Contract vs. full time employment?

A dilemma for a lot of job seekers. So which is recommended?

Well this really depends on what you want and geographically market you are in. In areas like London contracting can be a way of life, but employers in other countries will see this as “job hopping” and it can be difficult to get permanent work if you’ve been contracting long term. It is good to have an understanding of the attitudes of employers in your market.

The advantages or contract work are that you can get a higher salary either per hour or by day. However there are no employee benefits. You also have no rights as an employee unless you have been in the same group for several years and those rights are dependent on the laws in the country you are contracting in. So if there are redundancies on the cards the contractors are the cheaper options to “let go”.

One of the advantages of contracting is that you can build a lot of diverse experience within many organisations in a quick time frame. This can be exciting and fun and you can really get a good feel for what you prefer to do, or not do as the case may be.

The advantage of a permanent role is that you have “some” security and right regarding your job. Further companies generally take training and up skilling permanent employees more seriously. Though training will be skewed towards the job you are currently in and getting training in new areas can be very difficult.

Also, the job market you are in can very much effect your decision as to the job you take. If the market is really tight and there are very few jobs then it may not be a matter of choice, of course if circumstances allow it you could also try out a new job market or location. Relocating for a job is an increasingly common occurrence.

When deciding on which is best for you, take into account your personal circumstances and financial position. Also make sure you are very aware of what your long term goals are. Are you looking to build a career within one organisation or are you more interested in gaining diverse experience? Knowing yourself and your needs and limitations financial or career wise is the first step.

Goals

Last night CPG had the opportunity to speak at an SME networking event via Prem Group in Dublin, Ireland. Many thanks to Prem Group for the invitation and their support. It was a very successful evening and the comments and feedback on the talk were very positive. Helen Roberts CEO of CPG spoke about the importance of goals and how to ensure you are on the right track both personally and professionally.
Goals are something that we have all been told to have since we were in school. However it is very important that you work on those goals every day to ensure you are moving forward. Very few people write their goals down, and many of those that do find that piece of paper buried deep in a draw many months or years later.

So in a quick recap:

• Know what you want.
• Write your goals down in a clear and precise manner
• Keep those written goals with you at all times
• Know what little steps you have to take to achieve those goals
• Set a deadline. If you miss the deadline, don’t give up, set a new deadline
• Know what skills you are missing that may get in your way and eradicate that weakness
• Work on your goals every day
• Have a group around you that will support you in achieving your goals
• Be persistent and disciplined and keep going until you have achieved your objective.

Enjoy life and live to move forward every day!

Moving Country or City for a new job

Things on the job market have certainly changed over the last few years. We have seen an increasing number of people who are prepared to pack up and leave for another country for a job. It can obviously be difficult to leave a life and loved ones behind, but many have told us that it has been worth the change.

A new job is exciting and moving can be very exciting too. Lots of new places and cultures to explore. Lots of new dynamics and lots of fun getting into a new way of life. A lot of the people we spoke to are thriving and recommending to their friends that a move abroad is the way to go.

Of course getting a position in a new environment can be difficult without help. That’s were an international recruitment agency can be of help. They will know the lay of the land and already have the contacts in place to get you started and to introduce you to companies that are looking for your skillset.

So where are people going?

The top of the list for the people we polled answered

Asia, particularly Singapore and Hong Kong, London, New York and the Cayman Islands.

Their reasons for moving?

Better opportunities
Better salaries
To gain international exposure
Warmer weather

So if you are thinking of changing role, why not consider changing country as well. It could well be an experience of a lifetime!

Find out what employers are looking for to beat the September jobs rush

September marks the start of the busiest job hunting season of the year and with competition high, understanding what employers are looking for can make it easier to secure a role.

Whether new graduates or established professionals, those who are successful in their search will have more than their CV to hand, they will understand the value of their reputation and leverage it to create advantage.

What type of skills are employers looking for?

“A polished CV, rich in skills and experience is the minimum expected but you need to be clear about your future aspirations and why you believe you can achieve them,” said Jason Miller from Tinder-Box Business Coaching.

“Employers are looking beyond qualifications to the sort of person you are as much as what you have achieved, making your RV - your reputational value –as important to a prospective employer as your CV.”

Jason has worked with some of the UK’s large organisations to design graduate recruitment and talent management strategies and believes there are five things that an individual should consider to enhance their reputational value.

1 Understand your current reputation. Get curious as to what you are known for now. Ask friends, colleagues, bosses or even your old teachers to get as broad a view as possible. This will help you to understand who you are and why you are already successful.

2 Understand what drives you and let people know. Look at your list of achievements and understand what it is about you that enabled you to achieve them. Understand what motivates you and gives you the edge. Be ready and proud to present your values and personal motivations as much as your academic track record.

3 Check your social media presence reflects you. Consider Google as an immediate reflection of your online reputation. Type your name in and see what words and images appear. Does your reputation in social media reflect the person written on your CV? Is what you see consistent with who you are and how you wish to present yourself?

4 Embrace your new identity. Be ready to present yourself as the person you’ll be when you secure the position, not as the person you have been until now. This is a new chapter and employers want to employ someone who they are confident will be a competent future leader, not a student. Ensure that you present your future self.

5 Be clear about what you’re striving for. Be really clear about your future aspirations are and be prepared to articulate these clearly to any potential employers. Employers will be interested in not only what you’ve done to date but the potential return on the investment that they make in hiring you.

Choose a workplace you love and you will never have to work a day in your life

Being happy in the workplace is very important. People who enjoy their jobs and office environments will be more determined to work to the best of their abilities and keep procrastination to a minimum. It is true to say that a happy worker who feels valued and appreciated will invest time to get the job right.

But how do you achieve happiness in the workplace? First of all you have to find a job you love, but often this is not enough. If your offices are depressing, gloomy, dysfunctional and deeply uninspiring - the job you love might sadly become the job you hate.

Creativity, hard work and bright ideas come from positive and happy workplace environments where the people are allowed freedom to think, develop and express themselves. It should be a place where they can feel truly worthwhile. So does happiness need to be built-in to the fabric of an office place?

Peldon Rose is a very successful award-winning, workplace solutions company that has been dedicated to producing happiness in the workplace for over 25 years. It designs enviable places to work including creating spaces for major brand names and blue-chip companies such as Platina Partners, Google, World Gold Council and Tullow Oil.

Fun for them is paramount. They understand that personnel morale can transform a company into a successful business. So here are some top tips from the company in ensuring a happy work environment.

Let yourself go: Be spontaneous and have the right state of mind to enjoy work. Create breakout areas where people can socialise, network, play games, discuss ideas and relax during office hours.

At Tullow Oil for example, large seating booths are designed to enjoy a meal or have semi enclosed meetings with a high acoustic property. Each of the pods is totally wrapped in fabric panels forming the seat and back pads as well as the ceiling. They are a complete escapism from the rest of the space and are used throughout the day for informal meetings, as well as catching up with work friends at lunch times

My office desk: hot desking is a good solution for busy offices where space is limited and people come and go but in most working environments, personal desks are a great way of making your employees feel more comfortable when at work. Thanks to smart desk designs, desks can be fitted taking minimal space whilst still providing a friendly and efficient working environment.

Places to think: creativity and bright ideas cannot be produced at will but have to be nurtured and encouraged. Positive and calming environments especially designed to facilitate thinking time, with soft colour tones, can facilitate creativity.

In the World Gold Council offices an innovation room was created. Peldon Rose was conscious about the importance of creating a room that was completely different from the rest of the formal office space. This area has been furnished with off the wall iconic pieces of furniture and has an electronic wall that will digitally copy anything that has been written down, capturing spur of the moment brain storm ideas.

Places to breathe: designing green areas in the office where plants can flourish, can be a great morale booster. Parks and green areas have a natural relaxing effect on the human psyche so why not bring some green to the office. Plants can literally bring an office to life by increasing the oxygen levels, purifying the air, and creating a calming, happier and more productive environment.

A green terrace with outdoor seating areas for Capsticks, the leading provider of legal services to the healthcare sector, has been designed by Peldon Rose, where staff can meet, eat, wind down and enjoy a break in the fresh air just inches away from their office desks.

Places to eat: there is an increasing trend of people having lunch at their desk due to time constraints but also due to lack of space or designated eating areas. This results in workers not taking any breaks with a rise in stress levels and feelings of discomfort. The creation of friendly spaces that offer a change of scenery where employees feel they can take a break from their desk and sit down for a meal is therefore very important and can have a great impact on staff morale.

At Tullow Oil, each of the four floor plates is designed with a relaxation point in each corner of the building. These spaces hold tea, coffee and food making facilities and are decorated with African Art and soft sofas and bar stools so people can really unwind.

Lighting: lighting can have a huge effect on people’s moods and productivity and therefore in an office environment it is a very important design factor to get right. When offices are lit too harshly, it can anger people, cause headaches and lead to a lack in creativity or concentration. Aside from appropriate roof lighting, giving people control of their desk lighting can make them feel happier.

Peldon Rose carried out the fit out operations for Sapient Nitro, a global marketing and technology firm and assisted it to relocate to the City of London. The office design was to be unconventional and innovative while still being client-focused. To achieve this Peldon Rose used a dynamic lighting solution that can be tailored to any colour within a spectrum of thousands such as the colour-changing lighting feature in the foyer.

In the UK, we spend more time working than any other nation. For sanity alone, employees should be providing spaces that allow people to perform at their best. As Jitesh Patel, Chief Executive Officer, Peldon Rose Workplace Consultants, said:
“Investing in people is so much more than providing job training. Companies need to offer the proper environments for employees to work to the best of their ability and to enjoy their day. A workspace that has a wow factor, doesn’t need to be expensive and it can save a company so many costs, from attracting and keeping the best personnel to providing the best base from which to be successful”.

Source Telepgraph UK

Economists and other experts outline how to create jobs

More than two years after the Great Recession ended, some 14 million Americans are out of work, nearly half of them for six months or longer.

August's unemployment rate remained at 9.1%, unchanged from July.

And so for the second time since early 2009, the government is looking to jump-start a job market caught between tight-fisted consumers and wary businesses. President Obama on Thursday is expected to propose more government spending on construction projects, aid to budget-strapped states and new tax credits to encourage hiring, among other strategies.

Republicans have signaled they're firmly opposed to another large economic stimulus that adds to the $1.3 trillion deficit. They prefer less-costly steps to promote job growth long term, such as cutting the corporate tax rate and streamlining regulations.

USA TODAY decided to look past the partisan crossfire and ask more than a dozen think tanks, economists, industry groups and lawmakers a simple question: What can Washington do to get America back to work again?

Repair roads, bridges, schools

Fixing the nation's aging infrastructure would create jobs more quickly than tax cuts — in as little as a few months — and meet critical needs that must be addressed eventually. Transportation bottlenecks are costing the country about $200 billion a year, or 1.6% of economic output, according to a study by a bipartisan coalition of state and local politicians. It would take $2.2 trillion over the next five years to upgrade the USA's roads, highways, seaports, rail lines and bridges, the American Society of Civil Engineers estimates.

With yields on 10-year Treasury bonds at about 2%, borrowing costs for the U.S. government are as low as they've ever been. "There's never been a more opportune time to invest in infrastructure," says Andrew Fieldhouse, policy analyst for the liberal Economic Policy Institute (EPI).

To make a tangible impact, Congress could go big, spending $200 billion each of the next two years. Fieldhouse says that would create more than 2 million jobs and reduce unemployment about 0.8 percentage points. While that may seem ambitious in an era of fiscal austerity, each dollar spent generates $1.44 in economic output, according to EPI and Moody's Analytics. As a result, about half the money would come back to the government through increased tax revenue. Some funds also could be used to build out a smart electric grid, bring broadband to rural areas and upgrade water systems.

Political and budget realities, of course, may mean shrinking grand visions. A growing chorus of economists are calling for a more targeted plan to upgrade the nation's schools with projects such as fixing up playgrounds, removing mold and installing solar panels. Unlike highway or rail improvements that take months to launch, cash could be funneled to states and school districts within 30 days through existing funding formulas, and much of the work could be done in the winter. And since the projects are more labor-intensive, they would largely pay for salaries rather than heavy capital equipment.

Such a plan could draw wide public support, says Jared Bernstein, former economic policy adviser for Vice President Biden and now a senior fellow at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. "These are the public schools in our communities where we drop our kids off."

A broad jobs bill by Jan Schakowsky, D-Ill., calls for spending $100 billion to create 650,000 school construction and maintenance jobs in two years.

Yet anything that looks even remotely like the $800 billion economic stimulus might face an uphill fight in Congress.

A more politically palatable option that's gaining some traction is an infrastructure bank that would provide loans and loan guarantees to private firms that could recoup their investments through highway tolls or local sales taxes. Obama has pushed the idea. And a bill by Sens. John Kerry, D-Mass., and Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, would leverage $10 billion to $160 billion in public financing to generate up to four times as much in private investment.

U.S. Chamber of Commerce CEO Tom Donohue this week said, "There is lots of private money there" to invest in infrastructure improvement.

Here's the rub: Such a bank could take at least a year or two to get up and running, so it wouldn't provide the kind of short-term stimulus needed to quickly jump-start the anemic job market.

Give states ahelping hand

Since early 2010, budget-crunched state and local governments have cut 425,000 jobs even while private employers have added 2.3 million. States face budget shortfalls totaling $103 billion in the current fiscal year, helping to force an additional 300,000 state and local layoffs by the end of 2012, according to the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities and Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Analytics.

The government could provide up to $20 billion to states to save about 200,000 teaching and other government jobs. That's probably the quickest way to prop up payrolls, says Michael Ettlinger, vice president for public policy at the liberal Center for American Progress. A $50 billion program would close half the $97 billion deficit states face for Medicaid payments, saving about 500,000 jobs, Fieldhouse says.

Schakowsky's bill would spend $227 billion to create 2.2 million jobs in two years, at a per-job cost of about $50,000 a year, all through existing funding programs that can disburse the money within weeks to states and localities. Besides the school repair projects, her plan would hire about 350,000 teachers, police officers and firefighters, 40,000 health care workers and 100,000 youths to spruce up parks.

Add workers, at a discount

If you want to boost sales, cut the price. That's basically the idea behind a tax credit for each new employee a business hires over its staffing level the previous year. To make an impact, the government should offer a per-employee credit of $10,000 as well as 10% of increased wages for two years, says Michael Greenstone, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.

"This is most directly targeted at the thing you want: more employment," he says.

A similar tax credit last year didn't appear to light a fire under employers. Those that hired people who were jobless at least eight weeks were exempt from the 6.2% Social Security payroll tax. Employers of 10.6 million workers from February through October 2010 were eligible for the credit, which saved as much as $3,480 for the addition of a $40,000-a-year worker. But the Treasury Department acknowledges it doesn't know how many of those workers would have been hired anyway.

Both the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Federation of Independent Business oppose a hiring tax credit, saying companies add workers because of increased sales, not temporary windfalls.

Yet a sizable credit could nudge companies thinking of hiring but hesitant to pull the trigger amid economic uncertainty, Greenstone says, adding that last year's credit was too small. He also would not limit hiring to employees who've been jobless for a minimum period as that discouraged businesses that simply wanted to recruit the best workers.

Studies found a $4,500 tax credit in 1977 — $14,400 in 2008 dollars — increased employment by 3% at firms that knew of the program vs. others that didn't, creating 700,000 jobs. Greenstone estimates that under his plan, employers would add about 6 million jobs that would be eligible for a tax credit, about 900,000 of which would not have been created otherwise.

Share jobs to save jobs

Perhaps the least expensive way to bolster payrolls is through work sharing, a program that encourages employers to avoid layoffs by cutting all workers' hours instead. For example, instead of laying off 20% of its staff, a company could trim all workers' hours by 20%. The government then would make up half the workers' lost pay with unemployment insurance — so it's basically a wash or a small expense for state and federal coffers.

"It keeps people employed and at very little cost," says Dean Baker, chief economist of the Center for Economic and Policy Research.

Twenty-two states have work-sharing programs, but they're sparsely used. Baker says a federal initiative would be better publicized and could give employers more flexibility during the program to modify the number of employees getting reduced pay.

Although the recession's widespread job cuts are over, businesses are always laying off some workers, even when total payrolls are growing. An average of about 650,000 workers a month this year have been temporarily laid off, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

If 10% of their employers adopted work sharing, 65,000 jobs a month could be saved.

In Germany, widespread adoption of work sharing helped lower unemployment to 6.7% from 7.1% before the global downturn despite economic growth that has lagged behind the U.S.

Lower corporate taxes

Many economists call for cutting the average 35% federal corporate tax rate to make the U.S. more competitive in a global economy. The average tax rate in Europe is 23%. Chris Edwards, senior fellow at the conservative Cato Institute, calls cutting the rate to 25% "the single best thing we could do" to grow jobs. Obama has said he wants to reduce tax rates while eliminating loopholes and deductions.

Trimming the rate to 22% would cost the government $81 billion in lost revenue but create 350,000 manufacturing jobs directly by 2019 as it prompts U.S. and foreign companies to open factories here instead of overseas, the non-partisan Milken Institute says. An additional 1.7 million jobs would be added as benefits ripple through the economy, Milken says.

Economists say it could take a few years for any tax cuts to grow jobs. But Aparna Mathur, an economist for the conservative American Enterprise Institute, says creating certainty about tax policies could lead firms to hire in the short term.

Train the jobless

At least part of the reason for the high jobless rate is that many laid-off construction and manufacturing workers, for example, lack the skills for growing jobs in heath care and technology. Thirty percent of companies surveyed by McKinsey Global Institute say they have had positions unfilled for six months or longer.

Darlene Miller, CEO of Permac Industries and a member of Obama's Jobs and Competitiveness Council, is helping spearhead a 16-week course in advanced manufacturing at two Minnesota colleges. The program, she says, aims to promote better coordination among colleges, businesses and area career centers to identify and train workers. Officials hope to expand the initiative across the country in three to six months, Miller says.

The council, she says, also wants to help schools graduate 10,000 more engineering students each year to meet a dire shortage of engineers. The panel aims to raise $100 million in private funding for scholarships, launch a media campaign to trumpet engineering careers and encourage schools with high graduation rates to share their strategies.

Cut red tape

The Chamber of Commerce calls regulatory roadblocks that delay construction, environmental and other permits "the most significant obstacles to new hiring."

McKinsey says "inconsistent and sometimes lengthy" reviews can add months or years to project development, discouraging foreign firms from locating in the U.S.

Susan Lund, McKinsey's research head, says the government should allow one-stop shopping so companies can secure various permits from a single agency as well as enterprise zones in which many permits would be pre-approved.

It would be no surprise if the job-creation debate bogs down in political wrangling, with Democrats favoring new stimulus and Republicans supporting tax cuts. But Ross DeVol, Milken's chief research officer, says any viable plan must include both.

"We can't allow ourselves just to be in one or two camps and believe those are the only prescriptions that will work," he says. "Think of it as portfolio of stocks and bonds. You wouldn't want to have all your investments in one particular area."

Source: USA Today, By Paul Davidson

Find out what employers are looking for to beat the September jobs rush

September marks the start of the busiest job hunting season of the year and with competition high, understanding what employers are looking for can make it easier to secure a role.

Whether new graduates or established professionals, those who are successful in their search will have more than their CV to hand, they will understand the value of their reputation and leverage it to create advantage.

What type of skills are employers looking for?

“A polished CV, rich in skills and experience is the minimum expected but you need to be clear about your future aspirations and why you believe you can achieve them,” said Jason Miller from Tinder-Box Business Coaching.

“Employers are looking beyond qualifications to the sort of person you are as much as what you have achieved, making your RV - your reputational value –as important to a prospective employer as your CV.”

Jason has worked with some of the UK’s large organisations to design graduate recruitment and talent management strategies and believes there are five things that an individual should consider to enhance their reputational value.

1 Understand your current reputation. Get curious as to what you are known for now. Ask friends, colleagues, bosses or even your old teachers to get as broad a view as possible. This will help you to understand who you are and why you are already successful.

2 Understand what drives you and let people know. Look at your list of achievements and understand what it is about you that enabled you to achieve them. Understand what motivates you and gives you the edge. Be ready and proud to present your values and personal motivations as much as your academic track record.

3 Check your social media presence reflects you. Consider Google as an immediate reflection of your online reputation. Type your name in and see what words and images appear. Does your reputation in social media reflect the person written on your CV? Is what you see consistent with who you are and how you wish to present yourself?

4 Embrace your new identity. Be ready to present yourself as the person you’ll be when you secure the position, not as the person you have been until now. This is a new chapter and employers want to employ someone who they are confident will be a competent future leader, not a student. Ensure that you present your future self.

5 Be clear about what you’re striving for. Be really clear about your future aspirations are and be prepared to articulate these clearly to any potential employers. Employers will be interested in not only what you’ve done to date but the potential return on the investment that they make in hiring you.

Source: telegraph Jobs.co.uk By Louisa Peacock

Asia needs more high quality jobs to maintain growth

Developing Asia needs to create more high quality jobs if the region is to sustain the rapid economic expansion seen over the past two decades, the Asian Development Bank said on Tuesday.

"Asia has outstripped other regions in growth and employment creation since 1990," ADB Chief Economist Changyong Rhee said at a press conference in Singapore. But "Asia still remains home to most of the world's poor."

"I don't want to downplay the importance of economic growth, but on the quality job front, progress has been less impressive," he added.

Citing figures compiled by the Manila-based development bank, Rhee said the two-thirds of workers in developing Asia, which excludes Japan, were employed in the informal sector in 2008, little changed from 1990.

In India, the proportion of informal workers rose to 82 percent of the workforce, from 80 percent between 1991 and 2008. However, Thailand's percentage of informal workers dropped to 54 percent in 2008 from 70 percent in 1990, while Malaysia saw a drop to 22 percent from 31 percent over the same period.

In contrast, informal workers made up 12 percent of the workforce in developing Europe in 2008, and 33 percent in Latin America and the Caribbean region.

ADB said informal work is usually a sign of underemployment and lower incomes as well as the absence of social safety nets.

The bank urged low-income Asian countries to make it easier for workers to move from rural to urban areas in search of higher-paying jobs, as well as support activities to increase productivity in the rural non-farm sector.

It also recommended extending basic levels of social protection to informal workers.

Looking ahead, Rhee said Asia will be able to ride out the slowdown in the United States and Europe so long as there's no repeat of the 2008 financial crisis.

"We believe that Asian economic growth at this moment is robust and resilient enough to cope with a slowdown in the advanced economies unless this becomes a full-blown crisis which is very unlikely," he said.

Source : SINGAPORE (Reuters)(Reporting by Kevin Lim; Editing by Ed Lane)

Singapore Tightens Rules on Hiring Foreigners

Singapore’s government, facing complaints from residents having to compete with foreigners for jobs, tightened rules on Tuesday for firms hiring overseas workers in mid-level positions.

The ruling People’s Action Party is under pressure to restrict the number of foreigners seeking work in the rich city-state after May parliamentary elections that saw the opposition make historic gains.

Labor shortages mean the country has to rely on immigrant workers for many jobs. The unhappiness voiced by voters in the run-up to elections included competition for jobs and places in schools.

Starting in January next year, a foreigner must earn S$3,000 ($2,493) or more a month before he can qualify for an employment pass that will let him work in Singapore.

Singapore in July raised the minimum qualifying salary to S$2,800 from S$2,500.

“Our aim is to avoid increasing dependence on foreign workers over the long term, by keeping the foreign share of the workforce at about one-third,” the Ministry of Manpower said in a statement.

Source: GMAnews.com

Six ways to work well with recruiters

1) More is not better
Contact a minimum of three and an absolute maximum of six recruiters – any more and you risk losing control of your job search, with different recruiters sending out your CV for the same vacancy. That’s something banks really hate.

2) Get specialist
The recruiters you deal with should specialise in your job function and have solid experience. Don’t think someone is an expert in, say, risk management, just because the job title says so – he or she may have only recently been assigned to the sector. Choose someone who has been recruiting in risk for a number of years. Look at recruiter biographies on the firm’s website, or on LinkedIn.

3) Consider niche firms
Also remember that although it’s probably the large, mass-market agencies who will show up on a Google search, niche firms may be just as good. Leading consultants from the big players often end up opening their own boutiques, some of which will focus on your job function. So don’t rush your research of the recruiter market – take the time to see who’s really out there.

4) Ask them who they work for
It’s important to discover from the outset which banks your recruiters represent and which they do not. If someone says “every bank”, walk away: it’s just not true. They should be able to name a few key employers and answer your questions about them.

5) Test their knowledge
Have a chat about your job function to see if they can talk the talk and understand current issues, both technically and from an employment perspective. Ideally try to find recruiters who have worked in the financial sector themselves.

6) If they're good, stick with them
Just like bankers, recruiters are prone to changing companies. As a general rule, if you have a good relationship with a recruiter, stay with the person, rather than his or her firm. It's the individual consultants who usually have the industry contacts and the knowledge that you need.

Source: efinanciacareers.com By Simon Mortlock

How to Find a Job in a “Jobless Economy”

Job seekers may be very surprised to learn that human resources pros and recruiters attend conferences to talk about “the war for talent.”

Ironically, when so many people are looking for work, many hiring managers still have a difficult time connecting with the right candidates. They pay consulting firms a lot of money to teach them how their organizations can use Facebook to connect with potential applicants, and they hope Google+ is the next great social network to tap for professional information about new hires.

In the meantime, the average job seeker continues to plug away, applying for position after position, with little to no success in many cases. Jackie Bassett, the CEO of BT Industrials, Inc., works with the CEOs of a variety of global companies that are in growth mode. She acknowledges, “They all tell me their number-one constraint to growth is finding the right talent.” While many lost jobs are not coming back, “brand new needs have appeared that have yet to be met. The opportunity to fill any of those needs is everywhere. They just won’t be found where we used to go to look for them.”

Bassett collaborates with CEOs and with Joel Abraham, a talent manager at EMM Holdings and the author of Hired: Networking to Land the Job You Want, to help get the word out that all job seekers—from new college graduates to executives seeking jobs earning six figures—can get hired, even in today’s economy.

She explains, “CEOs, CFOs and community leaders everywhere aren’t waiting for Congress to find you a job. They are taking action now in many innovative ways. They know there are jobs out there. They know how they got where they are today. They got themselves hired and went on to create jobs they need to hire for. They are sharing their advice via career events town by town, family by family, college grad by college grad, to do whatever it takes to find the right talent they need to grow their companies and grow the economy.”

You can still land a job in a stubborn market. The trick is to avoid relying entirely on old-school mechanisms and to embrace new ways to get the word out about what you offer a hiring manager.

Curious how CEOs view the “jobless economy” that we seem to be stuck in? Some working with Bassett comment on concerns that are top-of-mind for many job seekers today. For example, some economists and “futurists” are predicting a shift to a contract-based work economy, where most workers will not be employees of organizations, but rather will be hired on a project-by-project basis. Steve Hill, the CFO of Burst Media, points out, "Over the last five years, we have seen a major move from traditional media to digital media. Now all media-related businesses recognize this, from newspaper, book, and magazine publishers to advertising agencies and all their clients. There are and will continue to be tremendous opportunities for creative and talented people with experience in the digital world, despite the current state of the economy. The trick for job seekers will be to gain that first experience working in this area. Schools, colleges, and start-up companies can provide those opportunities for people willing and able to work for free or part time on a contract basis."

Another difficult factor for many job seekers, whose homes may be worth less than what they owe on their mortgages, is relocating for opportunities, or being willing to retrain in growth fields. Jim Sheehan, the CFO of Ember, acknowledges that the “unemployment levels are not evenly distributed across geographic and market segments. In the Boston area, where Ember is located, we are experiencing shortages in qualified candidates for several technical positions we are looking to fill, which supports the statistic of 3 percent or lower unemployment for some segments of the job market."

While many job seekers want “safe” and “stable” opportunities and resist uncertainty, Brad Casper, the executive chairman of the board and interim CEO of Dymatize, suggests succeeding by pursuing a less-traveled path. He explains, “When looking for new opportunities for advancement, conventional wisdom normally suggests to 'follow your passions' or 'build on your strengths.’ An alternative would be to leave your comfort zone and pursue a new career path that is less traveled and perhaps a little more uncertain; . . . to leave the comfort zone and take on an opportunity that may be just slightly beyond what you think you are ready for. Intelligent risk-taking can lead to fantastic career growth."

[See A Recruiter's Tips for Job-Hunting.]

Meanwhile, not everyone resists the pull of a passionate fit with an organization. Virginia Rybski, the CEO of Regenesis Biomedical, Inc., advises, “During the job search process, it is essential to look beyond the basic criteria of location and compensation; you must follow your passion. Success in a new role is clearly dependent upon your fit within the existing culture and the level of passion and commitment you are willing to bring. At Regenesis Biomedical, we identified a real need to help diabetes patients suffering from disease-related skin wounds and pain. The satisfaction of helping these patients and their caregivers helps fuel that fire within each of us to create passion-filled jobs for others.”

Of course, no one advisor (even from a panel of successful professionals) has the answer for every job seeker. There’s no doubt that an important ingredient in any job seeker’s arsenal of tools is a willingness to work hard to move in the chosen career path’s direction. Consider this thought from Sarah Coppinger, a 2010 college graduate who is now a journalist working for Hometown Publications, LLC: “One thing I've learned after talking with distinguished media professionals, artists, and writers is that success only comes after discovering a passion, and then committing yourself to the hard work that follows. This takes time, as well as sacrifice. But, if you're passionate enough, the opportunities you take will outweigh the sacrifices you make.”

Source: money.usnews.com by Miriam Salpeter

Using LinkedIn to source a new job when you are already in one

Most LinkedIn tips and advice are geared towards jobseekers between jobs. LinkedIn can be a valuable tool to support jobseekers in active employment too. This post examines how current employees can use LinkedIn to source a new job.

Get over your fear and start using LinkedIn – Using LinkedIn does not automatically mean you are job hunting. Many business and professions use LinkedIn for other reasons.

Create a strong LinkedIn Profile – A LinkedIn profile is your own personal sales brochure. Some compare it to an online CV but I think it offers more. Build a full and up-to-date profile ensuring impact content and achievements, keywords and recommendations.

Your Headline/Status updates – Many job hunters between jobs use this to tell the world they are actively seeking employment. Use your headline to indicate what you do and who you do it for. Avoid putting information about your job hunt on your status.

Manage your account settings – Adjust settings so that your connections are not informed when make changes to your profile or status. If they can see you are connecting with recruiters it might give the game away. Use the settings to indicate that they are interested in career opportunities and that you accept messages from other members. Help recruiters/opportunities get in touch.

Ensure your profile is keyword rich – In US 85% of recruiters use LinkedIn to find talent and Ireland is following fast. Identify the keywords that recruiters may use to search for your skills.

Join relevant groups – Join groups in your specific field or industry. Recruiters and potential hiring managers will be monitoring. Contribute to the groups by posting meaningfully comments. This will help increase visibility and draw potential opportunities to your profile. Remember that everyone can read your comments so don’t give the game away.

Expand your network – The more people you connect to the more you expand your reach. Remember it is about quality and not numbers. Actively hunt down and build relationships with relevant recruiters through your group membership.

Comment on Blogs/Forums – When you comment on an industry forum or blog it is important to post your Linkedin URL. This can draw people to view your profile.

Email signature – Place your Linkedin URL on your email signature. When you send emails you are opening yourself up to potential viewers. Use your personal email and depending on your role you may be able to add to your work email.

Source Paula Mullan.ie

Permanent Jobs rise in UK In August

The Report on Jobs published today by the REC and KPMG shows that permanent staff placements rose in August at a modest pace that was identical to that recorded in the previous month. Similarly, growth of temporary staff billings held broadly steady since July.

The key points in the Report this month are:
•Further moderate increases in permanent placements and temporary billings
•Growth of vacancies continues to ease
•Weakest rise in permanent salaries for 22 months
•Strongest rise in permanent candidate availability since January 2010

Although demand for staff continued to rise in August, the latest increase in overall vacancies was the slowest in nine months. Weaker rates of expansion were signalled for both permanent and temporary vacancies.

Permanent staff salaries increased only marginally and at the slowest pace for 22 months in August. Inflation of temporary staff hourly pay rates quickened to a three-month high, but remained weak compared with the survey’s historical trend.

Recruiters indicated another rise in the availability of staff during August. Permanent candidate supply improved at the fastest pace since January 2010,

Kevin Green, the REC's Chief Executive says:

“The latest Report on Jobs from the REC and KPMG highlights the robustness of the UK jobs market. In the face of a slowing economy, falling consumer confidence and high inflation, private sector employers continue to hire staff. The numbers are lower than three months ago but placements continued to rise in August, which was the twenty-fifth consecutive month of growth. The figures also show that with a month to go before the introduction of new regulations covering agency workers that businesses continue to depend on and use this flexible resource.

“The UK jobs market is being incredibly resilient. Even with increasing job losses in the public sector and a new influx of school-leavers it is performing much better than many predicted. We are confident that this trend is set to continue and that the Agency Workers Regulations will not undermine the UK’s flexible labour market given that our members and their clients seem well prepared for the impact of the AWR next month.”

Bernard Brown, Partner and Head of Business Services at KPMG comments:

“Although the jobs market has held up relatively well, it remains in the summer doldrums and, worryingly, there seem to be early signs of trends similar to those of 2008. Whether this is a blip or a return to a familiar and unwelcome pattern will emerge over the next few months.

“Permanent and temporary staff appointments rose again in August but only at the same relatively low rates seen last month. And whilst it’s good that we are still seeing some growth in appointments, whether this can continue in the face of a decline in the rate of growth of vacancies remains to be seen.

“Employers continue to take a cautious approach to hiring decisions amid an uncertain economic climate. Whether this will persist as the summer holidays draw to a close is an open question. Much will depend on macro-economic factors and their effect on overall confidence, especially where permanent hiring decisions are concerned. With candidate availability continuing to grow – notably permanent staff availability has improved at the fastest pace since January 2010 – it’s a buyers’ market should employers choose to step up their recruitment in the autumn.”

Report on Jobs provides the most comprehensive guide to the UK labour market drawing from original survey data provided by recruitment consultancies.

Source: www. Rek.uk.com

Working break entitlements in Ireland

Your employer is required to give you adequate breaks during your working day. If they fail to provide you with enough or any breaks during your working day then they are in breach of Irish employment law. It’s important that you know your rights when it comes to taking breaks at work, and hopefully after reading this article you will feel more confident on this topic. These rules have been outlined in the Organisation of Working Time Act, 1997.

Break Entitlements Chart
Under 4.5 hours : there is no legal requirement for employees to be provided with a break if they are only working a short shift
Between 4.5 – 6 hours : you are entitled a 15 minute break (unpaid).
Over 6 hours : you are entitled to a 30 minute break (unpaid).
Further to these legal requirements for breaks during your working day there are also rules for time off outside work

Between 2 shifts / working days you should have at least 11 hours of a recovery period after your last shift.
In a 7 day period there should be 24 hours between shifts (after the above recovery period of 11 hours).

These are of course guidelines, and in certain jobs you may be ask by your employer to take longer or more frequent breaks. Depending on your job this might reduce the risk of RSI (Repetitive Strain Industry) or other occupational injuries.

These 10 Pre-Teen Entrepreneurs Make Millions More Than Their Parents

Success as an entrepreneur isn't about rules, textbooks, or MBA's. We know because many of the world's most groundbreaking, successful businesspeople don't even have a high school diploma.

Of course, that's because they're still in high school.

Check out these crazy-successful entrepreneurial kids — ages 12 to 23 — who revealed the six traits you really need to make big money doing what you love.


1. Support — don't go it alone

The wonder kids:Adora Svitak has published two books, been featured on Good Morning America, and presented at the annual TED conference. Oh — and she's 12 years old. Most middle schoolers are snotty and self-centered, but not Adora. She told us, "I cannot emphasize enough the importance of family encouragement - not just for me, but for everyone.

Farrhad Acidwalla is a 16-year-old college student in Mumbai, India. Between classes, he manages Rockstah Media, a full-scale marketing agency with over 20 international employees. How does he do it? Farrhad says, "My team is the backbone of the company. They give shape and form to my vision."

The lesson: It's easy to get caught up in your own vision and the idea that entrepreneurs don't need anyone but themselves to succeed. But entrepreneurship will throw you a lot of curve balls — and if you don't have the support of friends, family, and team members, then it's hard to have the courage to keep swinging.


2. Hard work — nobody said it would be easy

The wonder kids: Emil Motycka started mowing lawns when he was nine years old. His senior year of high school, Motycka Enterprises pulled in $135,000, offering everything from lawn care to Christmas light installation. An overnight success? Kind of. Emil frequently works overnight, saying, "Sleep is for the weak. I sleep four hours a night on average."

Andrew Fashion made $2.5 million by the time he was 21. By 22, he had lost it all (and then some). He told us all the sordid details, but we're more interested in how he'll claw his way back to the top: this year he's writing an autobiography, an eBook on how to pick up women, and he's launched beModel.com. Andrew's advice: "If you slack on it, no one is going to believe it.

The lesson: No, entrepreneurship is not all unicorns, lollipops, and solid-gold hot tubs. Well — it is, but that part doesn't come until later. In the meantime, don't count on finding overnight success unless you're ready to stay up overnight.


3. Passion — love it or leave it

The wonder kids: Juliette Brindak's brand for adolescent girls, Miss O and Friends, has been valued by Procter & Gamble at $15 million. That's a pretty serious piggy bank for a 21-year-old college student. But money has always been secondary to passion: Juliette started Miss O because she wanted to help out girls when, "things start to get a little bit rough.

Joe Penna was studying to become a cardio thoracic surgeon at the University of Massachusetts, when he dropped out to make YouTube videos. Crazy? Probably, but the 1.3 million subscribers he's attracted as Mystery Guitar Man hint that he's onto something. That something is passion: "If you think that you are going to love something, give it a try. You’re going to kick yourself in the butt for the rest of your life if you don’t."

Every one of the 25 kids we interviewed is completely and totally in love with their business. If you think that's a coincidence, then you're crazier than Joe. Follow your passion, because a lackluster attitude can only create a lackluster business.


4. Perseverance — how to take a punch and get back up

The wonder kids: At 17, Sabirul Islam was shopping his memoir, *The World at Your Feet*, to major publishers in the UK. He got rejected — 40 times. Any normal human being would have given up at that point, but entrepreneurs don't get the luxury of being normal. Sabirul self-published his book and promptly sold 42,000 copies in nine months.

Adam Horwitz is the 18-year-old who just launched Mobile Monopoly, an online product that earned a ridiculous $1.5 million in its first three days. The most amazing part: he still lives at home with his parents. Adam says, "I’ve failed at least 30 times with different websites and stuff... But, if I hadn’t failed all of those times, I wouldn’t be where I’m at now."

The lesson: The legend of King Midas is just that, a legend. If you expect everything you touch to turn to gold, then you're going to become disillusioned in a hurry. Entrepreneurship requires falling down. Success requires getting back up.


5. Naivety — because you just don't know any better

The wonder kids: Imagine you're a dyslexic 16-year-old who just dropped out of school. You would have to be pretty naive to think that you could find major success as a writer for blogs. Tell that to Michael Dunlop, the 21-year-old owner of IncomeDiary.com. He may not have a diploma, but Michael earns a healthy six figures a year writing for a living — spelling mistakes and all.

Catherine Cook and her brother started a social networking site, myYearbook.com, while they were still in high school. When an interested party offered the Cooks a few thousand dollars for their fledgling site, common sense suggests they should have jumped on the offer. Of course, they rejected it. Today, myYearbook.com boasts over 20 million members and $20 million in annual revenue.

The lesson: Entrepreneurship and common sense don't always get along. You can't get to extraordinary success with ordinary thinking. So, the next time someone tells you that you're being naive, take heart. That's what they told Bill Gates, too.

The lesson: The sixth essential key to success is being humble enough to learn from the people who have already been there, done that, and lived to tell about it. The 25 kids we interviewed are successful because they've never stopped listening and learning.

Michael Dunlop confided in us, "You’ve got to stop doing all the things that people have tried, tested, and found out don’t work... Young people really know what's going on and really are coming up with the best ideas and the best sites. If you don't listen to them, you're a fool."

Source: Businessinsider.com By Matt Wilson

The China Column: Relax, you’re at a local bank; Panic, you’re at a foreign bank

There are more and more vacancies these days at both local and foreign banks in China. These positions are across the board: cashiers, credit, compliance – all the way up to CEOs.

But nowhere is the battle between domestic and overseas firms as intense as in sales. As Miss Wang, an HR director of a state-owned commercial bank in Shanghai, recently explained: “Based on what we have seen in the past two years, Chinese banks will keep focusing on attracting a large number of sales people.”

The logic behind her statement is simple. Banks in China are expending a great deal of effort in attracting and retaining high quality clients, so they need more sales people to develop these relationships.

Chinese banks used to prefer candidates with a degree in banking or finance, but this is changing, says Wang. Instead of focusing on tertiary qualifications, which might not reveal much about the person’s sales capabilities, local firms are becoming more interested in communication and leadership abilities. These interpersonal skills will largely determine if someone has the potential to be a good salesperson.

Candidates see the benefits of Chinese banks

But do salespeople want to work for local banks? The answer, usually, is yes.

To sales candidates who have recently graduated and have limited work experience, local banks are typically their first choice because of better benefits and allowances, and a comparatively relaxed working environment.

Hu Jia Liang, a post-graduate from Tongji University, has been working for a major Chinese bank for a year. As a management trainee, his base salary is not as attractive as some of his peers at foreign banks, but if you include all the benefits, his total compensation is comparable.

Moreover, his working environment is less stressful than at most foreign banks because local firms usually already have a large number of sustainable, long-term clients. Foreign banks need to build their networks.

Stress is making young people shy away form overseas banks. And these days it is becoming more common for candidates at foreign institutions to consider moving to local ones.

A personal choice

The choice between foreign and local really depends on what a candidate wants in the future. If he or she desires a challenge and to emerge stronger in terms of business development ability, foreign banks could be the ideal place. Their training programmes are also usually better than those at domestic firms.

Nevertheless, foreign banks are also known to have an informal glass ceiling for local employees. It’s rare to see local mid-management professionals move up to the top ranks, at least not at the moment.

Source: EfinancialCareers.com.sg By Zhang Xiao Qing

Follow Reuters

European governments are ready to bail out those banks which cannot raise capital from investors after the EU details on July 15 which lenders have failed its latest, more vigorous stress test.

The European Banking Authority (EBA) announced on Friday the publication date for the results of its check on 91 of the region's top lenders. These will be accompanied by measures to bolster capital for those that failed or nearly failed, in another attempt to reassure investors that European banks can withstand future shocks.

According to a separate European Union draft document seen by Reuters, European countries will support banks that fail the stress tests if those lenders cannot raise capital from investors within six months.

The paper, being prepared for EU finance ministers to approve on Tuesday, is an about-face from promises by G20 policymakers in the wake of the financial crisis that taxpayers would never have to bail out banks again.

An official close to the EBA said all banks that fail must have a plan by September to plug the capital shortfall by the end of this year, as previously agreed by EU finance ministers.

Those just above the pass mark will be more closely scrutinised and must also plan remedial actions but their implementation deadline remains unclear and could be clarified by finance ministers next Tuesday, the official said.

Member states will be obliged to have backstops in place only for banks that actually fail the test, the official added.

European Banking Federation Secretary General Guido Ravoet said some banks may struggle to find enough capital.

"Is the European financial market deep enough to respond to the needs for capital? We are not the only sector looking for capital," Ravoet said.

PRESSURE ON PERIPHERY

This latest round of tests has been touted as being more rigorous than previous attempts, in which few banks failed, and finance ministers' officials are drawing up plans for how to deal with the fallout.

The EU document also says lenders that nearly fail the tests will be put on a critical watch list in case they deteriorate.

Sources close to the banks and watchdogs said all German banks were certain they would get the green light, although some lenders, including publicly owned landesbanks HSH Nordbank and NordLB, would just scrape through.

News that EU governments appear serious about supporting banks that fail to maintain core capital of 5 percent in the face of several theoretical markets shocks lifted Bund futures and UK gilts.

"In essence that puts even more pressure on the periphery (euro zone countries) to come up with measures, not only to shore up their budgets, but to support their banking sectors, which they can ill afford to do," said Marc Ostwald, strategist at Monument Securities.

"It's basically a charge to safety on the back of this. This is a market which is living in mortal fear of anything to do with the euro zone and anything that puts the banking sector under more stress," Ostwald said.

The Italian/German 10-year yield spread hit fresh euro-era highs amid fears that already fiscally stretched countries like Italy might have to dig into their pockets to bail out banks that fail the test as well.

Shares in Italian bank UniCredit fell more than 5 percent on fears that Italy could be pulled into the debt crisis that has already forced Greece, Ireland and Portugal to take bailouts. UniCredit is the only big Italian bank that has not yet announced a capital increase.

Italian banking association chief Giuseppe Mussari, when asked about possible government intervention for banks failing the stress test, said this was not an issue for Italian banks.

According to the draft EU document, capital-raising plans should first be based on "private-sector measures, including ... retained earnings ... raising additional common equity or high-quality hybrid instruments from private investors, assets sales, mergers."

But if the search for private capital leads nowhere, then governments should be ready to step in.

Officials do, however, make provision for "the extreme case" if efforts to rehabilitate a bank fail and it threatens wider stability, recommending "a process of orderly restructuring and resolution."

The number of banks declared by the EBA to have failed will either encourage investors that Europe is now coming clean with its banking problems, or if the tests are deemed too lax again, they will hurt the EU's already battered credibility.

Previous stress tests were widely dismissed as too lax -- with Ireland given the green light just months before the EU and International Monetary Fund had to bail its lenders and the country out.

PRIME SUSPECTS

Unlisted banks in Spain and Germany and a batch of banks that are already raising funds are the most likely to fail this year's health check, analysts at Nomura said.

Jon Peace, banking analyst at Nomura, said he expected few failures among the listed banks, and many of those who will fall short have raised capital this year or were in the process of doing so.

"We think it (failures) will be heavily skewed towards the unlisted banks in Spain and Germany and with some Greek banks in there. For large listed banks there will be few failures."

Nomura analysts said several banks could have a core Tier 1 ratio of under 5 percent under an adverse scenario based on end-2010 capital levels, including Spain's Bankinter and Sabadell, Italy's Banco Popolare; Greece's Piraeus and ATEbank; Cyprus-based Marfin Popular and Bank of Cyprus; and Bank of Ireland and Allied Irish Banks.

The new checks will measure how well the core capital that banks rely on to absorb losses such as unpaid loans holds up when exposed to an economic dip or fall in property prices.

They also gauge the impact on banks should government bonds they own, issued by states such as Greece, lose value.

Source: Reuters by By John O'Donnell

DARE TO DREAM AGAIN AND PLAY FULL OUT!

Now its time to look clearly at what not really going for your dreams has cost you – mentally, emotionally, spiritually and financially. Give your full attention and commitment to this exercise. It is vital for creating the kind of success that you deserve to have in your life.

Spend two or three minutes on each of the questions below. Don’t take a lot of time thinking about your responses. Just write the first thoughts that come in to your mind. Play full out and really go for it.

1) What is the cost of playing small and not really going for your dreams and not really playing full out in life?

2) What has that cost you so far in life? What does it cost you spiritually? What does it cost you emotionally? Financially?

3) What would it continue to cost you if you were to carry on playing small and not really going after your dreams? What would it cost you over the next year? Over the next 3 years? The next 5 years?


4) Then what would it cost you ultimately in your life? What would you lose out on? What would you miss out on? What’s the ultimate price that you would have to pay for selling yourself short, playing small and not going for your dreams?

5) What do you stand to gain by stepping up and making the commitment today to play full out, follow your heart, and live your dreams? What’s the ultimate benefit?

6) When you achieve the ultimate benefit, what will that allow you to do or have?

7) What’s important to you about those benefits?

8) How committed are you to that?


What are you waiting for……

DARE TO DREAM AGAIN AND PLAY FULL OUT!

Dreams Come True - Especially A Dream Job

There are a lot of people out there who dream, but only a few are willing to work on their dreams and make them come true. If you want to land your dream job then you may have to make short-term sacrifices. And boy, will it be worth it!

What To Dream

For example, maybe you are a janitor and you dream of becoming the president of the bank. It's going to be a step-by-step process, moving towards your goal. So,if you want to land your dream job then you must use your money wisely and get the education and training you will need to achieve this prestigious goal.

You work to save the money that you earn from being a janitor and invest it in your business education - you are on the first step of your dream - so, celebrate, many people don't even start!

Be In The Right Place

Whilst you are getting that business education, you can apply for a lesser position in the company where your dream job exists. When you are in that lesser position in the right company doing a great job will then provide you with opportunities to make your moves over time.

And at some point in time, you will become the vice president of the company and then eventually you will become the president. What you just did is land your dream job. This is your dream and you wanted it to happen and you planned your course of action and you worked on it. Focused action towards a real and possible goal.

You have to make sure that you will put in the necessary effort to make things happen in a deliberate and focused way with all your attention and effort. Then, anything is possible, because everyone started at the bottom once.

Dreams Come True - Only If You Work At Them!

You can not simply sit and expect to land your dream job out of nowhere. If you want your dream to happen then you have to work hard at it. You have to make sure that you are covering all the necessary requirements to make your dream a reality.

If you are a teaching assistant in the university, who wants more, then you must seek a level higher education that helps you on your way to becoming the Dean. You also have to deliver the teaching hours requirement if you want to go up the university ladder.

Studying hard, putting the hours in all along a planned path will get you there. Many people don't do this and fall by the wayside with complaints of unfairness and other excuses. Good luck and fortune often comes to those who put the effort in, so that at the end of the day, you will be able to be successful enough to land your dream job once and for all.

Put In The Dream Job Effort

It's about working hard and making sacrifices - yet you don't have to kill yourself. Work smart too. By focusing your actions and leveraging your time and resourcefulness, you can take shortcuts.

A dream job is accessible to everyone. A job where you love getting up each morning to face the great challenges of your working day. A day where you will feel fulfilled and you will truly be a round peg in a round hole and not the other way round.

The time is yours, the time is now. What are you waiting for?

Source: 123direct.com

US Debt deal not that far out of reach

You would never know it from all the hot air rising out of Washington, but President Barack Obama and congressional Republicans could easily reach a deal to raise the debt limit and avoid an early August default.

Before talks hit a brick wall last weekend, negotiators were tantalizingly close to a $2 trillion-plus budget deal that would enable Congress to sign off on further borrowing, according to Democratic and Republican sources.

Since then, things have not looked good. Obama compared Republicans to lazy schoolchildren and Democrats accused them of deliberately sabotaging the economy. Republicans have not shied away from salty language, either.

"Washington is addicted to spending, and the addict-in- chief is the president," Republican Senator Jim DeMint said on the Senate floor on Thursday.

Analysts worry lawmakers may be painting themselves into a corner. "In order to get out of this mess they're going to have to eat some of their words," said Joe Minarik, a former budget official in the Clinton administration.

The Treasury Department has warned the country will face default if Congress does not lift the $14.3 trillion debt ceiling by August 2. That could push the country back into recession and upend financial markets across the globe.

Whether Republicans and Democrats can bridge their differences over the coming weeks remains to be seen.

From a dollar standpoint, the two sides are closer to a deal than it might appear.

In talks led by Vice President Joe Biden, negotiators had agreed to reduce discretionary spending, which covers everything from space exploration to pollution control, by between $900 billion and $1.7 trillion over 10 years.

Republicans resisted cuts to military and other security spending sought by Democrats, but Senator Charles Schumer, a Democrat known as a hard-nosed partisan, said on Thursday he thought a compromise was possible in this area.

The two sides had also tentatively agreed on cuts to a wide range of benefit programs, such as farm subsidies, student aid and federal employee retirement plans -- a total of roughly $200 billion, according to Democrats.

STRUCTURAL CHANGES TO MEDICARE?

Democrats have hammered their conservative opponents over a Republican proposal to scale back the Medicare program for future retirees, but the budget talks have yielded some consensus in this area as well.

Democrats say the deal could save roughly $200 billion through structural changes to health programs like Medicare and Medicaid, the healthcare program for the poor and handicapped, that don't scale back benefits.

Both sides have also taken a look at changing the inflation index, which could slow the growth of benefit payments and tax exemptions. That could yield $300 billion.

The lowered spending levels would reduce the amount the government spends on interest payments. That could yield a further $400 billion or so in savings, according to a back-of-the envelope calculation.

That adds up to at least $2 trillion in cuts -- roughly enough to ensure that Congress would not have to revisit the politically toxic issue before the November 2012 elections.

The main sticking point is tax increases. Republicans leaders have said they're off the table, and Democrats no longer expect to get the increase in income-tax rates for wealthy households that they had initially sought.

Instead, they aim to close a range of tax breaks that could generate $400 billion in new revenue. Republicans are not likely to agree to the largest of these, which would generate $300 billion from wealthy taxpayers by limiting the amount of deductions they can claim.

But other breaks for corporate jets, yachts and racehorses have a minimal impact on the budget and provide Democrats with vivid fodder for campaign attack ads. Throwing a few of these into the deal could avert a few headaches for Republicans and allow Democrats to claim a moral victory.

"It's going to be a difficult lift, but I still think that calmer minds will prevail in the end and they'll recognize that we don't have any alternative but to move forward," said Bill Hoagland, a former Republican congressional aide who has worked on budget issues for decades.

Source: Reuters by Alister Bull and Deborah Charles

Time for Career Confidence

With all the media coverage of financial sector crisis, market uncertainty and burgeoning recession, it would be easy to convince yourself that now is not the best time to be reassessing your career direction or out in the recruitment market, and that you’d be best to keep your head down – but you’d be wrong!

Now is a perfect time to sit back and take serious stock of your career situation. Use the time productively to carefully analyse what you offer the market, define your preferred career future and work out a way of getting there. In effect you are taking time to sharpen up your marketing plan, perfect your sales pitch. Most importantly, you are investing in your key shareholder – yourself. You are building career confidence.

Whilst the talk on the street is generally negative right now, the corporate heart of Ireland is still beating strongly, with companies still looking to fill key organisational roles, at all levels. The jobs are out there, both through agencies and under direct company advertisement, for which interview candidates still need to be found. If you are career confident – i.e. you know exactly what you’re after work-wise, and have honed your self-marketing skills to perfection, then now is actually an excellent time to be offering your services in the job market.

This is because many talented people prefer to play safe and stay put, rather than venture out into candidate-land - even when they’re in jobs they are sick of, and don’t want to spend another minute in! Their lack of career confidence displays as a high preference for time-dependent job security. For that reason, the level of high-class competition, particularly for high level jobs, can be significantly reduced right now.

If you’re in a work situation where you are worried that redundancy may be around the corner, then you should be making career confidence your best friend. Do this by being fully aware of your skills & talents, know how to apply them to best effect in work, and understand their real value. Analyse them alongside your specific work requirements and take time to determine the most personally profitable career future for yourself. Finally, develop your CV into an effective marketing brochure, and start to practice your interview techniques. It is amazing just how much being career confident shows at work, and is actually capable of averting a redundancy situation.

Source: Onlinecareermanager.com

The European Banking Authority said on Friday it had received all the extra information it wanted from banks, paving the way for publication of its sector health-check this month

The European Union watchdog is stress testing 91 lenders to see whether they can still stand on their own feet in the face of scenarios such as the economy shrinking for two consecutive years or big falls in house prices.

The aim is to restore investor confidence in a sector still being propped up by taxpayers in parts and under pressure to contribute to a Greek bailout.

The EBA planned to publish the result in June but had to ask banks to resubmit information because it was too optimistic. It also toughened up the impact of a big ratings downgrade on sovereign debt -- putting countries like Greece into theoretical default.

"All the data is now in, and we are now entering the third phase of peer review," an EBA spokeswoman said.

Officials familiar with the stress test said the need to put further questions to banks could not be ruled out but that the results are expected to be published in July.

The date may be disclosed next week.

Some banks, however, believe the EBA may be forced to delay publication beyond mid-July.

"The EBA will never make their deadline. I think it's highly unlikely that it will publish the stress test results by July 13. The stress tests are in complete disarray," a chief executive of a German landesbank participating in the health-check told Reuters.

"Even now, new questions keep arriving. The reason is that the EBA is realising that not as many banks will fail as it had hoped in order to rebuild its own credibility - so it keeps adjusting the test," the CEO said.

Last year's test was judged a flop after only seven lenders failed, none of them from Ireland, even though Ireland's banks later had to be rescued by a bailout from the EU and International Monetary Fund.

EBA Chairman Andrea Enria has staked the fledgling watchdog's reputation on delivering a credible stress test.

"We expect the EBA to come back with more questions. It looks like the EBA is adjusting the test in a way that will produce this many failures -- and this way rebuild its own credibility," a manager at another German bank said on condition of anonymity.

Reuters reported this week that up to 15 lenders may fail the test, but Enria said on Wednesday that a result has not yet been reached.

Sources have told Reuters the results will be published mid-July, probably just after a meeting of EU finance ministers on July 12 to discuss the results first and make sure "backstops" are in place, if needed, to prop up lenders that fail.

Source Reauters Reporting by Huw Jones in London, and Arno Schuetze in Frankfurt

Dangers lurk beyond Greek parliament vote

The Greek parliament was set to approve detailed austerity and privatisation bills on Thursday to secure emergency funds and avert imminent bankruptcy, but longer-term dangers still lurk.

The euro and global stocks rose after Wednesday's first vote to adopt a five-year austerity plan despite fierce public opposition to more pay and spending cuts, as investors expressed relief an immediate meltdown had been avoided.

Belgian Finance Minister Didier Reynders said, as a result, euro zone finance ministers were likely to agree to release a next tranche of loans to Greece at a meeting Sunday.

That 12 billion euro loan will prevent Greece defaulting in mid-July or at the latest on August 20, when it must honour a big bond redemption, and shift the focus to a second assistance package likely to be about the same size as last year's 110 billion euro bailout.

But credit insurance markets are still pricing in an 80 percent chance of Greece defaulting on its 340 billion euro debt mountain -- 150 percent of annual economic output -- within five years, and a likely 40 percent write-down for bondholders on three-year debt.

Prime Minister George Papandreou's socialist government may find it hard to enforce tax increases and state asset sales against massive public resistance, while a violent fringe always present in Greek politics has burst to the fore.

Rioters armed with stones and clubs fought several hours of running battles with police firing huge clouds of teargas in central Athens until the early hours of the morning, leaving a field of debris for street cleaners to clear.

"The implementation law will pass without problems," said Costas Panagopoulos, head of ALCO pollsters.

"The problem for Papandreou is not in parliament, it is what is happening outside parliament: not in Syntagma Square, which is just a few hundred protesters, but with the whole of Greece's 11 million people."

ROLLOVER TALKS

North European creditor countries, led by chief paymaster Germany, are insisting that private sector bondholders must share the cost of any further rescue, so intensive talks are under way on a "voluntary" rollover of maturing Greek debt.

German bankers were due to discuss a French rollover plan that has drawn widespread interest with finance ministry officials Thursday, but differences remain over incentives for private investors and possible official guarantees.

European Central Bank President Jean-Claude Trichet, who has repeatedly warned the EU against triggering a devastating credit event or downgrade of Greek debt, gave a cautious response to the French proposal in testimony in the European Parliament.

"At this stage we have not yet (got) a position... we are very alert but I cannot give you a precise judgement on what is going on. There are several concepts being examined," he said. "We advise against all concepts that are not purely voluntary."

Three banking sources told Reuters Wednesday that politicians and bankers were confident that implementing the French plan would not trigger a payout of credit insurance or a default that would inflict losses on banks.

Banks had received positive signals from ratings agencies that they would not call the rollover plan a default, the sources said.

But officials cautioned that many details of the plan, including whether there would be any official guarantee, remained to be negotiated.

"We have had many discussions at the technical level to see what are the best solutions," Reynders said, adding a decision could be taken at a European finance ministers' meeting on July 11 and 12.

"IMPLEMENTATION RISK"

As Athens recovered from a night of violence, market concerns shifted from the danger of an immediate disorderly default for the first time in the euro zone to the medium-term prospect of a Greek debt restructuring.

"There's still implementation risk over the next few months but for now the default risk has been taken off the table so long as today's vote goes through," said Lloyds Bank strategist Eric Wand.

He forecast renewed pressure on the bonds of weaker euro zone countries on the edges of the single currency area after a temporary respite.

"There should be a brief hiatus in the periphery-bashing we've had in the last few weeks, but there are other problems."

Those included the prospect of early Spanish elections and squabbling within Italy's centre-right coalition as the country faces a credit rating downgrade.

Italy's cabinet is due to adopt Thursday a more ambitious deficit reduction plan than initially planned aimed at saving 47 billion euros by 2014 to try to ward off a loss of creditworthiness.

But Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's Northern League coalition partners have said the government is at risk over plans to raise the retirement age and cut spending.

Source: Reuters Daniel Flynn and Leigh Thomas

Why Lagarde got the IMF job today

For me the interesting thing about Christine Lagarde becoming the new managing director of the IMF is not the news itself. I said she’d get the job as long ago as May 15, and I’ve considered her a lock since May 20. Rather, the interesting thing for me is the timing: everybody expected the announcement on Thursday, the 30th, but instead it came today, the 28th. Why push things up?

Because in the fraught negotiations with Greece, every day counts — the IMF disbursement was originally due tomorrow, the 29th, and can’t wait much longer than that before Greek debt maturities in July start piling up and forcing a default. And the headless IMF, it turns out, has not been an effective actor in those negotiations. Here’s Mohamed El-Erian, an old IMF hand:

The post of managing director is not to be taken lightly in an institution that operates like a well-disciplined army, with staff looking up to the unquestioned general for decisive leadership.

This is why the resignation of Dominique Strauss-Kahn has been so disruptive to the functioning of the IMF.

With Lagarde now moving swiftly from an international campaign to actual management of the Fund, the world’s technocrats will all be hoping that she will prove a forceful and decisive leader on the urgent subject of Greece. The Greeks have a certain amount of freedom here, since it’s pretty much unthinkable that Lagarde’s first act would not be to disburse bailout funds. But one sign of a leader is getting results even when your actions are severely constrained. Lagarde has an immediate opportunity to prove herself, and it’s absolutely in Greece’s long-term interest to make her look tough and effective. She might well put these extra two days to very good use.

Source: Reuters

Finding Your Career Passion

Passion may seem an odd word choice when paired with career, but rest assured that one of the most important elements of personal happiness is being passionate about your career and your job. You do not want to be one of those people who live for the weekends and dread Sunday evenings. Life is too short to not love the work you do.

Will you love your work and your career as much as your passion for other things and people? Why not? It is completely possible to not only find the career that is a perfect match for your skills and interests, but one that also inspires you and fuels your desire to perform better, work harder.

Do you think you're too old, too entrenched in your current career? Or maybe too young and filled with too many ideas (or doubts) about what you want to do with your life? Or maybe a recent college grad who now realizes you chose the wrong major and career path?

Regardless of where you are in life -- where you are in your career -- there is always time to discover -- or rediscover -- what you're truly passionate about and turn that interest and passion into a new career.

Finding a career that you have a passion for is all about obtaining fulfillment. Some of these jobs may also not be the highest-paying jobs in the world, but career passion is not about the money, it's about how the job makes you feel inside. Loving your job and career will go a long way to loving your life -- so, take the time to find your career passion. The ideal scenario is one where you find a career that combines what you love to do with you're great at doing.

One of the best tools for clarifying your underlying interests, passions, and possible career paths is to sit down and reflect on a series of questions about how you have lived your life thus far. These questions are designed to really make you think and reflect on who you are as a person and what you want to become.

So, find a place where you can sit down for a while, grab a pen and some paper, and start the process. You don't have to respond to all these questions in one sitting… and it might be best, once you have answered all the questions, to take a break before you try to determine what your answers mean for your future. The only real rule for this exercise is to be honest with yourself.

About your favorite activities. What do you love to do in your free time? Try to brainstorm 5-8 activities. Don't count activities you have to do or are doing to make yourself look better to college admissions folks. Identify the activities that you truly enjoy. Once you're done writing them down, look for a theme.

About the skills that come naturally to you. What are the skills that come to you without thought and effort? Are you a math whiz who can easily add and subtract large numbers in your head? Can you hear a foreign language and immediately be able to replicate the inflections? What are some of the things you are a "natural" at? Brainstorm 3-5 of these skills.

About your favorite classes and subjects. Looking back through your school years, what were the classes -- or specific subjects -- that you enjoyed the most -- that inspired you to learn more? These do not need to be the classes in which you received the highest grades; rather, these are the classes that you actively attended because you loved the course material. Make a list of your favorite classes and subjects and look for some themes.

About your dream jobs and careers. If you could do any job in your life, what would you choose? You may have done this exercise in elementary school, but it's time to do it again; however, you can keep the same ones you chose then and any others that interest you now. The key is to ignore any roadblocks and simply choose dream careers. So, for example, even if you always wanted to be a fighter pilot but are not eligible because of health reasons, still put it on your list. Write down at least five careers that you think you would enjoy.

About discovering the types of things that energize you. What types of things energize you? Think about people, places, and activities. For example, if you are a diehard competitor who rises to the occasion no matter how tired you are, then competition should be on your list. If visiting the zoo is still something that gets you excited, put it on your list. Try to develop 3-5 examples.

About examining your lifelong interests. Examine the past 5 or 10 years for activities, subjects, or causes that you have been deeply involved with at a personal level. What are some of your long-term interests? For example, if you have always loved bicycling, have a poster of Lance Armstrong (or one of his wristbands), ride your bike as often as you can -- and for as long as you can remember, put biking on your list. Record your list of interests -- and then look for themes and connections.

About areas where you are already perceived as an expert. What are a couple of areas where your friends and family see you as an expert -- or at least as someone who is knowledgeable about the issue? Are you the person in your family whom everyone finds when they are having a problem with their computers? Are you an expert on all things related to baseball? Write down as many examples as you can think of where you are an expert.

About removing outside influences and pressures about what others think should be your career. Sometimes we think we want a career in a certain career field simply because we have been told so many times that we're perfect for it (even if we hate the thought of ever doing it). So... try and separate true interests from ones where you have been influenced by others -- or ones you are pursuing because you feel you should to please someone else. Write them down your true interests (if you have not done so already earlier).

About the values you most cherish. What are the values you hold dear and that help guide how you live your life? Make a list of them. This one may be the toughest for you to tackle, but think about the core values and principles with which you live your life. Typically, these are most influenced by your upbringing -- your family's values and your religious beliefs. This question is critical because you will never be happy or satisfied in a career that does not offer the same values that you possess.

About the subject areas you most enjoy reading about. When you are in a bookstore or the library, what are the subjects of the types of books and magazines that you are drawn to? What Websites do you visit the most and devote the most time to? These subjects can be related to your classes and schoolwork but should not be ones that you are required to read; rather, these are subjects you enjoy reading for your own pleasure and knowledge. Develop a list of your favorite subjects.

About discovering the best types of work environment for your personality. What type of work environment fits you best -- the fast-paced, always changing, or the slow-paced, predictable? If you're a student, this question might be a little premature for you to answer, but you could also think about the various classroom or teaching styles you have experienced in the past and see if you prefer one style over all others.

About reviewing your volunteering and community service experiences. What types of volunteering have you done or wish you have done? Again, as you make this list, think about experiences you would participate in even if you were not using them for college applications. What types of community service appeals to you? Look for a theme in terms of the types of organizations, types of people, or types of service you perform.

About examining the majors and prospective career paths taken by your friends. Make a list of the careers that your closest friends work in (or plan to work in). See anything that really grabs your interest? Write them down. Please note that this examination is not about copying what your friends are doing, but rather, because friendships are formed around common interests and bonds, examining their plans may provide some insight into your interests.

About understanding your deeply rooted beliefs -- your life's calling. Have your friends and family told you repeatedly that you would be excellent in a particular job or career? Do you have a deeply held desire for a particular career? Do you think about your calling in life? It sounds corny -- or maybe even sacrilegious -- but some people are born for certain careers. For me, it about being a teacher, about empowering people and making a difference in their lives. What's yours? Write them down.

About the types of things you currently do to help people. When your friends or family ask you for help, what are the types of things they ask you to help with? What are the types of things you wish people would ask you to do? If you're still struggling with this one, use this prompt: People I know often ask me for help with… Make a list.

About the goals in life you want to achieve. What are some of the big goals you want (or still want) to achieve in life? Do you want to save lives? Makes lots of money? Be a movie star? Live in a big house? Save the Earth? Become president? Think big here -- and think about the top couple of goals that mean the most to you right now. (Note, of all your answers, these will probably change the most as you move through life.) What types of careers might help you accomplish these goals? Write down answers for both goals and careers.

Finally, it's about putting together all your self-discovery results. Gather your assessments, preliminary research, and answers to the questions and see if you can find a couple of obvious themes running through them. Don't rush this process... contemplate. Make a final list of potential jobs and career paths.

Final Thoughts
Everyone deserves the opportunity to live a life of fulfillment and passion. Whether you are a student struggling to find a major or someone later in life looking for a new career and a fresh start, you can (or should) always find time to discover the right career for you -- the career that will fulfill your career passions and lead to a life of happiness and fulfillment. Look deeply inside yourself and remove all obstacles (real and perceived), and you will be on your way in your journey for finding your career passion, achieving career success, and living your life.

Source: quintcareers.com By by Randall S. Hansen, Ph.D.

Dublin property prices rise for first time in three years

Property prices in Ireland's capital rose 0.4 percent in May compared with the previous month, the first rise since April 2008, data on Wednesday showed.

Irish property prices have nosedived on the back of an economic collapse and Dublin has been hardest hit, with the price of houses and apartments in the capital having roughly halved.

The Central Statistics Office warned that individual monthly figures could indicate short-term volatility rather than the start of a new upward trend.

Nationally, Irish residential property prices fell 1.2 percent in May compared to a 1 percent drop in April.

Source: reuters (Created by Carmel Crimmins)

When is it the right time to change jobs?

There are a lot of things to consider when deciding when and why to move on. To begin with, you need to assess where you are now, what you have achieved and where you want to be in a few years time.

What do you enjoy about your present job? What don’t you enjoy? What do you feel is missing? What have you enjoyed about any previous roles you have done? What is the ideal situation for you? How will you know when you have achieved it? What obstacles are in your way? What can you do to overcome them?

Try to be systematic in answering these questions. Discuss them with friends, family or a professional career change expert and write them down. It’s always easier to make an accurate assessment of a situation if it’s clearly staring back at you from a piece of paper.

As well as your own personal motives for wanting to change jobs, there are plenty of other reasons out of your control that cause you to leave your current position, including:

potential financial difficulties for your employer
your company moving into an area of business you don’t agree with
a culture change in your company caused by a takeover or merger
a collapse in communication with your manager or colleagues
Spotting when the time is right
If you do decide to leave a job, quitting at the wrong time can hit you in the pocket if you’re not careful. For example, leaving just before your big bonus is due is not very sensible. It’s a good idea to think about whether you’re currently paid in advance or in arrears as any change may affect your monthly cash flow.

If you’ve got a holiday planned, wait until you get back before handing in your notice. Your new employer won’t take kindly to you booking two weeks off during your probation period.

Because so many people take time off during summer and winter, May and October are often prime times to look for a new job. In preparation for a lot of their workforce being away, employers look to train up new recruits to cover the anticipated gaps. On the other hand, you may be missing out on overtime opportunities in your current role if you leave before the holiday period is over.

Leave in a position of strength
Once you’ve made the decision to leave, make sure you have somewhere to go before handing in your notice. Don’t be tempted to storm off in a huff or make some sort of statement if it means leaving yourself vulnerable. It’s much easier to find a job when you already have one. Long periods of unemployment sends out a bad signal to a future employer, with all sorts of questions about why you left, and could leave you out of work for longer than you think.

Don’t ignore the consequences of quitting before you have a new job lined up, no matter how much you dislike where you’re working. Apart from looking bad as you start applying for new jobs, voluntarily leaving your former role could compromise your eligibility for unemployment benefits.

Money shouldn’t be the only reason
If money is the overriding issue in your desire for change, have the courage to address it before thinking about leaving. Find out the going rate for your job and, if you don’t feel you’re getting paid enough, ask for more. This can be a scary experience, but it could solve your problem. If your request is turned down, then you can take a view on whether it’s the right time to leave. If you have the option to think in the long term, you may even consider taking a pay cut, but moving to a company where the career progression and wage increases will occur more regularly.

Source: Monster.ie