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The other day while I was siting in the waiting room for a doctors appointment I picked up a magazine called “ Good Times” it was the February edition. “Good Times Magazine” is a Canadian magazine that has some pretty captivating and informative articles. One article in particular really caught my eye. The article was an interview with Mike Holmes - the infamous host of “Holmes on Homes”. I used to call Mike Holmes the Jack Bauer of home renovations. I have always thought of this guy as being really really awesome, but after reading about him in this article he had moved up for me by a several notches. If you are a hard working person you have probably seen his show or at the very least heard of him. He is a hard working machine of a man that is at the head of the Holmes group which is the parent company of 35 construction companies and about 200 employees and not to mention a great show with a cult following. One might wonder how he achieved all this. Well you know the old expression that hard work pays off, that’s how he did it. Hard work is the life blood of Mike Holmes. In this article Mike Holmes talks about how his father was really hard on him and taught him the true art of hard work, not to mention many other admirable traits. We can learn a lot from this as when most of us are confronted with an obstacle we go around them. While someone like Mike breaks right through obstacles and moves on (literally on occasion). His actions speak the philosophy of hard work, focus and relentless desire to beat the status quo. Like I mentioned before he is a machine who is always looking for a way to improve, grow and succeed at all he does. One of the most admiring thing about him is that he helps as many people as he can along the way. Mike and his TV crew repair about 13 houses a year. He has setup a foundation for people who want to study a trade or skill related to construction this foundation is called “the Holmes foundation“.

He also recommends this site “careersinconstruction.ca” if you seeking a job in construction. I strongly encourage all of you to reflect on how hard work and focus can help you in your everyday life, current job and finding a new job. Some of these old fashioned traits are the very foundation of successful people everywhere.

Ever wanted to take a course to learn something that may enhance your ability to get a really really good jobs? But you didn’t have the time or the money to go to school. Ever dream of going to an ivy league school…hmm I don’t know like MIT but didn’t have the marks, money or even knew what the application process was.
Well thanks to the open source era you can now get online courses for free from a miriad of great universities including MIT.
How you may ask? Well MIT developed an OpenCourseWare site. You have access 1800 courses ranging from Engineering to health sciences, they even have cources for Humanities and the arts.
Take a look at thisYou know what the best part of this is…they aren’t the only ones who are doing this. There are a whole bunch of them and they are part of the OpenCourseWare Consortium. Their MOTO is “Universities working together to advance education and empower people worldwide through opencourseware.” How do they make money to subsidize this great initiative…by donations and corporate sponsorship. I encourage all of you to take a look at this amazing resource. Whats the catch…no catch execept that these courses you take cannot go toward a degree, certificate and does not count for any credits. But on the upside it isn’t all reading, the courses have audio and video content as well. There are many educational instituations from around the world that are a part of this program. In the United States alone there are 12 prestigious instituations that are engaged in this very web 2.0 wikinomics program.

The full list of American institutions are as follows:

Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Michigan State University
Tufts University
University of California, Irvine
University of Massachusetts Boston
University of Michigan School of Information
University of Notre Dame
Utah State University
Utah Valley State College
Wheelock College
University of California, Berkeley

Now you can tell your friends that you went to MIT (wink wink nudge nudge) and at the same time you would of learned some amazing things to help improve your abilities at your current job or and getting into that really amazing job you’ve always dreamed.

Check these links out: http://ocw.mit.edu/ and http://www.ocwconsortium.org/

This is the title of the best book I have ever read about job hunting and career searching. Sounds like a book from the reading rainbow tv show…by the way that was one of my favorite shows when I was growing up. Anyways whats amazing about this book is that the author comes out with a new version of the book every year.
He has a companion work book to help you run through some excercises to help you find what you like, qualify for and are great at. He even has a companion website http://www.jobhuntersbible.com/ which by the way is one of the featured sites in our Resource page. I think you guys should take look at Richard Bolles site.It is full of advice, articles, links to job websites and much more. I believe it is an amazing read…
Read it! You wont regret it… here is a link to a previous version of the book as a can be found on googlebooks.

the work book can be found on Amazon : What Color Is Your Parachute Workbook: How to Create a Picture of Your Ideal Job or Next Career (Paperback)

Did you know that many employers ignore resumes that don’t come with a cover letter? To an employer, that’s like watching a movie half-way through. Every media needs some form of an introduction and a resume is no different.

A cover letter can say a lot about a person that a traditional resume cannot. A person’s professionalism, tone, and people skills are just a few examples of characteristics that resumes have a hard time conveying. This doesn’t mean that any old cover letter will do. The following tips will help insure that your cover letter will make your resume stand-out in the eyes of your future employer!

1. Take it Seriously.

Everyone knows how important a first impression is. Even then, many people put all their time in perfecting their resume and throw together anything for the cover letter. This practice might mean that their cover letter might not ever even be read. Take it seriously and make sure that you come out being as professional as your resume.

2. Keep it Short

The shorter the better. No more than one page. Since you want to be as brief as possible, make sure you put your best foot forward and emphasize points that are not made in your resume.

3. Get Personal

This might sound like a contradiction but your cover letter should be both personal and professional. Your tone should be friendly throughout. A little-bit of humor is good. You should make the reader want to meet you. However, don’t take it too far by speaking about personal matters that have no relation or impact on the position you’re seeking. This balance is the key.

4. Name the Reader

If you know the name of the person who will be interviewing you, address them directly in your letter. This can break the ice and show that you know how to communicate with people. And remember, you’re addressing Mr Smith, not John.

5. Focus on the Employer

Don’t ask what the company can do for you in your cover letter, there will be other times for that. Instead, do some research and tell the reader how you can help their business grow!

6. Proofread

Many people overlook the importance of this step. Make sure you don’t have any grammatical or spelling mistakes in your cover letter or resume before you submit them. Have someone else proofread them if you have to.

There you have it. Follow these tips and you should be on your way to a new, better career.

The other day, my fatekeep.com partners (George and Osama) and I were discussing some of the articles that we wanted to publish on fatekeep over the next little while. One of the topics that kind of stood out for me was the discussion around mothers and their return to the workforce.

Well, for one thing, it’s not easy being a full time parent and full time employee. I feel the demands of our society on us as human beings can sometimes be too much … and I’m a guy. For mothers who manage a household and work, it must be a lot to say the least. One of the goals of fatekeep is to help people find a career they love and one that pays them well. I hope this article brings us one step closer to this goal … but before we bridge the gap in careers for mothers and others lets get back to the meeting I mentioned earlier.

In our discussions about mothers and motherhood we listed some basics skills and abilities that all mothers share that can be applied to the workforce. Skills and abilities that you as a momma already have (yo momma shake what your momma gave ya):

patience

empathy

task oriented

perseverance

attention to detail

time management

dynamic personality

ability to teach and train

positive and encouraging

excellent communicator – great tone

able to work in a fast paced environment

WOW Momma! It looks like you got some amazing skill. It might take a company many face-to-face training sessions and lots of computer based training classes to get one of their employees to acquire a list of abilities like the one you’ve already got. Momma you got what it takes! You got what it takes to make an award winning career that pays you what you need and deserve. Lets get you headed in that direction.

Here are some steps that anyone must follow in their quest for a job:

1. Find your calling - Truly to understand that you are the master of your destiny, ask yourself what it is you want to do and then ask yourself what it is you can do

2. Resume time – start prepping your resume, please get others to look at it to make sure it is good. You can use the word processing templates to get an idea of how to structure your resume. But if you want a winning resume go see a job councilor or some sort of employment professional who can help you. Job placement agencies are a good resource as are unemployment offices.

3. Post it – begin applying online to the jobs you like, you can post your resume to career sites like workopolis.com, monster.com, hotjobs.com and careerbuilder.com . You can also go directly to companies that you like and apply to their jobs directly. Please take a look at THE LISTS page for a list of the 100 best companies to work for in 2008.

4. Seek the opportunities – go to job fairs and employment agencies, ask your friends and family to keep an eye out for you and ask them to put in a good word for you.

5. Interview thyself – always be ready for an interview here is a link INTERVIEW PREP to a document that will prepare for the interview. Also please take note that when you are being interviewed you can also ask the HR person questions about the company or job that are of importance to you. You will satisfy any curiosities you have about the job or the company and you will appear like a person who is serious and eager to work.

6. Vigilance – keep applying to jobs, keep looking for the job opportunities, keep working on improving your skill – never give up and never give in

You know something that I find funny about this article is that while I am typing it, my wife is applying to a company that allows for you to work from home. She is applying to be a home based customer service phone agent…check it out the website is contractxchange.com.

The job sounds and looks cool…take a look at it…because…Momma you got what it takes…

Hi Y’all … Welcome to fatekeep.com

Our hope at fatekeep.com is that we can assist in making it easier for you to find a great job/career.

Finding a job is one of the most challenging tasks we have to face at many points in our life. It is very important to stay positive during the process and not to become discouraged. You must work hard at applying to as many relevant jobs you like and/or feel qualified for.

Early in my career before email and online applications was the norm. I used to fax my resume to as many places I could. I told myself that I would send my resume to a minimum of 60 different companies a day. At one point I became so obsessed with send my resume to companies I stopped looking at the available jobs. I decided that it was up to them to see if I were qualified for their current openings.

In today’s job market that would not work very well as companies get hundreds of applications a day. The lesson that can be applied from my story is to give yourself a target number of relevant applications to submit everyday. It is a numbers game to a certain degree, you will find a job eventually it all depends on how hard you try to find/apply for one and how well you have made your resume. The most important thing is constant vigilance. Keep your chin up, there is a job out there with your name on it.