Your Guide to Job Search and Personal Branding on Twitter

Twitter--the 140 character social networking site--is becoming increasingly useful for job seekers. It doesn't work for everyone, of course, but it can certainly turbo-charge your networking, a key strategy for successful job hunting. It can also be an effective part of your personal branding campaign.

Here, then, is a (somewhat) definitive link guide to getting a new job (or losing your current one) through Tweeting. (I put this together for a client, so thought it would be nice to share).

Getting Started on Twitter--If you're new to Twitter. . .

Twitter Skills & Culture--You'd think it would be easy to type 140 characters and go, but like all social networks, Twitter has a culture that requires some skill to navigate. Ignore this section at your own risk.

Pimp Your Profile--Think of your Twitter profile as your "digital interview suit." First impressions count.

Twitter for Job Search--The nitty gritty of job searching on Twitter.

People and Sites to Follow

Job Search Tips and Tools

Case Studies

Twitter Brand Building--The Twitter job search is also about building your online brand.

Twitter Fails--Twitter isn't rocket science. These mistakes can be avoided with a little forethought.

May 16, 2009 in career, Career Management 2.0, job search, personal branding, social media, social networking | | Comments (3) | TrackBack (0)

Bamboo Project Readers' Guide to Blogging for Personal Branding

Networking 2.0: Blogging Your Way Out of a Job... and Into a Career
View more presentations from Sacha Chua. (tags: blogging web2.0)

Last week, I asked my readers to share their best advice for using a blog for personal branding and job searching. As usual, I got some incredibly thoughtful and helpful responses that merit elevation to a new post. I've also added some links and other resources. So below is the Bamboo Project Readers' Guide to Blogging for Personal Branding.

Should You Blog?
To the question of "Should I Blog?" the answer for most professionals is "Yes." Google is often the first place people turn  for information on potential employees and as we've discussed before, Google is not a search engine, but a reputation management tool.

Monitoring and managing your online reputation is a critical career management skill and your blog can be THE best tool you have to maintain that reputation.

A blog can:

  • Improve your search engine rankings
  • Establish you as a "thought leader" in your profession--someone with an opinion, credibility and a point of view.
  • Show potential employers and/or clients how you operate in a way that's more meaningful than what you put on your resume or how you answer questions in your interview.
  • Provide you with a valuable way to network with others who are online, expanding your connections and exposing you to new people and ideas. 
  • Be a valuable tool for your own ongoing learning and professional development.

All my commenters are bloggers themselves, so clearly they believe that blogging is an important part of the branding process, too.

Heather Carpenter shared a paper that she wrote based on interviews with Rosetta Thurman, Trista Harris and Sean Stanndard Stockton, all of whom have experienced incredible career growth as a result of their blogging experiences. If you want to read some real-life stories of how blogging has accelerated several careers, definitely check out Heather's paper.

Sacha Chua, another poster child for how blogging can support personal branding, offers additional advice in her presentation, Networking 2.0: Blogging Your Way out of a Job Into a Career (see above). She points out that blogging can help you develop your passions, build skills and make networking contacts, all of which are essential components of building your brand.

And if you need a final bit of convincing, then see what Tom Peters and Seth Godin have to say.

Time When Should You Start a Blog?

The entire issue of blogging for branding arose from a conversation we had in our first Career Commons webinar last week. Several people indicated they were in the process of starting up a blog as part of their job search, which raised the question of whether or not professionals should be blogging and, if so, how did that fit into the job search process?

Ideally, you should start a blog BEFORE you're in the market for a new job. As Catherine Lombardozzi pointed out, "Blogging for personal branding may be more productive as an ongoing strategy than a job-hunting one when you're in a crunch. Branding takes time..."

Tony Karrer, echoed this thought, pointing out that time spent on blogging is time NOT spent on your job search.

I would argue that the time to start a blog is NOW. If you are not actively job searching, then you'll have more of an opportunity to begin developing your brand over time.This is the ideal situation if you can do it.

However, if you ARE actively job searching, I still think it's worth spending time on setting up and maintaining a blog. It can:

  • Serve as an online portfolio and as a hub for all of your online identities and connections (i.e. LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, etc.). 
  • Be your platform for connecting to other bloggers and the conversations happening within your industry and profession.
  • Provide you with a way to show your ongoing engagement with topics in your industry and profession and help you stay up-to-date on what's happening. This can be particularly important when you're unemployed.

Just don't get so hung up on blogging that you forget to spend time on actually looking for work! Set up your blog and then spend a few hours a week working on it. The rest of your time should be spent on making connections and working your network.

What Should You Write About?

Clearly if you're using a blog for professional branding purposes, your blog should focus on topics related to the skills, interests, and ideas you want to showcase as being key to your brand.

Clark Quinn said:

They should write posts talking about the things that interest them (positively or negatively) in the field they want to work in. That is, riff intelligently about the field. Chronicle new ideas, reflect on some issues, be constructively critical. You're showing that you're an active thinker in the field.

Catherine offered this advice:

Consider defining what you want the blog to be about - for a "personal branding" blog, you don't want to just post about whatever comes into your head. It should be about the area(s) in which you want to be seen as a thought leader or expert.

And Sacha said:

Read. A lot. Read blogs, books, and anything else you can get your hands on about the field or industry you want to be in. This will give you plenty of material to write about.

Join the conversation. Find other bloggers and comment on interesting posts. If you have more to say, write a blog post and link back.

Write about your experiences and what you're learning from them. Write about what you do and how you can do it even better. Teach people as you learn.

Create value. Don't worry about the number of readers you have or the number of comments you get (or the lack of either). Write things that are useful for you, then use that practice to write things that are useful for others, and then keep your eyes and ears open for opportunities to help others. When you answer an e-mail with generally useful information, spend a few extra minutes on putting that into your blog, where it can create more value for others. Think of ways you can help others, and use your blog to reach more people than your initial audience.

I would also recommend looking for blogs written by others in your industry or profession to see what kinds of conversations are happening. (Here's a good article on some ways to do that).

What are the topics people are talking about? Where are there gaps that you might be able to fill through your expertise or ideas? What questions are raised by what you're reading and what answers are you finding in response to those questions?

From a purely practical point of view, you might also want to check out these different types of blog posts--they can give you some ideas on the kinds of posts you could start writing. Just apply the basic posting types to the content in your field and see what you can come up with. (For example, this post is a combination of advice, collation, and link posting.)

Moocards How Often Should You Write?

Most of us live in a perpetual time crunch, so the issue of how often to post is a pressing one for many new bloggers. From reader comments, it appears that frequency of posting ranges from once a day to once a week.

Said Clark:

I try to hit a post a business day. I don't get there, it's more like 3-4/week, but it's my goal. More than one a day I think puts a burden on your audience. May seem too frenetic. Tweets are for short thoughts, blogs are for more reflections. Of course, it may depend on your field; maybe it's important that you're processing and reacting to an ongoing slew of announcements of new products, pieces, etc (ala Engadget or Gizmodo).

I'm like Clark, shooting for once per business day, although not always hitting the mark, depending on what's happening elsewhere in my life.

Catherine favors once a week:

I find a commitment of one blog post per week is a good pace. I think it's frequent enough so people won't lose interest in monitoring the blog, but far enough apart that I have time to ruminate on a good topic. It takes me several hours to write a blog post, so I can't be doing it every day at this point.

And Sacha says at least once a week, but try for more often:

Write at least once a week. You don't have to write every day, although you'll get the most benefits from blogging when it becomes a natural part of the way you do things. Learn something? Blog. Do something? Blog. Got through another week? Blog about your achievements and your plans for the next week.

Most bloggers find that if they are writing shorter posts, once a day can work, but if they are doing longer, more thoughtful posts, then once or twice a week is your best bet. Plus most readers can't handle really long posts every day.

The point, as Soha El-Borno pointed out, is to get in the habit of writing regularly. You should also be sure that whatever you're writing is creating value, as Sacha mentioned earlier. Better to write nothing, than to write just for the sake of writing.

What About "Voice?"

Another issues that many new bloggers worry about when they are blogging for branding is their "voice." More to the point--what's the balance between sounding "professional" and sounding like a human being?

Catherine reminds people that it's OK to let your personality show, something I agree is critically important. Blogging, by nature, is a medium that invites you to have an opinion, to tell stories and to show who you are.

If you take the time to check out other bloggers in your professional space, you'll find that there is usually a range of "voices" from the purely professional to the sometimes irreverent. Each blogger has to find his/her own way on this, but in general, the more "you" that shines through, the better. 

It's Not Just About YOUR Blog

As several readers pointed out, blogging for personal branding is not just about writing your own blog posts. It's also about connecting to other bloggers and participating in the conversations happening elsewhere online. 

Said Catherine:

To be visible, find ways to get your blog out there... answering other's blogs is a terrific start - especially Learning Circuits and like forums. Respond to hot topics on other's blogs - I've found some of my favorites by following links when I was reading a comment trail on a particularly interesting post.

Soha echoed this:

Make friends and link to other bloggers. Add your point of view. . . . always leave comments and connect.

And Tony offered this advice:

I would highly recommend the trick of engaging in interesting conversations with some of the bigger bloggers in the persons space.

For example, if you are in the world of eLearning, you should definitely engage me around one of my conversation topics.

If you're blogging for branding, keep in mind that blogging is not simply the act of posting to your own blog. It's also interacting with people who leave comments in your blog and the comments you leave on others' blogs.

It's all part of a package and for blogging to work as a strategy for branding, you have to be prepared to visit and comment on other blogs as well. (For more advice/ideas and practice in commenting, check out the Comment Challenge activities)

Additional Advice

A few commenters had some additional advice:

Clark suggested:

Pick a good name (.blogspot or .wordpress is okay, but have a good 'meme'), and pick a professional design.

Ideally, have a branding that follows through on Twitter, FaceBook, LinkedIn, etc.

Make it easy for people to follow (make your RSS feed easy, and have an email link, ala FeedBlitz).

Have different topics, and list your categories. Have a blogroll of people you follow. Do follow other folks, go out and comment on their posts; let people know you're active and supportive.

And Catherine said:

Personally, I generate readers when I teach, and when I present at conferences, plus I put my blog URL in appropriate e-mails and other communications. Getting listed in eLearningLearning has also helped.

Additional Resources
I'm going to close this post with some additional resources and links that might be helpful. And a BIG thank you to all the readers who commented and shared their advice. I think that together, we came up with a great (if a little overwhelming) guide!

Flickr photos via Tonivc and  mexicanwave

Feed-icon If you liked this post, then you may want to sign up to be automatically notified when I add new content. Learn more here or grab the feed here. 

February 17, 2009 in career, Career Management 2.0, learning, personal branding, professional development | | Comments (7) | TrackBack (0)

Blogging for Personal Branding: Your Best Advice?

Person_winning2 We had our first webinar today for the folks at Career Commons. One of the questions that came up was how to use a blog for personal branding, particularly during the job search.  As Jesse put it in our call, "there's a broad blank canvas of possibilities when you start writing for your professional blog,  so how do you get started?"

Jesse had a great idea--he plans to start responding to the Learning Circuit's blog Big Question. I also shared some follow-up ideas and resources in the forum.  I'm wondering, though, what advice you have for the job seekers over at Career Commons.

Here are some questions:

  • What's your best advice for job seekers who want to start a blog as part of their job search and personal branding process?
  •  What kinds of posts could they write? How often should they write?
  • What other advice do you have for a new blogger wanting to put his/her best professional foot forward at a time when the blogger really needs to be visible?
Let me know in comments or write your own post and drop me a link so we can share it with everyone. These are particularly important questions for all of us to think about in today's economy.

February 09, 2009 in Blogging, career, Career Management 2.0, professional development | | Comments (10) | TrackBack (0)

Career Commons is Open for Business

Career commons 2
Per my post on Friday, I've now set up the Career Commons community on Ning. I've seeded it with some initial content, but hope that if/when the community builds, more will be added.

I've also scheduled our first informal webinar for February 9, 2009 at 12 noon (EST).

Please note that the webinar will be limited to the first 15 people who RSVP, so please go here and let me know if you plan to attend. We'll be using Go-To-Meeting, so once you RSVP, I'll send you the log-in info. Note that with Go-to-Meeting you'll be able to either use your phone or your computer and headset for the audio portion.

I've already had some great response through comments and email. Please feel free to continue spreading the word if you know of anyone who might be interested in participating.

February 01, 2009 in career, job search | | Comments (5) | TrackBack (0)

Free Online Job Club--Need Your Help!

Here's the deal. Unlike a lot of people in this economy, I'm very fortunate right now to have a stable consulting practice that actually looks like it will improve when the stimulus package goes through because of the nature of much of the work I do. And honestly, I feel a little guilty about this. I see how many people are struggling and, while I feel incredibly lucky that things are going well for me, I also feel like it's incredibly unfair that so many other people are NOT doing well. 

One of my areas of expertise and actually what most of my consulting practice is about is career development and job search. Most of my customers are government and nonprofit agencies who have me work with them to design programs that will help get people to work and climb the career ladder. I also teach their staff how to facilitate career development and job search activities. 

It occurred to me this morning that one small way I can potentially help in the downturn is by creating a free, online job club where people could connect to one another, we could deal with some of the issues that you face when you're out of work (including the emotional blow to the self-esteem) and you could get some feedback, information and resources on career and job search related questions. I want to do this in two ways.

Bamboo Job Club Network
I'm setting up a Ning network that can serve as an online resource and hub for job seekers to connect with one another. One of the things that is the hardest about being out of work is the isolation. Through my years of work in this field, I've seen that people feel a combination of shame, despair and anxiety when they lose their jobs and there's a strong need to connect with other people who "get" what they're going through. Often it's helpful if they can find people who are outside of their normal networks because it's safer to share some of their concerns with relative strangers.

I'm hoping that through the Ning network, if people want to connect, share their stories, get advice from one another, etc. they are able to do this. I will also include links to all the resources and information I have related to career and job search and will certainly do what I can to help facilitate discussions. 

Weekly Webinars
The other thing I want to try is weekly webinars. I have Go-to-Meeting, which allows me to do online meetings with up to 15 people. My thought on this is to post the date for the webinar and then invite people to sign up, first come, first served.

The webinars will be informal--people can send in questions/issues they want to discuss ahead of time so I can be somewhat prepared, and then we'll take an hour to talk, share resources, etc. If there's enough interest, we can then look at doing more "formal" programming if necessary. The webinars would be a way to extend connections from the network and/or be an alternative for people who would prefer to just participate in a call.

Both of these will be FREE. I want to give something back and this is an area where I think I can help. I'll be honest that I also miss direct contact with job seekers and the feeling that I'm actually making a difference, so this will give me an opportunity to get my "fix."

I Need Your Help!

What I need from you is to spread the word.  Let people know about this idea and if they are interested, have them email me at bamboojobclub@gmail.com. That way I can  let them know when I've set up the Ning network and scheduled the first few webinars, which I hope to do within the next week or so. This will also help me see if I need to enlist the help of some other people on this. There's potentially a HUGE need and I can see that I could quickly get overwhelmed if it got too big too fast.

I could also use your advice and suggestions, so feel free to leave them in comments.

And if you're interested in participating as a facilitator, either in the Ning or by participating as a "content expert" in a webinar, please let me know, again in comments or by email.

Let's see where all of this goes. . .

January 30, 2009 in career, job search | | Comments (18) | TrackBack (0)

What Are the Rules of Your New Ecosystem?

Ecosystem Seth Godin has an interesting post:

Businesses live in ecosystems. A series of rules and assumptions that, taken together, make a thriving mechanism. . . .

We get stuck because we believe that the rules of our ecosystem are permanent and transferable. In fact, they are almost always temporary and rarely transferable.

My approach now is simple: take a look at the rules of the new ecosystem. Do they make sense? Is it possible they'll come to pass? If they do, what happens to you?


This seems like some good career advice to consider in turbulent times. In our jobs, within our organizations and industries, what new rules and assumptions form our new ecosystem? If they come to pass, what does that mean for us? How does the new system change:

  • Our customers?
  • Our industry?
  • Our roles and responsibilities?
  • The skills needed to do our jobs?
  • The ways we develop new skills?
  • The people we work and interact with on a daily basis?
  • Where we do our work?
  • The tools we use?
  • How we communicate and collaborate with people around us?
  • How we think about ourselves and the work that we do?

The answers to these questions can give us a way forward, a path from the old to the new. If we haven't been having these conversations, maybe we need to start them now.

So what are the new rules of your ecosystem? How do you need to adapt?

Flickr photo via ecostaticist

December 09, 2008 in career, professional development | | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0)

What Are You Doing to Invest in Yourself?

Invest Harold Jarche points us to a recently released study on corporate responses to the recession/depression we're currently in:

This morning the CLC (Corporate Leadership Council) released the results of a survey that asked CEOs which areas were to suffer the most in response to the crisis. L&D [learning & development] came out on top at 38%. So this means, globally, that a third of organisations surveyed will stop investing in development of employees. Recruiting was second and IT infrastructure was third.


Aside from the obvious implications for L&D (which Harold dissects nicely), the bigger issue is that here is yet another reason why no one can afford to depend on their company for professional development. You must take responsibility for your own learning.

Smart companies use the downturns to prepare for when the economy improves. That's what smart people do, too. So some questions to consider in preparation for what promises to be a long, cold winter:

  • Do you know what skills employers are looking for? (This article says that part of what we're dealing with here is a fundamental mismatch between what people know how to do and where the jobs are).
  • Do you know which of your skills are obsolete or on their way to becoming so? Are you doing something to build new ones?

Now is the time to invest in yourself. If you don't, no one else will. What can you do to make that investment?

Flickr photo via wonderwebby

November 25, 2008 in career, Career Management 2.0, empowerment, professional development | | Comments (5) | TrackBack (0)

Four Practices for Bringing Artistry to Your Work

Artists_way A few years ago, as part of my recovery from depression and divorce, I began to explore my artistic side. As things got better and I became more engulfed in work, my creativity dried up. I miss it because not only was it personally satisfying, art also fed my creativity in other facets of my life.

As an antidote to my current dried up state, I'm now working with a friend on Julia Cameron's The Artist's Way, a sort of 12-step recovery program for finding your creative center. Interestingly, I'm seeing how some of the practices can be applied to our professional lives.

Morning Pages--I've written about these before, but the idea bears repeating. Morning Pages work like this. Every morning when you get up, you write--in long hand--3 pages of whatever comes to mind. The goal is to empty your head of all of your concerns, what's on your mind, etc. It's a practice that can clear the space for more creative thinking. It's really a sort of writing meditation.

I've been doing Morning Pages off and on for several years. When I stick with them, they help. When I don't, I start to dry up. Note to self--keep it up. If you want to try out the idea,  check out this link for tips on how to start your own practice. Also check out this video of a discussion with Tom Tierney of The Bridgespan Group where he discusses how he's used a personal journal to drive his own professional practice. 

An Artist's Date--Julia describes it this way:

"An artist's date is a block of time, perhaps two hours weekly, especially set aside and committed to nurturing your creative consciousness, your inner artist. In its most primary form, the artist date is an excursion, a play date that you preplan and defend against all interlopers. You do not take anyone on this artist date but you and your inner artist, a.k.a., your inner child."

You will be tempted to put off or re-schedule or to bring a companion. You should resist these temptations and give your Artist's Date the same respect you would give to a business appointment--maybe more.

A Week of Reading Deprivation--As someone who can finish a few books in a week and who is constantly online reading blog posts, articles, etc. this one scares the crap out of me. A week without reading will, for me, be like a week without food. But Julia's premise is that depriving ourselves of reading "casts us into our inner silence." She argues that for most blocked people, reading is an addiction. "We gobble the words of others," she says, "rather than digest our own thoughts and feelings, rather than cook up something of our own." I suspect this is true and I also suspect that this will be one of the worst weeks of my life. At least at the beginning.But I can also see how listening to our own voice could be a great key to re-claiming our own creativity. It helps us get clearer about what we want and need so we can return refreshed.

Take a Risk a Day--It's easy to get locked into our comfort zones. I know that if I'm not vigilant with myself, I lapse back into routine and focusing on what I know I can do well. But as we've discussed before, risk-taking is a form of learning. It's also something we have to get in the habit of doing. Thinking each day "Where did I take a risk" could be a small but powerful practice.

One of the most important things I'm finding in going through this process (which is just starting, by the way) is that what we resist is what we most need. That is, I'm reading some of these exercises and thinking "that sounds stupid" or "I don't have time for that." But then I realize that the fact of my resistance is actually a clue that this is the activity I most need to do. My resistance is simply my brain's way of trying to keep me locked in my comfort zone. So when I hear that little voice saying "You don't need that," I know that it means that I DO need that. Which means, friends, that in a few weeks I will be going without reading for 7 days. It's a good thing you don't live with me, because I suspect that I'll be extremely crabby then.

August 15, 2008 in career, creativity, learning, professional development | | Comments (7) | TrackBack (0)

It's a Matter of Trust

Trust So much of the stupid stuff we do at work is because we don't really trust the people around us. We don't trust them to do the right thing. We don't trust that they are essentially good and competent or that they want to do good work for our organization. We especially don't trust that they will do the work. That's why we have dumb systems of control in place, like measuring people's "work ethic" in terms of their willingness to sit in a cubicle for 8 hours a day. If you ask me, the people who are willing to do that aren't the people we really want working for us.

Last week I posted about my dream of a world where we'd let people's personal interests and passions be a much bigger driver in the professional development process. I keep thinking about how few of us have that option within the confines of an organization and wondering why that is. At the heart of it, I believe, is a lack of trust.

We don't trust employees. We act as though they are incapable of making "good" choices, when in reality its our fear that they won't make the choices we WANT them to make that's really the problem. Why is it that our choices, the ones we impose on the people who work for us, are somehow better than the ones they might make for themselves. Of course, maybe they don't make the choices we want them to make because of another trust issue:

We don't trust our employees with information. So many bad choices are a result of bad information or incomplete information, or information that isn't presented accurately.  Of course we can't trust people to make good decisions if we aren't going to give them the information they need to make them. Why do we insist on blaming people when we haven't done all we could to make sure they have the right information?

We don't trust the process. I'm seriously guilty of this one, constantly checking in to see if I'm making progress and if I'm not, then it must be because I'm doing something wrong.  But progress is an evolutionary thing, especially when it comes to professional development. Do we truly believe that the most worthwhile development shows immediate results? The skills that it takes to address the important issues aren't developed during a one-day training session. They are a result of months, if not years of learning and coaching and feedback. And learning that some might view as "extras" or "useless" (like Steve Jobs studying calligraphy) could, in fact, be the most powerful of all. But we'd have to trust the process to find out.

We don't trust in abundance . One of the most persistent mental models we work with is the idea that everything worthwhile is scarce. There are some things that are limited, no doubt--time, oil, episodes of Battlestar Gallactica. But under the right conditions, our potential for growth is unlimited. We just have to develop our faith to the point that we're willing to trust what it takes to create those conditions. Cubicles, meetings, measuring our worth in 8-hour increments and micro-management of learning are not what it takes.

Faith is a hard thing to maintain. Sometimes it's that our faith is being challenged. Sometimes it's that we've put our trust in the wrong things. I can't help but feel, though, that we need to explore our trust issues in more detail to see how they may be interfering with our ability to do what's right or what might work better.

What do you think? How does trust (or a lack of it) play a role in professional development? How can we deal with our trust issues?

Photo via dziner.

July 17, 2008 in abundance, career, learning, professional development | | Comments (7) | TrackBack (0)

Future Executive Directors Fellowship at the Nonprofit Roundtable

Just wanted to share a project I'm REALLY excited about. Starting in September,  I'll have the honor of serving as faculty lead for the Nonprofit Roundtable's Future Executive Directors Fellowship, an intensive 9-month program designed to prepare emerging nonprofit leaders. The project is being led by the tireless Rosetta Thurman who is one of the most amazing young womenNonprofit_roundtable I've ever met.

The program consists of six components:

Visibility & Networking: Fellows will be exposed to a rich network of colleagues, current leaders, mentors, funders, and other experienced professionals.  In addition, the Roundtable will provide multiple opportunities for increased visibility in the region’s nonprofit community. 

Skills Development: Fellows will engage in intensive skill-building workshops designed to fast track their functional understanding of board management, finance, fundraising, communications, legal requirements, advocacy, human resources, and managing change.

Executive Director Modeling: Participants will have the opportunity to have candid conversations as a group with senior nonprofit leaders who are recognized as exceptional Executive Directors for the region’s nonprofit community.  Sessions on the role of an Executive Director and work-life balance strategies will also be presented.

Advising & Peer Coaching: Participants will receive informal advice and support from seasoned nonprofit leaders during each month of the program.  Peer coaching sessions will also be facilitated to help participants achieve personal leadership goals though the “stretch assignment.”

Mentoring: Fellows will learn how to identify and work with mentors.  Throughout the program, we will facilitate the process of matching mentors with Fellows and expose Fellows to a pool of experienced nonprofit leaders from whom to learn in various ways.

Stretch Assignment: The capstone of the Fellowship is a personal stretch assignment that allows Fellows to customize and pursue a specific learning goal.  (For example, a Fellow may take on a fundraising project to gain development experience or join a nonprofit board of directors to gain experience and perspective on boards.) Stretch assignments are to be completed by the end of the program and may be implemented within or outside the Fellows’ organizations.

The Nonprofit Roundtable has also put together an amazing list of faculty to teach the course. 

The application deadline was May 30 and they received 113 applications for only 25 slots. Rosetta tells me that the quality of the applicants is stellar--selecting just 25 participants will be a really difficult task.

I'm particularly excited about helping people to work on their "stretch assignments." This is something that Rosetta has talked about before and in the previous long-term professional development programs I've run, these individual projects have made for some of the most meaningful and life-changing learning I've seen. Personally, I think that you could do an amazing job on professional development if you simply focused on helping people develop their career plans and then facilitated them in working through a series of these assignments. Totally customized learning and something that's relevant and exciting to most people.

This is going to be a ton of fun and another great learning experience . . .

June 10, 2008 in career, nonprofit, professional development | | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0)

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