This Halloween month, the Career Coach, Pamela Kleibrink Thompson, shares some tricks and treats to help you stay employed.
In October, we celebrate Halloween a time when we can masquerade as a ghost, devil or witch. Heres how to make sure your employer and colleagues dont think of you as a monster the rest of the year.
Leave your monstrous ego at the door. Become known as a person who is easy to get along with, dependable and delivers quality work on time, all the time and youll have an easier time getting more work. Dont act like a beast. Nobody wants to work with a troublemaker. Though work hours can be brutal around a deadline, maintain a positive attitude and be as accommodating as you can. Do your best at all times and youll brew a solid reputation which is better than a magic power for getting more work.
Dont be a phantom at the office. Be visible. Make your presence felt and contribute ideas and help solve problems. Be at work when it counts. No one will appreciate your solo midnight haunts at the office. Your employer wont appreciate the long hours you put in if he or she never sees you on the job. Have the same hours as your supervisor and be available for meetings.
If your co-workers are burning the midnight oil to meet an important deadline, be as obsessed as they are about delivering your work. Call on your supernatural powers and work like a demon to get the project done.
When you are between jobs, dont freak out if you are out of work for a spell. Sometimes it takes a long time to find work. Take the long-term view. There is no magic formula for career success. Recognize that it will take lots of work to get work.
Dont be a time vampire. Dont suck the life out of your contacts and connections. Be friendly, but brief on the phone as well as in e-mail. Realize that time is valuable and get to your point as quickly as possible. Try not to drive your connections batty.
Meetings That Are A Treat
The trick to running a good meeting is to have a planned agenda and stick to it. Start on time; dont wait for latecomers. It isnt fair to those who have made your meeting a priority and who are there on time. If you have them wait for others to show, it indicates that you dont feel the time is valuable of those who are already there.
Create an action list after the meeting and distribute it to all attendees and others who are affected but who couldnt attend.
Scare up job leads by networking. Go to industry related events. Things dont happen overnight like magic, but steadily building your network and keeping those relationships alive will help you in the long run. Conjure up ways to get your work seen by entering it in screenings of professional organizations and festivals.
Creating a Website could help you market your work to the world but make sure it doesnt spook viewers by taking an eternity to download. Dont expect that your emailed attachments will be opened. Many people fear computer viruses more than the boogeyman.
Bone up on animation history and techniques through books, industry Websites, magazines and classes. Continue to improve your skills and marketing materials.
Dont listen to pessimists who say that animation is dead. Haunt the theaters when they show animated fare.
Carve out time to work on your own project. If you have a great idea for a film, make it, dont take it to your grave.
With your career at stake, these tricks will ensure that your co-workers and employer consider it a treat to work with you.
Pamela Kleibrink Thompson is a recruiter, hiring strategist and career coach. She is recruiting artists for a visual effects film being produced in Los Angeles.
