Stay Sane - And Solvent!

Get Hired Boot Camp Dot Com - Yet Again

2012-01-14T13:21:00.000-08:00

I originally wrote about this very strange organisation as long ago as the 24th of August last year, and comments are still trickling in because - alas - Get Hired Boot Camp is still in business, still preying on the unwary, and still making money out of the misfortunes of other people.

Chinese people would call the times we are living in 'interesting'. Less philosophical people would call them 'hard'.

Having lived though a whole series of 'hard' times, I know that there will always be people who try to profit from them - and that there will always be people desperate enough to help them to do it.

If you are looking for work, do be careful about the on-line company you keep. Organisations like Get Hired Boot Camp Dot Com charge for the sort of advice you can get free, on-line, from hundreds of other honest, reliable sources who are truly interested in helping you, rather than helping themselves.

Geoffrey

Common Sense Utilities

2011-12-07T12:57:00.000-08:00

Utilities in France are enormously expensive - and the French are enormously reluctant to spend money that could otherwise be socked away, or used for something essential. Like food.

The methods French people use to avoid paying huge utility bills might seem a bit OTT to us, but I think we could learn something from their cut-it-down or cut-it-out and pay-as-you-go philosophy.

We have a friend who has a small business. She lives in a newly refurbished rented house, does alternations, makes garments sometimes, makes toys, bags, belts and ties out of scrap fabric all the time. Her house is equipped with a new shower and bath, a new washing machine, and a new central heating system.

She doesn't use any of it - and she doesn't have a land line telephone - but that doesn't mean that she doesn't stay warm, doesn't bathe, doesn't wash her clothes, and never speaks to anyone.

Heating is paraffin, which is cheap, pay as you go, and doesn't smell. The house is always warm.
€32 buys her a power-shower 7 days a week for three months at the local leisure centre - and she can swim as well when the hours suit her. Cheaper than using water and electricity at home, and fitness is a bonus.
'Smalls' are washed by hand. Bigger things go to the Launderette once a fortnight - cost €2. A lot cheaper than using water and electricity at home.
Telephone is a pay as you go mobile. Why support France Telecom?

The downside is that she needs to dust the shower.

OK - it's pay-as-you-go gone nuts, and it wouldn't suit everybody - but it's a regime that works for a lot of people, so it's worth thinking about how you might turn it around to suit yourself.

We haven't adopted the whole regime - but we haven't turned on the central heating this winter either. Even taking into account the cost of buying and using alternative sources of heating, our electricity bills have been reduced by €600 over the last two months alone - and the house is warm and so are we, and we don't miss central heating.

It really is worth a thought.

Emily

Riots - We All Need To Agree On A New Vocabulary

2011-08-09T12:46:00.000-07:00

Like everyone else everywhere, I've been watching what's been going on in Britain over the last few days - and in fact is still going on now, in Manchester City Centre.

The thing that has really struck me hasn't been the destruction or the fires or the theft, or the sight of violent hooded and masked people (some of them children!) throwing stones and bottles; it has been the innocent people who felt somehow obliged to apologise for it all - most of whom would have referred to themselves as 'black'.

I've always been very much opposed to the idea of referring to human beings as 'black' or 'white' because it seems to me to be not only racist, but ridiculous.

I have a black cat who is really and truly absolutely black - but I have never seen a person of that colour, and I don't expect that I ever will. Albinoism runs in my family - but whilst I have seen many things that are truly white, I have never seen a person of that colour, and I don't expect I will ever see one of those either.

The fact is that all people are - in that absolutely horrible American phrase - 'people of colour', because if they were not, they wouldn't be people at all. Indeed, the only real difference between all people anywhere is that whilst most of them have an internal moral lodestone, some of them do not.

At the moment, we are seeing people wreaking havoc in Britain who have no internal moral lodestone, no sense of community, and no sense of consequence.

It's important that we don't use the terms 'black' or 'white' to think of or to describe those people because those words are not only inaccurate and inadequate, they divide people in an arbitrary, and dangerously erroneous way.

I think we can all - people of colour as we all are - agree that the words 'dumb', 'immature', 'inconsiderate' and 'greedy' can at least begin to describe the people who wreck buildings and businesses and destroy other peoples lives, and use our social networks to undermine our society.

Emily - http://www.metlissbarfield.com

Stress & Spring and Hair & Nails

2011-06-20T06:05:00.001-07:00

All the pharmacies here are suddenly displaying shelves and shelves of expensive pills and potions designed to stop your hair falling out and your nails splitting irreparably in unfortunate places.

And that's quite smart of them, because everyone loses more hair than usual in Spring, and right about now is when it begins to be obvious that quite a bit of ones' crowning glory seems to have gone missing.

There's nothing wrong with the potions; some hair products are better than others, and the difference in price between name-brand products that specifically target a problem and generic products that don't isn't very great.

You should think very carefully before you shell out for the pills, though.

All the pills (no matter which brand) contain the same basic ingredients - and actually they are the correct ingredients. The problem is that they don't contain nearly large enough dosages of hair building vitamins to make any impact - even if used over the long term, which is, of course, exactly what the manufacturer advises.

If you're really having a problem with 'fall out' - particularly if you've been under stress - get a recipe from the internet (try looking at Natural News and use the suggested vitamins and foodstuffs. It's cheaper in the long run, and at least you know exactly what you are getting for your money.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com

Support the 'Get Brtain Trading' Campaign - It Could Get You into a Job

2011-05-21T13:12:00.000-07:00

Get Britain Trading is a new campaign which aims to raise awareness of the contribution that SMEs make to the UK economy and improve the conditions under which all SMEs are forced to operate. It calls for changes to be made that would allow SMEs to prosper - and, of course, to grow, and employ and/or train people.

If you're out of a job for any reason at all, this campaign is important to you.

There are literally hundreds of thousands of small or medium sized businesses in Britain that would like to expand, and would like (or need!) to employ more people - and they would, if they could. The campaign aims to create a climate that would make that possible.

In order to make sure that the campaign has the maximum impact and achieves the desired results, the Forum of Private Business, which has launched the campaign, needs as many SMEs as possible to support the campaign and its aims by going to Get Britain Trading , and signing up to the 'Get Britain Trading' pledge.

Signing up costs nothing and takes seconds - actually, signing up, downloading the logo you can see on the right of this blog, and putting it into place took me, an admitted IT idiot, less than a minute. And it will be on our website tomorrow.

If you know anyone who has an SME, please ask them to sign the pledge and display the logo on their website or blog. If you have started up in business yourself - sign up to the campaign today, and get as many other SME people to sign up as you can.

Any SME owner who puts in an e-mail address - and I did - will get a free guide giving practical and expert advice on common small business issues like bank lending, late payment and cost reduction.

We ALL need the changes that this campaign could bring about if it gets the support it deserves. Please do try to make that happen by spreading the word or taking the pledge here .

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com/

You Certainly Don't Need Cold Calls From Rogue Debt Management Companies - And Do you Really Need a Land-Line Telephone Anyway?

2011-03-19T13:29:00.000-07:00

Better late than never, Citizens Advice has filed a 'super complaint' with the Office of Fair Trading and called for a ban on cold-calling - and upfront fees - by debt management and 'loan finding' companies.

Debt management companies make approximately 840 million cold calls every year - frequently to people who are already in debt or have poor credit histories. Some offer loans against an upfront fee, persuade people to part with their bank details, and extract their 'upfront fees' from their victims' accounts. The promised loans, of course, rarely materialise.

The Charity estimates that rogue debt management and 'loan finding' companies are costing the public £190 million pounds a year. And if something very serious isn't done about cold-calling very soon that huge sum is likely to increase. Current economic conditions have put main-stream credit out of reach for a lot of people - and made any offer of financial help very tempting indeed.

Obviously, you don't have to fall victim to cold-callers of any kind. You can just put the telephone down willy-nilly on all cold-callers. Or you can avoid the nuisance of cold-callers, put yourself out of the way of temptation, and save a lot of money by 'going French'.

The French are dumping land-line telephones in favour of bog standard, no frills, pay-as-you-go mobiles in droves. Several thousand people, for example, live in the same small town I live in - but the telephone directory lists only a few hundred, and those are mostly businesses. Everyone else has opted out of the expense of an in-house telephone that can only be used in the house - and the number of which is, alas, instantly accessible to anybody and everybody who can read - and gone for cheap and secret instead.

There are, of course, pros and cons to not being 'in the book', but the advantages can outweigh the disadvantages. For one thing, bog-standard, pay-as-you-go mobiles are much cheaper than land-line telephones. For another, you can always be sure that you might actually want to speak to whoever happens to be calling you...

Geoffrey - http://www.metlissbarfield.com/

Your Forgotten Assets Are Worth Money - and Maybe You Should Let Go of the Past

2011-03-09T13:15:00.000-08:00

I cleaned out the garden shed yesterday - part of the mighty Spring Clean that I force myself into at about this time of year every year - and as I hauled gardening tools and equipment to and fro, and applied spit and polish to everything that was standing still, a couple of things occurred to me.

I own two lawnmowers - one moterised and an old push-me-pull-me job. I haven't had a lawn (or anything else mow-able!) for getting on for seven years.

I have a strimmer - but I haven't had anything to strim for getting on for seven years either.

I have a tiller - but my garden is mature now, so there isn't anything left to till.

I have a spade - but it's too big and too heavy for me, and it's been hanging in a corner with a John Lewis label attached to it since 2006.

Today was attic day. I found four kitchen chairs (blue with rush seats à la V. Van Gogh), a cupboard full of curtains that haven't seen a window since we left England in 1994, enough glasses to stock a public house, and a stash of ornaments and picture frames that have never seen the light of day in any house of ours. 1984????

Oh, yes. And when I opened the wardrobe this afternoon to pull out fresh clothes, I spotted a red feather boa. I tried it on. If you've got one - don't do it.

All that stuff! It's all in good condition and good working order - even the feather boa - but I had to ask myself why I'd still got it.

It's all going. It's all going in the next car boot sale I see advertised - along with the unwatched, unread and no longer listened to videos and CDs and DVDs and books that are clogging our shelves and cupboards, the clothing that we will never wear again, the tablecloths that we never use, and everything else that might be useful to someone else, but will never be useful to us again until it's turned into money and becomes the future, rather than the past.

Two things:

Firstly, your forgotten assets are worth something to someone else - and the money you get for them could pay a couple of bills, give you walking about money, or let you eat for free for a week or two.

Secondly - and this is just as important - all that old stuff is PAST. It's gone. It's lumber. Getting rid of it isn't just about getting money for it. The fact is that when you get rid of your old stuff you clear your mind as well as your cupboards, make tomorrow a better, unencumbered day, and leave space for the future.

It's Spring. Time to clear the dead leaves and leave space for new growth.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

Secret Resources...

2011-03-08T12:56:00.000-08:00

There are lots of reasons that you might be barred - or believe yourself to be barred - from becoming any kind of landlord or landlady - but if you are living in fear of being unable to pay your rent or your mortgage, it's time to ignore the obstacles, bury your scruples, and work out whether or not you can squeeze some life-saving cash out of the place you hang your hat. And, maybe, let's not forget, help somebody else out of a nasty hole at the same time.

The fact is that even if you have a small one bedroom flat, you can still let a room. It means sharing a bathroom, making cupboard space for someone else in your kitchen, finding hanging space for your clothes in your sitting room and using that room as a bedsitter, but it can be done.

I appreciate that nobody in their right mind is going to be in love with the idea of doing that, and that few people will relish the idea of sharing an intimate live-in life with someone they are not sharing a bed with - but it really depends on what the alternatives are, doesn't it? And let's face it, if the alternative is losing your home - whether you rent it or own it - or sharing it with someone else it until times get better, then sharing it has got to be a better option.

Our families are no strangers to sharing their personal spaces. My son and daughter in law have let at least one room in their house since the day they bought it 12 or 13 years ago. Bill's son has let all the rooms in his flat (including the sitting room) one by one, and has now moved out altogether to live with his girlfriend. In every case it was a 'needs-must' decision - and in every case it has worked out very well for everyone concerned.

Obviously, if you contemplate sharing your living space, you need to do some research - work out the practicalities of exactly how you are going to share your space, and find out what your shared space might be worth and price it (including estimated utilities, but not including the telephone which is always going to be a separate issue) accordingly. And then move yourself out, as it were, so that the space remains furnished and attractive, but is empty of your belongings, and ready to be let.

Then, of course, you are going to have to decide how you are going to find a tenant. Word of mouth is best - my daughter-in-law invariably lets to members of her Church - but advertisements work well if you obtain (and check!) references and get a month's deposit and a month in advance.

You ARE, of course, going to have to declare the money you receive from letting your space on your Tax Return, even if you are paid in cash. That might mean paying someone else to help you prepare your Tax Return - but you would still have your space, and you would still be quids in.

Geoffrey - http://www.metlissbarfield.com

£27m Reprieve for the Debt Advice Agencies

2011-02-18T07:37:00.000-08:00

In January, Mark Hoban, the financial secretary to the Treasury, announced that funding for debt advice agencies - including the Citizens Advice Bureau - would be cut at the end of March. The CAB issued 900 redundancy notices to its advisors as a result.

The Government has now, however, set aside £27m of funding to provide for free debt advice during 2011/12. The money will be distributed between the CAB and other independent advice agencies in England & Wales offering hundreds of consultants facing redundancy a reprieve, and ensuring that everyone will continue to have access to free and unbiased advice and assistance in sorting out their financial difficulties.

Despite the renewal of funding, however, the Secretary of State for the Department of Business, Innovation & Skills has called on "other funding streams" such as local authorities to provide more financial support to the free debt advice sector, and has also asked the Consumer Financial Education Body - which is soon to be known as the Money Advice Service - to deliver a free national advice service online, over the telephone, and face-to-face. The CFEB's site is already an extremely useful resource. The new service should be available by the Spring.

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com/

Keys & Gray - Dinosaurs are Still Roaming the Earth Then...

2011-02-12T10:44:00.000-08:00

Three weeks ago Richard Keys and Andy Gray, who were then employed by Sky Sports, made derogatory and objectionable remarks about Sian Massey, a perfectly ordinary and very well qualified young woman who works as a football referee or, more generally, as an assistant referee.

The remarks were supposed to be 'off-air' - but they weren't, and so the shit, as they say, hit the fan.

Sky Sports - no fool it - fired Gray immediately; Keys dug his own grave by way of an hour long interview with Talksport which left him with no real alternative but to resign.

The interview caused a bit of an uproar - The Sun called it 'Skin Crawling'; Ollie Irish (of 'Who Ate All The Pies?' in case you don't know) called Keys a 'deluded buffoon', and there were print media people around who, whilst being less forthright, were even less complimentary - but as a long-term parliamentary correspondent I'm afraid I only found it dishearteningly familiar.

Keys' insistent, repetitive, but never quite wholehearted, apologies, and his talk of 'dark forces' at Sky, and 'envy' everywhere else, reminded me of nearly every disgraced politician it's been my doubtful pleasure to deal with over the past thirty-five years. These people, you see, are never the authors of their own downfall. It's all brought about by other people, and it's all so unfair.

I had great hopes that after Keys resigned we would never hear either of him or of Gray again - but no such luck. The Gruesome Twosome began a new job yesterday, hosting a three hour radio show on Talksport, five days a week.

The papers thought the show 'dull' - and interestingly there doesn't seem to have been a single caller despite the fact that Talksport's number was plugged as often as ever.

Could it be that a lot of people find these two clowns as repugnant as I do?

Bill - http://www.therapypartnership.co.uk/

Only in France - But Why?

2011-01-31T14:05:00.000-08:00

One out of ten people are unemployed in France - and forty per cent of those people are considered to be 'long-term unemployed' because they have been out of work for a year or more.

So concerned is the French Government about that state of affairs that France's unemployment office recently launched a small test project designed to rebuild the confidence of the long-term unemployed. The project involves job counselling, and a lot of professional advice - not just from 'human resource specialists', but from make-up artists, hairdressers, manicurists, and image consultants.

The project is a day-long affair, and at the end of the day, participants go home, 'made over', loaded with goodies provided by the sponsors and - like anyone who has gone through a 'makeover' process - looking (and likely feeling!) a lot better for the experience.

Whether the project will ever help any of those people to get a job is moot - although a similar project designed to help 100 homeless women resulted in fifty percent of them getting jobs - but that isn't the point. The real point was more than adequately summed up by the organisers of the project, who emphasised that 'appearance isn't frivolous'.

Unfortunately, it's unlikely that you are going to get a 'makeover' courtesy of Her Majesty's Government any time soon - or, indeed, at any time at all - but you can still take note of the French message, and take it seriously.

You need to spend time on yourself whatever your circumstances - not for someone else, not to get a job, but for you. Spending time on your appearance isn't 'frivolous'.

Emily - http://www.thetherapypartnership.com/

Herbal Remedies are Going to be Licensed - But That Isn't a Good Reason to Buy Outside the UK

2011-01-30T13:15:00.000-08:00

As of the 1st of May this year, all alternative remedies must be licensed.

That does not mean that the herbal remedies that have been on the shelves of your local health food shop for years are going to be banned or unavailable.

It simply means that as of May 1st those remedies can only be manufactured by companies that can afford to purchase a licence to produce and label them in accordance with the new guidelines, and that you will only be able to buy those remedies from outlets that are regularly supplied by those specific manufacturers.

Which, sadly, means that you may no longer be able to buy everything you want from your local healthfood store - which likely buys from smaller manufacturers who will be unable to afford to license what they produce - and will have to go elsewhere, or buy on-line.

Buying elsewhere, or buying on-line, need NOT involve shopping outside the UK or EU. Boots Herbal Stores is not going to disappear, and if you can't find what you're looking for there - try Auravita or Vega Nutritionals .

This EU Directive - like many other EU Directives - has not been thought through, and is bound to put some small businesses in the UK out of business and some people in the UK out of work, but there is no need to make bad worse by rebelling against over-regulation by ordering goods on-line from companies based in countries where there is no regulation at all.

Geoffrey - http://www.metlissbarfield.com/

The Redundancy Hub

2011-01-18T06:06:00.000-08:00

I discovered The Redundancy Hub when the Facebook Group that's associated with it asked me to join them on Facebook. The website site says that The Redundancy Hub "... is the one stop shop site you can go to if you are facing redundancy or constructive dismissal", and it means it.

If you have been made redundant, or face the risk of redundancy, the Redundancy Hub is going to be useful to you on an emotional level as well as offering career action plans, job hunting advice, training options and - last but not least! - help with debt management.

And you can get a free 28 day redundancy action plan.

Emily - http://www.metlissbarfield.com

Is Self-Employment the Answer to Unemployment?

2011-01-13T07:31:00.000-08:00

When we began to write this blog in 2009, we all had great hopes that we wouldn't still need to be writing it in 2011. Unfortunately, things haven't worked out that way, and when Government cuts begin to really take effect later this year large numbers of people will find themselves having to deal with unemployment and all that that entails.

Informed opinion is that a large percentage of those newly out-of-work people will look to become self-employed, and whilst I'm all for that, I also know that self-employment doesn't suit everybody, and that not everyone can make a success of being self-employed simply by using the same skills that they once used for an employer.

There has, for example, been a big fall-out of credit management staff over the last couple of years - and I've lost count of how many of those newly redundant people decided to go it alone and set up as a debt collection agency. Despite the fact that there was (and still is!) and lot of debt around to be collected, few of them lasted beyond the first few months, and for the first time ever I began to see insolvency reports relating to debt collection agencies.

If you think you might want to go it alone,Start Ups is the perfect place to get advice and help on every aspect of starting a business. There's a "Business Idea Evaluation Tool" and a lot of other free tools and resources on the site - and a section that talks about the sort of personality that has what it takes to go it alone!

Posted by Geoffrey Metliss - http://www.metlissbarfield.com

Get Hired Boot Camp Dot Com?

2010-08-24T13:01:00.000-07:00

I learned about Get Hired Boot Camp Dot Com from an advertisement that came to me via the International and Insolvency Professionals Group on LinkedIn. The advertisement was posted by Ryan A. Scarborough of Voidray Marketing Solutions.

Mr. Scarborough has next to no profile at all on LinkedIn and, so far as I can see, neither he nor Voidray (nor 'Get Hired Boot Camp.dot.com'!) has anything to do with credit or insolvency. Moreover, if you Google 'Get Hired Boot Camp' you will see that whilst it offers a free webinar, it's also selling some very expensive courses and is looking for affiliates - people who will sign up and pay up and go on to offer a free webinar based on the free webinar and so on, and so on.

Judging by Mr. Scarborough's input on LinkedIn, he has signed up and he has paid up and is now doing his best to make something out of nothing using whatever tools he can - and I suppose that one can't blame him for using them very badly.

The Job Centre may not be an exciting place to be, and it's no fun answering advertisements and sending out endless CV's and trying to stay positive about your prospects, but it's certainly better than signing up and wasting time and money buying into schemes that are - like the Boot Camp - deliberately targeted to attract people who are unemployed, and having a hard time getting a regular job.

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com

Tweetyjobs.com?

2010-08-11T12:41:00.000-07:00

Sorry we've been away so long! I was surprised, today, to see no one had written anything for over a month.

Sadly, none of us were really on holiday. Bill has been rebuilding his late mother's cottage from scratch practically single-handed since the Spring, and has been working hard all through the summer to get finished before winter. Geoffrey just got back this weekend from visiting family for a couple of months. Unless you count 'taking up the slack' as a valid excuse for ignoring you for over a month, though, I'm afraid I haven't got one.

Anyway! The silly season is almost over, Geoffrey is back, and Bill's cottage has heating, windows and floorboards, and we can hopefully get to normal now - although I'm not sure that what I want to tell you about today is going to be very useful.

I had an e-mail this morning via Secrets of the Job Hunt Career Podcast that was talking about Tweety Jobs .

Despite the Twitter-like birds on the website, and Freshout's (don't ask!) input, Tweety Jobs is not genuinely part of Twitter - and it isn't part of Secrets of the Job Hunt, either. It seems to be something quite new that is being run by someone called Matt Blyth, and it was posted as part of a blog on Secrets of the Job Hunt by Chris Russell,who runs a series of on-line Job Boards in the United States.

I frankly wasn't impressed by the Tweety Jobs site (or its 'tweety' title!) but if enough people use it, it might become what it's trying to be - 'the worlds truly employment-centric social network'. Or it might not. But it's worth signing up just in case it does.

In the meantime, if you haven't signed up to Secrets of the Job Hunt - you could be missing out. Many of the Podcasts are useful and interesting wherever you live.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com

At Last - A Chance to Say Something as to How Your Tax Money is Spent

2010-07-09T13:33:00.000-07:00

I had an e-mail today from my nephew. He was forwarding a message he had received from David Cameron.

David Cameron's message was all about public spending - and, of course, the necessity of cutting it down.

Whilst I can remember many times in the past when cuts in public spending needed to be made - or were made willy-nilly - in order to avoid an economic crisis, I can't remember any Government asking me for my opinion as how those cuts might be made fairly and responsibly, or inviting me to comment on the waste of public funds. So the message was a 'newbie' for me - and it's probably going to be 'newbie' for you as well.

Don't miss this opportunity to have your say and make yourself heard! Go to Spending Challenge and tick the boxes, check out all the tags and ideas - and submit your own ideas.

In his e-mail David Cameron remarked that it is, after all, your money that your Government spends - and that's true. Having a Government that admits it? That's new.

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com

Secrets of the Job Hunt - Something For Everybody, Everywhere

2010-06-29T11:54:00.000-07:00

Weeks - actually I think it's more probably months! - ago, I mentioned something called Secrets of the Job Hunt . If you didn't join - and it is free to join! - take the time to look at it again, even if you don't happen to be based in the United States.

In the first place, joining means that you will get e-mails with Pod Cast attachments. The Pod Casts address a lot of issues. Don't be parochial when you listen to them. There are nuggets of information in there that apply to everyone who is looking for a job wherever they happen to be based. Just because you don't happen to live in New York, for example, doesn't mean that there isn't something in that particular Pod Cast for you.

Secondly, there are a lot of blogs there. I was particularly impressed by the one written by Lizandra Vega entitled "Six Unusual Things That Will Blow Your Job Interview" - not least because I've interviewed people who've 'blown it' in one or another of those six ways.

If you look for her page on Secrets of the Job Hunt, you'll also find that she has made a video entitled "Job Interviewing Tips - Appearance, Behaviour and Communication", which is also well worth a visit.

I have to say that I get more impressed with this particular site every time I visit - and never mind that the jobs advertised there are in the USA. The site is 'cross border' and has many things to say that are valuable to everyone.

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com/

Could be Worse - You Could be Unemployed in France

2010-06-24T13:17:00.001-07:00

Quite a lot of France wasn't working today because the retirement age here is going to be raised from 60 to 62. Few of the trains were running, not too many schools were open - and quite a few private businesses were closed.

In the United States the retirement age for everybody is 65 - and a lot of people prefer to keep on working past that age if they possibly can. In England many people complain they have to retire at 65 whether they want to or not.

And a lot of people in all three countries would like to have a job to retire from at whatever age.

The budget wasn't thrilling - a rise in VAT and a downgraded benefit system isn't going to please anybody - but there was a lot in the budget that gave business (and particularly small business) an incentive to hire people, and a lot there, too, that could help people to set up a small business of their own.

And despite the downgraded benefit system, you can still keep a roof over your head if it doesn't cost the state more than £400 a week, and get quite a lot of other assistance.

And your qualifications, if you have any, will allow you to stand on a level playing field with everyone else who has the same qualifications.

There is no incentive for businesses in France to hire people, and legislation has made it very difficult for anyone to get hired on a permanent basis however good their qualifications.
Everyone who passes their Baccaleuréate examination in France has an identical qualification to everyone else who passes that examination anywhere in the country - but in fact its value depends upon where a person passes it, so that it is less valuable to people who have studied for it in poor communities.
Taxation makes it virtually impossible to set up a small business and still earn enough to live.
There is no such thing as Housing Benefit - if you don't have a job here you can say 'goodbye' to your apartment, or your room, or whatever else you are renting to live in because the state will not pay for it if you cannot pay for it yourself.

There is a lot wrong with Britain - but there's a lot right with it as well. Things could be worse - you could be unemployed in France.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com

Things To Avoid - and Things to Do - At Start-Up

2010-06-18T13:37:00.000-07:00

According to Creditsafe , a lot of companies avoid trading with start-ups that are a less than a year old - which it felt was bad news for people who were fed up of waiting to get a job and had decided to go into business for themselves.

It is bad news - but there are several things that start-ups can do to make themselves instantly more 'acceptable' to established companies whether they are less than a year old or not:

A website is regarded as a powerful indicator of permanancy and reliability. 12 per cent of established UK businesses will not trade with a company that doesn't have one.

Land-line telephones are even more important. Over half of established UK businesses will not trade with companies that are only contactable by way of a mobile telephone.

And 51% of UK businesses won't deal with people who use P.O. addresses.

In the first place you don't need a P.O. box address. A lot of people fall for the idea that a P.O. Box address is more 'business-like'. And maybe it used to be - but it isn't now. So many people are working from home now - like me actually!- that renting a P.O. box is just money thrown away. There's nothing wrong or 'unbusiness-like' about using your home address as your business address.

It doesn't matter if your land-line telephone is in your own name rather than your business name. My land-line telephone is in my name - and that doesn't seem to bother any of my clients. If you are out and about a lot, and there's no-one at home to anwer the telephone - use 'Call Forwarding', so that all calls are forwarded to your mobile telephone.

A website can cost money - but not as much as you might think. Fasthosts offers web hosting for as little as £1.99 a month. That will buy you reasonable space, an easy website builder, and virus and spam protected e-mail. You can also buy and register a .co.uk domain in the same place for £2.95.

And if you don't believe that you can build the website you want with their tools, go to Allwebco Design Corporation where you'll find some cheap - and quite sophisticated stuff - that's easy to buy and very easy to use, and comes with lots of very useful advice.

Pundits can be a little bit nervous and very, very negative. Nervous I can understand - but I don't believe that 'negative' is very useful to anyone.

If you're just starting up, you're bound to be nervous - but you can meet the criteria for acceptance with established UK Companies if you follow a few simple guidelines.

Use your home address as your business address.

Use your home telephone number as your business number, and get 'call forwarding'.

Get a website.

Get a free blog at Google Blogspot and talk about yourself and what you do.

Use Facebook , or Naymz , or LinkedIn to advertise yourself and what you do.

And stay positive!

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com/

And Speaking of Scams... Look Out for This One

2010-06-06T13:29:00.000-07:00

I got a post via a Hypnosis and Hypnotherapy Group on LinkedIn today.

Someone in Amsterdam had called a member of the Group in Rhode Island and asked to book ten sessions to work on some issues. The therapist quoted $850 for ten sessions. The 'client' insisted on paying 'up front'. The therapist then received cheques totalling $3,000.

The therapist naturally e-mailed the 'client' to say that he had been overpaid. The 'client' said that it was an error on the part of his US agent, and asked the therapist to bank the cheques, subtract the $850 and send the remainder to his 'travel agent' - and gave full details of where to send the excess cash.

Fortunately, the therapist waited for the cheques to clear before sending any money to the 'travel agent', because the cheques were drawn on a ficticious account, and they all bounced.

The therapist posted on LinkedIn because he felt that the person who targeted him would probably target other therapists also - and I think he is certainly right. Sadly, I can think of a whole lot of other small service providers who might also prove likely to fall victim to this particular 'scam' - and I don't think that small service providers outside of the United States can afford to ignore its existence.

Take warning, folks!

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

Beware of Vampires and Other Predators

2010-06-01T14:04:00.000-07:00

I got a message via Monster France today from someone called Laurent Brouat who has a website at laurentbrouat.com. It was entitled 'The 7 phases of the Job Search' and, being a curious person - and because I'm standing on the edge of a cliff myself - I read all seven of them.

I have to say that I went along with the first five phases of M. Brouat's post - which was beautifully illustrated with a flow sheet, incidentally - because it concentrated on the emotional, mental and physical effects of unemployment that we are all only too well aware of, and described (actually extremely well) the ordinary things that people generally do in order to get a job. Including applying for any job, anywhere, whether your CV is a good fit or not.

So far, so good. I wasn't particularly disturbed by phase six either, because phase six concentrated on the value of networking, and I do believe that networking is a valuable tool - which is why I'm doing such a lot of it myself.

By phase seven, though, I knew I was in fairyland. Such a happy ending to that spreadsheet -but only through the professional help of M. Brouat.

I haven't given you the link to his website (a) because half the time it doesn't work and (b) because I don't believe that you need to pay for professional help to get another job.

There are a lot of people out there preying on the hopes of the unemployed. Don't go there. Agencies are free - and you can do a lot by yourself.

Felt like signing myself 'Disgusted of Reading', but I am (as always) Bill at http://www.therapypartnership.com/

We're All Very Bad at 'Shopping' People - But Some People Need to be 'Shopped' to be Stopped

2010-05-27T13:09:00.000-07:00

There are very few things upon which the Irish, the Welsh, the Scots and the English can all agree, but the ban on 'shopping' anybody for anything less than the abuse of small children or multiple homicide is taken very, very seriously by most of us. Perhaps too seriously, sometimes, and in some cases.

An estimated 165,000 households in the UK are using unlicensed moneylenders - most of them in Scotland, the north of England and the Midlands - who offer cash loans without paperwork, may take benefit money or bank cards as security, and often threaten or use violence to get money.

The Office of Fair Trading has joined a campaign to warn people of the dangers of loan sharks who use violence to enforce exhorbitant interest on debts. As part of the Stop Loan Sharks campaign the OFT and the Trading Standards Illegal Money Lending Teams have released a video urging people to report loan sharks and will be distributing posters throughout Scotland, Wales and England.

Additionally, the Stop Loan Sharks campaign website (and we've provided the link above) allows people to learn more about loan sharks, report loan sharks in confidence by telephone, e-mail or text/sms, and talks about different and safer ways to borrow money.

So far, the Stop Loan Sharks project has helped more than 11,000 people, written off more than £31 million of illegal debt, seized £1 million in cash, and successfully prosecuted a number of people, one of whom will be serving an indefinite sentence for the protection of the public - and that last little nugget of information says it all, really, doesn't it?

I don't like the idea of 'shopping' anybody - actually it's a repulsive idea - but loan sharks need to be stopped. They prey on people. They cause enormous misery and pain and exacerbate poverty.

So it's either 'shop' to stop, or turn a blind eye. Either way, you're going to have to come to terms with your conscience and live with it. I know what I'd choose to do.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com

How interesting is 0% interest for 14 (or more) months?

2010-05-23T13:32:00.000-07:00

I was looking for something else entirely when I fell across a Virgin credit card advertisement. It was all about transferring an existing balance from another card and it was offering 0% interest for 14 months. There was a 2.98% transfer fee (minimum £3.00) and a balance transfer limit of 95%.

I immediately became very curious about 0% interest rates at that point, because it struck me - actually not for the first time! - how very useful this loophole in the credit system could be to a determined and disciplined debtor.

I went to 'Credit Cards on Google' where one can compare credit cards with a 0% introductory balance transfer and their purchase rates. Purchase rates are much the same for all of them - but only Virgin was offering 0% for 12 months on purchases, as well as 0% interest for 14 months.

APRs differed widely - but determined and disciplined debtors would not be interested in APRs, because they would not be interested in making any purchases or incurring any interest at all.

Taking advantage of 0% offers like this - always supposing you are accepted, of course! - is a very good way of getting rid of credit card debt. IF!

You don't use the new card, but simply use the time available to pay off as much of the outstanding balance as you can.
You shift the remaining balance to a new 0% lender directly prior to the end of the interest free period - and then don't use that card either, but simply continue to pay off the then outstanding balance.
You go on moving the diminishing balance to fresh 0% per cent lenders, until no balance remains.

One can actually go on transferring diminishing balances to interest-free lenders - paying, of course, diminishing transfer fees for the privilege - almost world without end, because 'interest free for a given period' credit cards are not new phenomena, and are not likely to disappear any time soon.

The good news is that by working this system one can end up with a valid credit card and excellent credit record at the end of the day. IF - and only IF - one never uses any of the the cards until one has a nil balance.

Playing this system is worth a thought - if you have the good sense and fortitude to cut up and render the lovely, tempting, new cards useless the instant they fall through your letter box...

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com/

Tell The Truth and Shame The Devil

2010-05-21T13:42:00.000-07:00

A few days ago I wrote a very long post about fraudulent recruitment, and published an e-mail I'd received from M. Jean-Pierre Zunino, who had been a victim of it.

I think it cost Jean-Pierre quite a lot to come out on Monster France, LinkedIn, Twitter - and this blog - to tell the world that he'd been taken for a fool by unscrupulous people, and I admire and applaud his willingness to do that in an effort to warn other people of a potential danger.

He's been rewarded, in a roundabout sort of way. His honesty has pulled a lot of other victims out of the closet.

If you've been a victim of this kind of fraud, it's difficult to advertise it - but it would be kindly and generous to do so. Other victims feel less foolish, and more able to relate their own experiences fully, if one person is prepared to speak out - and many witnesses can build an evidential mountain that might lead to a conviction and the end of at least one fraud.

Falling for a scam isn't anything to be ashamed of - but keeping quiet about it might be.

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com/

Fraudulent Recruitment - Important, Please Read!

2010-05-12T13:08:00.000-07:00

A couple of days ago I received a notification from a Monster France Group Member. I have copied it here in full, and I suggest that you read it very carefully despite its length - not least because the Group Member in question applied for a job that he saw advertised on LinkedIn, which he felt sure was a trustworthy source:

+++ CAUTION +++
FRAUDULENT RECRUITMENT METHODS.
About 20 days ago I noticed an announcement, SIGNED TOTAL U.K., on LINKEDIN.informing they were looking for profiles for a new project in England.I sent my application and one week later,they requested to fill up the attached " TOTAL forms."requesting to detail my profesionnal experiences.They asked me to phone to "TOTAL U.K."as soon as I shall send the documents.I dialed the number which was indicated and the person advised they will revert very soon.Then,I received a mail confirming my recruitment.They attached the job description which, of course, corresponded with my experience, with the terms of my contracts etc.They advised me that before starting my new job I shall have to go to U.S.A. for a training.They asked to contact their travel agency, located in England,for an interview scheduled in their office.I had the travel agency name, its phone number and the name of the person in charge. I acted accordingly and got a reply asking some documents to issue my travel formalities such as my passport copy, a copy of the mail I received "from TOTAL UK".Then, they requested me to send them 489 pounds for the travel expenses.Being very much surprised,I decided to check on internet if this travel agency really existed. I got the confirmation but noticed the phone number was different. I dialed in vain this new number but had no reply.Then,I went to GOOGLE and had the good surprise to find this person who really works for TOTAL.Being confident,I deducted the travel agency number certainly changed.Decided to phone to "TOTAL U.K." I got the same person who advised that this was the normal TOTAL policy and that in any case I shall be refund on monday.They requested to be paid through "WESTERN UNION".The beneficiary of the money was the travel agency name and address mentioned on the " TOTAL U.K." mail.So,sent the money to England.They acknowledged the receipt of the money and reverted with the reference number to communicate to British Airways to get my flight details.I contacted the Marseille B.A. desk which advised me I was scheduled to leave from Paris airport.Thinking they made a mistake as I live at about 40/50 kms from Marseille airport only, I phoned them to amend my ticket.The day after they sent a very long mail advising they relayed "the news safety rules established by English Authorities.This mail explained that due to recent problems they met with terrorism, every time somebody will want to come to England, they will investigate to check this person does not belong to a terrorism group and for this investigation, the person will have to pay GBP 2.990 which will be refund on the coming date, subject the person is not a terrorist !I phoned them and they said there was no other way to proceed.Refusing to pay, the person promised to quickly revert with his " boss's decision".Half an hour later he called me back to give me a good news : " I shall only have to pay 40 per cent of the requested money!"As I maintained my position the person told me he will contact TOTAL to try to find a solution and promised to revert on the evening.From my side, I phone to the Sheraton Hotel in London and they confirmed they had a reservation for me !Then I decided to contact again "TOTAL".I tried several times but nobody replied.Then I decided to try my chance through another TOTAL U.K. office number and they advised they did not know the man who signed the "TOTAL U.K." mails.I finally decided to call TOTAL Paris office which advised recruitments are only made from Paris and confirmed I have not been recruited.They finally informed me that several times a year, there are victims of such procedures, with TOTAL, with SHELL and with other groups.Suggest you to relay to as much people as possible this information to avoid such things and maybe arrest this person who takes advantages from people who are maybe already in a critical situation.
Kind regards/Jean-Pierre Zunino

You will see that M. Zunino asked that I relay his information to as many people as possible - and I am doing my best to do so. In the meantime, I am asking you to do likewise.

Sadly, a lot of unscrupulous people are using social and business networks - including Twitter - for their own ends. Be careful.

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com/

Don't be Parochial - Particularly if You're Over 45

2010-05-03T13:42:00.000-07:00

I do a lot of wandering about on the internet - and in the process of wandering about, I join this or that social network or group because it happens to be relevant to what I do, or simply because I'm interested in what it has to offer or say.

Some time ago, I joined something called Secrets of the Job Hunt - and so things fall into my inbox from them along with a lot of other stuff from a lot of other sources. I see that there are a lot of jobs going for people who have specific skills, for example - in credit management or in the wine trade - but I was particularly interested in something I got from Secrets of the Job Hunt the other day, because it was a Podcast entitled 'Over 45 Job Search Advice'.

It was very relevant to me at the time because I had just received a message from someone on LinkedIn who is over 45 and who is about to be made redundant. He was using LinkedIn and Naymz - and, for all I know, other social and business networks - to try to get other employment. But he wasn't really using the internet to it's full potential.

He wasn't wandering about. He wasn't joining this or that network or group. In fact, he was too narrowly focused.

And so he wasn't getting the information that I get every day from networks and groups.

Wander about! Join things! And don't be concerned that some of those organisations are not on your side of 'the pond', or are not (apparently!) specifically relevant to you. It's all grist to the mill. You need the information - and you never know where it might lead.

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com/

In Memory of M. Titoukh

2010-04-26T13:08:00.000-07:00

This isn't a jolly story - and it's quite long - but I hope you'll read it.

Close to our house, the Rue Bourbon is an odd mixture of the almost new, and the very, very old. On our side of the street, the gardens of the houses run down to the slender remains of the moat and the great gated ramparts that formed part of Cardinal Richelieu's grand design for a perfect city at a time when a perfect city necessarily included gates, ramparts, a moat, and arrow slits in the otherwise windowless out-facing walls. The steps that lead down from the houses into the gardens are stone and - like the wooden stairs inside the houses - the steps have been worn away by countless feet over countless years so that they all have dips in the middle. Inside or out, no floor is level on this side of the street.

On the other of the street, though, there's a small block of flats. It's fairly new - in fact it's the only new building in the whole town - so all its steps and all of its floors are straight, and it hasn't yet started to lean this way or that. When it does, it will probably just fall down. It definitely wasn't built to lean, last, or grow gracefully old, picturesque, and inconvenient.

M. Titoukh lived in the flats, and his flat was directly opposite our house, so we saw him often, standing on his balcony watching the street.

He was a 'local' person, and like most 'local' people he would probably have preferred to live inconveniently and coldly moated on our side of the street rather than wrapped in warm breeze block on his side of it - and he would almost certainly have been better off had he had the freedom to go out into a garden - but he had no choice of accommodation. M. Titoukh was never very well, so he lived where local government put him: isolated in a flat one floor up from the street and a world away from it and everything else that would have made his life more interesting and more worth living.

For the first three or four years that we lived here, we never saw M. Titouhk outside his flat - and we observed that he had no visitors save for the woman (sent by the excellent French health service) who came to clean the flat for him. We spoke to him, of course - we and all our immediate neighbours - he above and we on the street below, and we were all very pleased when, last year, he seemed suddenly to get a lot better.

Last year M. Titoukh got a ginger cat. He got an old bicycle and rode it. He went out and shopped. He played boule under the plane trees on the wide boulevard on the other side of the ramparts. He went to the Cardinal's wonderful park that is all that is left now of the Cardinal's once magnificent palace. He began to smile and talk - and he became a known person and an accepted neighbour to all of us, and (at last!) an important part of the street-level life of the Rue Bourbon.

Whenever M.Titoukh had to go into hospital for this or that - which was quite often - he fell into the habit of putting the cat Caramel out into the street. We assumed that he did that because he had no one else to call upon to look after it, so we fell into the habit of looking after it amongst ourselves - Madame Vallee, Madame Pariat, my next door neighbour Christine and me - until he came back. No one minded - least of all the cat. Caramel enjoyed the fuss, the houses, the gardens, the moat and the lizards on the walls - and he certainly liked being overfed. But nothing could replace M. Titoukh for Caramel. At the first sign of M. Titoukh, Caramel would disappear into the flats - incarcerated until the next time.

A couple of weeks ago M. Titouhk came home from the hospital in a taxi as usual, and collected Caramel from his usual lunchtime spot in one of my window boxes. He let the cat out onto his balcony, fetched his bicycle and set off down the Rue Bourbon. A hundred yards away from his own front door, M.Titoukh fell off, and died in the street. He was less than 50 years old.

To everyone's surprise, M. Titoukh turned out to have had a great many relatives - all of whom lived at La Coupure du Parc, less than a kilometre away from Richielieu. His father arrived that day to take Caramel away, and last weekend a lot of people turned up to take away the remains of M. Titoukh's life.

Where on earth were all those people - all those noisy, laughing, healthy relatives with their cars and their trucks and their trailers - when M. Titoukh was spending his summers and winters (and every Christmas!) alone in his flat, visited only by a professional carer, spoken to only by people who did not know him very well? Where were they when he was going to and from the hospital by himself - expensively! - in a taxi? Where were they when he felt that he had to put his cat - and Mr Titoukh certainly loved his cat - out in the street to fend for itself or rely on the good nature his neighbours?

Actually, it doesn't really matter - save that it might, one day (I hope!) matter a great deal to them. M. Titoukh's sudden absence has left a surprisingly large hole in the fabric of the life of the Rue Bourbon. We remember him - and will always remember him - with affection. We miss him - and he died amongst friends.

There are a great many M. Titoukh's in this world - and helping people (and having them help you to learn and grow and understand) isn't always quite as cut, dried, and straightforward as it's often made out to be. And perhaps you aren't as badly off as you think you are.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

Amazon's Digital Text Platform - and What You Might Do With It

2010-04-21T11:45:00.000-07:00

If you've got a book in your desk drawer - or even just in your head - take a look at Amazon's Digital Text Platform .

The text platform allows you to publish your own book - and have it appear for sale on Amazon.com - as a Kindle book.

There are various things that you need to do on-line to produce a Kindle book - design a cover, type your manuscript in the prescribed form, check it for errors, set a price for the book, fill in the forms (and design your author page!) - but it's all free, and it's not difficult to do.

The book you produce will not be available as a 'paper book'. It will only be a downloadable e-book readable only on a Kindle machine. Don't let that put you off. Kindle machines were originally only available in the United States. Now you can buy them in Britain and Australia - and wherever Kindle goes, Kindle books go too. And whilst publishers don't, these days, take too many chances on new authors, they do keep an eye on what's going on around them - which means keeping an eye on Amazon.

Amazon offers opportunities to self-publish in other ways that would allow you to produce 'paper' books - but it costs money. The Digital Platform is a good FREE place to start - and it will begin to teach you how to produce e-books that you can sell on your own site.

I've produced a couple of Kindle books. I haven't earned a fortune out of them - but I learned a lot. And any money is better than a smack round the chops with a wet fish!

If you think you have a book in you - check it out. It takes time to Kindle a book - but I think it's time well spent.

Emily - http://therapypartnership.com/

She Told Me She Was a Princess - And That Most of the Money Was Mine

2010-04-19T12:47:00.000-07:00

Over a period, Rose Khalifa and I have almost become friends. She writes often - e-mails that set out the same long, sad, story with the same hook on the end of it that is supposed to hook me into giving her the number of my bank account.

I was, though, a bit surprised to find messages from Rose turning up on my Naymz account - but I think I was being just a tad naïve there. After all, Russian tarts proposition me on Twitter all the time, and I don't know them either.

I think it was inevitable really that the Rose Khalifa's and the tarts of this world would eventually seize upon things like Naymz, or LinkedIn - or Facebook - and try to use them to their own advantage, but I can't find in my heart to be angry with any of them.

I do, though, get very angry with people who try to use social media outlets to push out subtler, much more tempting, and even less realistic hooks.

There was a discussion today posted on LinkedIn by a so called 'Independant Financial Services Professional'. It offered mortgage loan help and unsecured lines of credit to people with bad credit records. Oh - and you can apparently get help there to clear your criminal records as well.

Really? Well. I shall put my next loose tooth under my pillow and wait for the Tooth Fairy to bring me my sixpence... And no, I'm not giving you the link.

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com

Improve Your Credit Status - Register to Vote

2010-04-07T13:22:00.000-07:00

Registering to vote doesn't only mean that you can register approval or disapproval for a particular Party, or have your say about which Party will be running the country after the upcoming election.

Being on the Electoral Roll improves your credit status. In fact, if you are not on the Electoral Roll, you might find it difficult to get any form of credit, simply because Credit Reference Agencies use the Electoral Roll to verify a person's identity.

There are a number of factors that contribute to a person's credit score, and determine whether or not that person is 'creditworthy'. However, credit and ID fraud remains a major problem, so lenders place considerable importance on Electoral Roll data to verify identity.

Whether you intend to vote in the upcoming election or not, make sure that you register to vote. Your name on the Electoral Roll is a fast and easy way of giving your credit score a boost, and could make it a lot easier to get a mortgage, a loan, a credit card, or insurance.

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com

Beware of Credit Debt Solutions That Involve Paying Out Money

2010-04-05T13:44:00.000-07:00

I think we've all warned people about going down this route before, but I think it's worth reiterating what one or the other of us has already said - if only because my own inbox is once again full of e-mails talking about 'debt settlement programs'.

The latest one - which I received today - does actually carry a 'health warning' in that it clearly states that "Debt elimination programs are not cheap and choosing the wrong option could serve to exacerbate financial difficulties later on."

Actually, 'choosing the wrong option' when you are looking to get yourself out of that kind of a hole is approaching the sort of organisation they are advertising in the first place.

If you have problems keeping up with your credit card payments - or any other of your bills - go to a recognised Charity for help. You should defintely NOT be paying for help to get out of trouble.

If you need to find reputable - and free - advice and assistance, go to Talk About Debt where you'll be able to find out which Charity to call first, learn which seven mistakes you must not make if you want to get safely out of debt, and (perhaps!) win £250 by writing (in confidence) about your own debt experience.

You'll also see a whole list of statistics - all of which make it clear that you are not alone with your problem, and that it's sensible to get help immediately rather than waiting and hoping that things will improve.

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com/

Vote 'No' To An Increase In National Insurance Rates

2010-03-30T10:50:00.000-07:00

You can't alas, do anything much about last week's Budget in the short term - although, of course, you can choose to vote for a party that will produce another, and hopefully less overtly political one in what I sincerely trust will not be the very long term.

However, you do still have time to say 'NO' to the proposed rise in National Insurance Rates by signing the Petition . You can find more information about the Petition on the Federation of Small Businesses website.

Please take the time to sign the Petition today - and don't be put off by the fact that the on-line form provided asks you to fill in your 'Company'. A 'Company' is a 'business' and if you are unemployed your 'business' is getting a job - so be creative. Put 'unemployed' or 'getting a job' or 'wanting work' -or whatever else works! - in the appropriate box.

Don't be put off, either, by the fact that the advertised signatories are large Companies. Your veto of the proposal is of equal importance - and will be recognised as such.

Given the numbers of people who are out of work at the moment, and its potential effect upon them, the proposed one per cent rise in National Insurance rates is a thoroughly disgraceful idea - and never mind that it isn't scheduled to come into effect until April 2011. April 2011 will be here soon enough - so this is not the time to sit down, wait for it to arrive, and hope for the best.

Make no mistake. The proposed rise in National Insurance rates is actually a tax on jobs - and if it goes into effect, it's going to mean fewer jobs, slower recovery, and yet more people having to sign on.

I have no idea what impact the Petition will have - but it's impact will certainly increase in proportion to it's length. So don't just sign it and forget it. Pass the information on. Get everyone you know to sign it.

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com/

Information, Information, Information

2010-03-28T13:18:00.000-07:00

I found Careers in Collections more or less by accident. In fact I found them because I follow Philip King , the CEO of The Institute of Credit Management , on Twitter , and Careers in Credit Collections follows him.

If you're actually looking for a career in collections - and you've got experience in collections - then you'll find twenty-one jobs on that site alone. Those twenty-one jobs though, aren't the point of this post.

The real point is that there are opportunities all over the internet - but you may not find them if you don't use the internet fully - and with discrimination.

I have to say that I didn't see the point of Twitter when I first looked at it - too many people with nothing to say, and all of them saying it far too often - but I've come to realise that Twitter is a very useful tool. I didn't see the point of LinkedIn or Naymz either - but I see the point of them, now, too.

I'm not looking for a job - I'm looking for business - but I stumble over job advertisements all the time. I find them by accident, because I happen to follow somebody on Twitter - or somebody happens to follow me. I find them because I joined Groups on LinkedIn and they turn up as advertisements in my in-box. They come in occasionally via Naymz - and sometimes even via Ecademy .

It was time-consuming - and frankly quite boring - to fill in all those profiles and join all those Groups that bring me in all that information. But it was worth it. Use the internet. Get everything out of it that you can.

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com/

The Beauty of Asking Yourself Questions

2010-03-25T08:48:00.000-07:00

You can be quite unhappy without knowing why.

You can want to change something without knowing quite what.

You can want to change three or more specific things, but dither about changing any of them because you can't make your mind up where to start.

The beauty of asking yourself questions is that is that you get more than you bargain for when you answer them.

Want to see? Print this post, then write out the answers to these questions. Take your time! It's likely you'll have to think about some of them...

If you work, does your work satisfy you? If not, why not?

If you are a home-maker, are you satisfied with your role? If not, why not?

What do you like to do in your spare time?

What would you like to do that you are not doing now?

What is stopping you doing those things?

What steps do you think you could take to make those things a reality in the future?

What do you want out of life?

Where do you see yourself in five years time?

What are the bad habits you would like to overcome?

What are your weaknesses that can be worked on?

What are your strengths that can be worked with?

What would you like to achieve in the short term?

What are your long-term goals?

Do you have overly high, or overly low, expectations of yourself and others?

If so, where do you believe those expectations originated?

In what kinds of situations do you most readily lose control?

In which situations are you best able to keep self-control?

How would you describe yourself?

Which of your feelings, thoughts, or behaviours would you like to change?

What benefits do you believe you would gain from understanding yourself better?

If suddenly one morning you discovered that your biggest problem had disappeared and no longer troubled you, what would be different?

If you answer the questions as honestly as you can, you'll get some insight right away - but your unconscious mind will continue to process what you've written for some time, so that fresh questions, new ideas, solutions to problems (and perhaps gradual changes in habits or attitudes) will occur quite naturally over a period and continue to manifest themselves for several weeks or months afterwards without your necessarily being conscious of the reasons for them. Which is the beauty of asking yourself questions...

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

Council Tax Benefit - And How to Deal With Bailiffs

2010-03-22T11:17:00.000-07:00

According to the Local Government Association, £1.8 billion in Council Tax Benefit goes unclaimed.

Check on-line with DirectGov. You can use the form provided to see whether you are entitled to Council Tax Benefit.

This is particularly important if you think you may have a problem paying your Council Tax.

The Citizens Advice Bureau has reported a thirty per cent rise in the numbers of people seeking help to deal with Bailiffs trying to collect Council Tax over the last three years - and more and more Councils are using Bailiffs to collect the tax.

Quite apart from the fact that nobody wants a Bailiff on the doorstep - they cost money. Which brings me to another point.

If you have to deal with a Bailiff, find out (from your local Citizens Advice Bureau) what their legitimate charges are.

Bailiffs are not regulated - and are unlikely to be regulated for at least two years - and there have been instances where Bailiffs have grossly over-charged debtors to collect Council Tax.

It's worthwhile in any event to know your law as far as Bailiffs are concerned. You can find out all about that by going to The UK Insolvency Helpline and look for "Debt Basics - Bailiff Guide".

Find out what you are entitled to - and know your rights!

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com

Fuel Bills, Getting Help to Pay Them - and Cutting Them Down

2010-03-18T14:40:00.000-07:00

We've just got in our latest fuel bill for the winter. They come every couple of months here - and this one was a lot less than it might have been, thanks to something very French, called 'Paraffin' - and I'll get to the beauties of paraffin in a minute.

In the meantime - and with fuel bills in mind - if you have problems meeting your energy bills there are various places you can find help:

British Gas Energy Trust offers grants to individuals and families to meet arrears of energy charges and other household bills. Look at their website to read more about what they offer and see their on-line application form.

EDF Energy Trust offers grants and assistance to account-holding customers to help with energy and household debts and costs.

There are also various Government programmes - like Warm Front England - which you can find on http://www.direct.gov.uk by using the search box on the upper right hand side of the site.

Anyway - coming back to France and paraffin - we'd forgotten about paraffin until we decided to live here. And then we discovered - as most French people seem to know - that paraffin is very cheap, that it doesn't smell any more, and that paraffin heaters (and particularly Zibro paraffin heaters) are attractive and portable, and very, very safe.

We were doubtful about using paraffin, but this year - this very cold year! - has changed our minds. Paraffin - even considering the initial price of buying something like a Zibro heater - is cheap and efficient. Much cheaper, and much more efficient, we found, than using electrcity or gas. Paraffin is worth a thought - if not this year, then next.

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com

Not About Staying Solvent - Just About Staying Sane

2010-03-15T13:48:00.000-07:00

For several days now I've been listening to a radio advert on Talksport.

The advertisement advises everyone to look out for people who don't talk to their neighbours; people who pay cash because they don't have a bank card, and people who close their curtains because they live on a main road.

Know somebody like that? You probably do - and it's probably your grandmother.

The advertisement is Government generated and intended to alert everyone to the existence of potential terrorists. God only knows what lunatic thought it up - and how many completely harmless people are going to be reported by their neighbours simply because they prefer to keep themselves to themselves, don't appreciate fumes and noise, and have decided that paying on tick is a lousy idea.

Naturally, we should all be on our guard against terrorism - and God knows, thirty plus years on we should be good enough at that by now! - but I very strongly disapprove of the Government inviting people to spy on their neighbours and take part in something that could very easily become a witch hunt. And I think we should all beware of becoming part of something like that - either willingly, or by default.

Obviously, if you've a genuine concern you should report it - but forget the advert. Use your own common sense, your own local knowledge, and your own criteria.

I'm sorry that this post isn't about redundancy or staying solvent. I do think, though, it's about staying sane!

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

Unfortunately, this advertisement reminded me of the instructions given to German children in the 1930's. They were encouraged to report their neighbours - and even their parents - to the authorities. And we all know where that led. Don't go there.

Geoffrey - http://www.metlissbarfield.com/

This sounds less like an injunction to love thy neighbour than to dump thy neighbour. Don't like it at all.

Bill - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

Spring Depression?

2010-03-12T09:27:00.000-08:00

Most people get a lift from the arrival of Spring - but most people isn't everybody. Some people find Spring very depressing indeed.

Sometimes that can be due to on-going non-seasonal depression - in which case anti-depressants are the obvious answer - but seasonal depression isn't an on-going state, and it needs to be treated differently.

If you do not suffer from 'non-seasonal depression' (and you would certainly know if you were suffering from it!) and find that you regularly get depressed in Spring, then it's worth checking to see whether you are a victim of one or more allergies - specifically an allergy to pollen or mold.

It's pretty much common knowledge that any allergy can make you feel physically pretty terrible all round - but not so many people recognise that an allergy can make you feel mentally awful as well, and bring up all the classic symptoms of depression. And mold, incidentally, grows particularly well when it warms up and rains...

Obviously, if you're feeling wretched, then you need to see a Doctor - but make sure, if your depression only attacks you at certain times of the year, that you explain that fact very carefully. Anti-depressants will not make not make any impact on an allergy - but lots of other, and more appropriate drugs, certainly will.

And no - whether you are non-seasonally or seasonally depressed, you can't handle it by yourself. Depression of any kind - and there are many, many, different kinds of depression - can be a very dangerous condition. If you are suffering from it - get help.

Bill - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

Bankruptcy Can Be a Good Option - But

2010-03-05T07:51:00.000-08:00

Bankruptcy can be a very good option if you are in serious financial difficulty - it is certainly a better option than living with perpetual worry and uncertainty - but if you are looking to go down that route, please do take advice first from someone who can explain all the options and all the consequences fully.

The Government is presently proposing to reduce bankruptcy procedure to an on-line 'box ticking' exercise. The object is to remove the stigma attached to bankruptcy and reduce the delay many debtors experience between the presentation of the Petition and the making of the Bankruptcy Order.

On the face of it, this looks like a very good idea - but it isn't, because advice isn't part of the 'box-ticking' package.

Bankruptcy is a very serious step to take and it needs to be treated as such. Anyone considering bankruptcy needs to talk it through first at a face-to-face interview with someone who knows and understands all of the options available to people in serious financial difficulty. You will be able to get help and advice as to whether bankruptcy is the best option for you from your local Citizens Advice Bureau or from a Debt Charity.

Could Be the Year to Get Rid of the Lawn

2010-03-04T12:58:00.000-08:00

My father was - along with a lot of other things! - a professional gardener, and he had an absolute hatred of lawns, however small. Grass was, he said, greedy and expensive unless something useful was eating it.

By 'something useful', he meant 'something edible' - and I recall that both of my parents could be quite reticent about the 'useful things' that they and their neighbours had kept in the back gardens of Wednesbury Road, Walsall during the war. Like communally owned, privately slaughtered (and probably illegal!) pigs and sheep...

Anyway! Coming back to lawns and grass, my father was quite right. Grass really is very greedy, very expensive, and very wasteful unless something useful is eating it.

No sheep? Get rid of the grass and grow something you can eat yourself. You'll need to dig it up, of course - and you'll need to do it soon. And afterwards you'll need to put back the nutrients that grass is so greedy of - but considering the price of veg today you'll find it worthwhile to make the effort and pay for the fertiliser and the seeds.

By the way - if you don't have a lawn, don't worry - my father was just as fanatical about window boxes and - when they appeared - 'Grow Bags' that can be propped against a wall, or set out on a balcony. And he was keen on growing vegetables and herbs along with the flowers in borders. He thought that vegetables could be just as ornamental as flowers - and I think he was right.

If you've never grown anything - give it a go! You can get lots of advice on-line - and lots of things will grow anywhere without too much encouragement. A few years ago, I walked past a small museum behind Spitalfields market. Something was growing out of the cracks in the pavement, and clinging to the front of the house. It had very pretty red flowers. Took me a minute to recognise it. It was runner beans. Dad would have loved that.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

Free Credit File Service

2010-03-02T09:00:00.000-08:00

Equifax compiles credit reporting data and creates a credit report reflecting your personal credit history. Under normal circumstances Equifax would provide you with an initial free report as part of a 30 day trial period, after which you would have to pay for information.

At the moment, however, Equifax has committed itself to help the debt distressed, and is working with all the key debt advice charities to provide free access to credit files.

If you are working with an established debt advice charity to get your financial situation sorted out, you can use Equifax's free credit file service. You will need to request your credit file from Equifax yourself, using a request form and a supporting letter from the debt advice charity. Your free credit report will arrive by post within 7 days of your request.

To find out whether Equifax is working with your debt advice charity visit your local Citizens Advice Bureau or check with The Citizens Advice Organisation on line.

Job Hunting USA

2010-02-25T13:05:00.000-08:00

A very old friend who lives in New York wrote to me today regarding Bill's post about totaljobs.com. It was a reminder that we can be too parochial - but we do do our best to cover the waterfront for everyone!

Anyway, here's some reminders of previous posts - and some new links for US job-hunters and freelancers.

Geoffrey discovered Secrets of the Job Hunt and Job Radio when a French friend invited him to join Monster France on LinkedIn. You can find that post by typing 'Monster France' into the Search Box on this blog - and there were a lot of other links to follow from Secrets of the Job Hunt and Job Radio. I'm not including a link to here to Monster France. It's spread to the UK - but not (so far as I know!) to the USA. If you want to look at Monster France - type it into Google.

I talked about the Twitter Job Deck shortly after Geoffrey's initial January post. You can find that post by typing 'Look at Twitter Job Deck' into the search box - and I think it's worth looking at it. And using Twitter. And Facebook. And Naymz. And any other advertising platform you can find to advertise yourself.

New things: if you want to freelance in the United States look at Elance or ifreelance - do you?

Hope this helps! I we find anything else - we'll let you know.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

totaljobs.com is worth a long, long, visit

2010-02-23T09:44:00.000-08:00

Speaking of talking to people in shops, I had quite a long conversation with an old client last week who was made redundant early last year, and spent most of the year doing all the right things and still failing to get another job in his field.

He told me that he had finally found a job with a charity - a complete change of direction for him - on-line through Total Jobs .

I'm very glad to say that the man I met by chance last week was much changed from the angry and devastated person I originally met last year - and who told me at the time that he felt castrated by his redundancy and feared that he would never work again.

As he was well into his 50's at the time, I have to say that I feared that as well, but as it turns out we were both mistaken - and perhaps we were both focusing on getting back to the past, rather than looking to use the past to create a future.

I do have an excuse for that negative reaction, by the way. I'd just lost one of the newspapers I'd been writing a column for for years, and I could see my long career as a political correspondent crashing to a halt. That didn't happen - but only because I did a re-think, changed focus a bit, and refused to let it.

Anyway, my old client was full of praise for Total Jobs - and having looked at the site I can why.

It's well worth registering there. And even more worthwhile to do a re-think, accept that you may have to change direction, and look forwards rather than backwards.

Bill - http://www.therapypartnership.com

Freelancing - It's Skills, not Age, that Matters

2010-02-21T13:40:00.000-08:00

I met an English woman in the supermarket yesterday. I don't 'know' her exactly - she's just another English person, and we made a decision when we came here that we were not going to get into the 'let's ignore the French and just enjoy the country ex-pat scene' - but we usually say 'hello' in passing.

Anyway! Somehow we got to talking about who was doing what and where, and it turned out that she freelances - partly from here at home, and sometimes 'on site' in Britain.

She gave me a lot of useful addresses, and I'm including some of them, but the most important thing is that there are many, many websites where you can learn about freelancing, advertise yourself your skills - and find jobs! - just by typing 'freelancing UK' or 'freelancing USA' into Google. In the meantime - start here:

http://www.freelancersintheuk.co.uk/

http://www.freelancers.net/

http://www.freelanceadvisor.co.uk/

http://www.elance.com/

I was particularly interested in elance.com because it asked a very important question - 'What can you elance?' I thought about it, typed in boxes - and was surprised to discover that I DID have things I could 'elance'.

I think that maybe a lot of people don't appreciate that their skills are valuable. And, by the way, freelancing seems to be about skills, not age. I ticked an awful lot of boxes today, and got an awful lot of thumbs up - but nobody said, "Excuse me. Did you say 1947?"

Liked that...

Try it! What can you lose?

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

Advertise Yourself

2010-02-17T09:13:00.000-08:00

If you haven't joined WebProNews and are looking to advertise yourself, your availability, or your services on-line it might be worth doing it. It's free, and a lot of the articles could help you to put together a really good "Look at Me, I'm Here and I'm Just What You're Looking For" campaign.

Today's article was entitled "Can You Be Successful Without a Website", and it was mainly aimed (as many of the articles are) at small businesses, but there was a lot of valuable information there for people who are just trying to use the internet to sell themselves to prospective employers.

I found it particularly interesting that 'social profiles' often show up very early in searches - much earlier, actually, than websites do because small websites are becoming harder and harder to find UNLESS they are attached to, say, a Facebook or Google Profile.

The article had various links attached to it giving lots of advice as to how to make 'social profiles' more interesting and more likely to come up in searches.

Worth going to have a look.

Bill - http://www.therapypartnership.com

Virtual Working

2010-02-13T07:32:00.000-08:00

One or another of us has talked about 'going virtual' a couple of times before, but I came across a really interesting blog yesterday on MA Consulting's website - and it's worth having a look at it. You can find it under 'Quick Links' on their home page.

MA Consulting follows a completely virtual business model - there is no office and management and consultants all work either at home or at their clients premises - and the blog explains how to make the best of this business model, how to set it up, what the benefits are to everyone involved, and (very importantly) what kind of people virtual businesses look to employ.

It also hints at the downside of virtual working - and mentions something called CoWorkingWest which is designed to ensure that virtual workers DON'T have to spend every day working alone. If you are already a virtual worker, or are considering become one, it's worth taking a look at that site, too.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com

Debt Management Companies Make Me Suspicious - Particularly if They Mention the Word 'Free'

2010-02-04T11:38:00.000-08:00

I received a post today from a Company which was effectively advertising a 'free debt management plan'.

I immediately became extremely suspicious.

There is no such thing as a 'free' debt management plan that is not being run by one of the many charities or government-funded organisations that have been set up specifically to help people deal with debt.

If you have a problem dealing with debt a good place to start to look for advice is the The National Debt Line which is a genuinely free service and which is in partnership with the charity The Money Advice Trust .

If you look at The National Debt Line's site, you will see that it carries a warning about Claims Management Companies, and that there is an information sheet to read.

Read it carefully - and avoid companies that make unsubstantiated claims, or ask for money up-front to deal with your problem.

The Ministry of Justice is the Claims Regulator for Claims Management Companies. If you have already become involved with a Claims Management Company and are dissatisfied with the service you have received, the address to make a complaint is:

Complaints Management Regulation and Compliance Unit
57-60 High Street
Burton-on-Trent DE14 1JS
Tel: 0845 450 6858 or 01283 233 309
e-mail: info@claimsregistration.gov.uk

Look: a Charity is a charity, but a Company is a business. Charities get their money from you and me and foundations and trusts and a whole range of other sources. Businesses have to MAKE money. Therefore - and obviously! - nothing that a Company offers is ever going to be 'free'.

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com/

And Here is - the News?

2010-02-03T13:27:00.000-08:00

According to the Charity Credit Action , 1,995 people are still being made redundant in the UK every day despite the fact that we are supposed to be 'creeping' out of the recession. As a result, 386 people will be declared bankrupt or insolvent every day, and somebody's property will be repossessed every 11.2 minutes every day.

In those circumstances, would someone like to tell me why one footballer's alleged 'affair' with another footballer's ex-girlfriend is hitting the front page?

Credit Action has a useful website. Ignore the big bold stuff, and go to the bottom of the Home Page where, under the headings 'Home' and 'Debt Advice' on the left hand side, you'll find another heading 'Unemployed'.

Useful information! What you might call the real news.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com

"Guardian Work" by Ian Carpenter

2010-02-01T14:13:00.001-08:00

I was listening to 'Talk Sport' yesterday when I heard an interview with Ian Carpenter who has written a book called "Guardian Work".

Ian Carpenter was a property manager in Basildon when he was made redundant. His response to his jobless situation was to reply to every single advert in a single issue of the recruitment pull-out of the Guardian newspaper regardless of whether he was qualified for the jobs advertised or not. Over a six month period he replied to 450 advertisements - including the one for an acrobat. He didn't get a job out any of them - or even an offer.

On the other hand - it wasn't a waste of time. Mr. Carpenter kept a blog of his experiences, and it's been published by Beautiful Books under the title of "Guardian Works".

Ian still keeps his blog at Guardian Work - and I think it would be worth going there - and buying the book.

Ian Carpenter is an extraordinary person. According to 'Beautiful Books' he's now running a second bookshop at Southend - and still looking for a job.

Think about it.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

Just Spreading It Around...

2010-01-29T14:38:00.000-08:00

Jobs In Credit is advertising four senior credit positions working for Shop Direct based at Liverpool.

Salaries are between £37K and £80K - so they look almost too good to be true (or failing which they want you to live on site!) - but they are for SENIOR Credit Management positions. You can contact brett.marlow@jobsincredit.com to find out more about them for yourself.

You can also find Brett Marlow on LinkedIn - where I found the jobs advertised on the World Credit Management & Risk Forum Group site.

Just spreading it around...

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com/

Look at TwitterJobDeck!

2010-01-26T13:25:00.000-08:00

If you haven't seen this - you need to.

TwitterJobSearch indexes Tweets that are jobs and screens out the rest - thus providing jobseekers with the tools that are necesssary to find meaningful, relevant job opportunities.

Now TweetDeck and TwitterJobSearch have teamed up to provide a dedicated Twitter JobDeck . It's designed to make it easier to look for jobs - and to stay in touch with what's happening and connect you with your contacts on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and other social and professional networking sites.

There's an awful lot out there about how to use the internet to find a job. You can find more information in the various blogs on Secrets of the Job Hunt or on Interview Angel or in a hundred and one other places.

The most important thing is to embrace the technology, and learn to use it. A lot of jobs now get filled through networking. Obviously, you still need a CV - and it still needs to be the best you can make it - and you still need to polish your interview techniques. But you also need to look further than agencies, newspapers and Job Centres and work on your website, your on-line profile - and learn to network.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

Network, Network and Join The Groups

2010-01-24T13:40:00.000-08:00

I'm getting more and more interested in what internet Groups and sites like Twitter have to offer to people who are looking for a job.

Three of us contribute to this blog. We all belong to various professional networking sites, and we've all joined Groups on those sites - so we get a lot of mail from the various professional networking sites and the Groups we've subscribed to over a period.

During the course of this week alone, we've seen jobs advertised by credit groups, wine groups, sales groups, and on Twitter. Most of them, I have to say, came via LinkedIn - but some of them came in on Naymz or Xing . I think we focused on the one came in on Twitter so you probably know all about that one.

The point is - if you don't join professional networking sites and work hard at making them work for you, then you won't hear about the jobs that are on offer.

One Group we know of on LinkedIn sends a very good message: "I will encourage you to use the Discussions, News and Job Panels as they are constantly updated by our members . Be active and you will benefit from everybody in the group." No surprise that that Group has almost 10,000 members.

It doesn't matter what you do, or how far up the ladder you are with what you do. Joining professional networking sites, and looking for Groups that suit you, can only help you get where you want to go.

Bill - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

It's Worthwhile to Bother with Twitter...

2010-01-21T13:56:00.001-08:00

...because if you follow enough companies and enough people, you may find what you're looking for.

At the moment, for example, Enigma Marketing is recruiting.

Ad on Twitter reads "We're RECRUITING. Fancy a job at a cutting edge marketing agency?".

The url given on Twitter doesn't work here, but if you're interested in the job, just click on the Enigma Marketing link above, or (if you use Twitter) go to http://twitter.com/EnigmaMarketing.

In the meantime, if you aren't using Twitter - maybe you should. I was really doubtful about it at first - and Bill definitely decided against it - but I think it has a lot more plus than minus points, because this isn't the only recruiting ad I've seen there - and neither Geoffrey nor I have bothered as yet to make too many contacts there.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

Monster France and Other Useful Places to Get New Ideas

2010-01-20T13:18:00.001-08:00

A friend invited me to join 'Monster France' on LinkedIn, and I did it because I've known Fred for quite a long time, and he insisted that it was going to useful to what we are all trying to do here.

He was right.

'Monster France' led me, by various roundabout routes, to a site called Secrets of the Job Hunt . It's an American Site sponsored by a radio show called Job Radio fm - and despite the fact that neither one is aimed at the UK, both sites are worth looking at, firstly because being unemployed presents more or less the same problems wherever you happen to live, and secondly because there is so much on offer there.

I was particularly struck by the podcasts that were available on the 'Secrets of the Job Hunt' site - like 'LinkedIn Tips for the Unemployed', for example - and the fact that there were so many links to so many different sites and so many radio programmes, all of which were aimed at helping people to get back into employment.

Do take the time to look, and listen to whatever is available. It really doesn't matter that it's all happening several thousand miles away. Advice on what to do and how to do it when you are unemployed are pretty universal. Which is how I got to 'Monster France'...

What worries me is that I had to go to 'Monster France' - and then to America - to get the sort of supportive programmes that are very much needed and should be available in the UK.

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com/

Be Careful About What You Write and Where You Write It

2010-01-18T08:34:00.000-08:00

Employers are increasingly looking for information about potential employees on social and professional networking sites prior to interviewing them - which means that you need to be careful about what you write.

People are generally very careful when they construct their profiles on professional networking sites like LinkedIn, Naymz or Xing, but when it comes social networking sites like Facebook they become much less reticent about what they say and the way that they say it.

And one unguarded Twitter can get you into trouble anywhere if you import your Tweets onto other sites.

If you have a busy Facebook-type account, are looking for a job, and want to continue speaking freely about anything and everything, then you might want to consider removing identifying markers like photographs, addresses and telephone numbers that would enable a prospective employer to find you easily. And Tweet discreetly.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com

One Angry Man Who Said it For Everyone

2010-01-17T13:25:00.000-08:00

I was looking through my old e-emails yesterday - clearing out 2009, really - when I came across something that I'd received from a very old friend last April who had just started up on his own. I can't quote it all - but I think what I can quote says it all about being middle-aged, middle-management, and redundant:

...as you can see after years of working for morons and idiots I decided I wanted some say as to my future. After being made redundant for the 4th time in my life I realised I was fed up with people deciding my future and fate behind closed doors.

I did absolutely nothing for the first six months and looked at just about everything other than credit control! Finally it hit me that I knew nothing other so I started to channel my efforts into a subject that I at least has some knowledge of...

The e-mail went on to talk about the Company he had set up, his website, and the fact that although he had originally set out to do outsource credit control he was getting other kinds of work - primarily debt collection - and that his new clients were sticking with him. 'I must be doing something right', he said at the time.

I'd say so, too. He's now been trading successfully for eight months plus in a cut-throat market that has seen other, much larger, organisations in the same trade go to the wall.

I don't want to mention his name, but you can see his website by clicking on the link.

Age, skill, and experience are valuable. Don't waste yours.

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com

Many More Than Twelve Angry Men

2010-01-14T13:40:00.000-08:00

Last week Abe Walking Bear Sanchez , a man well-known and very much respected in the credit community, began a discussion on the World Credit Management & Risk Forum - which you can find on LinkedIn - entitled "Is Age a Determinant in Getting Hired - What is Wisdom Worth?"

It got a large and angry response from members of that Group who had been made redundant in middle age, and found it difficult or impossible to find employment that they didn't provide for themselves.

I don't have a solution to this problem, and I don't think anyone else has, because I don't think there is one.

Legislation against discrimination of any kind - however good and well-intentioned - is actually impossible to enforce. Employers can always come up with reasonable and legally acceptable reasons for making a person redundant, or failing to employ someone who is already redundant or unemployed, and the fact is that unless an employer (or its employee or agent) states that a person is being made redundant - or that they are unwilling to employ that person - because of that persons' age, race, or religion, then no Court or Tribunal will find that they have acted wrongly.

I think it's important, though, to appreciate that 'ageism' - which was the focus of Mr. Sanchez's discussion - may generally be rooted less in ignorance or prejudice than in pragmatism.

Middle-aged, middle-management, newly redundant men often have more experience, better or more impressive qualifications, and perhaps many more contacts in a specific trade than the people to whom they would have to report in the jobs they apply for. Consequently, their CV's are reluctantly - sometimes very reluctantly, I think - discarded, or they fail on interview, and companies settle for younger, less experienced, more malleable, second best, and a quiet life.

There are options to sticking with a job hunt and watching your capital and your determination and your confidence in yourself drain away.

'Going virtual' has become such a popular option for small and medium-sized businesses and start-ups these days that it's much easier to outsource skills and experience and build a business on that basis than it was even a couple of years ago. And it's possible to work your contacts and set up on that basis - as I did twenty odd years ago - or to change direction and retrain.

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com/

Debt Advice - on Prescription or at Any Time

2010-01-11T10:05:00.000-08:00

The debt advice charity The UK Insolvency Helpline Debt Advice Service will be running a debt counselling service at fifty hospitals throughout the UK to support patients and families where illness has led to serious financial problems.

NHS and other hospital operators feel that the service will offer both a preventive and remedy-based service by getting people to access debt advice sooner.

Tony Roberts, who will be managing the new service, stated that stress-related illnesses which could cause high blood pressure and heart attacks were on the rise and were in many cases related to problems with debt.

Obviously, if you have financial problems - whether caused by illness in the family or not - you need to deal with them quickly. You can call 0800 074 6918, e-mail info@insolvencyhelpline.co.uk , or you can complete an on-line form sending your details or requesting a call back by clicking on the link in the first line of this post to get help.

The UK Insolvency Helpline Debt Advice Service is a charity - so it's free. If you have a problem with debt, they can help you to deal with it right away.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

Some News on the Virtual Assistant Front

2010-01-09T13:17:00.000-08:00

Firstly, Justine Curtis , the co-founder of the VA Success Group and chair of the UK Association of Virtual Assistants will be part of an expert panel discussing the virtual assistant's industry on Radio 4's Woman's Hour on Tuesday 12th January between 10:00 and 10:45 a.m. UK time. Don't be put off if you don't happen to be a woman. A lot of men are 'going virtual'.

Additionally, the Virtual Assistant Group is offering a mentoring package. As I understand it, the mentoring package will run March through August, and will take place by telephone for one hour once a month. This isn't a freebie - but if you're interested in going down the virtual assistant route you might want to have a look at what's on offer and decide whether or not you want to invest £57 a month in it. Main advantage is that you get advice and support from Justine and the other delegates.

If you don't want to spend that sort of money, or are not sure whether 'going virtual' is for you, there's also a downloadable e-book available. "So You Want to Become a Virtual Assistant" by Emma Walker is advertised as being a practical guide designed to help aspiring Virtual Assistants start up their business in the UK. At next door to £20.00 it isn't cheap, but if you look on Amazon.co.uk (and I did!) you won't find anything on the same subject very much cheaper.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

January - A Great Time to Start to Take a Course

2010-01-07T10:02:00.001-08:00

A long time ago, when we first started this blog, we talked about the importance of imposing a work-like structure on your life and sticking to it - working regular hours five days a week to try to get another job; making weekends as normal as possible; getting some exercise every day; staying positive.

It's a good regime, but even under normal circumstances early January can be a depressing and disheartening time to try to follow it, because people are still 'gearing up' after the holidays and interviews are even thinner on the ground than usual. And this year the weather is so awful that circumstances are far from normal and the 'gearing-up' process is likely to take even longer than usual.

So if you've never thought about taking a course - this could be the time to do it. There are a lot of courses around that you take on-line on all sorts of subjects. Some of them are free - or cost very little - and some of them (like The Open University) - are relatively expensive.

The are several advantages to enrolling in a course, or just following one. Courses are stimulating. They can enable you to get in touch with other people; learn something new, and get new ideas. And they look very good on a CV...

Bill - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

Believe in Yourself!

2010-01-04T10:14:00.000-08:00

Sometimes looking at the things that other people have done when they've been confronted by really bad situations can do you a lot of favours.

You get new ideas.
You realise that people successfully drastically change direction all the time.
You realise that you can start a new career despite the fact that you're over forty.
You realise that you can overcome a lot more than just redundancy.

Years ago, when the Banks started shedding branches left and right (leaving us no one local to talk to in the process!) our friend David G. was a Bank Manager in a small town. He was made redundant. He became a market trader. It was a drastic change of direction - and it worked out very well.

Not so long ago, when life in the financial world became impossibly stressful, our friend Dianne M. - who was then over forty - got out of credit management and joined the Probation Service. She was always a brilliant cook and a very knowledgable gardener. Now she works at Halfway Houses teaching people how to cook for themselves, and designs gardens for other people in her spare time.

Some years ago, our friend Julia M. had a very unpleasant and life-threatening accident. You can read about it - and about what Julia does now - by going to her website and navigating to 'About - Julia's Story'. Quite apart from reading about her personal experience and how she turned her life around afterwards, you'll find many interesting things on her site - whether you ever wanted to write a book or not. And a lot of those things - and a good deal of very good advice - is free.

David and Dianne and Julia all achieved something against the odds - and so can you if you are very determined, and believe in yourself.

Have to believe in yourself!

In the meantime, Justin Curtis has very kindly given us a couple of other interesting places to go - The VA Successs Group and My Virtual Assistant . Can't hurt to go there!

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com

Could You Outsource Yourself & Your Skills?

2010-01-02T08:23:00.000-08:00

Recently Emily has been talking about taking the decision to learn something new, change direction, or become self-employed, and her posts reminded me of something I'd been talking about in my own Blog way back in June or July of last year - skills outsourcing.

In the past businesses tended to outsource just one or two functions - bookkeeping was a favourite, along with payroll, receptionists and personal assistants - but these days people seem to be going much further and outsourcing (or virtualising) everything they possibly can.

I haven't done a lot of research, but The UK Association of Virtual Assistants might be a good place to begin to find out whether outsourcing your own skills might be a viable option.

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com/

Happy New Year!

2010-01-01T09:51:00.000-08:00

Keep up with the news. Things ARE changing - and many of the changes that are taking place now or are due to take place in the near future could benefit you. Good luck! I wish you a happy and prosperous New Year and a brighter future.

Stay focused and positive. You CAN take control and change some things yourself. Good luck - and Happy New Year!

Take care of yourself. Some treats are not treats, they're essentials - and some exercise would be good, too, folks... Happy New Year!

Never Give Up On Your Dream

2009-12-23T07:22:00.000-08:00

By Christmas 1977 my sister Joanne still had a job, but it was winding down and she knew it. She was already working evenings and weekends at what she considered to be her ‘real’ job, and she desperately wanted to be self-employed, but she needed just that bit of extra money to make it happen.

I’d been in the United States for three years by then, but I was at home that Christmas and over the course of a couple of days (and nights!) Joanne and I talked ourselves into trying to make some Christmas money the hard way.

We were too late for craft fairs and any other kind of fair that might have done the trick, but as one of my many, many, part-time jobs before I left England I’d been a door to door salesperson - encyclopaedias, double-glazing, and burglar alarms. In fact I was the person you never want to see on your doorstep.

The only real advantages to that particular job were that I didn’t have to watch the same movie so often that I could recite the dialogue (and if you want to listen to my rendering of the ‘The Blue Max’, do give me a call) or take off all my clothes and stand in a freezing room in front of a one-bar electric fire so that people could draw a naked me touching my toes, but I thought the experience would pay off sometime – and it did. After all, if you can sell double-glazing, burglar alarms and encyclopaedias you should be able to sell things that somebody actually wants. So we bought a load of the stuff that people do tend to want - and often forget all about until it’s too late - and set out on Christmas Eve to work the streets and tower blocks of Birmingham.

We began at seven o’clock that evening and worked until after two on Christmas morning. It was a whole-family effort. Joanne and I walked for miles in the cold, saw the inside of an awful lot of lifts, got a glimpse of an awful lot of parties, and sold an awful lot of stuff, and Dad sat in his old green Austin 7 guarding the stock and reading Isaac Asimov by torchlight. I think he thought we were potty at the time – and it’s to his credit that whatever we wanted to do, he would go along with it – but as it turned out, we weren’t so potty after all.

It’s amazing how many people are still up and prepared to buy tights, knickers, see-through baby-doll panamas, wrapping paper, rolls of Sellotape, boxes of chocolate and packaged nuts in the middle of the night.

A few months later, Joanne was made redundant, rented office space in the centre of Birmingham and became very successfully self-employed. It took a lot of courage -the economy was very bad then, too, and in fact while Joanne was looking for office space she was doing the rounds of the agencies as well - but she did it, and never regretted it.

Never give up on your dream. Try to make it a reality instead.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com

Sometimes Bad Times Can be a Wake-Up Call

2009-12-18T14:25:00.000-08:00

In November 1972 I was 25, and living by myself in London. Like practically everyone else I knew I had a very small bed-sit and three or four temporary and/or part-time jobs. At one point I was simultaneously a legal secretary (5 days a week), an usherette at the Odeon Cinema in Leicester Square (6 evenings a week), an usherette at The Prince Charles Cinema (Late-Late Saturdays), a telephonist in various hotels (Sundays), and an artist’s model (Saturday afternoons). They all paid peanuts.

Then we got the three day week, and suddenly “We don’t need you next week” or “We don’t need you on that shift” became more and more often “We don’t need you tomorrow”, or just “We can’t use you anymore” – and I finally got the message that I had a lousy lifestyle, no leisure time and no prospects.

In those days you could get a Green Card and go to the United States if you were a stenographer – they wanted 60 words a minute typing and a minimum of 100 words per minute shorthand. By June 1974 – thanks to Speedwriting I’d learned all about how to gt a gd jb & mo pa, turned myself into a stenographer, filed all the papers, taken all the tests, and was gone into another life.

It was a very frightening experience in many ways. I knew no one in America, nothing about the place, and nothing about the rules. But it was worth the gamble. I found friends there, and I learned the rules, and I’ve never regretted taking that step into the dark.

I was lucky, of course, because I had no ties, but having ties doesn’t mean that you can’t make a decision to learn something new, or change direction.

I don’t think that this is a good time to find a job, but I do think it might be a good time to think about where you want to be this time next year, and make plans to be in a better place - even if it means taking a step into the dark.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

You Don't Need Unproductive Emotions - So Get Rid of Them

2009-12-08T07:46:00.000-08:00

We all know that this is the Season of Peace on Earth and Goodwill to all Men, but it can be hard to keep that in mind when someone jostles you unmercifully in a crowded store, crashes into you and sends your packages flying, gives you a filthy look because (for reasons beyond your control) you're holding up the queue at the check-out, or cuts you up to grab the last parking space that's anywhere near where you want to go.

The people who do all those things are, of course, as interested in Peace on Earth as you are and feel as much Goodwill toward all Men as you do, and at any other time would probably not do any of those things. They're just over-stressed by the Season and - if you allow it - they'll make you over-stressed, too.

Try not to replay the bad or irritating things that happen to you over and over in your head until you can't think of anything else, and the bad things push all the good things out of your mind.

Get your feelings of hurt or anger off your chest by calling a friend and talking about what happened, posting a message on Facebook - either one of which will definitely get you some sympathy and understanding - or just by writing out what you want to say on a piece of paper and throwing it into the bin or putting a match to and burning it up in the sink. You don't need unproductive emotions!

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

Revitalising Breath

2009-11-27T13:50:00.000-08:00

The oxygen you take in whenever you breathe in revitalises every cell in your body - but you can help that process along by imagining and visualising it actually taking place.
By using your imagination, you can send energy-giving breath to wherever you like - anywhere that feels dull, or painful, or sluggish. Try it out!

Take a deep breath, and bring your arms slowly out in front of you and slowly up over your head.
S-t-r-e-t-c-h as you breathe out and slowly bring down your arms to your sides.
Breathe in again, bring your arms slowly out in in front of you, and slowly up over your head. Imagine your breathe revitalising your whole body, filling it with energy. Try to feel your body becoming alive with the oxygen that is spreading through all parts of your body.
Exhale slowly, bring your arms down to your sides, and imagine all your tension flowing out through your fingertips.
Repeat that sequence three times - and try to notice any sensations you may feel. You might experience warmth, tingling - or just a feeling of relaxation.
Now focus on an area where you feel tension or pain, and take another deep breath, and imagine/feel it moving into that area. Imagine that breath massaging that tension/pain away - and exhale.
Take another few deep, invigorating breaths - and imagine your whole body full of energy and vitality.
S-t-r-e-t-c-h your whole body, palms up, toward the ceiling. Rock your body from side to side by switching your weight from your right foot to your left foot, right to left, right to left.
Bring your arms slowly down to your sides, and take a few moments to enjoy the sights, sounds, colours around you and the feeling of being very, very alive.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

Crying Your Heart Out is Pretty Good For You, Too.

2009-11-20T12:41:00.000-08:00

And if you really, really need to do it on the bus - then you should.

On the whole, we're very bad at crying, and the fact that we're very bad at it, and persist in keeping 'a stiff upper lip', is very bad for us.

I mentioned a couple of days ago that everyone is a chemical factory - and that's true. The problem is that some of the chemicals people produce when they are over stressed, miserable and unhappy constitute the sort of garbage that a 'green' person would refuse to dump in landfill.

The ability to weep is a uniquely human emotional response. Only human beings of all living creatures are able to cry – and with good reason; the human body produces a great many chemicals in response to stressful situations, and some of them are very, very toxic indeed.

Tears produce protein, which helps rid the body of toxic chemical waste; they encourage the body to produce a natural painkiller called Enkaphalin - and they free pent-up emotions that might otherwise create physical problems.

Tears comfort and calm, cleanse the body, relieve pain and sorrow, get rid of tension and defuse stress.

If you feel the need to cry, then you should cry no matter where you are – and if you feel that you can’t cry immediately, then it’s very important to do it later on because if you don't you're going to be storing some very unpleasant garbage.

We all have to repress tears sometimes because it isn’t always possible or appropriate to cry when we want to, but letting tears out after the event is easy enough to manage; it's not hard to find a weepy movie - and, of course, writing about whatever it was that upset you earlier in the day will often make you cry, because the memory of it will make you shed the tears you felt like shedding at the time.

Better to cry later than not at all. And the method you use to make yourself cry is immaterial; the important thing is to cry, and go on crying until the crying stops of itself – which means, of course, no 'stiff upper lip', no admonitions to 'pull yourself together', and no smoking cigarettes to try to stop the flow.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

It's Good to Talk To Yourself. Just Don't do it Aloud on The Bus.

2009-11-18T13:55:00.000-08:00

When people are over-stressed or when bad or unpleasant things happen to them, the unconscious mind automatically causes the body to react to compensate - and the first line of defence it’s likely to come up with is an increased need to talk.

Verbalizing what you’re thinking or feeling about yourself or your situation or the unpleasant things that happened to you today, or yesterday, or even long ago, will allow you to achieve several very important things:

You can clarify, realise and understand what EXACTLY has made you so upset, so stressed, or so angry.

You can get things out of your system.

You can neutralise unpleasant situations.

You can turn your internal pressures down - or off.

You can dissipate your anger and avoid negative mental activity.

And no, you don’t need a therapist or even a friend to talk to in order to get the benefit of saying everything you want or need to say, because the essential element of the ‘talker plus listener‘ equation is the act of putting thoughts and feelings into words, and not the fact of having another human being to talk to. Listeners – even (and perhaps particularly) professional listeners - are comforting to have, conducive to communication, and encourage the development of ideas by asking questions, but they aren’t essential to the defining, cathartic process of verbalising thoughts and feelings.

The cheapest, most efficient, and most private way of talking is to talk to yourself – in writing. And the ‘private’ part of that is very important, because most of us have some things locked away inside us that we would never want to reveal to another person – even a professional ‘listener’ - and which therefore might otherwise never be verbalised at all.

If you don’t want to commit those particularly private thoughts to paper – and I can understand why you might not want to take the risk of having someone read what you’ve written either now or in the future - there’s always the cat, the dog or a tree in the park. You can talk to any one of them, because none of them ever tell tales – and you’ll still have said what you wanted or needed to say.

Everyone needs to talk often – actually everyone needs to talk every day – about the things that have annoyed or upset them that day. And, of course, they also need to finally come out with all those things that have been niggling away at them for months (or even years) and which can sometimes add the emotional weight of past events to present problems.

Diaries – real ones as opposed to the ones that remind you that you need to go to the dentist next Wednesday – have gone out of fashion. That’s a pity. Garbage is something that needs to be thrown out – and you can offload an awful lot of it into a very small, very cheap book.

Talk to yourself often! It’s good for you. Things tend not to get quite so out of proportion if you do.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com

Keep Smiling!

2009-11-16T12:37:00.001-08:00

While you’re practicing (I hope!) better breathing (and if you aren’t, please go back to yesterdays post and start practicing it today) I want to share a really simple stress-relieving technique with you that you can practice anywhere at any time – and the more often the better.

You probably don’t know it, but you are very efficient chemical factory. This is one of the reasons I can never understand people coughing up large sums for supplementary, more dangerous, and less effective chemicals – but that’s a whole other story. The important thing is that you appreciate that practically everything you do with your body causes a chemical reaction that can be positive or negative – and that many of those reactions are completely under your control.

All facial gestures, for example, trigger the production of neurotransmitters – negative or positive. When you smile, your brain is triggered to produce ‘uppers’ to fit the gesture, and your mood and energy levels lift accordingly – and (obviously!) the longer you smile, and the more you smile, the more ‘uppers’ your brain will produce.

Equally, if you frown the brain produces the equivalent of ‘downers’ - and the longer you frown and the more you frown the more ‘downers’ your brain will churn out, and your mood and energy levels will drop dramatically in consequence.

If you want to, you can test the speed and efficiency of this kind of automatic chemical response by going into your bathroom right now and snarling – really seriously snarling – at yourself in the mirror.

Whenever people snarl aggressively, the body immediately produces adrenaline and painkillers - and if you manage a really good snarl in the course of your experiment, you’ll find that not only will you undergo a very noticeable mood change, but also that your heart rate will go up, your nostrils will flare, and you’ll be able to feel ‘fight or flight’ quantities of adrenaline flooding into your system. There isn’t a threat in your bathroom, of course – and no reason to fight or to run away and live to fight another day either - but your unconscious mind will assume that there is, because that’s what you’re saying with your face.

Facial expressions are a particularly unsubtle form of body language, and the easiest of all to produce deliberately – and it’s a good idea to produce positive ones, because (as you will have learned for yourself if you managed a really successful snarl in your bathroom just now!) a particular facial gesture doesn’t have to be accompanied by the appropriate emotion in order to produce results. ‘Fake’ snarling produces adrenaline and painkillers; ‘fake’ smiling – smiling when you don’t feel like it, in other words – produces a cascade of upper-type chemicals from your brain, because your unconscious mind assumes that you wouldn’t be making the gesture without good reason.

This built-in, easily manipulated mechanism means that you have the power to influence your own moods, and reduce (or raise!) your own stress levels.

Negative and anxious facial expressions produce very definite stress reactions in the autonomic nervous system because the neurotransmitters they provoke are stress-producing.
Positive and happy facial gestures lower stress because the neurotransmitters they provoke make you feel good.

It’s obviously therefore in your own best interests to try to maintain positive facial expressions - and to make the effort to actively produce them if you’re feeling really miserable about something.

It’s important to bear in mind as well that positive facial expressions receive positive responses from other people – and equally that negative ones receive negative responses.

This is because facial expressions and moods appear to be contagious. In other words, when we perceive that someone else is happy, or sad, or angry, we don’t just register the fact, we actually experience the emotion, albeit to a lesser degree. Consequently, if you smile, you’ll not only feel better yourself, you’ll make other people feel better, too, and that mood will build on itself. Equally, of course, if your facial expressions are negative, you’ll make other people feel negative and that mood will build on itself.

Most of our stress and many of our negative thoughts and feelings directly result of dealing with difficult people.

Making the effort to maintain positive facial expressions habitually will go a long way toward ensuring that the person creating the difficulty isn’t you.

Oh yes – there is just one other thing. We all age and, in the process, we all get the lines and wrinkles we deserve. Make smiling your habitual facial expression today. Nobody needs to get written off as a miserable old bat on sight...

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

Breath is Life. The Best Breath is More of It.

2009-11-15T14:25:00.001-08:00

It’s always very difficult to explain to people why they need to practice breathing when they’re standing there with their chests going up and down and nobody is expecting to see a hearse arrive anytime soon.

But then there’s breathing, and not breathing all that well.

There’s an important relationship between breathing, emotion, and the autonomic nervous system, and if you can get that relationship into balance then you will be a healthier, calmer and much happier person.

Practising abdominal breathing is the best way to achieve that balance. Abdominal breathing leads automatically to physical and mental relaxation and better mental and physical health - and once you've got the hang of it you can do it whenever or wherever you want, or need, to.

When people are calm and composed, abdominal breathing is the norm. When people are anxious and stressed, on the other hand, costal (or chest) breathing can become the norm. Costal breathing is shallow, unsteady and jerky, which naturally results in the mind and the emotions becoming unsteady also, so that it becomes impossible to relax. That in turn leads to tension and anxiety which leads to continued costal breathing, thus creating a vicious circle that goes round and round and on and on until something finally breaks down.

It isn’t difficult to achieve and maintain an optimum abdominal breathing pattern. It just takes practice and a few minutes of your time every day. And it's something that you can build on - a simple technique that forms the basis of other 'stress breaking' habits.

Here’s one way of breathing in a less stressful life. Read the exercise through carefully a couple of times so as to be sure that you can remember what you need to do:

1. Lie on your back with your feet apart. Allow your feet to flop loosely, heels turned inwards and toes turned outwards.

2. Let your arms flop loosely away from your body, palms turned upward and fingers loosely curled.

3. Close your eyes, and take a moment to enjoy lying down in this physically relaxed position.

4. Put one hand on your chest and the other on your abdomen.

5. Take a moment to become aware of the rate and rhythm of your breath.

6. Note which hand is moving as you breathe.

7. Inhale and exhale slowly, smoothly and deeply.

8. Try to pull your abdominal muscles in as you exhale. If you feel that you want to, you can push those muscles in gently with your hand.

9. Put your hands back by your sides and continue breathing in and out. The only thing you need to think about now is the gentle rise and fall of your abdomen. (In general, people breathe in and out twelve to sixteen times a minute when they are resting. You may find that your breathing slows as you relax).

10. Get up slowly only when you are ready to get up. That could be in five minutes or in fifteen minutes or when you wake up on this first occasion. It really depends upon how tired and stressed you have allowed yourself to become. As you progess, you will find that five minutes will be the norm.

Practice for five minutes every day. If you have a problem dealing with this method of practising abdominal breathing, I’ll be talking about another method later this week. In the meantime one or another of us will be talking about other ways to use your body to reduce stress.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

Christmas - Less a Holiday, More a Stress-Fest

2009-11-14T13:18:00.000-08:00

Christmas can be a very stressful time for all kinds of reasons even if you have nothing else to worry about - which, for at least 95% of us, isn’t the case.

The best way to deal with stress is to anticipate it and take positive steps to cope with it, so over the next couple of weeks or so we’re going to be talking about simple physical relaxation exercises that can help you to cope with stress positively – not just at Christmas, but all the time.

None of these techniques will take up great chunks of your day – half an hour at most and sometimes as little as three or four minutes - and none of them are going to cost you anything. You do need to appreciate, though, that you are going to have to LEARN how to relax.

Genuine mental and physical relaxation isn’t about just sitting down and taking it easy: it’s a skill - like riding a bicycle or driving a car – and (just like riding a bicycle or driving a car) you need to practise until it becomes second nature. That takes time, motivation and commitment.

We’ll start tomorrow with abdominal (or diaphragmatic) breathing. That probably doesn’t sound very exciting, but actually it’s the most important stress management technique of all.

What will you get out of it?

Improved health and well-being, increased energy, and the ability to be mentally and physically relaxed at will.

What do you need to complete the exercise?

A place lie down – a floor or a hard bed - and three or four minutes.

What do you need to get the best out of the exercise in the long term?

A place to lie down and three or four minutes every day until abdominal breathing becomes your normal pattern of breathing. If you practice every day you'll find that that happens very quickly.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

The Only Person You Need to Impress is You

2009-11-06T13:30:00.000-08:00

I think most of us spend a lot of time at one time or another trying to impress other people. We do it in all sorts of ways - with our clothes or our belongings or by the way we behave or the things we say or do.

It works, of course, sometimes - but only with people who are impressed by externals - the young, the naïve and (let's face it) those very shallow people who judge others not by whom or what they are, but by their belongings, and the the labels in their clothes.

Obviously, getting a job (or even keeping one!) is about impressing people, and very good clothes and very nice accessories can be great props to ones confidence in those circumstances, but the fact is that nine times out of ten an interviewer or an employer (whilst perhaps noticing the neatness of your appearance) wouldn't know the difference between Cerruti and Marks and Sparks and couldn't care less one way or the other.

Being impressive to other people - real people who really matter - never depends on what you wear or what you own. It depends on you - the real you - the person you really are, and what you think of and believe about yourself and your skills, and your abilities, and what you have to offer to an employer, to society and the world.

That's why the only person you really need to impress is yourself. If you don't believe in the real you - the you without what Geoffrey's late mother would have called 'the schmutter' - who else is going to?

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com

TBG Learning - Free Training at Chesterfield & Alfreton

2009-10-24T11:26:00.000-07:00

I came across TBG (The Training and Business Group)on Facebook.

The branch of TBG that I found there is a a Derbyshire based organisation situated in Chesterfield (URL http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.tbglearning.com%2Flearning-chesterfield.htm&h=fce8e84fad40a62c9cc1ab184de5c629) and it seems to have plenty to offer - including a successful relationship with Job Centre Plus.

TBG Chesterfield states that it can make a real difference to the lives of long-term unemployed people, and that it is able to provide New Deal Programmes including Adult Literacy & Numeracy, Warehouse Production, and Retail in a relaxed and friendly atmosphere where learners receive all the help and support they need to improve confidence, enhance career prospects and gain recognised qualifications. Programmes are tailored to suit individual needs.

The following is taken from TBG Chesterfield's site on Facebook:

If you live or work in Derbyshire and you've recently been made unemployed, you're entitled to FREE training funded by the Government. Basically I work for a Company, and if we don't get people the training the money gets taken away.. so get in touch!

If you're applying for work and finding that you haven't got the qualifications you need.., we can help! FREE training includes... CSCS (Site Safety Card)FLT (Fork Lift Truck)SIA (Security) ECDL (European Computer Driving License) Business Administration or any other training you think will help you secure that job. (Within reason!)

Remember... Tell all your friends because if this funding doesn't get used it will be wasted... probably on a new skate park!

The TBG Learning centres in Chesterfield and Alfreton have secured government funding to provide anyone that's been made redundant in the last six month's free training to help them get back into work - so the most important phrase in the statement I found on their Facebook site from your point of view is 'any other training you think will help you to secure that job'.

In other words: don't be put off by the fact that what you want to learn isn't listed. If what you want is 'within reason' you stand a change of getting free training.

I don't know whether all of the TBG Centres have secured funding for free training. Find out by contacting http://www.tbglearning.com/.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

Priority Debts - And turn2us.org.uk

2009-10-11T13:32:00.000-07:00

All dunning letters need to be answered promptly - but it's particularly importantly to deal with 'priority debt' letters.

Priority debts are:

mortage or rent
fuel and utilities
council tax
income tax
maintenance to ex-partners or children
Court fines (e.g. magistrates fines for traffic offences
TV Licence

and it's vital to deal with them quickly, because if you don't, you could lose your home, have your goods seized in settlement of your indebtedness - or go to jail.

If any one or more of your priority creditors is threatening to start, or has started, to take Court action against you, then you can send them a 'holding letter' explaining your problems, telling them that you will contact them again in two or three weeks time, and asking them not to take any further action in the meantime. That will give you time to seek advice and help - and it's particularly important to do that if you can't afford to pay anything, and your situation is not likely to get better.

Obviously, if you are in that situation, the first place to go is your local Citizens Advice Bureau - they will help you to write to, and negotiate with, your priority creditors - but you should also look to try to get help from turn2us.co.uk.

Turn2us is all about support - and not just financial support, although that's obviously an important part of what the Charity does. Turn2us can give you advice, help you to get benefits or grants that will help you to pay your bills or buy essential items, point you to resources that you may not know about or have thought of.

You can join Turn2us on Facebook (link opens in a new
window) for news, events, real-life stories and a growing community where you can discuss topics of interest and share information on their discussion board.

Do it!

Geoff

Getting Help to Get Out of Debt

2009-10-01T12:58:00.000-07:00

A couple of days ago Geoffrey began to talk about dealing with debt, and he'll be writing more about negotiating with creditors, differentiating between priority and non-priority creditors, and handling various other aspects of this problem over the next few days. If you need to read what he has already said, then you can find it archived in September at "Dealing with Debt".

However, whilst the initial system Geoffrey recommended is simple and straightforward, works just as well whether you have two or twenty-two creditors, and can help you to feel that you have some measure of control over what's happening, the idea of dealing with a mountain of debt - constructing a complete and accurate statement of your affairs, and handling the correspondence involved - can be so stressful, depressing, and frightening that many people find that they just can't do it by themselves.

You can get outside help to get out of debt - but you shouldn't be tempted to pay for it.

There are lots of companies advertising that they can help you solve your problems, but all of those companies want money - sometimes large amounts of money - and many of them make unsubstantiated claims. The Ministry of Justice Claims Regulator has already put a hundred such companies out of business for fraud, disregarding the rules, persistently making misleading claims, and encouraging people to hand over fees on the strength of high pressure cold colds from marketing centres. You can read the complete story by using the search box at Ministry of Justice Claims Regulation .

If you have been approached by any company offering the promise of wiping out your debts by challenging their enforceability, top tips from the Ministry of Justice Claims Registration are:

DON’T be pressurised into making any on-the-spot decisions – take time to consider your options.

DON’T hand money over there and then – get full written information from the business about the service they are offering, what it will cost and the time it will take before paying anything. The business is required to provide this.

DO contact an independent adviser – such as Citizens Advice, who can advise you on the best way to deal with financial problem and complaints.

DO check that the claims company is registered at the Claims Management Regulation website – if it provides debt advice services it is likely to also need a consumer credit licence issued by the Office of Fair Trading, check the Office of Fair Trading's Public Register.

DO report any concerns you may have about a business, by email or by calling the claims management anonymous reporting hotline line on 0333 200 0110.

Our advice is to avoid people who claim that they can get your credit cards written off within six weeks, state that 80% of credit agreements are unenforceable, or that they can write off all your outstanding debt.

This is really the equivalent of a free lunch, and we all know know that there really isn't any such thing. If you need help, go to your local Citizens Advice Bureau . The Citizens Advice Bureau can help you to negotiate with your creditors. It's safe - and it's free.

Emily, Geoffrey & Bill

Dealing With Debt - If You've Got Problems, Kill Them While They're Little

2009-09-29T13:08:00.000-07:00

I’ve been meaning to talk about dealing with debt for some time – but it seemed better to all of us to deal with other aspects of the problem of being out of work first. Getting a job and staying positive and at least relatively sane whilst you are going about it, is, after all, very, very important. The trouble is that redundancy and getting into debt often go hand in hand.

The most important thing to do about debt is to face it, and deal with it immediately.

This is a sort of ‘kill it while it’s little rather than waiting for it to grow up’ strategy – and it’s a good one, because it may allow you to avoid having Claims issued against you.

If you receive a letter demanding settlement of a debt then you need to respond to it right away. Your reply should:

set out your financial situation in detail;
contain a request that your creditor freeze interest;
contain an offer to pay weekly or monthly instalments, however small;
mention any changes that are going to happen that will affect your ability to pay;
contain an initial payment on account – and those payments should be kept up week by week or month by month until the creditor either accepts or refuses your offer.

Here’s what may happen if you don’t respond to initial letters:

If you owe money and can't pay it, and you fail to respond to letters demanding payment, then your creditor may issue a Claim or a Writ, depending upon the amount that you owe.

If you do not answer the Claim or the Writ, then your Creditor may apply for Judgement.

If the Court considers that the Claim or Writ is substantiated by the accompanying documentation, then it will issue a Judgment against you.

When the firm of Solicitors acting for the Creditors receives the Judgment; it will notify you of it, and warn you that they may apply for a Warrant of Execution.

If you don't respond to the letter notifying you that there is a Judgment against you, then Solicitors acting for your Creditor may apply for a Warrant of Execution and instruct a Bailiff or a Sheriff to seize your possessions immediately they have the Warrant. There are household and other goods that neither a Bailiff nor a Sheriff is allowed to seize – but that isn’t the point of this post, although it is something I’ll get around to talking about in the longer term.

Your creditor or its agents may well refuse your offer and issue a Claim or a Writ in any event in an effort to secure the debt - but your letter will evidence both your current financial situation and your willingness to pay what you can, and the Court is unlikely to ignore your letter or award larger instalments to the creditor.

If you receive a Claim or a Writ, you must answer that, too.

There is no charge for doing this. You'll receive an Admission Form with the Claim Form, asking you about your income and outgoings. On the form you can make an offer to repay the debt (or a lower amount if you think you owe less than the creditor claims). If you have written an initial letter attach a copy of it and proof of payment of instalments to the form when you submit it.

If you have not previously made an offer in writing, and explained your circumstances fully, now is the time to do it, because if you don't make an offer and the Court decides against you, it may decide that you must pay either the full amount or make monthly payments.

You have 16 days from the date of the postmark to send the form back to the Court. If you need help to complete the forms staff at your local County Court will be able to answer your queries. Make sure to keep a copy of the completed forms for yourself.

If you ignore a claim, or miss the deadline, the claimant can request Judgment against you without hearing your side of the story. This is known as 'Judgment by Default'. This can result in an Order demanding that you pay the money in full (plus costs) immediately. Your credit rating may also be affected.

After the Court hearing, the Court may issue an Order saying you must repay the debt. This Order is called a County Court Judgment (CCJ) and will either be for the amount agreed between you and your creditor. If you can't agree, then a payment will be set by the Court. If you have written a letter in the first instance, and paid instalments, this will obviously count in your favour.

If you then pay nothing, or don't keep up with the payments under such an Order, the creditor can ask the Court to take steps to make you pay, in which case you may have to pay more costs.

However, don't forget. If you genuinely can't pay, even by instalments, you can ask the Court to reduce the amount of the payments or suspend the Order.

Important: If you have Judgments from more than one creditor, the Court can combine your debts and make an 'Administration Order' - saying you must make a single payment every month to be shared by all your creditors.

When you have problems of any kind, it's very tempting to bury one’s head in the sand, and think that things will go away. When it comes to debt, that isn’t good strategy. If you have creditors who are pressing for payment, or creditors who have issued Claims against you, take my advice and take the bull by the horns and answer them.

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com/

Final Questions - And One More Letter

2009-09-24T09:23:00.000-07:00

Once the interviewer (or prospective employer) has asked his or her questions, it will be your turn. Determine exactly what you want to know, and practice how you are going to pose your questions beforehand. It may be that the interviewer will raise questions that you hadn't thought of and obviously you won't be able to craft those questions, but some things are standard - what duties, what salary, and what chance of rises, bonuses and promotions.

Be very careful about how you approach the question of rises, bonuses, and promotions. Bald questions on any of these subjects are a bad idea. They can seem 'pushy', and they can lead the interviewer to believe that you are more interested in what you can get out of the job than actually doing it - or that you might be likely to leave if bonuses, rises and promotions fail to appear within a given time known only to you.

Bonuses, rises and perks are usually covered by an interviewer when people start talking about salaries. If they aren't, then frankly those are subjects that are best left alone. Promotion is, of course, another matter. Most candidates for any position need to know whether promotion is a possibility, and most employers are aware that few people really want a 'dead end' job. Be diplomatic - ask whether other people who have joined the Company in the past at your level have been promoted internally.

Most employers don't automatically let people know immediately that they have been successful - and many want to make a final decision only when they have finished interviewing all the potential candidates for the job - so your final question needs to about how long that decision is going to take.

Don't be afraid to ask it. All employers are aware that candidates are looking to, or have already, lined up other interviews. Consequently, the 'yes' or the 'no' tends to arrive in the short, rather than the long, term.

Don't take 'by the end of the week' as a sign that you haven't got the job, and that a 'Sorry, not interested, but Good Luck' letter will be on the mat tomorrow. You need to appear confident to the very end of your interview, and negative thoughts won't help you to do that.

Do thank people personally for their time before you leave - and do write a follow-up letter immediately you get home and post it same day if possible. It's polite and makes a good impression. It's politic (and it makes a good impression!) to say that you found the meeting interesting and stimulating. It's a good idea, too, to say that you would like the job - but only if you're really serious!

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com

Real Depression Can Be Very Dangerous

2009-09-15T14:20:00.000-07:00

You may have read in the newspapers, or heard on the news, that the French Labour Minister Xavier Darcos is to meet the head of France Telecom to talk about the number of suicides among the Company’s staff.

There have been 23 suicides of France Telecom staff so far this year. The latest occurred last Friday when a 32-year-old woman leapt to her death at a France Telecom office in Paris – and there have been two abortive attempts since then. Last Wednesday, a 49-year-old man stuck a knife into his own stomach during a meeting in which he had been told he was being transferred. Yesterday another employee attempted suicide.

France Telecom has something like 100,000 employees, and the Company is therefore quoting statistics, and stating that most suicides are prompted by personal, not professional, causes. It has, however, admitted that the cultural and organisational changes required by the move from French public monopoly to a competitive multinational were ‘bound to cause stress’. Given the nature and extent of the protection afforded to employees of a French public monopoly, that statement could probably rank as one of the great understatements of the century. These people thought they had jobs for life - and then suddenly somebody moved the goal posts.

Some people handle stress very well and adapt very well to change – in fact some people thrive on stress, and see change as a challenge. Other people - very obviously - do not.

We talked about the importance of staying positive and exerting some measure of control over your life way back in May, and you might want to go back and look at those posts, and maybe start to work with some of the techniques we’ve suggested – but in the meantime if you feel that you're getting seriously depressed, then you should seek help immediately.

Any GP can prescribe anti-depressives – and they work quite well – and if you are seriously depressed then your local GP should be your first port of call. But talking things over with a sympathetic listener and getting some objective advice can work better than popping pills that dull the pain, but leave the causes of it bottled up inside. And GPs don't have much time to talk.

The Samaritans provide confidential non-judgemental emotional support, 24 hours a day for people who are experiencing feelings of distress or despair, including those which could lead to suicide. You can contact them by telephone, email, letter and face to face in most of their branches. Samaritans is available to anyone in the UK and Ireland. If you live outside of the UK and Ireland, you can visit http://www.befrienders.org/ to find your nearest helpline.

And there is something else to think about here. If you go to the Samaritans website; you'll see that they state that:

Everyone has it in them to be a Samaritans volunteer. To touch another person’s life when it really matters, either by discussing their feelings with them directly, or by keeping our branches running so others can. Say ‘yes’ to joining us, and we will be behind you all the way with the training and back up you need.

Our confidential, 24-hour listening service, which never judges people, is at the heart of Samaritans – and there are many ways to contribute. By working together with the shared desire to help people experiencing emotional distress, our 17,000 volunteers make sure that our 202 branches are well-organised and supportive places to spend time. There are plenty of social activities too!

Learning to help other people is a great way to stay positive and add meaning and purpose to ones life.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

2009-09-12T14:54:00.000-07:00

Sometimes, when you go for an interview, you find yourself facing not one person, but a sort of panel instead. That can be very hard. You can really feel that you’re ‘on trial’ - and not being able to distinguish the Judge from the Jury doesn’t make that any better.

If you find yourself in that position, it’s very important to switch your attention from one person to another periodically and quite regularly so as not to exclude or ‘ignore’ anyone.

It's important, too, not to try to gauge the effect that you are having on any one person, because that can lead you to become ‘exclusive’. It's human nature to fix on a 'sympathetic' listener, but including everyone in a ‘conversation” is very important at any time, and is vital in these circumstances. The best interviews are (or become) 'conversations'.

For the same reason, try not to turn your back on anyone - and even if one person asks you a direct question, try to address your answer to everyone present.

I’ve been talking about practice. You can practice this, too: you really only need a couple of friends, or a couple of family members, and the questions that I’ve already provided to practice ‘panel’ interviewing.

In the meantime, here’s something else to think about. Panel interviews – in fact, lots of interviews - often start with the ‘what we do here is…’speech. The interviewer – and the panel if there is one - knows that speech off by heart. Actually, if you’ve done your research, most of it won’t come as any surprise to you either.

But some of it might - so don't spend the 'what we do here' speech time thinking about the questions that you think you might be asked.

Listen very attentively to the ‘what we do here is’ speech. In the first place, it’s a useful mine to dig out relevant questions of your own. Secondly, you might need to demonstrate that you have listened to, understood, and are able to extrapolate from "what we do here...".

And thirdly - all experienced interviewers know whether someone is actually listening. Or not...

Bill - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

Answers Raise Questions...

2009-09-06T13:51:00.000-07:00

And so interviewers probe. Consequently, however well prepared and well rehearsed you are, you can't possibly hope to cover all the bases.

If you are asked a really unexpected question that arises from an answer, or the interviewer choses to approach that same question again from an unexpected angle - take the time to think before you answer. Nobody is going to worry too much about a delay of 6 or 7 seconds to get an answer to a question that comes straight out of 'left field'.

The real danger here is losing sight of the point of the question, and finding yourself floundering halfway through your answer. If that happens - stop, ask the interviewer to repeat the question, and then try to stick strictly to the point when you answer it.

Good way to practice? Get hold of a friend or family member to help you rehearse your answers to the questions we've dealt with over the last couple of posts, and prime them to throw in a few 'wingers' for you to answer. They won't find that difficult because answers raise questions - and you'll benefit from the experience of having to answer unexpected questions 'off the top of your head'.

Bill - http://www.therapypartnership.com

So Tell Me About Yourself...

2009-09-05T09:31:00.000-07:00

Every interviewer wants to get as much first-hand, straight-from-the-horses-mouth personal information as possible from the person he or she is interviewing. Journalists want that information because it adds 'human interest' to a story. Job interviewers want it because they need to know something more about the potentially valuable human being that is sitting on the other side of the desk than can be gained from reading the CV that's sitting on the desk.

An interviewer might just say, "So tell me about yourself", but it's much more likely that he or she would go for leading questions, because leading questions are more pointed and more specific.

What are your strengths?

What are your weaknesses?

What have you done that you are particularly proud of?

What do you wish you had done differently?

An interviewer might also want to probe further into information given on your CV.

I see from your CV that you're interested in (golf, stamp collecting etc). How did you get involved in that?

I see from your CV that you're studying (French, accountancy, Contract Law etc). What made you decide to do that?

Questions, whether leading or straightforward, give you an opportunity to talk and to tell stories about yourself, show what you have experienced and what your interests are - to and illustrate that you are capable of logical, organised thought, because that's what talking about and telling stories about yourself well is all about.

It also gives you an opportunity to portray yourself in a positive light. But please don't forget that 'positive' in this context needs to include some negatives if it is to be genuinely 'positive'.

I have an enormous mistrust of people who - according to their own account of themselves - have no weaknesses, have never made a mistake, and have never regretted anything, or wished that they had done something differently. And any interviewer would, because life is full of pitfalls, and no human being lacks weaknesses, and has never experienced doubt or regret.

Don't hide negatives when you are asked to talk about yourself.

Admitting that you have weaknesses shows character and maturity and is illustrative of the fact that you have actually thought about your weaknesses and have recognised them.

Admitting that there are some things that you would have - or should have - done differently, shows that you are capable of learning from experience.

Being able to talk about those things to an interviewer - who is, after all, a comparitive stranger - is indicative not just of maturity, but of honesty.

Which is not to say that you shouldn't prepare yourself for such questions and rehearse your answers. Preparation and rehearsal will give you the confidence to talk and tell stories about yourself really well. The insight you'll get out of it isn't a bad thing either...

Bill - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

Why Do You Want The Job?

2009-08-31T09:22:00.000-07:00

This can be a very tricky question to answer, because although some interviewers might ask that question directly, many others will not.

The interviewer’s job is to find out whether you fit the job and the Company – and the easiest way to find that out is to ask you about your ideal job, and see how closely you and your ideal matches what’s on offer now and what might be on offer in the future.

You therefore have several options – and all of them require prior thought and planning.

1. Write out an answer to the question ‘Why do you want the job?’ based on the job description and what you have learned about the Company from its website and other sources.

2. Write out an answer to the question ‘What is your ideal job?’ based on the job description and what you have learned about the Company from its website, etc.

3. Visualise your genuinely ideal job, and write down a description of it.

If the interviewer asks ‘Why do you want the job?’ you can use the answer you formulated based on the job description and etc – item 1.

If the interviewer asks ‘What would be your ideal job? You can use item 2 or take a chance and go for item 3.

You might think it would be safer and more productive of success to stick to item 2 – but I wouldn’t take that for granted if I were you.

In the first place item 2 would be, to a greater or lesser degree, a lie – and few people are as good at lying as they think they are. An experienced interviewer would almost certainly notice something missing: the genuine and unmistakable enthusiasm of a person describing something they really want.

Secondly, a job description (however good) isn’t necessarily the be all and end all of what a Company is looking for in a potential employee. Your ‘ideal job’ might make you an ‘ideal person’ in the long, albeit not the short, term.

And please don’t forget that you are interviewing the Company just as surely as they are interviewing you. The Company may not be right for you – and you need to find that out. The easiest way to do that is to ask questions and tell the truth about what you want.

And in any event, appreciating that you are an interviewer and not a supplicant can make you feel a lot less nervous and a lot more confident about being interviewed - and having confidence and showing it can give you a huge advantage.

Bill - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

Interviews - Research, Rehearse, and Tell the Truth

2009-08-29T13:21:00.000-07:00

Sorry I’m late - and I know that I am very, very late with this post. I've been visiting the wife’s relatives in Armenia, and I’m still trying to catch up.

I think Emily told you that I was a political correspondent for many years before I became a therapist, so you’ll probably appreciate that I’ve spent a big chunk of my life interviewing people. Some of those people were very good, and came out of their interviews looking great and smelling of roses – and some of them weren’t and didn’t.

What made the difference between good and bad was preparation, rehearsal, and a willingness to be honest.

Good interviewees do a lot of research, know they want to say, and rehearse how they want to say it.

They anticipate the questions they're going to be asked, decide in advance what they're going to say in reply, and they rehearse their replies.

They have relevant stories to tell about their experiences, and they tell them confidently and well because they have rehearsed telling those stories.

They answer hard questions honestly even if the answers don’t reflect well upon them (have to say that many politicians stumble over that one!) – and they answer those questions well because they have anticipated and thought about them and understand that honesty is the best policy and that fudging isn’t going to fool anyone.

And they don’t try to blind the interviewer with science, or use acronyms unknown to anyone but themselves, because they’re intelligent enough to realise that that is really very, very irritating!

Over the next couple of days I’m going to be talking about some of the questions you might be asked, and we can discuss how you might answer them, but in the meantime, a couple of things to bear in mind:

Every interviewer begins with an ‘icebreaker’ question that is actually a leading question. A job interviewer is likely to use ‘What are you doing now or what were you doing in your last job?’ as an icebreaker/leading question.

This is your chance to shine, because what the interviewer really wants to know is why you took that job, what your role is or was, whether you understand and can explain how your role related to the rest of the company as a whole, whether you were really interested in the company, or whether the job was just a job and, of course, why you have left or want to leave it.

‘Icebreaker‘/leading questions are designed to allow the interviewer to frame follow up questions. If you answer an icebreaker fully and well you will have made a good beginning – so take some time to formulate and rehearse an answer to the icebreaker!

Every interviewer wants to know about your strengths and weaknesses. Most people are good on their strengths, but fall down on their weaknesses because they try to portray them as potential strengths.

Please, please, don’t use the same old, same old, ‘I’m a perfectionist’ or ‘I expect everyone to work as hard as I do’ answer to this question! Everybody knows that people are trained to use the ‘my weaknesses are my strengths’ technique, and nobody is fooled by it anymore – if they ever were. You'll be far better off telling people that you’re a lousy timekeeper or that you have a low threshold of boredom than going down that route - not least because if you do go down that route people are likely to fall about laughing the minute you leave the room.

Think about it. What are your weaknesses? Be honest with yourself, because you really need to come up with some genuine goods here. If you stumble over weaknesses and come up with nothing but platitudes you’re going to lose credibility all the way along the line. Rehearse what you are going to say and how you are going to say it.

Interviewers do research, too. If you screwed up somewhere – they’ll probably know all about it. And in the nicest possible roundabout way, they’ll ask you about it. Just as I would, and always did, albeit that I was rarely roundabout and wasn't employed to ask questions in the nicest possible way.

If you've screwed up somewhere – be prepared to admit it and explain what happened. Truthfully, with no fudging, no evasions, and no excuses. Politicians are bad at this one, too – which is why they’re so often publicly discredited by people like me.

Honestly is really very, very important when it comes to interviews, because one lie (or even one fudged or evasive answer) casts doubt on the integrity of every other statement made - and on the integrity of the person who makes those statements.

Research, rehearse - and tell the truth!

Bill - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

Interviews Are a Two-Way Street

2009-08-15T14:58:00.000-07:00

Sorry we’ve been missing for so long – Geoffrey and I have got decorators and a heatwave, and Bill’s just back from visiting his wife’s relatives in Armenia. Actually, it’s probably cooler in Armenia; it was 115 degrees in the shade in my garden at six o’clock this afternoon , and here it is nearly half past twelve and it really doesn’t feel any cooler.

Anyway, what I really wanted to talk about is the fact that interviews are a two way street. The question isn’t just ‘does this employer want you?’ It’s also ‘do you want this employer?’

Asking the right questions can put you onto an equal footing with an interviewer. That’s purely psychological, but it’s a powerful tool when it comes to interviews, because you might be considered more qualified than other applicants simply because the right questions can bring the interviewer to consider you – quite unconsciously – as an ‘equal’. However, the basic question remains: 'do you want this particular employer?'

Bill Doult was a journalist and a political correspondent for many years before he became a therapist. He’s therefore an expert interviewer (Maggie Thatcher always addressed him as 'dolt' - as in 'Oh, it's you again, Dolt' - but she usually answered his questions anyway), and he’s going to be talking about asking questions and fielding them, and I think that’s going to be very helpful. In the meantime though, and if you are going to be on the hotspot come Monday - ask who your immediate superior is going to be.

Quite often one of the people involved in interviewing you will be the person you end up working for, but if it isn’t, you should ask to meet him or her – and when you do, pay very, very close attention to how he or she reacts to, deals with, and speaks to you, because if the Company offers you a job, that person is going to be an important part of your life.

Don’t take a job if you feel you can’t get along with the person who’s going to be an important part of your life. In the present climate that probably sounds ridiculous - but it isn’t.

Try not to think of any interview as your last chance, or as any job as being better than nothing, because if you take something that you don’t feel good about, you could end up back on the market with a six month stint on your CV/resume that it’s going to be difficult to put over well.

It’s best to take the time to find the right job and take the pressure off by setting long term goals, rather than jumping at the first thing that comes along like a cock at a blackberry. I know it isn’t always possible to do that, but you may have other options that you haven’t thought about that don’t involve messing up your CV - and we can talk about that when Bill’s gone though asking and fielding interview questions!

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

I've Got Nothing To Wear!

2009-08-09T13:43:00.000-07:00

Yes you do.! You have a whole wardrobe of stuff that you've worn to work for ever. It's good and it's comfortable - so stick with it. New clothes are lovely to have - but they're not familiar - and familiar and comfortable is what you need when you have do have to do something 'scary' like going to an interview.

And the last thing you need is new shoes.

I have to say that I love shoes. I've bought ridiculous shoes with four inch heels in silly colours at silly prices (and worn them in some very silly places!) and I've bought plain black flats for interviews. They all pinched. Take my advice - polish your old ones.

If you're really worried about what to wear to an interview - stand about outside the building the morning before your interview, take a look at what everyone else is wearing, and take your cue from that. Normally you'll find that it's plain, dark and discreet. No flashy ties. No big chain jewellery. No pale green shoes with four inch heels. And certainly no skirts split all the way to anybody's bum. In other words - business as usual.

Confidence comes from inside you, not from new, unfamiliar and (usually!) uncomfortable clothing. Worrying about what to wear is wasted energy. Concentrate on what you need to say instead.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com

Being Interviewed Can Be Scary - BUT...

2009-08-07T09:40:00.000-07:00

Being interviewed for anything can be scary; being interviewed for a new job (particularly if you’ve been in the same job and off the market for years) can be particularly scary – BUT...

...being interviewed can be a lot less scary if you bear in mind that you got the interview on the strength of your CV, your Application Form, and your covering letter, and that although your prospective employers might have received fifty or even hundreds of sets of paperwork they chose yours, and were interested enough in it to want to see and talk to you. You can gain a certain amount of confidence from that!

In the meantime, if you’re not getting interviews, or not doing very well with the interviews you do get, remember that constructing a good CV and performing well at interviews takes practice, and the more you practice, the more confident and skilled you are going to become – which makes recruitment agencies a very useful resource:

Recruitment agencies interview you – which is great because not only do you get to practice being interviewed, you can also ask for feedback and get constructive help with working on your interviewing technique.

Recruitment agencies evaluate your skills – which is great because an evaluation can reinforce your belief in yourself and your abilities, or highlight areas that need improvement.

Recruitment agencies go through your CV with you – which is great because they see an awful lot of CVs, and will certainly be willing to suggest how you can improve yours because it’s in their own interests to do so. They are, after all, going to try to sell you on the strength of it.

Recruitment agencies discuss what you’re looking for – which is great because it can help you to clarify exactly what it is you do want.

There are a lot of businesses that give courses on writing CV’s or improving interviewing techniques – but they cost money, and you don’t need (and maybe can’t afford) to spend that money. Recruitment agencies are good at what they do – they wouldn't stay in business if they weren't - and they’re free to you. They’ll get you a job if they can – and they’ll also get you the best salary they can because they earn a percentage of the annual salary of every single person they place.

There are a lot of recruitment agencies around. If you live in a big city you can find one on nearly every street corner. Make plans to register with some of them. They might not be able to come up with an ‘instant job’ – but they can certainly give you some instant interview practice and give you some very practical advice and help on presenting your paperwork and yourself for success.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com

Don't Cross Yourself Out!

2009-08-01T08:49:00.000-07:00

Speaking of old friends and filling in forms and signing them: do you backslash right through your signature when you’re signing your name? A lot of people do that – in fact a lot of people aren’t content with just one single backslash; they go over it two or three times to make sure that their name is effectively well and truly crossed out.

Your signature reflects your personality; it’s personal logo - a written picture of how you see yourself in relation to other people. In fact, many Graphologists believe that when it comes to analysing people, signatures are more revealing than handwriting.

Whilst it's very unlikely that the people who read your Application Forms or covering letters will be trained Graphologists, those people will still be influenced by the way you sign your name, because signatures send signals about the personality of the writer to the conscious and subconscious minds of the reader.

So please don’t cross yourself out!

P.S. What prompted to me to mention this is a book called “Love Letters, The Romantic Secrets Written in Our Handwriting” - which was written by the same old friend who reminded me that ‘CVs’ are ‘resumes’...

A CV is a Resume - And We've Been Very Parochial!

2009-07-28T13:42:00.000-07:00

An old friend sent me an e-mail the other day to remind me that CVs are called ‘resumes’ in the United States. "Not that you will have forgotten" she said, "but, CV is an unknown term here - always just resume".

Actually, I hadn’t forgotten – I’d just gotten very parochial and really quite careless.

I have to say that Bill is absolutely innocent – he’s always lived in Britain - but neither Geoffrey nor I have any such excuse. We’ve both of us lived in the United States, and we now live in France, where the word for ‘resume, is - ‘résumé’.

Sorry everyone!

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com

Why Do People Want An Application Form When They Already Have a CV?

2009-07-27T06:27:00.001-07:00

Some employers ask that candidates complete an Application Form as well as providing a CV and a covering letter. Much of the information demanded by the form can be found on the CV and/or the application letter. So why do people bother with Application Forms – extra pieces of paper which cost money to produce (and, these days, post!)? Well – for several reasons:

A CV is a statement, which may or may not be entirely factual. A CV doesn’t demand that you verify that it is entirely factual; in fact it doesn’t demand that you verify anything at all.

On the other hand most Application Forms generally conclude with a clause that demands that a candidate confirm that the information given on the Form is entirely factual by signing and dating the Form in the space provided next to or below the clause – and some Application Forms positively state that if an employer discovers that any part of the Application is false, then the candidate can be dismissed for that reason.

Here are some of the points you can expect to have to deal with on a standard job Application Form:

1. Personal Details (excluding preferred working arrangements)

2. Education and Professional Qualifications
3. Present Employment (if any)

4. Previous Employment
5. Relevant Skills, Abilities, Knowledge and Experience

6. Other information (this will exclude reference to prior health record, and the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974)

7. References
8. Declaration

A job Application Form is a legal document. As such, it offers protection to potential employers. There are several things that you don’t need to reveal – but you do need to be careful about what you say. If you don’t feel able to swear to it, don’t say it. And remember – your CV needs to match your Application Form!

A CV is a pre-prepared statement – usually a very carefully crafted pre-prepared statement. Job Application Forms, on the other hand, are really a sort of questionnaire.

Questionnaires are designed to encourage people to reveal a great deal about themselves without being consciously aware that they’re doing so – which is why so many therapists use them.

Both the questionnaires that therapists use and many job Application Forms ask questions designed to reveal what people genuinely want, rather than what they would like to persuade the reader that they want. A therapist’s form, for example, might ask: ‘Where do you see yourself in five years time?’ The job Application Form version of that question is a request for a ‘Personal Profile’ or an ‘Objective Statement’ setting out an applicant’s hopes, plans, and objectives.

So where do you see yourself in five years time? You might as well spent some time thinking about that question now, because one way or another somewhere along the line somebody is going to ask you to answer it.

If possible, you need to spend as much time crafting and polishing your job Application Form as you spend on your CV. If someone springs an Application Form on you when you arrive for your interview TAKE YOUR TIME. Don’t get pushed into rushing through the form, because people can learn a lot about you from the way you complete it.

Ideally, if you get the form sent to you, you should take a photocopy of it and practice with it, or plan everything you want to say on a separate piece of paper. Practicing with a photocopy is best because you’ll be able to see exactly how much you can fit into each box without cramping your writing and decide what you want to say with space in mind. Don’t forget to ‘angle’ your answers to the Company – and don’t reply to any question with the words “See my CV”.

Obviously, you shouldn’t complete the real form until you’re completely satisfied with how your practice copy looks and reads. When you do, use a black pen so that it can be easily photocopied, use block capitals so that it is easily legible, and make it as neat and clear as possible.

Take a photocopy for yourself so that you can remember exactly what you said – and take the copy with you to the interview, so that you can refresh your memory while travelling or waiting.

Geoffrey, Bill, and Emily

Aghh! Covering Letters! Presentation, Presentation, Presentation!

2009-07-20T14:11:00.000-07:00

Obviously, if you’re sending out a CV, then you have to write a covering letter – a relevant, well-produced letter that has to be short enough to hold the reader’s attention, long enough to say what you need to say, and interesting enough to persuade the recipient to read your CV.

I was never actually in love with constructing a CV - and I was never keen on completing application forms either because I almost always managed to put something in the wrong box – but I really HATED writing covering letters!

There’s nothing for it, of course, but to keep on messing around with your sentences until the letter is short enough and long enough and (hopefully!) interesting enough to do the trick. In the meantime clarity and good presentation goes a long way toward grabbing someone’s attention:

If the advert doesn’t specify to whom exactly you should be writing, ring up and find out who is dealing with the applications. At least that way your letter ends up on the right desk, and you get brownie points for good manners and initiative.

If you have to telephone to get a name – don’t forget to ask the person to whom you speak to spell the name for you. Geoffrey once got an application addressed to Jeffrey Meltis. I don’t think I need to tell you how impressive he found that.

Make sure that you state clearly – in a emboldened heading, preferably – exactly which job you’re chasing. Big companies in particular tend have several vacancies at any given time, and you don’t want to find yourself being interviewed for something quite other than you had in mind. Don’t laugh – it can happen. People see what they want to see – and read what they want to read.

Set the letter well on the page. Don’t cramp everything up at the top and leave a huge white space at the bottom, for example, because letters like that tend to look as though the writer couldn’t be bothered to design the letter properly, and just ran it off in a rush. A piece of paper is a big white space. If it’s filled in a balanced way then it looks pleasant and harmonious – and gives the impression that the writer has taken some care and trouble over it.

The last word on the page (right at the bottom!) should be ‘enclosures’ – and after it (in brackets) should be the number of enclosures. It’s correct and efficient, of course, to do that, but the fact is that few people can resist counting the enclosures they’re supposed to have – and whilst one is counting one is also looking and reading. It’s a way of drawing attention to the enclosures.

Try to get some nice paper for your covering letters. People are more impressed by that aspect of presentation than you might think.

READ WHAT YOU’VE WRITTEN BEFORE YOU SEND THE LETTER. People don’t just see what they want to see – they see what they believe to be there. It’s amazingly easy to miss out a word or overlook a typo. And don’t rely on your spell check. It doesn’t know from context, and it can help you to come up with some real howlers!

Obviously, content is very important – but presentation is very important too, because first impressions are important, and your covering letter offers a prospective employer a chance to form a ‘first impression’ of you. Make it a good one!

Emily http://www.therapypartnership.com

It Can Be Hard to Be Objective...

2009-07-18T13:17:00.000-07:00

It can be hard to be objective when you are writing about yourself, but your CV is the key to getting through the ‘interview door’, and unless you can make your reader interested enough to want to see you from your CV, the key isn’t going to work, and you won’t get an interview never mind a job.

Write and design your CV to appeal to your readers - and bear in mind that, because your prospective employer might receive literally hundreds of CVs, something well-organised and brief is more likely to attract and hold his or her attention:

• Contact information should be clearly visible on the first page.

• Format should be easy to follow – headlines that are highlighted and indented, for example, catch the attention of the reader and make it easier for a person to take a QUICK look at your CV.

• CV should be accurate and correct. Fifty percent of people lie a little bit on their CVs; some people lie a lot - see http://metlissbarfield.blogspot.com/2009_06_01_archive.html for more information about that. Try to not to exaggerate or embroider facts on your CV. These days you’re likely to be found out – and obviously people aren't too keen on hiring people who haven't been entirely honest.

• Keep the CV as short as you possibly can without crowding the page - or making the typeface very small. Try not to use more than two sheets and keep the typeface very legible.

• Don’t forget to put a header and footer on the second sheet and on all accompanying Certificates, etc. Many people like to spread papers out in a line so as to be able to check one sheet against another – I do myself – so paperclips and staples are regularly removed from documents, and it’s very easy for loose papers to go astray even in the best regulated circles.

• Choose a style that is likely to appeal to the reader. Chronological CVs are the most common style and you will need to have one of those anyway, but skills-based CVs often ‘target’ better. Skills-based CVs are more difficult, because they demand that you think through all of the skills that are necessary to a particular job, and then list personal details under those skill headings. Skills-based CVs are becoming more common the UK, incidentally, so it’s worthwhile trying to design one if circumstances seem to demand it.

• Don’t forget that employers are looking for a ‘perfect match’ at the moment – not only because employing someone is an expensive proposition, but also because they are in a ‘buyers market’. Whether you go for a chronological or skills-based format CV, always write a new CV for each job, so as to tailor information about yourself and your experience for that particular job. It means collecting information about the company and the job in question so that you can match your talents to what they’re looking for – and it can be hard work if you happen to be sending out a lot of CVs. On the other hand you won’t get nearly such good results from sending out a standard CV in every case.

• Try to stay abreast of what’s going on in your particular field – the latest technology, training and jargon that are relevant to what you do. It some cases it’s easy to fall behind if you're ‘out of the loop’ for even very short periods.

• Vary style according to the type of job you are applying for. Big or ‘professional’ Companies (like Solicitors and accountants, for example) usually expect very formal CVs on white paper (and yes, the quality of the paper does matter!), but in some cases you might use coloured paper or an unusual design. Again, it’s a case of finding out as much as possible about the Company and deciding what would be most appropriate and appealing.

Your CV is, of course, is going to have to go out with a covering letter – but that’s a post for another day!

Geoff - http://www.metlissbarfield.com

Believe in Yourself - and Make Sure that Other People Can, Too

2009-07-08T13:46:00.000-07:00

To sell a product you need to believe in it, package it, and promote it.

You’re ‘the product’ here - and recently Geoffrey was talking about marketing and promoting yourself. He made some really good suggestions, but the fact is that you need to believe in ‘the product’ - and go on believing in it – to make the best of those suggestions and promote and sell your ‘product’ really well.

It’s the ‘go on believing in it’ part that can get difficult. Being made redundant can knock your belief in the quality of ‘the product’ all by itself, so a few rejections from prospective employers – and everybody is bound to get some of those – can make you begin to wonder whether perhaps you’ve passed your sell-by date.

I did. I’d pretty well walked from one job to another for more than 20 years when I was last made redundant. I had very good skills and an excellent CV – and I’d stayed in jobs and had good references - so it came as a nasty shock when I found I couldn’t give myself away, least of all sell what I had to offer.

I’d just gotten over thinking that my redundancy was MY FAULT – but I immediately began to believe that not being able to get a job was MY FAULT, and that there was something wrong with me that was preventing me from getting a job.

Well, there was something wrong - and it was MY FAULT. I was scatter-gunning CV’s and applications all over the place rather than targeting them properly – and I had desperation written all over me. I was certainly presenting and packaging myself well – but I was doing it far too well for most of the jobs I was chasing. And I had a really bad attitude to what I was doing.

I finally worked that out when somebody told me that he’d love to employ me but he thought I’d be bored within the week. The unspoken comment was “and gone in three months”. There was nothing I could say, because he was right. I likely would have been gone in three months, because at that point I was just looking to get employed by somebody – anybody – who would give me a job – any job - so that I could look around for a ‘real’ job and have the security of being employed in the meantime. And he knew it.

Quite apart from the fact that my approach was expensive in time and money, it was depressing, and bound to fail. I was inviting rejection – and I got it. That didn't make me feel too good. I was intending to use people – and actually to treat them very shabbily, because employing someone is very expensive – and I got found out. That didn’t make me feel too good, either. In fact, in retrospect, I still don't feel very good about that.

Scatter-gunning’ isn’t a route you want to go down. It can make you stop believing in ‘the product’. And it can make you feel pretty bad about yourself in some other ways as well.

Emily http://www.therapypartnership.com/

Get the Picture!

2009-07-04T07:23:00.000-07:00

Unless you've got unusual or special skills or a very high profile in a specific field, it's unlikely that potential employers will come looking for you - unless you market and promote yourself, that is.

A good CV is a great marketing tool, - but it will only be seen by a limited number of people if you persist in thinking of your CV as something you are going to send out by post in answer to an advertisement.

There are a lot of sites on the internet that allow you to publish your CV, market and promote yourself, do some networking - and look for jobs - all at the same time.

LinkedIn, Xing, Facebook, Naymz and Google Public Profiles are all free unless you opt to buy 'extras' - which most people don't really need - and some internet providers also provide a free web page as part of the account.

Make plans to use all of these resources. These sites are networking, marketing and self-promotion must-haves, so it's worthwhile clicking on the above links one by one, exploring each site carefully, and starting to work out how you are going to design your Profile and what you want your 'settings' to be.

You can also start looking for people you already know, deciding who you want to invite to join you from your address book and what Groups it would be advantageous for you to join, checking the 'membership list' for people it would be a good idea to contact and, of course, investigating the 'Jobs' section.

All four of the first sites on my above list have a 'Jobs' section. I've included an example of a newsletter I received from Xing below, so that you can see how it works on that particular site:

Here's the XING newsletter you requested, with the latest news from your network, new features and your personal statistics:

We're constantly improving XING jobs to make your job search even more effective. Besides job listing that appear automatically on your home page, you can also search for a job directly.

Now it's easier than ever, using our new "Get jobs by email" feature. You can have the latest jobs that match your search criteria sent to you as soon as they are posted, free of charge."

However, jobs also come in via advertisements from particular Groups, which is just one of the pluses of joining them.

Filling in an polishing Profiles takes time - you can expect to spend several days getting each one absolutely right and making contacts - but it's time well-spent for several reasons.

You begin to get a better perspective on what makes a CV interesting and what encourages people to read it - or turns people off - if you continually work on it over a period as part of completing a series of on-line Profiles, and then asking friends or relatives to check out your Profiles.

A personal profile/objective statement is an 'optional extra' on a CV - usually it's just a two or three sentence overview of skills, qualities, hopes, and plans. On-line Profiles actually ask for a personal profile/objective statement - and once you've completed four or more of them you'll really have thought about the subject and had time to come up with something short and interesting that will encourage potential employers to stick with your CV and read it all the way through.
A photograph is also an 'optional extra on a CV - either scanned in by computer or stuck on - but in my view a photograph is less an optional extra than an absolute must. All on-line Profiles ask for a photograph as a matter of course. GET A GOOD ONE! Automatic photo-machines never show anyone at their best. Get a friend (or a professional photographer) to take a series of photographs and then show them around to friends and family. Go with the one that gets the majority vote.

The address of the best of your Profiles - and you'll almost certainly find that one of them becomes a favourite and attracts more contacts than the others - should be included along with the rest of your personal details at the top of your CV. The mere presence of the address will say important things about you, your skills, and your attitude toward getting a job.

Once you've got your Profiles sorted out - start contacting people, joining Groups, and networking for all you are worth. Then you can hone and polish the CV you have been sending out to prospective employers...

Geoff

Nail Polish Lasts Really Well in the 'Fridge...

2009-06-22T13:35:00.000-07:00

The trouble with redundancy money is that it can make you feel quite rich. My personal ‘Gosh I’m rolling in it’ feeling lasted until the end of the first month when my bank account and credit card statements came in and I got a reality check instead of a salary cheque.

It was summer, and hot and sunny, and I‘d spent most of that month enjoying all the unaccustomed free time that comes with not having to get up and go somewhere. I’d signed on, of course, and I was looking at advertisements and working on my CV, but I didn’t feel any sense of urgency because, of course, I had all that money - more money, actually, than I'd ever had in my bank account in my life at any one time. In fact I felt as though I was on some kind of well-deserved holiday, that I all the time in the world to find another job, and that my future was assured and would just take care of itself. I drifted into the library, trawled the bookshops, took picnics to the park, and wandered about looking at stuff, feeling secure and rich - and, of course, spending money.

I didn’t actually spend anything that I wouldn’t normally have spent in an ordinary month - but I’d never appreciated exactly quite how much I was spending in an ordinary month until I saw the hole I’d made in my redundancy money in under 30 days.

I spent a whole afternoon typing out a spreadsheet and trying to work out where that money had gone to, and when I saw the figures in black and white (or, to be truthful, mostly in red given my circumstances!) I realised that I couldn’t even remember spending most of it - or even identify exactly what I’d bought with it, or where.

It was tracking down the nail polish that woke me up to the real world. I’d bought some Revlon nail polish in one of many tours round the shops; and when I looked at the price of it I realised that I’d spent exactly one tenth of my Job Seekers allowance on a small bottle of pink paint that I didn’t really need because I already had lots of small bottles of pink paint.

It was then that I also realised that my benefits were a small drop in the big bucket of my expenses; that if I kept that up I was going to be in real trouble, and that I hadn’t been really concentrating on getting a job, because my redundancy money had given a false sense of security.

I carried on carting around credit cards for another week after that, and then went back to a cash economy. Credit cards made it too difficult for me to keep track of what I was spending. Actually, they made it too difficult to stop spending, full stop. Paying cash makes you think about the immediate price of whatever you're looking at. Not having enough cash with you also gives you time to realise that you likely don't need whatever you're looking at, and probably don't actually want it, either.

It’s usually debt advisory agencies that encourage people to set out a budget on paper, cut out all the extraneous stuff and leave their credit cards at home, but it's actually good advice for anybody – and it’s particularly good advice if you happen to be ‘temporarily self-employed’. You don’t have to cut out everything that makes you feel better or more confident about yourself and the way you look, but you might need to develop a new set of habits - and be a lot less wasteful.

Nail polish lasts really well in the ‘fridge!

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com/

Benefits, Banks, and Bandits

2009-06-20T09:19:00.000-07:00

Whilst you’re working out exactly what benefits you’re entitled to and going through the process of getting them, you need to give some thought as to where you are going to put the money when it begins to arrive.

That can be a very important decision. To explain why, I’m going to tell you a sad and rather unpleasant story, and then talk to you about something called ‘The First Right of Appropriation’. Don’t go away. You need to hear the story – and you certainly need to know about your ‘First Right of Appropriation’.

Anyway, let’s get on with the story – which is, of course, a true story.

A self-employed acquaintance of mine – we’ll call him John – had a run of financial ups and downs over the years (most artists and designers do, however talented and popular they happen to be) but found himself in real financial difficulty once the present recession began to bite. John isn’t young man – he was 70 plus when this sorry tale began (and incidentally had a heart-bypass operation in the middle of it!) – so he qualified for various benefits quite easily, including Housing Benefit and Council Tax.

John arranged for those benefit monies to be paid directly into a bank account he held jointly with his wife. He had been a customer of the bank for many years and had an overdraft facility there which he used to run his business, so he had no qualms about using the joint account to receive his benefit moneys.

John’s wife had a credit card in her own name from the same banking organisation, and in better times John had arranged for the monthly payments due on the card to be taken directly from their joint bank account. John made that arrangement on-line, and when things began to get really difficult for him, he attempted to cancel it, intending to get in touch with the creditor to make an offer to pay instalments he could afford. He found that he couldn’t cancel it.

When work dried up almost completely, and John and his wife were relying wholly on benefits to pay rent, Council Tax, and essential outgoings, John went to see his Bank Manager seeking help to cancel the on-line arrangement made with regard to the credit card. His Bank Manager professed to be unable to help him because the credit card wasn’t issued by the bank, but by an arm of the banking organisation over which he had no control.

Letters were written on John’s wife’s behalf to the credit card company, making it aware of the situation, but it nevertheless continued to remove benefit monies from John’s account every month in respect of instalments that were in fact almost wholly made up of interest.

John finally did what he should have done in the first place. He opened an account with the Post Office Savings Bank and had his benefit monies paid into that, thus ensuring that he could pay his rent, Council Tax and essential outgoings.

In the meantime, the credit card company continued to extract money from John’s bank account – effectively raiding his overdraft facility every month. Eventually, it was no longer able to do so; John’s Bank Manager took fright and converted John’s overdraft into a loan, repayable monthly at what might have been affordable rate had he been able to continue to work. That was, of course, virtually impossible; he hadn’t the money to spend on the materials he needed to work, because he no longer had access to an overdraft.

When instalments stopped because the overdraft facility was no longer there to cover them, the telephone calls from the credit card company began in earnest. That company had, of course, already been made aware of John’s situation – a situation that has since grown much worse due to the actions of his Bank Manager – but nevertheless, and despite letters and explanations, the calls continued.

I shall be talking about how to deal with such collection calls in another post. In the meantime, I want you to think about what has happened to John, draw your own conclusions, and feel able make your own arrangements accordingly – which brings me to ‘First Right of Appropriation’.

You can, of course, have Housing Benefit paid direct your Landlord, but if you don’t want to do that, and feel that Housing Benefit or other benefit monies may be at risk if they are paid into your regular bank account, then you can safeguard them by opening another account elsewhere. In my view, that is the safest way to proceed. In the alternative, however, you can rely on your ‘First Right of Appropriation’.

The Social Security Administration Act 1992 provides that certain benefits - such as Housing Benefit - are ‘inalienable’. Banks are therefore forbidden to use Housing Benefit (or in fact any other income related benefits) to repay an overdraft or any other charges because, effectively, the money does not belong to the customer, who is simply acting as an agent to pass the money along to, say, a landlord.

However, and that aside, your First Right of Appropriation means that even if your bank account is overdrawn, you can choose how ANY funds (in other words not just benefits) paid into your bank account are used, simply by claiming First Right of Appropriation.

To claim Right of Appropriation, you must contact your bank in writing with new instructions at least 7 days before the money is due to be deposited every time it is due to be deposited, and make it clear in your letter that the deposit is to be used for specific purposes. Otherwise the bank might simply disregard the request. It might do that anyway, but I’ll come to that in a minute.

A letter claiming First Right of Appropriation should contain various elements. Here’s a sample:

I am writing to advise you that £xxx will be paid into my account on xx/xx/xx. This is (e.g. Housing Benefit/Council Tax/other benefit).

I want to exercise my first right of appropriation for this money, which will be used for: (e.g. Rent £xx and/or Council Tax £xx and/or living expenses £xx).

I shall withdraw the money on the day that it is deposited for that/those purpose(s), and I should therefore be grateful if you would ensure that any other payments out of my account do not interfere with that withdrawal.

Right of Appropriation is something all banks should be aware of, but it’s very rarely used – and obviously it’s not something they’re particularly anxious to publicise. John’s Bank Manager may have known of it - he certainly should have known of it – but equally he may have chosen to be unaware of it. And that’s the problem with relying on Right of Appropriation rather than just putting your benefit money safely away somewhere else.

Effectively, your bank might just disregard your letter whether you send it more than 7 days in advance of the expected deposit or not - and just gobble up your benefit money. You would then have to complain, in writing, both to the bank and to the Banking Ombudsman. Eventually, of course, the matter would be sorted out because the law is quite clear on this point – but the sort-out could take several weeks and wouldn’t solve the immediate problem of what, for example, you would do about paying your rent.

If you’ve already experienced this problem, or are experiencing it now, you should write to your bank and to Banking Ombudsman quoting Section 187 of the Social Security Administration Act 1992, which provides that:

“Subject to the provisions of this Act, every assignment of, or charge on:

(a) benefit as defined in section 122 of the Contributions and Benefits Act;
(b) any income-related benefit; or
(c) child benefit,

and every agreement to assign or charge such benefit shall be void; and, on the bankruptcy of the beneficiary, such benefit shall not pass to any trustee or other person acting on behalf of his creditors”

If you haven’t experienced this problem – and even if you never anticipate experiencing it – you might still want to make arrangements set up a specific account to handle your benefit moneys with a bank other than that you generally use. You really need to ensure that you will be in a position to pay secured and priority creditors, because you can get into quite serious trouble if you don’t. Banks and credit card companies are neither secured nor priority creditors; they can take action against you, of course - but defaulting on payments to secured creditors can have much serious consequences. As talking about bad news on this blog usually falls to me, I’ll tell you all about that (and what you need to do to avoid falling foul of the wrong people!) in another post.

In the meantime, you can find a lot of information about how to reclaim unfair charges at http://www.britishconsumer.com/ (it’s a free – and very useful – site). If you need to contact the Banking Ombudsman, you can call the consumer helpline on 0845 080 1800 or 0300 123 9 123 (office hours) or on 0300 123 9 123 or 020 7964 0500 (these numbers may be cheaper if you use a mobile phone or a phone company other than BT, and will be "free" if you pay a monthly charge for calls to numbers starting 01 or 02). They’ll call you back if you're worried about the cost of calling them. In the alternative, you can email complaint.info@financial-ombudsman.org.uk or write to The Financial Ombudsman Service, South Quay Plaza, 183 Marsh Wall, London E14 9SR

Geoff

Don't Forget to Contact Revenue & Customs

2009-06-16T07:02:00.000-07:00

You can’t get Working Tax Credit unless you are working sixteen or more hours a week, so if you’re made redundant (or start working less than sixteen hours a week) you to need to inform the Revenue – you can telephone the Tax Credits helpline on 0845 300 3900.

Working Tax Credit continues for four weeks after you finish work, and counts as income in respect of any means tested benefits you claim in that period. Council Tax, Housing Benefit and Education Benefit are all ‘means tested’ benefits, so if you are eligible to claim any of those benefits (or any other means tested benefit) and you claim them in the first four weeks you are unemployed, Working Tax Credit will have to be taken into account.

If you have a partner who works full time you can continue to get Working Tax Credit based on their earnings. Where that is the case you have a choice:

You can let the Revenue know immediately you stop work. The Revenue will then reassess you straight away – and you should get more Working Tax Credit. However, if you then get another job in the same financial year you MUST let the Revenue know straightaway. If you don’t you will be ‘overpaid’ Working Tax Credit and will have to pay it back later.

You can wait until the end of the financial year, and get any underpayment of Working Tax Credit as a lump sum, or have it added to your next year's tax credits if you are still getting them because your partner is working.

There is a lot of information about Working Tax Credits at http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/taxcredits - and you can, of course, get independent advice from your local Citizens’ Advice Bureau. The important thing, of course, is to ensure that you advise the Revenue that your situation has changed as soon as possible after you stop working.

2009-06-15T10:43:00.001-07:00

There are several things to do immediately you are made redundant., but the first thing you need to do – obviously – is to sign on for Job Seekers Allowance.

Jobseekers Allowance is for people who are available for, and actively seeking, work. There are two types of allowance:

A contribution-based allowance (JSA-C) which you can get for up to 26 weeks if you have paid sufficient National Insurance contributions. This allowance is not affected by redundancy or severance payments, but if you receive a pension from work the allowance is reduced by any amount over £50 a week.
An income-based allowance (JSA-I) which you may be able to get if your income and capital are below certain limits. You cannot claim this allowance if you have a partner who works 24 or more hours a week or you have capital (savings) of more than £16,000. NOTE: A statutory redundancy payment counts as capital, but contractual redundancy or severance pay only count as capital up to the amount of the statutory redundancy payment you would be entitled to. You can work out the statutory redundancy payment you are entitled to by going to the Department for Business Innovation and Skills website and using their ready reckoner.

As you have not left your job voluntarily, you should be allowed to claim a form of Job Seekers Allowance straight away.

Once you have sorted out your Job Seekers Allowance, investigate the whole benefits system thoroughly.

The benefits system is very complicated, and it’s in your own best interests to make yourself aware of exactly what you are entitled to claim – or what other people in your household might be entitled to claim. Investigate in particular:

Housing Benefit
Council Tax Benefit
Mortgage Assistance (you may get help with the interest part of your mortgage payments if you claim income related Job Seekers Allowance)
Education Maintenance Allowance (young adults over 16 may be able to claim this allowance).

But don't stop there. Your local Citizens Advice Bureau will be able to help you find out what you and other members of your family may be entitled to claim, tell you where to get the appropriate forms, explain what documentary evidence you need to provide, and direct you to the right Government Department to make your claim.

Checking out the benefits system can be time-consuming, boring and depressing. You might need to fill in a lot of forms, gather together a lot of information, visit a lot of government offices, and answer a great many (actually quite intrusive) questions – but the results will be worthwhile because they will help you to find out exactly where you stand financially and come up with a reasonable survival plan.

Once you get your benefits sorted out, you will have some money coming in - it could be a derisory amount, but it's still money. And you might be able to stop worrying quite so much about how you are going to pay your mortgage or your rent or your council tax, or how you are going to manage to keep one or more of your children on at school...

Benefits aren't great – certainly no honest person is going to get rich on them - but they're better than nothing. And don’t forget! You are entitled to benefit. You've paid in – probably for years; there’s no need to feel bad about trying to get some of your own money back.

If you've already signed on and have not investigated what other benefits you might be entitled to apart from Job Seekers Allowance - make plans to it as soon as possible. What, for example, is the point of struggling to pay rent or interest on a mortgage if you don't need to?

Geoff

Exercise is Important

2009-06-08T12:30:00.000-07:00

Before you decide that exercise is the last thing that's going to help you get back into mainstream employment, read this:

Exercise:

helps you to relax
helps you sleep better
makes you more alert
improves mental concentration
may improve your intellectual capacity
increases productivity
generates vitality and confidence
regulates your appetite
improves digestion
encourages and maintains a good erect posture
tones up muscles and improves the figure
increases physical strength
keeps the joints supple
improves your resistance to stress and disease
is known to help asthmatics
lessens the likelihood of sedentary diseases - arthritis, rheumatism, diabetes, backache
prevents coronary heart disease
increases cardiovascular activity
reduces high blood pressure
balances body and mind and promotes mental and spiritual development
expands your social network

Everybody needs all of those things - and regular supervised exercise need not cost very much. Bog-standard municipal leisure centres are cheap, have just as much to offer as expensive private 'clubs', are often friendlier and nicer (albeit a lot less swish!) places to be, and the advice and help that you get there and the 'keep-fit', aerobic and yoga classes they give are just as good. And municipal leisure centres nearly always have bigger and better swimming pools and tend to offer swimming lessons and water aerobic classes more often than private 'clubs' - and that can be important if exercising in water is your best option.

Important things to think about:

Choose a suitable activity for your age and ability that you think you'll enjoy - and that won't involve you buying equipment you don't already have! -and either join classes where you can get expert advice, or get books from the library that will give you relevant information.

Decide where you are going to fit your exercise sessions into your day - and stick to it. Aim to exercise three to five times a week.

Start slowly - and don't compare yourself with other people. What other people can do is immaterial; it's what you can do for yourself that matters.
Don't forget that walking is actually wonderful exercise. Ask yourself whether you really need the car or the bus to get where you need to go - and if it's too far to walk, try to ride part-way and walk part-way. Try to walk somewhere every day anyway - even if it's only round the block or a quick tour of your local park or recreation ground - and think of it as part of your exercise program.

If you don't exercise, muscles atrophy, joints stiffen, circulation becomes sluggish, you can become short of breath at the slightest exertion - and you can get depressed. On top of everything else, you really don't need that. Exercise is as important to your health and well-being as food, water and sunshine. Make sure that you get some!

SAFETY FIRST: If you have never done any exercise, haven't exercised for some time, or if you are overweight, have high blood pressure, any heart condition, any chest complaint like asthma or bronchitis, or if you suffer from arthritis or back pain or any other problem that you believe could be adversely affected by taking exercise, you should consult your doctor before embarking on any exercise program. Your doctor will be able to advise you as to what you can and should do to improve your physical health and your resistance to stress and disease.

Emily - http://www.therapypartnership.com/