career | Zinga Hart

One More Move: What will you let go?

Posted on September 21, 2015 by Zinga H

Just like in the Free Your Team article we must free ourselves from the burdens that hold us back from success. What can you think of in your personal, spiritual, business or community life that you wish would just go away. With our current times of ever more visible violence, deception, and distrust we need to constantly feed on positive sensations to manage the stress of simply being in the 21st century. Now that millennials have emerged in the workforce and are slowly becoming parents, the same old song and dance starts to wear thin on our history’s books. That goes for our personal lives as well. I confess this is the seventh blog I’ve started. It has taken that many tries to fully commit to the idea that I am meant to write for the rest of my life. My true passion is to write. Like a lifelong love that is always nagging at my spirit.

How do you envision your passions? We can discuss below.

So here we are, where we will claim our authentic success together. In order to hold on to these values, ethics, and beliefs that build our leadership we have to make space by letting go. This means dropping safety nets and, as Daymond John would say, taking affordable steps. At heart, this is the philosophy of One More Move. Taking conscious time to connect with our inner compass and ensure we find happiness with the decisions we take.

So here’s a tiny way to practice letting go. Find a junk drawer or go through your closet. Completely clean it out and only keep what you need. Get rid of at minimum 75% of what you have. You can give it away, sell it, or have it recycled. Use Craigslist, Facebook, or even your local post office for distribution. When your done admire the clarity you created in the space. Letting go allows us to have space to accept things we truly want in our lives. Release wisely.

That’s it for this Monday! I hope you all have a great night.

One More Move: Face Yourself

Posted on September 14, 2015 by Zinga H

Being an authentic leader, requires a healthy and growing amount of self-awareness. Back when I was in college (not tooooo long ago), I realized, I would avoid myself in the mirror if I was feeling the winter/semester blues. Now, I am a lot better at choosing to be positive, optimistic, and present, but back then I found this to be a big indicator that I was in a fog.

So why might one avoid seeing themselves in the mirror when they are down?

Avoidance is a coping mechanism we think helps us escape feelings and thoughts we do not want to deal with. I didn’t want to deal with being a first-generation, out-of-state, working-class dishwashing college student in the middle of my first dreary/frozen Ohio winter. From my reflections, I saw this as a time where my mind was not happy with my situation and thus nothing was good enough, most importantly the view of myself. It was almost as if I could not look myself in the eye because then all the truth would spill out and I would have to face it. One good thing is: avoidance and other limiting thoughts and behaviors are surmountable. It just takes practice.

Here I am, growing my authentic leadership everyday, and hopefully you are too! Facing yourself in good times and especially bad times is a conversation you must continue in order to ensure your mind, body, and spirit are all on good terms. So my One More Move Challenge below is to Face Your Self.

Challenge steps:

Find a comfortable place with a mirror.
Stand in front of the mirror and move close enough to feel as though you are truly staring within – .
Ask yourself: How can I achieve [x] ? ; or How can I project who [I truly am]?
Answer yourself
Accept your answer and express gratitude for your honesty.
*Bonus*: Give yourself a big kiss. [Rarely my style, but it can be fun :)].

Seems simple, but this may be uncomfortable for some people. Facing ourselves is not a practice people delve in often. Find a moment to make friends because you are your own best friend for life. Repeat this exercise every and you’ll begin to build your confidence and character leading to your authentic career brand.

Disclosure of Material Connection: Some of the links in the post above are “affiliate links.” This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive an affiliate commission. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will add value to my readers. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Free Your Team

Posted on September 10, 2015 by Zinga H

Authentic talent acquisition is a key trend in corporate recruiting. It keeps companies working with the millennial workforce and helps them stay competitive in our flat economy.HR professionals, CEOs, and leaders overall need to pay attention to ensure all members of the company family are thriving throughout their career. Capturing talent is an important best practice, ensuring your company’s people bring value on their journey.

What happens after is a road you must manage while your company and team evolve. An employee’s new career path will take them through many positions, those can either be with your company or with another. This is why it is important to develop a relationship with your employees where they feel free to grow within your company’s headquarters and global operation. Paying attention to placement, communication, and awareness of your team members will ensure you yield the most out of everyone’s purpose, passions, and contributions to the vision.

Placement

“Everybody’s a genius…”

How do you measure your organization’s genius? Every person is comprised of work preferences that ensure they will naturally thrive. Somewhat like a work destiny, work preferences could be boiled down to a six letter code, created by, academic psychologist, John Holland. He created the Holland code or RIASEC, which covered what a person would be enjoy doing as a part of their vocation.

Learn more about the code

Of course human measurements can only test so far, and at base our guesses our 50/50. Real placement comes from experience. Set up times and opportunities for your employees to actively experiment. Encourage committees and allow employees to shadow in departments; speak with your employees about their codes and get their feedback. Over time, you and your employee will find a place within your enterprise that allows them to apply themselves in a way that is motivated by their preferences.

Communications

We are now a part of the trust economy. Building trust with your company’s leaders and team requires communication, transparency, and integrity. Corporations must brand from within in order to project their integrity to larger community. Yet, how do you communicate with your entire organization? If you are constantly pointing towards how great your company is without ensuring everyone is on board you will eventually move away from the trajectory that your employees are following. Elicit feedback relentlessly and accept all feedback equally to keep the lines of communication flowing. The best organizations do not run on emotions, yet they allow emotions to be freely expressed. Have strong systems in place to ensure everyone feels safe to share the voice and take a seat at the table.

Awareness

When you company’s tribe is just right you will feel the buzz of flow. Everyone will have a strong attention and care to what they are doing. While this is excellent and you have built a strong rapport, the final step to the employee’s buyer’s journey is leaving them feeling delighted. Take small steps to show you are aware of their lives as humans. Celebrate birthdays, appreciate their impact, highlight their hobbies. Find the time to engage and go the extra step with your employees and they will become your best brand ambassadors.

Paying attention to your employees as listening to your overall market. A free team will be driven, motivated, and empowered to build the prosperity of your company’s mission and vision. With workforce potential declining, it is important to capture and keep talent on your side.

What is the cost of losing an employee?

For entry-level employees, it costs between 30% and 50% of their annual salary to replace them.
For mid-level employees, it costs upwards of 150% of their annual salary to replace them.
For high-level or highly specialized employees, you’re looking at 400% of their annual salary.

[Cited from Karlyn Borysenko]

The return on investment comes in the form of savings and revenue building from having a free and happy team.

How does your company ensure its employees are thriving?

One More Move - Sounds out the word omm which is a common chant in yoga

One More Move: Give Gratitude

Posted on September 7, 2015 by Zinga H

Back to our regularly scheduled One More Move article! This series gives you singular moves to keep you motivated, authentic, and connected as your grow you personal and career path. This week, I challenge you to express gratitude. Why? Because it is through this expression of gratitude that we heighten our life’s quality, elevate our mood, and build our interpersonal relationships with others.

The benefits of gratitude are immense. It affects our mind, body, and soul. Below is an excellently designed infographic on The Power of Gratitude. You can see how the power of gratitude can help you can gain more energy, get better sleep, be less anxious, and have fewer headaches. All these benefits are necessary to regulate in order to stay motivated on the long-haul to your legacy. In a sense gratitude is the attitude of leadership that keeps us going and connected to ourselves and others around us. How do you find gratitude through out your day?

Credit Thanksgiving Infographic from Mind Valley Academy.

Here 5 easy ways to express gratitude today!

Write a recommendation on LinkedIn
Send a thank you card to a colleague
Give a generous tip to your server
Publicly thank someone on Facebook
Handwrite a letter of appreciation to a mentor your admire

Tiny Buddha offers 50 unique ways to express gratitude, which focuses a lot of being fully present with others and considering ways to truly touch another person as a leader. There are many places where we can express gratitude. When we take time to make this one move we ripple forward positivity and good vibrations.

To cap off, here is a TED Talk on the Transformative Power of Gratitude. Give gratitude fair value as your return on investment is worth the deposit.

Akron Women in Tech: One Year Grown!

Posted on September 1, 2015 by Zinga H

I didn’t post a One More Move article yesterday because I was attending the One Year Anniversary of Akron Women in Tech! It was at the Nightlight Theater in Akron and the event went pretty well. Here’s some highlights:

The Group

I found Akron Women in Tech on MeetUp. The group hosts discussion meetings, workshops, and work meetings for women to come together learn, code, and grow. Every event I have attended (around 3) has been a great way to bond, talk latest tech trends, and just meet other women in Northeast Ohio. They’ve had 20 MeetUps so far and have definitely gained credibility quickly in the community.

Check out their online slides!

The Venue

I’ve never been to The Nightlight Cinema Theater, but I will definitely be back. The quaint venue was spacious enough for a mid-to-large group and the mix of theater seating with antique coaching helps make you feel like you’re balling enough to be in your own home theater. The Nightlight shows independent films for you Netflix scrapers and on Mondays they contribute to good community causes. Definitely worth supporting.

The People

Networking with others is a cornerstone of leadership and knowing there is a community of tech interested women in Northeast Ohio is definitely worth meeting. The discussion on crappy C- movies, latests technologies, and new tidbits like FreeCodeCamp being recognized on LinkedIN as an educator was definitely worth carting out my daughter and driving to Akron for a great celebration.

Props to Akron Women in Tech! I wish you all well with your new 501c3 status and hope you can collaborate with Limitless Ambition one day!

Want success control time. This shows a clock falling to the ground to show a sense of time being out of control

Want Success? Wield the Tool of Time!

Posted on August 6, 2015 by Zinga H

photo credit: 12 sec via photopin (license)

Do you want to move forward in your career, manage multiple projects with ease, drastically reduce stress levels?

You may be wondering how can I take control of my time?

What we know about time do know about time? Scientifically we are still inconclusive. Early theories related time to the breakdown of things; the collapse into chaos. The theory behind the relationship between time and energy show that with time dormant energy will move velocity and acceleration at a constant rate. Although what time is exactly is still fuzzy to definitions science agrees it plays an important role in the things that happen and perhaps even the creation of the universe.

Yet, with all the studies surrounding time Carrol claims it is “not the be found in the underlying laws of physics” Time does not take up space and does not have a mass. Which in a sense means time is a imaginary. It’s not a real part of our physical world, but one created by us humans. It is hard to pin down this tool we created. Major philosophical theorist divide into three parties: Presentists, Growing-past philosophers, and eternalists. Presentists believe on the present is real. Growing-past philosophers believe the past and the future are real and eternalists believe in the existence and reality of past, present, and future. I lean towards the eternalist camp. I think most entrepreneurs do, since the future is the substance of our dreams.

Which is why “time is money” is the mantra of any wealth warrior. Recorded in The Free-Thinker in 1719, the phrase time is money relates the idea that time is a valuable resource as one of the purest measures of human value since our time is finite on this earth and we must produce what we best can and seize opportunity. Are you leveraging your time to maximize your return? Wasted time is wasted money and it moves you further away from the feeling of success. As though you are not maximizing the opportunities available in your life. How can we escape the subtle sense of chaos that comes with time?

We have to focus on what is really at play. You have a desire to effectively seize the opportunities you have before you. Time-management needs to be re-named to Self-management. Self-management is “the process of evaluation [sic], prioritizing, and organizing one’s tasks” . Time is the imaginary tool we use to measure the movement and completion of tasks. We watch a flower grow and a forgotten yogurt die. When we use the tool of time right we realize the steps we are taking towards our goals. When we use the tool incorrectly, we can dwell in non-present aspects of time like stressing over the future or reminiscing in the sweet past.

How do you manage yourself wisely? The first step is to put yourself first. Self-management is a continuous process of a commitment to developing yourself. It took me ten years to get a comfortable grip on time, and I’m still striving for greater discipline. What major roadblock in my way, was the belief that if I just gave my mind, body, and spirit up to other things I would somehow feel fulfilled with the time I was spending. So I worried unnecessarily, ate indulgently, and felt all types of ways without making any real traction in my goals. It was only when I focused on myself: being my healthiest; cultivating my thoughts for pro-action; and rewarding my behavior with gratitude and respect that I suddenly began to take leaps towards achieving the life I desired.

Practice items

Here are some reflection exercises for self-management:

What do your value? How do you rank your values?
What are your top 20 priorities? Drop it down to 5.
What does it take for you to perform at your best?

References

Time and Energy – Millennium Relativity.” 2002. 5 Aug. 2015 <http://www.mrelativity.net/TimeEnergy/TimeEnergy.htm>

What Is Time? One Physicist Hunts for the Ultimate Theory …” 2014. 5 Aug. 2015 <http://www.wired.com/2010/02/what-is-time/>

“Time | Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy.” 2009. 5 Aug. 2015 <http://www.iep.utm.edu/time/>

“What is the idea behind the quote “time is money”? – Quora.” 2014. 5 Aug. 2015 <http://www.quora.com/What-is-the-idea-behind-the-quote-time-is-money>

“Time = Money | SUCCESS Magazine | What Achievers Read.” 2013. 5 Aug. 2015 <http://www.success.com/article/time-money>

“Time Management – Exploratory Studies at Purdue.” 2014. 5 Aug. 2015 <http://www.purdue.edu/exploratory/academic-support-new/time-management.html>

Management: Developing Self-Management Skills … – SQA.” 2007. 5 Aug. 2015 <http://www.sqa.org.uk/files_ccc/CB3496_self_management.pdf>

One More Move: Visualize Your Vision

Posted on July 25, 2015 by Zinga H

Note: Hello Readers, I am switching the title of One Move Monday to One More Move. This way I can post when inspired as opposed to just on Mondays, but I will still regularly post once a week on Monday.

Now One More Move!

In honor of the workshop I am hosting in Kent, Ohio I am sharing one technique to help build your future of abundant success: visualization. One of humanity’s greatest gifts is the power to imagine a future reality prior to the moment arising. We can foresee what we want our outcome to be and then have a blueprint to flexibly follow. Look to your future and see your greatness when you practice this visualization technique. One practice would be to record it in your own voice and then playing it during a 15 minute break.

Here’s the script from Infinite Futures.

Simple Tips For You To Impress at a Dinner Interview

Posted on July 23, 2015 by Zinga H

This is it. You’ve arrived. They only roll out the silverware and napkins for the most promising interviews. The dinner interview is your advancement into mid- or executive-level career positions. So, how do you masterfully wield your fork and career pitch to propel you forward into landing the job you most desire? Similar to the regular interview you must do your research, prepare your presentation, and show gratitude in order to bring awareness of the values you can bring to an organization. Here are 3 ways to sharpen your dinner interviewing skills.

Research the organization

Showing up to a job interview, not knowing about the organization, the person you are meeting, or even the industry you are entering is a quick way to crumble your opportunity away. Take it a step further by considering the bigger picture and vision that the company will be considering. Weave the organization into the network of all organizations and show that you can see with the lens needed to be successful within your future position.

Pitch Pleasantly

One thing you have for you at a dinner interview is it is so easy to display your character and ability to interact with others. How so you ask? The servers! A restaurant is full of people working in unison to help produce an enjoyable experience for their customers. All good businesses do this. Join in with the restaurant team and to show how well you interact with the world around you. Say please, thank you, and keep your table area clean. Work with them and display respect as if you had to work with these people every day. There is no easier way to display your grace than to do this. Treat your server poorly and you may do well to leave an unpleasant taste on your potential employer’s tongue.

Chew Well

This advice goes both literally and figurately. It can be easy to over talk during any interview, they added a casual atmosphere of a restaurant can allow your words to flow easy like a steady stream. To impress, ask important questions and weigh in on the answer while you chew your food thoroughly, then swallow and then speak or ask a more clarifying question. The dinner interview is a time to languish in the organization and treat it as if it is a potential partner you are taking on a date. Enjoy their company and don’t rush through your resume of skills and accomplishments. This interview is about them and the things you will do for them. Here are more tips on questions to ask to show an organization you care.

The dinner interview is a great way to get your seat at the table. Use your knowledge, words, and body language wisely and you will be sure to leave an impression.

photo credit: rack of lamb presentation II (license)

Tech Review: Build a Cleaner Resume with Resume

Posted on July 8, 2015 by Zinga H

When job searching it is important to spend a time catering your resume to each and every position. Taking the time to keep track, modify, and distribute multiple resumes can be draining, add making them modern and beautiful and you can find yourself consumed with time spent on just your resume alone. One website that helps makes this process easier for the job search is Resumonk.

Resumonk offers users easy design, fair pricing, and a sleek interface. Although there are some cons overall, the website delivers and has become a favorite since emurse went away.

Easy design

When first using Resumonk users have the option to start from scratch or import their LinkedIn Profile. The import tool was great because it brought in all facets of my profile, including any recommendations others have left. One downside was it listed all my skills. While useful you will have to pare down as it will take up a lot of space on your resume. It is easy to navigate from section to section, and there are many options to design your resume as you see fit.

Fair pricing

Resumonk is a freemium website. While you can use it for free, I ended up purchasing the subscription because I enjoyed the premium resume designs offered. A lifetime plan is $59 dollars while a 1-year plan is $20. Depending on how long your job search will take $20 for a year should be plenty of time to design, re-design, and distribute an unlimited amount of resumes.

Sleek Interface

A lot of resume builders online are ugly and as dreadful as filling out an online job application. Resumonk gets past that by paying attention to the design. The templates are well worth using and the fact that it pairs the design with the cover letter makes this web application a true professional service. Finally your dashboard provides you with all your past resumes to copy, edit, and reuse, making your job application process much easier.

Cons

While I will be using Resumonk for a while. I do hope they improve their resume template options. Although there are 4 pages, without the promise of more to come, I worry their designs will become generic as more users purchase their services. It should also be easier to transfer sections and pieces of one resume over to others. Finally, the import from LinkedIN can be awkward as it tends to list your oldest job at the top, requiring me to re-arrange in present chronological order.

Overall Resumonk is a great resume builder and tracker. You get to make 4 free resumes with the free option so check it out today!

Resumonk

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