Category: career

career, interview, job; career; money; raise; pay; increase, jobs, Law, Uncategorized

Your First Job: Key Tips for Young Job Seekers

bruceandholly
Aurora Department Store building with large glass windows and people walking outside
Shoppers enter and exit the illuminated Aurora Department Store during evening hours

With more than a million young people in the UK not in employment, education or training (NEETS), getting your first paid job has never been more difficult. But hasn’t getting your first permanent paid job always been difficult? When you have nothing to offer but a few paper qualifications and your enthusiasm? Yes – but it’s never been as difficult is it is today. We start by explaining the reasons for this sad state of affairs before looking at what you can do about it. Here are the reasons:

  • The modern trend of referring to our 16 and 17-year-olds as ‘children’ to be mollycoddled. Mixing them in with 11-year-olds. Banning under 16s from social media instead of making them streetwise. And then wondering why they act stupid. I was 14 years old when I bought my first packet of Players No 6 from a cigarette machine in a fish and chip shop. Just to look ‘big’. But it never did me any harm and I gave up smoking 5 years later. In other cultures it is different. Elsewhere in the world young people are not held back. They are encouraged to ‘grow up’, take on the family responsibilities and contribute. Maybe we can learn something.
  • Language illiteracy. The fact that learning foreign languages is not prioritized in the UK. Instead we expect everyone else in the world to accommodate us. The one thing I remember about learning French at secondary school was that I never actually met anyone who was French. In fact you were more likely to be taught by the woodwork teacher. Has anything improved since? I don’t think so.
  • The regulating away of the Saturday job. Forget paper rounds. No one gets their papers delivered anymore. It was the Saturday job which for many young people provided the gateway to paid employment. Unpaid work experience or internship is no substitute for a wage packet. The fact is that there are now many administrative hurdles for any business thinking about taking on a Saturday worker. If a person is under the age of 16, application has to be made to the local authority for a child employment permit, otherwise employers and public liability insurance might be invalidated. Young people require supervision at the till if they are serving restricted items like alcohol or cigarettes or lottery tickets. For most employers it is just not worth a hassle. Recruiting a Saturday person now requires more than just a 20-minute interview and a gut feeling
  • When you apply for your first ‘proper’ job, you are asking a prospective employer to take a ‘punt’. Because you have nothing to offer but a few paper qualifications and your enthusiasm. But the stakes for a prospective employer are much higher when everyone has day-one ‘rights’.

So what can you do to improve your prospects of getting that first job? Here are some tips:

  • To apply for a job vacancy, you first have to know about it. So you register with agencies. Look around to see what his advertised. Speak to people. But don’t get scammed, If someone asked you to send payment up front or to provide your bank details, you know it is a scam. Or if it is just too good to be true? Like becoming a crypto millionaire.
  • Don’t use AI to write your CV. Chances are it will filch from someone else’s CV. And you want a prospective employer to know about you and not your computer. So it’s got to be original and interesting and packed with examples which only you can talk about. Even using AI to check your spelling or grammar can be dangerous as it will default to American English. So maybe best to refer to an old-fashioned dictionary.
  • The likability factor. No one is going to offer you a job unless they like you. And first impressions count. So you throw away that hoodie and cover up those tattoos. Take a genuine interest in the job which is offered and find out as much as you can about it in advance so that you have something to talk about if you are called for interview. Buy a copy of Dale Carnegie’s ‘How to Win Friends and Influence People’ and read it. Likability can be learned. It’s the basic stuff like taking an interest in people and the world around you; taking the trouble to remember somebody’s name; treating everyone you deal with as ‘important’, even if they are sweeping the streets. Not breaking eye contact to look at your mobile phone.
  • Be presentable. The good news is that it is not expensive to look smart. So go to Primark or order off Amazon. Nobody is going to look at the label.
  • Think about learning another language. Because it will give you work-mobility. If you can speak some of the biggest languages, you can work anywhere in the world. Yes I know it’s difficult. Even though there are excellent programs like Duolingo. Problem is, it’s a solo activity. Everything is online. When you really need someone to practice with.
  • Polish up your communication skills both written and face to face. Remember that most of our communication is non-verbal. Hence the importance of eye contact. Don’t – don’t – don’t look at your phone when you are being interviewed. Switch it off and keep it in your pocket. Even if you don’t like football or cricket, at least listen to the sports news, because you need it for the ‘small talk’. Talking about sport is not going to upset anyone. One of the best ways to improve communication skills is practice. So join your local Toastmasters Club.

In the final part of this post, I’m going to introduce you to the world’s most exciting profession. Here it is

business, career, culture, emotional intelligence, Uncategorized

Embrace Networking Opportunities: Lessons from a London Summer Party

bruceandholly
Facade of the Merchant Taylors' Hall building with classical architectural design
The historic Merchant Taylors’ Hall building in London viewed from the street

Yesterday I had a lovely evening at a summer party at Merchant Taylors’ Hall courtesy of the barristers at Francis Taylor Building. The weather and the vibes couldn’t have been better.

I walked through the open doors the building, not knowing a soul. When I went to collect my name badge i asked if I could glance through the attendance list, all 10 pages of it, just to see if there were any names I recognized. I noticed some firms, including Avison Young, with whom we do business. But my aging eyesight meant that the name badges attendees wore on their lapels were of little use to me. At least not without invading their personal space. But having taken my drink, it only took me about 15 minutes to find somebody I did know. A barrister with whom I had worked many years ago on a couple of planning inquiries and whom I had met a few weeks earlier at another conference organised by the Ecclesiastical Law Society and who introduced me to a retired judge-turned-mediator – who in turn introduced me to other guests including a lady member of the City Corporation with whom we spoke about Smithfield Market. Later on someone shouted out my name, even though I couldn’t remember who they were. But it was someone I used to work with and we quickly got talking and he introduced me to other lawyer acquaintances. So what do I take from all this?

Never refuse an invitation because you are worried that you might not know anyone else who is attending. Because that is what networking is about. And as my late mother once said, “If you refuse an invitation, you might never be invited again”. So be gracious. Always accept courtesy when it is offered.

A very long time ago I attended a free networking course at the Law Society Legal Services Exhibition at Olympia. I went along with Allison, a former work colleague. The course was free because it was promotional. But that didn’t matter. Because I took away a lot. And I bought the book. Like me, the course promoter, was a big fan of the late Dale Carnegie and his book, “How to Win Friends and Influence People”. So what are my networking tips:

  • Get in the habit of accepting invitations when they are offered. If you are not there you can’t network.
  • Take a genuine interest in the people and the world around you so that you have something to talk about. That is always an issue for me because in our house, sport is always a ‘turn-off’.
  • If you don’t get to speak to anybody it doesn’t matter. Just enjoy the vibe. Say hello to the catering staff.
  • Remember that you’re not trying to sell anything. Only yourself.
  • Take the trouble to remember someone’s name. Just in case you meet them again.
  • Stick to the small talk. You’re not trying to make a point. And never criticize or complain.
  • Don’t hand out business cards unless somebody specifically asks for one.
  • Don’t try to work the room. Shaking hands with everyone is not going to get you anywhere.
  • Be sensitive to body language. All conversations have a natural end. You will know when it’s time to move on.
career, culture, jobs, medical, mens health, relationships, self improvement, society

Signs of Getting Old

bruceandholly
Photo by Andrea Piacquadio on Pexels.com
  1. When every time you make eye-contact with someone, they offer you their seat.
  2. When you celebrate every birthday with another tablet.
  3. When you eat less but put on weight. Like the 70’s rock band who decided to reform, looking like they’d just walked off a building site.

Things to Do When you are getting old.

  1. Make a will. It goes without saying.
  2. Make that extra effort to keep in touch with friends and family – especially the younger generation.
  3. Make a Living Will or Advance Direction, so you are in control of your own destiny, when it’s time to say goodbye.

Things not to do.

If you love your job and are at the top of your game, whatever you do, don’t retire, even if you’ve reached state pension age. Yes – take your company pension. You’ve worked for it and paid in to it. But don’t let it stop you working. And you don’t have to. Go freelance if you need to. You may also discover that your earning potential has never been higher. Because you will be getting your pension – PLUS – what you get working. And if you are past state retirement age, you won’t be paying any NI. What a great tax-break that is! So let someone else walk up and down a golf-course or kill time on a bowling green.

business, career, jobs, Law, property, real estate, self improvement, society

Conveyancing – How to Increase Your Productivity and Your Chargeable Output

bruceandholly

Conveyancing – Four Ways to Increase Your Productivity and Your Chargeable Output

Conveyancing is piecework.  Forget hourly rates.  In a competitive legal market, residential clients want to be able to compare quotes.  And professional rules now require transparency when it comes to pricing, so that prospective clients can see at a glance what they are going to have to pay.  But whenever you quote a prospective client, you need to be able to work within budget.  If you overrun that budget because you under-quoted or did not appreciate the extent of the work-tough!  You’ll be doing some free work. That’s not the client’s fault.  Unless you can genuinely say that additional complications cropped up which no one could have ever previously foreseen or because of something your client didn’t tell you.  So it’s all about packing in as much personal productivity as is possible for each working hour of your day.  Here are some tips:

  • Always dictate-dictate-dictate your work.  Never try to hand-type everything.  It’s just too much hard work.  Maybe like me, you lost your secretarial support more years ago than you can even remember.  Never mind.  There is Microsoft voice dictation.  If you’re working on a computer which is Windows 10 or above, you’ll find voice dictation somewhere.  Just go to ‘settings’ and ‘ease of access’.  Dictating your work can be annoying to those around you, particularly if you have to keep repeating the same phrase until your voice recognition gets it right.  Sometimes it never gets it right.  If I say the word ‘comma’, it will tell me to ‘call my mum’.  If I say ‘draft’ as in document, I will always get the draught which blows in from an open window.  So why do I use voice dictation?  Because even with its faults, it’s still three times quicker than trying to type everything out longhand.  Because even if you can touch type, you can’t type as fast as you can speak.  So by using voice dictation I can triple my chargeable output.
  • Standardise-standardise-standardise.  Take a tip from Henry Ford.  Install a conveyor belt.  Metaphorically speaking of course.  Try to create your own all-purpose templates, which you can easily and quickly populate before sending out.
  • Front-load your work, so that you can do as much as possible in one shot.  Don’t wait for the other party solicitor to send across to you their title documentation, download it yourself and save a week.  Never issue documentation in draft if the you can send out something which is a engrossment-ready.
  • Finally, never compromise on the quality of your work or the service which you provide to your client.  Make sure that everything is right first time, the moment it is sent out.  Don’t rely on your client to pick up your mistakes.  Take the trouble to organise your electronic file so that everything is correctly labelled and stored in its correct folder, so that you can find anything in an instant instead of having to trawl through the whole file.  It also makes it easier if a colleague has to look after your file in your absence.