A 'lesson for kids' we should all take note of....

This was wrongly attributed to Bill Gates but actuall was by educator Charles Sykes. It's an excerpt from his book "Dumbing Down our Kids". It is a list of eleven things you did not learn in school and directed at high school and college grads. Perhaps we should take a step back and listen to this as adults.

Rule 1: Life is not fair - get used to it!

Rule 2: The world won't care about your self-esteem. The world will expect you to accomplish something BEFORE you feel good about yourself.

Rule 3: You will NOT make $60,000 a year right out of high school. You won't be a vice-president with a car phone until you earn both.

Rule 4: If you think your teacher is tough, wait till you get a boss.

Rule 5: Flipping burgers is not beneath your dignity. Your Grandparents had a different word for burger flipping: they called it opportunity.

Rule 6: If you mess up, it's not your parents'fault, so don't whine about your mistakes, learn from them.

Rule 7: Before you were born, your parents weren't as boring as they are now. They got that way from paying your bills, cleaning your clothes and listening to you talk about how cool you thought you were. So before you save the rain forest from the parasites of your parent's generation, try delousing the closet in your own room.

Rule 8: Your school may have done away with winners and losers, but life HAS NOT. In some schools, they have abolished failing grades and they'll give you as MANY TIMES as you want to get the right answer. This doesn't bear the slightest resemblance to ANYTHING in real life.

Rule 9: Life is not divided into semesters. You don't get summers off and very few employers are interested in helping you FIND YOURSELF. Do that on your own time.

Rule 10: Television is NOT real life. In real life people actually have to leave the coffee shop and go to jobs.

Rule 11: Be nice to nerds. Chances are you'll end up working for one.

Free or Paid?

The question was asked the other day whether it is better to attend a free networking event or a paid one. In my opinion how much it costs isn't the point.

Networking is all about building long term relationships. It isn't about meeting somebody once and scaring them into doing business with you. Effective business networking means meeting the same people on a regular basis and establishing a relationship with them that potentially leads to business for you both. It probably won't be immediate - trust takes time and patience.

When you recommend another business part of your own reputation goes along with it. A poor recommendation reflects badly on you and you lose a little face. A good recommendation makes you look great and increases trust in you too. So wouldn't it make sense to know more about the person you are recommending?

It might no be possible to see the work of the person you recommend but if you have taken the time to get to know them then trust can be built in other ways.

Relationships should be two way, they should have trust in you before they pass you work. You should encourage this. Mostly recommendations are of the person not the business - you recommend the person you have built a relationship with rather than the business they are in. People buy people and trust is a major factor in their choice.

So the question of how much should you pay for networking is a mute point. Cost is immaterial as any networking event is what you make of it. If you network effectively you build relationships.

Another Scam Warning

In these tough times we might well be tempted to earn a quick bob or two outside our normal job. I received several emails today asking me to become a Mystery Shopper to earn myself a substantial amount of dollars. Being such an dis-trusting soul I automatically checked out the so called company proposing the offer.

Now while there lots of genuine companies offering jobs as Mystery Shoppers they never ask you for money up front or to do money transfers. This email seemed so plausible but Michael McDowell of WA Surveys is a con artist. Taking up this offer could leave you with a huge debt or worse still a court case. More information is freely available on the Internet.

So remember the golden rule: if it looks too good to be true then it will probably get you in trouble! Don't be taken in by scam emails - if it's a fabulous offer then look it up on the Internet and you'll probably find that it's a scam.