Employees Can Expect Higher Raises, Says CareerJournal.com

PRINCETON, N.J — Workers in the U.S. can expect a 3.7 percent pay raise in 2005 — the second straight year of increased raises for employees after a three-year decline — according to a report on CareerJournal.com, The Wall Street Journal’s executive career site.

The 2005 expected increase is slightly higher than the 3.6 percent average raise in 2004, according to data compiled by Salary.com. Average salary increases bottomed out at a five-year low of 3.4 percent in 2003, after hitting a five-year high of 4.4 percent in 2001. A 3.7 percent pay raise would mean that an average worker earning $34,000 a year can expect to see an additional $24.19 per week. Those with a salary of $100,000 can expect an increase of $71.15 per week.

“We are in the early stages of an upswing,” says Tony Lee, publisher, CareerJournal.com. “The projected salary increases for this year are a ray of sunshine following several years of salary freezes and layoffs.”

CareerJournal.com offers these tips on how you can earn more as the job market improves:

• Keep track of your successes to present to your boss.
• Document your fair-market value by researching free salary data on sites such as CareerJournal.com.
• Learn the art of salary negotiation-the better you are at negotiating, the better your chances of being successful.
• Ask what needs to happen for you to earn a raise in the future, and try to get a commitment in writing.
• “Having another job offer also is a great tool in negotiating a raise with your current employer, but be prepared to leave if your employer doesn’t meet your terms,” Mr. Lee adds.

Focused Education Is Key to Getting the Best Raises

In the accounting and bookkeeping fields, you need a way to stand out from the crowd to move up to a better job. The training that is taught in the Professional Bookkeeper (PB) program gives you that edge over other applicants. The PB designation proves to employers that you have the real-world skills needed to get right to work with minimal training.

Learn More About the Professional Bookkeeper (PB) Program

Fewer Seniors Leaving Job Force for Good

By Bo Emerson

ATLANTA — Thad Quarles likes retiring so much he’s done it three times.

He first retired after 20 years of service in the Marine Corps, then from Delta, where he was a pilot for 28 years, then from a family pharmacy in rural Tennessee, where he filled prescriptions and made ice cream sodas.

Today he’s on career No. 4, as executive director of the United Way in five counties of east Mississippi and west Alabama.

“It’s a departure,” admitted Quarles, 58, who travels with his wife, Cleta, from their Duluth, Ga. home to an apartment in Meridian, Miss., every Monday, returning on Fridays. The pay is less than half his Delta salary, but the job gives him a chance to exercise his instinct for servant leadership.

“People have always told me if you’re a pilot, you can’t do anything else,” he said. “This is a challenge to myself to say there is something else you can do in your life that would be meaningful and fulfilling.”

Older Americans, like Quarles, are retiring differently than they did a generation ago. Seniors once accepted a gold watch and moved quietly to the rocking chair. Today they use retirement to switch gears, perhaps move into consulting, work part time for the corporation they leave, start their own business, enter a new career or become a full-time volunteer. Fewer and fewer Americans call it quits after retirement age.

Before Medicare and Social Security, older Americans remained in the work force in much greater numbers; almost half of all men 65 and older were working in 1950, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

But by 1985, that number dropped to 15 percent.

Today, that figure is steadily creeping back up, said Sara Rix of AARP, as more and more older Americans stay in the work force. Last year, 19 percent of men 65 and older were in the work force.

Merrill Lynch in early 2004 asked 2,348 baby boomers (the population bulge born between 1946 and 1964) about their attitudes toward retirement. Of those surveyed, 76 percent said they intend to keep working and earning in retirement.

Many will turn to new careers, said Mary Ellen Garrett, first vice president with Merrill Lynch Atlanta Buckhead.

“I see the traditional pattern — retire at 65 and sit home or play golf every day — is just not the way it is anymore,” Garrett said. “I see more people leaving companies early — before 65 — and starting brand-new careers.”

That describes the employment arc of Jocelyn Bivins-Ford. She left BellSouth after 37 years and began working in administration for Atlanta City Councilwoman Joyce Sheperd. She also leads a Girl Scout troop and serves in the drama ministry at her church.

Friends keep asking the 55-year-old, “If you’re retired, why aren’t you in the house?” Bivins-Ford’s answer: “I retired from BellSouth, not from life.”

Also, despite income from her BellSouth pension, she needed the money. “I did the math.”

While contemporary workers tend to jump from company to company, retirees often follow the same pattern, retiring from a variety of careers.

Quarles is the very model of the modern “serial retiree.” Of his 20 years as a Marine Corps pilot, 13 were in the Reserves. During his time in the Reserves, he also flew for Delta, retiring from Delta in 2003 after 28 years of service.

Said Quarles, “After I retired from Delta, I stayed in the fetal position for a week or two, until my wife said, “All right, that’s it, out of the bed, you’ve got to do something.’ ” That’s when he began working for the family pharmacy. He soon retired from that, too, and took the United Way job.

Sherman Francisco, 70, is another serial retiree who considers work a crucial diversion from the empty calendar.

In 1987, he retired from IBM after 30 years of service, first as a salesman, then in the company’s real estate division. An injury led to his early retirement, but after a few years away from work, he was itching to get back into action.

First Francisco launched a custom furniture business, and was soon shipping bureaus and cabinetry all over the world. Then, last year, he joined the Home Depot, where he puts in 40 hours a week in the millwork department .

Rising medical costs are part of the reason for remaining in the work force. “Things have changed too much now. Everything is going up,” he said.

But Francisco also appreciates the opportunity to stay active. “It keeps me out of trouble,” he said. “My wife told me I’d be dead if I didn’t work here.”

Cheryll Schramm is, if anything, even more driven in retirement than she was working full time. Formerly chief of the Aging Services Division at the Atlanta Regional Commission, she now works part time on special projects for the organization, while juggling a dozen other interests. Those include travel, baby-sitting grandchildren, attending elder hostels, archaeological digs, teaching special education students and volunteering with a Clayton County resource center for grandparents raising grandchildren.

“Some people say work is just critical,” said Schramm, 60. “I like a combination. I like working part time, and I like volunteering.”

The debate over privatizing parts of Social Security may have little impact on the retirement decisions of the current crop of seniors, said Garrett of Merrill Lynch, adding that many older Americans have other sources of income.

But it may take a lot of income to keep baby boomers happy. Rix of AARP said boomers are accustomed to greater wealth than their parents’ generation, and won’t settle for modest retirements.

They are going to be better off than their parents in retirement, but they want to maintain their standard of living from pre-retirement days, she said.

This could keep many boomers working well into the golden years, because Social Security won’t pay for that mountain retreat or beach house.

The new retirees expect to pay for these things out of their own pockets, said Garrett, which is why more and more of them will keep working — even in second or third careers.

“Boomers are betting on themselves,” she said. “And why not? They were taught to bet on themselves.”

Semi-Retire in 10 Months . . . At Any Age

As mentioned above, most of today’s workforce plan to work at least part time in their retirement years. Because of the tremendous income potential of taking a few bookkeeping clients, we will show you how your retirement age can be one year from now, regardless of how young you are. It’s achievable, profitable, and easy. You owe it to yourself to at least check it out. It could very well change your life as it has for so many others.

Learn How to Make $30 to $60 Per Hour and Semi-Retire 10 Months from Now

You Bet!

Victoria Richardson started her business in January of 2004, and has seen incredibly rapid growth and profit ever since. She only spent the first 6 weeks marketing. Since then, she has had all the clients she can handle. In fact, she tells us that she has had to cut down to “only” 18 clients so that she has the quality time that she wants to spend with her children. Victoria is a stay-at-home mom and Professional Bookkeeper.

USA Today notes that while there are no statistics on the number of work-at-home moms (WAHM), the National Association of Women Business Owners reports that there are more than 10 million female-owned businesses in the USA. Many of those are run by stay-at-home moms who manage their businesses and take care of their children from the comfort of their own homes.

Perhaps you’ve wanted to return home to raise your kids but have worried about losing that stable income. But there’s no need to worry. Accounting is a lucrative profession that can easily be done while taking care of your family. Just ask Victoria.

Victoria Richardson, AAHM (Accounting-at-Home Mom)

At the time Victoria started her own accounting business she had two young children: ages one and two months. She was having ethical conflicts with her employer and had reached a point where she wanted something different.

As she considered her options Victoria said:

. . . my list of wants and needs included: complete flexibility to be able to be with my children when they needed me, if they were sick, or something had come up where they needed to spend time with me. I needed to be making at least $60,000 a year. I needed to be able to have a lot of flexibility, and wanted to work an abbreviated work week. And what I found was that … there was nothing out there that was willing to give me that package. . . . I discovered that the only option that was available for me was to be able to start my own business.

The Professional Bookkeeper Program

But Victoria knew she needed more practical education. She had a bachelor’s degree in business, but didn’t feel she had the confidence to manage the accounts of multiple clients without hands-on training. So she decided to enroll in Universal Accounting Center’s Professional Bookkeeper (PB) Program; it would give her the flexibility she needed to finish the course quickly and at her own pace.

When she was close to completing the course, she decided to quit her full-time job and become an independent contractor. Her ex-employer became her first client, and within 6 weeks she had enough clients that she could stop marketing.

Victoria feels like she has the edge and doesn’t worry about competition.

I know what they want to hear. I know what’s going to make them feel comfortable, and I know what their concerns are. And the Universal Accounting Courses taught . . . a lot of it has to do with . . . it’s semantics . . . it’s the language that you present it in. When I talk to them about increasing their profitability, they listen. It makes sense to them. I can feel confident in helping them discover what problem areas they have, and what ways they can work through that, so it’s not a situation where I feel like, you know, anybody else is coming in and giving them that because, unfortunately, that’s what they’re looking for and they’re not finding it anywhere. I can come in and do it, and I can do it and save them money.

The PB Program not only teaches you practical, day-to-day accounting for the small business, but it also trains you on marketing your unique skill-set. It gives you the edge over the competition so that you can feel confident in your ability to provide a better service for your clients.

More information on the Professional Bookkeeper Program

References

“Job Opening? Work-at-Home Moms Fill the Bill” by Stephanie Armour, USA Today

The Second Half of Our Self-Employability Quiz

If you’ve ever considered becoming a freelance accountant you need to ask yourself some serious questions before taking the plunge. There are a lot of variables to consider when becoming self-employed, and very few of them have to do with your accounting skills. Last week we posed the following five questions:

1. Are you self-motivated?
2. Are you a go-getter?
3. Are you organized?
4. Are you flexible?
5. Can you manage uncertainty?

This week we’ll talk about the final five questions of our self-employability quiz:

6. Are you patient?
Most likely you won’t have a flood of clients come through your door as soon as you hang your shingle. Building a solid client base will take time, and you will need to exercise patience throughout the entire process. There are other things that may require your patience as well: going full-time with your business, having enough money to hire staff employees, and collecting payment from some of your clients.

7. Can you promote yourself?
When it comes to contract work you must be able to promote yourself. Clients won’t come and find you; you must find them first and then illustrate why your services are better than any others being offered. Not only must you be able to promote yourself, but you must also believe in what you’re promoting: YOU!

8. Do you appreciate your business value?
When you recognize your business value, a lot of things will happen. One, you’ll emanate a confidence that will put clients and potential clients at ease. Two, you’ll be able to charge what you’re worth. And three, you’ll keep plugging away even when things get difficult.

9. Can you set clear boundaries?
With a traditional full-time job you work from 9 to 5 and then go home where you’re generally not expected to continue working. The difference with contract work is that your schedule can be more fluid, enabling you to work whatever hours you choose. This will require a bit more flexibility as you respond to client emergencies, etc. However, you will have to set some boundaries to avoid being taken advantage of. And once you set boundaries, be sure to abide by them.

10. Do you have enough knowledge and skills?
There’s no higher authority you can consult if you run into a complicated or difficult issue. As a freelance accountant you’re the higher authority. If you don’t have the knowledge or skill to run your own accounting practice, that’s your first order of business. Look for quality training programs that will help you gain the expertise you need.

Universal Accounting Center Offers Quality Training Programs

Last week when we introduced the first five questions of our self-employability quiz, we also shared our special professional package, designed to help people like you open a successful accounting practice.

The Professional Bookkeeper (PB) Program
Regardless of your expertise, whether you’re a beginner, intermediate, or expert accountant, the Professional Bookkeeper (PB) Program will teach you small business accounting, enabling you to promote your service to a large niche market. You’ll learn everything you need to know to help your clients’ businesses become more profitable. Imagine gaining the reputation as a Profit Expert, granting the Midas touch to every business with which you work. The PB Program will give you the skills to analyze a company’s finances and determine how they can best increase their revenue and become more profitable. Once the word gets out you’ll have more work than you can handle.

The Universal Practice Builder (UPB) Program
But getting the word out is sometimes problematic. While accountants may be comfortable crunching numbers, they generally are not comfortable marketing their services. Wouldn’t it be nice to learn a proven system for marketing your newfound small business accounting skills? Universal knows how to do that, and we want to teach you! For years we’ve been offering the Universal Practice Builder Workshop, designed to train you how to market your practice in order to experience significant growth and profitability. You had to attend this two-day workshop in order to glean all the amazing information offered. Now, to accommodate students and make this information more convenient we have turned this workshop into a DVD program. Imagine all that you could learn from our experience training thousands of individuals like you!

Receive a Free Gift
But wait, there’s more! We want you to take advantage of this offer so you can realize your potential. And what better way to help you accomplish that than by combining these two powerful programs with another profit-building program, QuickBooks Made Profitable, for FREE!

UAC has created this amazing program to teach you how to use QuickBooks to generate more clients. You’ll be trained in a proven system of how you can use QuickBooks to attract larger numbers of potential clients offering expert QuickBooks services. Learn how to leverage your time, meet potential clients and offer them services that will help them reduce taxes, increase profits and put money in the bank. With this added service you’ll become even more valuable to all those clients, securing their loyalty and the longevity of your business.

There is a certain amount of risk involved in starting your own business. But when you’ve proven your skills by earning a professional designation your chances for success rise significantly. Do all that you can to prepare for your success. Purchase this professional package today!

Where the “Opportunity Things” Are

Gain Control of Your Career

I was recently reading “Where the Wild Things Are” by Maurice Sendak to my kids for a bedtime story. I was stricken with how similar this well-known story line reflects what we all go through when pursuing our professional goals.

In the story Max is sent to his room, feeling constrained by those who are in authority over him. He imagines for himself a world where he has the control of what happens. How often have we, sitting in our little cubicles, had those same imaginings about our careers? How many of us have imagined what it would be like to gain the control necessary to steer our careers in the direction of success and happiness? How many of us have imagined that happy, yet seemingly unattainable position of empowerment, where we are in charge of our professional futures?

Most of us can imagine being able to dictate what we do, how we do it and for how much we will do it for. We imagine a place of business where we are not only invaluable to the company we work with, but an indispensable part of that company’s success. Or perhaps we imagine working for ourselves, determining our own schedules as we grow an accounting practice that we manage.

Unlike Max who, after creating his ideal world, went back to the reality of his own room, will we settle for this dissatisfying stage of our careers? Or will turn our dreams into reality?

The corporate world can really be a jungle, and for those in our field we need to be gaining the right tools that will help us clear a path to the places we would like to be in five, ten, or fifteen years from now. Where are your “Opportunity Things”? What tools can you use to take advantage of that next promotion, pay increase or business opportunity?

Universal Accounting Has the Answers

The Professional Bookkeeping (PB) Program is designed specifically for those in your situation, those who need the experience and training necessary to move forward in their chosen career paths. The PB coursework will supply you with the materials, training, and support that will enable you to become a certified Professional Bookkeeper. The PB Certification will get you the experience and knowledge that has been used by more than 30,000 others, just like you, to make their professional dreams a reality. This comprehensive program can be completed in as little as 60 hours, allowing you to learn at your own speed while acquiring the tools necessary to catapult you to the professional future you’ve been imagining.

Building your own accounting practice will require exceptional marketing skills. And when you couple the PB Program with the Universal Practice Builder (UPB) Program you practically have a ready-made business at your finger-tips. The UPB Program will train you in more than 12 proven marketing strategies, teach you how to get 15 to 25 qualified leads per month, help you create a customized marketing plan, and enable you to earn $30,000 more in annualized billings in just 12 months.

Isn’t it time to make a move on your career? What’s holding you back from turning your dreams into reality? What is separating you from those who have gotten where you want to be? Stop allowing others tell you how much you can make, what responsibilities you are qualified for and how far up the corporate ladder you can go. With Universal’s training and practical, hands-on experience, the steering wheel is in your hands, and you can decide where to take your career. Enroll now!

Now That You’ve Got Your Feet Wet

Recently we discussed what you needed to do to get yourself started in the right direction and moving your career path to where you want it to end up. You’ve put in the time and researched what you needed to, which type of a position within the accounting field most interests you. How much that person in that position stands to make and you have even looked up what type of experience you are going to need to be even eligible for your desired position.

You’ve identified what you have right now in terms of skill sets and experience already under your belt. And what work experience is just at-your-fingertips if you were to stretch yourself and step up to grasp ahold of it. You’ve started looking for those ways to network… find other like minded individuals who are in the profession that may have a different accounting responsibilities. You never know when you are going to make at least a lateral step from one company to the next. Always good to keep your options open for you.

We’ve also chatted about the training you can get to further your career. We’ve talked many times before about the pros and cons of going to a four year university, verses other forms of education. This fact is something that Universal Accounting took into serious consideration. What benefits do you receive with a four year university that makes you a better accountant? After several months of research the conclusion was found that if you were looking to be a big corporate accountant, then the four year option was for you. That’s only what they prepare you for, and teach you to do, in those accounting majors in the higher education institutions.

So What Benefit Can I Realize With Universal’s Training?
Very good question. It first all rests on the conclusion we came to when we started offering this training program. We saw that for most in the profession, accountants and bookkeepers were finding a greater opportunity for higher pay and advancement in those companies that were classified as small business operations. These opportunities have only grown over the years, from 85% of all businesses being in that small business category to approaching 91% of all business transacted are with companies with 100 employees or less.

Secondly, we found the then existing training available nationwide did little or nothing to prepare those who were in those businesses. A great need for the right accounting training was there for us to service. With Universal’s Professional Bookkeeper Program you are able to get hands-on instruction so that you can portray your accounts within a company the way they need to be for effective tracking and record keeping. In the training we teach what is the single best indicator of a company’s financial health.

Tested and proven techniques that will make your job easier and prove to your boss your expertise in helping the company to stay sound, financial viable and best yet, profitable! We’ve been down in the trenches, tested these strategies and methods in real time and have done the trial and error for you. Within 60-90 days you two can know, and put into practice what it took us years and years to perfect. Click Here to find out more about the training itself.

The “So What…” Factor
“So what does this mean for me?” you may be asking. What does the right and immediately applicable accounting and bookkeeping training going to do for your career? Frankly, it gives you more. The training affords you the ability to have the confidence in whatever may come your way in a company’s accounting needs that you know or can get the answer to it readily. This training allows you the opportunity to be able to apply what you’ve been trained in ANYWHERE to any company you come in contact with.

Most importantly, the Professional Bookkeeper Training Program gives you the luxury to be able to dictate what you can get paid, which position you will be able to occupy, and which type of lifestyle you can create for yourself and those around you.

The right training opens the many doors of accounting opportunities, and you choose for yourself which option to take!

Don’t Hesitate Another Day
Procrastination for your tomorrow is doing you no good. Take control of where your career is heading, don’t allow it to be dictated by someone else! Click Here to enroll today in what will be the difference in your earning potential, your job satisfaction and the type of things you will have access in doing throughout your life with your greater earnings. Enrolling in the Professional Bookkeeper Program gives you what you need tomorrow… today!

Want Another “Door” to Open to You?
UAC’s Professional Tax Preparer Certification May Be the Key. Check out Universal’s tax training is not only a great way to boost your resume, but it can also offer an added income stream come tax time. You’ll acquire expertise that most employers will appreciate, and you’ll be able to make money in your spare time as a tax preparer. You’ll also be able to earn a professional designation which is always a good selling point in any job interview. Don’t wait to make those career changes that you’ve been thinking about. Consider the PTP Certification your exit to success.

By David Schepp — The (Westchester, N.Y.) Journal News

On a recent rainy morning, Andrea Giangrande joined three other women at a career workshop, each with the hope of making their work lives more rewarding and less frustrating.

An interior designer by training, Giangrande, 32, of Somers, N.Y., recently began looking for work again after returning to the area from Boston, where she became disillusioned with her career.

Despite the image it may conjure in people’s minds, Giangrande tells the group that furnishing people’s homes and businesses is not glamorous work.

“It’s not ‘Will & Grace,’ ” she says, referring to the TV show that features an interior designer as one of its lead characters.

Moreover, she doesn’t buy into the argument that work is work and that nobody likes their job. “I don’t necessarily agree with that philosophy,” Giangrande says. “You should enjoy it at least a little bit.”

She hopes the half-day workshop by a career-coaching firm, will prod her to a more satisfying career.

Giangrande is typical of the clients counseled by Nicole Aliev and Kathy Kriskey, the seminar’s organizers and veterans of the corporate “rat race,” as they call it, which has chipped away at many workers’ enthusiasm toward their work lives.

Having achieved great success as corporate coaches, Kriskey and Aliev became disenchanted with their own careers. That led them in July to start Rat Race Be Gone, a career coaching and consulting business based in Aliev’s Mamaroneck, N.Y., home.

Career coaching makes sense for everyone, Kriskey says, adding that it needn’t be a long-term commitment. “Sometimes it’s just a few sessions and you totally change your perspective.”

Workers today are feeling less appreciated. Still, that doesn’t mean the workers she coaches necessarily want to leave their jobs. Rather, “it’s about changing how they view their jobs,” Aliev says.

At the core of the women’s philosophy is getting their clients to create an action plan that helps them visualize what their lives will be like a year from now, after they make changes.

Through its seminars, Rat Race Be Gone allows its clients to be vulnerable about their career choices and goals, allowing them to access advice from other members of the group who have an impartial view. By teaming them with other group members at the workshops, participants not only get free advice on how to handle their careers but also a new network of contacts, Aliev says.

In a world where workers are taught to spout bravado about the choices they’ve made in their careers, taking a glaring look at the missteps or the unhappy moments can be quite difficult, both women say.

Career coaching helps frustrated workers look at their situations from a fresh perspective.

“Recognition is a big issue,” Aliev says. “It’s acknowledging that employees go farther if they’re satisfied in their jobs.”

Many workers have stayed in unsatisfying jobs because of fear. “There was so much unknown,” Aliev says, referring to the recent economic recession and national security concerns.

But she and Kriskey have found that with the economy starting to rebound people are saying, “enough is enough.” Workers are no longer willing to stay in boring, miserable jobs any longer in the name of job security.

As for Giangrande, she came away from her four-hour workshop with a positive outlook in the knowledge that she is not alone in her discontent.

“It was therapeutic to be there,” she says.

How to Get Help and Supercharge YOUR Career

Would it be helpful to get some of this kind of coaching in your life? Would it be even better if it were free? This is the kind of coaching support that you get when you get the Professional Bookkeeper (PB) course from Universal Accounting. You will have your own coach that you can get advise from on career advancement or just get answers about Accounting and Bookkeeping principles that you are learning. This kind of unmatched support is one of the key features that really make our training unique. You always have someone to call to get answers from and to get vital career coaching.

Show Me How the Professional Bookkeeper Program Will Give Me the Training that I Need to Get a Better Job

By Dana Knight — The Indianapolis Star

Recruiters spend less than 20 seconds looking at your resume.

For every position open, only 10 percent of resumes get a second viewing after that initial scan, according to Monster.com. About 3 percent of resumes lead to interviews. And one person gets hired.

The odds are against you - big time.

“They’re looking for reasons to reject you,” says Irv Orenstein, president of Orenstein Advertising in Huntingdon Valley, Pa., who has provided job-hunting guidance for more than 30 years. “They can only consider a few. If you give them the right reason to dump yours, they will.”

So you’re thinking this is advice for the novice — a job-seeker who has never typed up a resume.

It is. But it’s for the workplace veteran, too. You would be surprised what the recruiters are saying about professionals with real jobs.

“Even when written by professionals, most resumes read like obituaries, and that’s why they get buried,” says Orenstein.

No one seems to be immune to a pathetic resume.

“We still get the resumes of people that put their pictures in with their height and weight,” says Janet Hambrock, a recruiting manager with ExactTarget, an Indianapolis software company specializing in e-mail marketing. “Don’t do that.”

Hambrock hires everyone from software engineers to salespeople. Among her biggest pet peeves: resumes written in third person. She also warns against listing personal information or hobbies.

“For the most part, that seems pretty harmless,” she says. “But the more they know about your personal life, the more they can discriminate.”

One way that can happen is with an e-mail address. If you have a personal e-mail like Partyer11@aol. com or HotMama@yahoo.com, that could be a problem. Opt to create another e-mail address to list on the resume, using your first and last name or initials.

Orenstein has his own list of common errors, mistakes that even the professionals make.

Most resumes are too long. The standard rule is to write one page for every 10 years of experience, says Orenstein. He suggests that all prospective job hunters offer a resume that is just one page.

Orenstein says another mistake is listing your salary requirement. The hiring team doesn’t know you or know how valuable you are, so it can only seem too high to them.

Don’t be me-oriented. Write the resume to please the reader. Let him or her know why hiring you will be good for the company.

Use a chronology. Orenstein suggests showing the progress you have made — starting with your first job and ending with the most current. It’s human nature to follow things in chronological order, he says.

Many resumes aren’t convincing. If=you say you doubled sales in a short amount of time, be specific so they know it’s the truth.

Which sounds better? “Worked diligently to surpass sales quota on an ongoing basis” or “exceeded $1 million quarterly sales quota by at least 25 percent for six consecutive quarters”?

Numbers are good, according to Monster.com, which provided the above example.

And, above all, forget the stiff, formal language. Write the way you talk. It’s more approachable. Less uppity.

Stand Out From the Crowd

Because your resume has so little time to make its point, you need a point of differentiation, something unique. The Professional Bookkeeper designation is just the thing to add credibility and get your resume noticed!

Learn More About the Professional Bookkeeper Designation

Take Our 10-Question Quiz to Find Out

A good boss makes his men realize they have more ability than they think they have so that they consistently do better work than they thought they could. - Charles Erwin Wilson

As you travel along your career path, at one point or another you’re going to determine whether or not you aspire to lead people and organizations to greatness. But it takes more than desire to become a leader, and you must first demonstrate your management abilities before you’re ever promoted to a management position. So what does it take to lead others? Take our 10-question quiz to determine whether or not you’re boss material. This week we’ll cover the first five questions.

1. Did you think “big picture”?
Leaders must invoke an alchemy of great vision. - Henry Kissinger.

You will never become boss if you lack the ability to see the big picture. Often employees get wrapped up in their own tasks and responsibilities and are unable to envision how those things are part of an organization’s broader mission and goals. Leaders can look beyond the tedium to see the final destination and can determine whether or not the organization as a whole is on track to get there.

2. Can you inspire others?
Leaders establish the vision for the future and set the strategy for getting there; they cause change. They motivate and inspire others to go in the right direction and they, along with everyone else, sacrifice to get there. - John Kotter

Before answering this question you should ask yourself whether or not you’re inspired to greater things, because it’s impossible to inspire others if you yourself are uninspired. Great managers incite passion and enthusiasm in their employees. The people they manage are driven to greatness because they have been moved to envision not only the organization’s potential but their own.

3. Can you manage a team?
You have to enable and empower people to make decisions independent of you. As I’ve learned, each person on a team is an extension of your leadership; if they feel empowered by you they will magnify your power to lead. - Tom Ridge

Have you had the opportunity to manage a team? If so, this was a good test-run for your leadership skills. Team management requires amazing people skills and the ability to know what team members are working on and how that work fits into the project as a whole. These leaders inspire people to work together and can move a team, and their project, to successful completion.

4. Are you a leader or a follower?
People ask the difference between a leader and a boss. The leader leads, the boss drives. - Theodore Roosevelt.

The word “boss” has developed a negative connotation over the years. Truth be told a good “boss” is a leader while a bad “boss” is just plain bossy. Regardless of your career path it’s important to know yourself. Are you a natural leader or follower? Both are valuable to an organization, but only one can aspire to leadership positions.

5. Are you comfortable giving directions?
The art of management is the art of directing others to get the job done right first time. - Anonymous

Bosses must direct employees. This requires that they 1) know what needs to be accomplished, 2) know who can accomplish it and 3) can articulate how that can accomplished. This is where the boss must dissect that bigger picture into employee responsibilities and tasks.

So how did you fair? Sometimes just knowing what it takes to be a leader can inspire you to begin exhibiting those traits. Come back next week when we’ll cover the last five questions:

6. Do you delegate well?
7. Are you interested in helping coworkers develop and grow?
8. Do you communicate well?
9. Are you charismatic and engaging?
10. Do you really want to be a boss?

As seen in the Salt Lake Tribune

Many would-be entrepreneurs dream of starting their own businesses, but have no idea where to begin. Theses entrepreneurs fear large personal investments with little or no return, or believe almost any home-based business idea is some get-rich scheme involving envelope stuffing or online marketing.

Yet there are many home-based businesses that are perfectly legitimate and offer significant earnings potential to entrepreneurs willing to try. In their book, “The Best Home Businesses for the 21st Century,” Paul and Sarah Edward profile more than 100 viable business ideas that can be performed in a home-based setting, such as fitness trainers to advertising consultants. Ranked among the “best of the best” is a bookkeeping service.

“Despite the availability of easy-to-use accounting software, many small business owners have neither the time nor the inclination to use the software themselves,” Edward says. “Wise business people also realize that their time can be better spent in marketing and doing the income-producing work of their business.”

Starting a bookkeeping service represents one of the lowest costs of entry for any home-based business. The main cost associated with starting such a business is purchasing a computer. The opportunities in the bookkeeping field far outweigh the costs of entry. In the Salt Lake area alone, many of the 33,000 area businesses use a freelancer to handle their accounting and bookkeeping duties, earning freelancers up to $60 per hour for their services. And with the number of small businesses in the Salt Lake area increasing rapidly (more than 1,000 new business licenses issued each month), phenomenal growth opportunities exist for bookkeepers.

A bookkeeping service can be started and operated by almost anyone. Many freelance bookkeepers gained their experience on the job or have learned through attending centers like the Universal Accounting Center, a Salt Lake City-based training center for accountants and bookkeepers. Relatively few freelancers have accounting degrees or are certified public accountants.

Allen Bostrom, CPA, and an instructor at the Universal Accounting Center, explained how someone could begin a home-based business. “We offer seminars that focus on the process of starting and marketing a bookkeeping service. We take the mystery of how to start your business right, what equipment and software you need, and what to charge your clients,” Bostrom said. “We even include information on whom to market your services to and what message to share with potential clients.

“We present valuable information to anyone interested in starting a home-based business, whether they’re experienced or not,” Bostrom said.

Bostrom said that process of getting clients is not difficult,if the person knows what to do, and will do it. Once a home-based business is established, Bostrom said the bookkeeper will often have a steady monthly income that will average $300 per month per client for only six to eight hours of work.

“Many bookkeepers pick up clients while working full-time and do work for them evenings or on weekends,” Bostrom said. “Operating a home-based business this way makes the financial transition from employed to self-employed much easier. Before long you have replaced a full-time income with part-time work.”

In addition to more income, operating a home-based bookkeeping service offers a degree of flexibility not often found in the corporate world. “Most of the bookkeeping work can be done at home so that you can plan your work around your own, or your family’s schedule,” Bostrom said. “Today with mobile phones, fax machines,a nd the Internet, you can work with clients anywhere in the world as though you were right down the street.”

Universal Accounting Center offers a free two-hour seminar to individuals wanting to start their own home-based bookkeeping business. The seminar covers the basics of starting a business including marketing and growing the business, equipment needs, fees, and more.

For further information, or to register for a free seminar, call 801-265-3777.

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