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Right around the time Sleeping Bear Dunes was named by Good Morning America as “The Most Beautiful Place in America”, my best friend and I took our kids there for a fun day-trip while in Northern Michigan. We had a great picnic lunch at the base of the Dune and afterward, eagerly climbed the Dune, which was a lot of fun. While at the top of the dune people were commenting that we should continue on to see “the Dune Lakeshore” and the wonderful beach. Well, my 15 year old daughter, 12 year old son, and I were game. My friend and her son went back to the gift shop, where we planned to meet up with them shortly…after-all how far could it be?

So, off we went. Now remember, we were barefoot. We walked and climbed and walked and climbed, thinking we were surely almost there, when someone from another party exclaimed “we’re about a third of the way !” Uh-oh! Well, I blew it on the good-mom/leadership front. I had not done my homework. We started this trek without knowing how long the trip would be – 3-4 hours. We had no idea of the landscape – 3.5 miles of incredibly steep “sand” hills and valleys. We surely didn’t have proper provisions – 1/2 a small bottle of water and no sunscreen (we rationed capfuls of water!). And…we were not in proper gear – “no shoes” was perfect for sand dune climbing when the sun was cloud covered, but once it was full force and baking the sand, our feet were burning up! We pressed on…..

Just shy of our “beach” goal, my daughter burst into tears – thirsty, hot, tired, and defeated. She wanted to quit and go back. I agreed to let my son go to the beach, take some photos, and return, while I waited with my daughter…..for about 4 1/2 minutes….then I said, “this is a metaphor for life, I cannot let you get ‘almost all the way there’ and let you quit….we’re going”. And we did. When we reached the beach, we found that yes, in fact, it was gorgeous, and one of nature’s finest, and….fortunately for her, my daughter had had her bathing suit on under her clothes (when did she do that?). She proceeded to jump in. She gulped down some lake water and swam until she was cold! And then…we began our trek back.

Long story short, it was a long and grueling trip, the hills seemed twice as high and steep as they did the first time around, but we made it! It was an accomplishment.

Bottom-line: we were mentally and physically unprepared. Had we been prepared, it would have been a much different trip. Now that we know what we know, we’d like to go back sometime and experience it again…differently!

My lessons of the day: 1. You can’t quit just shy of your goal – persevere; 2.Whether in “life” or business, you need to know “where you’re going” to maximize the trip along the way, and for best goal attainment; and 3. What a great bonding experience to get out of your comfort zone…and accomplish something bigger, together; and 4. You are probably stronger than you think you are!

p.s. my friend and her son occupied themselves with new books, phone calls, and the beautiful scenery….thankfully and ironically, technology allowed me to better enjoy the nature….once I had text’d my friend while sitting on the beach, apologizing for our longer-than-expected trip, I could relax and enjoy Michigan’s lakeshore !

I’ve had a lot of calls lately regarding “resumes” – people are dusting ‘em off and getting ready for potential opportunities! I’ve reviewed quite a few of these high-level-over-achiever’s resumes and there seems to be a common theme….

A vast majority of the resumes I’m seeing are “responsibility oriented” vs. “achievement oriented” – they typically do not reflect the excellence or the essence of the person. Most people don’t see the problem. Let’s say you are in sales, as is your best friend, and the two of you have worked for the same set of companies your entire careers. If your resume is “responsibility oriented”, both resumes will look exactly the same (minus your name and address of course)!!! You know: cold call prospects; create proposals; generate new business; handled existing accounts; blah, blah, blah. This doesn’t feature/show the real you and it is incredibly boring!

If you really want the prospective employer to sit up and take notice of your resume….start by over-hauling/editing your resume with a “results/achievement-oriented” pen! Take the same example as above but this time list “achievements” instead of responsibilities, like: averaged 10 new Fortune 500 clients per year; stack-ranked #3 out of 148; grew the territory 110% year 1, 150% year 2, and 130% year 3 …and on and on and on. See the difference? Non-sales people complain they don’t have metrics to list. I challenge you to think outside the box! What about: mentored 3 new hires who achieved their quotas; or brought 2 new products to market resulting in $2 million in additional revenue; or scored 8.9 in Customer Satisfaction; or decreased production time/material waste/personnel turnover by 10% resulting in $50,000 in cost savings? …take your pick! It sounds different doesn’t it? Much more powerful, right? OK, so that’s the first thing. [Note: this is the most difficult part of "creating a resume that pops", it is time-consuming, requires introspection, thought, and creativity....many people give up before the start...don't be one of them!]

Secondly, here’s a perspective on the average hiring authority reading your resume…typically 30-45 seconds the first time through…30-45 SECONDS…so make the most out of it. You know the half to full-page dissertation/summary you have at the top? Often, it gets bypassed so they can get to the real stuff. The “real stuff”, the meat, is your job history/background. Do not spend more than a third, maximum, a half, of this very-precious-resume-real-estate with a summary/summary bullets. Focus on making your experience really highlight you in the best possible way with an achievement-oriented background/experience section.

Third, if your resume is vague, know you will not get a callback. Usually vagueness means something is not being said, and there isn’t enough curiosity or patience to dig in further…NEXT! By the way, I see this a lot with “Education”. By not listing the dates, companies assume things…like you are hiding something, and the assumptions are usually not in your favor. Beleive it or not the assumption they often make is that you did not actually graduate!!!

Next, Standard Format is still preferred….summary/objective/whatever-you-want-to-list-as-your-opener at the top, then Experience (with a couple sentences outlining the type of company and your main responsibility followed by BULLETS highlighting your achievements), followed by Education, and then Associations, Hobbies, etc.

Finally, going back to the fact that only 30-45 seconds is spent reading the resume – HELP THE READER READ THE STUFF YOU WANT THEM TO READ!!! Here’s an idea, go through your achievement-oriented bullets and highlight, or should I say “bold” the phrases (not the entire bullet statement) that they should focus on. The bolding will help them zip through the important stuff that shows who you really are!

One more thing…when all else fails, if you’re wondering if something does or does not belong, ask yourself the question “Who Cares?” So, (back to the sales example) the cold calling you did in 1992 – who cares? – it is a given and doesn’t offer a lot of relevance to today since you have “graduated” to other sales positions that require cold-calling.

Good luck with your re-write and your job search…make that resume POP!

One of the things I love most about being a coach,  is the opportunity to offer new perspectives to individuals/groups – to see the shift – the shift in thinking, the shift in perspective, the shift in behavior. And…I love it when I get an opportunity to shift my own perspective as well! So when this clip was sent to me, the opportunity presented itself to pause and reflect on the implications to my life, the relationship to “ego”, and the application to my clients. Interesting. Go ahead and view – it’s pretty quick…then I have a few comments.

Life is Like Coffee

I’m going to take the liberty to tweak the analogy just a bit. As a business coach (vs. “life” coach), I don’t see the “my-cup-isn’t-as-nice-as-his/hers” as much as I see clients forgetting to enjoy/appreciate the coffee. They (I’m about to start tweaking) get so lost in the cups (what is “outside” – what others expect from them, who they think they are supposed to be, how they’re supposed to act - living up to others’ expectations), that they lose the richness of the coffee (the inside, their core, themselves!). They are no longer aware of the rich aroma, the smoothness, the bold, full-bodied flavor (I feel like I’m writing a coffee ad!!) of the coffee. In other words – they lose touch with the “inside”…with who they are!

Between losing touch with their core and wearing layers of “ego”….many clients don’t always act, sound, or reflect their “true selves”.  As a result many have blind spots (by the way, if people/leaders/clients readily “saw” their blind spots, the term wouldn’t be “blind spots”!). The most interesting thing is, for the most part, the further away from their “true self” a client is, the more unhappy/disconnected/incongruent they tend to be.  So, a new perspective or “shift in thinking” is one of the best ways back to “self”…and to happiness – and just enjoying a good cup of coffee.

One of my clients suffered a devastating loss last week – a house fire. Yes, the family is safe. A few personal items were salvaged…but most of the house has been gutted. The furniture is gone, as is the roof over their heads. Unimaginable!!! I got a call from her yesterday and I was so inspired by her attitude!

She has chosen to handle the situation by not focusing on the uncontrollable aspects but instead focusing on the controllable – her attitude. She is focused on the “silver lining”…and moving forward. Huh?….silver lining??? Something she said really struck me “We are just so glad we are going through this with each other. We are bonding on a whole new level….our relationship is so strong right now”. They had also sent out an email letting people know they were OK and how they were focused on dreaming about the rebuilt house! Wow!!

In the work I do, I encounter many people who are busy telling themselves “a story” – almost always limiting their potential outcome. These stories prevent them from moving on – prevent them from being the best version of themselves. We all have a choice. Often we have no control over the situation, but we can impact the outcome by choosing to change our perspective or reaction. In an excerpt from The Success Principles, author Jack Canfield uses an equation to illustrate this concept, E + R = O: