How long is too long?

By Kate Sykes, CareerMums

Some of our users have sent questions to CareerMums on how to deal with the challenge of having worked for an employer for over 10 years but are now facing a redundancy or are being performace managed out because their salary levels far exceed the typical salary range for that role.

I should start by saying what a wonderful achievement for anyone to stay with an employer for more than 10 years - even 5 years demonstrates loyalty these days. For some people, incremental pay rises over a long period of time can sometimes price people out of the market. I heard about a woman in a PA role who was earning $105,000 because she had been with the same employer for over 20 years. She has since left her employer - a redundancy was offered. In these cases it gets to a point where certain roles are worth a particular range in salary.

For people experiencing this challenge, it may be worth looking for a new role. New roles provide new learning opportunities and new challenges. Another solution is to talk to your employer about non-monetary benefits so you don't price yourself out of the job.

Regardless, employers should be up to speed on career paths and performance management for each employee and it should be dealt with appropriately and in a professional manner.

Tackling Interviews Head On

I don't think I have ever met someone who loves job interviews. Why is that? Surely there are some people out there who could talk about themselves all day - LOL!

I think our fear of interviews often comes down to the unknown. Most of the time, we don't know the people we will be talking to, so it is difficult to know if it will be a relaxed or formal interview with easy or difficult questions.

It is safe to say that there are some things we just can't control. On the other hand, you can control how prepared you are.

• Know the location, time and who you will be meetingat least 36 hours before the interview.
• Dress up! It is always better to be dressed up than dressed down.
  
• Do some research on the company. Use the internet and look up people on LinkedIn.
  
• Review the job advertisement. Can you do everything it says? What about the key competencies? How can you demonstrate your suitability?
• Know your flexibility requirements.
  
• Don't lie about anything.
  
• If you are asked to give examples using prior work experience, refer to experiences on the past 5 years.
  
• Always speak positively about yourself and focus on successful outcomes you have been part of.
  

Remember that nearly 50% of getting a job comes down to your perceived 'culture fit' with the organisation. Just be yourself, respond to the best of your ability, and see where it gets you.

Interview questions

The typical traditional recruitment questions include:

• What are your greatest strengths or weaknesses?
• Do you prefer to work alone or in a group?
• How would you describe yourself as a person?
• What did you enjoy most / least about your last position?
• Where do you want to be in 5 years?
• How well do you work under pressure?
• How would your co-workers describe you?
• Describe the best boss you have ever had.
  

Certainly consider these questions in your preparation. There is now more of an emphasis on behavioural based questions which involves actual behaviour / performance of the candidate based on the core competencies required of the advertised role. Look for the core competencies in the job description. If they don't state the key competencies in the advertisement, ask the contact for them.

Make sure you pay close attention to the key comptencies the employer is looking for and start to consider examples of work you have done that reflect these competencies.

Try not to use your children in your responses. Your responses must be workplace related.

Think of these responses as telling a story.

Examples of competency-based bahavioural interview questions:

Conflict Management

• Describe a time when you facilitated a creative solution to a problem between employees.
• Tell me about a recent success you had with an especially difficult employee or coworker.

Customer Focus

• Give me an example of a time you effectively used your peole skills to solve a customer problem.
• Tell me about a time when you encountered a customer who was complaining of poor service. What did you do?
  

Negotiation

Describe for me a situation where two individuals or parties were at odds, and you helped to negotiate a win:win solution.

Strategic Planning

• Tell me about a strategic opportunity you identified and pursued.

Team Work (Encouraging and building)

• Describe a time you led a team of people who didn’t always see eye to eye. What did you do? Why did you choose to do that? How did it work out?

Losing Sight of What You Really Want

By Kate Sykes, Director of www.careermums.com.au

Last week, I was tasked with recruiting for a part time Administrator role in Sydney. We had over 90 applications! The process of culling applications is a difficult one. Some resumes simply haven't been tailored to suit an administration role. For example, if all of your experience relates to graphic design work, it makes it diffciult to be shortlisted. others simply did not have the required experience requested by the client.

I am not a recruiter that penalises people for taking time out to look after children so this was not a big issue.

The next stage was phone screening. Talking to people on the phone is an interesting exercise. If you lack enthusiasm, knoweldge of the administrative duties required of the role, or can't remember the role you applied for (because you have applied for so many), it makes it difficult to be shortlisted.

I finally shortlisted six candidates. They were a mix of mums returning to work, mums already working and some older women who were looking to transition from full time work to part time.

While talking to one of the six candidates, we came to the agreement on the phone that this role was actually not for her. Why? This candidate was used to more senior consultant roles, but having not worked in these types of roles for 8 years, she felt that she had to start somewhere. And that somewhere was lower in skill and pay.

This is a common challenge. My immediate advice to her was to not settle for second best. Over her 'family years' this candidate had worked in 2 part time roles, published cook books, and more. She had shown incredible endurance and resilience in taking on various work related projects and roles while raising her young children.

My advice is this: If you want to return to the workplace in roles that you worked in pre-children, get busy with contacting past colleagues, managers, clients etc. Network at local business events. Attend workshops or conferences to find out more about employment opportunities. There is a skills shortage, so if you think you still have it (and want it), go for it. You will not only feel better in yourself for pursuing your career goals, but you will also be teaching your children some valuable lessons in life.

Next week: Preparing yourself for interviews.

If not a “Working Mum”, then what?

By Kathryn Hocking, Reverie Coaching

My mother hates the term “working mum” so you can imagine my concern and her unease when I unveiled my business to her, one that was based around the concept of “Coaching for Working-Mums” and by that I mean coaching for women in paid employment. My choice to coach this niche doesn’t mean that stay at home mums are not welcome in my practice it just means I have chosen to target my marketing efforts towards “working mums”.

This got me thinking about the term “working mum” and the fact that my mother, who has been ‘stay-at-home-mum’ (SAHM) most of her adult life, hates the inference that SAHM’s don’t “work”. As an aside I could also dissect the implications of the term “SAHM” but I will leave that for another time!

My argument to my mother was that:
1. Given “working mum” is the recognised term for mothers who return to paid employment sometime after having a child; and
2. Given that so much of online business and marketing is based around ‘key words’ and Google searches that I had to use the popularly accepted terminology whether I agreed with it or not.

However, the recent release of the book “Career Mums” by Kate Sykes and Alison Tait really got me thinking about how the term “Career Mum” may be a far more appropriate term to move forward with in my business.

Let us for a moment consider a few definitions:

According to Dictionary.com the word “work” is:

1. Exertion or effort directed to produce or accomplish something; labour; toil;
2. Something on which exertion or labour is expended; a task or undertaking;
3. Productive or operative activity;
4. Employment, as in some form of industry, especially as a means of earning one's livelihood;
5. One's place of employment.

So based on the above definition SAHM’s would certainly be considered to use exertion or effort to accomplish a task and certainly undertake productive activity even though it may not always feel like it!

It does get a little tricky when considering that the word work relates to ‘employment’ which typically relates to earning a living rather than non-paid work. However despite this I would certainly agree that SAHM’s do “work” and so the term “working-mum” is certainly problematic.

When considering the word “Career” Dictionary.com defines it as:

1. An occupation or profession, especially one requiring special training, followed as one's lifework;
2. A person's progress or general course of action through life or through a phase of life, as in some profession or undertaking;
3. Success in a profession, occupation, etc.

I feel more comfortable with the term “career mum”, however, I personally feel that having a career (requiring special training and it being one’s lifework) and having a job can mean quite different things and this is the advantage to the term “working mum” which encompasses both.

So consider whether a SAHM has a career by asking the following questions:

• Is being a mother a profession (definition: a vocation requiring knowledge of some department of learning or science)?
• Could being a mother be conceived as one’s lifework? and
• Isn’t being a mother a progress or general course of action through a phase of life (i.e. your children’s childhood)?
  

It would seem at least two elements of the word career could apply to SAHM’s, As I hope I have demonstrated here, there really is no perfect terminology for the mother who spends time in paid employment either working from home or in a specified workplace (what a mouthful!).

I personally think the core of the issue is not about terminology but gets down the lack of respect, or perception of lack of respect, that SAHM’s feel they receive in comparison to “working mums” or “career mums”.

Being a full-time working mother or career mum myself I have come to realise that this lack of respect is not one-sided. I have seen many instances of SAHM’s not respecting and out rightly judging working mums as bad or selfish mums who are damaging their children permanently and on the flipside seen career mums disrespecting SAHM’s thinking that they are unmotivated, unintelligent or lazy.

There seems to be a lack of respect of the choices that women in Australia are lucky enough to have combined with a lack of support among women about the fact that everyone must make this choice based on what is best for them and their family.

While out to drinks with a large group of women recently (incidentally I was one of only 1-2 full-time “working mums” in a group of 15) a friend said to me when I asked her about her job:

“I’m only working part-time because I am choosing to put my child first”.

Now as someone who works full-time because:
• Firstly, one income doesn’t cover our mortgage and bills;
• Secondly, I am trying to build a more flexible long term future for my family; and
• Thirdly, because I really enjoy having a career

I could have taken this statement to mean that I do not put my child first and been extremely hurt, however, considering her a friend I gave her the benefit of the doubt and respected her position despite the fact her words were poorly chosen. Interestingly this shows there is even a divide between mums who work 1-3 days a week and mums who work 4+ days a week!

My experience to date has been that women are quite divided on what is best for their kids and quite judgemental of mums who make a different choice to theirs.

I think we should stop getting hung up on the terminology, and start supporting each other to make the choice that is right for them. I know for a fact that I am a happier, less stressed and more loving mother when I am undertaking paid employment than I was when I was at home full-time. At the end of the day my family benefits in many ways from my participation in the paid workforce yet I have the utmost respect for my mother who was an amazing SAHM and I have many memories of outings, craft projects and creative games with her. My daughter may not grow up to have as many of those types of memories but I hope she will grow up with a sense that she can be or do anything she puts her mind to, that she can pursue her dreams and that she can have a career and still be a great mother if she chooses!

I am, however, considering changing my programs to “coaching for the career mum”…..

Kathryn Hocking, © Reverie Coaching 2012, www.reveriecoaching.com

Kathryn is the Director of Reverie Coaching and uses her passion, forward thinking and creativity to inspire, motivate and encourage working mums and mumpreneurs to pursue their dream careers and dream businesses in a way that does not compromise their identity as mothers.

Kathryn offers the following face-to-face and online coaching Programs “Dream Career Kickstart”, “Coaching for the Working Mum, “Life Coaching” and will soon be offering a “Coaching for the Mumpreneur" program. Kathryn also publishes a weekly blog “Ambitious Mummy” and monthly newsletter “The Inspired Mummy”, you can view her website at www.reveriecoaching.com

Don't forget your network and find jobs that are not advertised

Depending on how long you have been out of the workplace, your network can be your lifeline to paid work again.

Your network is made up of friends, family, colleagues, ex-colleagues, staff, managers, and other people you know in your community (including local businesses and shops). These people know you, your work habits, your capabilities, and your personality so you already have an advantage.

Before you start looking, get your resume up to speed, know what you want to do, know your key skills, how many hours/days you can work each week, and how much your are worth. Then start approaching your network.

If you don't have a profile on LinkedIn (www.linked.com.au), get one. You can then start tracking down ex-bosses that you have lost track of. Then send word out on Facebook, email others in your network, and call the rest.

Some of the best leads come from close by. Try it.

Top tips for being a part time mum

Blogger Sarah Wayland from That Space In Between considers her new existence as a part time mum and what works for her.

A lot of mums re-entering the workforce after the fog of maternity leave choose to work part time. It's akin to having a few secret identities you have to have an ability to wear different masks at different times. Working part time is not only a juggle in terms of how you separate your week but it can be a little tricky in terms of how you fit into the workplace.

I returned to work part time a few months back. I stepped back into the workforce gingerly as Id gone back full time after my daughter was born 6 years ago (full time over 4 days) and I had really found the pull to be at home unbearable some days. This time I wanted to ease myself back into it so that I was home more than away. Working one day in the office and one day at home is an opportunity that not many are provided with but I must admit some weeks I feel like I'm there so little that I don't feel connected to the workplace so here are a few tips I've developed for myself with some input from other PTMs (part time mums....I'm a public servant so it goes without saying that I love an acronym)

1. Get to work early on the day you're in the office. It gives you a few more minutes to pop around and say hi to people without feeling guilty that you're not using your limited time to the best of your ability.

2. Have a really clear outline of what you want to achieve on the days you're at work. You don't have the luxury of staring out the window and working back late when small people have to be collected from various places.

3. Pop in randomly for work social activities that fall on days you're not there. At Christmas time I packed up my littlies and went in for a morning tea. Sure there were some people with their mouth hanging open that you'd come to the office on a day off but it made me feel like I belonged a little more than my name on my door.

4. Check your emails on the night before you return to work. It helps to offset any nasty surprises when you've forgotten you're interviewing a job applicant at 9am and you might be swanning around drinking a coffee and reading the paper online (this has never happened to me).

5. Send your boss (and any other colleagues it affects) an email when you finish up at the end of your work week. Just a bit of a heads up while you're not there, an update on where you are at and even a gentle reminder when you wander back in the following week feeling like it's been months since you were there last.

Part time work is great but remember it's just that, it only makes up part of your week so the camaraderie, the connectedness and the engagement you felt when you lived there before you had kids won't be the same. On the flipside it also doesn't mean that the work day is devoid of laughs and the occasional opportunity to eat the birthday cake of someone you barely know.

Sarah Wayland has been working as a Social Worker in the missing persons field for the last 10 years. She is currently a part-time stay-at-home mum, part-time public servant and part-time postgraduate student in the field of hope and loss at the University of New England. She blogs at thatspaceinbetween.com.

Are you a victim of your own perspective?

By Emma Grey from WorkLifeBliss

There was news last week that a family who had lived through the ravages of last year's Queensland floods had won $5million in the lottery. This time last year, the newsagent where the ticket was bought was submerged.

What a difference a year makes. Bad things happen. Sometimes several bad things happen in a row. Good things happen. Sometimes great things happen.

Your house doesn't 'always' flood, and nor do you 'always' win the lotto. In reality, we have a mix of experiences - positive and negative - but we tend to pick a side and either focus on lows or highs.

It is said that we're bombarded with two million 'bits' of information at any one time. The conscious mind cannot hope to process a sensory load of this magnitude, so it triages the input - deleting much of it, distorting some and generalising a lot. This is why you and your sibling may have entirely different recollections of that family holiday when you were little.

In the end, you can comfortably manage about seven (plus or minus two) 'chunks' of information at any one time. There are times in life when we're dealing with more than this - like when we start a new job or course of study and we experience that steep learning curve. We're exhausted at first, from the juggling of more chunks of input than usual - and gradually, as we become more comfortable with it, we start chunking the information together.

Think back to when you first learnt to drive a car. All of your seven chunks were fully occupied in learning to drive - working out the gears, the pedals, the road rules, watching for other motorists, keeping an eye on the blind spot, listening to your instructor and obeying the speed limit.

If you've been driving for a while, you're probably only using one chunk to do all of that now - while you plan your shopping and talk to your passengers, listen to music, do your pelvic floor exercises ... you get the drift.

How we choose to fill our seven conscious chunks is enormously influential on how we experience our lives. Imagine you're heading into a job interview and filling your seven chunks with this:
• I hate interviews
• My clothes don't fit right today
• I didn't get enough sleep
• I never know how to answer the questions
• There's no way I'm going to get this job
• They've probably already given it to someone else
• Why doesn't anything work out for me!

Seven negative chunks, and it's not hard to predict the outcome.

If all of the experiences in your life - good and bad - were kept in a large, dark warehouse, and you got to go in there each morning wearing a miner's hat with a headlight on the front, and focus your light on something that would set the tone for the day - where would you focus?

Some people zoom in only on the corner of the warehouse where the 'failures' are kept. The pile of things than went wrong. The time the house was flooded. The jobs that fell through. The relationships that didn't work out. It's no wonder the story becomes 'nothing ever goes right for me'.

If you tilt your head slightly to the left, though, you may notice the times things went well, the time you won the lottery (if you're lucky!), the promotions you had, the relationships that brought you joy.

Turn your head again, and there's a pile of dreams for the future. Ambitions, hopes, plans...
It's up to you how you behave in your warehouse, how broad your view is and whether you choose to limit that view or not. You're at the mercy of your perspective on life and you can change your future because of this. One way or the other.

Emma Grey is a Life Balance specialist and runs WorkLifeBliss. Through a suite of innovative concepts and tools, Emma offers organisations and individuals practical solutions to the modern challenge of ‘having it all’.

Emma holds a BA (Hons), Graduate Diploma in Education and Advanced Practitioner certificates in Coaching, Training and NLP. She is a published author, speaker and freelance journalist. Her book, Wits End Before Breakfast! Confessions of a Working Mum (Lothian, 2005), was reviewed as ‘fresh, witty, hilarious, sharply-observed and relentlessly truthful.’ Emma writes regularly on a range of social issues in the national media, including for Mia Freedman’s ‘Mamamia’, The Punch, Australian Women Online and HerCanberra. She is a mother of three and has two step-children. When she can sneak the time – she’s writing a vampire-free novel for young adults.