PREP To Get Hired!

PREP to Get Hired is a four part educational series that gives tips and advice to job seekers that will improve their chances of having their resume come to the top of the pile, of having them be one of the people called for a phone interview, and of having them be in the top 5 who get invited in for an in-person interview.  The information provided will also help participants improve the impression they make in the interview so they can become the best candidate for the job.

Topics covered will include resume writing, interviewing tips, and how to find job openings.  But what’s unique is that we’ll be giving them from the perspective of someone who does the hiring at a company – what is it that HR professionals need to see from you, read from you,  or hear you say that will first get you noticed, then invited in for an interview, and then hopefully offered the job.

The program will also be teaching participants ways to make contacts with people that can lead to job opportunities that will never be found on a website search.

The sessions will run on Tuesday, November 15; Tuesday, November 22; Wednesday, November 30; and Tuesday, December 6.  Session times are 5:30 pm- 7:00 pm. They are open to the public, but the intended audience is people who have already held professional positions in their life and find themselves either out of work or needing to make a change.  It can often happen that a person with professional experience in a certain type of job can’t find any work of that type – but our sessions will help them identify the skills and knowledge they have that can be transferred into other types of jobs where there might be openings.

To register, click here http://chippewavalley.shrm.org/forms/registration-prep-get-hired-program

Sponsored by Chippewa Valley Society for Human Resource Management and Workforce Resource located in the Eau Claire Job Center.

The Library Radio Network

Did you know there is a new Library Radio Network sponsored by Library Management Today? You can listen to podcasts online at kiesermanmedia.podbean.com :

Welcome to a podcast station of fascinating interviews, news you can use, and compelling feature stories, all focusing on America's libraries. Our talented team of audio journalists brings you up-to-the minute information on library leaders and the libraries they manage in a convenient downloadable MP3 format. Stay tuned for frequent new updates to our network.

Letters About Literature

Young readers write to an author describing how that author’s work somehow changed the reader’s view of the world or himself/herself. Readers respond to the book they’ve read by exploring the personal relationship between themselves, the author and the book’s characters or themes. Visit the website for specifics on entering, last years winners and even some fancy envelope art that carried the entries. http://www.lettersaboutliterature.org/home

Writing Prompt Ideas for November

• 11/5   Book Lover's Day - Share your favorite books relating to the work your nonprofit does. 
• 11/11   Veteran's Day -  Highlight volunteers, staff or clients who have served. 
• 11/15   America Recycles Day -  Share how your organization recycles. For a twist, try "recycling" old content that got a good response. 
• 11/17  Great American Smokeout -  Encourage your readers to put out their cigarettes for the day -- or encourage them to break some other bad habit related to your work. 
• 11/24  Thanksgiving (U.S.). Thanks supporters, clients, and volunteers. Email messages of gratitude around Thanksgiving are a great way to kick off a series of fundraising emails in November and December.

from Kiva Miller at www.nonprofitmarketingguide.com

Find Basic Computer Skills Help Here

Do you ever wish you had a way to refer people to places where they could get help with their basic computer skills? Take a look at a new resource--we are hoping it is a comprehensive look at the offerings for classes, labs, and one-on-one training for basic computer skills, arranged by county. We'll be rolling out this site to other service providers (Job Centers and Literacy Councils, to start with). It is easy to update, so if you have suggestions for additions, please let Leah know! http://techskillshelp.iflsweb.org

Boyceville Public Library Launched New Site

The Boyceville Public Library recently launched it's brand new website that is light and fun and full of great information.  The new site, as many of the new sites created for IFLS libraries, is easy to update and maintain by the librarians themselves.  So, take a peek and see what you think.

www.boycevillelibrary.org

Three Simple Marketing Rules All Libraries Should Live By...

1. Market the service, not the content.Telling people about content puts the onus on them to think about how they can integrate that content into their lives; many people simply don’t have time to analyse what we’re offering in that way. We should be making it explicit how we can help them so they need no imagination to understand it – and that comes from marketing services. To paraphrase the awesome Sara Batts, Content is, Services do. Doing is more useful to people than being, so when you have a very limited time in which to appeal to people with limited attention span, market to them what you can do.
   
2. No one cares about the how!Can’t stress this enough: libraries are seemingly process focused, but the the rest of the world is focused on results. When marketing a service we should concentrate on what people aspire to, not the tools which will get them there. A classic example is databases: we say things like “we subscribe to X databases which you can access via the library catalogue” or, even worse, we name them individually. We market the features; what people want to know about is the benefits. Like Mary Ellen Bates says, the way to market databases is to say ‘we provide you with information Google cannot find’.
3. Market what THEY value, but continue to do what WE value.
   The SLA’s Alignment Project unearthed some fascinating truths about what we as libraries and librarians think are important, and what our patrons and potential patrons think are important. There are marked differences, I’d urge you to read about it for yourselves. (To sum up, users put the emphasis on value-driven attributes, we put it on functional attributes. This is, essentially, points 1 and 2 above, mixed together.) But the key thing is this – it doesn’t mean the stuff we value isn’t important, it just means that it isn’t as valued AS highly by other people. So we continue to DO all the important stuff we value, we just concentrate the marketing on promoting the stuff THEY value.
   .

You don’t need to be a genius to do this stuff, or to have huge marketing budgets, or even loads of time. It’s just a case of reconfiguring our existing efforts to acknowledge some simple rules.

Any that you’d add?

- thewikiman blog