21 Mar 10 3 More Questions to Ask During Your Job Interview Even When You Are Desperate
An interview is not just an opportunity for the interviewer to know about the interviewee, but it is also an opportunity for an interviewee to know if the company he or she is interviewed for is any good or not. And the only way to find this is by asking questions. You will not know anything, if you do not ask questions. Continuing our discussion from where we left yesterday, in this post I will talk about 3 more questions you need to ask during your interview.
Question 1: How performance is measured
You need to ask your interviewer about the criteria on which you will be judged when taken for the job. It will give you a target to match in order to get promoted or rewarded. A good company will have a set practice for employee evaluation, and HR people will not shy away from telling you that.
Question 2: Why previous employee left the job
This is a tricky question, but you need to know why the place became vacant. There could be a genuine reason for the previous employee to leave, and office politics or unfair boos could also be a reason, which you can only find by asking about it. The answer to this question will give you good idea about the existence and complicacy if office politics.
Question 3: Remuneration
You need to know about your salary, perks, performance bonus, etc. After all, it is the money that you are working for. You also need to ask about the salary date, deductions, etc. You will not want surprises here, so do not hesitate in talking about your remuneration. If you find the package offered below your expectation then tell the interviewer what you were expecting. Interview is the best place to talk about your salary and other benefits.
Answers to these questions will help you understand whether your personal goals will be met in the company or not. This will help you weigh the job opportunity properly.
I had only this to say, what else do you think should one ask during an interview?
Tags: Boos, Employee Evaluation, Existence, Expectation, Genuine Reason, Good Company, Interview Question, Interviewee, Interviewer, Job Interview, Job Opportunity, Money, Office Politics, Performance Bonus, Personal Goals, Remuneration, Salary, Surprises, Target, Tricky Question
13 Mar 10 How a Small Business Can Fight a Big Business?
In the era of corporatization of everything, the mom and pop stores has reached to the brink of extinction. It is no longer seems to be viable to start a small business because in the public imagination, a small business cannot stand against the Goliaths of the business world.
Or is it so?
I don’t care what you are told, but as far as I am concerned, this is not going to happen. It is always the small business that has an upper hand while dealing with customers or fulfilling their need, or even when fighting with big giants.
Why?
Because…
- It is the David who always wins the battle.
- It is the David who clicks with the masses.
- It is the David who knows to connect.
- It is the David who does not underestimate the competitor, and prepare the strategy accordingly.
- It is the David who does not become myopic.
- It is the David who tries harder.
- It is the David whose life is at stake.
Goliaths (big corporations) are managed by managers, they are not owned by them. And the distance f ownership from those who runs it plays a big role in deciding how much power one exerts.
The small business owners understand that if he loses his livelihood will go for a toss, so he fights. Contrary to this, a manager thinks: how does it matter if his corporation wins or loses now or in the long term. Neither losing nor winning is going to affect the paycheck he is drawing every month. The manager feels satisfied as long as the target set for him by his superior is met.
It is about the target, not about the customers or their satisfaction.
This is not so with small business owners. Go to a neighborhood shop, and he will cordially greet you and will ask for your well-being. You will not receive the same warmth from big giants. Indeed, they will greet you, but you also know how superficial and greed-dipped it is.
Small business do have a chance to stand against big business, but for them they have to stop pretending that they are big, and start behaving what they are. They will have to connect with the audience, and give personal touch to all the interaction with every customer.
Follow this and you will defeat the goliath (giant company) sooner than you ever expected.
Tags: Brink, Business World, Competitor, Corporations, Corporatization, Extinction, Giants, Goliaths, Greed, Livelihood, Neighborhood Shop, Paycheck, Pop Stores, Public Imagination, Satisfaction, Small Business Owners, Stake, Start A Small Business, Target, Warmth
26 Feb 10 Freelance Writing: How Many clients You Should Keep?
A better title would have been: “Freelance writing: how many clients you should keep at one time?”, but I didn’t want to make the title run for miles.
Whatever! The answer is all the same, which is: as many as you can handle. Do not chew more than you can digest. It will give you an upset stomach.
What’s the benchmark?
There is no external benchmark; the benchmark is the quality of work you produce. The moment your quality starts deteriorating you should put a stop sign outside your home office. You would not like to risk producing second-rate content, articles, or whatever it is that you write for your clients.
Then…
How many should I keep?
I cannot say for sure how many you should keep, but I can tell you about how many I keep and how you can decide how many you should keep. Generally, I keep 2-3 fulltime clients—depending upon the volume of work given— and work 1-2 one-off projects that do not have too tight deadline.
How you can decide how many?
How much you want: Say what you may, but you are doing freelance writing to pay your bills, be it your fulltime venture or part-time juggle. Therefore, you need to keep in mind your monetary target for a month.
How many hours can you devote: You also need to find out how many hours in week you can put aside for your freelance writing job.
How many articles can you produce in an hour: I understand this sound like absurd, but bear with me because I know people who can produce two articles of 500 words in one hour. Initially, you will not be able to write more than 40-50% of an article in an hour, but soon you will improve.
Do the math
Use the number you got from the above and calculate to find how many articles you need to write in a month to meet your monthly monetary target. The number you will thus get is the amount of work you need per month. If one client can fulfill this requirement then you do not need a second client—which is unlikely.
So, how many clients do you need at a time to fulfill your goal? Post the number you get after doing the math. I am eagerly waiting to hear from you.
Tags: Benchmark, Content Articles, Find Articles, Freelance Job, Freelance Writing, Math, Part Time, Rate Content, Stop Sign, Target, Tight Deadline, Upset Stomach, Writing Articles, Writing Job
