If you have recently started a new job or internship I would highly recommend reading Seth Godin’s new book The Dip.

I just picked it up last night at Barnes and Noble. It is only 80 pages but of the first 40 I have read, I am extremely impressed. Most of you reading this blog will be familiar with Seth Godin from his extremely influential and popular blog about business and life. His new book is a good reminder for all of us that we need more than desire to be the best in our job and in life; we need focus.

Some of the highlights that I have picked up so far include:

- The Dip is the valley between average and great
- Most of us have too much on our plate to be the best at whatever we have set out to do.
- Focus is better than being well rounded
- Diversification isn’t always good.
- Quitting isn’t always bad

If you have read Seth’s book or are reading it let me know what you think.

Thanks and have a great weekend!

In honor of my friend Josh Shipp I wanted to make you all aware that May is Foster Care month.

Check out their web site and check out Josh’s latest version of HeyJosh.tv.

Is Volkswagen nuts?

In case you haven’t heard Volkswagen recently raised their work week from 28.8 to 33 hours.  How dare they!!!  Have they gone insane?!?!?!?

For all of you who work way more than 33 hours in a week, I am sure this was a laughable article in the Wall Street Journal today.  Unless you pay for the Journal online you cannot read the article.  However, it is in the print version as well.

I recently participated in the ProBlogger.net group writing project. The subject was, Reviews and Predictions. You can read my contribution to this effort by clicking here, Web 2.0 in 2007.

Hundreds of people posted about their perdictions and forecasts for 2007 and beyond. The topics were broad but included, blogging, travel, Christmas, careers, web 2.0, China, politics, and even shoes. I thought it was a great experience to be apart of a worldwide blogging experiment. Below, please find a few of the posts I think are worth reading.

Web 2.0 in 2007.
Blogging Lessons Learning in 2007
Online Travel in 2006
China 2007: Thoughts and Predictions
Top 8 YouTube Videos of 2006
Top 5 Food Business Trends For 2007
28 Things I did to Improve Traffic to My Site in 2006
Looking Ahead: Tech Predictions for 2007

There were hundreds of more posts to go through. I couldn’t go through all of them but I encourage you to read as many as you can at ProBlogger

Merry Christmas!

I have been meaning to post about a band that a few of my friends are in for a couple of weeks now, but better late than never. The Mike Duncan Project is the name of the band; I posted about them a few months ago but that was before their CD offically launched and before they launched their new web site.

Mike and the band have a great sound that I think everyone will enjoy! They are a band with a message of Hope in a troubled world. Check out their CD cover in this post and then go by their new album.

justin driscoll

I have been very lax in my blogging lately so I apologize. I don’t vary much on this blog from the topics of job searching, career development, workforce development, but I felt compelled to give you some insight into what I have been thinking lately about Christmas! I hope you can relate.

Even though the real meaning of Christmas has nothing to do with shopping and parties it seems like those are those only two things I do this time of year. Don’t get me wrong I love going to go Christmas parties but the shopping is something I would rather avoid. Is it just me, or does it seem like the older I get the less I like “stuff.” Sure, I like my electronics; iPod, MacBook, Treo, and a maybe a few other toys but that is really about it. My mother keeps asking me what I want for Christmas, and I keep saying, I don’t need anything. I really don’t. Do I want a few things? Sure, but I don’t actually need anything.

I am amazed at the stories I hear from other people about how much money they are spending on Christmas, buying this and buying that. For what? The truth of the matter is most of us will look at all of the “stuff” we are given on Christmas morning and think to ourselves, “I like all this stuff, but I would really like X.” You can fill in the blank about whatever X is. That feeling of dissatisfaction on a day where our stuff is supposed to fill us up can be quite confusing.

Here’s the bottom line:

“Stuff” is not what Christmas is about and it will not satisfy any of us. It is temporary and passing away.

The real meaning of Christmas is to celebrate the birth of the Savior of the world Jesus Christ. We can all say Happy Holiday’s all we want but we cannot avoid the fact that the real meaning of Christmas is Jesus and not how much stuff we buy for each other.

This Christmas I encourage you to forget about your stuff and concentrate on the One who is bigger than your stuff. Concentrate on the One who is worth more than all of our “stuff” put together. Remember, Jesus was born so that you could have life on this earth and more importantly eternal life!

Merry Christmas; and I say again, Merry CHRISTmas!

justin

The past couple of weeks have been very busy between speaking and the conference I am planning at work.

I did want to mention some of the places I have been speaking at this past week and a half.

ITT Tech in Pittsburgh had a large job fair for three of the local campuses. In order to kick the fair off right they brought me in to speak on “Finding Your Passion and Not Your Job.” I want to thank Dana Melvin from ITT Tech in Greentree for arranging this engagement!

A few days later I was at Seton Hill University in Greensburg, PA speaking on behalf of the Pittsburgh Technology Council. I spoke to a group of freshman on the information technology industry in Pittsburgh and how these students can get more involved in technology careers. Becky Campbell from Seton Hill is to thank for arranging this event. Becky came to the event fairly sick, thanks for being a trooper Becky!

br>

Finally, just the other day I was asked to speak at the Community College of Allegheny County to a group of high school students who attend a special school within the college. There were about 200 students in attendance. This was my first non high school speaking engagement in some time so I was looking forward to it. I think it went very well! The one thing I like about high school students over college students is the fact that you can be silly with high school students. College students are more serious and more business like than high school students are. I tell a story about a “3-Pack-a-day-rooster” that we met in Thiland a few years back. In order to grab the students attention I had two of the students come up on stage and give their best rooster crow. Vinny and Tim did a great job! College students would never do that.

Charles Bostaph and Carol Johnston made this event run very smoothly. Thank you for your support and for making this event very special!

Sorry for the delay in not posting for about a week, but life can sometime get in the way of blogging.

Hope you enjoy some of the photos from this past week or so.

I was at a job fair today and saw a man walking around the job fair with his daughter talking to companies about job opportunities.  I am a protective parent like the next guy but I think this crosses the line.  It is not the job of the parent to go with their child to speak with companies about job opportunities.  There needs to be a point where a parent has to let go.  Sure, give them advice, counsel, and direction but do not go to a job fair with your children.  You are not their agent, you are their parent.

So I went roller-skating today.

Do you or your kid’s still roller skate?

The last time I went roller-skating, cell phones were not used by most Americans, Bill Clinton was in the first term of his presidency, Madonna was young and relevant, Vanilla Ice was an actual singer, and the internet was only beginning to take shape in our lives. Today as I skated around this old world activity I took pictures on my Palm Treo, emailed them to Flickr, and began to jot notes down for this blog post. Oh how things have changed.

Today my wife and I took a group of middle school kids from our youth group to a local roller skating rink. While I was there I was amazed at the number of unique and interesting observations I made. Therefore, I thought I would share them with you.

The rink opened in 1948, it looked like it had not been updated since about 1960.

The same man who started it still owns it today. In fact even today he was the one playing the music for his customers in the “DJ Booth.”

When we walked into this rink it felt like we went back in time at least 30 or 40 years. The women behind the glass took our money to get in, $5.00. As you may have guessed no credit cards were accepted. If I heard correctly she was the wife of the owner.

Then it was over to the skate rental window where a man approaching 80 took our $3.00 for skate rentals. I am not sure if he has been working there since 1948 or not but he sure looked like it. I was surprised to see they did offer inline skates rather than the regular four-wheeled roller skates.

The skate rental guy was not able to remember very much information as he worked. As I told him I needed a 13 in roller blades he brought me only one skate. As he set it down in front of me he looked at me like, “Well what do you want me to do? Get going.” So I looked back at him with a puzzled expression and said, “Can I have the other one?” He then realized what he did and then found the other one in the back. I have not idea what he was thinking by only bringing one skate instead of the pair. Especially if you have been working there for 58 years. Don’t’ you think you would have mastered the art of the skate rental window by now? Maybe I don’t know exactly what all goes into remembering the size, taking the money, and brining skates back to the window all at the same time but I would think one could get a handle on this skill after 58 years.

As I began to skate I noticed a man in a referee jersey skating around with a whistle. He apparently was the one in charge on the rink floor. If you stepped out of line in any way he blew the whistle at you to get you back on the straight and narrow. I am not sure how long he had worked there but he also looked like he was still stuck in the 1970s. The pants, the hair style, the mustache, everything. It all fit very well in 1976 but not 2006. All I could think of was that the TV show “That 70s Show.”

There was an organ behind some glass that is used on “adult skate” Thursday morning.

There was a couple who wore the old style skates with clothing that also looked like it was from the 1970s. Their skating abilities far surpassed anyone else’s in the rink but their unique look and fashion style fit very well with the rest of the operation. During the “couples skate” they did not skate and hold hands like we use to do but they danced while they skated. It was very impressive.

Then of course there were a few miscellaneous men, also dressed in an un-modern way, skating around and showing off for people who didn’t care to watch them; also, quite strange.

We did the limbo and some number game where the winning group received a free Pepsi! Oh the joy that filled my soul with a free Pepsi!

I have to tell you, as bizarre as this place was skating is quite a work out. I was sweating quite a bit and have the sore legs to remind me of it tonight.

This post has nothing to do with job searching but I thought I would share my interesting day with you.

Does anyone still roller skate? If so, is your local roller skating rink as bizarre as mine?

Have you ever had one of those weeks where you think back and wonder, “What in the world did I do this week? Where did the week go?” That was my week.

I have been speaking nearly every day of the week at a different school or education organization.

Monday I started out at the Pittsburgh Council of Higher Education where I presented to a group of career counselors from Pittsburgh area colleges and universities on the Pittsburgh Technology Council. We talked extensively about what types of skills technology companies are looking for in college graduates. Some of those skills include: JAVA, ASP.NET, HTML, C++, C, and a few others. Software jobs are in great demeand here in the Pittsburgh region. One of the things I have been trying to emphasize to students and educators is the importance of communication skills in the workplace. Time and again recruiters emphasize to me how important it is for new graduates to have strong communication skills. A company can train someone to be a better programmer or engineer but it is hard to train them to write or speaker more effectively. It can be done but it takes longer.

On Tuesday I was part of a very large “Career Day” at a local school district. There we had four group of local high school student’s parade through to hear all about different careers from professionals around the Pittsburgh region. I was on a panel with a banker, a lawyer, someone from hospitality and tourism, and higher education. I had the chance to tell my popular “3-Pack-A-Day Rooster” story. It is a big hit with high school students.

Wednesday I was a vendor at the Robert Morris University job fair. I love attending job fairs. This is the fourth year in a row I have attended this fair. The student attendance was a little light but I would say that is true with ever fair I have been to this year. Are job fairs quickly fading away as a good way to find a job? How mayn of those companies were actually looking to hire the people who they met at the fair? Since the internet is so important for companies and recruiting why spend the money attending job fairs? I am not an expert but I am a thinker. (Thanks Glenn Beck)

Today, I spoke at Chatham College in Pittsburgh to a group of science students. The attendance was light but the interaction with the students was great. The major emphasis was on internships. The students who attended were mainly freshman or sophomores. I hope they were able to understand my passion for college students doing internships.  Thanks Monica for setting this up!

It has been a world-wind of a week which does not end yet. Tomorrow is the @pgh.cafe job and internship fair for college and universities students. This is a technology job fair here in the Pittsburgh region. We have 31 companies participating so I am putting the final touches on that event today. It is such a great job market right now. I have turned away nearly 10 companies because we are out of room. Our next event is in February which is poised to be a huge success.

Needless to say I am looking forward to the weekend but it has been a joy speaking at so many schools and affecting so many students these past several weeks.