Every week I check dozens of “career” blogs and other online publications, looking for things that will help you find a job, get promoted, develop your skills, and keep everything in perspective and balance. Here’s the pick of the lot for this week. I’m pointing you to items about using Twitter in your job search, mid-career change for women, three times you should lie at work, becoming MVP material, and learning and hireability.

From the Wise Job Search: Five Best Ways to Use Twitter for Your Job Search!
“Twitter can be a tremendous, fast moving tool in your Job Search Toolbox.  Here are 5 ways to get the most out of it.”

Wally’s Comment: Searching for a job is one of those challenges where the more of the right people you’re connected to, the more successful you’re likely to be. Here are five specific ways to use Twitter to improve your job search.

From the Wall Street Journal: Career Women, Remade
“If you’re a mid-career woman who wants to make a change, where should you begin? Columnist Alexandra Levit on how you can reinvent yourself.”

Wally’s Comment: This is a good rich piece that’s worth a read even if you’re not a woman and even if you don’t want to “reinvent” yourself. Read it for the idea value.

From Penelope Trunk’s Brazen Careerist: Three Times You Should Lie at Work
“Everyone thinks transparency and authenticity are great. But sometimes you need to rein them in. I’ve talked about how I do this with my blog, which is really an example of how I rein myself in at work. There are times we each have to do this at work, and in some cases, we need to lie.”

Wally’s Comment: Mostly I find Penelope Trunk’s posts to be strident, “look-at-me-I’m-edgy” pieces. But this post puts that self-conscious edginess to good use.

From Fistful of Talent: Lessons from LeBron: Are You MVP Material?
“Dr. J, Michael Jordan, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar – - and now LeBron James.  Named MVP of the NBA, LeBron is the 3rd youngest to ever win the award and quickly credited his coach and teammates saying, “Individual accolades come when team success happens”.  He had incredible stats on the offensive end and finished second in the voting for defensive player of the year.  Not too shabby. While LeBron has many “natural” advantages (6′ 8″, 250 pounds and faster than a Cajun at a crawfish boil) his mental focus, work ethic, knowledge of his competition and commitment to team are the key drivers of his success.  Sound familiar?”

Wally’s Comment: Kathy Rapp draws good parallels between success in a sports career and success in another kind of career.

From HR Observations: Constant Learning is the Key to Hireability
“To stay employed today you not only have to have a current skill set you also have to be acquiring a new one.”

Wally’s Comment: The reason you hear so much about the importance of lifelong learning and development is that it’s important. Really. It’s characteristic of those MVPs that Kathy Rapp writes about in the post just above and top performers of all kinds. And it’s more important than every right now. Mike Haberman tells you why.

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 14th, 2009 at 8:17 am and is filed under Tools and Strategies for Success. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.