The Asia Pacific Headhunter

Mainland Chinese women top the world in holding senior business roles, survey shows

Mainland Chinese women top the world in holding senior business roles, survey shows | South China Morning Post.

The shows our progressive mainland China is in the role of women in the corporate world. Is there a reason why the Western world hasn't caught up with this? And how much does the political landscape in China have to do with the business landscape being different?

Tim Ferriss's new book is coming out Nov. 20th and in order to teach my 10 yr old son about some of Tim's ideas we worked together to produce this minecraft style trailer for his new book trailer competition. Please share the video to give my son and I a chance to win the competition and to talk with Tim about becoming an entrepreneur.

Check out the book here: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0547884591/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=theasiapacifi-20&linkCode=as2&camp=217145&creative=399373&creativeASIN=0547884591

Why Having No Ambition May Kill You

Bad news from scientific studies on baboons and health workers that shows chronic stress raises mortality rates for those who are at lower levels in a hierarchy much more than for those at the top. This despite the stress being tougher on those at the top. Jonah Lehrer details in the WSJ article "It's Good To Be The Top Banana".

I think there is a simple reason for this: if you're at the top the rewards from chronic stress are much greater than if you are at the bottom. The rewards make the difference in counteracting the negative influence of chronic stress. Unfortunately that'll be a tough premise to prove. 

"Silver Bullet" Employees

I have a new term to describe what a lot of companies want in a new hire. It's prevalent across the world, across industries and organisations. It's called the Silver Bullet Employee. 

What is a Silver Bullet Employee?

• They're self-motivated and hard working. They look for ways to solve problems that they aren't asked to solve yet.
• They're learners and doers, they continue their own self-development while having a bias towards getting things done in their organizations.
• They are super easy to manage as they're getting things done for their bosses without supervision.
• They outperform their colleagues and they become profiles for what the company wants in a hire.

Why are they popular?

• The cover up mistakes and make the company money.
• They don't need managing to succeed and deliver.
• The company doesn't have to deal with their processes that don't work because the Silver Bullet covers them with their effort and smarts.
• Managers can blame problems that are in other areas on not having a Silver Bullet rather than using other problem solving techniques.
• Hiring one doesn't require a job description.
• You can hire one with a very general idea of what you want them to achieve but no plan for how to help or measure that success.

Why they fail in new jobs?

• They burn out.
• They're hired as a Silver Bullet and often the problems they're hired to solve haven't been framed correctly from the beginning making it impossible to evaluate their achievements.
• They start to feel like they're being taken advantage of by their peers and management.
• Current employees work actively against them as they're seen as a dropped in superstar to fix problems caused by current employees.
• They can't deal with internal people working against them.
• They're unfairly evaluated by managers who haven't defined success in the role other than "getting it done".

The Silver Bullet is attractive to managers because they don't need managing and they make you look good. But another useful point about them is they hide bad management practices. How? Because when they fail it's so easy to say, "well I guess they weren't as good as we thought they were" rather than deal with the root cause of the failure.

Of course we can all deal with reality by creating an imaginary alternative, but I think if we're going to self-evaluate honestly we'll start to give the Silver Bullets in our midst a fairer chance. They will out-perform but you can't hobble right from the beginning by trying to use them as superglue for all the breaks you have.

 

 

Winning Systems That Work

The world is full of systems that work for almost every problem. You have a lot you use yourself. We all feel the rush of excitement when we discover a new system that produces a great result for us. It might be a recipe, getting something done online or a fix on the computer. Or even a shortcut on the way home that cuts five minutes off our commute. 

But how often to you honestly look for new systems? And do you look for systems that deal with the biggest problems you have? I recently read that people in one study had a bias to take more physical action that produced no results than spend more time on a problem they were struggling with that was solvable. The study concluded that the participants dedided it was less energy to do the physical work than the thinking.

Worst First Interview Question Ever

"Why do you want to work for us?"

It seems a lot of employers still ask this question, but I personally can't work out why. It may be appropriate for graduates who are looking at a variety of companies and are basically choosing based on brand names at a job fair, but here is what goes through the mind of an experienced candidate with choices when they are asked this question:

1. You think I need this job and want me to beg you for it.

2. You think your company is so great I should want to work here before you tell me anything and you want me to explain to you why.

3. You think I'll give you some new ideas as to why you should stay.

4. You're not sure how to sell me on this job or company so you really hope I already want it so badly that you don't have to tell me why to take it.

5. You're on an ego trip because you get to choose who gets this job and asking this question makes you feel important.

 I guess a good candidate could have a serious answer to this, but what could you possibly learn from it? You might learn that the candidate has done some serious research on the company before arriving. But you could find that out from asking them, "what do you know about us?".

I've had feedback from other recruiters that the question is used to make sure candidates are serious about their organisation. But at a first interview with candidates that have choices it's too presumptious to ask this question. A lot of times in recruiting we use the analogy that recruiting is like getting married. Asking this question is the equivalent of asking someone, "why do you want to marry me?" on a first date. Anyone tried that with any success?

If the position is important enough for you to get the right person then getting them to join for the right reasons for them is just as important. That kind of symbiotic result is what produces success, a meeting of equals. But the question of "tell us why you want to join our company" isn't the kind of question that demonstrates a meeting of equals, it's a question that demonstrates the power of interviewer. Most candidates don't want to feel dominated at work. They want a place that will be fair and allow them to achieve while helping the company achieve.

Employers can go on asking this question when times are tough and when they feel the upper hand, but it'll backfire when you need intelligent candidates with choices to join your company.

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Need intelligent candidates? Email me: steven@searchniche.com

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Five Quick Tips on Social Media, Job Hunting and Recruitment

Social media is being promoted as the answer to a lot of problems in recruiting. Both from the perspective of employers and job hunters. I'm a pretty active user of social media, not a guru or expert as lot of people claim to be, but I think I have some quick insights that might help you. 

1. Don't rely on it exclusively. It's just not useful enough to be a primary method of recruiting or job-hunting.
2. Try to get involved before you need it. Whether you're a job-hunter or an employer, trying to dig the well when you're thirsty isn't going to be particularly useful.
3. Forget about measuring ROI at first, if you do you'll quit.
4. Don't expect your contacts to do much more for you at first or even ever. The relationships you build on social media sites like Twitter aren't the kind where you can ask for immediate help. 

Good luck with building your social media profile, first thing you can do is follow me.

 

 

Two Things to Start Doing in 2012

I just read an interesting article on the Harvard Business Review Blog Network from Dorie Clark. She's decided on a list of things to give up in 2012. It's hard to disagree with anything on the list, but for many people it's not enough. It's like telling you to stop eating donuts and pies when you're entire diet consists of donuts, pies, candy, soda and alcohol.

Instead of just giving up things and continung bad habits what are the things you should add to your list in 2012?

1. Develop your concentration. Are you jumping from activity to activity. Start stopping and really concentrating on what you are doing. It builds up your mental strength and helps you deal with difficult problems with less stress.

2. Investigate deeply. Why are you doing something? Do you really know the reason? Do you need to ask yourself why you came up with the first reason? One piece of advice I was once given was to ask myself "Why?" seven times. The discipline of asking "Why?" gets you to the bottom of all the excuses we give ourselves for acting in ways that don't produce the results we want.

Building these two things into habits will make a big difference for you. It takes a lot of discipline at first but like bad habits they get easier over time, and they produce big results.

 

 

Senior Data Analyst, Auckland

Have you outgrown your current job?
What excuses have you been making to yourself about staying there?

How would you like:

1. a stable company that is growing steadily internationally.
2. lots of opportunities to grow personally.
3. close interaction with customers.
4. products that have social value and benefit everyday people, not just businesses.
5. international travel.
6. the opportunity to part of an amazing team changing the world from New Zealand

Our client is only growing bigger and better - join them on the way up and get your chance to dig deep in a broad range of technology with an incredible amount of space for career development and growth. If you have at least 6 years commercial data analysis experience with the following

• Excel
• VBA
• possibly MySQL, R, SAS. 

as well as the following characteristics

• attention to detail
• ability and comfort in communicating and working with others towards common goals
• the ability to do some international travel 

then email me NOW!

Don't miss out on this opportunity. It won't last. Give us a call on 09 306 8950 or send in your CV to steven@searchniche.com, or get in touch on twitter @stevenkempton

Also, if you think I'm some faceless Recruiter who will ignore your application check out some of the quotes from candidates about me:

“I used Steven as my agent to help me find new employment. From the very beginning to the very end I really appreciated Steven's integrity as a recruiter. He really wanted the very best for me. When I am next looking for work I will definitely be speaking with Steven again.”

“Highly recommend Steven as a recruitment agent. Has a much more hands on approached compared to the standard recruitment agent. Can count on him to be there with you each step of the way as a friend and advisor. Very personable, approachable, very honest and forth coming.”

"Steven is a pleasure to deal with and is always ready to listen. If he is unable to help, he will tell you straight up and will endeavour to provide some direction.”

You're No Longer An Employee - Can You Be A Business?

Seriously, you're a business like every other business now. The world of work has changed to the point where if you just judge yourself as just an employee at some point you'll be disappointed that people treat you like a business. 

So what does this mean to you? It really empowers you. It means you can decide the training and development you need. It means you can decide where you invest in your business, and it means you can decide your target market.

At the same time it opens you up to the same kind of treatment you currently give other businesses. You vote with your feet and money; your own customers can do the same. You need to hustle to keep them and to provide them with reasons to stay with you, in the same way the businesses that sell to you do.

So as an employee try asking the following, if you can answer them then you're thinking like a business:

1. How much money has the company made this month and was my role important in delivering that?
2. How much profit did we make and what was my role in delivering that?
3. What am I uncertain about at work that makes me worse at my job?
4. What can I influence to make myself a key part of the business?
5. What do the customers think of our business and of the part I play in delivering it?

And one little extra to think about:

1. If my company went bust tomorrow would my personal brand currently be good enough to convince a current customer to work with me personally?