How much do you know yourself ?

Every successful business must have a competitive advantage which gives the business the edge in an industry. The same can be said for you as you compete in an employer's market. Do you have a unique ability that makes you preferable to other applicants? An appraisal of your abilities and personality can be done through a careful analysis of your strength and weakness. Strengths are qualities, special endowments, skills or aptitude that a person possesses which makes the person operate in a unique way in handling a task. Strengths can also be in the form of technical skills, a natural ability, or knowledge of doing things.This will often be a combination of training, educational qualification, background experience, interests and values.

Your uniqueness is your brand

ASSESS YOUR ABILITIES The only way to discover the limits of the possible is to go beyond them into the impossible. The next step to a successful job search after defining your vision is an appraisal of your abilities. You need to do this to establish your uniqueness in the job market. What you are able to offer an employer is your uniqueness and your uniqueness is your brand. Too many are mere applicants. You have to move from being a job applicant, which is like a commodity to being a person who has something valuable to offer to prospective employer. This is branding of yourself and it is the secret of winning in a competitive environment. Abilities are the hidden capacity to get the right things done at the right time. It is a mixture of intelligence quotient and adversity quotient. Intelligence Quotient is the demonstration of a technical skill, while Adversity Quotient is staying power; the ability to withstand pressure in the face of adversity. Your abilities are very vital to your productivity and your prductivity in turn determines your economic well being. Ability is a combination of the power to achieve a project and the drive or enthusiasm to see the project to a logical conclusion.

How long do you want to work in an organization?

Most people have been employed their entire lifetime,only to realize that they only have regrettable work experiences. Some even find themselves going through the painful routine of working in an environment they find uninspiring. In both cases, these may be a lack of plan of how long you want to work in a particular place. It might be that you have decided to work in a place as long as you are needed and the conditions of work are favorable, but how long can you hold out?, you would have to quit someday due to age. It is not unusual to transit from being an employee to an employer, although this, if not properly planned, can lead to failure. Thus, it is important that you have a plan of how long you want to work in an organization so that you can work on your persona objective and harmonize this as much as possible with the objectives of the organization while in employment.

Employment

What future plan do you have for yourself? Employment can only guarantee financial security while you are at it, but only a sound plan for the future will ensure financial freedom. It is important that you carefully determine and start to execute whatever plans you have for your future as soon as you can. There are so many people today that are disgruntled with their employers and as a result have diminished in their productivity. This situation is due to the absence of a plan for the future. Getting a job without a clear idea of how the job can impact or enhance your life for the future can sometimes lead to frustration and depression. The ideal thing to do is to ask yourself important questions as you search for and accept employment opportunities.

Development of particular skill

It is one thing to be good individually, but it takes the right attitude, values and belief sysem for people to work together for the good of an organization. It is important that you determine ahead, the benefits you are looking for in a particular job. WHAT BENEFITS ARE YOU LOOKING FOR IN THE JOB? Your objectives could be initial job training, development of particular skill, exposure to certain professional environment,financial remuneration or opportunity for international experiences and exposures. However, your expected benefit for the proposed job should be in line with the current position in your career ladder. Research has shown that people at the entry level tend to look for jobs where they can get the right training experience and personal development that will enable them move up in their career, while people at mid`career look for job opportunities that helps them consolidate their experiences and take higher responsibilities . A good rule to follow is to make the main objective in any job an opportunity for self development.

Principles and belief

Your personal vision is usually discribed in your career objectives. A career is bigger than a job; infact it sometimes takes working in various jobs to fulfill a career. Too many people are looking for a job just because of the economic benefits. This is good i n the short term, but in the long term, to receive more reward, you will have to increase your skill. You will not always be paid for appearance, but for the value you help create for others. What values do you uphold that might affect your choice of job? Values are principles and belief systems that guide a person's actions in life. You will need to determine your values before you start your job search. Organizations are often weary of employees that have values that are at cross purposes with their own values. Values are the bedrock of attitudes and attitude is the key to your altitude. Your attitude will have a lot to do with your ability to get a job on time. Your educational qualifications are necessary requirement for work,but this is often not surfficient. Values are more important because it helps the Organization to blend people to work together.

VISION IS THE ENERGY

Vision is the invisible picture of a desired future. It is a clear and precise mental portrait of a preferable future. Vision is the energy for consistent action,the tonic that keeps you going in the face of rejections and disappointments. It is the guiding factor for all your efforts. Vision helps you answer the following pertinent questions before you can make progress in your job search: 1. Why do you want to work in a particular industry, sector or Organization? 2. What values do you uphold that might affect your choice of job? 3. What benefits are you looking for in the job? 4. What future plan do you have for yourself? 5. How long do you want to work in an Organization? The question No.1 above is one of the most common questions in inteview sessions. It simply probes for personal vision. You must have a personal vision that is more than geting a job. Jobs are designed by employers to meet the objectives of the owner. While working towards this objective is important,it is more important that you are achieving your personal vision in the process.

make progress in your career

From the points so far, winning at job search and making progress in your career in a competitive environment involves being fully acquainted with and critically considering the following important steps: 1 Identify your vision 2 Assess your abilities.3 What do Employers want 4 Job search plan 5 Applying for a Job 6 The Interview process 7 Tips for Career Success 8 Turning your setback into setup. If you do not think about the future, you cannot have one. Success in life is the result of a vision. Winning at a job search begins with the right vision of your aspirations in life.It is impossible to arrive at any meaningful destination without prior determination of the direction.It has been said that if you aim at nothing, you'll get nothing.

Discover the joy of work

The value of work should be learned at an early age,although it is never too late to learn. Discover the joy of work and achievement; whether you are self `employed or employed by someone else. Those who are pre `occupied with avoiding work and pursuing pleasure usually learn too late in life that they missed much of the real fun in living. Measure your work by the love you can give to it and the enjoyment you get from engaging in that activity rather than the monetary reward you derive from it. Work with purpose. Working for the sake of work alone is little more than self punishment, but labor gladly accepted and thoroughly executed, can be true delight. Hundreds of thousands of people look out for a job and quit when they find work. Tens of thousands of employees worry and wish to be PROMOTED but they make no effort to prepare themselves for promotion. If a man wants to be transplanted, he should first grow too big for the pot that he is in. The great inventions of Thomas A. Edison were the fruit of long and painstaking effort. He said,"Genius is one percent inspiration and ninety `nine percent perspiration. I never did anything worth doing by accident, nor did any of my inventions come by accident; they came by work".

Success Await you

Nothing is impossible if you try hard."Wish for the Moon", used to be seeking something impossible, yet man tried that"impossibility" and made it possible. Greatness and success await every man who will rise above failures, and use defeat as a stepping stone to victory. If you are deluged by discouragement, it means that you need to re`order your thinking process. The desire to grow and to make the most ourselves is within all of us. We are conscious of the fact that we have resources yet untapped, talents we have never used, and capacities which have never been tested. Ambition is like the picture printed on a seed packet. You know what you want and what you expect. If you are without ambition you are like a gardener who plants seed from a packet which has no label. He does not know what to expect and cannot prepare accordingly. For your life to have any value,you must have an ambition and a determination to reach your goal. You must believe that you have a purpose to fulfill.

Success or Failure

Think about it. A lot of people who have jobs are dissatisfied with their jobs because they are trying to solve the right problem for the wrong employer. On the other hand, some others are trying to solve the wrong problem for the right employer. The best thing you can do then, is to prepare yourself to be the right problem`solver. Don't wait for someone to call you and give you a job. It is not wise to wait until work knocks at your door. It probably won't. Invest in yourself and look for opportunities to solve problems. If there are no opportunities, create them. You have to blaze your own employment trail. Sometimes,the recommendation of someone may help, but if you do not have this priviege, step out all the same. Someone will look at your merits and connect with you. There is a great deal of satisfaction in being able to stand alone and succeed. Life is how you look at it and what you make of it. Your attitudes and perceptions will determine your actions. The number of opportunities a person has in life depends not on how"lucky"he is, but on how well he has traind his mind to see opportunities in ordinary daily routines and occurrences. Success or failure depends more on the individual than his environment. What is your perception of life? It matters how you perceive your world. You will have to become "inverse paranoid" to succeed in a competitive environment. Let me explain. Being "inverse paranoid" is the belief that everything in life is conspiring together to help you succeed. With this kind of mind`set, the people that gravitate towards you will be those with your kind of attitude.

Job for everyone

There are some fundamental truths regarding jobs, which when fully understood will help you a great deal. These include the following: 1. There is a job for everyone. I know this sound unrealistic, but it is the truth. No one exist in isolation; you are the solution to someone's problem. You may not have a job now, but there will always be a work to do. Get to it and give it your best shot. If you are not willing to work for nothing, you will never be paid for something. 2. Finding the job that fits is the major challenge of most people. The best job for you is not necessarily the "right"job, but the one that you have made right. Winners do not look for the right job; they make the job they have found the right one. 3. Finding a job is a job itself. It is principally a process of "selling yourself" to a prospective employer. It requires the same professional skill as that of the greatest sales person in the world. Unfortunatly,many people are very casual in their search and more often rely on luck to get a job. Success in life is not an accident; it is a conscious choice of a desired destiny.4. Getting a job starts with an interview; sadly many are ill prepared for this critical process and end up missing great opportunities. As a matter of fact, the secret of getting a job quickly is to look for an interview and not a job. The interview is the neccessary input for the required output `the job. The right focus will be to prepare to win at every interview because you will likely be offered the job upon satisfactory performance in the interview process.5. Deciding on your career is crucial to getting a job on time. Too many people merely float in life, but you must realize that employers require stable people. If you don't know where you want to be in the next five years, why would anybody want to hire you? A JOB IS A MEANS TO AN END AND NOT AN END ITSELF.The end, in this context, is your career. You will need to decide what a suitable career is, after a careful analysis of yourself. A careful analysis of yourself will include giving honest thought to your dreams,goals,aspirations,likes and dislikes,training and experience,personality type etc. 6. You must challenge your fears. This takes continuous personal discipline and training. You must take risks and force yourself to do things you shy away from. Fear is simply Fantasized Experiences Appearing Real. It comes to cripple your imagination which is the seat of creativity. The ability to conquer in life means facing difficulties and overcoming them. It means not losing courage when promises are not kept and when employers are rude.

Competitive Environment

INDIVIDUAL AND ORGANIZATIONS WHO KNOW 'WHY' WILL ALWAYS BE AHEAD OF THOSE WHO MERELY KNOW 'HOW'. Having a job is very important. Infact,it is a primary requisite for a satisfactory life. It fulfils the requirements for purposeful living and provides a medium of usefulness in the society. Work is a necessary requirement for self actualization. In many developing countries,where jobs are scarce,most people are forced to accept any job that is available. Thus,they never get what they really want,and seldom want what they get. This ought not to be so and you have the power to make a choice. This begins with a well coordinated Job Search. A successful job search is all about your ability to convince a prospective employer that you can create and add value to their business or organization. Persistent failure to get and keep a job is often due to a lack of preparation to solve any problem. You can learn from this blog how to break out of the general negative beliefs and mindset,develop a successful job search plan and make progress in your career. The thoughts and ideas that i share in this blog work because they have worked in the lives of my friends and associates."If you are not willing to work for nothing,you will never be paid for something"pastor sola olubode".