Knowing your core values

I took a class in college that had to do with job hunting, starting from the basics.  Interests, hobbies and values being the very first steps we all should be taking in order to find a job that we will enjoy.  There is a lot to discover about yourself and your needs in a job that will make you a better job hunter.

I walked into an interview not too long ago with the hopes of landing “the job” and working in a field that I had no experience in. The position was in the educational field which I had been working in for almost a year and I wanted to sell to them that I knew the field.  I thought that I could show my interviewers that I would be hard working, a quick learner and that I wanted to take on the challenge of having no previous experience in business/accounting.  I prepared for the interview as much as I could.  I viewed their LinkedIn profiles, researched the company and visited the job description NUMEROUS times.   One of my references even endorsed me with this company, making me think I had the upper hand to other candidates.  The moment I got called into the interview room, I should have turned around and left.  It didn’t feel right from the get-go, but I wanted to make the best of this interview and I wanted to feel accomplished by landing “the job”. My interviewers asked their questions, I answered and did my best to offer the best responses to their repeated questions.  It felt like we were all just going in circles.  They were asking the same questions and I was giving the same answers.  There were long awkward pauses and it felt…. weird.

As the awkward pauses became increasingly difficult to ignore, I thought Why is this going so poorly?  Why are we still doing this?  I don’t think I want to work here.   I had wanted a job so badly that I almost overlooked the fact that this really wasn’t what I wanted.  I didn’t want to disappoint my referencer by not getting the job.  I didn’t want to disappoint my family for not making a good living with a good paying job.   But my family will never stop loving me and this is not going to disappoint anyone.  As long as I am happy, everyone else is happy.  Duh Kendra.  I almost threw my core value of enjoying my job out the window, in order to have a job and to please others.  The “others” being unrealistic thoughts that I created in my head.

If you need a job, then you need a job, but that experience for me truly would have been settling when I aspire for something better.  To be happy and get to where you want to be, you really want to understand yourself first.  I know that I want to love what I do for a living and that I want to help others.  Working with money and big numbers wouldn’t have matched either one of those criteria for me.  For you, it might have matched your criteria, and that is great!  You should know these things about yourself before you even begin to apply for any position though.  Some things to consider about yourself:

• What motivates you (i.e. money)
• Do you want to be in an office setting
• What kind of leadership do you seek in a boss
• Do you like working as a team
• How do you feel about conflict in the workplace
• How much free time outside of work do you want/need
• Are you a people person. Why or why not
• What are your hobbies/interests

For some of these bullet points think about the polar opposite as well.  If you can pin point what does motivate you, also try to pinpoint what does not motivate you.  You might be able to avoid a situation like mine, where I walked right into a place that wasn’t going to motivate me.  I suggest writing these things down for yourself to see a visual of these values.  You might not refer back to them, or you might hang it on your ceiling and look at it every night.  Regardless, it is always a good tool to know yourself and what you’re all about.  When you fill out an application you can then convey your needs better.  Then when you get to that interview (because you can get there) you can effectively communicate why you are the best fit.

I recommend anyone to take this step to evaluate their “energizers” in life now, whether if you are looking for employment or not.  If you realize that you fear asking your boss for anything (avoiding conflict being something you value), then you might be able to overcome the fear and muster up the courage to ask for that raise you deserve.  Self reflection is good for everyone at any stage in life.  Of course, I am suggesting you do it with your career, because people rarely think to self reflect in this manner.

“Do you have any questions for us?”

In light of my upcoming interview I thought I would discuss the question that comes up at the end of every interview ever.  This question is essential to be ready for.  Your interviewer(s) will ALWAYS (and if they don’t, comment and let me know!) ask you this question and there is a right and wrong answer.  First the wrong answer:

Q: Do you have any questions for us?

A: No

OR

A: No I think I understand everything

Why it is the wrong answer:  No matter how you say it, even if you are very nice, polite and say that you fully understand everything about the position it is still not a good way to end an interview.  You might think you are doing everything right by letting your interviewer know that you have a grasp on the position and that you would be the ideal candidate, but the interviewer wants to hear you ask something to show more interest in the position/company.  By saying “no” you are not showing that you want to go the extra mile for this position.  Think about it.  If you fit the criteria for a job and the company feels that you would be a good fit for the position then you might get the job.  What if John Smith who was also just as qualified in every other way decided at the end of his interview to ask his interviewer, “what is your expected growth for ASDF Company over the next several years”?  If you were an interviewer who would you be more interested in, the guy that said “I’m your ideal candidate” or the guy that said “I’m the ideal candidate, but while we are talking about your company let me ask you more about it”.  If you still are not quite convinced that John Smith would be picked over you keep reading.

Right Answer:

Q: Do you have any questions for us?

A: As a matter of fact I do….

OR

A: Yes.  You mentioned QWER and I was wondering…..

Why this is the right answer: Saying “yes” followed by asking your question is clearly the right answer from what I discussed before.  If you do ask a question it means you are invested.  However, I like to take a psychological approach behind this as well to understand why having questions are so important.  In most interviews, the interviewers have a piece of paper in front of them with a list of questions.  They go round robin, ask you their questions, you answer them, they interview the next candidate.  One key piece to an interview, is to get them to remember you in a positive way.  So what if instead of following the known procedure you mixed it up a little and get them thinking of something else?  Believe me, I’ve been the interviewer before too, they want to hear/think about something other than doing this interview.  If you ask them something about the company, it takes their mind away from the interview and gives them a chance to talk to you more about what they know and their interests.  When you give the interviewer a chance to talk about themselves, you can leave them thinking that you are the ideal candidate.  People love the opportunity to talk about themselves and have someone listen to what they have to say.  It makes us happy.  If you give them that window of opportunity to speak about themselves/company, you make yourself a better candidate.

My go to question of choice:  “What is your favorite part about your job?” I like asking this question because it gets them to think about their daily job duties and is making them think of the positives.  If they are thinking positively about their job, their last impression of me is that I could have a positive impact on the company.  It’s totally psychological and maybe it is just my theory, but I think it works pretty well.  Furthermore, I like to ask because I am genuinely interested.  Yes, it is kind of a manipulation tool, but I do want to know what people like about their jobs.  I know that I want to have passion in my career options, so if I see that passion in someone else I can get a better sense if I will get what I want out of the company.  It depends on what drives you but for me this is really good feedback to have at an interview.  At my latest place of employment, the answer that I got to that question in my interview was “I wake up everyday and look forward to everything about my job, the good the bad and the ugly.”  That answer was a selling point for me that I wanted this job just as much as he wanted me there.  It bounces off the idea that you are interviewing them as well.

There are so many other questions you can ask as well.  This is just one of my questions I like to ask.  There are more depending on the job.  Don’t use just this example and make it fit into your interview always.  We are all different and my experiences are not going to mirror yours.  Let me know what you think are good or bad interview questions.

An Interview!

It is always good news when you get a call for an interview.  It brings me to a place I like to call “Cloud Kendra”.  Basically, and all of my friends can testify, I have a huge adrenaline rush making it seem as though I’ve just chugged a RedBull.  I tend to be bouncing off the walls because I am so pumped that someone saw what I had on paper and thought to themselves “who is this girl?  I want to talk to her”.  On the difficult road of submitting application after application it is really awesome to get a call about an interview.  Most of the time, I let an application fly and expect to hear nothing back from the company.  It’s the nature of the beast.

But alas on this day, I got a call for an interview next week with a new company.  It is not with a college campus.  I have applied to numerous college campuses over the last year and a half and I have yet to get work with a college campus.  So I have to branch out.  This summer has proved to be a difficult process in terms of branching out.  I’ve been on quite the narrow road about sticking to only applying to college campuses.  But those jobs are not the most common to come across with my level of education as colleges prefer a candidate with a Master’s degree.

Today, branching out has proven to be a great thing and I am so glad that I decided to apply.  It is a brand new company, and being able to say that I helped launch a new business would be a great accomplishment.   So it is not so much to be bummed out right now that I haven’t gotten an interview for a job on a college campus or my big dream of working in career services.  It more about the fact that these opportunities can come to us without us seeking them out.  Some people might call this “settling”, I don’t.  It’s far from settling in my opinion, it is another chance to prove that I can be great at doing something brand new.  To learn a new trade, to launch a new business and to maybe someday help me become a career counselor….. or maybe not.  The world is at my fingertips and it is at yours too!

It takes time

It takes time to find your place in the world.  I am slowly realizing that as I grow and learn more opportunities that there are out there for me.  This past week I traveled to “The Great New York State Fair”.  Most New Yorkers know that the fair is a big deal for us due to the food, competitions, shows etc. That the fair has to offer.  The NY state fair is known for having themed days for fair goers as well.  I am that person that decided that I wanted to go on SUNY day to learn more about working in higher education. The SUNY system is a higher education organization.   What better place to learn more about my field of interest than a open forum!

So I went to to SUNY (State University of New York) day and sadly did not learn as much about careers in higher education as I’d hoped.  However, I did pick up a few tips about Master’s programs in higher education offered completely online. While I wasn’t looking for that information, I have learned since applying for positions in higher education in the last year that I pretty much NEED a master’s degree in order to advance in the world of higher education.

It is going to take me some time for me to reach my goal of getting into higher education, but as they say (whoever the heck they are) “if you really want it, it’s worth the wait”. My takeaway from visiting the SUNY tent was that I am doing all of the right things to get myself to where I want to be. Sometimes it takes a complete stranger to tell you to “just keep swimming”

Never rule out any chance to network, interview or just talk to someone as it could lead you anywhere.

I always remind myself of where I learned of my dream in higher education and where I someday dream of returning to help others just as they helped me

What they don’t teach you in school

We learned so much from our studies from kindergarten to high school graduation and beyond.  We’ve been provided with a great skill set in the fundamentals to being productive members of society.  But those life skills everyone keeps telling us we need to obtain are more often than not in short supply.

I see no reason to keep the knowledge I learn about pursuing a passion in the career of your choice from the world. With endless possibilities to what we can achieve I refuse to let the challenge of job hunting get in my way.  Why should it get in yours? Join me and see what opportunities await you.