Content. We hear about it all the time and are encouraged to produce more of it. But what is content? Simply put, content is anything that you create that communicates an idea. Content can be a blog, a white paper, a video, or an audio recording. “Content marketing” is the practice of creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract and retain your audience. The ultimate goal is to...

Office space has become more and more open for the past few decades. The days when managers automatically got private offices have been replaced by cubicle culture. When cubicles initially became standard fare in offices, they were generally relegated to lower level employees. As time wore on, more senior folks found themselves staring at the three walls of their cubicles. Individual offices became scarce, premium real esta...

During the period following World War II, until the late 1970s, the American economy experienced unprecedented growth, driven by the middle class. About half of those among the postwar middle class were blue collar workers. Buoyed by strong wages and often protected by labor unions, the working class was also the middle class. The factory worker lived next door to the engineer. Their children were friends. They shared commo...

Each year, publications such as U.S. News & World Reports publish lists of the “best” colleges and universities in the U.S. Families are looking at significant investment in higher education, so it makes sense that they would want their children to have the best possible educational experience. As news of rising college costs continues to dominate the media, many so-called experts are offering incoming studen...

You’ve noticed. Business has radically changed. No longer can you sit back and enjoy increased revenues from the same products, year after year. You need to do something different. Maybe you need to find a new market for your products. Or perhaps you can find a way to solve new and emerging problems for your existing market. You ruminate on it. You decide to host a “town hall” meeting, in which you stro...

I recently received this question via email: How do I set up my resume and LinkedIn profile for the NEXT job I want? If I’m a “Manager,” I’m not that interested in jobs with the title “Manager” in them. But how do I ensure people searching for Senior Managers, or Directors find me if my current job title is Manager? Similarly – how do I put together a CV which says I’m rea...

Hi Deb: I’m currently employed, and have been interviewing for a few months. A friend of mine just told me that he submits a bill for his travel expenses to his interviewer after the interview is complete. He will bill the interviewing company for his mass transit ticket, parking, mileage, and any other expenses associated with his travel. He said that I should be doing this too, as it “commands respect.&rdqu...

You know you need to build a professional brand to effectively market yourself in your career. But how do you build awareness of your brand? Branding is one of those things that we like to make really difficult. It doesn’t have to be; it’s actually quite simple. Let’s start with what branding is not. It isn’t: A tagline A logo A website A campaign These are all tactics that you employ...

I recently had a very telling conversation. I was speaking with a man at a networking event. Let’s call him David, for the sake of this story. David regaled me with the story of his professional life. He graduated from an Ivy League university in the late 1970s, with a bachelor’s degree in philosophy. Upon graduation, he moved to New York to pursue his dream of becoming an accomplished stage actor. As expected,...

There is a pervasive myth out there among job candidates that the interview is about you. It should be easy to go in and talk about yourself, your achievements, your vision. Make no mistake. The interview isn’t about you at all. It’s about the business pain that the hiring manager and company have. The hiring manager doesn’t want to listen to your life’s story or a rehashing of every project on whic...