GeoSpatial Connect Job Seeker Coaching
No matter at what point you are in your career, moving up the ladder or even just trying to get onto it, it is all about building relationships not just connections.
It is very easy these days to build lots of connects on Facebook, Linked In, Google Plus, etc , I can even show you a strategy on how to build good quality connections in a short period of time, but are these connections good for your career.
Let’s have a look at three broad areas and why both sides of the equation can be important but it will be very obvious which side you should be leaning towards. These broad areas are “Quality versus Quantity”, “Mentors versus Colleagues” and “Networking versus Chatting”.
Quality versus Quantity
I have almost 8000 connections on Linked In, there may be a good chance you are one of these people, but how many of these people do I really know and connect with on a regular basis, to be honest not many. That is not to say I have not had at least one e-mail conversation with a great majority of them but there are probably only a couple of hundred people that I converse with on a regular basis. In many ways business and finding a job can be seen in this category, so it is a real numbers game. The more people you connect with the more likely you are to find people you resonate with. The aim of the game is to find enough quality people to build a professional relationship with. Find people that are doing the sort of role you would like to be doing, or work for the company you would like to work for. Reach out and introduce yourself, connect, follow and ask questions. Build the relationships as this is what will get you a job or promotion or anything you desire.
Mentors versus Colleagues
When you are building your quality list of connections, look for people who can help you on the journey. As mentioned above, people in the role you would like to have, or who work for a company you would like to work for. These are the sorts of people who can mentor you or give you the inside running on a job vacancy that may be coming up. Don’t disregard your college mates or other work colleagues as one day they may be in the position of influence but build the relationship with the people who can help you right here, right now.
Networking versus Chatting
It is very easy today to waste time chatting to your connections about the weather, the results of the weekend sports, family or any irrelevant small talk. Don’t get me wrong this is important in building a solid relationship as you want the people you are connecting with to feel a genuine connection, but too many times we waste time chatting about nothing and forget to ask simple questions that will help us to get to the crux of why we are networking. Networking is probably the most important part of the job seeking process but it is one part that most people do not put time into. When I ran GISjobs Australia for over 10 years, I would say that less than 25% of all GIS industry roles were filled through advertising or through external recruitment agencies. That means that most jobs are filled through word-of-mouth, well before they are advertised. Make an effort to be involved in your local business and user groups, get know in your industry, be an active participant not just expecting things to flow to you without any effort.
Dean Howell
GeoSpatial Connect
#People
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A few weeks back, Aleks did an interview with the CEO of Estimote, where we got a glimpse of what we can expect from iBeacon technology (here’s the link to the interview). iBeacon is a feature that Apple Inc introduced in WWDC June this year and was officially announced as one of the features in iOS 7. Anyone who follows Apple will pretty much know, how the social media took to iOS 7. There were articles about a lot of misses but what we did not hear so much was about iBeacon! Now with reports coming in about Apple’s implementation of iBeacon in its stores, there has been an explosion of articles and news items claiming how Apple’s iBeacon is going to change the Indoor Positioning landscape and retail shopping.
So what is iBeacon and How does it work?
iBeacon is basically Apple’s brand of indoor positioning technology that utilizes Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) to detect your presence inside a building using small wireless sensors called Beacons. The Beacons transmit data to your iPhone (Andriod is also going to roll out support I read) using BLE or Bluetooth 4. Beacons is not an Apple technology but the buzz is due to that fact that Apple has decided to throw its weight behind BLE in comparison to Google’s fondness for NFC or Near Field Communication.
iBeacon is so highly rated not only because it can transform the indoor positioning landscape but also because it has the potential to change the retail experience, mobile payments and so much more.
Already a lot of companies are rolling out support for iBeacon and are starting to make use of the technology to enhance their retail shopping experience. Macy’s became the first store to announce iBeacon shopping experience. So the next time you walk into a Macy’s with your iOS device, you will receive information regarding the latest sales offers and more. This technology over a period of time could end up being the deciding factor in your shopping choices.
Hasn’t this technology been around for a while? or atleast the concept, then why the hype?
Well, to be honest, I had the same question in my mind before I ended up spending a couple of hours reading about it before coming to the conclusion: iBeacon is definitely an interesting development. It is not only a marketing or indoor positioning system, it’s being developed with the idea of being the next level of shopping experience. Let me quote an example that I read online at 9to5Mac.com
Let’s get a little more sophisticated. You may be standing in a clothes store looking at suits. The system notes that you’ve been stood in front of one particular display for a couple of minutes, so it might offer to show you what the suit would look like on you. It directs you to what appears to be a mirror, which photographs you and then overlays an image of the suit on your photo. It offers to show you other colors and styles. – 9to5mac.com
To add this to expanding list of possibilities, paypal announced its own PaypalBeacon which means that paypal is also onboard to enable mobile payments without you even lifting a finger. No more queuing up to make payments! This means NFC for mobile payments could slowly be phased out; but if we have learnt anything from the Tech Industry, it is “nothing is forever”.
Forget about QR codes, NFC technology, kiosks, and tablets as the major game changers in retail; introducing iBeacon and Bluetooth Low Energy technology to our everyday retail experiences is like introducing the Flintstones to the Jetsons shopping mall. – PCMAG
If you are eager to read more about iBeacons, Paypal Beacons, BLE and more; here’s a good list of articles 🙂
There is going to be a boom in the number of location-based applications that have for retail. More and more retailers will want to install BLE based Beacons to be able to leverage this new technology. Whether the iBeacon experience is going to be the Jetsons shopping experience or just another privacy problem is something that we will have to wait and watch.
