Liz Ryan
Liz Ryan is a former Fortune 500 Human Resources exec and an expert on the changing workplace. Liz is the leader of the 25,000-member Ask Liz Ryan Online Community, and the author of "Happy About Online Networking: the Virtual-ly Simple Way to Build Professional Relationships." Liz is a CNN commentator on workplace and career topics, and a columnist for Business Week Online, Kiplinger's Finance, Yahoo! and other publications. Liz is an opera singer (dramatic soprano) who lives in Boulder, Colorado with her husband and their five kids, two dogs and two cats.
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- Page Views
- 106,733
- Content
- 48
- Fans
- 15
- Contributor since
- 10/4/2011
Education/Experience
BA Loyola University of Chicago, MS Northwestern University; Manhattan School of Music, vocal performance majorInterests
workplace, networking, job search, careers, social networking, Facebook, interviews, resumes, cover letter, LinkedIn, salary negotiation, job offers, small business, branding, entrepreneurism, leadership, HR, policy, employee communications, team-buildingMotto
I am working to bring humanity back into the workplace.Favorites
None yet.
Displaying Results 1 - 48 (of 48) for All Content
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How to Hire for MojoTraditional hiring puts all the emphasis on years and type of experience, educational credentials and formal qualifications. That's insane, since the people who get everything done in any business are the people with mojo.
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Job-Seeker: Show, Don't Tell, What You're Capable OfWe can't expect a hiring manager to take our word for it when we say we're smart, savvy, results-oriented or strategic. We've got to make the case through stories.
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Why "Strategic Business Partner" is the Worst HR Title EverIn their quest to be taken seriously, HR folks have adopted what's got to be the world's most fear-based job title: Strategic Business Partner. Are they trying to hasten the downward slide of HR credibility?
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Is This Your Last Full-Time Job?Are you ready for the new world of work? Most working people aren't. They're still behaving as though getting a job and keeping it were their chief priority, or even a goal to shoot for
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Don't Lob One More Resume into the Black HoleYou know the Black Hole chews up resumes and eats them. The response rate from a corporate careers site is ridiculously low. Here's how to avoid the whole Black Hole scenario
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The Wildly Self-Confident Job SeekerWe've all met the wildly overconfident job-seeker at one point or another. Who is that person, and why does he or she act that way? Maybe there's a lesson for all of us in the question
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Help! I'm Not Qualified for Any Job I See AdvertisedReading the typical help-wanted ad, a person with a reasonable work experience can easily feel like a can of chopped liver! Job ads ask for the moon, but you can get a job without having many (or even most) of the listed job requirements
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Six Reasons to Run from a Job OpportunityThe myth says "Employers are in the driver's seat. There are so many people chasing so few jobs." True: lots of people are out of work. But employers aren't high-fiving over their good fortune, as great employees are incredibly hard to find.
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Working at the Top of Maslow's HierarchyThe laser tag lady reminded me that it's more important who you get to be in the job than what the title is
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LinkedIn Advice: How Do I Reach a Third-Degree Connection (and What Do I Say?)Your first-degree LinkedIn contacts are your friends. Your second-degree connections are friends of your friends. Your third-degree connections are important members of your network, too, but it takes a certain finesse to enlist them in your project
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When I Grow Up, I Want to Be a Results-Oriented ProfessionalCan we move past boilerplate corporate speech to interact like humans at work, and can we talk about ourselves using a human voice in our branding? We'd be a lot less stressed out if we could get there.
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Ten Ways Employers Screw Up HiringIt's not only job-seekers who gnash their teeth over the sad state of things in the getting-a-job department. CEOs are none too pleased, either, because their own corporate hiring machines are broken. Here are the top ten ways hiring engines fail
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Love the Offer, Hate the Money: How to Negotiate a Salary OfferFormer Fortune 500 HR VP shares tips for sweetening the salary part of any job offer
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Don't Believe It!: The Three Worst Lies Told in BusinessHow many of the time-honored, dusty business 'rules' are out of date, irrelevant or just idiotic? Former HR VP Liz Ryan breaks it down
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Tell a Story in Your ResumeDespite the high unemployment rate, employers are desperate for good employees. Done-to-death phrases like "motivated self-starter" can't help you make an impression, but your stories can.
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Why I'll Shop at J.C. PenneyJ.C.Penney brought itself big-league controversy when it joined forces with openly gay talk-show host Ellen DeGeneres to rebrand itself for a reinvention. Here's one suburban mom's take on the affair
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Goodbye to Resumes, Cover Letters, and Job Ads?Resumes and cover letters don't cut it anymore. How are firms bringing in talent in the post-Black-Hole recruiting era?
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How to Answer the Worst Job-Interview Questions (Without Groveling)We all know the two most annoying job-interview questions: Why Should We Hire You? and What's Your Greatest Weakness? Don't roll over and beg when interviewers ask these brainless questions: show some mojo, instead!
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Reinventing Your Career? Five Ways to Get Your Brain MovingCareer expert Liz Ryan shares tips for moving your career reinvention along
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Why Employers Can't Find Good PeopleEmployers across the U.S. are clamoring about talent shortages, high unemployment rate notwithstanding. What's going on? Here's one expert's take on what's keeping great companies and brilliant employees apart.
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Job Search Without GrovelingA lady wrote to me. " I've read some of your columns about resumes, where you tell people to use a human voice and avoid pitching resumes into the Black Hole." That's just the beginning. Most of what we know about job search is wrong, as it turns out.
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Put a Human Voice in Your ResumeWe've all seen enough 'results-oriented professional' type resumes to last a lifetime, or more. Put some spark and life into your resume by using a human voice, instead a robotic corporate battle drone one
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The End of Employment?As the working world shifts from a full-time worker model to something completely different, people who put their faith in their employers to manage their careers will be sorry they did.
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The Implosion of the Recruiting Black HoleWe know the rigid, left-brained, governmental, soul-crushing Black Hole recruiting system is broken. Will employers find the courage to tell the truth about the Black Hole problem and start building a solution?
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Put a Human Voice in Your ResumeAdding a human voice to your resume will bring more of your power onto the page -- try it!
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How to Write a Pithy LinkedIn RecommendationIt's nice to have recommendations from other LinkedIn users glittering on your profile, but only if they make you sound as brilliant and powerful as you really are
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Take a Survival Job (But Don't Get Lost in It)There's no shame in working a retail job or finding other employment to put food on the table. Here's how to find one and keep your 'career' job search going, without trashing your self-esteem and your brand
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Job-Seeker, It's Not Your Fault: The Hiring System is Brokenworkplace expert Liz Ryan describes why the process for hiring people is broken beyond repair - and how to capitalize on that breakdown
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Should You Quit Your Job in 2012?If you're thinking about quitting your job next year, don't write to ask me whether you should --- because I'll tell you "Do it!"
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Does Your LinkedIn Headline Tell Your Story?Your LinkedIn profile headline matters, because it's all most LinkedIn users will see of your profile apart from your name. Make your LinkedIn headline count!
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Employers, Why the Hate?Over twenty-five years in HR, I haven't seen a job-search environment quite as hard on job-seekers as this one is. Why do employers abuse job applicants? Don't they know that their insulting job-application processes are driving the best candidates away?
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Forget the Cover Letter! Write a Pain Letter, InsteadMost job-seekers know that a cover letter is a boring document that doesn't differentiate them. Let's throw out the cover letter, and write a pithy Pain Letter instead
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Five Clues to Pay Attention to on Your Next Job InterviewWe're trained to go on a job interview ready to please the interviewer. It's easy to forget that you have some standards, too.
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Personal Branding Doesn't Have to Be CheesyWe've been told that we need a personal brand for a job search or entrepreneurial venture, but we see so many cringe-worthy examples, we may be put off by the concept. Here's a more human, non-sales-y way to think about personal branding.
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Five Signs Your CEO is IncompetentIf your employer is going through a rough patch, there's no need for panic - as long the ship's captain has a clue. Here are five signs you're working for someone who has no business being in charge.
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Ten Personal Branding Mistakes to AvoidWhen you're writing a LinkedIn headline or composing your 15-second "who am I?" speech, watch out for these common personal branding pitfalls
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Five Lousy Reasons to Put Off a Job SearchStaying at the wrong job longer than necessary can hurt you, so pay attention to these tips from careers expert Liz Ryan on how to know when to bail.
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Five LinkedIn Blunders that Can Hurt YouWorkplace expert Liz Ryan shares five ways that misusing the popular business networking site LinkedIn can destroy the very relationships you're trying to cultivate.
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Dear Job-Seeker: You Suck, but We'll Keep Your Resume on FileWhen corporate resume-screeners start to believe their own hype, this is what you get.
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Give Your LinkedIn Headline Some PersonalityYour LinkedIn headline is the only thing (apart from your name) a LinkedIn user will know about you when your name comes up in a LinkedIn member search. Why not make your headline count?
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How to Rock Online Job ApplicationsIf you're going to take the time to fill out those tedious online job applications, follow our suggestions to make your application stand out in a good way
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How to Answer the Interview Question "What Did You Earn at Your Last Job?"Employers love to ask job-seekers what they got paid at the last job, or every job they've ever held. Here's how to pass the 'salary history test' without spilling the beans and hurting your negotiation chances
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"A Culture, Not a Costume" Campaign is MisguidedStudents are up in arms that there are Halloween costumes of Asians, Mexicans and Arabs. That's a crazy thing to get worked up about.Also published on:
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Are We Teaching Job-Seekers to Grovel?In an age of Occupy Wall Street and massive unrest among working people, can we lose the plantation-era mindset about getting (or having) a job?
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Five Lies You'll Hear on a Job InterviewJob-seekers are used to answering tough questions on a job interview. But do they know when X means Y, and how to read between the lines when the job-interview BS starts flying?
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Answering the Interview Question "Why Should We Hire You?"We've been taught that the best answer to the dreaded "Why you?" job interview question is a suck-up reply. That's not so, says former Fortune 500 HR exec and career advisor Liz Ryan - there's a better way to get your power across.
