Government Shutdown Veteran Impact

By Ron Rutherford, TAOnline

The longer the Federal Government shutdown lasts, the greater the impact it will have on benefits for Veterans and their families. About 3.8 million veterans will not receive disability compensation for November, if the shutdown continues into late October. Veteran Affairs Secretary, Eric Shinseki, updated the House Committee on Veterans Affairs late last week on the growing impact of the shutdown on veterans. Also impacted would be more pension payments to more than 310,000 veterans and 202,000 surviving spouses. In addition, Shinseki says efforts to reduce the backlog of pending claims for longer than 125 days is now on hold until government ... Read More

3 Steps to a Better Job Interview

By Bill Hobbs, Author

Interviews are a great place for candidates to demonstrate how their unique skills sets may be valuable to employers. By connecting with an employer face-to-face, you can become more than just a name in a stack of resumes. Interviews also provide a great opportunity for you to evaluate the employer and the position, to determine if you want to move forward. When transitioning into a new career, your focus shouldn’t simply be on "winning the job," you should also determine if you would enjoy working in this new role. In order for you to make an accurate determination, you and the interviewer will need to connect effectively. ... Read More

Are you TAOnline.com Featured Hero Material?

By Ron Rutherford, TAOnline

TAOnline.com knows the job market is very competitive. We see the same monthly unemployment statistics you see. We know veterans and non-veterans are competing for similar jobs. We also know, according to a recent report, most companies would rather hire a veteran over a non-veteran. But, employers cannot hire what they cannot see. And, in today's job market veteran job seekers should capitalize on every tool at their disposal to get noticed. That's one of the reasons TAOnline.com launched our Featured Hero program. The Featured Hero service spotlights highly skilled veterans seeking employment. This unique enhancement is completely free to the ... Read More

5 Resume "Rules" You MUST Ignore

By Susan Joyce Reprinted with Permission
www.workcoachcafe.com

What works and doesn't work for job search today has changed substantially in the last few years — technology and the economy have changed most of the basic "resume rules." Unless the employer is pretty small, fewer than 100 employees, the process of posting jobs and collecting resumes is automated. For resume submissions, this is significant. 1. Don't bother including widely-held skills like email, spreadsheets, and word processing expertise. Wrong! If the words are used in the job description, be sure to include them in the resume you submit for that job. See the next two rules for ... Read More

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Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to Hire Over 800 Veterans as Peer Specialists and Peer Support Apprentices by December 31, 2013. Make a difference in the lives of your fellow Veterans! VA is hiring over 800 Veterans to work as Peer Specialists and Peer Support Apprentices. To qualify, you must be a United States Veteran who has recovered or is recovering from a mental health condition. Completion of an approved peer specialist training program is also required. Click here for more information and to apply.

Government Shutdown Veteran Impact

By Ron Rutherford, TAOnline

The longer the Federal Government shutdown lasts, the greater the impact it will have on benefits for Veterans and their families.

About 3.8 million veterans will not receive disability compensation for November, if the shutdown continues into late October. Veteran Affairs Secretary, Eric Shinseki, updated the House Committee on Veterans Affairs late last week on the growing impact of the shutdown on veterans.

Also impacted would be more pension payments to more than 310,000 veterans and 202,000 surviving spouses. In addition, Shinseki says efforts to reduce the backlog of pending claims for longer than 125 days is now on hold until government funding is restored.

Shinseki told Congress that a piecemeal approach to restoring funding isn’t the answer, because VA partners with so many other federal agencies to deliver veterans services.

He noted, for example, his department's work with the Labor Department to promote veterans jobs programs and with the Department of Housing and Urban Development to end veteran homelessness.

The U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs produced an information sheet called the Veterans Field Guide to Government Shutdown. This information sheet can be downloaded from the internet and is updated as warranted.

Also, a more comprehensive document, the VA Contingency Plan can be accessed from the VA website (www.va.gov). However, the VA homepage and social media sites will only be updated intermittently.

Also, Regional VA Offices are shutdown, making it harder for veterans to get information about their benefits and claim status.

While active duty personnel remain on duty, the military has stopped providing tuition assistance for service members taking college courses during off-duty hours.

State workers who usually help Veterans find employment or training programs; found themselves unemployed last week, due to the shutdown.

More than 70 Local Veteran Employment Representatives (LVER) and Disabled Veterans' Outreach Program (DVOP) specialists were furloughed early last week in Washington State. Other states, like Florida aren't laying off workers, just consolidating offices.

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3 Steps to a Better Job Interview

By Bill Hobbs, Author

Interviews are a great place for candidates to demonstrate how their unique skills sets may be valuable to employers. By connecting with an employer face-to-face, you can become more than just a name in a stack of resumes. Interviews also provide a great opportunity for you to evaluate the employer and the position, to determine if you want to move forward.

When transitioning into a new career, your focus shouldn’t simply be on "winning the job," you should also determine if you would enjoy working in this new role. In order for you to make an accurate determination, you and the interviewer will need to connect effectively. Connecting allows both you and the employer to engage in a meaningful exchange of information and provides a basis for decision making. Below is an excerpt from The WORK Book, How to Build Your Personal Brand and Get Hired!, that covers connecting during the interview process.

It is important that you understand how to effectively connect with an interviewer. "Connecting" begins when two people truly understand each other’s view point. It is the first step in building trust and eventually creates mutual understanding. You have probably experienced what it’s like to connect at different points in your life. Maybe this happened in a conversation with a friend, or family member while trying to solve a problem. The moment when you and the other person suddenly understood each other, you were connecting.

Connecting is critically important during any conversation where you need to reach a decision point. An interview is a place where you definitely need to connect with the interviewer so that you can understand what he or she is looking for and he or she can understand what you are looking for.

Step 1 – Listen: Let the other person talk, and be sure that you understand exactly what he or she is asking. Don't interrupt, but if you are unclear even a little, pause for a moment and then ask a clarifying question. Asking questions shows the person that you are listening and genuinely interested in answering the question he or she asked.

Step 2 – Provide Adequate Information: After answering a question, look for signs that the interviewer is satisfied with the type of response you gave. It is very possible that the phrasing of the question he or she asked meant one thing to the interviewer and a completely different thing to you. When this happens, you and the interviewer move further from mutual understanding. The interviewer won't get the information he or she is seeking, and you may miss an opportunity to demonstrate value. If you are not sure about the read on his or her reaction, simply ask, "Does that answer the question?" "Does that make sense?" By doing so you can be sure that the interviewer got the type of response he or he was looking for. If not, it will give the interviewer an opportunity to rephrase the question.

Step 3 – Be Interesting: Step back from the canned answers, and give some context to whowhom you really are. Canned answers are boring and push you and the interviewer further from connecting. Think about the interests you have, and relate them to the job you are applying for. If you like sports, music, or the outdoors, talk about why your experiences in those areas make you a stronger "fit" for the company For example, I played football in college. If I were applying for a job where teamwork was important, I could reference a situation where through teamwork we were able to pull out a fourth quarter win."

Rather than just "winning the job," focus on connecting during the interview. Spend some time preparing and researching before the interview. During the interview be sure to listen, provide adequate information, avoid canned answers, and try to enjoy the process. Finding a new career should be a fun and exciting time in your life

For more information on The WORK Book: How to Build Your Personal Brand and Get Hired! by Bill Hobbs, check out www.bill-hobbs.com. The book is available on Amazon, Kindle, and Nook.

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Are you TAOnline.com Featured Hero Material?

By Ron Rutherford, TAOnline

TAOnline.com knows the job market is very competitive. We see the same monthly unemployment statistics you see. We know veterans and non-veterans are competing for similar jobs. We also know, according to a recent report, most companies would rather hire a veteran over a non-veteran.

But, employers cannot hire what they cannot see. And, in today's job market veteran job seekers should capitalize on every tool at their disposal to get noticed. That's one of the reasons TAOnline.com launched our Featured Hero program.

The Featured Hero service spotlights highly skilled veterans seeking employment. This unique enhancement is completely free to the TAOnline.com job seeker. The benefit to the jobseeker:

  • Tell their story beyond their resume
  • Puts a face with the name (picture is required, preferably in uniform)
  • Discuss their goals, experience, expertise, and how that combination will benefit employers using TAOnline.com
  • Minimum 30-day highlighted exposure as Featured Hero seen throughout Employer portion of TAOnline.com

Employers can view these Featured Hero profiles and resumes free of charge. "We're frequently perplexed by some of the candidates we see without a job," explains Debbie Glynn, TAOnline, Senior Account Executive, "The Featured Hero program is our way of saying thank you to these particularly special people," continues Glynn.

While all veterans are heroes, only a few will qualify as TAOnline.com Featured Heroes. If you believe you have the makings of a TAOnline.com Featured Hero, click here to apply (Login required)

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5 Resume "Rules" You MUST Ignore

By Susan Joyce Reprinted with Permission
www.workcoachcafe.com

What works and doesn't work for job search today has changed substantially in the last few years — technology and the economy have changed most of the basic "resume rules."

Unless the employer is pretty small, fewer than 100 employees, the process of posting jobs and collecting resumes is automated. For resume submissions, this is significant.

1. Don't bother including widely-held skills like email, spreadsheets, and word processing expertise.

Wrong! If the words are used in the job description, be sure to include them in the resume you submit for that job. See the next two rules for the reasons.

2. One size fits all.

Not anymore! In the past, we created one version of our resume that was distributed, via snail mail, fax, or hand-delivered. And this physical version of our resume was read by a human being and stored in a file cabinet. Those days are past. Now, resumes are usually stored electronically and read by a human being after appearing in the search results for a keyword search through the resumes or applications.

At a minimum, the top of the resume should be customized to match the job title of the job being sought, like this:

Objective: [employer's job title]

or

Summary: [one or two sentences that summarize why you qualify for the job, like "Administrative professional with 5 years of experience managing the calendar, group meetings and conferences, travel arrangements, and staff communications for the VP of Whatever" assuming that the applicant actually has that experience and is applying for a job which requires it.]

Better:

To be found in a resume database or applicant tracking system, resumes must be customized to the opportunity because the words in the job description are most likely the words the searcher will use to pull resumes out of the database.

So, make sure that in addition to the summary or objective described above, you pay close attention to the words you use in your application or resume:

  • If the job requires someone who has "managed" a group of workers, don't use the term "supervised."
  • If the job requires someone who has "expertise with Microsoft Office," don't describe it as "expertise with Microsoft products."
  • If the job requires someone with "experience managing social media," don't describe it as "experience managing a LinkedIn Group."
  • If the job requires someone with a "PMP Certification," don't describe yourself as "a Certified Project Management Professional."

NEVER be untruthful! But match the words in the requirements as closely as possible. The language you use should match the description as closely as possible.

More on this next.

3. Be consistent in your use of language.

Nope! The person who does the searches may or may not use exactly the same terms as the person who wrote the job description. And, reality is that the person who wrote the job description may or may not have created an accurate description.

So, this is time for you to be inconsistent in your use of language.

Cover the exact terms in the description, like the examples in number 2 above, but then you include alternate versions. For example:

  • If the job requires someone who has "expertise with Microsoft Office," describe it as"expertise with Microsoft Office (Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel, Microsoft PowerPoint, and Outlook, both 2007 and 2010 versions)."
  • If the job requires someone with "experience managing social media," describe it as "experience managing social media (including LinkedIn Groups with more than 5,000 members)."
  • If the job requires someone holding the "PMP Certification," describe yourself as holding the "PMP (Project Management Professional) Certification."

Now, you have covered the exact terminology used in the job description and added important keywords that are alternatives to the words used in the job description. Continue being inconsistent with keywords, including multiple versions of important terms like abbreviations and acronyms with the words or phrases they represent:

  • "BofA" and "Bank of America"
  • "NM" and "New Mexico"
  • "WP and "WordPress"
  • "Admin Assistant" and "Administrative Assistant"
  • "CPA" and "Certified Public Accountant"

4. Use a functional resume (rather than chronological) to highlight your skills, particularly if your work history is a little spotty.

NO! Every recruiter I've ever asked this question has told me that a functional resume, one which is completely focused on the job seeker's skills, sends up red flags, and they automatically ignore that applicant. Resume expert Susan Ireland has long recommended using only a chronological resume or a "combination resume," basically a chronological resume with a section near the top highlighting skills, particularly useful when you are changing industries.

5. Underlining, borders, and other graphic elements make a resume stand out.

These may add emphasis, but they may also confuse the software that "digests" the resume, and, in the age of hyperlinking, underlining often confuses people. What is intended as emphasis becomes confusion when the "link" doesn't work, as above.

About the Author…
Online job search expert Susan P. Joyce has been observing the online job search world and teaching online job search skills since 1995. Susan is a two-time layoff "graduate" who has worked in human resources at Harvard University and in a compensation consulting firm. In 2011, NETability purchased WorkCoachCafe.com, which Susan has been editor and publisher of WorkCoach since then. Susan also edits and publishes Job-Hunt.org.

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