Certificates Instead of College, Who Benefits?
In a new study released today by the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce shows that certificates are the fastest growing form of postsecondary credentials in the U.S., increasing from six percent n 1980 to 22 percent of awards today.
Certificates are more affordable than college, usually taken less than a year complete and can mean a higher salary.
Tags: career choice, Careers, college students, job seekers
Global Dissatisfaction in the Workplace
Employees around the world are questioning their career goals. Many are searching for new opportunities. Others plan to stay with their current employers but are seeking greater fulfillment. Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: career choice, employee attitudes
An Income Gap for Baby Boomers During Career Transitions
New research from Civic Ventures, a San Francisco think tank aimed at baby boomers who want to combine work with social purpose illuminates some of the challenges to doing so. Read the rest of this entry »
Intern Hiring Up, Wages Down
For those students who anticipate having summer internships in 2012 the National Association of Colleges and Employers National Association of Colleges and Employers has mixed news. Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: career choice, college students, hiring
Dissatisfied at Work? Is it Your Age?
If you are dissatisfied at work, it could be your age. In a study released this week by the Sloan Center on Aging and Work entitled Generations of Talent Study trains a spotlight on the effects of country, age and career stage among employees worldwide. Read the rest of this entry »
Are You a Free Agent? It May Depend on Your Age
Are you a free agent? Kelly Services recently asked that question of adults in the United Staes. Over 40% of employed adults now consider themselves free agents a larger percentage than before the financial meltdown of 2008. Read the rest of this entry »
Can Your Child Enhance Your Career?
Long time readers of this blog will remember a post in January 2010 when I interviewed Marc Freedman, the head of Civic Ventures about working longer. You can read that post here. This year Mr. Freedman came out with a new book entitled The Big Shift. A compelling and well reviewed book, it advances the conversation about delaying retirement. One suggestion he floats is that of a gap year for adults. Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: Amy Winehouse, career choice, career transitions, Civic Ventures, Marc Freedman, Mitch Winehouse, parents and children, second careers, second chances, The Big Shift, young adults
What’s Ahead for Summer Employment
With the jobs numbers due out on Friday, once again attention is turning to the youngest entrants into the labor market, low income young adults between 16-24. Tomorrow Secretary of Labor Hilda L. Solis will be speaking about the importance of summer jobs for young people as part of the Summer Jobs USA: Make the Commitment! Summer Jobs USA: Make the Commitment! initiative. The department’s goal is 100,000 jobs this summer.
That’s not a lot when you consider that within the next few weeks, as strains of Pomp and Circumstance are heard on college campuses nationwide, 1.7 college graduates will receive their diplomas, toss their mortarboards into the air and begin to flood the job market.
We’ll be following what to expect from a job market that has been inhospitable to these groups for the last few years.
Tags: career choice, college graduates, hiring
Top Jobs for the Class of 2011
Back in January we reported 47% of accounting majors received job offers before graduation, followed closely by business majors, 45% of whom received offers.
Now the results of a new survey conducted by the National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE) 3 have been released. Among the class of 2011 accounting majors are currently receiving the most job offers. Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: Accounting, career choice, Consulting, entrepreneurship, Financial Analysis, Investment Banking, Management Training, National Association of Colleges and Employers, Sales, Young Entrepreneur Council
The Price of a Non-Linear Career
For those contemplating a little time off, perhaps to care for a newborn or toddler, an elderly parent or even to take a sabbatical between jobs, may to well to consider the findings of Sylvia Ann Hewlett, President of the Center for Work-Life Policy and one of the authors of a recent study about the effects of leaving the workforce and then attempting to re-enter it.
With less than two years out of the workplace and Dr. Hewlett found earnings take a 15% hit. Stay out three to four years, get into the swing of volunteering and feeling you are doing good work and expect to see your financial penalties zoom up to as much as 40% of previous earnings. And that’s not counting opportunity costs of missed promotions or what Dr. Hewlett calls stretch assignments.
If you’re female and think this can’t happen to you, think again. Her data shows that fully two-thirds of women have non-linear career paths. Many of the paths were designed by the women themselves because until recently, corporations were letting women quit rather than making accommodations to a career that doesn’t go in a lock step.
Now that’s changing. Dr. Hewlett reeled off several initiatives from Cisco, Ernest and Young and others that pay more than lip service to modified work arrangements. Still, in many other companies the going is uphill.
There is good news when corporations are left out of the picture and employees rely on their own initiative. According to Dr. Hewlett when Lehman Brothers collapsed the women themselves came together, some 600, to network with one another and provide support, encouragement and job leads. That’s an upside to the financial meltdown. “Ten years ago you wouldn’t have seen that cooperation at that level,” she said.
Women who make it back into the workplace after children, face prospects of facing a second off ramp if elder care responsibilities fall to them.
It’s probably not a coincidence that there is still a high rate of childlessness among female executives. Turns out you can have it all if you are willing to see your earnings tank, or rely for a time on a spouse, which may turn out to be a bad bet in this uncertain economy.
Tags: career choice, female executives, time off
