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Last-Minute Gifts for The Higher Ed Job Seeker

by | Dec 21, 2010 | Career Skills, Coaching, Higher Education, Job Search, Student Affairs, The Placement Experience

Every year, I start the holiday season with good intentions…making lists, coming up with the perfect ideas for each person on my list, and taking some time to get a good head-start on things.

And like many, I fall short.

I began writing this post the night of the 19th. At that point, I hadn’t begun my Christmas shopping. Yesterday morning I was going to go out, but all the sudden it was nearly 2 p.m. before I was finally heading out the door to do some shopping. I still have a few more things on my list, but they will have to wait. Today is my daughter Susie’s 2nd birthday and we are eating cake, opening presents, and (undoubtedly, because we do this every day) watching Team UmiZoomi about 20 times.

My wife, Sarah, is one of those people who buys ahead and finds all the great deals. So she and I periodically talk about ideas and she buys many of our children’s gifts early. And my siblings, parents and the other adults in our family have moved on to doing a “country gift exchange,” so I don’t really have all that many people to shop for, but the ones I do are pretty important to me.

If you are a last-minute gifter, and you have a higher ed job seeker on your list (or you are one, and hope to give yourself the gift of a new job in the coming year), here are a few ideas for last-minute gifts:

  • Buy the person a website to set up a job-seeker blog. If possible, register a .com address and use the person’s name, so they can stake out a “home base” for their personal brand. You can find plenty of good web hosts out there, and it’s really easy on most to set up a blog using WordPress. I use FatCow, which has a lot of nice features and add-ons, and a really affordable annual rate, with unlimited storage and bandwidth, as well as e-mail addresses for your domain. They are running a $4.67/month hosting special right now, which you can get by clicking on the link above or on the ad in the right-hand column. The deal includes hosting for one year, one domain, and a lot of easy-to-use tools. For example, easy set-up of a WordPress.Org blog like this one, photo galleries, forums, Moodle and Joomla sites, even an online store. Users also get ad credits on Google AdWords, Facebook, and Yahoo, which your job-seeker could use to place personal “Job Wanted” Ads.
  • If you self-host a WordPress blog, you can install a standard template or get a little fancy. My blogs run the Thesis theme framework, which has some built-in features that help with Search Engine Optimization. You need to have some confidence with technology to get it installed and set up, but once you do, the dashboard is pretty easy to master, and you will enjoy better search results without having to get a certificate in internet marketing.
  • Buy your job-seeker some assistance with writing and editing their job search materials (or if your job-seeker is going back to school, with admissions essays). I offer these services as part of my 1-on-1 coaching packages, and would be glad to speak to you or your job-seeker about what I can offer, but I also recently became an affiliate for ResumeEdge and EssayEdge, the leading resume and essay editing and assistance services on the internet, so please check them out as well.
  • screen grab of module 3 outline for HigherEdCareerCoach.Com's "Placement Partner" Coaching Program

    Screen grab of Module 3 of the Placement Partner Program Moodle Course

    Give the gift of coaching. I am opening a job seeker group for spring.  I am offering first spots to people on my mailing lists, so sign up here to get information. There will be a limited number of spots for this program, because I want to offer members a quality experience and to give them personal attention, so list members get first crack. If there are available spaces in January, they will be opened up to the general public.There will be three levels of participation:

    • Value Edition: Online group with self-paced activities and forum discussions ($180 for 6 months access. You must register for this option to be offered the opportunity to upgrade to either of the other levels. The first five modules of this 26-module program are now live and available for those who are ready to get started with their exploration and planning over the holiday break. The rest will go live in sometime in early January.)
    • Standard Edition: Online group, plus free access to webinars and 2 1-on-1 meetings for resume assistance and mock interview practice, and e-mail coaching through the duration of your enrollment($300-with the option of paying for the upgrade all  at once or in 6 monthly installments.)
    • Personalized Edition: All of the above, plus 6 additional coaching sessions. ($500-with the option to pay for the upgrade all at once or in 6 monthly installments.)
  • If you are looking just for 1-on-1 coaching, my rates for one-on-one coaching are reasonable, and depend on the length of the session. If you’re interested in 1-on-1 coaching, visit my public calendar to schedule a free initial consultation. There is no obligation to purchase anything. We’ll talk about what you are looking for in a coach. I will tell you a bit about my coaching methods and business practices, and we’ll discuss the going rates for the services that interest you. If you like, I will even give you a couple of other resources to check out. Every job seeker has different needs and the “fit” between coach and client is just as important as “fit” is to landing the right job. So the consultation will be an opportunity for both of us to assess whether we might be able to work together on your job search.
  • Or you can buy a gift certificate (that can be used at my webstore toward any of the programs above, or 1-on-1 coaching, or other products and services to be offered soon, including e-books, webinars, and job-seeker tools and resources.

    Whatever you end up getting your friends, your loved ones, or yourself, I wish you the best this holiday season, and good luck in your job search!

    Photo of Sean Cook

    Sean Cook Higher Ed Career Coach

    Sean Cook is a certified Life Purpose and Career Coach based in Athens, GA, and owner of Cook Coaching & Consulting, the publisher of HigherEdCareerCoach.Com and HigherEdLifeCoach.Com.
    Through his practice, Cook assists higher education professionals and persons looking to transition into administrative and faculty positions in academia. He also coaches college students and their parents through the difficult transitions that come with college.

The Value of Traditions

by | Dec 9, 2010 | Coaching, Higher Education, Student Affairs


It  has been just over a year since I left Penn State University, which had been my home for nearly 15 years. There are many things that I miss about being at Penn State, especially at the end of each semester.

Traditions are a funny thing. We value them as rites of passage to joining new community, and as part of the institutional history. Some traditions come and go, as student leaders try to define their unique legacies on campus.  So every year, around exam time, there would be study breaks, and programs with food, and stress busters, and door decorating contests, and special dinners in the dining halls.

My favorite program among these was booking a massage therapist to give students five–minute stress buster massages on one evening of the exam week. We worked with the same massage therapist every year. Her name was Angie, and I got to know quite a bit about her  during these events. We would talk about campus events, news in town, and our kids. Angie is a single mother, and a Penn State grad. She was always pleasant to work with and loved talking with all the students. In some of the areas where we would book her, the staff would simply greet her, make sure she was able to set up, and then leave. I would always stay around and visit, drink coffee and smoothies from the coffee bar in the commons, and just have a good time joking with her and the students who came by.

Now that I am down South and on my own, I find that I really do miss the traditions that I helped establish and maintain at my old school. And at times around the holidays, I feel down and a little bit alone and I really miss the sense of home those traditions gave me.

But last week was different. I have a part-time career coach position at  Wesleyan College in  Macon, Georgia, and was invited to help host a table at their annual holiday banquet.

Anderson Dining Hall is much smaller and less modern than the fancy facilities I was used to at Penn State. In this great Georgian style room’s with high cathedral type ceilings and huge fireplace mantels at each end of the hall, with appropriately historic paintings mounted above them, teams of faculty and staff set 24 tables and decorated them for the students.

It was my first time in a college dining hall since leaving Penn State, and I realized quickly how much I missed being a part of the campus community. It’s clearly an event that faculty and staff enjoy just as much as the students. Tables are hosted by teams of two faculty or staff members, and each table has a theme. Since I volunteered last-minute and was matched with a faculty member I have yet to meet, our theme was  “Christmas.”  Really original, huh?  we had very simple decorations, bought hastily at Wal-Mart about an hour or two before the event–little clear candy bags with penguins on them, wearing Santa hats;   filled with cookies and candy, and finished off with a novelty swirly straw that had either Santa or a polar bear on them. Other than that, we had cardboard Christmas trees and glittery stuff.

I met my faculty partner, Dr. Karen Huber, a professor of history. Our table was basically assigned to students who had not registered early enough to be assigned another table. We went about assembling the candy bags and decorating our table and then joined the other faculty and staff to eat dinner in another dining room. At the end of the meal, we received our aprons and returned Anderson Dining Hall, as they opened the doors to receive students.

We were eventually joined by seven students and joined the rush of other faculty and staff to the kitchen for platters of turkey, dressing, squash, mashed potatoes, green beans, cranberry sauce, and bread. We served each student personally and made conversation with them about school, their interests, and their holiday plans. After clearing the main course from the table, the lights were darkened in the hall, and the foodservice staff rolled out carts loaded with the desert for the evening, Bananas Foster, over vanilla ice cream. All in attendance watched with eager anticipation as the bananas were flash caramelized with burning rum,  and the glow of bluish flame lit the room.

It was a festive end to my first semester of contract work for this small women’s liberal arts college, which had welcomed me and made me finally feel at home again. Penn State had been my home for nearly 15 years, and I had known the comfort that comes with familiarity and tradition. There have been times over the last year when I have questioned whether I would ever have that feeling of belonging again.

I think that this is the feeling that many students come to campus with–a loss of home, friends, connections, and belonging. It serves as a great reminder that student affairs professionals and other members of the faculty and staff play key roles in creating a sense of belonging on campus. It’s no wonder, then, that many students return to their families in December, enjoy their vacation time, and return to the halls in January, saying “it’s good to be home!”

What traditions have you helped establish on your campus?

What role do you play in making your students feel at home?

And what traditions have helped you feel at home on your campus?

Please share your thoughts in the comments section. I’d love to hear what others are doing around the country. Happy holidays to all, no matter your personal traditions, beliefs, or hopes for the new year.

Stumbling and Starting Over

by | Nov 2, 2010 | Coaching, Higher Education, Job Search, The Placement Experience

Have you ever had a busy time, when you knew you couldn’t afford to miss a step? You knew it was coming, and you made a plan to juggle all your responsibilities, and you were ready, in the words of Project Runway’s infamous Tim Gunn, to just “make it work.”

And then, despite all the planning, thinking things out from different angles, and even planning the contingencies, you trip over some unexpected change in terrain….

Boom. Flutter. Fall.

Flat on your face. Ouch-ey! And you wonder whether you should even bother to get up.

Fall has been kinda like that for me, and I’m finally at a point where I need to start over, focus on some core priorities, and let some other things go (or delegate them out). This week, I’m going to tell you what I’ve been doing with my time, and ask you to help me prioritize a bit by letting me know what you’d like to see.

Part 1: The Blog(s)

Readership was pretty consistent last spring during the “placement conference season” and through the summer. July was the best month for traffic, probably in part due to the “down time” many of us experience right before the August/September madness. Since August readership has been down, and I’ve been struggling to come up with fresh content, in part because I am juggling several other projects now, including a part-time gig with Wesleyan College down in Macon, GA, a hybrid coaching course for placement season, some webinars, some guest posts for other blogs and web sites, and the beginnings of some e-books and other “informational products.” I also helped plan a half-marathon.

I thought I had some good plans for this fall, and a good idea of how to execute them. But I got stuck in a few details, distracted by other projects (who knew planning a half-marathon would require so much work?) and then thrown off by a few life events (both cars robbed in my own driveway a couple of weeks back.) So my blogs are off-track, my business has taken  a back-seat to a race,  my office is a mess, my schedule is full, and there are days I look back over my shoulder and say “where did the day go, and what do I have to show for it?”

I’ve been teetering between the two big options lately: giving up and bucking up. When I set out to do this, I had idealistic reasons in mind, and some pie-in-the-sky ideas about how I’d turn my interests and idealism into a sustainable business and lifestyle. The reality is that I’ve been stumbling through some of it, and like anyone, I could use some feedback and direction. So I’m turning to you. I’ve decided not to quit (at least not yet).

  • What do you think I should do to mold this idealistic vision of helping higher ed job seekers into a sustainable business model?
  • What interests you?
  • What would you be willing to pay for?
  • What do you want?
  • And what do you need?

Last year, I did a good job of building up some partnerships and getting guest writers. In July I had a few, and it was the best month for readership for both HigherEdLifeCoach.Com and HigherEdCareerCoach.Com. Many of my regular guest bloggers have started new jobs or had other significant changes in their lives. I’m working with a couple to find time to “get back on the horse,” but I’m also going to bring in some new contributors, so the content can be fresh, and so new voices can find a platform. As I do, I could use your input to help me prioritize any changes or updates to the blogs.

As a reader:

  • Which past guest posts have you enjoyed the most?
  • Which contributors?
  • What topics do you want to read more about?
  • And if you are a writer or a fellow coach, what would you like to contribute?
  • Should we have more video and audio posts, slideshows, resource lists, tips and tricks?
  • Do you like book reviews, product reviews, or “wish list” types of posts?
  • How often should we have new posts? I had been shooting for 2-3 per week.

Please share some ideas that will help improve the blog, either by commenting below or by sending feedback to sean@higheredcareercoach.com.

Thanks!

If You Don't Insist on Work/Life Balance, You Won't Have Any

by | Oct 14, 2010 | Career Skills, Higher Education, Student Affairs

There are some important periods of the academic year to pay attention to when you work in higher ed. Everyone acknowledges that the busiest times…welcome week, exam week, and closing for the summer… can eat up your time and energy. But it’s equally important to pay attention to the times which are slower-moving, because they sometimes represent “the calm before the storm”

When I worked in Residence Life, I always had a mid-semester slog starting around October. People were settling into routines, events were happening here and there, and my calendar would feel pretty set, with regular committee meetings, 1-on-1 meetings with supervisees, and loads and loads of busy work. It was always around this time, too, when we’d start to see roommate and neighbor conflicts pick up, alcohol poisonings increase, and psychological issues rear their ugly head.

This period between early October and Thanksgiving always felt to me like wading through molasses. When this feeling hits you (and it will, sometime between now and Thanksgiving, I guarantee it!), you may do one of two things…bury yourself in work so that you feel busy and productive, or avoid work like the plague, put off unpleasant tasks as long as you can, and just hope to ride it out until break. Neither of these methods should be mistaken for work/life balance.

Times like these call on you to stop ad pay attention to how you are balancing your priorities. If you don’t, it can be like a slow, smoldering burn, ready to flash into a fireball at any moment, and leave you ashen, grey, or even burnt to a cinder.

So do yourself a favor: Pay attention to how you are spending your time, and find some time for yourself. If you don’t insist on work/life balance, you won’t have any!

What do you do to make it through your mid-semester slog? Share your ideas, questions and thoughts in the comments below.

Photo of Sean Cook

Sean Cook, Certified Life Purpose & Career Coach

Sean Cook is a certified Life Purpose and Career Coach based in Athens, GA. Before completing his certification from the Life Purpose Institute, he earned his M.Ed. in Counseling and Guidance Services from Clemson University, and spent over 15 years various student affairs roles in higher education. He specializes in working with college students, recent graduates, and higher ed professionals, and acts as publisher for HigherEdCareerCoach.Com and HigherEdLifeCoach.Com. You can listen to his periodic podcast, the Higher Ed Life and Careers Show, at 11 a.m. Eastern on Fridays on BlogTalkRadio.com. Look for his upcoming contribution to SelfGrowth.Com’s new book “101 Great Ways to Enhance Your Career” later this Fall.

It's Never Too Early to Get Your Act Together!

by | Sep 28, 2010 | Coaching

Are you planning to job search this year? Placement may seem a long way off, but the truth is that the most prepared candidates start early, get a lot of feedback, expand their networks continually, and devote themselves to the search as a job, in and of itself.

Since last spring, I have offered a few small group experiences, including a job seekers group, and a self-paced “hybrid” program that featured both online activities and 1-on-1 coaching, including personalized resume and cover letter assistance, mock interviews, and personal coaching throughout the process.

Both my free and paid offerings seemed to help job seekers, but the “hybrid” program seems to have been the most helpful to the clients who participated. Four persons enrolled in my “8 Weeks to August” coaching program, which was aimed toward seekers who found themselves “stuck” after the conference season ended, and summer  began.

Of the participants in the last program:

  • One dropped out without doing any of the activities.
  • One got a job, and
  • The other two have been consistently getting interviews, and will hopefully be employed soon. I believe wholeheartedly that they will, because they have made great strides and interviews keep coming in.

Since my goal was to have both of these people employed by the end of this week, I e-mailed them Monday to see if they wanted their money back, because I believe in guarantees. I couldn’t guarantee these clients a job. But I did guarantee them satisfaction with their progress, and I am only as good as my word.

Since I’ve had an opportunity to evaluate the different programs, I am going to revise some of the content and format, and offer a new program that will last from now until May. I’m calling it the “Placement Partner” Coaching Program. At the end of May or beginning of June,  I will again offer a program more geared toward the needs of job seekers who find themselves “stuck” without a job after the Spring 2011 recruitment period ends.

Right now, I am gathering information on persons who might be interested in this type of program, so I can tailor a couple of levels of participation, and create programs at different price points. My goal is to have programs that will meet the needs of job seekers at different levels, and to offer a value that far exceeds the cost of entry.

Sign up using the form below to be notified when more details become available. It’s free and you will also receive our regular e-mail newsletter. There is no obligation, and you can opt-out at any time.

I look forward to helping student affairs job seekers this year. Sign up below and forward to others who might be interested.Thanks!