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from Lifehacker by Jason Fitzpatrick WhatsTheCost is a financial calculator designed to show you how much something really costs you over time, whether it's your mortgage, credit card debt, or even your pack a day cigarette habit. Photo by Andres Rueda . Looking at the short term picture when it comes to debt and expensive hobbies or habits can be a real money sink. WhatsTheCost is a simple financial calculator that lays out the long term cost. There are calculators for loans, mortgages, rate changes, savings, credit cards , debt snowballing, and even smoking and drinking. Curious about costs? A pack a day at $5 a pack costs you $1,825 a year. If you're unlucky enough to be a smoker in New York City, the taxes there mean you'll spend $4,015 per year to keep the habit up. A car loan for $10,000 at 7.5% over 48 months actually costs you $11,605. A mortgage for $150,000 at 5% over a standard 30 year repayment plan will cost you $289, 883. The calculator just gives yo...

from Lifehacker by Azadeh Ensha Photo via YouthCentral.Vic.Gov.Au So you've sent in countless resumes and finally landed yourself an interview. Now what? The Harvard Business Blog suggests seven rules to follow next time you're face to face with your potential employer. Harvard Business Blog's David Silverman suggests, for example, that apart from shutting up and listening, you can "answer the question you wish they'd asked" when being interviewed. This means pre-empting your interviewer instead of waiting on them to ask follow-up questions like, "What did you do at your last job?" To the extent that companies appreciate employees who exhibit some initiative, anticipating rather than waiting for the next question can place you in a more favorable light. And as much as you'd like to come across as polite, taking this leap can serve you well in the interview process. Among the post's more obvious tips? Dress the part and show interest. ...

from WebWorkerDaily by Pamela Poole In a recent conversation with some Internet pros about different aspects of personal branding, one thing really struck me: we all fell into one of two opinion groups. One group thought personal branding is natural and necessary, while the other group felt that personal branding is icky. I'm convinced the reason those in the second group feel that way is down to the use of the word "brand." It's the baggage associated with that word that gives "personal branding" a bad name. So let's not call it that. Instead, let's call it "image" and talk about what it is and what it isn't (or what it shouldn't be). But first, some basics. You are being Googled. If you haven't done so lately, do a vanity search and try to objectively assess the impression people will get when they see the results. Who's Googling you? Potential partners (of the love and work variety), clients, investors…all kinds of pe...

from Dumb Little Man - Tips for Life by DLM Writers Trademarks are often some of the most valuable assets of a business – legend has it that Coke® is the second most well known word in the world after "hello." The Google® brand is estimated to be worth more than $20 billion. A trademark is a brand name, logo, or slogan that distinguishes your business' products or services from those of competitors. Regardless of how big or small the business, the value and protection of brands is critical, particularly in the online word of today where domain names and user names (such as Facebook® and Twitter®) can be key to connecting with customers. To help protect your brand(s), here are five basic steps to strengthening your trademark protection: Choose Wisely The more creative your brand name is, the greater the odds that it is unique. A more distinctive and create name or slogan is generally more capable of standing out among the competition and becoming a brand with real va...

Here are a few articles for those seekers and a few for those trying to keep theirs. How to keep your current job more satisfying ? It could be that you need to manage your manager . Integrity matters especially at work. Should you make the perfect elevator pitch , or maybe you think that they are dumb . Look better and get a job, while you still have one . It could be that you just need a sustainable existence . Do you treat the job search like, err, well a job search or maybe they are just not into you because an interview is a lot like dating . You might need help navigating online job postings . Clearly you should use the 5 essential pre-interview strategies because what you don't know can kill your chances for landing that new job . Why not just outsource your job search ? You don't want to leave your current job and burn bridges , do you? Are you ready for jaw droping interview questions , or 8 fit questions and their fatal mistakes in the interview. It cou...

from WebWorkerDaily by Georgina Laidlaw Written by Georgina Laidlaw . A friend of mine told me today that he just can't work from home. He simply cannot do it. This guy enjoys his work, he likes his team, he's great at what he does, and he feels a sense of responsibility to his employer. It made me wonder: What makes him incapable of working from home, when others have no problem at all? What is it that we remote workers have, that others don't? 1. Discipline You knew this was going to be first up, and it's probably the single biggest factor in remote working success. Discipline isn't just about staying focused when it's a nice day outside and no one really knows what you're doing. It's also about keeping reasonable and appropriate working hours, and keeping commitments outside of work as well as within. Generally, I think of discipline as the thing that lets you hold up your end of the deal you made with your employer, as well as the one you mad...

from WebWorkerDaily by Meryl Evans Is your LinkedIn account mostly sitting idle? You can do so much more with it than simply look up contacts: find gigs, sell products, expand your networks, grow your business and gain free publicity. Here are 33 ways to use LinkedIn more effectively. Fill out your profile completely to earn trust. Use widgets to integrate other tools, such as importing your blog entries or Twitter stream into your profile. Do market research and gain knowledge with Polls. Share survey and poll results with your contacts. Answer questions in Questions and Answers : show expertise without a hint of self-promotion. Ask questions in Questions and Answers to get a feel for what customers and prospects want or think. Publish your LinkedIn URL on all your marketing collateral, including business cards, email signature, email newsletters, web sites and brochures, so prospects learn more about you. Grow your network by joining industry and alumni groups re...

from Brazen Careerist by Pete Kistler image via realworld101.org As students are eager to begin a successful career after college, it is very essential they know how to interact with coworkers in their work environment. According to Susan Solovic, co-founder and CEO of SBTV , and author of three books, "It's a social environment as well as well as a work environment. However, you must remember: While you can be friendly and develop a good rapport, business is business and friendship is friendship." That is to say, socializing with coworkers is all well and good, however, there are certain topics that are not appropriate for discussion in a work environment. To help maintain a steady and successful career after college, here are some things you should never say or converse in the workplace: 1. "That's not my job." It is only inevitable that you will be asked to perform tasks that are not necessarily part of your job. If someone asks for your assistance...

from JobMob by Jacob Share Positive action verbs make your resume achievements sound even more impressive. Use this long list of action verbs to make your resume sizzle. All the resume action verbs you'll ever need In alphabetical order: Accelerated Accomplished Accounted for Accumulated Achieved Acquired Acted Activated Active in Adapted Addressed Adjusted Administered Advanced Advertised Advised Advocated Affected Aided Alerted Allocated Amplified Analyzed Answered Anticipated Applied Appointed Appraised Approved Arbitrated Arranged Arraigned Arrested Articulated Ascertained Aspired Assembled Assessed Assigned Assisted Assumed responsibility Assured Attained Attracted Audited Authored Automated Awarded Balanced Billed Blazed Boosted Bought Briefed Broadened Budgeted Built Calculated Campaigned Captured Carried out Cataloged Caused Centralized Chaired Championed Changed Channeled Charted Checked Clarified Classified Closed Coached Co-directed Collaborated Collecte...

from Brazen Careerist by careerrocketeer Too many people treat their job search as if they had an MBA from Harvard. They send their resume or apply online for an appropriate job opening and wait for the phone to ring. Unfortunately, most of us don't have that highly valued sheepskin, or some other "bell ringer" that will jump off the pages of our resume to reliably cause recruiters or hiring managers to call. So the rest of us have to be more proactive in our search. The key, especially in today's job market, is to always remember that a job search is a Sales Process! For many people that aren't in a sales career the thought of having to "Sell" is frightening. That fear often comes from a misperception of what a good sales person does. Good sales people don't fit the stereotypical "˜Used Car Salesman" persona. They don't deceive, gush false flattery, manipulate, or exude a "large personality". A good sales person is rea...

from Brazen Careerist by Pete Kistler Believe it or not, twitter is more than just a place to tell the world what you had for lunch. With over 6 million current users, it's a perfect place to take your job hunt. By adding to the conversation, twitter can help you: Gain credibility in your field Build meaningful professional networks quickly and effectively Introduce new opportunities and land a job However just like LinkedIn , simply joining twitter will get you nowhere. You need to develop a well-defined strategy catered specifically to your needs. Here are four easy steps that will get you well on your way and the tools that will help you get there. 1) Create a focused, targeted profile The first step is creating your presence on twitter. Everything about twitter is short and concise. Your profile needs to say everything important about you in the time it takes to read half a sentence. Dan utilizes the background to include more info about him. #1) Claim your twitter...

from Brazen Careerist by Charles Gilkey image from i.ehow.com Odds are, if you're reading this, you've probably checked your email a few times today. And I have a couple of questions for you: Why are you checking your email? What's in there that will really make a difference to what you're doing for the day? Take a second to think about your answers. If you say "I don't know," keep reading. If you have a good reason, keep reading. While I've got you thinking about email, I'd like you to think about checking email. I'll say this in very clear terms: the only time you should check email is if you're anticipating receiving a message that answers some specific question that is relevant to the task at hand. Hold onto that thought while I answer an objection that just popped up for a lot of people. But email is the way my employer communicates about what work needs to be done?! If you're in a work environment where people use emai...

from  WebWorkerDaily  by  Georgina Laidlaw Written by  Georgina Laidlaw . Finding work on the web isn't easy. The time I've spent looking for work on freelance job sites has always left me fairly underwhelmed. OK, that's a huge understatement. I dislike having to sign up for different services to access the details of the jobs they're offering. I loathe having to wade through the reams of alerts I receive from each one. And I can't be bothered trying to remember which ones require me to buy a subscription in order to pitch for jobs, and which ones don't, as well as all the other little nuances of each service. I can safely say that so far, my job search subscriptions have  not  paid off. For me, the tedium and frustration of tracking all these individual subscriptions has far,  far outweighed any value I've obtained from them. Last week I wound up just trying to search direct through Google in a desperate attempt to find the kind of project I w...

from  MakeUseOf.com  by  Tim Watson A lot of us here at MakeUseOf use  Skype  to get in touch with each other. Skype, for those who may not know, is a Voice-over-Internet Protocol ( VoIP ) service which allows unlimited free calls between users using the  desktop ,  mobile  or  iPhone  application. If you pay for Skype credit, you can call out from Skype on your computer to normal phones (wireless or landline) at a discounted rate. Also, for an additional cost, you may get a "Skype-In" phone number, which is essentially a Skype number disguised as a local land line, so that all calls to that number will be forwarded to your Skype account, allowing you to take the call anywhere and on any computer with Skype installed. This benefits the caller — if Skype is not available, he/she can always contact you simply by dialing a local number. It's a cool thing to have, but outside of this site's staff I don't have much use for the service (many of my friends ar...

by  Kevin Purdy LinkUp doesn't offer the most results in the  job search  game, but does claim to have better and more up-to-date listings because it works with companies' own posting sites. Companies don't pay LinkUp for their postings, but simply agree to let LinkUp's scraping tools run down their corporate site and pull job listings from it. From all those Career/Opportunities/Join Us pages, LinkUp claims to have 21,185 companies polled nightly for new openings, and doesn't charge searchers anything to click through and apply. Obviously, you don't get to post a resume for everyone to browse, and there aren't social networking tools or the like. It's just an RSS-friendly, regularly updated database, and it seems like a must-add for any online job hunts. Looking for more tools and tactics? Try our compiled guide to  nabbing the job you want. LinkUp is free to use, doesn't require registration or email verification. LinkUp Job Search Engi...

from  Brazen Careerist  by  kirstypiper Guest post by: Lauren Berger,  The Intern Queen T he economy is down. Spirits are down. Hope is down. And most careers are down. What is left to help turn things right side up again? What can military wives do to change careers and turn over a new leaf ? Internships can be the solution to the problem. What better way to bridge the gap between one career and another than an internship? Internships are no longer just for college students. Even as an internship expert, I tried to fight the sudden surge of internship interest from Baby Boomers and candidates that have graduated college some years ago. Termed the "Alternative Internships", professionals have started searching for internships in today's economy as a means to transition from one field to another. People are starting from the bottom all over again as interns, ready to do whatever it takes to get back on top. Why should you consider interning and how can you fi...

Posted on July 7, 2009 by BioJobBlogger Amber Johnson at Job Profiles suggested that BioJobBlog readers might be interested in this post about Twitter and job searches. While I can't personally speak to the utility of using Twitter as a job search tool, it certainly can't hurt to give it a try in today's challenging economy.  100 Useful Twitter Tools and Feeds for Your Job Search If you're searching for a job, surely you've learned about the extensive amount of tools available online to help you land your perfect position. But did you know that Twitter is the hottest job search tool out there today? It's true -- employers, recruiters, and job search sites are flocking to the service. Check out this list to find tools and feeds on Twitter that can be a great help to your job search. Search Use these tools to search for the jobs being posted on Twitter. TwitterJobSearch : With Twitte...