On the Job by Anita Bruzzese Dont be Afraid to Question the Data

On the Job by Anita Bruzzese Don't be Afraid to Question the Data Dont fall in love with the data. Frank Sesno Not many companies ignore data these days since its often thought to be the secret sauce thats going to lead to greater success. Yet data can be an inexact science. Whether its erroneously predicting the winner of a presidential election or the number of expected flu cases in a certain year, data science is a technology that can see things as never before, but also can be a blunt instrument, missing context and nuance,findsThe New York Times. Thats why companies cannot be lulled into complacency when it comes to data, and must instead be ready to question it thoroughly, says Frank Sesno, a former CNN anchor. Sesno, author of Ask More: The Power of Questions to Open Doors, Uncover Solutions, and Spark Change, says that teams and leaders cant ignore their gut instinct, relying only on data to make decisions or predictions. Experts say that data science is just another tool, and its designed to provide probabilities, not absolute answers. In addition, companies must understand that those who build the predictive models may haveflawed assumptionsor be mistaken about what data is most important to a companys objective or strategy. Data also can lead to teams not relying on their own knowledge and experience to come up with the best solutions. Researchers found in astudythat 60% of radiologists asked to analyze a routine chest x-ray failed to detect that a collarbone was missing because they were so familiar with data that trained them to expect to see one. So, how do organizations use data to its best advantage? Experts say it begins with committing to a strategy that uses data but not to the exclusion of anything else. Asking the right questions Sesno, who has interviewed five presidents and other world leaders, is now director of the School of Media and Public Affairs at The George Washington University. He says that his journalism training has taught him the power of asking the right questions, and hes learned even more from people like Colin Powell, former Secretary of State and chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Dr. Anthony Fauci, who was critical in cracking the HIV/AIDS mystery. While data certainly adds to the overall picture when it comes to forming a strategy or developing goals, Sesno says that teams cant park their common sense when using it and must still: Ask diagnostic questions.Whats wrong? How do we know? and What are we not seeing? are all way (read more here)

6 Executive Job Search Email Content Blunders - Executive Career Brandâ„¢

6 Executive Job Search Email Content Blunders

Understanding the New Train Driver Recruitment Tests

Understanding the New Train Driver Recruitment Tests Understanding the New Train Driver Recruitment TestsIn this article we will provide you with new details of the train driver tests which came into force in 2013. These tests will be conducted by the majority of UK train operating companies. Attention Test of Everyday Attention for Occupational assessment (TEA-Occ)Attention is crucial for any train driver and, therefore, is heavily assessed in the train driver selection process. One of the methods of this assessment is achieved through the Attention Test of Everyday Attention for Occupational assessment (TEA-Occ).The TEA provides a measure that is sensitive to sustained attention, selective attention and attentional switching. You attention will be tested by engaging with familiar everyday items such as telephone directories and looking for key symbols, this part of the test is called the telephone search.Another subtest, the telephone search while counting involves you once again searching through a telephone directory, but this time simultaneously counting a run of tones played in the background.The final subtest of the TEA is designed as a test of the auditory selective attention. You will be asked to pretend you are in a lift on the bottom floor but the lift’s floor indicator has broken therefore you have to determine which floor you arrive on by counting a series of low tones and ignoring high tones used a distraction.The TEA is used to determine different patterns of attentional skills and provides a broad-based indication of the theoretical aspects of attention.KEY SKILLS MEASURED IN THIS ASSESSMENT: Attention to detail;Meticulousness;Sustained attention and concentration over time â€" includes multi-taking elements.KEY INFORMATION:Train Operating Companies across the UK do not stick to the same time limit;Typical time lengths for the TEA-Occ can range from 5 minutes, to 25 to minutes;As you can see, 5 minutes and 30 minutes is a huge difference. Generally, the more appealing and popular TOCs tend to se t the bar higher; meaning their assessments are much more complex and gruesome. Group BourdonThe Group Bourdon test is a train driver concentration test. It is also referred to as the dots test. It is designed to measure a train driver’s ability to maintain concentration and accuracy for a long period of time. As a train driver, you have the responsibility for the safety of yourself, the crew members and the passengers, which is of the utmost importance. Due to this the test is often used to eliminate many candidates from the selection process early on.The Group Bourdon test is a psychometric test used to access your ability to maintain diligence, speed, accuracy and concentration whilst looking for a cluster of 4 dots. If you chose groups of dots other than that of groups of four, you will lose marks. Consistency is key.Scoring well on the Group Bourdon test will show the recruiters that you have the qualities needed to become a safe train driver.KEY SKILLS MEASURED IN THIS ASSES SMENT: Visual perception;Attentiveness, alertness and concentration;Maintaining speed, diligence and accuracy over prolonged periods of time.KEY INFORMATION:Train Operating Companies across the UK do not stick to the same time limit;The Group Bourdon test comprises of 5 sheets, with approximately 2 minutes spent per sheet; Vigilance WAFVThere are 6 parts to the WAFV test but for vigilance it consists of two main tests; visual and auditory. It is a computerised assisted test in which you have to respond to the change in intensity of the visual and auditory elements presented top you. It is essentially an attention test that is completed on average within 15 minutes.KEY SKILLS MEASURED IN THIS ASSESSMENT: Quick reactions;Visual and auditory skills;Ability to observe, analyse, and be vigilant in pressurised situations.KEY INFORMATION:Train Operating Companies across the UK do not stick to the same time limit;Typically, you will get approximately 25 to minutes to complete this test. ME MORY ABILITY TESTS (PART 1) The Memory Ability Test is a specifically designed test for train drivers and is presented in two main parts. Its purpose is to give the assessors an implication of your potential to be successful throughout training. The first part of the test examines your ability to maintain and recall job-related knowledge.Testing your memory, the first part of the test will involve the listening of a fictitious recording of safety-related rules. You are required to learn the rules and recall them from memory answering the 18 questions that will be presented to you. Materials include a question booklet, information sheet, CD/cassette tape, answer sheet, and scoring keys.A good performance on the test can often be linked with the actual train driving performance and, therefore, the Memory Ability Test has been identified as to having a significant impact on the selection of train drivers in the UK.Reasoning Ability Tests (Part 2)The second part of the Ability Test exam ines your ability for learning new concepts that represent those encountered in driver training. You will be presented with fictitious dials that represent those seen inside of a train cab and also rules relating to how they function. You will have to apply these rules in order to make a decision on which dials should be checked. There are around 40 dials that you will have to check in this test.The Ability Test part 2 will attempt to measure your ability to learn and pick up a new range of ideas and concepts. Most of these concepts will be completely new to you and therefore you will be required to learn them and apply them quickly.Perception Adaptive Tachistoscopic Traffic Test (ATAVT)The ATAVT is designed to test your observational ability by quickly presenting pictures of traffic conditions on a screen. The picture is briefly visible for around 1 second and after seeing each picture you will be asked to identify what the picture contained from a list of 5 options. The process th en repeats.An example of the process may be you being shown an image containing 2 cars and a pedestrian in a busy town, you will have to select after seeing the image ‘pedestrians’ and also ‘motorcars’ from the list of available options. The difficulty of the items presented within the image are adaptive and will change in difficulty depending on your ability in speed and accuracy.This test will access your speed of perception, visual observation and ability to maintain an overview of that observation.KEY SKILLS MEASURED IN THIS ASSESSMENT: Observation skills;Ability to quickly take in information;Attention to detail Reaction time WAFVThe trainee train driver selection process accesses your ability to react fast and accurately through the Reaction Time WAFV. It is utilised to measure how well you can concentrate intently whilst you react to timed events presented on screen. It is a computerised test in which you are first assessed on your own pace and then you are assessed a t the computer’s pace. It will test your ability to focus on the task at hand by having the ability to continue the test fully focussed even if you realise you’ve made a mistake.KEY SKILLS MEASURED IN THIS ASSESSMENT: Quick reactions;Visual and auditory skills;Ability to observe, analyse, and be vigilant in pressurised situations.KEY INFORMATION:Train Operating Companies across the UK do not stick to the same time limit;Typically, you will get approximately 25 to minutes to complete this test. Hand coordination 2HANDThe purpose of the 2HAND test is to reliably asses your eye-to-hand and hand-to-hand coordination. The task will involve you controlling a red dot which you have to guide along a given track. This will be done by using either two control knobs or joysticks. The track in which you need to guide the red dot along consists of three sections that will make various demands on your ability to coordinate your left and right hand. This is the greatest difficulty of the task; being able to coordinate both hands in the need to make the correct visual assessment. Anticipation of direction also plays a big part.KEY SKILLS MEASURED IN THIS ASSESSMENT: Hand-eye coordination;Motor skills. Written Communication Test (WCT)The WCT is designed to test the train driver’s communicational skills with other people in a written form. It will test how clear and informative your written piece of communication is. Written communication skills are indeed important to the train driver role and it does coincide with safety but the vast majority of a train driver’s written tasks are completed whilst not in control of a train i.e. during a work break or completed at the depot. Therefore, written communication is not time critical and a lack of communication skill will not result in a train driving error.Relevant behavioural/personality attributes Situational Judgement Exercise (SJE)The situational judgement exercise (SJE) is a multiple choice test that presents a range of different situations that you encounter in an actual train driver role. The exercise will ask you to select the most appropriate behavioural responses to those situations, or the behavioural responses that you yourself would chose. There are normally between 4-5 possible actions to choose from and it will be your task to distinguish which is the most effective course of action to take (i.e. the action you would make yourself if the situation were real).Train operating companies use SJEs as part of the selection process as it provides strong evidence for situation-based measures in predicating your job performance. It will be used to identify the potential strong performers within the selection process.KEY SKILLS MEASURED IN THIS ASSESSMENT: Analytical skills;Strong written communication;Communication skills.KEY INFORMATION:Train Operating Companies across the UK do not stick to the same time limit;Typically, you will have 11 minutes for this exercise 3 minutes will be spent analysi ng pictures, and the remaining 8 minutes will be spent writing a report.Multimodal Interview (MMI)The Multi-Modal Interview is developed to work in conjunction with the Situational Judgement Exercise (SJE). Its purpose is to access your verbal communication and the behavioural selection criteria. You will be assessed on your ability to be able to communicate work related information in a clear and accurate manor. Once again, safety is one of the key elements that the recruiters will assess you on. So being able to verbally communicate safety-critical information is a must.   This entry was posted in Train Driver, Assessment Centres. Bookmark the permalink. Joshua Brown Getting to Grips with the Royal Navy Interview Changes for 2013Supermarkets Offering Employees Degree Programmes

Job Search Advice What Your Phone Message Says About You! - Hallie Crawford

Job Search Advice What Your Phone Message Says About You! Were sure youll appreciate this job search advice from  Terry L. Wynne, Ed.S., LPC, BCC, Career Coach at HallieCrawford.com.  After all, sometimes its the little things that help you land that job! You submitted your job application and you’re waiting on that all-important call asking you to come for an interview.  If you can’t answer your phone, what kind of outgoing message will the prospective employer hear? Do you want the employer to hear:                A message recorded by your adorable three year-old?                Your favorite rap song playing in the background?                Background noise of your dog barking? If your message is cutesy, lyrical, rhyming, off-color, or risqué, you just conveyed a message about yourself to your prospective employer.  Is the message you conveyed how you want your prospective employer to view you?    If not, write a script, record it, play it back, and make sure it’s clear and audible.    You don’t need to list reasons why you’re not available such as “I’m away from my desk or on another line.”  Simply state your name so employers know they reached the right person and ask them to leave their name and phone number. An example of an effective message is: “Hello, you have reached Stacy Constantine.  I’m not available to take your call, but if you leave your name and phone number, I’ll call you back as soon as possible.” Simply put, the most appropriate outgoing phone message is businesslike and professional â€" hopefully, just like you! We hope this is job search advice is helpful to you!   Schedule a free consult with HallieCrawford.com today

Writing Resume Responsibilities - What Should I Put?

Writing Resume Responsibilities - What Should I Put?To find out if you should write a resume in the resume Responsibilities column, you need to know what your resume Responsibilities are. There are hundreds of positions on your resume. You must know what is on your resume to figure out how to write a resume in the Responsibilities column. This way, you will know that you are fully prepared to impress your prospective employer, whether he or she is hiring full-time or part-time.First, think about what you want to say in your resume. If you want a job, then put a heading of 'Job' on your resume. On the other hand, if you want to promote yourself, put a heading of 'Promotion'Manager' on your resume. Either way, you have to put your information in the right format.First, keep your resume in order. Don't leave any section of your resume out. Put the information you want to be found on your resume in the correct sections.Use headings and subheadings appropriately. As an example, the name o f your position is usually stated in your title and on the first page of your resume. Also, don't put it all at the bottom of your resume.Headings are really important, as they should be able to stand on their own. It would be very awkward to put headings together, if they don't match.Subheadings are used to link back to the headings. They should always be accurate. If the subheading is the only thing your prospective employer will see, it might be better to skip the subheading altogether.As you can see, the headings and subheadings are important. Writing resumes in the Responsibilities column is actually just like writing a resume, except it is part of your job-search process.

Whats a Good Salary Science Has Found the Perfect Number

What's a Good Salary Science Has Found the Perfect Number You might think your life would be better if you just had a bigger paycheck â€" but science finds that’s not necessarily true. A study published last year found that once you make around $200,000, having more money won’t make you any happier. While this isn’t exactly peanuts â€" it’s nearly four times the 2015 U.S. median household income of $55,775 (according to Census data) â€" it’s not quite Scrooge McDuck piles of money, either. The trick is hitting your optimal income by the time you hit 40. If you have a college degree, you can expect your income to climb sharply through your 20s and continue to rise at a slower rate once you hit your 30s, according to career expert Penelope Trunk. But after you hit 40, you essentially hit a pay ceiling that lasts for the remaining 25 years of your career, an analysis of data from PayScale.com has found. Raises workers get after 40 are often barely enough to keep up with inflation. But don’t panic if you’re nowhere near $200,000 â€" or, for that matter, if 40 came and went some time ago. As it turns out, $200,000 is actually the outer edge of the money-happiness connection. In fact, the researchers found that the “wealth benefit” â€" a sort of happiness buffer that protects people from negative emotions â€" begins to taper off at an annual income of around $80,000. A separate study of whether or not money can really buy happiness came to a remarkably similar conclusion. They found that although how satisfied you are correlates with how much money you make all the way up the income spectrum, the influence that earnings have on happiness â€" that is, the emotions you experience on a day-to-day basis â€" peters out after your annual income hits about $75,000. “We conclude that high income buys life satisfaction but not happiness,” the authors wrote. “Health, care giving, loneliness, and smoking are relatively stronger predictors of daily emotions.” Not, that is, how much you make. What’s more, scientists have also discovered ways that you can elevate your happiness quotient by tackling a few factors that are under your direct control. 1. Adjust your expectations. People who think they’re rich â€" and who spend accordingly â€" can sometimes do more harm than good to their well-being. In a 2015 study, researchers found that the prospect of a “pleasant but ordinary” vacation couldn’t hold the interest of people who traveled a lot. “Wonderful life events might provide high comparison standards to which people could specifically contrast their more mundane present experiences,” the authors theorized. In other words, if you’re expecting a T-bone steak or a big banana split, a hamburger patty or scoop of vanilla ice cream is going to seem kind of blah by comparison. Sonja Lyubomirsky, psychology professor at the University of California Riverside, explained it this way to the Wall Street Journal: “If you have a rise in income, it gives you a boost, but then your aspirations rise too. Maybe you buy a bigger home in a new neighborhood, and so your neighbors are richer, and you start wanting even more.” 2. Get a handle on your debt. Another often-overlooked variable that can affect your happiness regardless of your income is how much debt you have â€" and what kind it is. “Low levels of debt are common and can be used for instrumental purposes of purchasing necessities such as a car,” wrote Louis Tay, an assistant professor of psychological sciences at Purdue University, in a recent study. “By contrast, inordinate levels of debt that are not manageable can consume one’s life and attention.” The findings suggest that some kinds of debt are worse than others. Credit card debt can be problematic, for instance. “It does suggest that there are different types of debt and not all debt is necessarily ‘bad’ for well-being,” Tay said. And although earning more mitigates the stress of having debt, it doesn’t totally eliminate it â€" especially if you’re living beyond your means. 3. Distract yourself. Finally, your well-being might improve if you can manage to focus less on money. Hal Hershfield, an associate professor at the Anderson School of Management at the University of California Los Angeles, found that about two-thirds of people, when asked if they would rather have more time or more money, picked money. But here’s the interesting thing, he noted: “The people who chose time over money were happier.” They were more satisfied with their lives, he explained, and they experienced “greater well-being” â€" a finding that held regardless of age, income and other variables. He theorized that this could be because people who would rather have more time place a greater priority on their enjoyment. “When you ask them what they wanted to do with that extra resource, it was things they wanted to do, rather than things they needed to do,” he said. And that might just be the key to being happier â€" regardless of how much you make.

Retirement Planning What You Need To Know - Work It Daily

Retirement Planning What You Need To Know - Work It Daily The recession has caused a shift in how employers will handle benefits for their employees. Temporary workers are becoming permanent fixtures, making for a workforce that constantly rotates without the benefits that come with full-time employment. One of the biggest changes is occurring in retirement planning. Increasingly, employees are being asked to bear more of the weight of their retirement. What's Defined Contribution? When an employee enters into a defined contribution plan, the employer stipulates up front how much of the burden of your retirement they will share. In some ways, employees have more freedom of where and how their money is invested. For those who understand long term investment strategies, this is actually a kind of benefit. The risk comes into play when the assets that are part of the employee’s retirement portfolio drop in performance. This means that retirement planning now requires more attention on the part of the employee, and that anything less than careful management of your portfolio could lead to dire financial straits. Employment Facts The May 2013 employment numbers are in from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and the situation is largely unchanged, except when you consider the rise in professional and business service jobs. The second largest increase occurred in the IT and technology sector, an increase of roughly 6,000 jobs. The largest change? Temporary workers made up 45.6% of the increase in professional jobs (That’s 26,000 temporary workers), pointing to an obvious shift in how worker benefits are dealt with. That leaves 31,000 workers added to the professional workforce, which is only a small fraction of the entire labor market. With a defined contribution plan, these new workers will have to adjust how they view their retirement. Higher medical costs coupled with mandated healthcare means that workers will increasingly bear the burden of long-term care. The solution is careful retirement planning. What You Can Do No matter your age, there are steps you can take right now to help plan for retirement. Use a retirement calculator and run some realistic numbers. Depending on your age, and your employment status, you might not get to climb to Macchu Picchu, but you can still live a fulfilling life. Create a list of the essentials, the things you need in order to feel well about retirement: A house that’s paid off Children that have settled their student loans A working car (or other method of transportation) Money for food, bills, and trips How do you put a price tag on all of these items? The solution, analysts say, is to put away enough to replace 70-100 percent of your income when you retire. A 48 year old with $5,000 or less in the bank can earn well over $200,000 by the time he or she hits 70. That’s enough money to stop working for at least five years, or to use for trips to help ease the burdens of aging. Each person’s retirement goals are different, and not everyone can afford to put away $400 each month. Find the number that’s right for you, cut back on your “guilty pleasure” and work toward your future. Photo Credit: Shutterstock Have you joined our career growth club?Join Us Today!