Career Help: How To Complete Jobs Applications

The majority of the employers will give you a job application that you have to fill in although you have already submitted a resume. This application is as important as the resume. Usually jobs applications request the same standard information. So it's better if you can gather this information in advance. You can type it on a page and when you are at the employer's office you can copy the info avoiding mistakes that can appear because of the emotions and panic. You should list your past positions, salaries and any other compensations you had. Do not forget to ad the list of schools you have attended and military services. You will also be asked about the duties and responsibilities for each position. This answers you should also prepare from home. Instead of trying to remember and hesitate it's better to have four or five phrases prepared. It's also useful to include any volunteer activities like working at the school newspaper or fundraisings. Most important is to be honest. All the information about you can be verified. So if an employer finds out you lied he can disqualify or fire you. Try to write as clear as you can and have a correct grammar and punctuation. You should fallow the instructions exactly, and don't forget to fill any field that is required. If you don't understand a question you can always ask for clarifications. Review the application before turning it in and don't forget to sign and date the job application where you should. Review the application carefully before turning it in. Proofread it twice - once from top to bottom and once from bottom to top. When you complete an application that is before an interview try to arrive 15-20 minutes early so you can be sure that you have enough time to fill the form correctly. If you can, deliver the application yourself, if sending by mail make sure there is enough postage. If the application you are submitting is for a job interview try to return it within 24 hours with a brief cover letter and a resume. Follow these guidelines and your application will make a good impression.

Career Advice

I often get asked questions about careers in IT (Information Technology). After all, I've been a Vice President of Consulting (twice for two different companies), Vice President of Development, Senior Technical specialist many times and now I am a Director Of Technical Services. I've been working with computers for 23 years as of 2001 and plan on continuing my education and career in a positive direction until the day that I die. So what would I recommend to anyone seeking or currently holding a career in IT? What are the qualities that make an IT person invaluable to a company? I think one of the most valuable traits that anyone in any career can foster is simple communication. This is especially true of IT people, as many of us tended to get into the field in the first place because we are introverts. I don't know about you, but when I started with computers over 23 years ago, I didn't want to talk with anyone. Computers I could understand, but people? That was a different question. In college I had a professor named Fredrick. He taught a class in assembly language - which was very advanced for the school. I excelled in this class and spent a great deal of time talking to the teacher. When Fredrick started a new consulting company he needed to get someone on board who could program but was also very inexpensive. Because I had been communicating with the man during his class, he offered me a job as a programmer in his new company. I stayed there for six years, and by the time the company was purchased by a British conglomerate I was the Vice President of Development. As I matured I began to open up to people, and after a few years I found that the more I communicated, the better my career progressed. Don't get me wrong, communication is not always fun and definitely isn't easy sometimes, but it is absolutely vital to any kind of career movement. To advance in your career it is necessary to make sure people understand your intentions. More importantly, it is critical that they understand that you understand. You want people (those you supervise as well as your supervisors) to know your capabilities and how those can aid them and the company that you all work for. What you do is talk to your boss regularly. Ensure that he or she fully understands what you can do and what you want to do (thus greasing the skids for additional training and promotions). Discuss how your talents can help the company achieve it's goals and how you can help your boss achieve those goals. Do the same with people who work for you, customers, vendors, and other co-workers. Use email to your advantage. Email is just another form of communication, and it's best used to ensure that others are on the same page as you. For example, it's usually a good idea to send an email after a meeting to those who were in attendance, briefly explaining what was discussed and what you've committed to produce. As you meet those commitments, you can also use email to make it known. If you are a supervisor, you need to let the people who work for you know not only exactly what is expected of them, but also other details such as how they fit into the organization, how their efforts contribute to the bottom line and the goals and objectives of the comp?ny, department, sub-department and group. This allows your people to be more effective, which in turn allows you to be more effective. Use performance reviews as a method of letting your people know where they are doing well and where they need to improve. This is a very legal, highly controlled method of communicating with your people (or your boss) and must be done correctly to be effective. One golden rule of reviews is nothing should ever be a surprise to the employee. If a person is not doing well, he must know about it long before the review so he has a chance to correct his mistakes. Another rule of mine is that all critical comments must be done in private, one on one (unless there are legal reasons, such as a reprimand for sexual harassment, for witnesses). Never give reprimands, no matter how minor, in a public location. Conversely, it's great to give positive remarks and reinforcement in public - in fact, generally the more public the better. Remember that communication is very powerful, and used properly it, combined with your knowledge, talents and abilities, can propel you up the corporate ladder. On the other hand, when used improperly you will certainly succeed in stalling your career. Use communication very poorly and you may find yourself jobless in short order. If you use your emails to cover your behind, you will soon find it is exposed and ready to be kicked. If you try and sling mud at others around you, it's very possible you will find yourself not only covered in mud, but even tarred and feathered. For example, I had a boss a number of years ago who thought the main purpose of email was to ensure that everyone understood whatever had gone wrong was someone else's fault. I remember on several occasions our department had failed to provide service to the users, and our boss had us write emails that went on for pages, patiently explaining how these failures were the fault of someone else. My god, we all got so tired of protecting our bosses behind. In fact, when he finally left the company, we felt such a feeling of relief that it was amusing. This same man is a great example at how a lack of communication can doom a person. He tried to build a wall between our department and the rest of the company. All communications between our group and the outside world had to be approved by him, and he often insisted on performing the communication himself. Thus, it became impossible for any of us to do our job - and it became very difficult for anyone in the department to understand how they fit into the overall company business. So to sum it all up, what's my advice? Use communication to your advantage. Ensure your boss knows that you want to contribute to the success of the group and, more importantly, that he completely understands how valuable you can be. Use communication to give positive feedback and to let everyone know your commitments and understandings, as well as other areas in which you could be helpful. Equally important, don't abuse communications. This is a very powerful tool, and if you've ever been on the wrong end of a public reprimand or the subject of water-cooler gossip you understand exactly what I mean. The managers who excel in their career have learned these lessons and apply daily to their jobs without even thinking. That's the main tool of the trade. Simple communication.

Business Career, Executive, Life Coaching Article Mechanisms

Suppose that the human mind is nothing more than a bio-computer and that the function of this computer is to get its owner exactly what he says he wants.. The computer mind takes what you say very literally. So, if you say you cannot do something, the mind interprets that as a command and makes sure you cannot do it. If you say you are confused and don't know what you want, the mind makes sure you have that experience. That is why the harder we try to change, the very things we want to change persist stronger than ever. Think about it. How many times in a day do we give our minds negative commands? We say things such as "this is hard for me," or we complain that we don't have something we want in our lives. When the mind hears us making these declarations, it hears it as a command, not as a wish it wasn't so. If this is the way our computer minds work then we have to find a way to give it commands that get us what we want. Positive affirmations are a way to do exactly that. There was a time in my life when I used to complain that I knew how to make lots of money, but I could not hold onto it - that I would manage to find a way to make it disappear and thus never seemed to have any reserves. Guess what kept happening? Finally this way of life and "my story" about it became untenable, not to mention scary. With the help of a coach, I began to use affirmations such as "I am a competent manager of my money and make good investments." Or, "I know how to educate myself and take actions that will result in building reserves." I would write these affirmations daily, look at myself in the mirror and repeat them every day until I started to really hear them and believe them. I soon started to read books about money and shifted my beliefs about money. I joined DA (Debtor's Anonymous - a 12 step support program) where I learned how to create a Spending Plan and more importantly, how to follow it. By using affirmations I was able to create a life that I love to live and the financial reserves that allows me to take care of myself in the present and in the future. I now live in a state of abundance, not scarcity. "Be careful what you ask for, you may get it," simply means that you must be careful about your language when you are giving commands to your mind. To be perfectly clear, phrase your affirmations following the Top Ten Tips below. To those of you who are skeptical about the theory, I know it seems strange at first, I ask you to consider the possibility that this version of how things work may actually result in the outcomes you always wanted. Some of you may want to talk with a coach to help you clarify what it is you really want and how to phrase your affirmations. It does take some practice. After all, you will be changing a lifetime of functioning one way, what I call "hard wired programming," and behavioral patterns. Experiment! I would love to hear about your results.

Breathe Your Way To Healthier Life

Breathe Your Way To Healthier Life I don t have the time to exercise! I am busy! How can I spend 10 or 15 minutes to just sit there, closing my eyes and meditate? I don t have the room to do this! I can t stretch like that! At that specific time, I m not available! Do all the above sound familiar to most people who want to stay healthier but could not do so due to a number of reasons? The list can go on endless How nice if I can get to do something easily at anytime and anywhere, and stay healthy! Yes now you can! Huh? How? By just changing the way you breathe, that s all! Kidding me??? No, I m serious! Most of us, in fact 98% of North Americans do not breathe correctly. Friends, co-workers, students, clients and vendors I came to know around me do not breathe correctly. Some of my friends I keep contact with through the Internet know how to breathe correctly but do not do so. There are two reasons why they do not do so. First, they do not know the correct breathing methods. Secondly, they know but do not know how to learn and practice so that it becomes a habit. I would like to share in this article on how to solve these two reasons so that you too can breathe your way to healthier life and well-being, easily at anytime and anywhere. First of all, let me explain what are not the correct breathing methods then only move on to the correct method. Most people breathe using the chest or the upper diaphragm. Worst still if they breathe through the mouth. Breathing in this way will result in shorter, shallower and coarser breath. Shorter, shallower and coarser breath does not allow the air to go in deep enough to oxidize the cells in the lungs. This of course results in lesser oxygen intake into the blood systems. Breathing through the mouth will let unwanted elements in the air to go into our blood systems. Mouth breathing is one of the reasons that cause you to snore in your sleep. Even if you are tired or gasping for air after strenuous sports or activities, try to breathe through the nose, except when you are swimming. The correct breathing pattern is long, deep and in smaller flows. Long breath allows more time for the lung cells to be oxidize and send more oxygen into the blood system. This increase the metabolism rate, and increase blood circulation throughout your mind and body. I believe most of you know what deep breathing is about, and I m sure some of you have done this. Felt better each time you did deep breathing? Of course, you did. I will explain this from the Chinese point of view why deep breathing is good. In meditation practice, martial arts or qigong practice, one of the requirements to make these practices effective is to Sink the Qi into the Dantian . Qi here means vital energy, and in the same time air. Dantian is the acupuncture point (acu-point) at 1-2 inches below the navel which gathers the vital energy Qi for our body. Sinking the Qi into the Dantian can be achieved through long and deep breathing. With more vital energy coming into your body, your energy level will increase, and you will have a healthier and clearer energy body. Breathing should be done in smaller flows. This will result in a calm and relaxed disposition and composure. How to achieve all this? The secret to long and deep breathing, with smaller flows is to breath with your abdomen or lower diaphragm. This is called Abdominal Breathing. Abdominal Breathing is the key areas taught by most instructors, whether they are Tai Chi Chuan instructors, martial arts shifu, Qigong master, Yoga guru or meditation masters. From my experience in energy healing my master emphasizes on abdominal breathing during healing session and energy meditation! Unfortunately, some people took abdominal breathing lightly. Sad to say, some don t even bother to learn and practice. Understandably, they have been breathing using the chest over the past what, 10 years, 20 years 30 years? It has become their habit. So, if you want to change your breathing pattern overnight and make it a habit, you need to put in the effort to do so. This comes to the second reason as to why people do not breathe correctly despite of knowing the technique. First of all, I came to know that most instructor tell their students about abdominal breathing. Some showed them how to do it. But the students have to consciously doing it, and in the same time focus on the movements, motions, postures, steps etc and etc and soon before that, their forgot about their abdominal breathing! Most of them focus on the form, not on the essence! I have a Tai Chi friend from New Zealand who shared with me that his friends do Tai Chi, but do not feel Tai Chi. Breathing forms the essential parts of the practice and for you to understand and feel the flow of Tai Chi. Secondly, I came to know friends who tried to practice abdominal breathing, and they got confused and breathless don t know which is which: the chest or the abdomen! They gave up instantly. Thirdly, I myself took almost 2 years of conscious and constant practice to make it a habit! Now, I m doing it unconsciously as a habit! Thus, to consciously doing it is easy. To make it a habit takes time and effort. That s why most give up after that! So, how to make it a habit? Based on Tai Chi Chuan s healing and breathing system, plus my 23 years of experience in various meditation forms, martial arts and Tai Chi Chuan, I derived a 5-Step Systems which I call as Tai Chi Breathing to help my friends to habitualize abdominal breathing. The 5-Steps are: Step 1: Connect the channels with the tongue touching the upper palate. Step 2: Abdominal breathing by using the lower abdomen. Step 3: Use the nose to breathe, with the mouth tightly closed Step 4: Breathe deeply, with long, slow and with tiny flows of inhaling and exhaling. Step 5: Maintain the slow and constant breathing rhythm. These 5 steps each consists its background and reasons, and I designed many exercises and practices for each of the steps specifically for you to master each of the steps, towards making it your breathing habit. These steps look easy, but they require exercises and constant practice in order to make it a habit. I have friends e-mailing to me saying that how these steps helped them to keep focus and conscious effort to make abdominal breathing a habit in their life. One of them told me that he stopped smoking because of this! Where can you get these exercises and practices. Go to my website under my name or author profile to find out more. Till then, I wish you with great health, great joy and happiness. And may you breathe your way to a better life! May the Energy of Tai Chi be with you! :) Written by, C. Guan Soo Tai Chi Chuan Practitioner http://www.TaichiBreathing.com ***** Copyright (C), 2005 C. Guan Soo ***** You are free to distribute or publish this article provided you do not change any of the content, and/or delete my name and URL from the article.