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Peter Weddle - known for his authoritative work on on employment sites showcased on weddles.com - has written a novel on how three protagonists navigate the new world of work. It's called A Multitude of Hope. His thesis is that, with the demise of the corporate ladder, we are on the verge of a work renaissance, where talent and continuous learning and training are the determinants of career success. While being interviewed by coaching pioneer Susan Whitcomb, Peter, somewhat surprisingly, didn't repeat the common mantra of the age:

"Follow Your Bliss."

Popularized by Joseph Campbell, this is the instruction commonly given to people who are unhappy in work. Having been interested in the world of work for decades now, I have always veiwed such a proscription with a touch of skepticism. I know it works out for some. Some are able to follow their bliss and still make the money they need or adjust their lifestyle to match their new income stream.

But, for many, there is a difficult tradeoff between what they would love most to do all day and the job that will bring them in enough money. So, what did Peter say? He said that your work should be at the intersection of your talent and practicality.

Although talent isn't identical to what you love to do, the concept is the same: for work, find a situation where you can use the particular subset of your talents and/or bliss activities and also get paid what you need (your assessment). Also, find a job that provides you with the challenges and opportunities for growth that will maintain and sustain you over time.

Take the musician who works in Whole Foods' award-winning cheese department during the day, but plays the gigs she loves to play at night and on weekends. She also loves cheese and relating to people. So her day job pays for her first bliss, music. And Whole Foods is a company that provides the team-centered and customer service work she enjoys and also an opportunity to earn a wage that has the potential to inflate significantly over time, even if she doesn't progress up the ladder of promotions.

In another instance, a Director of IT has worked in the insurance industry for a decade. He loves IT, but not insurance. So he lands a job working for a charitable organization he is passionate about and where he has volunteered his time. He gets to exercise his leadership and IT talents, follow his bliss, and make the money he needs, even though compensation is less than in insurance.

This issue comes up a lot in career branding and personal branding, areas that I work in. It's critical, in helping my executive clients to get their next great job, to find the sweet spot where their personal brand and their career brand and requirements live.

Peter Weddle's book promises a lot of very interesting ideas about the world of work. This is just one of them. How have you found a way to strike a balance between your talents, your bliss, and your need for practical rewards?

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Have you been wanting to improve your LinkedIn Profile without tipping off your employer, boss or peers that you are looking? A number of people I talk to are reluctant to fully utilize the potential of LinkedIn for job search for fear of getting questioned or fired by their employer. It's a legitimate concern. Some companies do keep an eye on changes employees make to their profiles and may view them as red flags.

So what do you do? Here are some strategies:

1. Before your make any changes to your profile, go into Settings and under Privacy Controls turn OFF your activity broadcasts. Then, when you are finished, go into Privacy Controls again and turn it back on.

2. Make changes only incrementally. One week you may punch up the accomplishments under one job. And do that for each job title only once a week.

3. Let the dust settle, then tackle your Professional Headline. To optimize for job search, get your keywords in there: your target title and industry, and your value proposition - all in under 120 characters! :)

4. Then here comes the trickiest part - the Summary. Here is where employers most likely will be able to see if someone is suddenly looking for a job. So handle your profile diplomatically. There is a way to do this that does not scream, "I'm looking for a job!" Write it from the point of view of someone who is happy and contributing at their current employer. Use the name of the company right from the start: "At Neptune Associates Universal I proactively align technology with business requirements. My own passion for providing superior customer service is a good match for Neptune's commitment to overdelivering on every promise."

5. The following week complete your Skills & Expertise Section - paying close attention to including the keywords that people are likely to be searching for in your space.

6. Continuing to space your changes, build out the rest of your profile. You are aiming for 100% complete (LinkedIn will tell you when you get there.) Request new testimonials, list interests and books read, consider using available apps to show a PowerPoint presentation you created or a video of you speaking as a thought leader in your field, etc.

7. Once you have your Profile complete, start to expand your activity on LinkedIn by sending out invitations to connect with people on an ongoing basis - including with folks in your function and people at companies where you would like to work. Join groups where thought leaders, recruiters for your function and/or industry, and your target companies hang out.

8. Exercise care in sending invitations to connect with recruiters and hiring managers. Also, use caution about joining job search groups. Since people can see the groups you are in as part of your profile, stick to professional groups with a focus on increasing knowledge in your space.

9. If you tweet, join your Twitter and LinkedIn accounts - again, after an interval of time has passed.

If you follow these steps, you will be changing your LinkedIn content so gradually that, although at some point people may say to themselves "What a great LinkedIn profile!" - they will not be able to pinpoint exactly when the changes happened. What they will see is a loyal employee who has the good sense to build out his/her profile in a rich, highly professional way.

Recruiters and hiring managers will see the same things - and that will work for you too! The biggest mistake you can make is holding off on the process of optimizing your profile for job search. Your LIP is where everyone will go when considering you for a position. Good luck!

Have you been wanting to improve your LinkedIn Profile so employers and recruiters can find you without tipping off ? Here's how:

How to Optimize Your LinkedIn Profile for Job Search Under the Radar

Most people approach the matter of submitting their resume with some trepidation - certainly with the sense that there is some mystery surrounding whether a recruiter or hiring authority will, in the first place, see it at all and, in the second place, act positively on it. And so much rides on whether they do! Success or failure can make the difference between getting an interview or not.

So, what should a resume be these days? Everyone knows times have radically changed in terms of job search and recruiting. Old-fashioned networking is still a good way to get a job. But companies and job seekers alike are finding new opportunities for networking and search on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and other online networks. And the increasing use and sophistication of applicant tracking software (ATS) has put a premium on knowing the keyword rules.

But there are a couple of tests you can run your executive resume through that will give you an idea of whether yours is ready for prime time. The first has to do with whether a human being viewing your resume will be inclined to put it in the Yes pile. The second has to do with whether your resume has a good chance of being retrieved electronically so the recruiter will actually see it.

Test #1 HUMAN EYES

Can the reader figure out your unique selling points in 4 seconds? Since you have ONLY 4 SECONDS to make an impression, is your resume set up to be visually accessible and with critical key content that will motivate the recruiter to contact you?

Test #2 ELECTRONIC RETRIEVAL

Does your resume have the keywords and formatting that will enable it to be retrieved in an electronic search by a hiring authority or recruiter for a specific job?

If you've answered "Yes" to both #1 and #2, read no further. But if you've answered "No" to either, keep reading for 6 quick pointers on effective ways to get your resume to pass both these tests.

HUMAN EYES - 3 POINTERS

1.Customize your resume for each opportunity. State your career brand - your unique promise of value for that specific opportunity - right at the top under your contact information. If you don't know what yours is, look through my earlier posts or contact a Certified Personal Branding Strategist like myself for help.

2. Use the target title (as listed in the ad) somewhere in your profile, and use the core competencies required for the particular job somewhere in your profile, preferably in text or in columns/lists if you have too many. This is important, because when a human being scans your resume, s/he will be looking for a match with their open job.

3. Make your top accomplishments stand out visually. For instance, in the experience section below your job title, select the one stand-out contribution you made when you held that particular job title. Then bold it, box it and/or graph it. And use numbers! Then there will be just 3-5 such statements over your whole career that the eye will have to process. Take advantage of the 4 seconds you get to whet the recruiter's appetite for reading about the other accomplishments for each position in more detail!

ELECTRONIC "EYES" - 3 Pointers

1. Identify the keywords in the ad. They will be the required and desired titles, skills, degrees, training and technologies listed. Try to include them in the text portions of your resume as well as in lists/columns. Newer, more sophisticated ATS systems can identify keywords in context and may drop or give less value to lists.

2. Save your resume in ASCII/text format. This is because the formatting you use in your Word version may not translate well, therefore making your resume very hard to read. To save a Word doc as a .txt file, choose Save As from your drop down menu under File and select "text only" - then clean it up and save.

3. Keep your section headings simple and obvious in your ASCII/text version: Summary, Work Experience, Education. The ATS is geared to look for these. If it doesn't recognize a heading, it may well drop that whole section, deep-sixing your resume's chances.

Although all of the above may sound daunting, make every attempt to render your executive resume both people- and machine-friendly. Swing the odds in your favor!

Job boards have something in common with lawyers and dentists - people have decidedly mixed feelings about interacting with all of them! I've seen job boards go from being the solution to someone's job search in the early years when Monster first began to dominate, to being the hopeless black hole of desperate job seekers to - what exactly, now?

Following up on Louise Garver's interesting blog post discussing the new hybrid job boards, I started thinking about who wins with job boards and how they do it. We all know - and many job seekers have experienced - the fruitlessness of applying to jobs on job boards in general. This is because:

1. Once the idea for an open position reaches HR and then gets formulated into a job ad for posting, you become one of a mass of applicants, often hundreds. That means the competition is fierce. Much greater than in other forms of job search.

2. Nobody is 100% clear on how to write their resume so that it gets picked up in a search. Because search is what it's all about. Automation, not human eyes, determine the winners who will get interviewed. That puts a premium on getting the right keywords for the ad, a science in its own right. And that means customize every resume submission!

So why bother with job boards?

1. Despite all the recruiter activity on professional and social networking sites, a significant percentage of companies still hire from job boards. So, if you're not a senior executive, you may as well devote a limited time each day or week to customizing your resume to the specific jobs that are a close match with your skill set and background.

2. Some job boards are trying to play catch up ball to places like LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook. They are endeavoring to create industry and/or function-relevant conversations that take place on their site that enable recruiters to convey their employment brand and job seekers to become know to each other and recruiters.

The second IS NOT A SMALL THING if it's really happening. The idea is that both active and passive job seekers alike are actively interacting with others on the site (social).

What is it? Networking in just another guise. We all know how important networking is.

But what is the reality?

Here's a review of three job boards:

Dice.com, a premier site for technology and IT jobs, allows you to sign up for Talent Communities broken up by technology or geographical area. And job postings are also posted within your talent feed. You might sign up for cloud computing, mobile development, or Ruby on Rails. You can check the mashup daily. If you find an active group, engage with it regularly for high-quality networking.

Monster.com has "communities." They say that top ones are in Art, Nursing and Education - but when you click through there are not obvious user interactions going on. They have SalesHQ where there appears to be some conversation.

CareerBuilder says they have Talent Communities. The link doesn't come up.

Indeed.com - a jobs aggregator - has active forums organized by job, city, company etc. - it seems as though users are providing support and answers. 717 people responded to a question about medical coding. 5,000 to a question about an airline group interview.

TheLadders.com has no obvious ways for users to interact meaningfully.

The result of my fast and informal screen of top job boards? At this point in their attempts to become hybrid social, they fall far behind LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter!

My advice? engage, engage, engage in...

LinkedIn Groups, LI Questions & Answers

Twitter Monitor and contribute to relevant areas: #Your Field or Function or Job. Follow recruiters and companies. Become involved in Twitter

Facebook friend companies, recruiters, and employees you want to know and be known by.

A few weeks ago I opened an eBay store and became an eBay seller for the first time. This is a sideline to my regular business, a way to indulge my avocation. It has been a very steep learning curve for me - how to set up a store, how to list and upload images, how to take good photos, how to source and price products, identify vendors, and engage with buyers, etc.

But I can tell you that in just a few short weeks I can see that the level of customer service you provide is everything on eBay. Here is the reason why it's important to provide exceptional customer service as a seller:

If you don't, your seller rating - number of stars and percentage of satisfied customers - goes down and people may not be willing to buy from you. Your rating is very obvious and a key reason why customers decide to trust you. People with Top Seller status, dependent on their rating, in part, get more traffic and can charge higher prices, because their service is known to be trustworthy.These are some ways that can help you get a good rating on eBay:

• Have positive email interactions with buyers.
• Ship out your products by priority mail - 2-3 day delivery.
• Do it within 48 hours of receiving payment.
• Contribute a percentage of every sale to a charity of your choice that is displayed on your page.

With eBay, you learn that it is critical to respond to customers POSITIVELY, VERY FAST, AND EVERY SINGLE TIME. I am struck with the almost-pleading requests many Top Sellers and others make to prospects/buyers below their product description. It goes something like this: "Please, if there is anything you don't like about the product, the shipping, or our communications, tell me first so that I can fix it. Do not just give me a negative rating. Let me make it right. Customer service is VERY important to me."

With your very livelihood at stake, you have to prioritize customer service as a critical value on eBay. So what does this have to do with job search? If you interact with your social networks, LinkedIn, your contacts at companies, interviewers, recruiters etc. with the level of customer service eBay conditions you to, you will be noticed, you will be remembered. How do you do this?

1. Respond to email and phone messages FAST.

2. Send out thank-you notes or emails IMMEDIATELY.

3. Communicate REGULARLY, CONSISTENTLY, AND POSITIVELY.

4. GO OUT OF YOUR WAY to meet the needs of the other.

5. Do your work and engage with other to a STANDARD OF EXCELLENCE.

6. Do 1-5 EVERY SINGLE TIME.

So customer service in your job search shouldn't be just one aspect of the process. Make it ALMOST EVERYTHING - and see what happens. Maybe 5 stars, 100% satisfaction, and Top Seller status will translate into the job of your dreams.

Executive at a crossroads

Let’s call him Jesse. His story is a hypothetical example, but one that is not uncommon. Jesse has done all kinds of great things. Wonderful quantifiable achievements. And in several industries – IT, Manufacturing, Consulting. Clearly, he’s loaded with talent.

So, he’s 45 or thereabouts. And he wants to apply at the VP level for positions that might come up in any of those fields. The trouble is, is it too late for that?

When is he deemed to be too far along in his career (code for too old) to capture a senior management position in any of those fields?

Talk of  “ transferable skills” is everywhere in media stories about job search. This idea is offered as a panacea for how to get a job in a different field than the one you're experienced in.

Don’t get me wrong! I’m a believer that many people could successfully cross industries and even be more effective because they are deeply familiar with more than one sector.

But that’s the truth from the individual’s point of view.

The truth is the common faith in the transferable skills idea most likely isn’t going to hold any water from the perspective of the hiring authority or recruiter any more, at the executive level. And this is, in part, because the whole world of candidate selection has changed.

Before 2009 or so, the candidate pool was pretty much limited to the recruiter’s contacts, referrals, and perhaps people who had posted their resumes on a job board or corporate website.

But, since LinkedIn has become a premier database of professionals, recruiters now have access to profiles of both unemployed and employed executives. And I have heard recruiters in two panel discussions say that they are now able to hire candidates who possess 10 out of 10 of their requirements. The old, pre-LinkedIn number was 7 out of 10.

What this means for Jesse is clear. If the recruiter can find someone who has 25 years of experience in one industry, and probably is even more narrowly specialized in the desired industry niche, that person is going to be selected over the executive who has 7 years in 3 different industries.

So, if you are 35 and thinking about your next job, know that the industry where you land may well determine the industry you will reside in professionally for decades to come. It will simply be too difficult to switch industries at the more senior levels.

This is not to say that it’s impossible. If you are able to tap exceptionally strong, well-placed personal connections or if you are a well-known superstar you may be able to make such a move at 35 or even 45.

But I encourage my clients to commit to an industry as soon as they are able. Ideally 30, 35. If an executive is 45 and has split experience between 3 sectors, I encourage that individual to strengthen his presentation of his most recent experience and go after positions in that field. And this is the advice I would give to Jesse.

So the word to the wise today is: play the field if you want to in your twenties, but settle down in your 30s. Don’t count on your skills transferring to get you a job. Develop the core, desired skills that recruiters will be requiring. Keep your eye on your goal a couple years down the road and manage your career accordingly.

Facebook is considering launching a job board. How you react to this information in a Forbes' blog post may well impact your success in your job search some day soon:

Facebook Jobs Could Kill LinkedIn's Momentum

So, will Facebook eat LinkedIn's lunch re job search and recruitment? Never underestimate the power of the 900M-active-monthly-users Gorilla!

Can I tell you what the percentage of the time my tech exec clients say they steer away from Facebook? Approaching 99%.

Time to play catch-up ball! Already Facebook has job apps such as Glass Door and JobVite. With a new job board/aggregator, it will be a force to be reckoned with. Don't think recruiters haven't noticed the huge database that is Facebook. They have, and companies are already using Facebook to build a recruiting and employment-brand presence.

LI is still the #1 source with 89% of companies having hired people using LI. Only 26% have hired via Facebook. But those numbers may be about to change.

So get ahead of the curve. Establish a public profile on Facebook where you can post mostly professional activity. Or, if you have a personal profile that adds to your brand rather than subtracts from your hireability, begin to insert professional updates.

Being on Facebook doesn't have to be ugly! And it may well get you a job one of these days.

Has anybody told you...

You MUST have a 1-page resume. Not true! The Career Directors International survey of recruiters, HR managers, and career coaches/resume writers shows that most people care more about the quality of the material than the length of the resume.

You MUST not go over two pages. NO, see reason above.

You MUST have a QR code on your resume. NO, so far there is no indication that this practice is catching on in a big way; if you put one on your resume, only some will click through.

A video resume is the way to go. NO, with 25% saying they would not view one and 13% saying they would, don't go out of your way to make one.

You don't need to be on social media. NO, Only 27% of people said they don't or rarely use social media to check out a candidate before deciding to interview them.

So, what should job seekers do in a positive direction?

• Get on Facebook!
• Get on Twitter!
• Create a branded 100% complete LinkedIn Profile! Add apps!
• Write a resume of 2-3 pages that has excellent content.
• Visually present information so that the resume can be scanned in 1-2 minutes.
• Extend your online identity footprint; make your content on other sites support your personal and career brand as expressed on your resume.
• Take advantage of online opportunities for visuals: LinkedIn's slide app, Pinterest, youtube, etc.

Get in gear for the new job search with these suggestions!

The LinkedIn Profile is now the cornerstone of your career communications. It is gradually, along with other social media sites and Google results, supplanting the resume as an introduction to you as a job candidate. For those of you who are writing your own profiles from your branded resume, I have put together 5 critical tips:

1. Your Professional Headline

- Make sure you have the title you are seeking in your Professional Headline. You can usually find the title at the top of your resume.

- If you can fit it into your allotted 120 characters, include a “reason to hire.” Your “reason to hire” is your value proposition, the value your bring to the table ($$ in revenue enabled, $$ costs cut, functionality improved, etc.)

2. Summary

- The summary is different from the profile on your resume. Keep it to no more that 3-4 short paragraphs.

- Make it less formal than your resume. Use your own “voice” to express your career brand* and your personal brand**.

- Present a quick overview of your career, particularly the last 8 years. Avoid going into detail.

- Include the top accomplishments – if possible, in terms of dollars or percentages.

- Let your personal brand shine through.

3. Skills & Expertise

- Populate your “Skills & Expertise” section with the keywords appropriate to your job target. These are often the same as the skills list that is part of your resume profile.

- Build these keywords into the Summary in a natural way as much as you are able.

4. Experience

- You want the information under the workplaces to be shorter than in your resume.

- Select your most standout contributions. You will find them standing out in your resume. Write them up using bullets.

- Include a brief snapshot of “Scope” – Number of reports, budgets managed, chief areas of accountability, etc.

5. Recommendations

- Get recommendations from people you work with or have worked with: bosses, reports, colleagues, vendors etc.

- Give them some ideas about what to write. Get these from your resume. Anything they can say that will reinforce your brand or one/many of your accomplishments will make your profile even stronger.

* Your Career Brand & **Personal Brand

- Your career brand has to do with your position (title, function, industry) and what you uniquely bring to the table (value proposition).

- Your personal brand has to do with the qualities of your personality, character, and style that are part of what make you successful.

Character Limits

Headline: 120 Chars

Company name: 100 Chars

Summary: 2000 Chars

Skills: 25 skills up to 61 Chars each

Position Title: 100 Chars

Position Description 200 Chars minimum, 2000 max

Interests: 1000 Chars

If you're like me, you spend much of your waking hours at a computer, sitting down. If you're like me, you spend much of your time in knowledge work of one kind or another. That's why I was struck by a TED talk by Alanna Shaikh: How I'm Preparing to Get Alzheimer's.

And if you're like me, you also get along quite well in a state of denial about getting AD*. Nevertheless, I will pack away in my brain, somewhere near where I keep such denial, the points she makes.

She is doing three things to help her when/if she gets the disease, apart from diet and exercise. Having watched her father's decline, she is rightfully sensitive to the possibility that she may have inherited a tendency to the disease. Although you don't have to have a relative with AD to get it. I'll talk about the first, because it's particularly relevant to knowledge workers.**

1. She is learning to do things with her hands, knitting and origami, because the hands remember even though the mind forgets. Her father, a bilingual college professor, loves to fill out forms (meaninglessly but happily), now that his mental higher faculties are gone.

Perhaps I'll try to pick up one or another of these again in a spare (?!) moment. Even though I'm sure I won't get Alzheimer's (see * above). What would you do?

** FYI: Here are the last two. 2. She is using her body actively in new ways in order to hold onto coordination and balance as long as she can: tai chi, yoga. 3. Becoming a better person. Her father's good heart shines through even though his mind has deteriorated.