Have you heard about iStartStrong? It’s a new report, based on the Strong Interest Inventory® from Consulting Psychologist Press. The purpose of this assessment is to guide people into careers that best fits their personality and interests.

The 8-page iStartStrong report identifies one’s top two general themes with links to detailed definitions. And, it provides one’s top five specific interests along with the related areas of study, career fields, activities, and related occupations. The related occupations link directly to the O*Net Online Summary Reports.

Although the report appears to focus on students who are selecting their college major and future career, I also think it is beneficial to people at any stage of their career. I give this assessment and report a “Thumbs-Up.”

The cost for this assessment is $9.99. To purchase and administer this report, you need either a master’s degree in an appropriate area or completion of a Strong Interest Inventory® Certification program.

© 2010. Nancy Branton.

It’s Monday morning again! “How do you feel about going into work? Perhaps you’re having a hard time getting started. Write down right now 2-3 job duties that drag you down; you’d prefer to push them aside, and do them later in the day, or tomorrow…or never.”

This is a simple conversation that you can have as a career professional with any client. Many of our clients will present us with a story about a bad jobfit, which is often characterized with negative opinions about the job’s circumstances, such as lousy pay, a bad boss, a long commute, and so on.

But take some time to probe their story for more details about regular or frequent job duties.  Here’s a simple exercise you can use to bring more clarity into the situation.  Ask them, what are the 5-10 job duties that they are expected to perform each day or week as critical job requirements? Get them to identify which  job duties they enjoy and don’t enjoy.

Ask them if they can remember a time when they looked forward to Monday mornings, in their current job, or in another job.  If you have their resume handy, ask them to highlight  the critical job requirements that they enjoyed performing on a regular basis in their previous jobs.

Perhaps they procrastinate with starting or completing certain job duties.  Get them to identify the job duties in their current and previous jobs where they procrastinated.

Identify items (both positive and negative) that seem to recur in their performance evaluations, regardless of who does the assessment.

Make a list with two columns: one of job duties that energized them, duties that they enjoyed performing consistently; and, another column, of job duties that drain them, duties that they push aside or procrastinate on.

Then take their current job description and estimate how much time is spent each day or week performing job duties that drain them. If they are spending 40% or more of their time performing job duties that drain them, or duties that they chronically delay doing, they may be suffering from a job misfit in terms of their critical job requirements.

What is a good jobfit?

It may be helpful to remind your client that there is no such thing as a perfect job where one is 100% happy and satisfied all the time with their core job duties. The world is just not organized that way! However, many studies show that the key to career success is to limit the downside of a job to 40% of job duties.

The remaining 60% of job duties should be organized around your client’s natural strengths, especially how well their talents and motivations correlate with their core job duties. In general, if we spend about 60% of work hours in a jobfit, then our work will be challenging and will provide a sense of growth and fulfillment.

Try to correlate your client’s natural strengths with specific job duties. Help them develop a job description aligned with what makes them happy and productive in the workplace, so that they can operate 60% of the time in a mode that comes naturally and effortlessly to them. This 60/40 split will energize them. This is jobfit.

However, we may also need to remind them of the likelihood that many times this 60/40 ratio may slip to 40/60 or worse, in which case they may feel drained by brief periods of routine work. This is nothing to be alarmed about as long as the ratio returns to 60/40 in due course; if it doesn’t, they’ll need to take action.

In performing this simple exercise with your client, you may discover that they do, indeed, have a good jobfit. You can then turn your attention to the frustrating factors of their job circumstances. I will deal with those factors in my next article.

But if you and your client agree that there is a serious misalignment between their natural strengths and the critical requirements of their current job, you can then discuss opportunities for refashioning their current job into a better jobfit, or finding a better fit with their current employer, or identifying other careers/jobs that will recognize and reward them for the job duties that energize them.

At that point, an assessment may be in order, one that can match them to good jobfits–specific jobs in specific work settings with the right combination of extrinsic and intrinsic factors to bring out the best in them and reward you for their strengths. A good career assessment can provide such matches with clarity. The information may be valuable in terms of developing options with their current employer or with a new career target.

If how you feel about going to work on a Monday morning is an accurate “thermometer” for measuring your jobfit, then you can raise the temperature by helping your clients wake up excited about the coming day’s activities.

While interviewing people for my upcoming book, “I Want a Job in an Association, Now What??,” I’ve asked many what advice they’d give to someone interviewing with an association after having worked in philanthropic non-profits or corporations. The same few answers came up over and over again.

Show your flexibility: Often, association employees need to wear several hats, and you may need to take on duties that have nothing to do with your job. One person even told me, “even though I’m the executive director of a small professional state association, I need to be able to do a presentation in front of my members one day and take out the office trash the next.” Be prepared to give examples that speak to your willingness to pitch in where needed.

Research EVERYTHING: Of course, the job is a must but also look into the association you’re interviewing with and the overall industry/profession it focuses on (i.e. healthcare). Learn about their mission and history as well as their current challenges.

Know that members are of the utmost importance: Members are the bread and butter of professional associations and keeping them happy is the number one priority. Anything you can say in the interview that shows how you can add value to the members will give you an edge. This can include experience in the same industry, examples of your strong customer service skills, or even a passion for the profession the members work in.

Remember, some experts recommend that you spend 10-15 hours preparing for each interview. Keeping the above tips in mind will help you maximize this time!

Recast Your Network for the New Year

Where do you want to go professionally in 2011?  You have a range of options:  a new role, a different industry, a promotion, self-employment, retirement, or a combination of several of these options.  As you develop your career goals for the New Year, it is critical to have the right network in place to help you plan, assess, and achieve your goals.

Re-evaluate your network:

Often, your network takes shape without much forethought or design.  You meet people and develop relationships in school, at various jobs, and through professional organizations. These accumulated relationships become your network. When you are looking for a job or making a career change, you reach out to this network for advice and support.  However, they may not be the right people to help you attain the goals you set for 2011.

To reach your goals, you need information, insights, and influence.  For example, if you want to change industries, you need assistance from people who have worked in that industry, who can tell you about the trends, opportunities, and pitfalls of that industry, and who can introduce you to people who have the potential to hire you for that industry.  Because your network developed based on relationships you had with people you knew when you worked in other industries, it may be unlikely that you have the appropriate people in your current network to help you with the transition to your target industry.

As you develop your career goals for 2011, take an inventory of your current network and identify those people who have the relevant information, insights, and influence to support your new goals. Then, begin to design a new network.

Re-align your network:

To design a network that aligns with your 2011 goals, first create the strategic framework. Start by developing profiles of the people who would be in your ideal network. For example:

What industries do these people work in?

What companies do they work for?

What roles do they hold?

Who are their managers, mentors, and colleagues?

What professional organizations do they belong to?

Who are their thought leaders?

Who are the consultants, vendors, and distributors they use?

Once you have the strategic framework for your 2011 network, next fill in the framework by identifying specific people who would belong to this network.  For example, find people who are working in your desired industry, company, or role, the hiring managers and decision makers, potential colleagues and mentors, thought leaders, and consultants, vendors, and distributors.  You can find this information by researching industry / trade publications, web sites, and blogs, company web sites, association directories, and business directories.  Once you have your networking framework populated with specific names, you have designed the ideal network to help you reach your new career goals.

Re-energize your network:

Now, your current network really can help you.  Some of them may belong in your ideal network, many may not.  However, even if they do not fit the profile of someone who should be in your ideal network, they know you, they believe in you, and they want to help you.  Leverage your current network to help build your ideal network. Show them your networking framework and the people who would ideally be a part of it.  Ask if they can provide introductions or referrals to those specific people.  If not, can they suggest other people who might be in the industries, companies, and roles you are targeting?  As you start to make connections and build new relationships, you are creating the support system to reach your new career goals.

Resolve to recast your network every year:

Your old network cannot support new career goals.  Make it a step in your annual process of setting your new career goals to re-evaluate, re-align, and re-energize the network you have to create the network you need to move forward with your career.

In his 1969 book by the same name,  Dr. Laurence Peter, formulated the following principle: “In a hierarchy every employee tends to rise to his level of incompetence.”  It is based on the notion that employees will be promoted so long as they work competently until they reach a position where they are no longer competent and there they stay, stuck, unable to earn further promotions.

This principle is famously played out in the popular TV series The Office by actor Steve Carroll, who portrays the role of Michael Scott, branch manager of paper company Dunder Mifflin in Scranton, Pennsylvannia.  If you watch the series, you may find it hard to believe that Michael was ever competent at anything!

But, the fact is that people are promoted because they are competent.  And they are competent because they have a particular flair or talent or strength for performing certain job duties.  Their work is valued so much that they are often rewarded with a promotion to a supervisory position.

Peter Principle

However,  the Peter Principle becomes active when a managerial position requires a set of skills that do not come easily or naturally to the person who has been promoted into it.

For example, I have worked with a good number of engineers who excelled at troubleshooting technical problems, especially when they were left alone to work in their own way at their own speed to analyze a particular problem and design a solution, often building the solution with special tools & equipment.

They were masters of a physical world of structures, machinery, and processes.  Then they are promoted into a managerial position where they are required to collaborate with others on committees and make decisions through long meetings before moving those decisions up a hierarchy for approval.

In the meantime, they must resolve disputes between employees who disagree on how to proceed; they must plan years in advance for potential scenarios and compete with their colleagues for scarce organizational resources, and fight about money and budgets—none of which they have a genuine interest in or a knack for dealing with.

However, some engineers feel they must put up with this job misfit for the sake of a better compensation package, or the admiration of their peers, or the expectations of power, prestige, and status for someone their age.

And, of course, it is very difficult for accomplished individuals to admit that they might not be good at everything they turn their hand to.  Ego.  Or, to put it in traditional terms: pride goeth before the fall.  But, the simple fact is, not every individual is cut out for management.  The American Management Association estimates that only one-third of individuals have a knack for core managerial duties.

Motivation is the Key

If someone is not motivated by their core job duties, their performance will degrade, so that when the inevitable downturns of an economy occur, they may be laid off when their performance is compared to others who are suited to managerial duties and feel motivated by their work.  Or, the level of job dissatisfaction fosters dis-ease that leads to physical illness, anxiety, depression or any number of stress-related disorders.

Sure, we can learn managerial skills by taking courses but just because we know how to do something doesn’t mean we will do it.  For example, you can learn how to do conflict resolution but if you avoid conflicting situations or highly charged emotional encounters then you will not excel in such situations.

Listen for talent clues

Helping our clients find their right jobfit is never easy.  But, in the end, guiding them into a managerial position when they are not suited for it does not serve them or you in the long term.  Listen carefully to their stories.  What parts of their experiences energizes them most?

- Do they come alive in situations during which they take an active role (high-involvement or high-touch) in managing the talents of people under their authority?

- Are they comfortable with authority and the inevitable stresses and strains that accompany it?

- Do they have a knack for selecting or choosing people, matching tasks and people, and tapping the strengths of those under them?

- Can they negotiate well with peers for competing priorities in their organizations, or do they tend to withdraw when they need to be assertive?

- Do they confuse leadership—the ability to motivate and inspire others to follow a cause, aim, purpose, or objective—with management, a talent for resolving conflict at different levels between corporate goals and union objectives, between stakeholder interests, contract disputes, supplier complaints, or putting out fires on the front lines of daily operations?

There are many paths to success.  The one most healthy is the one most natural.  Help your clients stick to their strengths.  Help them navigate the world of work and advance in their careers efficiently and effectively.  By doing so, you add value to their careers and to your business.

Although employers use ability assessments for employee selection, few career coaches offer ability assessments to their candidates. Below is information about four ability assessments which will raise your candidates’ awareness of their job related abilities.

1. Battery of ability assessments in Test Your Own Job Aptitude: Exploring Your Career Potential

In addition to exploring one’s personality, motivation, and interests, this handbook includes these short, paper-and-pencil ability assessments that measure the following areas:

• Verbal reasoning
• Numerical reasoning
• Perceptual reasoning
• Spatial ability
• Technical ability
• Acuity skills
• Analytical ability

After they complete the assessments, have them note their two highest scoring abilities and review typical occupations for their unique combination of abilities. (E.g., the verbal/numerical combination links to Commercial Managers, Senior Administrators, Insurance Agents and Head Teachers).

2. O*NET® Ability Profiler (AP)™

The AP helps candidates identify occupations that fit their abilities. The nine job related abilities measured are:

• Verbal Ability
• Arithmetic Reasoning
• Computation
• Spatial Ability
• Form Perception
• Clerical Perception
• Motor Coordination
• Finger Dexterity
• Manual Dexterity

Typically the AP is provided by workforce development professionals who have been trained to administer it. Ability results link to over 800 occupations in O*NET OnLine. Click here for further details on the administration of the AP.

3. The CALL: A Vocational and Life Purpose Guide

This Christian-based, online assessment measures 27 distinct dimensions and shows occupations that best match the candidates’ results. The six abilities are measured in this assessment are:

• Cognitive ability
• Learning Pace
• Verbal Skill
• Verbal Reasoning
• Numerical ability
• Numeric reasoning

Candidates may purchase this assessment at The Call http://www.thecallonline.com or take it through a coach who has completed The CALL assessment certification training. A detailed report is provided to the candidate which highlights occupations that best match their profile.

4. The Highlands Ability Battery

This online, three-hour battery of tests includes nineteen different work samples. It measures candidates’ natural strengths, along with personal style that cluster results into these four broad areas:

• Personal style, e.g., generalist, introvert
• Driving abilities, e.g., classification, idea productivity, spatial relations visualization;
• Specialized abilities (design memory, verbal memory, number memory, visual speed, etc.
• Vocabulary

A 30-page report is generated from the battery of tests. A trained facilitator interprets the candidates’ results and guides them into careers that best fit their natural strengths. A list of affiliates who are trained to administer this assessment can be found at Follow Your Calling.

Since people’s abilities influence their career success, it is wise for career coaches to incorporate ability assessments as part of the overall career assessment process for candidates. If you know of other good ability assessments, I invite you to share them.

Copyright 2010. Nancy Branton.

Midlife, that hard to define life stage between youth and old age, is finally getting some respect.  Long the butt of jokes and stereotypes, midlife is now fodder for research, partly driven by the sheer number of baby boomers moving through midlife, but also shaped by our expanding understanding of the aging process.  New knowledge is coming from many fronts, including psychology, neuroscience, sociology, anthropology, and even gerontology.  This multidisciplinary approach allows us to take a nuanced view of midlife, and deepens our understanding of the joys and challenges that help shape the midlife experience.

Of the many midlife myths, I’d like to dispel four of them.

Myth 1: Midlife Crisis is a common event.

Pervasive in the popular psyche, “midlife crisis” is defined as a time of conflict and desperation, where aging is denied and defied.  Research shows that this kind of crisis is not prevalent. For most, midlife continues to be a time of development, well being, and resilience.  Instead of a crisis, we tend to experience turning points – events such as death of a loved one, job loss, divorce, or illness – that compel us to reevaluate and perhaps shift direction.  Turning points wake us up to our lives and motivate us out of complacency, but aren’t necessarily experienced as crises. 

Myth 2: It’s all downhill from here.

Midlife is seen as a time of loss – of physical vigor, and mental acuity.  In reality, medical advances and preventative care have dramatically expanded life expectancy, and midlife can be a time of health, wellness, and heartiness.  With respect to the aging brain, we now know that the brain continues to resculpt itself, creating new cells and developing new pathways.  Adults in midlife and beyond actually perform better at some mental tasks, especially those that require complex problem solving.  This is partly due to the influence of experience, but also due to the older brain’s ability to draw from both hemispheres.   Our emotional circuitry also matures, so we become more adept at filtering emotions through the lens of experience.

Myth 3: You can’t teach an old dog new tricks.

Many people go through major retooling at midlife, with still plenty of time to build a significant career.  A career launched at age 45 will mean 20 years of contribution, assuming a traditional retirement age of 65.  In today’s standards, 20 years is a long time for any career!  Millions of people are making these kinds of moves.  In the 2008 Encore Careers Survey, an estimated 5.3 to 8.4 million people shifted into an Encore career – a career that combines income, meaning, and social impact in the second half of life. 

Myth 4: I have to have it all figured out before I take action.

Traditional career counseling starts with self knowledge, usually through some kind of assessment of skills, interests, values.  The next step is to explore the world of work.  Through a systematic, matching approach, viable options are identified and weighed against each other. 

While there’s lots of merit to a planful approach, people sometimes get stuck here.  They assume there is one right option to uncover.  Or they try to discover a true “calling” that will fulfill a life mission and provide purpose.   Worse yet, they angst over the fact that they don’t have a “calling” and believe there is something wrong with them.

The planful approach needs to be balanced with a willingness to try new experiences and take some risks.  Instead of waiting for clarity from within, take small steps.  If things don’t work out, no worries!  Career paths are rarely linear, and experimenting allows us to playfully try on new hats while limiting risks.

Midlife can be a period of tremendous growth and potential.  By embracing the shifts and opening ourselves to new experiences, we can create and recreate ourselves throughout the lifespan.

Resources

Brim, Ryff & Kessler (2004).  How healthy are we?  A national study of well-being at midlife.

Cohen, G. (2005).  The mature mind.  Basic Books.

Metlife Foundation/Civic Ventures (2008).  Encore Careers Study.

Ibarra, H. (2003).  Working identity: Unconventional strategies for reinventing your career. Harvard Business School Press.

Lachman, M.E. (Ed) (2001).  Handbook of Midlife Development.  New York: Wiley & Sons.

Although the Canadian market seems to be starting to take a turn, there is still much talk about a struggling economy. Many companies have had difficulties and are working hard to emerge from the recession. The job market is primed for leaders who are ready to position these companies for the next phase in their development.

These days, most companies are in a state of flux. Many organizations are undergoing major transformations in the form of mergers, acquisitions, centralization, decentralization, downsizing, upsizing, restructuring, and so forth. If you are a senior-level job seeker, you can leverage this to your benefit.

Prospective employers are looking for leaders that will build on and improve their organization. In order to address this need effectively, you will need to deliver some stories that outline your ability to plan and lead organizational change initiatives.

In your resume and during the interview, you must highlight how you can institute stability during a state of change, while strengthening financial performance.

Start, by uncovering some examples from your career that directly show how you enabled the company to survive and thrive during change. Then, develop dynamic stories that show how you can do the same kinds of results for your prospective employer.

Practice delivering your organizational change stories with passion and optimism. By effectively articulating your ability to transform a organization and lead it into a strong and healthy future, you will attract and impress employers who are in dire need of these competencies.

Sharon Graham is Canada’s Career Strategist. For additional information on this topic, read Leaders: Create your Career Brand and Present your Value Proposition.

Yes, sometimes it comes down to what’s in a job ad or what a recruiter is sourcing for. However, if you’re proactively looking while employed, you may have the luxury of targeting associations that interest you the most.

Let’s assume for just a moment that you are an experienced executive director, and you get to strategically plan your job search–you’ll contact recruiters in your areas of interest, network with people in your target area, and apply to associations with missions that really speak to you–but what IS that mission?

There are a few ways to go about finding out:

• Look to your past work experience. What jobs did you enjoy the most? What tasks did you prefer spending your time on? What companies did you most like working for?
• Go back even further. What did you major in? As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?
• Think about which causes are closest to your heart. What organizations do you donate money to or volunteer with? How do you spend your free time (sports, arts, travel, etc.)?

While these questions may not give you an immediate answer, you should gain clarity on what areas you’re most passionate about. For example, if the arts are a strong theme, start exploring associations that focus on arts in the schools, professional theatre, or art museums. Depending on your area of interest, there could be a variety of options out there. According to the ASAE & The Center for Association Leadership, there were an estimated 86,054 trade and professional associations in 2004. While you may have to repackage your career marketing materials for your area of interest (if you’re breaking into a new industry) rest assured there are plenty of exciting possibilities within association management.

“I hate my job!” If you’re a coach or counselor who, like me, has worked with thousands of individuals, then you’ve heard this phrase hundreds of times, at least!

If you’re client expresses this sentiment with genuine emotion, remind them that the power to change their career is right under their nose…well, behind the nose actually! Stored in our brains are memories about events and activities we truly enjoyed in life since childhood.

Ask them to do a quick inventory from childhood years (ages6-12), then teen years (ages 13-19), then young adult years (ages 20-29), then thirties, forties, and so on. In each period, there are specific examples. Help them create a shortlist of their top 10 most enjoyable events.

The Power of Story

The power of our stories is in the facts, people, and events of our lives. These stories are like veins of gold that run through our life. Mining gold, however, involves moving a lot of ore with tools and equipment to get at that precious metal.

Similarly, mining the veins of gold in our life is easier when we use the tool of writing. Help them write about what is important to them, not what they did to please others. Identify those activities that gave them an intrinsic sense of pleasure and satisfaction, where the rewards were more internal than external.

Brutal Honesty

Above all, encourage them to be brutally honest about what is they truly enjoyed, as opposed to what they are simply proud of accomplishing. We may be proud of a certain accomplishment but there is no real innate pleasure from the activity itself. For example, many people get high grades in school in order to please their parents, not because they truly love math, or history, or truly enjoy studying and doing homework.

Pick a Format

It actually makes it easier to tell the story if we stick to a proven format. You may want to analyze or evaluate their stories for an accurate and reliable picture of their motivational pattern. Or, you may want to turn the exercise over to a personal story analyst to really nail down the essence of who and what they are in terms of work when they are doing what they enjoy most and doing it well.

For example, our stories can be analyzed to identify and define our Key Success Factors. Please understand that the factors critical to success are very different than personality traits, or the results you get from Myers-Briggs and other personality assessments they may have done.
Career match result

A personal story assessment can answer in very clear, concise and meanginful terms the questions: What are the natural talents they use and consistently bring satisfaction to them when they are doing what they enjoy most and doing it well? What is the subject matter that they gravitate to without even trying? What circumstances or conditions have to exist in the job environment to bring out the best in them? How do they naturally build relationships with others? How do these success factors combine to create an essential motivation; that is, the thing they are best at and best suited for in terms of work?

The Right Picture

This accurate and reliable picture of their right work can be developed into an Ideal Job Description and matched to specific opportunities in the world of work.

Turn the negative “I hate my job!’ into a positive that reinforces your value as a coach and counselor. Give them real hope that is grounded in who and what they are, and show them how that correlates to real jobs in the world of work!