Linda Doliner is in The Lab’s Spotlight

In this week’s Spotlight Poll Linda Doliner is our winner.  I have known Linda for a while as she was one of the earliest work wednesday supporters (along with Eric Andersen at IBM).  Here is Linda, in her own words, talking about what makes her tick, and why you should consider her for one of your job openings.

It has been said that analytical people are good to have but not necessities. I would argue that, especially in this economy, analytical staff members are luxuries you cannot afford not to have. We will help you with the needs analysis that will allow your company to staff smartly, monitor your costs so that all relevant inputs are captured and price your products so that your salespeople can sell on value not on price. Management reporting will have all of the variables requested with readable charts and understandable graphs that convey information to those who are not inclined to like working with numbers.

My value proposition includes a strong commitment to internal customer service and process improvement experience so that good information gets into decision makers’ hands in a short turnaround time. My database experience is with custom written applications as well as using Access to tap into data warehouses. One of the nicest things ever said about me was that I eat Pivot Tables [with formulas] for breakfast. Another label for me is Excel Mercenary because my experience has been to be assigned a project, getting the information and people organized then being called off the project to work on yet another corporate initiative.

I am looking for a position with a company in the Boston area (Burlington <> Framingham <> Boston <> Quincy). I am not targeting any job title but rather am looking for an organization that will utilize my database, Excel and people skills to help grow the company.

You can learn more about and reach me via the following channels:

LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/lindadoliner
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/Lin_Dolin
My blog: http://lindadoliner.blogspot.com

Affiliate link

Workwednesday special, a job candidate’s pitch: Mikhail Gorelkin

I am connected with Mikhail on LinkedIn but have never worked with him directly. However, workwednesday is focused on helping job seekers and the organizations with job openings find one another. Today, Mikhail Gorelkin explains why you should give him a call.

*Here is the best kept secret: the only way to build effective software systems for business is to use advanced software engineering.* I can help you design and program highly sophisticated models and algorithms for many areas such as: adaptive websites, semantic SEO, personal intelligent assistants, personalized searches and recommendations, intelligent social games, distributed computing, agent-based architectures, automatic negotiation, dynamic pricing, adaptive marketing, etc.

I am a mathematician / AI programmer specializing in solving real-world problems, designing and developing intelligent and adaptive algorithms and systems in a variety of computer languages. I use advanced methods from mathematics, statistics, cybernetics, artificial intelligence, machine learning, natural language processing, and computer science to formulate difficult problems adequately and to solve them correctly. And then I program these solutions in C++, C#, F#, Python, and Java. I think that with my skills and experience I can make your projects cooler, more intelligent and profitable.

Mikhail Gorelkin
E-mail: gorelkin@hotmail.com
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/gorelkin
Resume: http://www.scguild.com/resume/9195R.html
Blog: http://www.gorelkin.blogspot.com (my web models)

Hiring or job hunting, do not forget these resources

There are so many great resources on the web, on social networks, in person in life.  Since today is Wednesday that means it is #workwednesday on Twitter. If you are not sure what this means, feel free to check out my video about this weekly job sharing fest.

I wanted to quickly note, before I list the other resources I am making available, that this cartoon was found at http://www.apnijobs.com/, another site focused on sharing jobs.

Some of my personal resources:

• My LinkedIn group is pulling in the #workwednesday RSS feed from Twitter.  Anything that you have missed can be reviewed there.
• If you do not have someplace to post your resumé, job tips, or job listing you can share it here.  As long as it is not offensive, go for it.
• My Facebook group can be used to share video resumes if this is a preference of yours. Please remember, however, that video resumes, while powerful, should always be kept short and to the point.  If you fail to do this no one, and I mean no one, will take the time to watch the video.

My highlighted job of the week is the Government Liaison role that Twitter is looking to fill.  If you want to impact how the government, and I believe the private sector as well, uses social media, check this position out.

What hidden resources have I missed?  Share them here, on LinkedIn, on Facebook, or on Twitter.   Our goal is to help people find those hidden jobs, the ones they have looked for, the ones they will be passionate about, the ones in which they will excel.  Of course, failing that lets, at the very least, do all that we can to help people find A job.

John

Looking for work? Highlighted jobs of the week: RightNow Technologies

Alright,you know one of the things I care most about is doing what I can to help people find work. Creating value as part of our social media efforts is a good way to put positive karma back into the bank, right?

I am going to, if any company is interested, highlight a job or two from a company in the areas I follow.  I AM NOT PROMOTING THE COMPANY and I receive no compensation for this highlight.  I am basically selling my soul (or blog space) and getting nothing in return, kind of foolish, isn’t it?

Today I want to share a couple of jobs that are available at RightNow Technologies.  Why did I choose them?  A recruiter that I have a lot of respect for, Stephanie McDonald, asked me if I could help her out.  She is honest, passionate about recruiting, and a good person, how could I turn her down? Here, from Stephanie, is some information on the jobs she is looking to fill.

“RightNow Technologies is currently seeking Account Executives in NYC, Dallas, and Chicago, as well as a Solutions Architect in NYC. The Account Executive position is responsible for selling large, enterprise sized deals to new clients, as well as selling into the existing client base. The Solutions Architect is responsible for assisting the Sales and Professional Services organizations positioning services to new and existing customers.

Click here for more information and to apply.

Or call:

Stephanie McDonald
Talent Acquisition Consultant
RightNow Technologies
843-881-0195
recruitrightnow@gmail.com

“

John

Looking for work? Know of a job?

I kicked off workwednesday on Twitter a few months ago with the simple goal of helping people find work.  Listen to me as I explain how it works and jump on in, please.

In honor of HireMonday a guest post by Rebecca Denison

I was fortunate enough to meet Rebecca through twitter as the result of asking about social job hunting success stories.  Rebecca was able to leverage her activities on social platforms into a job and I asked her to share her story.  I hope you find her story useful as an example of the possibilities that social media holds for job hunting.  Enjoy .

Bloggin’ and Tweetin’  My Way to a Bonafide Grown-Up Job 

By Rebecca Denison

John asked me to share my experience with you, but I’m honestly not sure exactly how I got where I am.  When I graduated in May, I already had an internship with Edelman, a PR agency, in Chicago.  During that internship, I started blogging and Tweeting about my passion: measurement.

Officially my job search began last fall during my second-to-last semester as a college student (at the best school in the country).  Truthfully, though, my job search did not really gain momentum until July 7, 2009, when I Tweeted my first words.  Not to say that I hadn’t been trying hard before this time, but I wasn’t focusing my efforts until this point.

I had been on Twitter for a long time, but I had been using a personal account to keep up with college friends and friends from my hometown.  In July, after noticing how people were interacting on Twitter and realizing it could be a great learning tool, I created a professional account which I wanted to use to learn more about public relations measurement and social media.

Twenty days later, I created my own blog, which was something I never thought I would do.  Blogs are for geeks and nerds who are obsessed with tech toys and video games, right?  Absolutely not.  Blogs are for people and professionals who are passionate about what they do, and want to share with and learn from others.

I had done some research, but I was still unsure what I should write about or how often or what to expect from readers.  It didn’t stop me.  I made an effort to blog almost every day, and I spent time each weekend reading blogs and articles about social media and measurement.  I would bookmark posts I wanted to share and crafted Tweets ahead of time in a Word document so I could Tweet during the workday without actually taking away time from my work.

It’s important to know that even though I was working hard to be involved and interactive online, I never let this stop me from doing the work at my internship.  And I never let my online activities prevent me from doing something to the best of my ability.  So I didn’t blog every single day, but I tried hard and proved myself at work every day.

Because of my presence online, I ended up connecting with someone who worked in a different department at Edelman, the Digital group.  She noticed my passion, and I had plenty of questions for her, so we met up for coffee one day.  I asked her about the work she did and if I could help with any projects.  Because I was an intern for a different department, I couldn’t technically help, but it didn’t stifle my passion at all.

I continued to blog and Tweet as much as I could without taking away time from my day job.  On the second to last day of my internship, I was asked to interview for a new open position with the Digital group.  And I got the job!

I know that my social media presence was not the only reason that I got the job, but I am convinced that it was a big reason that I was the first person Digital thought of when there was an opening.  And my continued presence has opened up new opportunities for me at work.  As my colleagues notice my passion, they have offered me work on projects they realize I might enjoy.  How cool is that?

There is no simple formula for using social media to get a job, and I would not recommend using social media as your sole means of job-hunting.  I know that my hard work at the internship I had, as well as in-person networking ultimately helped me a great deal.  Without showing my passion and knowledge about measurement online, however, I am confident I would still be searching for a job today.

Another idea to help people get back to work, HireMonday

Linda Doliner had been heavily involved, as have others, in helping make workwednesday a reality.  Each week the number of job listings grow and I know that we are doing good work, helping people find jobs they might not otherwise know about.

Linda has come up with the idea of HireMonday, giving job seekers the opportunity to share, in 140 characters, who they are.  Here are Linda’s own words on the idea, will you support this?

———————————————————————–

In all fairness, #HireMon was the idea of @Ross. The idea of tweeting jobs on a certain day is beginning to gain traction with #WorkWednesday and I wanted to encourage the tweeting of resumes.  I had heard about tweeting resumes some time ago but it did not take hold.  I want people to advertise that they are looking for a job.  Let’s try to get the twitterverse to show how many people are really looking for work.   Your resume should be 130 characters (to account for the #HireMon hashtag)
 
For example, mine is:
 
Financial Analyst-budget, forecast, pricing development & sales analysis. Advanced Excel & Access skills BS/MBA. #jobs #Boston. #HireMon
 
@Lin_Dolin
–
Linda Doliner
Linda on LinkedIn

How to prepare for a lay-off

I asked my Twitter community for their thoughts on what people should do to be in a position to best handle being layed off.  I put together this simple slide show to cover the collective thoughts.  I hope you find this helpful.

John

Lessons learned from recent social experiments

I have been on Twitter a while now and I am constantly experimenting, trying to understand how to leverage the platform for good and for evil. (cue scary laughter)…  Okay, maybe not for evil, but I am always interested on the boundaries of where the platform can add true value.

Here are some social experiments that are currently underway, the thinking behind them, lessons learned:

Workwednesday

While you can read more about workwednesday here the simple concept is for the larger Twitter community to come together and share job postings, job tips, and support those who are out of work.  I started the concept a month ago and participation has increased every week.  My hope is that I begin to learn of success stories, where people are finding work, making critical contacts, learning how to better position themselves.  I am confident it will happen.

Twitter is clearly a good platform for engaging groups around positive change.  Charitable fundraising has clearly had some success, even in a poor world-wide economy, efforts that require no monetary investment, just the good will of your fellow Twitter community, should continue to have great potential.  Do you want to do something good and just need to build buzz?  Consider twitter.

Social CRM and Social Support Communities

Is it possible to use Twitter to turn an industry on its head for the greater good?  Well…. yes and no…  I have been experimenting to see how far you can go in this direction, here’s the story.

CRM Next is commonly referred to as Social CRM.  In my opinion, which is well documented, this name is misleading and misrepresents the impact social will have on companies and how it will be best leveraged.  Okay, to battle this misconception I decided to identify the true tools that exist today, Social Support Communities (SSC), and to lobby via my blog and Twitter, for a better definition of the CRM framework, its processes and tools, its pitfalls.

I decided to approach this discussion, initially, as if it were a collective discussion of colleagues, discussing the point logically back and forth.  The discussions began as useful dialog but soon descended into individual debates of “because that is the way it is”.  Along the way people who I respect decided to avoid conversations, debates became nothing more than shouting matches…. All of us, especially me, looking foolish.  However, it’s an experiment, lessons must be learned.

I decided to end this experiment when it began to look and feel more like High School cliques than intelligent debate.  Here is my takeaway, you are not going to change an industry via Twitter.  Certainly you can play a part in change, often a very large part.  However, Twitter does ease the creation of “group think” as it is easier to avoid discussion and debate when you are not looking someone in the face, eye to eye.

Do I believe in the power of Twitter to brand, to drive change, to grow consensus?  Yes, absolutely.  You need to be sensitive to the dynamics at play, probably even more sensitive than you normally are when you are trying to do the same thing internal to your business.

Well, onto my next round of experiments as I push the boundaries to continue learning.  #Workwednesday must continue as it is an important experiment in positive social change.  The Social CRM debate ends as it was a failure.  What’s next?  You’ll have to wait and see.

John

Back to work in 140 characters

We are going to get it done this week, right?

Audio is 1:16 in length.