How Many Hours Should I Devote to My New e-Business?

Starting a new business doesn’t necessarily require quitting your day job and becoming fully immersed in your new venture – unless you can afford to do so. Most people can’t afford to just drop everything and devote 100% of their time to developing or managing their new online businesses. The video below gives some guidelines and points you in the right direction to learn more.

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How Do I Start and Build My Own e-Business?

Last year, or maybe two years ago, my father and I attended a seminar presented by a company that hosts and maintains Web sites for people who want to start online businesses. As someone who was once a small-business owner, he knows what is involved in such a venture. But what about those people who are interested in starting their own e-businesses but don’t have a clue where to start? The video below will point them in the right direction.

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Do You Have Adult Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD)?

We hear a lot about ADD and ADHD (Attention Deficit Disorder and Attention Deficit and Hyperactivity Disorder) these days. It used to be these diagnoses were only applied to bouncing-of-the-walls children. Now, just about every adult you talk to will say, “I’m SO ADD! I can’t stay focused on anything.” But is it really ADD/ADHD or just the modus operandi that describes how we currently function in our stressed-out work and home lives?
In a recent Wall Street Journal article, “Mind Games: Attention Deficit Disorder Isn’t Just for Kids. Why Adults are Now Being Diagnosed, Too, Melinda Beck says, “How do you know you have ADHD, which experts compare to having a mind like a pinball, with thoughts flitting in multiple directions. Maybe you’re just overcaffeinated and overworked?”
If you can relate to “having a mind like a pinball,” how do you differentiate a real ADD/ADHD diagnosis from a chaotic work style or work environment? As the article states, getting a definitive diagnosis is tricky, even though children have been diagnosed and treated for years.* Continue reading …
This is a post by Nancy LaFever. You can read more from her at the Centre for Emotional Wellbeing blog.
Article courtesy of Andrew G.R. and jobacle.com – your cure for carbon copy career advice!

Should I Learn Internet Marketing and Business Skills?

You don’t have to be an aspiring entrepreneur or small business owner to benefit from learning about Internet marketing or business; however, if you are planning to make a career out of self-employment via the Internet, then learning as much as you possibly can is a good idea. The video below tells you how and where you can get started.

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Is There Life After Rejection?

I’ve been looking for work lately and it’s bleak out there and because I’m a “glass half-empty” kind of gal, it started me thinking about rejection. I haven’t had the chance to be rejected (or accepted) since I’ve not been asked to interview for any positions to which I’ve applied. Rejection stirs up all kinds of bad feelings. No matter how confident you are, your self-esteem takes a hit.
A recent article in the Wall Street Journal, “Before They were Titans, Moguls and Newsmakers, These People were…Rejected,” by Sue Shellenbarger examined how successful people, including Ted Turner, Tom Brokaw and Warren Buffet, responded to being rejected by their first college of choice. Often, after receiving that rejection, going to a different school led them to their eventual career path. In fact, some of their most impressive achievements can be traced back to that early rejection. Shellenbarger quotes Buffet, who was rejected by Harvard Business School at 19, “The truth is, everything that has happened in my life…that I thought was a crushing event at the time, has turned out for the better. You learn that a temporary defeat is not a permanent one. In the end, it can be an opportunity.” Continue reading …
This is a post by Nancy LaFever. You can read more from her at the Centre for Emotional Wellbeing blog.
Article courtesy of Andrew G.R. and jobacle.com – your cure for carbon copy career advice!

Entry Level Jobs With Blippy

We all have that friend who shares way too much information on social networks, and in many cases we are that friend. The problem with status updates is that most of them aren’t very interesting. Lately, we’ve been moving in a much more interesting, but also much creepier, direction. Now we have services that tie into our Twitter and Facebook accounts that can tell people where we are, whom we’re with, and even what we’re buying. It’s that last one that we’re going to talk about today. Blippy is a Palo Alto, CA based startup that lets you and your friends share and discuss recent purchases. It may seem a little weird at first, but it makes sense. Why go to review sites to get reactions from people you don’t know or trust, when you can see what your friends have bought and what they have to say about it?
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Article by Willy Franzen of One Day, One Internship and One Day, One Job

Entry Level Jobs With VICE

I spent a few hours poring over an issue of Fast Company that includes their list of “The World’s 50 Most Innovative Companies.” It is loaded with companies that I’d never heard of, so I picked out the most interesting ones and checked to see what their job opportunities looked like. Luckily, I found quite a few prospects, so you’re in for some really cool stuff over the next few weeks. One of the companies that I found was VICE, a New York City magazine and media conglomerate that publishes a “superedgy hipster bible.” Their content is about as safe for work as American Apparel advertisements, which is partially because AA is one of their main advertisers. The interesting thing about VICE is that they are a huge company–they have a print circulation of nearly a million magazines and their sites get 3.5 million monthly unique visitors. This has sparked growth from $45 million in revenue in 2008 to $64 million in 2009.
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Article by Willy Franzen of One Day, One Internship and One Day, One Job

What’s Yext in Your Career? Perhaps, an Entry Level Job.

This is a sponsored post for Yext. Check out our editorial post on entry level jobs with Yext to see what we said when we first covered them. Just make sure you use this link when you apply.
A [little while] ago I got a tweet from Ashley Hajduk, a recruiter at Yext in New York City. She said, “Thank you for creating such an awesome site! I found my job at Yext through you and just got promoted to recruiting and hiring!” I was excited by the news, so I decided to get Ashley on the phone to chat about how we could work together to create more Yext/One Day, One Job success stories. She brought Yext co-founder Brian Distelburger in on the call, and he told me all about how Yext is ravenously hiring entry level Sales Associates. We’ll get to that in a minute, but first let’s talk about what Yext does.
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Article by Willy Franzen of One Day, One Internship and One Day, One Job

Internships With Man Made Music

Like I told you before, I have a ton of new companies to feature thanks to Fast Company’s list of “The World’s 50 Most Innovative Companies.” It may not have been one of the lists that I mentioned in my article 9 Magazine Lists That Will Help You Find a Job, but I’d certainly add it if I were writing the article again. Today we’re going to take a look at Man Made Music, “a unique bi-coastal music production company and Sonic Brand consultancy with an extraordinary team of young music and sound design talent, well-known composers, music supervisors, programmers, club DJ’s, musicologists and brand strategists.” By bi-coastal, they mean New York and LA, obviously, and you can’t really talk about Man Made Music without mentioning their founder and President, Joel Beckerman. He’s been in music media for nearly two decades, and he rolls with big names like John Legend, Morgan Freeman, and John Rzeznik. Continue reading about Man Made Music…
Article by Willy Franzen of One Day, One Internship and One Day, One Job

How To Work at Home

Overall, working from home can be a positive and rewarding experience for you, your family, and your employer, if you follow a few simple tips:
1. Understand your employer’s expectations. Will your job requirements and duties be the same at home as in an office environment? How much support will you receive as a home office worker. Some companies have very stringent guidelines about what equipment and support will be provided by the company and what they will not. Companies will often provide a computer and telephone and will support each, but not a printer or a fax machine, for example. It is important to clarify where your company stands and what they are willing to negotiate on.
2. Be sure that you meet (and/or exceed your employer’s expectations) and make sure your boss knows that you are consistently doing so. You may work 9, 10, 12 hours a day, but it won’t matter if your boss doesn’t know it or you don’t get the anticipated results! How will you communicate your efforts and results to your employer? Don’t rely on them to evaluate this. Your performance, or lack thereof, may not come up until there is a need for a scapegoat or something goes wrong…
3. Set up a comfortable, separate space for your work area. This is critical to your success as a home-worker. Your space should be relatively free from distractions such as family, pets, home telephone, the television, even an attractive view if you are new to telecommuting. You should have a good quality chair and large monitor if you are primarily working at the computer (who isn’t!).
4. Make sure that you have everything you need to do your job at home. A computer, workstation, phone, printer and fax are a given. BUT, you will also need paper, ink cartridges ( you would be surprised how quickly these seem to need to be replaced, even in a “paperless” environment), possibly letterhead, pens, sticky pads, etc. Think about many of the things you use in your office and the well stocked supply cabinet there. Will you visit the office periodically to replenish these common items or purchase them and be reimbursed. Iron this out in advance.
5. Set boundaries with your family and friends. This is pivotal not only to your success at working from home, but to your personal relationships! When you first begin telecommuting friends and family may not understand the demands that this requires of you. A friend whose sitter cancels may call you for a favor, “Can you watch the kids, since you are working at home?” You may get invitations to lunch or drinks, which down the road you may evaluate that you can work into your schedule periodically. In the beginning, you need to be careful to set a tone for your family and friends as well as good work habits for yourself.
6. Set specific work times or goals. Daily, weekly, monthly, yearly and beyond. Goals are important to keep you on track as well as to validate your progress. Working at home can be very positive in terms of autonomy and independence, but it can be lonely and unfulfilling without the regular feedback that comes from working in an office. The telecommuter needs to feel confident that he or she is doing what is necessary to be viewed as successful and to feel secure in his or her job. Paranoia can set in pretty quickly without the regular input of fellow coworkers.
7. Stay connected. It may be a good idea to start out telecommuting just a day or two a week and increase gradually from there. This will provide you the opportunity to slowly transition how you will communicate in a more natural way. You will find that you and your coworkers may email or call more often to stay in touch. You will determine which issues and/or coworkers to attend to and which to not. Increased productivity due to decreased coworker distraction may be a major benefit to working from home.
8. Schedule daily and weekly breaks. Many home workers find that they spend too much time at the computer which can decrease overall productivity. Schedule breaks into your day. Take a regular lunch (at any time you want – no one is watching!) and stand up and walk around periodically. You might find it helpful to set an alarm in Outlook or other calendar to remind you to move away from the computer. Telecommuters may not realize that they are squinting at the screen, are hungry, or, even, have to use the restroom when they get too engrossed in their work.
9. Understand your work style. It is crucial for you to understand how you work best. Do you work best according to your moods? If so, keep track of your tasks according to task type: computer work, telephone work, meetings, etc. This way you can perform these tasks when you are at your best.
10. Track your work and progress. Your employer may have a specific way for you to track your time. It may be as simple as emailing your supervisor when you start and stop your work. It may be a more elaborate time tracking system where you record your specific activities in time increments or journal style. It may be a good idea to keep track of what you are doing in more detail. It may come in handy if you are asked to justify your time or when you would like to ask for a raise.
11. Assess your progress weekly. It is important to organize your work in such a way as you are able to quickly and clearly see what you have accomplished. Often, this is accomplished through effective use of a calendar system like Outlook In some industries, the billable hour or journal system (even a combination) are standard. However you approach it, you need to be able to clearly determine you are on target to reach your goals.
12. Make adjustments to how you accomplish your job. If something is not working, don’t be afraid to change it. As a telecommuter, you may be a pioneer at your office, company or industry. No one may have all the answers. Invest time researching ways to improve your productivity. Don’t be afraid to ask, “Is there a quicker, better, more effective way out there?” Seek it out, albeit carefully. Don’t jump on the first bandwagon that comes along. Try it out tentatively -not all solutions meet all users’ needs.
13. Ask for help or input. Have regular meetings with your boss or coworkers. These meetings could be weekly, monthly or quarterly. The meetings may be more frequent to begin with. Talk to others from a similar field who also telecommute. Use social networking to stay in touch and obtain advice in answer to a question or before you ask it. Be selective about which groups or lists you sign up for or follow. You don’t want social networking to become a distraction rather than a way to stay in touch and obtain input!
14. Take care of yourself. It is hard to do your best when you don’t feel your best and especially hard when you don’t have regular input from others! Get up at a regular time and get dressed. Have your breakfast and coffee before work if that is your habit. If you usually brown bag it, pack a lunch to eat when you are ready. Meet coworkers or friends for lunch periodically if you are in the habit of this. Set regular breaks and quitting time. Avoid the temptation to work when it should be family time and remember to exercise and go to bed at the appointed hour.
Article by Mary Sevinsky
Courtesy of the Recruiting Blogswap, a content exchange service sponsored by CollegeRecruiter.com, a leading site for college students looking for internships and recent graduates seeking entry-level jobs and other career opportunities, and posted on I-CareerSearch.