December 12th, 2006. JibberJobber was barely 6 months old.  I talked about an idea that proved to be a turning point in my job search.  Even though I opted to end my job search, this one action provided the most results in my job search efforts, and it eventually led to my first couple of real job offers.

Go check out the post Substantiate Yourself.

How can you substantiate yourself?

Combine that with about 10% unemployment in the U.S. and you have about 30% of our workforce that cannot generate any, or enough, income.

I’d guess (with NOTHING to back this up, just a guess) there is another 10% who have moved from the gov’ts misleading stat of “unemployed” to whatever they move to after they run out of unemployment insurance, and we have about 40% of the population that wants to pay their own way but can’t.

I don’t know if this includes long-term, multi-generation welfare families… but I won’t even add them in since 40% is a pretty bleak number.

That is 4 out of 10 people.

What’s worse, it doesn’t include those who are UNHAPPILY EMPLOYED.

That probably covers another 50%.

Don’t ask me why people aren’t happy at work.  Maybe they don’t make enough. Maybe they don’t get the recognition they want.  Maybe they think they are destined for greater things.  Maybe they feel trapped.  Maybe their boss sucks, or their company isn’t green enough.

Maybe they wouldn’t be happy, no matter what.

But put that 50% on top of the other 40% and you have 90% of our workforce that is misused (is that a good way to put it?).

What’s the answer to unemployment and underemployment?

• Play the “numbers game” – send more resumes… etc?
• Find work out of state (I hear Detroit isn’t the best place to look for a job)?
• Wait for the economy to correct itself so there are more openings?

What’s the answer to unhappily employed?

• Look for another job?
• Start your own business?
• Quit and go live on a mountain?
• suck it up, do your job, and find fullfillment outside of the office?

The answer will be different for different people, and their circumstances… I don’t know what your answer was, but I’m working my tail off on “my answer,” which you can read about in my Multiple Streams of Income posts.

Whatever the answer is, I guarantee it doesn’t include you asking to meet with your boss or HR to see how secure your job is.  I can tell you how secure it is.

I’m not asking if you are afraid of FAILING, I’m asking if you are afraid of SUCCEEDING.

With success comes responsibility.  It might come in the form of money, or a title, or recognition, etc.

Sometimes I look at stuff people do and wonder if they are intentionally doing wrong things because they are afraid of succeeding.

Maybe the job seeker is afraid of getting the wrong job, even though they succeed at ending their job search… so they do the wrong stuff.

Maybe the business owner is afraid of getting that big sale, or growing their business to $x.

Back in school it was uncool to get the best grades, so we didn’t (I didn’t, but not for that reason :p).  We were afraid of succeeding because it just wasn’t the cool thing to do.

But now, as an adult, as a professional, as a strong contributor to society, it IS okay to succeed.

Are we still afraid of what success really means?

If we are not, then why don’t we change our actions so that we are positioned to succeed?

One of my favorite sayings is right in front of me… it was a gift from Heather Gardner when I spoke at her company:

what would you attempt to do if you knew you could not fail?

When I start out on projects that perhaps should fail, I read that and forge on.  How about you? (if this makes any sense to you, read Janet Thaeler’s post Whatever Your Fear Tells You – Do the Opposite (Seth Godin))

You know how I feel about “job security”… there is none.  Even those who do “everything right” in their career can get canned for one of a million reasons.

Even so, here’s a fun list from Rob Frankel… he created it for his employees to help them know what they could do to become more valuable, or as Rob says, to save their butts.  The full list is here… here are the first four:

1. When it doubt, don’t try to fake it. Tell the client you’ll check on it and call back. “Better to keep the mouth shut and be thought a fool, than to open it and remove all doubt”.
2. Make a copy of everything and then file it. That way, you can always prove what you were doing, when you did it and why you were doing it.
3. Tag everything with a job number. Suppliers need to tag their jobs with a number, too. The more you tag, the fewer headaches we have when clients or suppliers call us about particular costs.
4. Send clients back-ups. Whenever we bill a client, send a copy of the estimate showing that he approved the job he’s being billed for.
5. …  the full list is here.

Any of this ring true?

I usually don’t write two posts in one day but I figured I better close the loop on my last post, which was a suggestion to Obama on how to create jobs the democrat way.

Here’s my other-perspective letter:

Mr Obama,

You say we need to create jobs this year (2010).  Big priority.

Well, here’s what you do: GET OUT OF THE WAY.

Let companies do their thing.

Let entrepreneurs do their thing.

There are companies and people who are dying to fill the holes the federal government is trying to fill.

Stop using stimulus money to buy shares in Detroit companies. Instead, use that money to really stimulate the economy (not just to stimulate auto sales).

Keep the interest rates low (I personally don’t know what the implications are of this, but it seems like a really good idea).

Encourage creativity and foster an environment where entrepreneurs can take risks.  What if there were some way to distribute the money to entrepreneurs, instead of companies that are just too big to steer back into a good path that will be self-sustaining, create jobs, etc?

Tesla Motors is an example of an entrepreneur putting his money into redesigning the auto industry.

Please read Inc. Magazine.  Make your staff read it.  Put it on Air Force One, and in any other vehicles. Have it in government buildings.  The paradigm must shift from the bubble inside the DC beltway to what we experience outside of the beltway.

Also, read this short piece by former Secretary of Agriculture Ezra T. Benson titled The Proper Role of Government.  There are some scary things in there about what government should AND SHOULD NOT do.  It talks about the citizen’s role in all of this.  It is a terrific read and I’d love to know how much you agree or disagree with this. I think all of Congress should read and study this document (NOT assign it to their staff for a briefing).

I think that if you can just get out of the way we’ll get this righted.  There are thousands of stories about people filling a need, creating a business, and hiring employees (ie, creating jobs).  Here are two examples:

Jayson Edwards did the unthinkable: he opened a hot dog stand in a relatively small town in Utah.  He’s become a local legend and quite successful. He had to make sacrifices, but he found and need and fills it. I’m sure this sounds crazy to you if you are in a big city (D.C. or NYC), but it was unheard of in Provo.

Cloud Star Products is a company that apparently employees 100 people.  This company started when a couple’s dog was just not doing well – they eventually came up with a line of food that helps dogs with allergies (who’da thunk!).  I read about them in the Costco Magazine (article here).

You know what?  It is OKAY that these people don’t work for the government, and that they don’t work for a big company.  There is more to this country than that.  They are chasing their American Dream, and that has to be okay.

What can you do to help us pursue our American Dreams?  Remember, many of the big companies today are here because some guy or gal was alone and broke, but had a dream and a passion and the will to chase it.

Don’t trip the chaser.

This was harder to write than the first letter…. thoughts?

Yup, I jumped the shark and got political.  Don’t worry, I’ll balance it out with another post about how to create jobs the stereotypical republican way.

I need to clarify something, though. I think the average American who is very passionate about their political party really doesn’t know what it means to “be democrat,” or “be republican.”  If they knew and understood all the issues of both parties they might find they thought they were democrat when they were actually republican, or they thought they were republican but they favor democrat ideals.

Americans are just “funny” that way.

Another clarification: I am not very political, and not smart enough to be an economist, and I’ve never been in a think tank.  I did manage to get an A in Calculus, but I know I don’t know A LOT.  So this post might not make sense.

Here we go…

Mr Obama,

Want to fix the economy and create jobs?  I think this is the easiest solution, considering you are Democrat and you favor a big government.

I know you’ve dumped a lot of money into stimulus programs, which I don’t think is a good idea.  Some of that has gone into bonuses of people who got them because they have the right title, not because they have performed (that’s the way I understand it, anyway).

How about, instead of dishing out money that the U.S. doesn’t really have, you impose more government programs and regulation?

Let me give an old example.  Tax season is drawing near.  Imagine how cool and easy it would be if we had a flat tax (or, some other very simple tax system).  People could do their own taxes with a sheet of paper and a pencil – it would be uber-simple to understand.

In the U.S., however, we have an extremely sophisticated tax system.  I have an accountant do my personal and small business taxes because I don’t want to overpay, I don’t want to underpay, and I don’t want to get into any trouble by the feds (that would be you).

The problem, if we switch to a simple flat tax, is that many hundreds of thousands of accounting professionals would be out of work. The system and simplified regulation would make their roles obsolete.

We can’t have the government make something simplified to the point where it essentially lays off that many people.  Imagine the millions of people impacted (kids, dependent parents, etc.).

Let’s reverse engineer that example and figure out how to “create jobs.”

I have an idea that will really have an impact: Get your fingers into healthcare. It’s already a mess. I think it’s a mess because of the health insurance industry (not necessarily because of the medical services provided).

Remember, the goal here is not to clean up the mess, it is to create jobs.  So what I propose is that you nationalize healthcare, and impose all of the regulatory oversight that you can think of in this space.  Imagine how many tens of thousands of new jobs you’ll create!

I’m not talking about changing any of the medical service providers, rather adding all the employees we’ll need to make this a national solution.

Adding more government control in this area will provide new industries, probably, and increase the viability of regulatory professionals.  Just like the accountants who make a lot of money because of the IRS codes, you can create massive need for these other types of professionals.

Don’t forget the oversight arm, like the IRS for accounting and OSHA for safety, that will be responsible for taking care of violators.  This oversight arm could be really powerful and grow large (like the Border Patrol) and provide a lot more jobs.

That, I think, is the best way for the government to create more jobs – create more government programs that will require more governement employees (more jobs!) and create cottage industries to support it!

I’m sure your staff can come up with other areas where you can add more government intervention to create a ton of jobs.

What do you think? I’ll write a republican perspective later today.

I wanted to let you know that I’m only backing away from the premium subscription for a little while.  I start a new job tomorrow, one that I was able to land in no small part because of your JibberJobber career management software.  I was able to track several submissions I’d made to this particular employer, giving me a valuable history of my interactions with them.  That history allowed me to connect a few dots and that gave me an advantage I needed during the interview process.

This is the response he gave me when he downgraded from Premium to Regular.  I love it – last week I’ve had three JibberJobber users change their status from unemployed to I FOUND MY DREAM JOB!

That really thrills me.

JC ended his message to me with this:

[JibberJobber is] a great tool that I’d be proud to help plug for.

Thanks for sharing JC, and best wishes at your new gig!

Not on JibberJobber yet?  Sign up here.  Get on our next user webinar tomorrow morning (register here).

The idea is how every employee can make a difference on the bottom line and become indispensable.  As a business owner I’ve become hyper-sensitive to what we make and what we spend.  Here’s an example of the kind of thinking I think you’ll find in the book:

A legal assistant noted that the company’s beautiful color signature at the bottom of every email meant that every email she printed and filed (and in the legal department, that’s pretty much all of them) required at least two pages and a fair amount of expensive full color ink. For email strings between executives, the logo illustration could actually appear 2, 3 or even 10 times in the finished document she would need to print out and file. By simply eliminating the logo for intra-company email the hotel could save several thousand dollars in paper and color ink every year. But even more impressive, when employees used the PPG (Profit Proposal Generator) to calculate the equivalent level of sales it would take to equal the profit their savings produced, they were astounded. A savings of $25,000 a year in ink, paper, and unnecessary office supplies is pure profit—and in a company with a 5 percent profit margin, it would take $500,000 in sales to produce that same profit!

Reminds me of a time when I was driving across Idaho with a coworker who said “Do you know how many toilets had to be cleaned for us to go to this conference?” We worked at a building maintenance company, with lots of janitors, and she was referring to the cost of our activity compared with the revenue brought in.

I expect to get my copy soon – here’s how you can get yours:

1. Answer a question (see below) in the comments on this blog post (not on Facebook),
2. Someone judges the questions – in this case, the author Larry Myler  is going to be the judge!  He’ll announce a winner before we do the next giveaway next Monday.
3. Larry will send his book to the winner.

If you aren’t the lucky one to win the book you can get Indispensable by Monday here.

Here’s the question (ANSWER IN THE BLOG POST):

Give an example of something extraordinary (not amazing, but out of the ordinary and perhaps even creative) you have done to make a significant impact on the top or bottom line at any company you have worked at.

OR

Give an example of something extraordinary that you have seen someone else do (same question but you can use a coworker).

BONUS: In addition to the answer you’ll already give, tell us something extraordinary a government worker could do to make a financial impact.

Go for it and good luck!

Thanks to Kristian Andersen for putting this together

In LinkedIn they call it a Professional Headline.

Some call it a tag line.

It is the bite-sized value proposition… I might get bored listening to your poorly-crafted 30 second elevator pitch, but I can’t help but digest your 5 Second Elevator Pitch.

One of my favorites is from Carol Fletez, who is an IT professional in the D.C. area.  Look at how fantastic her 5 second pitch is:

This might not mean anything to you but I used to work in a mainframe environment.  Mainframes are cool and powerful, but many times you feel like you are in the bedrock era.  Carol’s very simple phrase…

Helping Companies Migrate from Mainfraimes to the Future!

… is just clever! It brought a grin to my face, and immediately I assumed she has an expertise in legacy systems and new stuff, and marrying the two. Anyone who has been around mainframes will know what this means.

Guess what?  She also has this sentence on her email signature – she is getting that branding in multiple places (as she should).

What is YOUR 5 Second pitch?