Actually, I usually hate it. It drove me mad last year, in the heat of my job search.

Why? Because I felt that most of it didn’t apply to me. For some reason, whether it was the city I lived in, the job titles I was going for, my background, my personality, or the income bracket I needed, the articles I read just didn’t do it for me. After a while, I got really frustrated - “oh no, another 10-point list that says to do these things and I’ll be successful.“

Really, I just needed someone who could pinpoint my problem. I needed someone to reach through my laptop and yell, “Jason! Your resume is keeping you from interviews because you put all your stuffed-shirt titles (like CIO, general manager, vice president) but you are applying for jobs at lower levels (like product manager, project manager and even business analyst)! Change the titles to be more general, or generic, because you are scaring off the hiring managers and confusing HR!!”

I would have replied with “ya but, I want them to see how cool and accomplished I am!” And the response would have been something like “You can be cool and accomplished, or you can start getting interviews, which do you prefer?”

That’s what I needed to hear. That was the biggest problem in my job search. If I had that I would have had a nice job over a year ago (and JibberJobber would have been nothing more than a dream).

But I never read that anywhere. I just read articles on what to wear to an interview (ironed clothes, dark and matching socks, etc.), how to interview (always ask them questions to show you are smart and prepared), and those magic lists that seemed to promise “do these 10 things and your wildest career dreams will come true.”

Sometimes we can do it on our own, taking a few hours to learn and apply. But sometimes it makes sense to get help. I just spent four action-packed days with resume and career professionals in Savannah, and it was… incredible. This is my second conference with many of these professionals and I am always amazed at what drives them, and what their value prop to a job seeker is.

I’m hooked - I’m a believer. Sure you can do it on your own, but if you are stuck, seriously consider getting help. It can be free (you can get free help from the state, or a religious entity), or you can find a professional that specializes in what you do. For example:

Kim Batson specializes in C-level and senior technology (IT) executives. She gave a presentation about IT resumes that taught me about my own industry - she knows her stuff!

Deb Dib specializes in senior-level executives who are entrepreneurial and want to make a difference in the world. Deb is very respected in the industry and helps her peers and her clients get laser-focus to acheive what they really want, with tools, techniques and strategies.

Susan Whitcomb has written a number of books on resume, job search, interview, etc. She has researched and studied this stuff for years, and even certifies coaches in an accredited program she developed - Susan knows how to find out what your problem is and help you develop the right solution.

Claudine Vainrub specializes in educational consulting and helps you get into the schools you want. Her clients have called on her services to get into Harvard and other top-league schools … she has “been there, done that” and instead of taking a gamble on getting in, you need to check out what she can do for you!

My point? There are lists, and there is generic advice. But sometimes what we need is more than a list. We need a guru that can draw on experience and wisdom, someone who understands hiring trends and tactics, and someone who can identify our own issues. If you are stuck, or know that you want to accelerate the process for that next great step in your career, check out one of my partners (all four above have partnered with JibberJobber).

A few weeks ago I announced the Career Management Toolbox that I’m working on, with significant input from my partners. I said it would be live and available within a week … and then got busy on my book! Nonetheless, I received some excellent feedback and resources from my partners and thought that I should get this rolling out right now.

There is a new “page” (that’s what a blog calls something that isn’t a “post”) called Career Toolbox. You can always find it by mousing over Pages and then clicking on Career Toolbox. I really want to call it Career Management Toolbox but that was too long for the menu :(.

This looks very elementary right now, without many links. But you’ll get a chance to see what I’m thinking. There are a number of resources that I haven’t put in yet and will be fleshing it out over time - for now I need to work on my book (I need to send the first draft to an editor this weekend!!)!

If you have any suggestions on what other topics or resources should be in the Career Management Toolbox, please let me know! You can leave a comment here (I turned comments to that page off).

(if you haven’t found the other four links to the Career Management Toolbox yet, click here to check it out ;))

The National Networker!

The National Networker provides free newsletters to over 15,000 subscribers that are interested in various aspects of networking. I really like how they have divided up the interests between local and topical subjects.

The local networking articles are written by Bureau Chiefs, covering various regions of the U.S. (and one chief for Canada).

The topical articles cover the following topics: Career Transition, Entrepreneurial, Politics, Sales & Marketing, Minority-Based Networking, Financial Services, Women’s Networking, Legal, Social Networking, Arts & Entertainment, Sports, Technology, Real Estate, Health & Wellness and Network Marketing.

In addition there are big-name “contributing writers” that are major players in networking or sales success and training.

It is an honor to be the Career Transition Editor - and I’m proud to announce my first article (I personally think its REALLY cool): How To Be Visible - Virtually.

I hope you enjoy this article, and I encourage you to read through some of the other articles sent out this week (you can find them on the front page of TheNationalNetworker). Also, note on the top right there is a “Subscribe Today” button where you can subscribe and get the newsletter in your e-mail. Of course, I encourage you to subscribe to the newsletter

Here are links to the blogs that I found of the other writers:

TheNationalNetworker Blog

Jane Greer - All in favor of TRANSPARENT COMMUNICATION, jump! - one of the cleverist bits of writing I’ve seen. I love reading Jane’s stuff - its witty, very smart and refreshing.

Lori Richardson - Sales Coach on AllBusiness.com

Mark Sturgell - Intersection of Purpose and Now

Zale Tabakman (Canada) - Create Sales Success From Your Marketing Efforts - Today!

Matthew Best (Politics) - writes at Courage of Conviction

Maria Elena Duron (Minority-Based NetWorking) - The Buzz 101 - Attraction Brand© Coach- “where connecting gets personal”

Nancy Laine (Social Networking) - Powerful Intentions - the Law of Attraction community

Question: What do JibberJobber, NetSuite, SalesForce.com and JigSaw have in common?

Answer: We all integrate the Anagram software so that you can easily enter data to our systems!

Note: this is FREE for regular and premium users. Please continue reading to see how it works (its super easy).

Anagram is one of those cool little programs that makes your life easier - basically it allows you to copy and paste data into a box and have it auto-populate the entire form.

On the Add Network Contact page there is a new box on the left (see image above). You can copy and paste an e-mail signature, or a block of text from a chat or a website or anything into this box.

Then, click on the “<< Fill Out Form” button and Anagram will take this information and fill out the Add Contact form - its that easy!!

Is this cool or what? Go check it out, for me this reduces the amount of time to create a new entry from 60 seconds to… 10 seconds!

Please be a little forgiving with this feature - I found that some signatures are not optimized for the Anagram logic so I had to do a little more copying and pasting once the form was filled out.

For example, I had “CEO, JibberJobber LLC” which all went into the Company field.

The easiest way to fix this is in the big box, put each thing on its own line. So after I made it look like this:

CEO
JibberJobber LLC

and then it went to the right boxes.

Is this cool or what??? (yes, I’m excited!)

To try it for yourself just add a new contact (Network, Add Contact). The box is on the right. Note that you can even just type things in this box and then hit the “Fill Out Form” button, instead of tabbing through the form.

What? Don’t have an account on JibberJobber yet? Why not?? Go get one for free.

In my post yesteday announcing my new relationship with a company that specializes in helping you rollover your retirement accounts into a personal account, here is more information…

Yesterday I had a question/comment to my post from David Grubman:

But Jason…. you can roll over your old retirement savings plans (401k or 457 or 403….) to any qualified IRA. Not sure I get the unique value proposition of these guys.. you can do the same with Vanguard or Fidelity.

Good question… I’ll let the CEO (Brandon Small) answer it:

Absolutely. You can rollover to anything - from anything. But neither Vanguard or Fidelity do the tracking. And the paperwork leads many to not do their rollover.

I’m not saying we invented the wheel. But we are focusing our efforts on a specific niche. It’s like your site, there are other “similar” sites, but you do it differently - choosing to focus on topics you think are important.

I’ve found Brandon’s service to be exactly what I needed. When I went through this process I had a number of questions to ask, and he had the time and knowledge I was looking for. I didn’t want to be sold a complementary service… it was very straightforward, but he respected my “unique situation.” I like service providers that provide… old fashioned service. I can vouch for Brandon and his company.

Here are a few more “details” that came up:

401k Accounts only??

No, that is my myopic name for “retirement savings account”… it applies to various plans, which you can see on their website. When in doubt just fill out the form and they’ll get back to you to discuss it.

What is the cost to do a rollover?

On the transfer (rollover) we are charging nothing nor does the client incur any cost.

How does Rollover Express make money (I get this question all the time):

The fee is between .5 % and 1.5 %, charged quarterly - so 1/4 of that will be deducted as a fee (from your principle (total assets)) every 3 months.

Most advisors that provide fee-only have a minimum of $150k to $200k. We have no minimum - this is a function of our lower costs and competitive edge. This is the preferred fee structure for investors.

What is your motivation for serving me, as a client?

We charge a flat annual fee for managing assets, .5-1.5%. Commission advisors charge 4-6% upon investment. Because of this compensation structure we are naturally service centered, not sales centered. Fee-only is also the direction most advisors are going.

Discount brokerages, like ETrade and TDAmeritrade and Scott Trade, charge for every transaction - like $10 for a stock trade or other, but you get no investment service/advice.

I asked my LinkedIn network (using the new Answers feature) and got some outstanding replies and information - here’s one that I think it really noteworthy, from Frank Galea, CFA, who is a Mutual Funds Compliance Manager:

The only hitch is that you would not want to commingle rollover funds with additional personal contributions because the latter will not be eligible for rolling into a future employer plan and can lead to accounting headaches to figure out ratio of eligible vs. non-eligible funds.

One of the answers I got on LinkedIn was from David Craker in Australia - it kind of suprised me:

Jason, this is a global forum, please remember this… A 401k is nothing that anyone else is interested in other than the USA… We do not have these issues and constraints by the US Government rulings in Australia unless we are directly US citizens that need comply with this for the USA… Here we are ruled by Australian Taxation Office, possibly the Corporations Act and Australian Securities and Investment Commission if it involves investments.

Why did this surprise me? The point of this entire topic is managing your own career, which includes planning for and managing retirement. I don’t care where you live, or what great company that you work for that has a great retirement plan (can you say E-N-R-O-N??) - I don’t even pretend to know the options in other countries - but my message is FIGURE SOMETHING OUT. Don’t leave this to an employer, or a government. You can if you want, but I’m a little skeptical after my experience last year of getting booted out the door. I’m all about figuring out what YOUR plan is for YOU.

Is this interesting? Do you have a plan? If you are in the US (thanks for the reminder David) then go fill out the form and get the ball … er, rolling

Last year I wrote an article about having a “master 401k account.” Its based on the idea that you’ll change jobs (employers) nine times before you retire, and I thought it was quite ingenious So here’s the basic idea:

You get a job and begin to invest in the 401k program. The company matches a certain amount and if you are lucky there is no vesting period (which means that you “own” the amount the employer contribute from day one). Two years later you change to a new employer… what happens with your 401k?

Your new employer will likely encourage you to roll your last 401k over, and keep it all in one place. They’ll probably have different policies, perhaps there is a two year vesting period. The policies and fees will most likely be different than the one before, and if you care then you’ll get to read through a bunch of legal documents to see how your retirement money will be handled.

For the average worker, repeat this seven more times. Sound fun? Not to me.

So my article, which is in the JibberJobber library (just login and click on Library, Articles), talks about having a personal master 401k account. The idea is simple, and its all based on taking ownership of your career (in this case, your retirement).

Find a service provider that you trust that will help you take your 401k account(s) and roll them all into one master account. This is completely independent of any employer account. Each time you change employers you don’t have to worry about rolling the 401k into the new employer’s outsourced service provider — you just roll it into your own master 401k account.

I still strongly recommend taking advantage of a company 401k account, especially where the employer matches the contribution!! Don’t miss out one a 100% return on investment! But managing all of these accounts… blah!

What if you could just fill out a simple form and your 401k will be rolled over into a personal master account? Actually, you can.

I’ve partnered with Rollover Express (an Invested Interests company) and personally went through this process last year. When you go to RolloverExpress.com and fill out the form, you’ll be contacted by a specialist in rollovers… the process is simple, painless and quick. And the customer experience I got was awesome.

I wanted to go through the process and work with them for a while before I promoted them, or partnered with them, but now I feel very confident in recommending their services.

Now I’m no expert in finances, but this seems to be a very smart move in managing your retirement money.

If you have any retirement accounts just laying around (from previous employers), go sign up at RolloverExpress and begin the process to create your master 401k account. Make sure you tell them you came from JibberJobber!

I’ll blog later on some specifics in a process like this, but there is NO COST to you to do this. There are plenty of financial advisors that will charge you to fill out the paperwork and submit it - this is a no-cost transaction for you. And it was a no-brainer for me.

What are you waiting for? Go sign up now - its just a “contact us” form, and they’ll get back with you to get more information.

Be sure to let me know how it goes.