What Would Dad Say » Paul Epps

Doomsday Cometh

admin — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 13:21:53 +0000

Ed. Note: Never met Paul Epps but his blog makes me laugh out loud. If you grew up in a small town like I did, you have heard your own versions of the doomsday scenario. And, by the way, Paul’s writing skill is unmatched.

by Paul Epps, in his blog, found here.

Doomsday Cometh

15 Jun 2009 / PE

Credit: Paula Wirth

I saw my brother for the first time in years this past weekend. He’s been living in Utah but he’s now on his way to Alaska to escape the coming Armageddon.

Canada and Mexico will be invading the United States from the top and bottom . . . I’ve forgotten the details, but it’s going to be bad. I don’t know why he was informed about this and I wasn’t.

I’m not moving to Alaska though. I’m not a cold-weather person. They can kill me right here in a pair of shorts . . .

Paul Epps: Interviewing Techniques

admin — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 02:14:47 +0000

Ed. Note: Most of us who write about the job search, resumes and interviews often make the mistake of being condescending, as in “Sammy, you dummy, here is how you should do your resume.” Other times, we write stuff that is equivalent to “and the world is round.” When we do succeed, it’s most often because we re-tell a story, or use a metaphor, that makes a larger point in a clever, memorable way. My online friend, Paul Epps, himself a programmer and writer, just posted a clever story about an interview his company just completed. Nick Corcodilos would be proud.

From Paul Epps’ EPPS NET, January 11, 2009 Interview Tips

Willingness

I been warped by the rain, driven by the snow
I’m drunk and dirty don’t ya know, and I’m still willin’

— Little Feat, “Willin’”

If you’re a genius like Mozart and you’ve got a 1000 IQ in music or whatever your specialty is, then you can distinguish yourself by doing things that other people are simply not capable of doing.

Lucky you!

On the other hand, if you’re a person of moderate intelligence like me, you’re going to have to distinguish yourself by doing more than other people are willing to do — not more than they’re capable of doing, but more than they’re willing to do.

We were interviewing candidates this week for a web editor position. One of the candidates brought in some mockups he had made to illustrate how we could incorporate social networking elements into our web site.

Were the ideas groundbreaking in any respect? No. Could the other candidates have done the same thing? Probably, if they’d been willing to put in the effort.

But they didn’t.

I have to assume that you’ll approach the job the same way you approach the interview. Are you willing to do more than what’s absolutely required?

Preparation

If you want to pull a rabbit out of your hat at the interview, first you’ve got to put a rabbit in your hat.

In fact, given the high degree of uncertainty, you may want to put 10 rabbits in your hat and be ready to pull out whichever one you need.

At the very least, you must be absolutely prepared to answer the question, “What makes you the best person for the job?”

Even if that question is never explicitly asked, everything you say and do must be targeted at answering it.

Put together a list of the unique contributions you’ll make to the job and the company. Brush up on a few stories that show you at your best in the workplace.

In politics, these are called “talking points.” Politicians don’t try to think up answers on the fly to every question someone throws at them. They have a prepared list of points to make, no matter what you ask them.

So do you!

Reviews of DIG YOUR JOB: On Playboy.com, And More.

admin — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 22:00:33 +0000

The first review of Dig Your Job is up now at Playboy.com. Rumor is that National Geographic is next. Kidding.

But seriously, the most recent three book reviews at this site were Snowball, Alice Schroeder’s brilliant biography of Warren Buffet, Andrew Zuckerman’s classy portrait book Wisdom (with Clint Eastwood on the cover), and hilarious Men With Balls book by a Deadspin editor. I am in good company.

A trip to Hef’s Mansion is out of the question. I asked, but they said no.

More praise by:

From Barbara Safoni at Career Management Alliance

From Dave Opton, founder and CEO of ExecuNet

From Mike Street at greasyguide.com

Deborah Brown at SurpassYourDreams

Heather Hulman at Examiner.com

Dan Schwabel at Personal Branding

Anita Bruzzese at USATODAY and GANNETT

Alexandra Levit over at her awesome blog, Water Cooler Wisdom.

Naomi Moneypenny at ManyWorlds.

Nick Reddin of Manpower, BOOK OF THE YEAR. wow, Nick, thanks.

Nick Corcodilos of AskTheHeadhunter fame, one of this industry’s most reliable voices said this about DIG YOUR JOB. Read Nick.

From Chris Russell, Secrets of the Job Hunt

From Paul Epps, one of the first bloggers that made me laugh, at EppsNet.

Lewis at Seattle Interview coach wrote a nice post on his blog about the book, too.

HEY!!! I Made Me Some Art!!

admin — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 16:58:42 +0000

A word or tag cloud is a Web 2.0 thing you see on a lot of blogs, even websites. Basically, it graphically presents the words in a document by relevance, alphabetical order, number of times the word was used, etc. You can read about them here.

A wordle is a word game. Jonathan Feinberg, an IBM researcher, combined both of these into Wordle.net, a time killer that will take any group of words and create a cloud for you. Cool.

So, what I did, in like 15 minutes, was go to several bloggers who I read every day, and “wordled” them. The bloggers are Seth Godin, Dr. Ellen Weber, Robyn McMaster, Jacob Share, Steve Roesler, Jason Alba , Drew McLellan, and Dan Schawbel.

Hat Tip: Paul Epps.

The resulting artwork follows, try to match them up.