Career Development - The Advance Group

How to Create a Better Workforce for Top Millennial Talent

Raza Rauf on April 29, 2016

As we mentioned in a previous post, millennials are the largest generation of employees who are making an impact on the workforce today. Most recent figures put them at 53.5 million strong, and they have even outpaced the baby boomers (Pew Research, 2016). Therefore, any employer that wants to attract the best talent in the coming years needs to find ways to appeal to millennials.

At the same time, we are in a talent crisis as baby boomers are leaving in droves for retirement, at the rate of 10,000 per day, and the unemployment rate is also down – meaning less available talent looking for work.

How can a company create a better workforce for top millennials to keep them on board, get them trained well, and away from the competition?

Provide rewarding work experiences.

Millennials need instant gratification. They are used to this because of the environment in which they grew up. Everything is within reach of a mobile device these days, so if they are not feeling excited about the work they do, they are probably searching for something else.

Instill the value of loyalty.

Make the idea of loyalty a part of your core corporate culture. How? Provide a unique environment with plenty of millennial-friendly perks that they cannot get elsewhere. Use strong branding and messaging to create cheerleader employees. This is effective at attracting new candidates too. When they see how happy your employees are, they want in.

Give them a chance to learn.

Millennial talent places a high value on learning through nontraditional means. This is because they are smarter about college loan debt and don’t want to get stuck paying for this like their parents did. Bring learning and development opportunities to your employees, to both encourage participation and skill building. This enables your organization to create a structured advancement plan that’s linked to learning.

Set up a mentorship program.

Younger employees generally enjoy learning from more seasoned ones, mostly because they want to have these higher-level jobs sooner. Match your leaders and mentors with millennials and watch them blossom. If you hire temp-to-perm employees, give them a chance to work under the guidance of a team lead for a time until they prove their worth.

These ideas are just the start! Partner with a staffing agency like Advance Staffing Solutions to support long-term millennial talent placement and that company goals are met as the youngest generation revolutionizes the world of work.

Follow Your Career Dreams! (Just Read This Advice, First)

Raza Rauf on April 26, 2016

Millennials are taking over the workforce, as one of the largest group of workers since the baby boomers. They tend to bring with them unique values, including the idea that they can do anything they put their mind to. Many have pretty clear ideas about what they are interested in and what they want to be “when they grow up.” This is a generation that wants to move up the corporate ladder faster than their counterparts, and they are willing to do what it takes to get there.

While most believe that if a person works hard enough, people can live their career dreams – there is some practical wisdom to be gleaned from the experiences of others. Before you quit your day job to live out some fantasy career, read this advice first.

1. Find your passion first.

The sooner you identify what you are most passionate about, the clearer your career dreams become. In other words, get to the heart of your values before you select a career. Take a look back at your life and what you have been most interested in. What are your natural talents? What are things that are important to you? Take a personality and career assessment to dig deeper into your passions because from this place you can build a dream career.

2. Be realistic.

Learn as much about yourself as possible before you choose a career. During the personality and career assessment, which you can take through a staffing agency, you will learn what you are all about. Consider what your personality type says about the kind of career you realistically can handle. If you are a people person, for example, you will likely want to work with people. If you are not as outgoing, you may find yourself more suited for technical work behind the scenes.

3. Kiss a lot of frogs.

Just as you would in the dating world when you are trying to build a dream career you will encounter jobs that you are not well-suited for. Your first job after college, a job that you got through a family friend, an internship you had to complete – these are good experiences but they may not have been perfect for you. Try some temporary assignments to learn about what you like vs. what you don’t like as you create your best career path.

Need help chasing your career dreams? Contact Advance Staffing Solutions today, and let us place you with a great new career today!

5 Tips for a Stress-Free First Week at Your New Temp Job

Raza Rauf on April 12, 2016

A new temp job can be an exciting experience, especially if it’s the first time you’ve been employed in a while. But, just like anything else, it can also be a little nerve-wracking because one never knows what to expect. The first week can be especially brutal because you will be encountering new people, new processes, and new tasks. Feeling stressed yet?

Fortunately, we’ve got you covered. Here are some survival tips for a stress-free first week at your new temp job.

1. Get into a good sleep and waking routine.

Your body and mind will thank you as you adjust to a new working schedule. Set a schedule for bedtime and for waking up, and keep it consistent during the workweek. If at all possible, get to bed a little earlier the first few days and leave earlier so you are not stressed out on the way to the new temp job.

2. Bring your lunch.

It can be challenging to find places to eat while on a temp job, so bring a healthy lunch with you each day, While you are at it, bring some healthy snack items with you too until your body adjusts to your new schedule. Fruit, granola bars, and yogurt can all be healthy, easy go-to options.

3. Be prepared.

During your first week, think ahead and bring a notebook, a pen, and a light sweater for your time at the new job. You will be glad to have these items for taking notes and staying comfortable in the new work environment. Ask your temp staffing agent if you should bring anything else that the company requires.

4. Research the team.

If you know a little about the people you may be working with at the new temp job, look them up and connect on LinkedIn ahead of time. Be sure to clean up your social media profiles too, because people will be checking you out there.

5. Practice your introduction.

Along with figuring out where the bathrooms and copy room are during the first week, the impression you make on every new person you meet counts. Take the time to develop a quick 10-second introduction for yourself, and be sure to shake hands and use eye contact so that others see what a professional you are.

By following the above tips, you will be successful in your first week in a new temp job. If you need help finding a new temp job or a more permanent career, click to check out our current open positions.

Monroe Job Fair

Raza Rauf on April 7, 2016

Career Opportunity & Expo

Friday, April 8th

10:00am-1:00pm

Location: Monroe County Community College

Health Education Building

1555 S Raisinville Rd., Monroe, Michigan 48161

We have numerous openings in the Industrial and Clerical field

Bring updated Resume

Any questions email

Renee@advancestaffingsolutions.com

Are These 4 Crucial Items Missing From Your Resume?

Raza Rauf on April 5, 2016

Have you ever glanced over your resume and wondered why this document is so important? To most job seekers, it’s a necessary requirement of applying for jobs. But, it’s so much more. When you start looking at your resume like the powerful document it’s meant to be, it takes on a new level of importance.

Your resume is actually a marketing document – and in this case, you are selling YOU.

When you think about a resume in these terms, it makes better sense to ensure it’s not missing any critical elements that could stop a recruiter from wanting to learn more about you. Think about it for a second. The last time you read an advertisement, it probably covered several important areas, like:

a solid and complete introduction to the service or product;
a compelling reason why someone would buy this over a competitor;
the main features and value of the offering; and
the direct call to action – to take action or buy it.

Now, take a look at your resume again. Does it include the above elements?

Your resume should introduce you to the recruiter in a solid way. The first part of your resume serves as an area where you can develop a strong introduction and list of your work related skills. Like if you were reading an advertisement for a car, you’d see the intro to the car model and the features like anti-lock brakes, air conditioning, and automatic transmission.

The reason why someone would hire you comes next. This is the meat of your resume. Include your career experience and your education here. Don’t leave anything out, if it’s compelling and a reason someone would want to hire you.

The main features and value of the offering are listed as your achievements, your award winning work, and your efforts to excel. Include volunteer experience, industry associations, your portfolio items, and any place where you have received recognition.

Lastly, bring it all home with a call to action, which is included in your resume as your clear and up-to-date contact information listed prominently in the header. Use a cover letter to ask the recruiter to call you and list your contact phone number again.

Need help writing an effective resume, or finding a job in Michigan or Ohio? Click here to browse our open jobs, or contact the dedicated staffing specialists at Advance Staffing Solutions today!

Open Interviews

Raza Rauf on March 29, 2016

Wednesday, 4/6/16

12:00pm-4:00pm

Positions are located in Blissfield, Dundee, Monroe areas.
Starting Wage is $9.00-$13.00 per hour

South Central Michigan Works!

Lenawee County Human Services Building

1040 S. Winter Street, Suite 1014, Adrian, MI 49221

POSITIONS AVAILABLE:

Warehouse, General Labor, Assembly, Welders & Packagers

Must have…

HS Diploma/GED
Work history within the last 12 months

Pre-Register Online

www.advancestaffingsolutions.com

Malinda Tepe

734-457-0056

malinda@advancestafingsolutions.com

How to Un-Brand Yourself as a Job Hopper

Raza Rauf on March 28, 2016

Have you had a variety of jobs over the last few years? Maybe you were laid off, worked a lot of temporary assignments, or just had bad luck with companies closing their doors during the recession – in any case, your resume looks like you could be a job hopper. A classic job hopper frequently changes jobs, and this can be seen as a negative mark on a career history. Companies want candidates who can stay on board for at least a year or more so they can earn a good return on investment in training and hiring new employees.

How can you successfully un-brand yourself as a job hopper in the minds of recruiters? Follow these tips:

Know how to explain the frequent or short-term jobs
Depending on the circumstances, most of the time the reason employees leave their jobs is because of something involuntary – through layoffs, company closures, end of temporary assignments, and offshoring. Do you have a way of explaining this to recruiters? Now is the time to come up with a positive way of explaining what happened and how you did not let it affect your career goals. In fact, turn the experience around so that it was a positive step that helped you to build your career.
Be careful of how you are listing jobs
A big mistake that many job seekers make with their resumes is separating temporary jobs into individual jobs, which makes job hopping look worse. Instead, list the jobs under the name of the agency you worked for, with a brief explanation and the dates for each assignment. In this way, the jobs are in a logical progression under a singular agency or employer.
Consider a skills-based resume vs. a chronological one
If you have a lot of jobs (more than five in a three year period), it may be best to put your information into a skills-based resume template, instead of a chronological timeline of jobs. In this case, list your top skills and achievements in the very top half of your resume. Following this, put your software and educational knowledge, and then your jobs can be listed by year in the bottom portion of the resume.
Share your references
Let others speak for you by including some great professional and personal references. Let them know you are trying to establish yourself in a stable work opportunity and so they can speak to this ability. Prepare your references in advance and give them some talking points, such as your ability to complete tasks on time, your interpersonal skills, and your reliability.

If you’re looking for a new career in Ohio or Michigan, partner with the team of staffing experts at Advance Staffing Solutions! We have an inside track on the hottest, newest and often unlisted exciting job opportunities, and we work with many high-profile companies that would love to hire a candidate like you. Click to contact us today.

Free Job Fair – Wood County Library

Raza Rauf on March 21, 2016

FREE JOB FAIR

Thursday, March 24th, 2016

1:00PM-4:00 PM

Wood County Library Atrium Meeting Room B

Employment opportunities

Assistance with Resume Building

Help with Job Applications

No registration required

Open to the General Public

Interview tips

Summer job opportunities for Students

Want to Move Your Resume to the Top of the Pile? Use These Tips!

Raza Rauf on March 18, 2016

It’s been estimated that for each and every job posting advertised that recruiters can receive as many as 300 – 500 resumes from eager candidates. That’s a lot of reading and screening! Unfortunately, most recruiters have very little time to spend on each resume, so they skim through them looking for specific things, make a pile out of about 1/10th of the original resumes, and start calling people in for interviews. In other cases, the applicant tracking system may scan resumes first and only kick out those that meet the job descriptions.

Sadly, your resume could end up at the bottom of the pile, or worse yet, in the bottom of a garbage can – that is, if you don’t know the secrets of success (that we are about to share with you now). If you want to move your resume to the top of the pile, read on.

Use a standard resume template

Any recruiter will tell you that they cannot stand it when people try to ‘reinvent the wheel’ with their resumes. They don’t want to see a resume that’s super creative (unless they are hiring for a creative role), with fancy colors and head photos of the candidate. Instead, stick to the rules and use a simple format with defined headings for Skills, Education, Career History, etc. These will have a better chance of being read properly by the ATS, and by the recruiters.

Try a nicer paper

If you plan to mail your resume in (who uses snail mail anymore?) be sure to invest in high-quality paper that has a nice texture and is slightly off-white. Your local office supply store can help you pick out the best paper and matching envelopes for this purpose. Have your resume professionally printed out. Don’t turn your resume in on brightly colored paper or poorly printed from an at-home machine.

Call the recruiter

It may seem simple, but taking the extra step to call the recruitment office 48 hours after sending in your resume can alert the hiring team that you are an interested candidate. Provide the recruiter with your full name spelled out, the job title you are applying for, and your contact phone number where they can reach you. Don’t ask them to interview you on the spot or take up too much of their time. Just say thanks and that you hope to hear back at their convenience.

Get recommended

Another way to ensure that your resume makes it to the top of the hiring pile is to ask for a direct employee referral from a colleague who works there. If you can, send this person a copy of your resume and ask them to walk a copy down to the HR office in person. If you don’t know anyone who works there, you can also reach out to the staffing agency you are registered with and ask if they are recruiting for the job, then get them to send the employer your resume. This can be a very effective way to get called in for a job interview sooner.

The last secret to success in a job search is to partner with a staffing agency like Advance Staffing Solutions. We have staffing experts on hand in Michigan and Ohio to help you land whatever career you’re aiming for!

Open Registration in MONROE!

Raza Rauf on March 15, 2016

Saturday March 19^th

8:30am-10:30am

Open Registration

We have openings in…

Machine Operators
Packagers
Assembly

In the following areas…

Monroe
Carleton
Dundee
Blissfield

Hourly pay ranging from $9-$13 per hour depending on experience.

Must have worked within the last 12 months

High School Diploma/GED

Bring two forms of ID

There’s Such a Thing as Being “Too” Relaxed at Work!

Raza Rauf on March 11, 2016

Has your job become dull and uninspiring? Have you begun to get too relaxed and lazy on the job? You are not alone. As many as two-thirds of all working adults become disengaged when it comes to their jobs. And another major percentage find themselves searching for other opportunities while on the company clock.

This is never a good place to be. But you can get back that excitement of your job if you take the following steps.

Go back into the past.

Think back to when you first started your current job and how you looked forward to getting started. Were you anxious to prove yourself to your new employer? Was your brain filled with new ideas? Take a look at your career now. What has transpired since then? Chances are, you are just getting settled in and taking things for granted. Try to find some aspect of your work you can get behind again, and go for the gusto!

Find your passion.

Instead of sitting back and just watching the clock each day, why not discover something about your work that gets your wheels turning? Think about the things you are passionate about – be it a cause, a personal interest, or a way of doing things. Integrate this into your daily tasks and projects. For example, maybe you enjoy planning parties. You could ask your boss if you can head up a team celebration committee!

Consider how in-demand you are.

If you were to leave your job today, what marketable skills can you bring to the table? When you become too relaxed at work, it’s easy to take this for granted. Someone more skilled, or with fresher skills just out of college may be thrilled to take your place. Get some training in an area that honors your job and industry, and appreciate your job a little more.

Share your ideas more often.

When is the last time you contributed a new idea to improve things at your workplace? It’s common to “shut down” when you feel like you are getting accustomed to the job and no one cares anymore because you are not the new person. However, you do have great ideas to share so make it a point to connect with your supervisor on a regular basis to share new ideas for improving things around the office.

By taking the above steps, you must step outside of your own comfort zone and stay motivated. In the end, however, you will enjoy your job more and grow as a working professional. If none of these tip work, and you want to find a new job altogether, click here to see the open positions available through Advance Staffing Solutions!

5 Apps That Can Make You a Better Boss

Raza Rauf on March 9, 2016

Have you ever wondered how you can learn how to be a better boss when you have so much on your plate all the time? Turns out, there’s an app for that. Here’s a rundown of the best apps for management skills development on the market today.

Dispatch

As a boss, are you continually weeding through hundreds of emails each day, only to find yourself buried in responses? You are not alone. The average manager gets around 150 to 300 emails a day. Luckily, there is an app called Dispatch that can help you chop down those emails and get back to actually being around your people — instead of sitting behind a computer all day. Dispatch “lets you get rid of mails by swiping, respond faster with snippets, and process your mails with other apps.” It’s available on Apple iTunes.

EasilyDo

Always forgetting important tasks, employee birthdays, ordering office supplies, setting up travel, and other critical team-building activities? EasilyDo is an app that can help you stay on track with daily reminders of what’s priority as a boss, and executing some of these things for you. It’s akin to having a personal assistant to help you stay above water. It can even integrate with your email and contacts for smooth transitions between tasks, and sending alerts and reminders to others.

Flow

Managing a team, tasks, and projects can be the bane of every boss’ life. The Flow app makes it easier by creating a collaborative task management space where managers can allocate tasks, communicate with team members, and stay on top of deadlines. Use the Flow app to separate tasks into teams and individuals who have the right skills to achieve them.

TimeTrade

Tired of the back and forth emails asking you to schedule meeting times and get phone numbers and other contact info in place? TimeTrade is a perfect management app that helps you to streamline meeting schedules for yourself and your team members. Powerful analytics also let managers see where they are spending the bulk of their time. The best part is that there is a free version.

Talkboard

If you have a creative team or employees who spend a great deal of time working in silos, why not bring them together during meetings using the collaborative whiteboard of Talkboard? It’s simple to use, and interfaces with Apple iPads. Integrate video and images, social networking, and more to make presentations and meetings fun again.