JOB REQUIREMENTS HOW I MEET THE REQUIREMENT

1. Insert job requirement #1 1. Insert how you meet the requirement

2. Insert job requirement #2 2. Insert how you meet job requirement #2

3. Insert job requirement #3 3. Insert how you meet job requirement #3

Continue until you’ve covered all the major requirements.

Of course, there’s more to me than I can convey in a cover letter. For example, people say they really enjoy working with me. So, I hope you’ll choose to interview me.

Sincerely,

Joe Jobseeker

Another Winning Way to a Job

If you make a good first impression and can think on your feet, in addition to answering ads, contact employers who are not advertising a job opening. Make a list of 25 employers you’d like to work for, and phone or send each an email like this:

Dear (Insert employer’s name),

I’m a recent graduate of (insert alma mater, or your most recent job if it’s more impressive than your alma mater).

I’ve read a fair amount about your organization and am impressed. (Insert one or two specifics.)

I’m wondering if you might be willing to meet briefly with me to see if I might be a suitable employee for you, or if not, to offer me some advice as to where I should turn.

Here are a few highlights of my background:

Insert three one-line bullets, each of which is likely to impress the reader.

Hoping to hear from you,

Sincerely,

The Plan

Make your goal to answer 25 on-target ads and to contact 20 employers who are not advertising a job opening. Unless you have a fabulous network, I’ll bet if you do that, you’ll land a job much faster than someone who followed the standard exhortation to network, network, network!

Marty Nemko is Contributing Editor at U.S. News, columnist at Kiplinger.com, and was named “The Bay Area’s Best Career Coach” by the San Francisco Bay Guardian. 500+ of his published articles plus the archive of his National Public Radio-San Francisco radio show are free on www.martynemko.com.

The right job. Nothing makes your worklife more pleasant than having a good job: a moderate amount of moderately difficult work, a good boss and co-workers, reasonable pay and commute, and a place of employment you’re proud to work for. Your job isn’t anything like that? The most important thing you can do to have more fun at work is to find a better job. Or tweak your job description so you spend more time doing things you enjoy.

Don’t fight work. Many people expend inordinate effort trying to get out of work. Don’t you know people whose most productive at-work activity is shopping online? (Except, of course, when the boss comes by, whereupon they click onto a spreadsheet.) They end up feeling guilty that they’re slackers or terrified they’ll get caught--neither of which is much fun.

Fact is, work is key to the meaningful life, even if you’re just a payroll clerk whose job is to recount the beans counted by a co-bean counter. Most employees don’t check their paycheck’s accuracy--they rely on you to ensure they don’t get screwed. Nearly all ethical work is more fun than not working. At least, think that way.

Give yourself intrinsic rewards. Whatever task you’re doing, ask yourself ‘What’s the most fun way I could do this?” You’ll be surprised how often the fun way is as least as effective as a more painful way.

Give yourself extrinsic rewards. Many of us are motivated by concrete rewards-- how many of us would show up to work every day if we didn’t get paid? But wouldn’t it be more fun if you got paid more than just weekly? Well, you can get “paid” as often as you’d like. For example, why not promise yourself that if you finish that stupid task in 59 minutes or less, you’ll give yourself ten minutes to, for example, flirt in the breakroom. That ticking clock can be fun to compete against.

Threaten yourself with punishment. For example, if you’re a liberal, write a $100 check to the McCain campaign, if you’re conservative, to Obama’s. Give a friend the check. If you haven’t completed the agreed-on-work by the agreed-on time, he mails it. You’ll enjoy your work more knowing you’ll get the $100 back if you get it done and that that good-for-nothing candidate won’t get a dime from you.

Think of difficult problems as challenges rather than annoyances. That’s more fun. Can’t meet a challenge by yourself? Find someone who’d be fun to solve it with.

Think of your worklife as an endless series of choices. Even if you’re a peon with a micromanaging boss, you’re actually the emperor of your (admittedly small) dominion, with many choices: What do I wear today? Which task should I do first? Should I wear headphones? Should I make the report pretty or no-nonsense? Should I spend my break chatting with my honey or schmoozing with someone who might help me get a better job?

Consult this compendium: For a cornucopia of capers and other condiments to catalyze your colorless career, see Leslie Yerkes’ book, Fun Works. But caution: continual cavorting can cause catastrophic calamity, culminating in career carrion. Curses.

500+ of Marty Nemko’s published writings are at www.martynemko.com.

At the risk of losing all credibility, I believe that core to Barack Obama’s having entranced the nation is his adrenal gland.

People vary in their responses to stress. On a 10-point scale, a 0 secretes almost no adrenaline, even if the building is on fire. A 10 flies off the handle in response to a slight. He goes from 0-60 in one second and even in the absence of stress, seems a bit agitated.

Obama is a 4. He secretes just enough adrenaline to appear enthusiastic when it’s called for, but never overreacts, indeed appears unflappable, even in response to Hillary’s barbs. That physiology-based calm also enables him to always stay on-message. Nothing can annoy him enough to make him lose sight of the fact that his focus-group tested message is probably more vote-getting than any other statement he could make. Also, being calm but not lethargic makes others feel calm but not lethargic.

Of course, Obama’s being a 4 may also be affected by his upbringing, his faith, etc., but his physiology is undoubtedly a factor. Talk to any 10 and he’ll readily admit that his body releases a surge of adrenaline in response to stress that makes him overreact. Most 0s will admit they have a hard time getting worked up about anything --If other people in a room hear a startling noise that makes their hearts leap, a 0 will be not feel physically different.

Your adrenal gland profoundly affects your success in the workplace, even if you’re not applying for the nation’s top job. Develop a reputation as a hothead and your chances of getting ahead plummet. Develop a reputation as emotionally flat, and you’ll be viewed as lazy or not dynamic enough.

Of course, some of this is beyond your control. Your body will react as it’s going to. But there are things that people from 0 to 10 can do to maximize their career success.

If you’re a 0-2: Keep top-of-mind the importance of what you do--that can increase your energy level. Remember that even if you’re a clerk, what you do affects people’s lives. Too, it may help to have a cup of coffee in the morning and/or a half hour before you must do important work or attend a key meeting.

If you’re a 3-5: Be grateful. Your physiology is in sync with what most American workplaces reward: a generally calm but not phlegmatic demeanor, getting moderately enthusiastic as called for, but rarely getting angry or even ecstatic. (Remember Howard Dean’s 10-level war whoop? That single moment killed his presidential campaign.) And be confident that your natural demeanor is the most likely to help you succeed in the typical workplace.

If you’re a 6-8: Be vigilant to not overreact to stresses, and try to place yourself in situations in which you’re less likely to be stressed. Rehearse 3-5-like responses to emotional situations. In response to something positive, in pleasant but not exuberant tones, use phrases like, “I’m delighted.” or “Good job.” In response to something negative, in modulated tones, say such things as “I’m disappointed” or “I’m a bit concerned about that.”

If you’re a 9-10: You really should put yourself in work situations unlikely to yield much stress. For example, if you have a boss who drives you nuts, it’s particularly important that you try to get transferred or find a job with a different employer. If time-pressure or high-stakes decision-making even occasionally leads you to blow your top, do everything you can to change your job description or to a less adrenaline-triggering environment.

I am an 8 and have addressed my potential to overreact by being self-employed, working in my quiet home office, firing clients who annoy me, and doing tasks that use my best skills and so don’t stress me--like writing this column.

The San Francisco Bay Guardian named Nemko, “The Bay Area’s Best Career Coach.” 500+ of his published writings are free on www.martynemko.com.

by Marty Nemko

When I was a boy, I just could not sit still in class. I was very bored and active by nature, so I would rock my chair back, whisper and write notes to kids, even wander around the classroom--until the teacher yelled, "Martin, sit down!"

This was decades ago. Today, I suspect I would have been put on Ritalin. But in either case, the blame is placed on the smart, active boy, rarely on the schools, which claim to celebrate diversity of learning styles and needs but stop celebrating when it comes to smart, active boys. Indeed, the decade's signature domestic policy, No Child Left Behind, redirects nearly all efforts to educate the lowest achievers.

This, of course, is ironic in that gifted kids have the greatest potential to contribute to society: to cure its diseases, close the racial achievement gap, develop cost-effective solar power, etc.

The unfair treatment of smart, active boys comes from four factors:

1. The widespread abandonment of ability-grouped classes. In most of today's elementary schools, gifted and slow are placed in the same class. This creates more equality--especially racial equality--but the result is that all children receive a worse education. Imagine for example, that you spoke good Mandarin but wanted to become expert. Wouldn't you prefer a class with advanced students rather than one with both beginners and advanced students? Yet today, we don't give gifted kids (or their parents) that choice. We force them into mixed-ability classes, where they learn little and are bored. And because, on average, boys are more active than girls, they more often can't sit still for six hours a day, five days a week, 180 days a year, year after year. Rather than the harder task of accommodating to gifted active boys' needs, countless teachers have urged parents to put these boys, long-term, on Ritalin--a meth-like drug.

2. That elementary school teachers are overwhelmingly female. Today, the percentage is up to 92%, the highest ever recorded. Even if teachers believe they're accommodating to all students' needs, they can't help but tilt their teaching to what appeals to them. Thus, students stories of male heroism are replaced by stories of female relationships and heroines, typically in which an inferior male is shown-up by a wise female. Competition--a prime motivator for boys--is replaced by so-called "cooperative-learning," which usually reduces to the bright doing the slow's work, boring the bright kid and precluding him from learning new things.

3. The media's continuing to perpetrate the myth that females are oppressed and males are the oppressor. For example, they continue to spout these disproven assertions:
-- women earn 79 cents on the dollar compared with men. In fact, for the same work, women earn the same as men.
-- women are underrepresented in high-level positions because of sexism. In fact, as documented in recent well-reviewed books such as Susan Pinker's The Sexual Paradox, women's not being in high-office comes much more from choosing to have a less work-centric lifestyle.
-- the schools shortchange girls relative to boys. (the long-debunked Reviving Ophelia canard.)
-- men abuse women--in fact, studies show that 30 to 52% of severe domestic violence is perpetrated by women.

Thus, the subconsciously or consciously held feeling among educators, policymakers, and the public, is that we need to do more for females than for males, ignoring such statistics that boys are achieving far worse in school than are girls, much more likely to abuse drugs, commit suicide, and drop out of high school, far less likely to graduate from college, much more likely, as young adults, to be sleeping late unemployed on their parents' sofas.

4. Society's bias that says: let's help those with the greatest deficit rather than those with the greatest potential to profit: "Those smart boys will do okay without special help. Let's focus our efforts on the lowest achievers." I deeply believe that such a philosophy will reduce our society to the lowest common denominator, ironically resulting in a worse life for us all. Besides, it simply is unfair for the public schools to not provide at least a marginally appropriate education for all kids, and right now, smart boys get the very least appropriate education.

What do you think? I look forward to reading your comments. Email them to me at mnemko@comcast.net or post them on my blog. (This article appears there as well). You can get to my blog by going to http://martynemko.blogspot.com

When I was a teenager, I thought money was the answer. So, I took after-school jobs, and tried to buy my way into contentment: clothes, nice car. That didn’t do it.

Then I tried noble work—teaching in the inner-city. But the problems those kids faced were so big, so multi-dimensional, that despite my trying hard, very hard, I felt I wasn’t making much difference.

Next, I tried prestige: got a PhD from Berkeley, became a professor. But in my social science field, I often felt like an emperor with no clothes. So much social “science” is poorly substantiated, politically motivated theory. My students ate it up but I felt I was often feeding them ersatz food.

I’ve been trying the values route: focusing on what did I most value: work. To that end, I decided to be a career counselor. I believed that helping people find right livelihood would make my life feel meaningful. But now, 22 years and 2,800 clients later, despite a 96 percent client satisfaction rate and the San Francisco Bay Guardian naming me “The Bay Area’s Best Career Coach,” that feels empty too. Some of my work—helping people to make the most of their current job—feels good. That helps them live up to their potential, and, in turn, their employer to provide good products and services. But too often, my clients come away with a plan they’re excited about but fail to execute. Even when a client lands a good job, I too often wonder if my efforts to package the client yielded a net negative to society: Some more deserving person, who couldn’t afford a career coach, didn’t get the job.

I particularly value meritocracy. I believe that more good accrues from ensuring a meritocracy than nearly anything else. 30 years ago that would have meant dismantling the ol’ white boy’s network. But alas, today, the ol’ boy network has largely been replaced by the Diversity Industry, hell-bent on ensuring that women and minorities receive undeservedly positive treatment. Here's just one of countless examples I could cite: When women and minorities have a deficit--for example, the so-called underrepresentation of women in engineering--a massive redress effort is initiated. But if men have the deficit, even the ultimate deficit--they die six years younger and spend their last decade in worse health than women do--not only is there not redress, but over the past 50 years, the vast majority of gender-specific health research and outreach has been conducted on women. A 50-year review of PubMed, which indexes the 3,000 major medical journals finds 43 articles on women's health for every one on men's. Regarding outreach, think of all the breast cancer pink ribbons you've seen over the past decade. Millions more men die and die earlier of sudden heart attack, yet where are the ribbons for that? The Diversity Industry is so powerful, it has shut off dissent. I have tried prodigiously to protest the rampant reverse discrimination against men and whites, to no avail. When I write politically correct letters to the editor, they’re routinely published yet when I write to protest reverse discrimination, my letters are always censored. I’ve had 500 articles and columns well published, yet when I write about reverse discrimination, the pieces are deemed unworthy of publication. I’ve written a screenplay on the topic, Affirmative Actions, which the London Daily News said was “Sure to trigger a bidding war” yet no film studio would touch it. My first five books, politically correct, have been published and critically and commercially successful, having sold over 200,000 copies. Yet, when I wrote what I believe is my best book, the politically incorrect The Silenced Majority, it was rejected by 28 of 28 publishers, told again and again that the book is excellent but that feminists on the publication board have or would quash it. Self-publishing isn't worth it--I'd get too few readers but all the career-devastating media opprobrium. When I dared opine that the effects of uncontrolled illegal immigration are a net negative, a computer programmer with a blog called "Anarchogeek" admittedly "Google-bombed" me with the term "Marty Nemko is a Racist," so that since, 2006, if you google "Marty Nemko," that link appears near the top. That horribly untrue yet devastating libel has had untold effects on my career, yet I have been unable to get him to desist. So, I’ve been totally censored and censured--so much for living my values. Today, it seems that’s permissible only when your values are politically correct. I worry about a society that censors and censures benevolently derived thought that doesn't conform to the orthodoxy. It hurt us from the Right in the McCarthy era. I believe it's hurting us even more from the Left today.

Many people find the meaning of life through relationships. While I have a decent marriage, I’m not sure the meaning of life, at least for me, fully resides there. And my only child, who is an ardent feminist, refuses to talk to me, in large measure because of my views on reverse discrimination. My daughter and I also have important let's call-them incompatibilities, so I've decided it's not wise to try to develop a closer relationship with her. So, I won’t, as so many parents do, find enough of life’s meaning through my family.

Many other people find the meaning of life in religious faith. But I can’t find meaning in a God that would, for example, allow thousands of babies to be born every year with horrifically painful diseases and then die months later leaving bereft parents. Books like Richard Dawkins' The God Delusion and Christopher Hitchens' God is Not Great provide many additional sound arguments that that there is no God worth praying to. I'm unalterably sold.

Is that all there is? I'll soon turn 58, with signs of aging starting to creep in that remind me that the coming decade will probably be my last substantially productive one. I want to live as meaningful life as possible in the time I have left. How the hell do I do it?

Here’s my current thinking, subject to revision. It comes down to: spending as much time as possible using my best skills (writing and speaking) to make a difference in something I care about that few others do that nonetheless has a reasonable chance of success.

My current choice is to focus on boys and young men, especially the intellectually gifted, because the Feminist Machine is less likely to shut that down, mainly because even man-hating feminists have sons they love.

Alas, I'm finding that for the first time in my life, I'm lacking the powerful drive it takes to tackle an unpopular cause. I did pitch a cover story, "Saving Our Young Sons" to my boss at two major magazines for which I write, but both have demurred, and sent it to 20 important periodicals. None have responded, let alone published it. And I wrote a boy-positive movie treatment--I couldn't even find an agent. But in the past, I would have done much more: I'd have written the book, Saving Our Young Men and sent it to a zillion publishers or spent every possible moment writing press releases and white papers to educate the media on boys' and mens' issues. But I just can't seem to make myself do it.

So, my newfound lazy side is wondering if I should reduce my efforts to enhance the meaning of my life to just seeking opportunities to be nice to everyone possible. So, I give lots of heartfelt praise, make rich conversations with the Trader Joe's checkers, give free advice to strangers who email me, buy a casual friend an unnecessary gift, etc. I don't expect anything in return--I rarely get it. try to take pleasure in the giving itself. That approach to life ensures I do some good, it doesn’t require Herculean effort, and I feel good no matter how other people respond. Oh, and I do get great pleasure from loving my sweet dog, Einstein, whom I got from the pound, perhaps saving his life.

But is that all there is? Might there be more to the life well led? Email me at mnemko@comcast.net