when education becomes student centered which translates to where students are given tools and hands-on experiences and taught to think by analyzing, reasoning and synthesizing to develop their own learning. This is in contrast to where in the old days that we as teachers lectured and students were led to believe that the words and wisdom of the instructor is omnipotent. (This approach would be considered instructor-centered teaching.)
I am thinking of closing this semester with the thought that a job search is not an isolated experience. All that my students learned this semester has a connection, not only to each of their assignments, but to that which they do on a daily basis as well as prior life experiences (like Experiential Learning). For example, take something as simple as me going to the supermarket. It is not just about me going to the grocery store to purchase food. To go to the store I have to consider whom am I cooking for this week? Am I the only cook or will Lori be cooking this week too? Will Lori’s mother be with us at dinner? Are their health issues that we have to consider? How can the food we purchase help us be healthier and live longer? (Darn my parents! Why did they make me leave a clean plate?) What is my work schedule? What is Lori’s schedule? And what about other experiences such as three weeks ago when Lori cooked a vegan lasagna that was actually good, for not having any meat. (Do you understanding where I am going? Do get my point? If I was thinking of Lori’s lasagna for three weeks, how could it be an isolated experience if it was still in my thoughts? Giving time I could bring in many more examples that a simple visit to the super market is not an isolated experience.
This premise that there is no such thing as ‘isolated’ holds true for the job search experience as well. Like my supermarket trip there is more involved in a job search than only the specific event. This is the message that I imparted last week when I spoke to c-level executives at the local workforce program and afterwards to ‘soon-be-graduates of our Honor College. I like my students, with this final lecture, to understand that a job search is really a series of staged opportunities waiting for a successful experience to occur. {Here are activities that could become staged opportunities; distributing a résumé, delivering a 30 – 45 seconds selling (elevator) speech, attending a networking business event, sitting for an interview, canvassing and cold calling, making a telephone sales call, or responding to an employer’s objections.}
Each of these activities is an event by itself. How my students go about to achieve success in these activities now or following graduation is directly related to everything they have done in life to this point. What they learned in their fifth grade writing class set a foundation for their résumé, or a high school speech class gave preparation for building networking skills, past work history establishing an employer’s attitude about their work expectations, or possibly accomplishments and achievements in other areas such as being a member of an association will have consider impact on what happens to them now in their job search and planning a career. So to say a job search is an isolated experience is just not so.
I will share with my students that to be successful today, they must be mindful of all of their choices and decisions as they move through life if they want to boost their personal performance for improving job search effectiveness. The message is to do their best, no matter. Build success by doing everything well, whenever and wherever. To be effective, they must keep in mind that their success is an accumulation of all their prior experiences and training that have led to this opportunity.
So where am I in preparing my final lecture? Should the topic be, that there can not be an isolated job search (or life plan) experience? Everything is connected. Or maybe for now, I will just encourage my students to build a plan drawing from what learned in this course. Write it down. This makes it real. Let this plan give you direction.
I have two weeks to decide.
Here’s my personal plan. Use it to develop your own career and life map.
- Define Yourself.
- Follow a Plan. Write it down.
- Retrain. Don’t let your education and time pass you by.
- Stay Informed in your field or where you want to go.
- Get Involved. Talk to people.
- Stage your opportunities.
- Keep in the Line of Sight of Decision-makers.
- Measure everything – You don’t manage what you don’t measure.
- Job Search – Ready Aim Fire
{ 0 comments }
