Right now you need to go sign up for Gist. http://www.gist.com. If you don’t know where to start then make sure you reach out to the gist team or sign up for an upcoming webinar and learn how to use the tool better. It is business, careers, and life wrapped inside of a super powerful and IMHO bad ass tool that I think can help anyone do better business or find better careers.
Remember that Gist doesn’t replace Twitter, Facebook, Google Buzz, and other social tools, Gist makes them all better and worthwhile. Gist is how you say hello while twitter is just the doorway. It is what you say when you walk through it that matters. Relationships are life and is what Mr. Gary Vee is trying to let everyone know.
Here are the people at Gist who you may want to follow.
What makes me an expert? Nothing. I am just a guy who enjoys helping people find career paths that they didn’t know existed. I travel around speaking to colleges and trying to help students look at this career game a little differently. I strive to help people ask questions and find new ways to play the game. Life and Careers are about asking the right questions. Please ask anything, or subscribe to the The Squab feed via RSS or Emailto receive notifications of new posts.
I woke up around 4:30. Couldn’t Sleep. Beautiful day in Seattle and I couldn’t imagine myself anywhere else in this time of my life then here. Right here. But here I sit, confused. Confused on where to go. What to do. How to do it. Fear.
I have spent my life striving to kick ass in all I do. Relationships, career, and anything else that I set my hands on. But here I sit, thinking about leaving my job to pursue other opportunities. I have not slept more than 3 hours in months. I can’t. Working a day job that I like, building a company, playing music shows and weddings, and most of all, helping people is my drug, I can’t stop. But have I left yet? No. If there is one thing that is amazing about my company, my boss, my co-workers, it is that they support me, better me, challenge me, and most of all, they are there to help. I told them the truth. I have other job offers that came in just by chance and I also have this itch to do my own thing. Damn, how the hell can this happen? Luck? Yet, I feel anyone would be lucky to work where I do. And here I am, thinking of moving on to another endeavor, maybe my own endeavor, maybe this other offer, when nothing is wrong where I am at. Actually, I had an incredible 2009 and will probably have some great opportunities coming down the path should I stay. So I look back…
What if you could multiply what I just said 10, 20, or even 100 times? That’s how it can change lives. #incredible
People sometimes ask what makes me an expert? I tell them nothing. I’m just a guy who thinks a single conversation or story can help people find career paths that they didn’t know existed. I strive to help people ask the right questions and think about things a little differently. Life and Careers are about asking the right questions and meeting the right people. Please ask me anything, or just subscribe to the The Squab feed via RSS or Emailto receive notifications of new posts.
Seriously, not kidding. Alright, maybe I am kidding and it can’t hurt to attend but just don’t expect much. I understand that removing yourself from situations to meet new people and/or companies is never a good idea regardless of how you look at it. You can stumble across that one person or company at any moment and as long as you are prepared it could be the turning point in your career. The problem though is that the career fair usually = typical out of college $36,000 a year job that not a damn person, Gen-Y or not, would usually find rewarding. Penelope Trunk says it best,
Out of college jobs suck. Everyone wants reasonable work, not just Gen Y.
You are probably thinking, “I have to start somewhere to work my way up, right?” It is a valid question and there are many different thoughts on this, but I believe having that mentality with your career will only stunt your growth because you should always strive to find something that you enjoy, no matter what. Don’t get me wrong, I am not saying that you know everything and that we should be the CEO tomorrow but I am saying that you should like what we do and work hard to find a company willing to teach us how to do better. Find a company that you feel like wants to help you get better. That’s what this journey is all about, learning from others. I often say that age is not a barrier, rather a number that can be silenced by ones ambition, passion, and ability to learn from those who are willing to teach. Here is the full post by Seth Godin that made me think about my past experiences at career fairs and what initially inspired me to write this.
So there are some exceptions to this and Gary Vee would be the first to come to mind. To his credit, he doesn’t brag about how many emails that he has at all and he has more email than anyone would ever want to deal with. The fact that he answers all of them is unbelievable. Kudos to that man. If you have an inbox that is out of control or you are the person who people consider spam, take a minute and read these 26 Email Etiquette tips from About.com.
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The day after I wrote this post and started editing it, I found Ms. Career Girl’s post, “The Best Education is Self-Education,” and Matt Chevy’s “I’ll Never Go Back to School,” which are both great reads. I want to dig a little deeper, ask some different questions, and think about it from another angle though. Before I start with my thoughts on college degrees and questioning the value of them, please know that I believe ongoing education is one of the most important parts of life and can honestly say that Self-Education has taught me more than anything. I also understand that Medical Doctors, Lawyers, and Bio-Molecular Engineering probably need years in a classroom. This is more about the ‘other’ majors, and I find myself thinking about this subject a lot lately when I see my student loans every month and the career path I took is a completely different route than what I studied in college, Finance and Economics. Sometimes you just have to wonder if you really needed that $60,000 piece of paper? Lately, mainly because of the free information era we live in, I feel that I have learned more over the last year than the past 6 combined. It is no longer about the resources available to us because we are only limited by our willingness to learn. Everything is out there and the best part is that it’s free. The bigger problem is knowing where to look. Here are 5 questions that I sometimes wonder about…
This year for Christmas I decided to do something a little different. I feel like many families, like mine, buy gifts just for the sake of having something to give regardless of what the gift is. Many families come together at Christmas yet rarely talk throughout the year. I was determined to change that this year and try to help our family build better relationships with each other. I also decided to give the money I saved on gifts to St. Jude instead. In the end, the only thing we truly have are relationships. This is the first podcast on The Squab and I hope you find this as a guide to careers and life in general.
Recently I had an old college friend tell me I was “lucky.” I didn’t really know what that meant. Was I? Am I? I don’t even know what luck really is. What I do know is that I am always striving to learn and achieve greater in life and I am truly thankful for so many great opportunities that I have had (music, my job, co-founding a company, learning/enjoying html/css). Is that what luck is? After thinking about “luck” for a while, I came up with this little chart and a made-up phrase, “True Luck.” I would argue that the moment in time in which an opportunity occurs could be considered “luck,” but without being prepared for that moment you may never have known that the opportunity was right in front of you, thus never feeling “lucky.” If you are not prepared then you may never seize any opportunity. Therefore, I believe that being “lucky” isn’t about luck at all, and I am not alone. After a quick google search I realized that people have shared my idea for centuries. Here are some of the quotes that stood out about luck. Continue Reading
If you are looking for a job nowadays then you have probably heard everyone talking about the importance of creating your own personal brand. You need to be visible. You need to do more than just a resume to land that next job. The problem is that you either get a list of 500 different things to do or some “famous author” who says we should only work a 4-hour workweek. It’s true, there are a crazy number of tools and websites out there to join but in the end it is about finding a community that will help you learn and be more motivated to join in on discussions which will allow your voice to be heard. It is about answering people’s questions and that is what I believe builds better business. That is exactly what Brazen Careerist does so well. It brings together like minded individuals to discuss a variety of topics that can help individuals get started in building their brand, career, and resume for that matter. Brazen was started by Ryan Paugh, James Ryan Moreau, and Penelope Trunk. Penelope is known for giving raw, real, and creative career advice on her personal blog which over 40,000 people subscrive to. There are many other tools that can help streamline the tedious task of creating the perfect resume, allowing you to focus on what really matters, being visible, sharing advice, and true networking. Continue Reading
I recently came across Job Spice, a powerful yet simple resume tool, and decided to give it a whirl because I know how much time can be spent formatting and designing your resume when you should be focused on the content. Making it good looking is important but in end content is king. That is what is so appealing about Job Spice. It allows you to drag and drop “content fields” in any order to lay out your resume. All you have to worry about is filling in the blanks and you are done. It then uses CSS so you can change between designs with the click of a button. It also allows you to save your resume online as a pdf with your own URL, www.yourname.jobspice.com, which can be downloaded by anyone who you tell to take a look at your new online portfolio. It will not only make you look professional but the simplicity of it will make whomever is fetching your resume surely appreciate your unique style. You talk about a dream come true. Continue Reading
I'm the Director of Product at Zaarly. I helped build Seattle based Gist which we sold to BlackBerry. I founded Hello There, an advisor for a couple companies, wrote some book, play some music and if you'd like to check out everything else click here. I spent the beginning of my career doing digital marketing and product for top tier auto manufacturers like GM, Hyundai, Lexus, VW and more. I've been lucky enough to have writings featured in The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Reuters, U.S. News and World and many other press publications discussing the changing business economy along with new and disruptive ways to get hired. I write here about things I learn, stuff I think about and everything I wish I'd have known earlier in life. Continue reading.
Seriously, not kidding. Alright, maybe I am kidding and it can’t hurt to attend but just don’t expect much. I understand that removing yourself from situations to meet new people and/or companies is never a good idea regardless of how you look at it. You can stumble across that one person or company at any moment and 
The day after I wrote this post and started editing it, I found 
This year for Christmas I decided to do something a little different. I feel like many families, like mine, 
Recently I had an old college friend tell me I was “lucky.” I didn’t 
If you are looking for a job nowadays then you have probably heard everyone talking about the importance of creating your own personal brand. You need to be visible. You need to do more than just a resume to land that next job. The problem is that you either get a list of 500 different things to do or some 
