Marty Nemko's Blog, page 387

Getting Hired With a Liberal Arts Degree

A 2012 study found that 53.6 percent of college graduates under the age of 25 are unemployed or doing work they could have done without a college degree—read: cab driver or hotel room cleaner.
A 2014 study that tracked college graduates since 2009 found that a quarter are living at home two years after graduation, 20 percent were earning less than $30,000 a year, and half of those less than $20,000.
The news is even worse for liberal arts majors. A 2014 studyfound that only 2% of employers are looking for candidates with a liberal arts degree. 49% believe there are “no jobs” out there for those with a liberal arts degree.
But there you are with your B.A. in psychology, sociology, English, ethnic or gender studies, art history, etc.  You also have a mountain of debt. You want a job. You need a job. But how do you defy the odds?  I offer suggestions in my PsychologyToday.com article today. 

Be Quick But Don’t Hurry

ESPN named John Wooden the sports coach of the century. He is known for telling his teams to be quick but not hurry.

That advice is useful for many people outside of sports. I discuss how in my PsychologyToday.com article.today.

The Holidays and Your Career

Many people defer career thoughts and actions until after the New Year. That’s unfortunate because, whether you’re employed, self-employed, or unemployed, December may be most potent.

Many articles have been written on the topics. In my PsychologyToday.com article today, I try to cram all the best advice I can think of into one short article.

Alternatives to Black Friday

"Black Friday” is the latest marketing ploy to get you to buy more than you need or even, unnudged, want.
Yet, like lemmings, millions of Americans will trot out, or should I say crawl out given the likely traffic and parking problems, to the mall to get the “bargains.” Of course, only a tiny percentage of most stores’ items are much less costly than after Black Friday. And the odds are even tinier that one of those items is what you really want. So if you’re lucky and they haven’t run out of those “bait” items in your size and color, it’s misleading to say you “saved” anything. You’ll probably spend good money on something other than what you really wanted or maybe didn’t want at all---Do you really need yet another pair of shoes, even if it is half off the likely inflated regular price?
So, might it be time to create a new post-Thanksgiving tradition, a more colorful and rewarding alternative to Black Friday? In my PsychologyToday.com article today, I propose 17.

The Dieter’s Moment of Truth

If you’d like to lose weight, you’re about to face the year’s biggest challenge: a gauntlet of pigging-out opportunities: Thanksgiving, the day-after-Thanksgiving leftovers, office holiday parties, personal holiday parties, Christmas dinner, day-after-Christmas leftovers, capped off by New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day. 

As someone who, despite having written on how to lose weight, can’t seem to lose my 15 extra pounds, perhaps I have no right to offer any more dieting advice but I sense that being aware of the dieter's moment of truth may have some value both to you and to me. That's my PsychologyToday.com article today. 

Do Your Hobby at Work

More often than you might think, you can incorporate your hobby into your job. I offer lots of examples in my PsychologyToday.com article today.

A Practical Path to Prominence

Just three years ago, if I had told Barbara Nemko that she would have won four national awards in technology, she would have had me committed. While she was a successful education administrator in Napa, California, she had little expertise in education technology.


Yet in the last two years, she was named one of the nation’s Top 40 Education Technology Leaders by the Center for Digital Education, the Legislative Advocacy Award from Computer Using Educators, the Digital Innovation in Learning Award from Digital Promise, and the Public Policy Award from the International Society for Technology in Education. 
For My PsychologyToday.com article today, I interviewed her to unearth lessons for anyone trying to gain professional prominence.

What Careers Match Your Core Skill

In a previous PsychologyToday.com article, I reviewed the hundreds of skills listed in Gallup’s Strengths Finder, Eureka’s Microskills, the Knowdell Motivated Skills Card Sort, Elevations,and Skills Profiler, and then adapted or wrote 26 skills that I believe are most likely to help people find and succeed in white-collar or professional employment.

In my PsychologyToday.com article today, for each of those skills, I list one or more careers that require that skill and is liked by many people. For each career, I include a link to a site with information on it.

This article may be of use to you even if you’re staying put in your current career or job. Scan the list of skills to find one or more that you’re good at and would enjoy using more in your job. Might there be ways to tweak what you do so you spend more time using your favorite skills?

Using Thanksgiving to Boost Your Career

Sure, you could say, “Thanksgiving is no time to talk career—it’s downright unseemly. Thanksgiving should be about family, football, and gratitude."

But especially if you could use career help, it’s a terrific opportunity. My PsychologyToday.com article today offers tips on how to make the most of it, whether you're looking for a job, could use some advice on a problem you're facing at work, or want to give a struggler some career tips.

A New Tool for Helping You Decide Whether to Change Jobs, Career, or Neither

In my TIME.com article today, I offer a novel tool for helping you decide whether to change jobs/careers.