Category: Aureus Consulting

Developing an International Resume

Written in March 2015 for Aureus Consulting:

Applying for a job in a foreign country contains a myriad of communication challenges. How do you translate your school records? Should you use British or American English in your cover letter? What if your references don’t speak the language of the company you hope to join?

Business standards and professional expectations can be tough to navigate, particularly when it comes to the crux of your application: your resume.

The UK and the US wish to know nothing about you but your qualifications in order to minimize the amount of influence your gender or race has on the decision to call you in for an interview. Many people even forgo listing hobbies. Singapore, on the other hand, normally wants a photograph and a date of birth, and you’re more likely to be selected if your experience or previous titles directly overlap with the position you’re applying to. In addition to a photo, the Philippines sometimes go as far as expecting your height, weight, religion, and even parents’ occupations. Be prepared to fax your resume in Japan, where cultural/organizational fit often outweighs hard technical competency. Inappropriate email addresses are grounds for immediately rejecting a CV according to 38% of employers in Brazil and 36% of employers in China.

Research has shown that it takes just 6 seconds for a potential employer to decide to reject your resume or get to know you better, which means no matter where in the world your career takes you, the first impression of your curriculum vitae is crucial. So how can you develop a resume that is impactful worldwide?

Regardless of cultural norms and expectations, some elements of a strong resume are universal. Your contact information should be near the top and your email address should be professional (no “Iheartmartinis@hotmail.com”). Formatting should be consistent and clean – bullets should be neatly aligned; bold and italics are great ways to highlight achievements but they should be used sparingly; and don’t mix and match fonts. The descriptions of your work experiences should be evocative and your accomplishments should be quantified. Don’t say you were the number one sales person without including the net gain you earned for your company. Don’t say you increased the efficiency of production without including by what percent you increased it by. Numbers are clear markers of success in any language.

Put the effort in to make sure your experience is accessible to a person who knows nothing about your country. Every employer in Malaysia will know that Petronas is a Fortune 500 company, but odds are that employers outside of Southeast Asia will not and so it’s up to you as an applicant to include that detail. Generic job titles can also work against you. A potential employer won’t be able to visualize your responsibilities from “Marketing Manager” alone. Even if that technically was your official title, add a qualifier – like “Head Marketing Manager for APAC Region” or “Digital Content Marketing Manager” – to give readers a shortcut.

And lastly… Spell-check. A careless error makes a poor impression in any culture.

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How to Achieve Work-Life Balance

Written in October 2014 for Aureus Consulting:

There are a lot of tips and tricks out there for juggling a career and a personal life, and they run the gauntlet from reasonable time management to abject selfishness. But it really all comes down to one thing: knowing when and how to say No.

Knowing when to say ‘No’ is tricky and it’s different for every person because it depends on values. We all need to oscillate between periods of activity and rest, but the type of activity that matters to you and how long you need to rest can vary greatly from the next person. For example, someone who highly values spending time with friends might not understand someone who chooses to study instead of go out on a Friday night. What is more important to you right now: a future goal or living life to the fullest today? Note that the factors we consider when choosing to say No change throughout our lives. You might prioritize working late when you know a promotion is coming up, but then later prioritize spending time with your family because your wife just gave birth or your mother has become ill.

The main enemy to a work-life balance is guilt. Guilt over what you should do. Guilt over taking time for yourself. Guilt over letting down a client or a colleague or a friend. Guilt over not trying as hard as you can. We each only have one life and what you decide to allot the majority of your time to is completely your choice; but don’t waste the limited time you have on feeling guilty over your decision. Allow yourself to fully commit to both your periods of activity and of rest. If you’re working towards a goal, ignore anyone who tells you you’re “working too hard.” And when you go on vacation, go on vacation. Turn off your phone and leave the laptop at home. If you work in an industry that occasionally needs real time responses (like urgent client needs or crisis control), then figure out a system with your co-workers.

Remember: just because you can take on that project at work, doesn’t mean you should. And just because you technically have the time to volunteer to be the leader of your daughter’s Girl Scout troop, doesn’t mean that’s what you should spend that time on. Saying No doesn’t just mean declining to work overtime some days, it also means turning down social events you don’t want to attend. It means understanding what you want and what you need before making a decision or taking action.

While figuring out when it’s right for us to say No is a path we all must forge alone, learning how to say No is much simpler. All you need to say is something along the lines of: “I’m sorry, but I have a lot on my plate and I can’t do that at this time.” Be confident. You don’t owe anyone explanations. As author Elbert Hubbard said, your friends don’t need them and your enemies won’t believe you.

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5 Ways to Promote Creativity in the Workplace

Written in July 2014 for Aureus Consulting:

According to psychologist Sam Glucksberg, incentivizing employees to be more creative actually does the complete opposite. Offering rewards for creativity narrows the focus of an employee, which restricts his/her ability to conceive of possibilities and dulls the mind to creative thinking. This is a fact that has been proven in economic and psychological studies over and over again.

So then how to promote creativity in the workplace? Creativity can’t be induced with rewards and certainly can’t be forced; but it can be welcomed. Here are five ways to create a work environment more conducive to creativity:

1) Have a place to jot down your ideas.

Whether it’s a group inspiration board for the office or just a person’s notebook on their desk, designating a space for ideas is like preparing a guest room for a good but unpredictable friend. You might not know when this friend will show up, but you want to make sure you can squeeze them in whenever they do. A group idea board also encourages people to brainstorm together in a more relaxed setting than a formal meeting.

2) Be easygoing and positive.

People are more likely to share ideas if they feel comfortable. Psychological studies have revealed that creativity is more likely to visit us when we’re in a positive mood, because a relaxed attitude grants us greater flexibility in thinking and a widened perspective. So if you’re struggling with a problem that demands innovation, try watching a funny video or listening to upbeat music to pep yourself up.

3) Be open to diversity.

A uniform and agreeable group of employees may make for a pleasant work atmosphere, but when it comes to creativity, the less homogeneity the better. Encountering new ways of approaching even simple tasks can create more room for ideas to flourish.

4) Take a break.

This may seem counterintuitive but the best ideas can come to you when you’re not looking for them. That means giving your brain a break, using your annual leave, or even just relaxing for a few minutes. Creativity can be hard to summon sometimes, but it’s nearly impossible to summon when you’re stressed or overworked.

5) Leave room for autonomy.

Since rewards don’t encourage people to be their most creative selves, what does? Room for autonomy. Google famously implemented a system where employees were allowed to spend 20% of their time working on a Google-related passion project of their own choosing or of their own creation. This policy led to products like Google News, Google’s autocomplete system, and even Gmail. When an employee feels she has autonomy and purpose, creativity naturally infuses itself into her work.

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5 Things to Know Before Accepting a College Offer

Written in April 2014 for Aureus Consulting:

Congratulations! You’re in! You’ve been accepted to not one but several universities! …Now what? Which offer do you accept? How do you choose between top schools? There are 116 universities in Great Britain and over 4,000 in the United States, so any school in the top 25% is going to offer you a quality education. The key is figuring out which education is the right one for you.

1) Consider the money. I know, I know, a good education is priceless. Except it isn’t. According to The New York Times, the number of students who have to go into debt to get a bachelor’s degree in America rose from 45% in 1993 to a little over 94% today. So even though you might be eager to accept an Ivy League’s offer, take the time to weigh the costs. While the school’s reputation may boost your career in the long run, it might be too much of a burden on your job requirements in the short term (especially as fresh college graduates don’t earn as much as they used to). If schools with similarly reputable programs are offering you scholarships or have less costly tuitions, they might be worth looking into.

2) Don’t be blinded by celebrity. Yes, we all want our resumes to feature the name Harvard or Oxford at the top but just because a school is prestigious doesn’t mean it’s the best choice for your future. Find a program that fits you. Did you know that Durham University in the UK is ranked in the top five globally for Geography studies? And National University of Singapore is in the top ten. Harvard isn’t even in the top 50. So if you have your heart set on becoming the world’s best geographer, Harvard wouldn’t be the place for you. Do your research and make sure a school fits your unique needs before signing on.

3) Environment. Would you prefer a quiet study session on a wooded campus or a fast-paced debate in a busy city coffee shop? Colleges come in all shapes and styles: from tiny rural communities to business-oriented hubs to sports-loving schools the size of small towns. Coming from secondary school, which doesn’t offer much choice in learning environment, you may not know your ideal study setting. Give it some thought. You’d be amazed at how much your surroundings impact your educational experiences.

Bard College

4) Ignore the rankings. Or if you can’t ignore them, then go by brackets instead of digits, since they tend to be less changeable (i.e., a school in the top 20 instead of school number #7). Different publications have different parameters for their rankings and those parameters might be completely irrelevant to what you value in a school. For example, the Times Higher Education World University Rankings 2013-2014 put the California Institute of Technology as #1 but the U.S. News & World Report put it at #10 and Forbes placed it at #18. You’d go nuts trying to make your decision based on college rankings.

5) Know yourself. The better you know what you want to do, the easier it will be to figure out where you want to go. Take some time to really ask yourself what is important to you. Is it being close to your family? Is it getting a high-paying job in finance? Is it having time to write in your journal? Where do you want to be after university? Believe it or not, those four years will go by fast and before you know it, you’ll be setting off into a career with a degree in hand. Determine what you want that degree to say about you now and your journey will be that much smoother.

 

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Tips for Settling Into a New Job

Written in February 2014 for Aureus Consulting:

For recent graduates fresh to the professional world, you may be comforted (or disappointed) to learn that starting a new job is rather similar to the first day of school. You’re eager to appear intelligent yet likeable. You wonder who you will eat lunch with. You worry about how you will handle the workload. In the beginning, you will need to learn everything: where the bathrooms are, how to submit expenses, whose toes not to step on, and so forth. During my first decade post-graduation, I worked at a non-profit organization, a high powered New York City law firm, an Irish software company and an Australian one, and at an English school for Japanese expats in Singapore. Every single time I moved into a new role, I encountered a fresh set of lessons to learn, difficulties to overcome, and-in some cases-cultural norms to adjust to. Since many young professionals come to Aureus Consulting seeking guidance on how to move their careers forward, I thought it would be helpful to compile a few of the tips, tricks, and suggestions that I’ve picked up along the way.

Ask questions. It’s tempting to try and impress your new boss with how sharp you are, but no one expects you to know the ins and outs of the company in your first few weeks. It’s important to ask questions if you don’t know something. If you’re too busy pretending to appear competent, you won’t actually learn how to be. This is something even more experienced professionals can struggle with. You might worry that if you require help, people might think you’re stupid. Or worse, that by asking for advice, you might somehow cause people to dislike you. Recent studies have discovered that that line of thinking couldn’t be more wrong. Wharton professor Adam Grant, Stanford professor Jeffrey Pfeffer, and persuasion specialist Robert Cialdini are among the large number of experts who now consider seeking advice to be one of the most effective strategies for encouraging others to warm up to us. So, ask away!

Accept that you will make mistakes. It will happen. It will be embarrassing. It’s okay. Mistakes can be forgiven and forgotten. However, one thing your superiors will not forget is if you try to cover up a mistake. Let me give you an example. Back when I was working as a paralegal in that New York City law firm (my first paying job after college), I once accidentally moved an important file from my team’s shared network drive to my desktop. When I attempted to return the file to its original location, I found that it would take over two hours. Instead of informing my superiors of the problem, I just prayed that no one would notice the discrepancy. Of course, they did and I was reprimanded harshly, not for accidentally moving the file but for failing to own up to my mistake. The error was a minor one but my poor handling of the situation caused me to lose the trust of my team, which took far longer to repair. If you do make a blunder, the best course of action is to admit it, apologize, and ask how you can avoid repeating it in the future.

Be aware of your own limits. You might be tempted to say yes to everything during the first few months on a job. It’s easy to understand why: you want to demonstrate that you were worth the chance the company took when they hired you. And while you should absolutely be tackling your new role with gusto, taking on more than you can handle can backfire, since the quality of your work is likely to decline. A growing body of research shows that people are at their most productive when they are allowed take short breaks during the workday and when they obtain six to nine hours of sleep every night. To quote Tony Schwartz, author of Be Excellent at Anything: “Human beings aren’t designed to expend energy continuously. Rather, we’re meant to pulse between spending and recovering energy.” So when your supervisor asks if you can take on another project when you already have ten on your plate, don’t be afraid to (politely) say that you won’t be able to at this time.

Be willing to adjust to a new office culture. Culture shock can happen to even the most prepared individuals. After all, it’s impossible to know quite how you will fit into a new environment until you’re smack in the middle of it. Whether you’ve relocated to another country or simply to a company with a different work ethic, I highly recommend you take note of the business habits of your colleagues. Are important decisions reached in a weekly meeting or through casual email dialogues? What is considered an appropriate manner of communication within the office? What are the leadership styles of your superiors? Does everyone attend the annual company baseball game even if they’re not required to? While you shouldn’t have to completely alter your work style or personality upon entering a new position, being aware of your company’s socio-cultural norms can only help you.

Find a mentor (or two). Who are the people at your company you wish you could be like? Ask them for advice on your projects and offer to help them with theirs. By actively getting involved in certain tasks, you’ll not only improve your knowledge base but you’ll likely gain a reputation as a supportive coworker. This isn’t just smart networking; this will also create a congenial work atmosphere that you can grow in. There is, however, a fine line between being helpful and being a brown-noser. If you’re not genuinely interested in emulating your boss, she or he will catch on sooner or later.

Don’t get discouraged. The honeymoon phase will wear off and you may realize your new job isn’t perfect. No job is fun every hour of every day. At some point, you may even feel like quitting. If you get to that point, take a few deep breaths. On tough days, remind yourself of why you took this job in the first place and what your long-term career goals are. Even if you do decide that this role isn’t the right one for you, it always behooves you to base such a choice upon rational consideration rather than your emotions of the moment.

The learning curve of any job is hard to predict from the outset. And much like the first few weeks of school, the amount you need to learn can sometimes seem overwhelming. The most important thing you can do is be open to absorbing new information, even if it’s as inconsequential as where the bathrooms are or what the trick is to getting the printer to work.

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