Career Development Blog

How to Attract Recruiters on LinkedIn

LinkedIn just turned 10. Part of its staying power has been its use as an effective tool for recruiting talent. Are you using your LinkedIn profile to draw in recruiters—or turn them away. Here are some tips get results from your profile.

What's Your Networking Story?

Do you prepare for a networking event? Now until the end of June is the time for the last round of networking events before summer begins. You want to think about the ideal professional image to project. This is branding.

Be Like Albert: What Einstein Taught Us about Overcoming Setbacks and Learning

Thursday, April 18 marked the anniversary of the death of Albert Einstein, one of the most successful scientists of all time whose discoveries radically changed the way we understand the world of physics. He was also an inspirational figure well beyond the walls of universities and scientific institutes. Ever quotable, with a deep sense of humor and humility, he had a particular affection for children and their seemingly limitless curiosity.

Knowing Your Motivation Can Help You Find the Right Career

When offering career guidance, many experts advise people to follow a passion. The HBR Blog Network post, “The Key to Choosing the Right Career” contends that choosing an occupation that “fits well with your skills and values…and provides a good motivational fit for you” might work out just as well.

Your Contribution to Your Organization's Bottom Line

Engagement and retention are huge hot topics and buzzwords in today’s workplace, especially as the economy starts to heat up again. As a training and development professional, how do these two mandates impact your role and your activities each day?

Building Relationships Leads to Building Careers

Two recent posts on the HBR Blog network focus on how building relationships is major factor in one’s personal career development.

Tips for Becoming a Career-Friendly Organization

A career-friendly organization ensures that career development strategies support both organizational needs and employee needs. Here’s how.

Where are you in your T&D career?

We are truly looking forward to the publication of the 3^rd edition of Career Moves due out September 2013. Our book highlights the latest training and development trends and gives you the tools you need for the practical application of the revised ASTD Competency Model™. This blog is being initiated for ASTD members and other individuals to become aware of this new resource and the importance of managing your career.

What Skills Are Important in Training Today?

Authors Caitlin Williams and Annabelle Reitman are working on the 3rd edition of the ASTD Press book, Career Moves, which will be published in September. They’d like to hear from you about what skills are most important in this field. Help us provide some great input to Caitlin and Annabelle – there’s only one question to answer!

How to Prepare Your Social Networking Profiles for the New Year

Fine-tuning the details can make all the difference in a candidate’s 2013 job search. Here are four simple tips on how job seekers can improve their social networking profiles.

Four Strategies that Shorten a Job Search

The goal of a job search is to find a job quickly. Rather than getting entrenched in the process, jobseekers can use these four strategies to help them focus on specifics and efficiency—and save valuable time.

Hiring for the Best Fit, Not the Best Resume

Resumes are a key to the new employee selection process, however, it’s not the at the top of the list in importance as many people might think. Author of Stuck in the Middle: A Generation X View of Talent Management, addresses this major factor in hiring a new company team member. He further delves in to the subject by examining how recruiters and hiring managers can work together to find these best fits.

Using a Career Portfolio

A professional portfolio is a career development tool that can be used for a number of purposes. Most people think of portfolios as a way to demonstrate their abilities to employers and potential employers. Like a résumé, there is no one right way to create a career portfolio.

Listen Up! Memorable Career Advice

Since July, ASTD has been collecting stories from members about career moves they’ve made. Fifty-two respondents logged on and shared answers to the following question: What’s the best career advice anyone ever gave you? They generously passed along the wisdom that they had gathered over the years to create a summary of some best practice themes for others who want a successful and happy career.

ASTD Excellence in Practice Awards in Career Development

The Excellence in Practice category recognizes organizations for results achieved through learning and performance solutions. Awards are presented for proven practices that have delivered measurable results, and Citations are presented for practices from which much can be learned. Here are this year's winners in the Career Development category.

Career Wellbeing

Gallup researchers recently conducted studies of people in more than 150 countries to identify core elements that define human wellbeing. Their research is detailed in Wellbeing: The Five Essential Elements by Tom Rath and Jim Harter. Their findings describe the human experience from suffering to thriving in five universal categories of wellbeing: career, social, financial, physical, and community.

Help Wanted, Skills Lacking: Why the Mismatch in Today's Economy?

This report is the fourth from ASTD to cover the growing importance of talent to organizational performance and the skills gap that threatens so many organizations today. The 2012 edition of Bridging the Skills Gap updates the picture with the jobs outlook in today’s recovering economy, looks at the role of training and education, and explains the need for collaboration among all sectors responsible for filling the jobs pipeline.

New Survey Finds Employees View Career Development Vital

The vast majority (91 percent) of employees report that they view job training and development as vital, according to a new survey by career transition and talent development consulting firm Lee Hecht Harrison (LHH). Only 3 percent report training and development as a hindrance.

L&D Salaries Remain Steady at $75,000, Says 2012 ASTD Salary Whitepaper

In the 2012 ASTD Salary Whitepaper, ASTD and Salary.com collaborated to examine compensation for the learning and development (L&D) industry from the employer perspective. ASTD examines L&D industry salaries using Salary.com’s database of employer reported salary data covering more than 29 million individuals working at more than 16,000 U.S. companies. The national median annual salary for L&D professionals as reported by employers in 2012 is $75,814.

Best Time to Find a New Job is NOW!

Lifecycles occur in every organization and company, leaving openings for you. When you hear that there aren’t any jobs, read this list again. You need only ONE position, and the best time to look is when you are ready. If you’re ready, then the best time is NOW.

Career Conversation Starts with a Single Question

Career development is one of the most misunderstood management activities today. Too frequently it’s all about the forms, checklists, and annual deadlines. But genuine development doesn’t happen like that. It happens a little bit, everyday. And it happens thought conversation.

Career Development Is Not for Wimps

Since July, ASTD has been collecting stories from members about the scariest but best career moves they’ve made. A simple analysis of themes helped us summarize key ideas from the data collected. Who would have guessed that changing one’s field or industry would be the top scariest move to make?

The Career Development Paradox for Mid-Market Companies

There's an inherent paradox for human capital leaders: mid-market companies may have limited career paths, and promotional opportunities may not coincide with the readiness or desires of employees to move up or move out. Here are some career enhancement activities, and how can mid-market organizations implement them.

Overcome Recession Fatigue

Here's the best strategy I've found to push through that Recession Fatigue: Shift your energy to those areas that you do have some control over and concentrate on being successful in those areas over the next few months.

Five Quick Tips to Rock Your Network Online

Review your current social media and identify at least three action items from this list you can implement immediately. Bottom line: Make an action plan to effectively manage your online network.

Support: A Key Ingredient to Successful Career Transition

Career changes can seem daunting; however, people generally want to help. Being open to support, as well as being specific about your needs, are key ingredients to getting the help you need to make your career transition a success.

Career Considerations: Serendipity or Strategy?

Have you had one job, then the next, and then the next … some great, some good, some not so wonderful? Or have you taken a more strategic view of your career, deciding where you wanted to go and how to get there?

Be Visible and Valued

To make yourself visible and valuable, join organizations where your peers and potential clients or employers congregate, like ASTD. Be sure you avoid the biggest mistakes most people make.

Book Brief: Happiness at Work, Maximizing your Psychological Capital for Success

Are you happy at work? If that sounds like a strange question, it was to me, too. In 25 years in the workplace, no one ever asked me if was happy at work. Did you meet deadline? Is your job fulfilling? Are you satisfied with your salary/professional development/resources? These were all common questions, but no, happiness was not an “issue.” In Happiness at Work, Maximizing your Psychological Capital for Success, author Jessica Pryce Jones tells us that happiness matters.

7 Ways to Diversify Your Network

Diversity is its own reward. Moving into new worlds is sure to be interesting, but Ron Burt, a professor at the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business, says you can expect even more good things. here are seven strategies you can use to diversify your network.

How to Screen a Company for a Good Culture Fit

How does it feel to truly love the place you work, and does your workplace truly love you? Is a loving relationship between you even possible? To answer these questions, there is one terrifically central concept that you and your organization must adapt if you are ever to enter a mutually-loving relationship: a good culture fit. This lies at the very center of your happiness together, regardless of job titles, job descriptions, desk space, office views and all the other “hearts and flowers” that come with being in a relationship with your organization. The question remains: how can you screen a company for a good culture fit? Perhaps more importantly, how can you do this before getting in too deep and risking heartbreak?

Contribute to the Next Skills Gap Whitepaper

ASTD is updating its whitepaper on the skills gap and is looking for brief case studies from organizations.

ASTD 2013 International Conference & Expo Call for Proposals – for Career Development

ASTD is accepting speaking proposal submissions for next year’s conference in Dallas, Texas. An entire track will be dedicated to practitioners delivering learning and performance solutions for career development.

Summer Reading List to Boost Your Career

It’s summer. It’s hot. Co-workers are flittering off on vacations. Let’s face it: Some days it seems impossible to stay focused on the daily grind—much less direct your attention and energy on advancing your career. Enter the summer reading list. It’s not more work; it’s inspiration. Hopefully, these books will redirect your thinking, boost your spirits, and motivate you to take the next step in your career.

8 Ways To Become Part of the Inner Circle

Do you want to be part of your profession’s Inner Circle? A great way to start is by being a part of a professional association. Here are eight things you can do to get involved.

Twitter for Career Development

Twitter is a powerful tool that can help you develop strong networks to promote your career, but be mindful of how best to use it. Here are some best practices—and pitfalls to avoid.

The Seasoned Employee Skill Set

A new release, The Great Employee Handbook, provides a wealth of how-to advice aimed at helping readers become more productive and successful on the job. He divides the book into three sections aimed at the three “worlds” employees inhabit: the worlds of the boss, coworkers, and customers. When we’re able to master these skills, everything in our life goes more smoothly—not just from 8 to 5 but after hours, too. Here is an excerpt.

What's the Net Worth of Your Network?

Are you a smart networker? Take this quiz to find out. If you answer all 10 questions "Yes," you're a networking whiz. If not, use the tips to make your networking pay off.

Keys for Résumé Wordsmithing: Matching Keywords, Partial Keywords, and Keyword Logic

On a conceptual basis, job keywords make sense to everyone. However, when you dig into the details of how computers identify keywords, many challenges arise. I am going to explain the logic to clear up the confusion and hopefully start an ongoing discussion about keywords. I will use laymen terms to remove the complexity of understanding computational linguistics.

Get the Most Out of Networking at ASTD 2012

Get fired up to attend this year’s ASTD International Conference and EXPO! Here are some tips from career coach Wendy Terwelp to help you get the most from the conference through networking.

Ignite Your Job Search

The world of work is very different from the way we were brought up to believe. We can not rely on our employer to provide us with satisfaction in our job. In the highly competitive global economy in which we work, you need to look out for your own best interests.

Your Online Presence

Do you blog?

Do you have a detailed "Linked In" profile with at least 100 connections?

Do you Tweet or use Facebook?

If you answered no to even one of these questions, join the 21st century and build your brand NOW!

Welcome

Welcome to the Career Development Community of Practice! I am Jennifer Homer, manager of the community, and I look forward to engaging with you this year.

Be an Attractive Passive Candidate

Wouldn’t it be nice to never look for a job again? Highly successful people don’t look for jobs!

Career Coach Help

There will be several career coaches in the Career Center during the ASTD 2012 International Conference & Exposition waiting to assist you. If you’re wondering how you can benefit from working with a career coach, answer these questions.