"What's Your Problem" Series #6 - Tricky Interview Questions

Most interviews you attend will throw up at least one tricky question, that one question that you hope they won’t ask, or one where you just can’t think of a good example to give as evidence of a competency.

Your first priority in a situation like this is to make sure you don’t panic.  Panicking is a sure way to make your mind go blank!  To avoid this there are things you can do as part of your preparation before the interview, as well as coping mechanisms during the meeting itself.

Before you go to your interview make sure you’ve thought honestly about your CV/application form in comparison to their job description & person specification.  Consider if there are any gaps in your work history, whether there is more than one job where you only worked there a short time, or if there are any areas called for on the job description where you have only weak evidence. 

These sorts of situations are predictable areas for the interviewer to probe, with questions that could be tricky to answer if you haven’t through it through beforehand.  Ignoring them in the hope that the interviewer won’t spot them, or won’t bother querying them, is a sure route to disaster.

Honesty is the best policy in answering questions about any anomalies in your past work history.  Having said that, blurting out “I had to move jobs because I hated my last three managers, they were awful and had no idea how to manage people” isn’t a great idea.  So, how do you explain difficult situations from past employment?

There are a range of situations from past jobs that need careful handling in interviews –some of these are listed below, with suggestions of ways to talk about them in interviews.  These ideas are not meant to be proscriptive, as each person’s situation will be different from these generic scenarios, but hopefully offer some ideas that can be adapted to suit

Situation	Suggestion
Gap between jobs	Depends upon the reason for the gap and its length. Short gaps while job hunting (less than 6 months) should be explained simply as time spent searching for the right job. For longer gaps it is good to show how you kept active, involved in the profession and up to date with current issues and skills during your time out of work (eg activities as a member of information associations & groups, involvement in Twitter or LinkedIn discussions, professional reading, writing a blog, etc. For gaps due to other life events (moving house, caring for a relative, studying) it is fine to give the honest reason for the career break, and again to demonstrate how you have kept up to date.
Many short-duration jobs	If these jobs were a series of fixed term contracts and temporary roles, the interviewer will be seeking reassurance that you are now committed to a permanent post and will stay for longer than a year or two (ie, that you will repay their investment in you in terms of induction and training). One idea is to describe them as something you did in order to gain a range of new experiences and learn new skills, which you now want to put to good use in a long term position. If these jobs were permanent posts, but you moved between jobs once a year or more often, then the interviewer will be concerned about possible clashes of personality with peers or managers, or whether you may have been sacked from one or more of those jobs. If you genuinely left jobs because you disagreed with the company culture, attitude of colleagues or management style, then it is fine to say so as long as it’s done in a positive way. You also need to acknowledge that any disagreement was a two-way thing, and show you recognise that your own actions or attitude may have contributed to the situation(s). Showing self awareness, reflection and learning from past situations is a key skill interviewers are looking for.
A job where you were sacked for misconduct or poor performance	Answers to questions about leaving past jobs, where this was the case, will depend upon the exact reason(s) and how relevant that situation was to those likely to arise in the job being applied for. For example, if the reason was poor performance in customer service, while the current job application is for a back room library services role, then simply stating the reason plus saying that you have now shifted your career goals to less customer facing roles, could be the best approach. Alternatively you could explain how you’ve worked to improve on the skill at issue in the time since (perhaps you’ve had a retail job in the meantime, or volunteered to help at a conference or membership group seminar?).
A criteria in the job description or person specification where you have weak or no evidence	The first thing to remember is that they have called you to interview despite there being little or no evidence that you meet this criteria on your CV/application form or cover letter. This means it isn’t an immediate deal breaker, and they are open to hearing how you are addressing (or planning to address) any deficiency. The interview is your opportunity to discuss this with them. When they ask a question ‘give an example of a time when you xxx (the situation you haven’t faced at work’, first of all give an example a similar or comparable situation, and then use this as your chance to show what you’re doing to get more of this skill, experience or knowledge. For example, if they want budgeting experience and you haven’t been in charge of a budget, you could give as your example a time when you contributed figures or results to your manager and discussed with them how they’d impact the budget, and go on to say that you’ve signed up for (or completed) a budget management course to extend your knowledge, and you’re now keen to put that into practice.

What's Your Problem series #5 - Answering Competency Questions Successfully

Many interviews these days will include some competency-type questions, if not be solely based upon a full blown competency framework with few, if any, ‘normal’ questions included.

So what are ‘competency questions’?  They are based upon a framework that described the ‘competencies’, or behaviours, knowledge and skills, that need to be displayed in order to carry out the responsibilities of the job effectively.  Competency questions are calling for evidence that the candidate has exhibited these behaviours, in situations similar to those likely to arise in the role, in previous jobs or other activities.

A competency framework usually has several levels for each competency, for example corresponding to behaviours that indicate a novice, practitioner or expert level of competence at a particular activity.  An interviewer may therefore have several example answers they are looking for, which correspond to these levels.

What do competency questions look like?  Since they are asking you for evidence of certain behaviour in the past, they are generally calling for you to give examples of having done things before.  Some examples might be:

• Tell me about a time when you dealt with a difficult customer
•  Describe a situation where you had to win consensus for a course of action
• Give me an example of how you researched a question from a user
• Tell me about a time when you worked in a team to achieve something

The interviewer is hoping that you will tell them about how you did things in the situation they’ve described, since that will give them an indication of how you could behave in similar situations in their organisation.

In order to answer these questions successfully, you need to have prepared quite a few examples of different tasks you’ve done or situations you’ve been in, so you don’t have to rely on one example to answer several different questions, as well as thinking through how you dealt with those tasks and situations.  When you prepare your answers to these questions, a useful framework to use is the STAR framework.

This acronym stands for Situation, Task, Action, Result.  Since the interviewer wants to hear about how you did things, and whether it was a success, you need to focus on the Action and Result parts in your answer.  Talk briefly about the situation, describe the task you had (ie, your goal in that situation), and then go into a bit more detail about the action(s) that you took to try and achieve this goal, and about the actual outcome or result of those actions.

Taking the first example question above, here is one potential answer to it, using the STAR formula:

“I once had a user who was very upset that we didn’t have a particular book on the shelves the day they came in.  They said they didn’t have time to come back and it was a disgrace that we couldn’t keep popular books in stock.”  (situation) 

“I had to calm the person down, explain to them why the book wasn’t available, and try and find a solution to their problem of getting access to it.”  (task) 

“First of all I showed that I appreciated it was an upsetting situation for them by saying ‘I agree it’s frustrating the book isn’t here immediately’, then I got their permission to start explaining by saying ‘would you like me to explain how this has happened’.  Next I told them how many copies of that book we had in total, and when each copy had been signed out, and so when the earliest of those was due to be returned.  I said that we can only stock so many copies of each book, so that we can have a full range of books available.  Lastly I explained that they could reserve the book, and we’d contact them to let them know when it was available, so they wouldn’t have to come in again on the off-chance but only safe in the knowledge it would be here waiting.”  (actions)

“They gradually calmed down as we were talking, and agreed that we couldn’t stock unlimited copies of each book.  They were surprised to hear about the reservations procedure and asked if they could reserve a book without coming in face-to-face, so I told them about phone and online reservations.  They were pleased about this and said they’d do that next time.” (result)

When you go into your interview, it’s a good idea to take a notepad, ask the interviewer ‘is it OK if I take a few notes?’ and then have it sitting in front of you.  So that you can remember your examples, prepare your notebook in advance by writing keywords that will job your memory in light pencil at the bottom of the page (ie the part nearest to you when the notebook is on the table).  You can then just glance down and quickly remind yourself, if your mind goes blank from nerves during the interview.  You can use the top part of the notepad to takes notes of the answer the interviewer gives to all the questions you have prepared!

"What's Your Problem" Series #4 - Selling Yourself; the big bugbear demystified

Job hunting these days seems to be all about selling.  From personal branding and image, or designing your CV as a marketing brochure, to selling your key skills at interview, at all stages of the process you need to be selling.

 

Many people find influencing and persuasion skills difficult to master, and just the thought of trying to persuade someone to hire you, especially by ‘blowing your own trumpet’ face to face in an interview, can seem even more awkward and unappealing.

However, help is at hand.  There is, if not a formula, at least a set of communication skills that can be learned that will help you present yourself and what you can do for an employer more successfully.

Here are some links to useful articles about influencing and persuasion skills:

http://www.nickheap.co.uk/articles.asp?art_id=23  focus on influencing skills

http://www.resultsdelivery.com/influence1.html

http://www.kent.ac.uk/careers/sk/persuading.htm links persuading, influencing and negotiation together

All of these techniques are based upon focusing on what the other person’s needs are rather than on your own.  In a job hunting situation it is easy to get trapped into only thinking about what you need – what kind of job, where, with what organisation and at what salary.

However, to sell yourself successfully you should spend some time finding out what the potential employers you are applying to need.  Think about things from their point of view – what sort of person would they expect would be able to do the job they’re advertising?  What qualifications, skills and experience are they hoping to see on a CV/application form?  What answers would they be expecting to their interview questions?

If you can answer these questions, then you can work backwards to prepare better answers to interview questions, write a more tailored CV, and create a more impressive online presence. 

One of the simplest things you can do is to ruthlessly avoid using the words ‘only’, ‘just’ or ‘we’ in your answers.  For example, instead of saying “it was just a small project” say “it was a small project where I ...” and instead of saying “I’ve only used xxx system once” say “I used xxx system at...”

In the words of one of the articles quoted, the aim is to create a proposal the person wants to say yes to, because it will benefit them.  It is your job to ensure that your CV/application form, and your interview answers, form this ‘yes proposal’ in their minds.

"What's Your Problem" series #3 - Troubleshooting Your CV

If you have sent your CV off in response to lots of job adverts, but haven’t been having any success, then your CV might be suffering from one of these common problems:

1.   Too descriptive – Reads like a narrative or like a ‘cut and paste’ from your job description.  Lots of detail about what your duties or responsibilities are, but little analysis of what your results or achievements have been.

Remember, your CV isn’t your life history; it is your personal marketing brochure.  Like a brochure, it should focus on the benefits you bring to an organisation, not on a list of things you have done.  Put the most beneficial tasks and outcomes, or those most relevant to the job you’re apply for, near the top of each section.  Make sure your skills and achievements are clearly stated.

2.   Too assumptive – Leaves the reader to assume what your skills are from the mere fact of where you have worked, what your job titles have been or the length of your experience.   Assumes that the reader is going to be a librarian or information professional who ‘gets it’ and will understand.

Both of these assumptions are likely to be wrong.  The reader is more likely to be from HR, or to be a senior line manager who doesn’t come from a library background.  Even if a librarian is involved, they may not make the leap from your job titles or lists of duties to believing you have the skills they feel are necessary to do the job they’re advertising.

A CV should have as its primary goal communicating your key skills clearly to the reader.  As a test, give your CV to a friend, without any hints, and ask them to tell you what you main skills are.  Make sure they tell you skills, not ‘things you have done’, or experiences.  Can they see what your skills are?  Are the skills they come up with the ones you expected?  Are they the relevant skills for the job you’re applying for?

3.   Doesn’t look professional.  You are an information professional; part of your core skill set should be presenting and communicating information.  If your CV is poorly laid out, riddled with grammatical and spelling errors or typos and hard to read then you are demonstrating that you fall down in this key skill area.

Your CV needs to be well designed.  There are lots of CV templates and examples available in books and on the internet to give you ideas.  Make sure that you use a professional looking font, use enough white space to make it pleasant to read, and use bullet points, bold, a larger font size, indented paragraphs or columns to make sure the information is well laid out and key points are highlighted.

4.   Lacks key words. While your organisation may call the intranet their ‘Knowledge Base’ or another jargon term, the reader of your CV or the agency doing a text search of your CV is more likely to use the generic, well known, term.  Make sure you ‘translate’ organisation jargon into everyday terms.

If your CV is going being uploaded to an employer’s CV database or to an agency, then their system may not be able to read text inside text boxes or tables, so it is better not to use them in those circumstances.  These databases can parse text and pick out key words to populate skill code fields in the database.  Make sure you include the right key words for the type of job you are seeking in the plain text areas of your CV.

Addressing some of these issues with your CV and making sure that your skill, achievements and passion for your work stand out will greatly increase your chances of getting an interview.

Tailoring your CV, so that the skills and experiences most relevant for the job you’re applying for are found near the top of each section, will also help you get to the top of the list for shorlisting for interview.

"What's your problem" series #1 - What role would you enjoy?

In the first of a series of articles examining some of the common problems encountered by people seeking to develop their career, this post takes a look at career goals.

What sort of job, in what sort of organisation, do you want to aim for?  How do you know?  I’ve always envied those few people I’ve come across who have it all sorted, who have known from a young age exactly what they wanted to do in life, and have succeeded in achieving their goal.  On the other hand, I’ve also found such single mindedness a bit daunting.  How on earth did they know, aged 13 and ¾ or whenever, what they wanted to do with their whole life?  Why did I have no idea?

There are several different approaches to developing your career, all equally valid in my mind.  These range from the single-minded, vocational, ‘I’ll be an xx when I grow up’ through the general aptitude and interest ‘I’ll give that a go and see what happens’ to the uncertain but need to earn a living ‘I’ll take anything that I can do with the skills I’ve got’ approach.

Do you have to have a career goal?  The short answer is ‘no’.  If you are happy with how things are going, you’re working in a job you enjoy and earning what you need, and you expect to either stay in that role or earn promotion naturally over time, then you probably don’t need a grand master plan.

On the other hand, if you are feeling at all dissatisfied with your job, aren’t earning enough, or aren’t sure where you’ll be or if you’ll be enjoying it in a few years time, then a bit of strategy and some action planning on how to get somewhere better probably wouldn’t go amiss.

Once you’ve decided that you need to think about where you’re going with your career, then the problem becomes one of ‘how?’.  There are two halves to this question – how to find out about the wider information profession, so you have a clear picture of all the possible opportunities and directions available out in the market, and how to determine what you’d enjoy doing and have the capabilities to do.

Finding out about the first one is a matter of research.  Investigating all the various library, information, records & knowledge management groups and associations that are out there is one good way to tackle this.  Every part of the industry, it seems, has its own group catering to its own networking and professional development needs.  Simply creating a list of them all will give you a good idea of the full spread of the information profession.  Taking a look at the events and courses they offer will give you more insight into each area.

Finding out what you’d enjoy doing entails:

• Examining your personal values (what’s important to you; status, achievement, learning, money, promotion, reward, acknowledgement, family, etc)
•  Looking at what gives you job satisfaction (finding information, helping others find information, organising data, facilitating knowledge sharing, etc)
• Understanding your personality type (how do you behave in a team, what sort of management style will help you thrive, etc)

With the outcomes from these two questions in hand you can match between the two, and hopefully find some degree of overlap between available options and roles you’d enjoy having!  That gives you a clear template to use when you are browsing lisjobnet or other sources of library and information sector job adverts, to filter down to only those jobs that will help you on your path to your ideal job.

Having a clear career goal in mind, and being aware of your skills gaps and how certain roles might help you bridge these, also means that you can be better prepared for interviews.  These are two way communications and are your chance to find out enough about the organisation, its culture and the job itself to see whether it’s a good match for you.


I also came across this article with some great tips for making goals achievable and realistic by Annette Earle that I wanted to share with you.

What’s in an elevator speech?

One of the themes reported to have been running through the recent SLA Conference in Chicago was to have your elevator speech prepared.

This may seem a daunting proposition to many.  What should you include?  How can you avoid making it sound cheesy and canned?  When will you be able to use it?

If you have ever had someone say to you ‘What do you do?” and been stuck for a simple, clear answer, then you’ll understand the need for a short, prepared sentence or two to explain.  The alternative is either saying “I’m a librarian” (irrespective of whether you work in a library, a knowledge centre, or somewhere else), or going into a long winded explanation of some of your daily tasks (while watching your conversational partner glazing over).

So, what does an elevator speech look like?  Here are some examples that could suit various different kinds of library & information roles:

• I help people find the right information, from books, journals and online databases, to write better assignments, as well as training them to use the resources more effectively for themselves

• I use a range of subscription-only sources to provide business information and analyse it to create insights the (consultants, lawyers, etc) can use in their client work, either to develop new business or provide better services to existing ones

• I organise the organisation’s own information so people can find it more quickly and easily, and help people share the knowledge in their heads so they don’t have to ‘reinvent the wheel’ all the time

• I support people with all sorts of things – from introducing kids to the joys of reading via storytimes and helping people find the information they need, to helping elderly people create their first email account or job seekers submitting an online job application

The key thing is to focus on the benefits to the user of the work you do for them, not to try and explain the detail of how you go about doing this.  Unless the person you’re talking to is a librarian themselves, they’re unlikely to be interested in a detailed explanation of Boolean searching or how you constructed a taxonomy! 


Another SLA Chicago attendee, Neil Infield, also blogged a while ago about a workshop he'd attended on creating an elevator pitch.  While being focused on a pitch for a business, it is well worth reading for some extra tips on how to craft a good message.

Prepare something short, outcome/solution and benefit focused, and have it ready to go next time someone at a party asks you “so... what do you do?”

What’s Your Problem?

Six posts in this series of articles about common job-hunting problems are now up!

What role would you enjoy?

Personal Branding, is it for you?

Troubleshooting Your CV

Selling Yourself; the big bugbear demystified

Answering Competency Interview Questions Successfully

Handling Tricky Interview Questions

Is your career going swimmingly? If you are totally satisfied with your career progress so far and confidently expect your career development to continue on a smooth upward path, until your eventual retirement, then read no further.

*Shaking myself awake from this utopian dream* If, however, you are like most of us and are struggling to balance life, career, money, hobbies and time, then you might have one of these problems:

• You’re not sure how your career could develop, or what sort of jobs you’d enjoy doing in the future
• You’ve heard about personal branding, online reputation and image management but aren’t sure how they apply to you or what you should do about it
• You’ve worked hard on your CV, but when you send it off you get very few interview invitations
• When you get to interviews and they ask you to name your key skills, top three strengths or tell them ‘why should we hire you for this role’, you panic and can’t think of what to say
• You’re often faced by application forms when you apply for jobs, and feel daunted by the large blank box asking you to explain why you’re suitable for the post
• At interviews you try and answer their questions to ‘tell me about a time when you....’ but they never seem satisfied with what you say and you have no idea what you’re doing wrong
• You always get asked tricky questions at interviews, about why you left previous jobs, or what you want to be doing in 5 years time, and you never know what to say for the best

These are common concerns that come up when I’m spending time with people I’m career coaching, so over the next few blog posts I’ll try and address a few of these issues and offer some suggested strategies to cope. 

If you have come up against a different career development problem you’d like me to cover, why not add it in a comment below?

Six posts in the series are now up!

What role would you enjoy?

Personal Branding, is it for you?

Troubleshooting Your CV

Selling Yourself; the big bugbear demystified

Answering Competency Interview Questions Successfully

Handling Tricky Interview Questions

Start with the end in mind

Other than 'what skills do you have to offer', I've noticed that the question 'where do you see yourself in three or five years time?' is probably the one that leads to the most scratching of heads and baffled looks during interviews to register to look for work.

This question is asking the job seeker to articulate their career goals.  What is their vision for themselves in their career in a few years?  Many of us have given little thought to this question, or somehow hope that it is something that will sort itself out over time, so long as we work hard and do a good job.

In the past (well, not so long ago really, maybe 10 or 15 years ago) this approach may indeed have been perfectly fine and led to a nice career looking something like this:

These days, however, with everything changing so fast around us, such a 'work hard and hope for a just reward' approach is more likely to lead to being left stranded up a dying backwater than cresting the wave of new opportunities (if I can mix metaphors!).

So how do you create a vision for yourself?  This sounds all high-faluting and a bit 'corporate-speak', but it really means having some idea where you are heading before you set out - which is just common sense really.

In order to start with the end in mind, it pays to spend a bit of time imagining what sort of life you'd like to lead.  Do you have loads of ideas of how the library service could be run that you'd love the chance to put into practice?  Do you really enjoy mentoring junior members of staff and seeing their skills blossom?  Does creating an effective taxonomy or information architecture and seeing users find what they want without having to learn to be 'mini-librarians' to get there bring you great satisfaction?

What sort of job would you need to have in order to do more of these things? Don't worry whether you have the skills, qualifications, experience (or confidence) to do that job right now - just keep it in the back of your mind as you do your skills audit, prepare your CV or sift through job adverts.  Think about what the in-between steps might be to help you move in this direction. Evaluate promotions or new jobs against this eventual end goal - will they help you on your way?  No?  Don't apply for them then, find something more useful.


Some links to posts with other useful ideas and tips around goal-setting:


#Chartership chat on Reflection

Well formed outcomes

Mindtools Personal Goal Setting

Top Achievement's Powerful Written Goals

So you want to do a Skills Audit?

Bethan Ruddock spoke recently at the CILIP New Professionals Day 2012, on the topic of her book The New Professional’s Toolkit published recently by Facset. Although I wasn’t present for her talk, I followed events on Twitter and noticed several mentions of her advice to carry out a skills audit. 


Over many years working in library recruitment I’ve noticed that people often find it hard to answer the interview question ‘what skills do you have?’ Sometimes people offer one or two software packages that they can use (an LMS or online database, for example). Often people look blank or get embarrassed and can’t think of anything. 


I believe there is a clear and direct linkage between someone’s skills (proficiency acquired through training or experience) and their ability to progress in the career direction they want. This sounds obvious but, if so, why do so many CVs focus on a historical recounting of experiences and sideline or ignore skills? 


I think this is because many people find it very hard to analyse themselves, to tease out what their skills really are, and to articulate those in a concise way. It is easier to say what you’ve done, rather than what you’ve got out of doing it. 


So, how do you do a skills audit? As a career coach I offer people a range of exercises and worksheets to help, but in essence you need to review your experiences, and break down large chunks of experience (eg, “I do online research” or “I’ve managed an intranet”) into smaller tasks (eg, doing a reference interview, selecting online source(s), conducting searches, collating results, etc). For each of these tasks, you then need to think about what skill(s) you used to carry out each one. I find that imagining you were training a complete novice to carry out the task helps to envisage what skills you’re actually using. 


Once you’ve gone through all the tasks, for each of your experiences, you will have teased out all of the skills that you have. Of course there will be duplicates where you use the same skills to accomplish different tasks, which you can weed out. To get from this (probably long) list down to your key skills, I advise people to consider both how good they are at performing each skill, and how much they enjoy using it, then tally those two to reach a ‘score’ for each skill.


This article will be published in the CILIP SW Group newsletter shortly and is reproduced here with permission.

Infographic - Interview Tips

Which job is right for me?

When you are reviewing jobs from agencies, job boards or industry magazine adverts, how do you decide which opportunities to apply for? It is tempting to look for impressive job titles, well known organisation and good salaries – but are those the best indicators of a job you’ll enjoy?

To be able to effectively sift through all the jobs available, first of all you need to spend a bit of time on yourself. If you spend some time reflecting on your own values, what motivates you, and what gives you satisfaction at work, then you will be able to look beyond the flashy headlines to assess the job itself more effectively.

If you are to fit comfortably into an organisation and feel energised and motivated to work there and give your best, then you need to be sure that their organisational values are a good match to yours. If they operate on the ‘make the most profit at any cost’ principle, while you gain satisfaction from going the extra mile to give great service, you are likely to find your natural inclinations at odds with their operating policy much of the time. Likewise, if you are driven to earn the highest bonus while they place most emphasis on customer care, you are likely to feel impatient with their slower pace of life quite frequently.

Perhaps you are motivated by receiving praise and recognition in front of your peers for a job well done? Check whether a prospective firm offers internal award schemes. Perhaps getting a promotion is important to you? Find out what their internal career development and appraisal process is like.

Think about what aspects of your current and past jobs have given you greatest satisfaction – that ‘wow’ factor of a job really well done. Was it hearing from a user about positive effects of the information you’ve found for them, completing a library reorganisation or move, or learning new skills so you’re ready to tackle something more challenging? How many of these satisfying activities would a new job involve?

Having thought through all the aspects of a job and an organisation that will make it right for you allows you to frame the right questions to ask of your recruiter, to look for in adverts and job descriptions, and to ask at job interviews. Always remember that these interactions should be two way conversations! Armed with this more in-depth information you will be able to make a better decision when it comes to which job to apply for – and which offer to accept.

Career goals - a good time for change?

It's the start of a brand spanking New Year (and it's my guess that you've already broken any new year resolutions you half-seriously made the week before!).  

Earlier today I was reading James Mullan's excellent blog post about setting New Year goals and finding your focus, and I was struck by the difference between a resolution (generally along the lines of 'I won't do so much of xxx this year' - eating, smoking, etc)  and a goal (much more centred around a positive, can-do idea, something you want to strive for and achieve this year).

A resolution is hard to keep.  We are generally good at convincing ourselves that 'just one' (sweet, cake, gin!) isn't really breaking the rules, after all, it's only one... isn't it? On the other hand, it's harder to 'fall off the wagon' with a goal.

A goal is something you have to actively do things in order to achieve, rather than avoid doing (generally pleasurable) things.  Indeed, the steps along the way to achieving your target can in themselves be pleasurable.  If your goal is career related, then some of these steps might be about learning new skills or gaining new experiences, to enable you to apply for that promotion or that new job, for example.  

Learning new things, that feeling of having mastered a new skill, gives a great feeling of satisfaction and achievement.  Add together a range of these, plus the increasing realisation that you're now equipped to get that new job or move to that new sector you've had your eye on, and the journey can be as pleasurable as the destination.

Maybe 2012 is your year for looking around at the library & information profession, deciding whereabouts in it you'd like to be working, what kind of role and what sort of organisation, and setting about to collect the skills and experiences that will get you there?  Now that's a goal to get your teeth into for the New Year!  Good luck!

The Library Career Centre Launch Competition

** Winner Announced!! **

The winner of the launch competition of The Library Career Centre
is Imrana Ghumra, a Knowledge Manager from the Healthcare sector 

Imrana won a FREE CV Review Report

and said

"Wow, thank you!

I'll take a look over the weekend and then let you have an amended CV."

Event - ARA New Professionals Section - Summer Seminar

On Friday 19th August I spent a very enjoyable afternoon with the New Professionals Section of the ARA, listening to some interesting talks and running a careers workshop session.

First to speak was Dr Andrew Flinn, head of the archives and records management programme at UCL and also ex-chair of FARMER, who gave us a very enlightening talk about the factors affecting the content of archives and records management courses in the UK, and some ideas about their potential future direction.

Pressures include the massive increase in the range of areas and duties covered by archivists and records managers over the past 10 years, which means that a far wider range of skills are needed across the industry. However the time allocated to the courses hasn’t increased, and it has become increasingly difficult to fit everything in, and cover each to the required depth.

One solution to this issue that is emerging is to introduction of more specialist Masters courses (eg the one at University of Glasgow is more focused on digital continuity, while Northumbria University just does records management and not archives. Another likely scenario foreseen by Dr Flinn is that the current generalist courses offered by 5 of the 7 FARMER universities will move more towards a ‘core course + options’ model, with a higher number of more specialist options being offered.

These changes are leading to debates within the profession as to what should remain ‘core’ - in the past this would have undoubtedly included medieval paleography, for example, but now jobs for archivists have expanded beyond County Records Offices a lower proportion of roles call for this skills. Is there therefore a case for making this one of the specialist options?

After a lively coffee break with lots of networking and chatter going on round the room, we reconvened for the next hour and half with a careers workshop. I gave a talk covering what types of jobs the skills gained in archives & records management courses could be used for, where to find them, and how to decide which were the right one(s) for you, before focusing on how to write an effective CV and be successful at interview.

ARA New Professionals Career Workshop August 2011

We then rearranged the room into break-out groups (photo above) and people worked on firstly the layout, and secondly the content, of their CVs in groups of three or four. Those who preferred worked on some anonymised CVs, with common suggestions for improvements including:

• spend less space on the address/contact details
• use more bullet points
• move more relevant sections nearer the top

Once we had put the room back together into (more or less) neat rows of chairs, the final two speakers gave two very different but equally interesting talks. These slots were reserved for two new professionals to present, and one chose to talk about the specific archive in which they work, while the other gave an overview of all the different roles and responsibilities that now fall to the lot of an archivist, wherever they work.

Fabiana Barticioti of the V&A, who will be starting her Archives’ Masters course this September, gave us a multimedia rich presentation of her work with the dance materials archive held by the V&A. It was fascinating to see the dance choreography notation and then watch a video of a ballet dancer performing those particular moves.

Sarah Norman of the UK Debt Management Office, who qualified from UCL last year, looked at the Roles of an Archivist, which included:

• Lawyer (FoI and EIR requests)
• Project Manager (lots of funny terminology to get to grips with!)
• Procurement Officer
• Records Manager
• Stationer (from photocopying to supplying paper...)
• Detective (who, of course, knows where the files labelled ‘missing’ in the catalogue are to be found!)
• Line Manager (yes, even after 1 year’s experience)

Sarah said the role was a lot more varied, and more challenging, than she had imagined before hand, and with constraints on resources this shows no sign of diminishing.

As the members of the New Professionals Section got together to discuss what the members of this new SIG wanted from the group, I bowed out to go and catch my train. To round off a very pleasant afternoon the sun was shining, so I could walk along the Strand and over the bridge to Waterloo; in the daylight this time!

The Job Hunting Process

There are many steps to the job hunting process.

A successful job hunt may be defined as one which culminates in you getting offered a job which is genuinely a good fit for you.  A 'good fit' may refer to the organisation culture, to the opportunities for advancement the role offers, or to the new skills you will learn one the job.

How do you make sure that you have a successful job hunt, rather than risk ending up in a job you hate, or working for an organisation or manager that makes you feel despondant or frustrated?

Working through the steps on the job hunting pyramid illustrated will give you a head start.

Many people find the first step, self assessment, the most daunting, however.  Exploring the employment environment can also be taxing, especially if you have previously worked solely within one organisation or one sector of the profession.  Where do you start?

Working with a career coach can help you analyse your skills, evaluate your values, think through your interests and strengths.  Working with someone who is also experienced in the information industry means you can tap into valuable advice and insights on the types of roles available in the various sectors of the profession.

Moving up the pyramid, a coach can also help you draft a really effective CV, or give you tailored interview tips that fit the type of roles you are applying for.

Why Invest in Career Coaching?

Factors Impacting Your Job Hunting Success

Developing your career can be a job in itself.

It is a job that calls for its own specailised set of skills - unfortunately they aren't skills that are taught at school!

Analysing your skills, identifying your key skill set, communicating your skills and match to a vacancy effectively in a CV or on an application form, performing well in an interview, giving an effective presentation at a second round interview - these can all be daunting tasks.  Where do you start? 

Working with a career coach will help you in a huge range of areas. A career coach gives a more independant viewpoint than friends or colleagues. A career coach will help you:

• Carry out a skills analysis and identify your key strengths
• Assess which of the roles currently on the market are best matched to the skills and experience you've gained so far
• Clarify your career direction and job requirements
• Establish clear goals and plan a route to get there

Career coaching will also:

• Give you a CV review and critique, tailored to both the library & information sector and to your own preferences
• Provide individual interview coaching
• Give you mock interview practice and feedback on your performance
• Review any presentations you are asked to prepare, act as a 'test audience' and give you suggestions to improve content or style 
• Act as a 'critical friend' and sounding board for your ideas

It need not be expensive, and you may not need support in all of these areas, all the time.  One of the great benefits of career coaching is that you can 'pick and mix' the different options and book one 1 hour session, one CV review, or a series of sessions including skills analysis, CV critique and interview coaching - the choice is yours.

7 CV Blunders to Avoid

Setting out to draft your CV can be a daunting experience.  A blank sheet of paper awaits you, and you need to make decisions on layout, what sections to include, what dates you worked where.. the list goes on.

There are some blunders which crop up time and again, which you can avoid by paying attention to some quite simple tips:

1. Don’t write essays.   If you write lots of long paragraphs in your CV you are dramatically reducing the chances of anyone reading it.  Your CV is analogous to a marketing brochure.  It should send clear, straightforward and easy to digest messages to your intended audience.   
2. Don’t cram the space full.  Your messages will be lost if they are mired in a mass of text. Make sure you have a clear, simple layout using lots of white space, bold section headings and bullet points. Make your key skills easy to pick out, and relevant to the type of job you are applying for.
3. Don’t include a picture.  Unless you are applying for a job in some European countries (eg Germany), a picture or other graphics are only expected on CVs for the media industry and graphic designers.  Putting in a photograph just invites the person reviewing your CV to make subconcious judgements based upon your appearance.
4. Avoid using loads of different fonts or coloured fonts.  Multiple different fonts look messy. Stick to one font, and just vary the size for different levels of heading (eg Header 1 = your name = largest font size, then Header 2 = section headings = second largest size, then Header 3 = Company names = third largest size, etc).
5. Don’t lie.  Don't even be tempted to exaggerate the truth a bit.  It might get you the interview, but then you will be quizzed face to face and asked to give examples to demonstrate the skills you claimed to have.  Interviewers may also check out your online profiles and/or take up verbal peer references either before or after the interview.  Failing all that, if you get offered a job based on a lie, you will then be expected to perform to the standard you let your new employer to expect...
6. Don’t try and include everything you’ve ever done in your entire life.  While you need to avoid having gaps on your CV, there is no need to include the same level of detail about the bar jobs or retail work you did while a student as for your most recent information management role.  Devote more space and prominance to the most recent &/or most relevant skills and experience, which demonstrate your suitability for the jobs you are applying for.
7. Avoid being so generic that it could be anyone’s CV.  This particularly applies to the profile section.  While it's OK to use 'How to...' books and articles for inspiration, don't just copy down a cool-looking list of 'action words' to create your profile.  Make sure you write something personal, accurate and relevant to your skills, your career goals and the type of job you hope to get.

If you follow these steps, and if you have done a thorough skills analysis before putting pen to paper, you will be able to create an effective CV and raise your chances of securing interview invitations.

Effective CV Writing - where do I start?

Your CV is your personal marketing brochure – it should clearly demonstrate why you are the solution to the hiring problem faced by the employer.

If you bear this in mind as you set out to create or update your CV it will help you with all aspects of writing it – the structure, the content, the language to use and the best layout.

An invaluable exercise to do before you start putting pen to paper on your CV itself is a skills analysis.

Once you have a clear idea of the skills you have to offer, it is a good idea to prepare a skills matrix.   This equates each of your skills to an example showing how you demonstrated it.  You will be able to refer to this again and again throughout the job hunting process – writing your CV, assessing job adverts to see which ones suit you and preparing for interviews.

Influencing     -     Persuaded manager to do xx

Communication         -       Within a team

Organising     -     A collection of grey literature

Next you should think about which of the skills you have are particularly relevant to the job you are applying for – these should stand out loud and clear for anyone reading your CV.
Once your CV’s written, give it to a friend and ask them to pick out your key skills from it.  Don’t give them any hints!  Compare the skills they notice to the list you made of the skills needed for the job – do they match?  If not, your CV needs some more work!!

Remember, your CV is NOT a history of your life.  Your CV is your personal marketing brochure. 

With this in mind, you can see why you should NOT include:

·         Date of birth (age discrimination is now illegal in the UK)

·         Marital status (how does this show you are suitable for the job?)

·         A photograph (unless your physical appearance is a vital attribute for the job in question)

·         Number/ages of children (or pets) (again, does this have any bearing on your ability to do the job?)

Now you have a clear idea of which of your skills and experiences to emphasise in your CV, to match the job or type of jobs you will be applying for.

The next step is to decide on the order of the different elements, so that the most relevant are highlighted.

The key elements to include are:

·         Skills

·         Career History

·         Education & Qualifications

Other potential (optional) elements  you could include are:

·         Profile

·         Hobbies and Interests

·         Publications & speaking engagements

Within each element, make sure that the most relevant &/or recent item is placed at the top.  Within each item make sure that you order the bullet points so that the most relevant information is again at the top.

If you follow these steps, you will have made an excellent start to creating an effective CV which promotes you to the types of employer you are targeting.