How to Become Hired at your Dream Marketing Job

Everyone wants to work with what they love to do, but it is not an easy task to get hired at your dream marketing company. So what does it actually take for you to become hired there?

Well, let’s flip sides for a moment.

You are the recruiter for a great marketing company that is hiring some talents. Would you hire someone who knows how to handle all softwares with excellence but has an “asshole” personality? Or would you rather hire someone who isn’t that good with software, but is an excellent, coachable, team player with great attitude? 9 out of 10 would go with the second person.

The problem here is that school doesn’t teach coachability, team player abilities, or attitude. You have to figure that out yourself. You also have to know what type of person the company is looking for. If you want to become an accountant you should be detail-oriented. If you are looking to become a sales representative you should be goal-oriented.

Wouldn’t it make sense to know and develop these traits before you apply for a job?

Of course it would, and that’s why I found out the exact soft skills they are looking for in a marketer

The Top 6 Soft Skills for a Successful Marketer

Combining sought after personality traits with matching requirements of experience, degrees, and skills makes you a candidate they can’t refuse.

Here are the top 6 soft skills:

6. Results-oriented

In a marketing environment, you are always expected to produce quality results. Being able to meet objectives and deadlines means that you are not only disciplined, but that you have a your priorities straight as well.

5. Solution-oriented

Working with marketing means a lot of chance - and a lot of new problems and challenges. A highly positive mindset that turns any problem into a thinking process of finding a way to solve it, no matter how big or small the problem is.

4. Coachable

Not only do you have to be able to listen, interpret, and execute new habits, you also have to be humble and self-aware that you do not always know best - but you are striving to become the best. A friend of mine said that when he produces anything he “removes pride from process, and add it when you’re done”. This is the mindset of a coachable person.

3. Analytical

To be analytical, you have to look at the whole picture and see the sum of its parts. In terms of marketing, you have to consider cultures, trends, economic environments, and human behaviour when making smart decisions. Knowledge and a sharp thought process is key.

2. Team player

There are lots of sub-skills that you have to have in order to be a good team player, communication, accountability, unselfishness, and the ability to build and maintain relationships are the most important parts of being a team player. Self-centered persons could have all the above traits, but without the ability to be a true team player you will always fall short.

1. Self-driven

The most important soft skill to have as a marketer is to be self-driven. This does not only apply for marketing, or even business, but for life in general. The keys to be self-driven comes from self-leadership, discipline, and an attitude that exudes great willpower even when things are getting tough. A true self-leader is in control by being proactive, and follows a well designed plan for himself, which makes him successful both in business, and in life.

Add the requirements and experience of having:

• A BA degree in marketing
• At least two years of experience
• Excellent written- and communication skills
• Very skilled in MS Office (Word, PowerPoint, Excel etc.)

And you will be an unrefusable candidate for the job.

As a conclusion, knowledge is far away from enough to be hired at your dream company. In fact, this could be your advantage depending on the person you are. If you feel that you are lacking in any of the top 6 traits, make sure to learn what you are lacking, and you might end up being the most valuable person in your company. You could become so valuable, that you are the last person they would fire and the first person they want to hire. Who wouldn’t want that?

How to make the World Sustainable Again - Changing the Game for Businesses around the World

The earth today is not used in a sustainable way. The problems with global warming, and climate change comes largely from man-made carbon dioxide emissions, which has been proven but is unfortunately still debated. I believe that the facts from science beats people’s opinions every time, and the chart below proves my point about CO2 and its effect on temperature.

This post however, is not focused on the problem, but the solution to this problem. The solution to reducing CO2 emissions all over the world in the best way possible, exploiting behaviors of human competitiveness and greed to change the world from the current state, to a sustainable one.

By tracking down the major sources of CO2 emissions, the emissions originates from:

• Forestry
• Agriculture
• Industry
• Waste and waste water
• Energy supply
• Transport
• Residential and commercial buildings

Out of all these sources, forestry, energy supply, industry, and agriculture are directly related to businesses - which adds up to 76% of all CO2 sources. Since the main purpose of a business is to make a profit, businesses are actually competing to contribute to the global warming - and eating up resources in a non-sustainable way.

It is estimated that the ecological resources of the planet sums up to around $50 trillion dollar for human purposes like filtering water and storing CO2 emissions, in other words - we have to pay our reduction in resources in one way or another. The solution to the problem of CO2 emissions is to look at why business does this in the first place - which is to make a profit, and change the way a business makes a profit. A profit is in it’s most basic form the result of what is left after subtracting expenses to the income. In order to make sure that businesses work in a sustainable way, we have to add ecological resources to the expenses category, to make businesses compete to make the earth sustainable again. What got us, humans, here in the first place was competitiveness and greed. Adding ecological resources in the financial statement would not only mean that expenses would be added, but companies can theoretically make money on i.e. planting trees to store CO2 - making ecological resources an income and not expenses. Assumed that the government sees this as an opportunity to save money by having a long term mindset.

Imagining a world where businesses and people make a profit from making the earth sustainable would finally leverage the human potential of being a force for good, rather than the destructive force we are today. The new mindset of working FOR the earth instead of against it  would definitely turn the world around, and at the same time make sure that we can put food on our tables for ourselves and our kids. I really hope that it happens soon, otherwise we will experience a future that is not suitable for the generations to come.

http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/ghgemissions/global.html

http://www.futuretimeline.net/21stcentury/images/correlation-co2-temperature-graph.jpg

http://www.esd.ornl.gov/benefits_conference/nature_paper.pdf

Was the Refugio Oil Spill a Result of Greed?

The Refugio oil spill caused not only the death of over 200 animals, but also a big “I told you so” for the environmentalist around US. The question is; could this have been prevented?

According to www.zacks.com, “The cause of the rupture has not yet been ascertained (June 12). However, in early May, federal regulators had found extensive external corrosion along some sections of the pipeline.” Which means that the company responsible for this pipeline, Plains All American, did know about this problem, but decided not to do anything about it.

By looking at Plains All American Income statement, we can see that the revenue for the first quarter (January - Mars) was reduced to almost 50% of last years earning.

Revenue Q1 (millions of dollars)

2015  2014  2013 2012

5,942 11,684 10,620 9,218

The net income was also reduced from 384 million to 284 million, a difference of over $100 million for the first quarters of 2014 and 2015. If Plain All American wanted to fix the corrosion problems, they could have done so with the income generated. But instead they had to pay $65 million to clean up (so far), which means 23% of Plains All American Pipelines net income for Q1 2015.

Plains spokesman Patrick Hodgins has since come out and defended its record to media by reiterating that Plains is one of the largest midstream operators in the nation, and operates substantially more pipeline than many other companies in the PHMSA database.

According to bizjournalz.com, As cleanup continues on the major oil leak in California, the Los Angeles Times reports that federal records show Plains Pipeline LP has had 175 safety and maintenance infractions since 2006.

This means that once every three weeks, Plains All American has a maintenance infraction. Not a good history.

I believe that profit and the avoidance of expenses has cost Plains All American in the long run, since they have only thought about reducing costs for that quarter. If ony companies could pay to prevent huge mistakes, the world would be a better place.

#refugiooilspill

Plains All American Pipeline - Website

Refugio Response Information Website

Is Europe Guided Towards War?

I just finished watching a documentary, Zeitgeist, that made me think about the world, and what kind of systems we are put in as human beings. It made me question how free our will really is, and how our perspective of the world is almost entierly formed by the media we are absorbing, and the people that ultimately runs the world.

The goal of Zeitgeist was to make us humans THINK and QUESTION what's really happening around us. Sometimes, or even most of the times, we are finding out things using the path of least energy. Like Googleing a subject, and finding out a direct answer to a big question. I'm not saying that it is wrong to do so, I am even doing it myself, but the principle of always chosing the path of least energy can be costly in the long run - forming believes that you have about the world that is not true and unsupported. Even humans are usually more wrong than right when asked about something. Do your own research. Stop listening to what the TV says. Use critical thinking.

I am using critical thinking more and more, but it is not easy to be aware of how we are affected by what someone tells us. After all, it is part of our social codes to try to understand each other in order to be part of a group, but we must learn to differ from what is true, and what is not.

What scared me most about this documentary was how the future of Europe will look like. Are we heading towards war? The first step towards war is to separate ourselves from others, so we can "see" the enemy.
This year started with a "terrorist attack" in Paris, known all over the world. Sweden and Germany are becoming more and more hostile to immigrants, having the right winged parties steadily increasing their votes and power. This is not a good trend... especially since Sweden is considered the most neutral, peaceful country on earth. If Sweden starts a conflict, then what kind of message does that send to the rest of the world?

Maybe it is time to do some research to see what is going on behind closed doors of Europe. The biggest profits are made from war. Look at the documentary and see what is really going on...

Technology in Education

In 1995, less than 1% had access to Internet. 20 years later, 50% of the world has access to this global phenomena that makes us informed, and connected in a way we have never seen before.

The use of the Internet has already started to impact the way education works, both for students, and for teachers. Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC), TED talks, KhanAcademy, and other platforms makes it easy for any individual to learn new skills. Many schools are also provided with a platform that connects students with their courses, which makes the teachers more in control of the assignments and delivery of personal feedback.

So, what are the pros and cons of this technology? Well, I just read this morning that 190 scientist have released a document saying that electronic devices such as cellphones, "are damaging the living cells in our body, and killing many of us prematurely", which has lead to an official warning about electronic devices usage. Future will tell if this report has an impact on the market, but if it does, then we could see a decline in the number of social media users for the first time in history.

A huge con for social media - in general and for educational purposes - is that we start to rely on technology that might not work as well in the future, especially if there will be a digital divide from the report I just mentioned above. What if some parents tell their kids not to use their cellphones anymore due to the risks of using it? This will mean that some students can't access the Internet to the same extent as other students, which could essentially affect their grades.

Although we did receive bad news from the scientists this morning, we can't ignore the benefits of using Internet for educational purposes. I am writing this blog post as a part of an online class where the teacher is in Australia. That sentence could never have been written 2 decades ago, and I must say that I enjoy online classes since I can use my own time and place to answer questions in my own pace. I do believe that online educations are here to stay, and will only keep growing. It is no coincidence that LinkedIn just bought Lynda.com to further develop their platform, and increase their market value. Some platforms will cost money, but some are also out there for free, which will decrease the knowledge gap between countries, assuming that they have access to the technology of course.

A few days ago I held an interview with a project manager and the president of a creative marketing agency. I asked them which kind of hard skills you would have to have to be a successful marketer, and they said that "software skills is something that you should have as marketer, understanding excel, Photoshop, and other important software programs will increase your chances of becoming a successful marketer". I think that schools needs to understand that we should increase the hard skills in software programs, and make us learn the proper use of technology. I know that it can be hard for teachers to learn and teach such a rapid technology, but if they don't do it then students will be lacking even further skills and knowledge when they enter the marketplace.