Your Career Is Calling on Monday and Wednesday Nights at 9PM (EST)

Rider University will now rebroadcast our radio show “Your Calling Is Calling” every Monday and Wednesday Nights at 9pm.

You can tune in on 107.7 FM and online on www.1077TheBronc.com.

Best wishes and own your career,

Rod Colon

Q&A with Rod Colon

Question # 1 – Jennifer S., Allentown, PA

“Rod, doesn’t this whole process seem like an awful lot of work just to find a new job? In The Black Hole, I’m done within 5 minutes. Your methodology looks as if it could take weeks, maybe even months!”

Answer # 1

Yes, it is a lot of work. But didn’t you agree to view your job search as a business back in Chapter 3? Are you going to abandon that mind-set so quickly? Business owners work hard to achieve their goals; as the CEO of ME, Inc., why shouldn’t you?

NEWSFLASH: That “5 minutes” you spend in The Black Hole doesn’t include weeks of waiting for an answer. And guess what? In some cases, the answer never comes — remember that you’re not interacting with live communicating people, just a bunch of computers. In terms of human interaction, it is a totally connectionless environment.

Do you really expect “quick” results from a connectionless environment?

Rod Colon

Connections: When It’s You and Someone Else

I have a special reverence for those occasions when I meet a person and step into his or her life for the very first time. You never know what surprises await. The person you’re about to meet may have won a Pulitzer Prize, climbed Mt. Everest, or served time for bank robbery. As a person’s story gradually unfolds before you, it will be quite easy to tell if there are sparks of mutual interest that could ignite for future encounters.

Whenever you first meet someone, you take a risk — but that’s how all good relationships start. They start with an element of chance, the chance that the other person might become a good friend or perhaps a trusted business associate based on common interests, shared experiences, and perhaps some good old-fashioned intuition.

But if you’re not willing to risk a first encounter, there’s little hope of developing any relationships. Call me foolish, but I relish these opportunities because, even when the worst-case scenario does occur, I still end up learning a great deal about human nature. There is never any real failure in the connection laboratory, just occasional setbacks.

In reality, first-time connections are golden opportunities for future relationships and in the business world, connections and relationships are everything. Just try conducting business without them! You won't get very far — and that will be especially true in the 21^st century jobscape where the opportunities for business growth will be heavily dependent on the strength and abundance of personal relationships.

Determine Someone’s Wants / Needs / Desires (W/N/D)

Let me share a special technique that creates an immediate bond with another person. The technique is to get people talking about their W/N/D (wants/needs/desires). It's an incredible weapon in your networking arsenal.

This is how it plays out in conversation: You pick up a casual remark about selling Girl Scout cookies or coaching the swim team, for example. That then gives you a hook on which to hang questions, express interest, and fuel a conversation. The best part is that your desire to learn about someone else frequently triggers reciprocal inquiries because people are naturally curious. Presto! You’ve just established a connection. Whether it deepens or dissolves from this point on is totally up to the two of you.

Uncover a Person’s Passion and Build an Instantaneous Bond

Keith Ferrazzi, author of Never Eat Alone, believes that if you uncover a person’s true passion, you have a golden opportunity to bond with that individual since you’ll be connecting on a powerful, emotional level. Indeed, most people will freely share information about their passions and interests.

FORM = Family / Occupation / Recreation / Money (FORM = GOALS)

Another useful formula for making connections is the FORM Equation. Get someone talking about any of the four topics above and you’ll be connecting in record time. Why? People love to talk about the powerful motivations that propel them toward their life goals.

Nurture the Budding Relationship

Once you establish an interesting connection with someone, nurture it with periodic follow-up. Connections can be solid but fleeting; if you sense there is substance to a new connection, don’t miss the chance to reinforce it by making a phone call or two. Nurturing a good connection is the best way to solidify it into a trusted, long-term relationship.

Follow up

Don’t allow yourself to forget this critical step. In my view, the failure to follow up with newly made acquaintances – and even people with whom you already share a trusted relationship – accounts for almost half of all relationship failures.

Play It Low-Key With Bad Connections

Many of us carry a certain amount of negative baggage. But if it consistently oozes into the conversation with someone you’ve just met, consider an early exit. People who radiate negativity drag everyone else down with them. Who needs that when you’re already hip-deep in a job search?

The bottom line is this: If you decide that a new connection isn't going to work, politely head for the door. Confrontations rarely produce positive results.

Best wishes and own your career,

Rod Colon's Interview on ABC-TV Shares Tips for Job Seekers

Rod Colón

Link to Rod Colon's Interview on ABC-TV "Tiempo" on Sunday, January 16th

NEW YORK -- -- Concerned about the Hispanic community? If you are, be sure to tune into "Tiempo."

"Tiempo" is a weekly round-table discussion show about topics affecting and relating to Hispanic citizens.

This week on Tiempo: Sunday, January 16:

This week on Tiempo, we begin with an issue plaguing the entire country. Unemployment is hitting the Latino community especially hard. Radio host and career coach Rod Colon of "Empowering Today's Professionals" joins the show and shares tips on dealing with joblessness.

Clink the link below to see the interview:

http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/story?section=news&id=5790398

Best wishes and own your career,

Rod Colon

Shape My Career Counselor Rod Colon Guest on ABC-TV

NEW YORK -- -- Concerned about the Hispanic community? If you are, be sure to tune into "Tiempo."

"Tiempo" is a weekly round-table discussion show about topics affecting and relating to Hispanic citizens.

Please join us for "Tiempo" on Sunday mornings (11:30 AM), only on ABC-7!

This week on Tiempo: Sunday, January 16:

This week on Tiempo, we begin with an issue plaguing the entire country. Unemployment is hitting the Latino community especially hard. Radio host and career coach Rod Colon of "Empowering Today's Professionals" joins the show and shares tips on dealing with joblessness.

Find more information: www.etpnetwork.com

Then, we explore the remarkable history of Grand Central Terminal. Now, you can learn the secrets of this New York City landmark in a variety of languages. Metro North Spokesman Dan Brucker talks about the new tours.

Find more information: www.grandcentralterminal.com

http://search.abclocal.go.com/search/client?st=wabc&q=tiempo

Social Networking What's The Point!

Nowadays, most people can tell you all about social networking. It seems as if everyone is involved with social networking to at least some degree. Web sites such as LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter used to be novelties, places where you could casually observe comments, profiles, messages, inquiries, and photos of complete strangers – until it became widely recognized that these sites were, in reality, “connection pools”, i.e., places where you could meet people and expand your personal network. From that time on, the sites simply “took off” and there’s no sign that they will be fizzling out any time soon.

Similarly, blogging used to be regarded as a leisure-time activity in which you could pen your thoughts, opinions, and comments and share them with whoever might have an interest in them. But, as with social networking, the business practicality of blogging (especially in the B2B world) overtook casual usage and business owners began turning their blogs into full-force inbound marketing machines.

All of this means one thing to the 21st century job seeker:

If you hope to achieve any level of name or brand recognition, you’ve GOT to have a presence on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter and it’s practically a necessity to have a regularly-updated, traffic-generating blog.

Own your career,

Rod Colon

Self Assessment

When you need to find a job, it’s important to find the right job. Despite popular fantasies of winning the lottery, buying expensive cars and homes, and doing fascinating work with interesting people in exotic places, the sober reality is that most of us have to work hard over a long period of our lives.

If you spend forty to fifty years – not an unlikely timeframe – working at jobs you’d rather not be doing, you are in truth throwing away a large part of your life. This is tragic once you realize that a career you can truly love is within your reach.

Shape My Career recognizes that participants will not necessarily enter the program with an intuitive grasp of their own skills, capabilities, preferences, talents and abilities. On that basis, SMC uses a battery of diagnostic and assessment tools to help participants learn the all-important first step in finding the right job, the right business, or the right career: knowing yourself exceptionally well.

Own your career,

Rod Colon

THE TIMELESS “INNER CORE” CHARACTERISTICS OF A GREAT CANDIDATE

Decision-makers agree that candidates with the following characteristics stand the best chance of being selected for a given position. Such candidates:

• project an attitude of confidence and pride in whatever they do;

• demonstrate a positive mental attitude at all times but especially while confronting difficult or challenging situations;

• demonstrate mental toughness in dealing with challenging or difficult situations;

• are articulate, clear and concise in verbal and written communications;

• are especially good communicators in all sorts of forums and venues;

• have the ability to multitask while delivering high quality performance;

• are open, direct and honest in all interpersonal conversations;

• show a distinct talent for working well with others, in teams, and in a variety of collaborative situations.

Although this is a great list, it is just as applicable to the 1990s jobscape as well as today’s 21st century business environment. With that in mind, the items listed above represent a kind of “inner core” of essential characteristics. So what, then, are the newer, fundamental “outer core” characteristics that make a candidate attractive to a prospective employer in our 21st century jobscape?

Own your career,

Rod Colon

The Importance of Giving Back

Leaders all over the world recognize the importance of giving back to the organizations that put them in power. ETP Network leaders feel the same way and realize that their selfless efforts make a great difference to the organization as a whole.

Investing time in the group as a leader means helping the “next wave” of CEOs to blossom and grow. An earlier group did it for you, correct? And when you were on the receiving end of all that mentoring, I’ll bet you were occasionally curious about how those leaders made their way into those positions of leadership.

Giving back to the organization is clearly not an obligation. But most leaders give back because they know that sustaining the new wave of CEOs will have far-reaching benefits for them, too, e.g., expanding their networks, gaining exposure as networking leaders, providing high-powered resume enhancements, and so on.

Think of it this way: If you have kids, you know how important it is to ensure the success and well-being of the next generation. It’s just another reminder that things are not always “just about me”; sometimes it’s necessary to direct attention to a generation that will someday replace you.

It’s the natural order of things.

Best wishes and shape your career,

Rod Colon

732.367.5580