January 2015 Jokes

Royal Flush





Loafers

Thanks for reading!
Ev
A Heck of A Nice Guy

Keep a "Good Stuff" File

Recruiting and Sales are a tough business in that the highs are great highs and lows are great lows.
The trick to keeping your sanity is to remember that if you are doing your job properly everything will even out in the end.
In those times that you need a little reinforcement that you are a great recruiter and salesperson, or if you need a little pick up, keep a file (written and digital) of all the compliments and nice letters you receive.
Keeping these positive statements in a place you can remember them, and not just see them, reinforces positive energy and outlook about your skills, profession, clients, candidates, and life.
Research by Objective Management Group shows that a salespersons/recruiters outlook can definitely affect performance when it comes to sales.
The more positive an outlook the better you will do in your role and the opposite holds true as well.

I like to keep my "Good Stuff" files sorted by employer and I keep a paper copy in a  binder and a digital copy. Below is a list of some of the compliments I've gotten recently from candidates and clients from my last position. So what does the tiger picture stand for in a post about keeping a good file you might ask. Nothing except tigers are cool and awe inspiring.
Thank you all!
Ev
A heck of A Nice Guy

Hey Everet,

Has anyone told you lately that you're awesome? Thanks a lot for sending me out for this one. That description sounds great!
-Roy

This one makes me laugh becuase of the name he calls me:
Subject: RE: Student Professional Experice Pro
My name is Michael Scalf and I am very interest in meeting with Mr. Kamikazes to discuss career opportunities and what steps I take next.
Feel free to contact me by phone at (414) 614-6375 and I will make time in my schedule to come in.
Thank you for contacting me and I look forward to meeting with you and your staff.
Sincerely,
Michael Scalf

King Sh*t
That is all I have been hearing in my head since then! Classic. Thank-you for trying to set him straight. Holy crap.
Let me know when you are downtown so we can do lunch. 
Tammy
Vice President of Human Resources

Hi… It has been awhile…. Thanks for doing your blog. It is a great “break” during the day. I liked your thoughts regarding the Middle Aged applicant.
I hope you and your family are doing well. Take Care!
Gail F.

Career Services here is far far better than MATC.
Gary C.

Above all, thank you for the call this morning. You provided a lot of valuable insight that I will be taking to the GCD Capstone Monday night as well as spreading to those DEGD/VC graduates that will listen. Have a great weekend and I will be sure to share any success stories I have with this group!
Thanks,
Devon-Director of Career Services

Please join me in thanking and congratulating our Career Services department for being fourth in the company for 2013 employment results for our graduates.
Yesterday was the cut-off for schools to report the 2013 results for the disclosures new students and reentry students receive.
This is information is not something we can share with current or prospective students but you played a part in getting them to the finish line so I thought you would want to know our local results!
THANKS.
Liz-Campus Director

Please help me congratulate Aleks and Everet Kamikawa, our Career Services team, for being selected as the best CS team in the Midwest. This is a great honor and now the team will compete against the winners from the other 13 districts to see who wins the national award. Great job!!
Jarvis-Campus Director

Congratulations on being named CS Team of the Year for the Midwest District!
You have done an outstanding job this year and this award is well deserved!!
Thanks for all you are doing for our grads-you are making a difference in their lives.
Your team now competes at the national level so good luck and let’s hope Jarvis comes back from CMM with the “win”!!
THANKS AGAIN!!
Liz-Regional Director

You are a "Doll". Thank you very much.
Suzanne...

From: Ewa
To: Aleksandra
Cc: Jarvis; Everet
Subject: Everet's presentation
Hey Aleks,
As I was observing Kevin’s class this AM I had a pleasure to hear Everet’s presentation.
It was great to see Everet’s passion, his straight forward approach and most of all his interactions with students.
Kindly,
Ewa

You. Are. Awesome – thanks so much!!!
Missy Helgerson-Associate Recruiter-IT

On top of knowing techies, Everet is a very kind as well!
Thanks,
Jacob F

Cute blogs, Everet!
Lori B

Another comment that makes me laugh!
The most outrageous comment someone said I still can't believe to this day...they didn't show up to the interview because their poop was green and not brown. How do you respond to that! lol
Sharyl O

Everet,
I would like to sincerely thank you for your help in finding this position!
I know you probably don't hear it often enough for all the leg work you do.
So, Thank you! I start on Jan 22nd officially.
Sincerely, Mark K

Hi… It has been awhile…. Thanks for doing your blog. It is a great “break” during the day. I liked your thoughts regarding the Middle Aged applicant.
I hope you and your family are doing well. Take Care!
Gail F.-Employee Relations Consultant

Thank you for sending the articles, and continuing to provide clean humor. (Can you guess which article I read? )
Mark

You got some pretty nice links and to respond on your closing quote of every email or post you do, you truly are "A heck of a nice guy!"
Jerry B.

I don't care if it old, THANKS FOR ALL YOU DO! You and the rest of the career services team work your hind ends off and deserve more than a pat on the back.
Michael F.

Keep sending this good stuff; especially the material that agrees with my philosophies!
Sharing is caring!
Kathy

I always look forward to your humor.
Susan Fischer

Thanks for doing a awesome job Everet with out your guidance I would be lost in a jungle of careers.
Eric Coats

P.S. Your recruiting blog always brightens my day!
Crystal LK

Either way, I hope you continue putting out great content through your blog. It has been a sincere pleasure to read.
Thanks
Alissa A

Everet –
Loved those. I love watching old Sesame Street clips w/ my kids on youtube, but haven’t seen those ones! Very good tie –ins to your points as well! I don’t deal w/ this aspect of HR much, but you have good stuff to share! Hope all is well.
Becky

Hey Everet, you’re obviously younger than I. I did not “grow up” with the Muppets. I did, however, babysit for kids who had Grover, Cookie, Kermit and Ernie as role models. Thanks for the perspective.
Carole W.
Vice President Human Resources

The Muppets idea is killer. Loved it.
Veronica W.

It has been a sincere pleasure to read your great content.
Sincerely,
Jasmine H.

It has been a sincere pleasure to read your great content.
Thanks for your time!
Helene S.

Tonight -- 40Plus presents
"Why They say No!" with Mr. Everet Kamikawa; President, The Recruiter Network of Southeast Wisconsin
7 -- 8:45 pm The Brookfield Library
1900 N. Calhoun Rd., Brookfield


"Please tell me if you only want to be removed from the list, or if I should never ever call you again and why. I will call you to follow up! Thank you for reading!"
Gotta love it – how many people aren’t paying attention?
Just want to say I enjoy the articles.
Judy H.

Everet,
very frustrating at times when cold calling but your posts and blog has got me inspired again.
Brian K.

You are a Heck of a nice guy! We always find a way to compensate our friends for helping us network.
Kathy S.

Hi Everet!
I read your blog & enjoyed it very much! :)
So I would like to add you to my professional network on LinkedIn.
- Yasmine M.

Everet: Thanks, Of course I went right to the jokes and they are actually pretty good! Boy you have been improving, I will look for you on the Jay Leno show. Barb N. is a recent excellent recruiter hire here at R----- and she is handling the Security Specialist positions. Please include Barb on any college career fair information or any leads on excellent students you are aware of.
Barb’s direct line i...
Thanks
John Q.

I Just got off the phone with Ryan’s mother, Alice and she wanted to thank all of us for assisting her son on his educational journey and for the work in helping him find a job.
It is phone calls like these that confirm for me that we are doing the right thing for our students.
Thank you all for your dedication to our students.
Jarvis-Campus Director

Guys,
Thank you very much for the class. I especially appreciate the help in making a better resume and the help in creating my portfolio. Even though I have been working in my profession for several years now the knowledge I gained from this class will be very helpful in years to come as I look to redirect my career and improve my benefits package. So thank you again.
Sencerly;
Chris G.

Everett –
Thanks for your email. I want to compliment you –I think this is one of the best examples I’ve seen of a Newsletter that delivers value.
Short. Sweet.
And the jokes were the BEST!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
You’re inspiring me to launch mine.
Oh and by the way – could I convince you to come talk to my candidates here sometime? An hour or so?
Laura PB
Career Management Consultant

You. Are. Awesome – thanks so much!!!
Jamie G.-Senior Recruiter

"Thanks for posting another interesting article, Ev! You drew me in with Kermit, of course. Have you read "Influence" by Robert Cialdini -- excellent book describing personal stories and research about the psychological principals that direct human behavior (and help drive sales) -- reciprocation, consistency, social proof, liking, authority, and scarcity."
Marilynn M. MLIS (Independent Project Consultant & Research Librarian)

Great Job Ev!!
Aleksandra H. Director Of Career Services

Sent: Thursday, October 21, 2010 10:34 AM
Subject: Everet Kamikawa new CSS
Team please welcome Everet,
He is a 16 year veteran of sales and recruitment marketing having worked at WisconsinJobs.com and Job Connection here in Milwaukee.
He is an avid fan of Brewers baseball, racing, and fishing. In his spare time he races slot cars and photographs sports and concerts. In past lives he has been a professional studio photographer and photojournalist, and radio announcer. This experience will help him as a CSS and he will be working with the CNS, VC, and DEGD programs.
Please feel free to stop by Career Services to welcome him with a bagel.
Scott T.-Director of Career Services

Pt. 3: Top 10 ‘Bleeding Edge’ Recruiting Trends to Watch in 2015

The Top 10 ‘Bleeding Edge’ Recruiting Trends to Watch in 2015

by Dr. John Sullivan

Additional Bleeding Edge Trends To Watch

Some additional trends that also reveal the future of recruiting include:

• Data-based decision-making in recruiting goes mainstream – recruiting leaders are finally realizing that all other business functions now make all major decisions based on data. Metrics-based decision-making will have a huge impact in recruiting because I find database decisions to be at least 25 percent better than intuitive decisions. Forget the low-value historical metrics and expect to see real-time and predictive metrics dominate. If you need increased budget resources, work with the CFO in order to assign a dollar value to how much recruiting results directly increase corporate revenue.
• Referrals continue to dominate – spamming employee contacts for referrals has run its course. Referrals produce quality hires not because of who they know, but instead because your best employees far surpass even recruiters in finding, building relationships, assessing, and selling top people who are not active in the job market. At top firms, over 50 percent of the hires will come from quality employee referrals.
• Personalization will become more common – top candidates will no longer tolerate a “one-size-fits-all” approach. In-demand candidates are now beginning to expect a unique and personalized recruiting approach (much like what occurs in executive recruiting). I call this approach “artisanal recruiting.” And don’t be surprised when top candidates begin to expect that even their job will be customized for them. Providing top candidates with choices that include who they work with, where and when they work, and even who their supervisor will be become more prevalent. And because the measured resources mean that you can’t personalize every job or candidate experience, prioritization will become even more essential. Prioritization allows you to focus your resources on the jobs and the candidates that will have the most business impact.
• Colleges and their students have changed dramatically, but college recruiting has not – unfortunately, corporate college recruiting budgets and processes have been stagnant for years, even though the demand for grads is now soaring. Unfortunately, during the slack college hiring period, colleges themselves, the visibility and the expectations of college students have changed dramatically. A reengineered recruiting model must move beyond a focus on career centers. Instead it must increase its capabilities in the areas of global college recruiting, remote college recruiting, recruiting students from online universities, recruiting “passive” students, and the use of market research to completely understand the job search process and the expectations of this new generation of grads.
• Large firms will struggle to compete with startups for innovative talent – the recent lavish funding and the economic success of numerous startups will continue to make them attractive to innovators and top talent. Unfortunately, few major corporations have a market-research-driven strategy or a set of tools that allows them to successfully recruit against startups for these valuable innovative prospects with a startup mindset.
• Workforce planning returns as a hot issue – recruiting shortages and high turnover rates have historically forced executives to focus on developing dependable talent pipelines. Expect an increased emphasis in all aspects of workforce planning, including talent pipelines and talent communities, supply/demand forecasting, succession planning, predicting employee turnover, and leader development. Don’t expect much success in this area because of the volatile VUCA environment and the fact that professionals in each of these workforce planning areas have almost universally failed to produce the promised results because they do not use data based decision-making.

Expect Continuing Disappointments in These Recruiting Areas

Unfortunately, you won’t find any predictions of dramatically new recruiting technologies on this list because our technology sector has continued to disappoint by providing only incremental changes.
Also don’t expect any new innovations in recruitment process outsourcing, in truly global recruiting approaches, in executive search, on corporate career websites, and from those who push recruitment and employer branding advertising. And finally, although these areas are getting more attention, expect little major innovation in the candidate assessment, diversity recruiting, and automated employee referral areas.

Final Thoughts

Many industries are finally experiencing dramatic growth, and as a result, their executives are clamoring for the talent that is required in order to continue that growth. And as the world moves faster, these executives are also expecting a continuing increase in corporate speed.
Meeting these high-level growth, speed, and innovation needs is difficult enough during normal times. But the escalation of turnover rates combined with vicious competition for top talent has produced a level of difficulty and challenge that recruiting leaders haven’t faced in years. Firms that expect to simply meet those challenges will obviously need some new recruiting strategies, tools, and approaches. However, if the goal of your firm is to go the next step and to dominate your industry, you will need to be on the bleeding edge of recruiting practices. This is because you can’t expect to provide your firm with a competitive advantage if you simply copy the recruiting practices of your talent competitors.

Capturing the lion’s share of top talent and becoming an elite recruiting leader in a highly competitive talent marketplace requires the foresight and the courage to implement the bleeding-edge approaches that are listed here.

Here are parts one and two in case you missed them:
Part 1
Part 2

Pt. 2: Top 10 "Bleeding Edge" Recruiting Trends

The Top 10 ‘Bleeding Edge’ Recruiting Trends to Watch in 2015

by Dr. John Sullivan

 
Turnover issues dramatically impact recruiting – turnover rates continue to spiral upward (they went up 44 percent last year). Increased turnover will mean that the volume of recruiting will increase significantly, but the firm’s reputation for high turnover will also impact your ability to recruit new talent. Given the high impact of new hire turnover, firms will need to begin assessing candidates on their likelihood of an early departure.

Learning to hire whenever scarce talent becomes available — during periods when top talent is extremely scarce, the best targets enter and exit the job market over a matter of days. That means that recruiting functions must shift from their traditional recruiting model, where you hire only when a position becomes open, to a completely different approach, where you hire whenever top talent applies to your company. That means when a top talent applies for a critical high-volume job at your firm, you begin the hiring process immediately and make an offer quickly, even if there is currently no vacant position. Yes, this means that you will hire some talent a few weeks before you need them, but that results in a lower cost than being unable to fill jobs at all because no qualified talent is available when one of these high-volume positions eventually opens up.
 
Deemphasizing resumes and accepting online profiles — resumes have many weaknesses, but the primary reason that they need to be made optional is hiring speed. This is because few employed candidates have any interest in, nor do they have the time required, to update their resumes. They simply can’t become a candidate at your firm until they update and submit their resume. Firms must learn to eliminate the “resume update wait” by instead accepting LinkedIn profiles for referrals and at least the initial application for regular job openings. LinkedIn profiles are generally more accurate than resumes because they are viewed by so many individuals that any misstatements would be instantly discovered.
 
Sourcing will add a “find-their-work” component – some of the most competent professionals have weak resumes. Fortunately, with the growth of the Internet and social media, it is now becoming possible to find the actual work of most professionals. And this is a good thing because an individual’s work is almost always a better representation of their capability than their resume. Employees looking for referrals and recruiters need to also focus on discovering the great ideas and the writing, the pictures, and the video representations of their work and the actual work samples of “hidden individuals” who couldn’t be found based solely on their resume. As an added benefit, your firm gathers information on new approaches, whether you end up hiring these individuals or not.

Boomerangs return as a primary source – boomerang rehires of previous high-performing employees have proven to be one of the highest sources of quality hires. Because so many have been released, there is an abundant talent pool to choose from. And in addition, keeping track of corporate alumni is now so much easier because you can find them easily on LinkedIn and on social media. Because of their speed, low cost, and high quality of hire, expect boomerang rehires to reach 15 percent of all hires at major firms.

The above is part 2 of 3 of John Sullivan's great article.
Part one and three are below:
Part 1
Part 3
Ev

Pt. 1: Top 10 ‘Bleeding Edge’ Recruiting Trends to Watch in 2015

The Top 10 ‘Bleeding Edge’ Recruiting Trends to Watch in 2015

by Dr. John Sullivan

Most articles that cover recruiting trends highlight what I consider to be obvious approaches that many firms have already adopted. But my perspective on trends is unique because I am focused on what I call the “bleeding-edge trends.” These trends are unique and rare because they have been adopted by less than 5 percent of the major firms. However, they are still important for all recruiting leaders to know and watch because they signal the path that all progressive firms will eventually have to follow. The top bleeding-edge trends are listed below in an easy to scan format. 

The Top 10 Most Impactful Trends That May Surprise You

1. The shift in power to the candidate means current approaches will stop working – 83 percent of recruiters report that the power has shifted away from where it has been for years, the employer, and toward the candidate. In a candidate-driven marketplace, “active-recruiting approaches” simply stop working. Now that top candidates are in the driver’s seat, the best have multiple options, recruiting must dramatically increase hiring speed, offer a great candidate experience, and shift to an emphasis away from assessment and toward excellence in “selling candidates.” Once candidates realize that the power has shifted to them, many will develop an arrogant “why-should-I-work-for-you?” attitude, which you must adjust to if you expect to land the best.
2. The mobile platform begins to dominate every aspect of recruiting – most firms have finally figured out that individuals should be able to apply for a job directly from their mobile phones. However the best firms are now realizing that the mobile platform should dominate every area of recruiting, because of its versatility and its incredibly high response rate (compared to other communications platforms). The mobile platform should be the primary mechanism for communicating with prospects/candidates, spreading your employer brand messages, to view recruiting and job description videos, and to push relevant open jobs to applicant communities. Eventually it will be used by most to offer live Hangouts/Meetups, for candidate skill assessment, for most candidate interviews, to find referrals, and finally to allow individuals to accept job offers directly on their phone. Recruiters and hiring managers must be able to approve reqs, post jobs, post videos, review resumes, schedule interviews, and other administrative tasks from their mobile phone. Employees must be able to do all referral administration and apply for internal openings on their phone.
3. Shifting to compelling offers becomes essential – during the down economy, almost any offer was accepted. However, in today’s marketplace where top candidates get multiple offers, the offer generation process must be radically updated. That means that sign-on bonuses, exploding offers, and identifying and meeting an individual candidate’s job acceptance criteria will become essential once again. In addition, hiring managers, compensation specialists, and recruiters will need to update their skills and approaches for creating compelling offers and selling in-demand prospects and candidates. Relearning how to successfully combat counteroffers from a candidate’s current manager will also become essential.
4. Perhaps the biggest surprise will be the shortage of top recruiters – as recruiting volume and difficulty both ramp up, firms will begin to realize that there is a significant shortage of talented and currently up-to-date recruiters. Expect a bidding war over the few available top corporate recruiters. A lack of quality, leading-edge recruiter training will unfortunately also make the experienced recruiter shortage even worse.
5. Videos begin dominating recruiting messaging – Online video now accounts for 50% percent of all mobile traffic. So now that viewing videos (rather than static pictures or reading text) has become widely accepted, they must be used in every aspect of recruiting. If you’re not already using video job descriptions, videos for employer branding, video employee profiles, video job postings and video job offers, you need to realize that authentic videos are an essential supplement to all traditionally print messaging. Videos make it easier to see and feel the excitement at your firm.

The above is part 1 of 3. Part 2 of 3 will be published next time.
Thanks John for these great insights!
Ev

Maybe LinkedIn Profiles SHOULD be a Resume

A few months ago I wrote that a LinkedIn profile was not a substitute for a resume because in the past...it wasn't!
a-linked-in-profile-is-not-resume
People included parts of their career that were only relevant toward the current industry they were in, and often left out important details that could be of interest to a future employer. They also didn't take the time to complete their profile, or simply had an account that they never did anything with.

Since I wrote the article above, I'm not so sure that we as recruiters and client companies shouldn't accept a profile as a resume, at least to get the recruiting process started.
There are five reasons I've seen just in the last few weeks.

Popular opinion seems to be that people are MORE HONEST on their LinkedIn profiles because they are public and people can argue whether or not they actually did the job they claim. This makes some sense because we've all seen resumes that looked great, but wondered if the person really had all the skills and experience they claimed. With LinkedIn if someone makes a false claim, it is easier for their network to spot it and call them out on it.

A second reason is it eliminates the waiting time for getting a resume back from a candidate. Everyone claims to want the "passive job seeker," however most passive job seekers are working and haven't updated their resumes in years. Instead of waiting for them to get a resume back to you and running the risk of someone else stealing them or the candidate giving up on the process because it isn't a priority for them (it is for us because we want to place them or hire them), so they take their sweet time on getting it back to us.

Accepting LinkedIn profiles as resumes could also be a good option because it stops the candidate's objection of "why should I send you a resume, you found me and called me?"
We can immediately start asking the candidate questions about their experiences rather than wait a few days to receive a resume and then have to go through the exercise of hunting them down to talk again. Their LinkedIn profiles already have an abundance of information on them that we can ask about to start building credible rapport with them about our firm, company, or job opportunity.

The fourth reason is it gives your company the competitive edge of speed. It is now an employee marketplace. Good candidates are getting multiple offers and getting them faster then a few years or months ago. Eliminate the extra time wasted by waiting for a resume, application, and reference check, and use the candidate's LinkedIn Profile to get the process started faster. Contact the people that recommended them. Ask candidates questions about why people would endorse them for their skills. See who else in their networks they recommend so you can grow your talent/applicant pool.

A fifth reason is the consistency of formatting.
There are many ways of doing resumes correctly and even more ways of creating them incorrectly. Information is lost all over the paper it is written on and you often don't know where to look or even read what is there. With a LinkedIn profile you know where the information should be because the template is the same for everyone on LinkedIn. 

LinkedIn is already here and candidates use it all the time. Maybe we as recruiters and companies need to use it differently that we used to in order to take full advantage of it in this market.

Thanks for reading!
Ev
A Heck of a Nice Guy

Top 10 Traits of Successful IT Pros

Since my team and I recruit IT professionals I thought this article was interesting.
Thanks to Bill B. for sending it over to me.
Ev

Top 10 Traits of Successful IT Pros
by
John Hales, Global Knowledge Instructor,
A+, Network+, CTT+, MCSE, MCDBA, MOUS, VCP, VCAP, VCI, EMCSA

What makes a successful IT professional?
This has been discussed and debated and considered for years. While there are many technical abilities that relate to a person's success - and all are vital - I'd like to focus on the general character attributes every IT pro should have and on the things that every IT pro should know or do. While general character attributes, like being ethical or inquisitive, are more difficult to learn and develop, professional skills, such as knowing when to say you don't know something or not being afraid to call technical support, can be learned and honed.

If you are considering becoming an IT professional, pay special attention to the character attributes to see if yours match. Anyone can improve in the Things You Know or Do category, whether you are just starting out or have worked in the field for years.

Character Attributes
Character attributes are generally things you are born with or have a natural tendency toward. It is true that talents and tendencies can be improved upon if you work at it. Set goals in these areas, and these skills will serve you well.

Adaptable
If you like a steady routine with few if any interruptions and a high level of predictability, IT may not be for you. In fact, as an IT professional, you need to be adaptable at both the micro and macro levels.

At the micro level, things change minute-to-minute throughout the day. The email server crashes, a drive fails, or a senior member of your company deletes a file and needs you to get it back right away for a big meeting. These things are normal and happen every single day.

Likewise with your hours. You may be scheduled to work 9 to 5, but there is a very good chance that you will be called to work late to fix a problem, work over a weekend or a holiday to perform an upgrade or be called to get on an airplane and fly across the country to fix an urgent problem. This is the nature of IT and why we are compensated well when compared to many other careers.

Adaptability is also critical at the macro level. Standard ways of doing things change all the time. PCs with mainframe access gave way to network servers, which led to server sprawl, which then led to the rise of virtualization that is evolving into cloud computing. Networking standards for PCs in the 1980s didn't really exist to any wide degree. We carried floppy disks between computers to share information or, if we were really cutting edge, shared data over a 9,600 bps modem. That gave way to ARCNET, Token Ring, FDDI, and Ethernet physically and NetBEUI, IPX, and TCP/IP in the 1990s, which settled to TCP/IP over Ethernet in the 2000s with many switches, routers and other devices to manage, control and secure traffic. Today, Software-Defined Networking (SDN) and Network Functions Virtualization (NFV) are changing the conversation in networking. Banyan Vines was superseded by Novell Netware, which was in turn replaced by Linux/UNIX and Windows servers. Programming, storage and many other areas have undergone similar transformations.
In each case, you need to adapt and change or get left behind with skills from the previous era that are no longer in demand.

Inquisitive / Curious / Eager to Learn
Next, the successful professional is inquisitive, curious and eager to learn. These attributes all explain the same thing, namely the insatiable desire to learn new things. This is closely related to being adaptable - to adapt, you constantly need to learn new things, look for trends in the industry and make judgment calls about what fields to study and where the "up and coming" areas are. There is more to learn than can ever be learned in the IT field, so determine where your interests lie and study that area. Know it well and then understand how it relates to other areas; also be aware of changes in those related areas and the changes they may make in your chosen area. If your area seems to be on the decline, determine what is next and start learning about it now while you still have a job. Take every opportunity you are offered for training, whether formal classroom training, informal lunch and learns, industry groups and conferences, reading blogs and books or taking video training.

Teachable
Being teachable is closely related to the first two attributes. Be quick to learn and observe. Take direction, advice, correction when you make a mistake, etc., and learn from all of those. After you receive any form of constructive criticism, think about it and decide how you will act differently in the future. Don't get defensive when called out. Instead, learn from it and improve, so you don't make the same mistake again. Many of these lessons will come from the school of hard knocks. While these lessons are not usually fun to learn, the experience and your reflections on them later may prove invaluable and will separate you from many others.

Team Player
Never has the need to be a team player greater than in IT today. There wasn't a lot of team playing in the 1980s, as there was not a huge IT infrastructure and most of the work was help desk work where being a team player simply meant dividing up the workload among the available staff. In the 1990s and 2000s, IT specialized significantly into silos, such as storage, networking, server administration (physical, email, database, etc.). Today, these silos are being broken down more and more, with greater virtualization and its resulting need to work across teams, as well as the move to SDN, software-defined storage (SDS) - indeed the software-defined data center (SDDC), if your company even has a data center anymore. More and more companies are moving to the cloud - how will you adapt? What skills are required by your company relative to cloud computing, etc.? These changes cross the boundaries of traditional silos of expertise and will require much greater cooperation among all members of IT.

Ethical/Trusted
While the other attributes previously discussed focus on your ability to change and adapt and work with others, this attribute of being ethical and trusted is a bedrock must-have skill to move beyond the most junior ranks of IT. IT routinely has access to sensitive information (financial, tax, health, grades, etc.). If you are even tempted to access data that you have no need to access, this is a red flag. Once you do it, you will be tempted to do it again and you will get caught - it is just a matter of time. Once caught, your career is over in IT at any firm. Your ethical standards need to be beyond reproach at all times. It is not a stretch to say that organizations trust their very existence to the data the organization has, which is in the hands of IT. Abuse of this trust could have financial, legal and other implications, not only for you as the IT representative but for the organization as a whole.

Enthusiastic
Your knowledge and skills are important, but if they are conveyed in an exciting, positive way to your coworkers, management, and clients, you will go a long way. No one likes to work with a negative person who can only say "no" to every request. Find ways to solve challenges and present them to those affected. While not as critical as being ethical, being enthusiastic is very important if you want to grow in your career.

Things You Know or Do
The character traits I've described are indeed very important, and, while they certainly can be developed, doing so typically involves a lot of time and much effort. Not that you shouldn't try to develop or improve your character - just know it's a slow process and don't expect overnight success.

On the other hand, these things you know or do can be learned, often from experience, and that learning and progress in your skills can really make you stand out from your peers. You don't need to necessarily learn all these things from your own experience either - you can learn from your colleagues, blog posts, etc., without having to make the same mistakes as others.

Know Your Limits / Know When to Say "I Don't Know"
No one knows everything - not even close. Even in your field of specialty, there will be many things you don't know, and that's OK. It is far preferable to say you don't know something and then go learn about it than to make up an answer and have people act on that information only to find it was incorrect. Undoing the changes and starting on a new course of action will probably cause much more time, expense and loss of respect among your colleagues than doing some research and coming back a few hours or days later.

Be Not Afraid ... to Call Tech Support
The previous point leads directly into this one: Don't be afraid to call technical support. They are the experts. Calling them means you'll have some cover if something goes wrong based on the actions you took at the direction of tech support. Besides, this is why you have support contracts and pay the vendors for access to that help. Rarely when you call support will a technical support representative be available to help you at that exact moment. Open a ticket and get the process started, then go to work researching and solving the problem yourself.

If you get it solved on your own, you can always close the ticket and impress management by fixing the issue. If you don't, you've still learned during your research and can inform the tech support person what you have done to speed up the diagnosis when they call back, shortening the time to fix the issue.

Willingness to Document as You Troubleshoot
Related to the previous point, your willingness to document as you troubleshoot is important for a few reasons:

You have a record of what was done if you need to back out a change.
You can send the list of what you've done to support if technical support gets involved.
You can learn from the experience and not make the same mistakes again.
You can resolve similar problems in the future much more quickly if you have record of what worked in the past.
Others in the organization can learn from your actions and you can, in turn, learn from theirs, which ties into the concepts of being teachable and a team player.
Let me reiterate: Document as you are troubleshooting, not at some later point when you've forgotten the exact steps taken.

In this regard, here is one of my favorite tips if you run Windows on your workstation: While documenting in Notepad what you're doing, press the F5 key to add date and time stamps along the way so you know exactly what was done, changed, said, etc. This can be useful if you have to look at other systems or logs to know what time to look for.

Planning Ability with Back-Out Options
The ability to plan is critical. After all, as an IT professional, you need to be able to plan how you will make changes, upgrade systems, etc. Closely related to your planning ability is the ability to create back-out options along the way. Things don't always go as planned, so if you run into trouble and have a back-out plan, you will recover much more quickly with less downtime, etc., than if you shoot from the hip and see what happens.

Conclusion
Beyond technical skills, success in IT takes an interesting mix of character traits and things you know and do. Review your own character and disposition to see if IT is a good fit for you. Think about how you can improve some of these traits to progress in your IT career. Go back over the list periodically to see where you have improved and to determine what areas to work on next.

About the Author
John Hales, VCP-DCV, VCP-DT, VCAP-DCA, VCI Level 2, is a VMware instructor at Global Knowledge, teaching most of the vSphere classes that Global Knowledge offers, including the Horizon Suite, vCAC and vC OPS classes. John is also the author of many books, including involved technical books from Sybex, exam preparation books, and many quick reference guides from BarCharts. He has also authored custom courseware, including Global Knowledge's "SDN Essentials: The Future of Networking" and "SDN Planning Workshop: Demystifying Vendor Solutions." His latest book on vSphere is entitled "Administering vSphere 5: Planning, Implementing and Troubleshooting." In addition to his VMware certifications listed above, John has various others, including Microsoft MCSE, MCDBA, and MOUS; EMC Storage Administrator (EMCSA); and CompTIA A+, Network+, and CTT+.

Best Compliment Ever: You're A Professional Salesman

 

Everyone wants to be known as GOOD at something in their job. Everyone would love to be known as an EXPERT in their career. If your career has anything to do with recruiting or sales, what would be the word that a client could attach to your name that would be the best compliment to pay you?

If the client said that you're:

Good

Awesome

Friend

Consultant

Would any of these be the words that you would want to best describe you in your career?

For me one of the best compliments I've received is being called a "Professional."

People don't often think of salespeople being professionals.

They usually get the image of Herb Tarlek from the TV show WKRP in Cinncinnatti.

I was in a sales meeting with the owner of the company I was working for and the manager of a major account. Being the salesperson I understood that the owner needed to do the presentation and questioning his way and style and let him take the lead of the meeting, after all he was the company owner. I stayed quiet and took notes and asked pointed questions when appropriate or gave precise answers when asked. I listened intently to the client and took notes without interrupting the client's train of thought. The owner alternately was engaging and losing the client.

I could see the client was bored so to get him engaged in the presentation I started asking questions, and probed the answers with more questions. The owner knew that it was his time to sit back and let me do the driving. At the end of the meeting I had all of the information from the client, had them agreeing to our proposal, and feeling comfortable about the buying decision.

As we left the client pulled me aside and said that it "was a pleasure doing business with a sales professional."

I was on a sales high because we closed the deal, but a compliment from a peer made me that much more excited. So excited in fact that all these years later I judge my sales calls by that compliment and standard. Was I professional in my questioning, presentation, close? Would that same client give me the same compliment if they were in that room with me watching this latest meeting? 

That's my professional goal each time out.

Thanks Bob for the compliment!

Ev

A Heck of A Nice Guy