CMS Career Blog

I’m curious to find out where our readers volunteer. Where do YOU volunteer?

Volunteering produces a lot of positive outcomes for you, and for the organizations where we give our time and talents. Here are some important potential outcomes from volunteering:
- you can pick up new skills and/or experiences to use on your resume
- you can utilize a new skill in an organization that needs what you have just learned in school, on the job, or in the organization itself
- organizations can achieve their mission through your gift of time, energy and talent
- you can achieve wholeness in your life (volunteering provides an outlet that you may not have in other areas)
- it fun!


Let’s compile a list of some of the places our readers volunteer. Let us know where YOU volunteer (and what you are getting out of it).

That’s hardly a “news break”, but this morning I noticed one more way in which the Internet is shaking up the “regular order of things” — “Cyber Monday”. Retailers have for some time called the Friday after Thanksgiving — claiming it to be “the biggest shopping day of the year”. Watchers of our economy look at the figures for “Black Friday” (as it is called) and can predict whether we are in a recession or an expanding economy. So much of our economy revolves around our propensity to BUY BUY BUY at this time of year. Thus, “Black Friday” is indeed an important economic indicator.

Enter the new kid — “Cyber Monday”. Now experts are calling the Monday after we go back to work “Cyber Monday”. They say that everyone who didn’t get their shopping done on Friday (like me, they didn’t want to face the crowds) will go to work, hit their computers and the Internet armed with charge cards — and don’t forget the FREE SHIPPING!!! This is another example of how the Internet has changed our world. a few years ago we had no such beast. NOW, it too is an important economic indicator.

How has the Internet changed YOUR world? How has it affected your business? How has it shaped your life? For one — you are reading a BLOG — most of us had never even heard of this form of communication 3 or 4 years ago!

Think also of the ways the Internet has changed the job search process. Hiring managers and recruiters now have a whole new slough of methods for finding out intimate details of your life. Maybe they “shouldn’t” base hiring decisions on what they read about you in MySpace, but they often do. Give a thought to the “BRAND”you are presenting online. How will the Internet effect your job search?

Some colleagues and I are trying a “31 Day Blog Challenge”  as a way of encouraging us to develop content that will help our respective clients.  Keep an eye on this space, and you will see some GREAT things, I promise.  Feel free to let any of us know what subjects YOU would like to learn more about.  We are all respected professionals in our respective fields. 

If we don’t know it. . . we know someone who does. 

In the meantime, you can see the blogs from those who are in the challenge at the following links:

 http://findtheliar.blogspot.com/ – a blog about hiring practices and how to protect your company from hiring felons, etc.

http://smotis.com/blog/ – a blog dedicated to securing your information and making IT simpler. 

http://mindshare.eamann.com/ – a blog dedicated to marketing yourself and your business.

http://www.mid-lifecareertransition.blogspot.com/ – a blog for those who want to move from career success to career significance.

Keep blogging!  Sean Harry