Smile for What it’s Worth

Don’t underestimate the value of a smile. Literally.

A study of recent MBA graduates found that optimistic people get hired more quickly than their less-optimistic peers. Plus happy workers were more likely to get promoted.

Whether at work or in your personal life, wouldn’t you rather deal with happy people than unhappy people? The notion is quite universal. Even pessimists prefer optimists.

Vicky Oliver’s latest book, “The Millionaire’s Handbook”

“Being happy on the job improves your reputation,” says author Vicky Oliver. “Optimism also makes you more resilient, able to adapt to new situations, and solve problems faster. Happy employees get better feedback from bosses and peers. And they enjoy more job satisfaction because work doesn’t feel boring, difficult, or unpleasant.”

Oliver, an image consultant in Manhattan, is the author of five bestselling books on personal branding, etiquette, and career development, including her latest, “The Millionaire’s Handbook: How to Look and Act Like a Millionaire Even If You’re Not.”

In this video, another happiness professional, Gretchen Rubin, gives advice on how she, and you, can find contentment in everyday life.

Here are four tips from Oliver on how to put on a happy face at work and smile all the way to the bank:

1. Wear your “rose colored glasses” to work. For every disappointment, find a lesson. Try to see a positive aspect in situations that don’t turn out the way you intend. For example, maybe you didn’t get the job, but you got your foot in the door at the company, making it easier to go back next time. Maybe you didn’t talk to the most important person at the cocktail party, but you talked to the second most important person.

2. Pepper your language with upbeat words and phrases. Words have a powerful, subliminal effect on others’ moods and impressions. Bosses and coworkers love dealing with pleasant, positive people. It’s easy to jazz up routine exchanges by adding words that convey a happy mood and upbeat energy. So, “I’d be delighted to” is much better than “Sure.”

3. Give yourself a daily pep talk. Write down 10 statements you’d tell your best friend if she suffered a career setback. For example, “You did the best you could,” or “Mistakes are great ways to learn.” When you don’t get the praise you deserve from an irascible boss, tell yourself, “That’s his problem, not mine.”

4. If you feel a complaint coming on, zip it. Complaining makes you feel worse, and it makes others around you feel worse too. Just as happiness is contagious, so is negativity. If you can’t figure out a way to say something constructive about a problem or challenge, then keep quiet. People who act positive are perceived as being positive.

Despite what you’re feeling, in the end just acting cheerful in the face of challenges will do great things for your career and professional reputation.

 

Mark Cafferty on Career Talk Radio

Mark Cafferty has been the president and CEO of the San Diego regional Economic Development Corporation (EDC) for a little over a year. Before that Cafferty spent nearly six years at San Diego Workforce Partnership, working his way up to president and CEO.

Cafferty has plans to improve and expand the way the EDC strives to establish more jobs in San Diego. Since taking his position at the EDC, Cafferty has been paying special attention to companies like Qualcomm, focusing on growing jobs in the area rather than moving pre-existing jobs here.

A recent study produced by Cafferty and the EDC, regarding Qualcomm’s overwhelming economic presence in the region, is intended to serves as a guideline for creating homegrown jobs in San Diego, like Qualcomm did. Rather than focus of the EDC being “to attract high-wage companies to the region from around the world,” as stated in the EDC’s mission statement, Cafferty hopes to expand that mission to include the generation of new local jobs as well.

Hear Cafferty discuss his most recent work at the EDC and give advice for job seekers in San Diego on the upcoming episode of Career Talk Radio. Click here to listen live Thursday June 13 at 10:30 am.

Check out this video of Cafferty talking about San Diego’s job summoning potential.

For other episodes of Career Talk Radio, visit the Career Channel at uctv.tv/careers.

Would you Like a Certificate with that Wine?

San Diego has become the craft brew capital of the state with over 50 licensed breweries in the county, which is more than twice the number in the second highest county, Los Angeles. And it doesn’t stop there, 33 more licenses have been issued since that data was collected in 2011.

As San Diego’s craft beer business is brewing,  new opportunities are created for beer lovers, beer brewers, and entrepreneurs alike. UC San Diego Extension offers a way to make beer your business and pleasure with the new brewing certificate.

Do you try to keep your alcohol consumption classy? If you prefer wine over beer, then SDSU has the certificate for you.

Even before Jesus turned water into wine, wine has been a favored beverage among bacchanalian partiers and lonely, single women alike. 2,000 years later, wine is still increasingly popular in the United States.

According to Time Magazine, the U.S. now comprises the biggest chunk of the global wine market, drinking 13 percent of the world’s wine.

With successful books and award winning movies like “Sideways,” the story of two men’s week-long road trip to the Santa Barbara wine country, the culture of wine making is becoming mainstream. As the love of this potent potable is more widespread now than ever, there is certainly a need for more workers in the U.S. wine industry.

If you’re looking to make the transition from wino to sommelier, SDSU offers the Professional Certificate in the Business of Wine program through its College of Extended Studies that has helped numerous students find jobs in the wine industry.

Eddie Zavestoski was just out of college when he decided to be adventuresome and take the SDSU Business of Wine certificate program. Little did he know that it would lead to him becoming a tasting room sales lead in Oregon’s Willamette Valley, where he attributes his career to the extended studies wine program.

“The certificate program instructors work in the business and are very knowledgeable,” Zavestoski said. “They are very willing to answer questions. They make sure everything is clear.”

Some of the Business of Wine students have taken the program for pleasure, but then had it lead to a profitable career in the industry.

“Many of my students have gone on to start their own business,” says the aptly named instructor Lisa Redwine, the second woman in San Diego County to become an advanced sommelier, which is the second-highest distinction possible by the Court of Sommeliers.

The comprehensive certificate courses are geared for professionals and entrepreneurs in the wine, food, and hospitality fields who want to quickly expand their knowledge of wine topics. The certificate is directed to restaurant owners and staff, winery employees, event planners, distribution and retail sales employees, wine bar owners and staff, anyone interested in moving into wine or hospitality careers, and wine enthusiasts who desire a professional-level education.

“Employers in the wine industry prefer to interview job candidates who possess a solid understanding of the basics within their field,” said Joe Shapiro, dean of SDSU’s College of Extended Studies.

For more information, visit www.neverstoplearning.net/wine.

America’s Top Career Coach to Speak at June 8 UC San Diego Career Boost Camp

By Henry DeVries

Understanding your personal brand is the key to boosting your career, according to America’s top career coach, who is coming to UC San Diego on June 8 to speak at the second annual Career Boost Camp, part of the fifth annual Alumni Weekend, June 6-9.

“Your career identity is not some slick piece of advertising,” says best-selling career author Robin Ryan.  “Your career identity is based on the authentic, talented, and genuinely unique and special person you are. It is not phony and conceited, or an exaggeration, nor is it a trick or fleeting fad.”

Ryan is the keynote speaker at the Career Boost Camp sponsored by the UC San Diego Alumni and Extension at 9:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. Saturday, June 8 at the UC San Diego Rady School of Management. Registration is $25 per person and open to the general community. Your registration includes breakfast and a raffle ticket for career help books, workshops and Extension classes (http://alumni.ucsd.edu/careerboost). Parking is free.

CBS Radio says “Robin Ryan is the leading job search expert in America today.” Ryan has appeared on “Oprah,” “Dr. Phil” and more than 1,500 other TV and radio shows. She is the best-selling author of seven books including “What to Do with the Rest of Your Life,” “Over 40 & You’re Hired,” “Winning Cover Letters” and “60 Seconds & You’re Hired!”

Ryan has a successful national career-counseling practice providing individual career coaching, resume writing services, interview preparation and salary negotiation consulting to clients nationwide. A dynamic national speaker, Ryan frequently teaches audiences how to improve their lives and obtain greater success. She has been featured on NBC News, PBS, CNN, NPR and in the Wall Street Journal and USA Today.

“I recommend you give yourself a gift if you care about career advancement,” says Ryan. “No matter what stage you are at in your career  —  the beginning, middle, or senior level, or if you are changing careers or reinventing yourself — you need to give yourself a game plan for your future. Then you will know how to self-promote and market yourself successfully to become the very best you can be.”

The program begins with Ryan’s talk based on her book “60 Seconds & You’re Hired!” The event is also great for networking. A panel of entrepreneurs and UC San Diego alumni will share their career identities and journeys to building successful businesses. Alumni scheduled to appear are: Kalman Chodakiewitz, co-founder and CEO of Cuttle.com; Giola Messinger, founder and CEO of LinkedObjects Inc.; Drew Spaventa, a member of the founding team at ecoATM; and Lisa Gordon, small business ambassador for the City of San Diego.

Science Fiction Novelists Present Free Lecture on “The Literary Imagination”

Science fiction novelists Jonathan Lethem and Kim Stanley Robinson will present a free evening of conversation between authors on “The Literary Imagination” at 7 pm Tuesday, May 14 at the UC San Diego Price Center Ballroom.

In honor of the grand opening of the Arthur C. Clarke Center for Human Imagination, these two authors will discuss their use of imagination in literary works, like the imagined future setting of Clarke’s “2001: A Space Odyssey.” This discussion is part of a weeklong series of inaugural events highlighting the collaboration of different disciplines, from neuroscience to literature, in the study of the imagination within the Arthur C. Clarke Center.

Lethem is a novelist, essayist, and short story writer who has melded the genres of science fiction and detective fiction with his first book in 1994, “Gun, with Occasional Music.” He then published three science fiction novels (“Amnesia Moon,” “As She Climbed Across the Table,” and “Girl in Landscape”) before writing “Motherless Brooklyn,” which garnered mainstream success.

Of all his characters, Lethem claims to identify most with the protagonist of this novel. “Motherless Brooklyn” went on to win numerous awards, including the Nation Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction and the Macallan Gold Dagger for Crime Fiction. His 2003 book, “The Fortress of Solitude,” was a “New York Times” Best Seller and published in fifteen different languages.

Lethem has been praised for not only his blending of genres but for his eagerness to blend literary and popular writing. When asked about his genre mixing, Lethem referred to the way his father’s art “always combined observed and imagined reality on the same canvas, very naturally, very un-self-consciously.” In 2005, Lethem received a MacArthur fellowship.

Robinson, a UC San Diego Alumnus (BA, PhD), is a science fiction writer most famous for his “Mars” trilogy. “Red Mars,” “Green Mars,” and “Blue Mars,” tell the story of the settlement of Mars. With each book, a color transition reflects the changes Mars undergoes in order to become a thriving populated planet.  Robinson’s works frequently explore ecological and sociological themes, such as in his novel “Antarctica,” which was published two years after he went to the pristine frozen continent on assignment from the US National Science Foundation. In 2008, “Time Magazine” declared Robinson a “Hero of the Environment.”

“The Literary Imagination” is free and open to the public, with no tickets or reservations required. For those arriving by car, park at the Gilman Parking Structure. Parking is $4  after 4:30 pm. For more information on this and other Arthur C. Clarke Center events, visit imagination.ucsd.edu.

Exporting Your English Skills

Teaching English abroad has become just as common as studying abroad, offering an opportunity of adventure, particularly popular amongst recent college grads, before settling into the corporate world.

Why has interest in teaching English abroad recently spiked? Half the world’s population is expected to be speaking English by 2015. English is a first language for 400 million people and a fluent second for 300 million to 500 million more.

Cultural and economic reasons have thrust English upon the world stage as the new lingua franca, a common business language used for communications by people who do not share a mother tongue.

If you have ever considered living overseas and earning money at the same time by teaching English, the College of Extended Studies at SDSU and UCSD Extension offer programs that may be a perfect fit for you.

The 130-hour Teaching English as a Second Language/Teaching English as a Foreign Language certificate program is offered through the American Language Institute, a division of SDSU’s Extended Studies. The program prepares novice instructors to live and teach English overseas.

A recent graduate of SDSU’s TESL/TEFL program in Saudi Arabia

SDSU Extended Studies is an approved provider for this and many other “education to career” funding programs through San Diego Workforce Partnership, Military Spouse, and Veterans benefits.

More than 150 graduates of the SDSU program have been employed in nearly 40 countries with the help of the American Language Institute’s job placement assistance program, which combines a solid teaching foundation with hands-on practical classroom experience.

“Traveling and living overseas has been a valuable and meaningful rite of passage for generations of Americans,” said Van Hillier, assistant director of the American Language Institute and course instructor. “Facilitating the process for those interested in such an adventure has been very rewarding.”

Hillier received his undergraduate degree at UCSD and his master’s at Rutgers University. He has been teaching since 1983 and has taught English at SDSU and Harvard as well as overseas in Saudi Arabia and Switzerland. He has also taught English as a foreign language in the U.S., Korea, Jordan, Japan, and Mexico.

In addition, UC San Diego Extension’s professional certificate in Teaching English as a Foreign Language (TEFL) trains teachers to use teaching methods and special techniques to rapidly increase their students’ proficiency and fluency. This certificate provides in-depth study and training in best practices and methodology for teaching English learners.

“The major goals are to provide training which results in highly advanced knowledge and skills in explaining the English language at every level: elementary, secondary, university, and adult, around the world,” says Roxanne Nuhaily, director of the English Language Institute and International Student Services at UC San Diego Extension.

Choose a Company with Employee Development

How important is a company’s dedication to employee development when choosing your career path? Although such training may not be in the fore front of your career decision making, consider the effect employee development may have on your overall job satisfaction.

Two decades of private industry and academic research, summarized in 2010 by Tim Lohrentz of the National Network of Sector Partners, confirms that employee development can improve employer bottom-line profitability by increasing revenues and lowering expenses.

Many employers are skeptical about investing in employee development. Why not, reason many executives, just hire employees with the strengths to fill the jobs? That is a common miscalculation.

The measurements come from a variety of methods including surveys, questionnaires, interviews, focus groups, tests, observation and performance records. A review of the employee development literature reveals the links to profitability in the following five main ways:

• Increased ability to take advantage of innovation

• Increased levels of employee engagement

• Reduced rate of employee absenteeism

• Increased quality of work or service

• Increased productivity

Employee development can also make you a happier employee. In 2008, HR World magazine reported on a study conducted by Spherion Atlantic Enterprises LLC, a staffing firm, in which 6 out of 10 respondents who received development or mentoring said they were very likely to remain with their current employer for the next five years.

Independent research by a local employer of 21,000 confirms the national trends.

“At Qualcomm, we’ve conducted two separate metrics studies of employees who worked with our internal career coaches to align their development with natural talents, interests, and motivators,” says Ed Hidalgo, senior director of staffing at Qualcomm and chairman of the Workforce Investment board of the San Diego Workforce Partnership. “We were excited to find a positive impact on employee engagement and statistically significant increases in performance across two review periods, when these employees were compared against a control group.”

The Conference Board reported that in a survey of 500 CEOs, 98 percent reported at least one business benefit from workplace development. One-third reported a reduction in absenteeism and another 40 percent said that employee development led to increased employee retention.

Hidalgo adds: “The Gallup organization, for example, has gathered some pretty compelling metrics that Qualcomm has taken notice of: higher productivity, higher profitability, higher customer service scores, lower absenteeism, better safely records, etc. in its studies of 32,000 business units that focused on employee development that is ‘strengths-based.’”

Bottom line: companies that thrive do not solely rely on the strengths employees arrive with in today’s competitive business world.

A Few Words on the Future of Libraries

By Henry DeVries

San Diego City Librarian Deborah Barrow is busy with final preparations for a new downtown central library to open this summer, but she’s not too busy to ponder the future role of libraries.

In today’s digital age when most Americans have access to plentiful information on the Internet, it is not uncommon to hear questions about the evolution of and vision for public libraries. Far from fearing obsolescence, Barrow has a clear view of the future—libraries will always be in the business of connecting people with information.

“Libraries are centers of knowledge, and knowledge does not get old,” says Barrow, who leads a system with thirty-five branch libraries visited by more than six million patrons annually and served by nearly four hundred employees. “Knowledge will always be there to be grasped by anyone who wants it and we are one of the conduits to help them.”

Throughout history, libraries have served as a treasury, a protected storehouse of important books and documents. In 1455, Johann Gutenberg unveiled his printing press to the world, ushering in a printing revolution that saw over five hundred thousand books put into circulation before the year 1500. Private libraries were needed to house those precious manuscripts.

“In medieval times, books were valuable possessions far too expensive for most people to own,” says Thomas Frey, executive director of the DaVinci Institute. “As a result, libraries often turned into a collection of lecterns with books chained to them. We have transitioned from a time where information was scarce and precious to today where information is vast and readily available, and, in many cases, free.”

Libraries are undergoing change in the age of Amazon.com, iPhone, and Wikipedia. With the vast amount of information available in the world today, some have likened searching for answers in the digital age to trying to take a sip of water from a wide open fire hydrant.

“According to a recent PEW Research Center study, 91 percent of Americans sixteen or older say public libraries are important to their communities,” says Barrow. “We are the place where free information is available, where there are tools available to find it, and where people are there to help navigate the search.”

A great library is also a setting to allow people to work collectively, hold meetings, and foster community-building conversations—quite the opposite of the stereotypical librarian running around shushing people to be quiet. “For example, students are being encouraged to study and do projects together,” says Barrow. “Now you need to be able to talk at the library; otherwise, how are you going to communicate your ideas about the project you are working on together?”

Designed to that end, the new library is a nine-story building of flexible spaces with diverse and accessible public amenities. Bay-view terraces, roof gardens and a public reading room reflect and celebrate San Diego’s natural beauty and temperate climate. The library’s open spaces are designed to invite patrons to explore exhibits or relax with new-found reading material. Unique features include a flexible special events room on the ninth floor, a state-of-the-art auditorium, and a beautiful reading room under the signature lattice dome—creating a distinct and extraordinary facility.

The plan allows the library to fulfill its crucial role as the heart of the branch system. There is plentiful space to deliver children’s and adult programs, provide disabled access, offer technology and web-based services, and answer reference questions from throughout the region.

“At the new library, we will provide digital access and plan to have as many as four hundred computers available for people to use,” says Barrow. “But the library is something beyond the books and materials. There’s a cultural and social value to the library. It’s a place people go to gather.”

The 492,495 square foot central library includes an outdoor plaza and café, 350-seat auditorium, three-story domed reading room, 400-seat multi-purpose room, teen center, 10,244 square foot children’s library, technology center, and two levels of underground parking.

Barrow is a firm believer that libraries change lives. A San Diego native whose father worked at the Navy base on North Island and mother worked at the UC San Diego library, she has fond memories of her time spent in libraries while growing up. Her love of learning led her to a bachelor’s degree in anthropology from Scripps College and a master’s degree in library science from the University of Southern California.

“I have had so many people come to me and tell me how the library has made a difference for them,” says Barrow. “One of our city engineers said to me, ‘I am so happy to be working on the new library project. When I came to San Diego and didn’t have a computer to look for a job, the way I sent my resumes out was through the library computer.’ This is someone I consider to be in a high level city job who is telling me about this experience.”

In recognition of the continuing importance of libraries, donors have stepped up to support the project. Thanks to the leadership of the Library Foun­dation’s Mel Katz, Judith C. Harris, and Katie Sullivan, the Library Foundation has become a model for public-private partnerships by raising more than $65 million from private and corporate donors for the new central library.

Grammar Matters

There is a big difference between writing “Eat here and get gas” and “Eat here, and get gas.”

When it comes to business writing, do you mean well but it comes out good? Are you never quite sure what is there, they’re or their? Are you wanted by the grammar police, whose mission is to serve and correct?

Many jobseekers and career climbers are unaware that poor grammar is holding back their careers. Beware if you don’t know that your and you’re are two different words. According to a Harvard Business Review blog, many companies will not hire people who use poor grammar.

An excellent book to help you brush up your grammar skills is “Eats, Shoots and Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation” by British journalist Lynne Truss.

Asserting that punctuation “directs you how to read in the way musical notation directs a musician how to play,” Truss wittily argues for the merits of preserving the apostrophe, using commas correctly, and the proper use of the semicolon.

This #1 New York Times bestseller’s title is based on the following old joke. A panda walks into a bar. He orders a sandwich, eats it, then draws a gun and fires two shots in the air. “Why? Why are you behaving in this strange, un-panda-like fashion?” asks the confused bartender, as the panda walks towards the exit.

“I’m a panda,” he says, tossing a dictionary on the bar before he goes. “Look it up.”

The bartender turns to the relevant entry and, sure enough, finds a definition. “Panda. Large black-and-white bear-like mammal, native to China. Eats shoots and leaves.”

For those in San Diego, more personal punctuation help is also available. Published author Anne Bromley, a writing instructor and consultant, helps students get it right (or write) the first time when she teaches the Professional Certificate in Business Writing program through San Diego State University’s College of Extended Studies during the spring semester.

“What’s happening now is that more and more people are being called into management positions and forced to write,” Bromley said. “They get kicked upstairs and realize they are not very good communicators in writing. It has caused a lot of problems in the workplace. We’ve had so many issues where people need help.”

Students who enroll in the Business Writing seminar will receive Bromley’s assistance in a series of three half-day workshops designed for professionals who would like to hone their writing skills.

For information, call (619) 594-5489, email nbridgers@mail.sdsu.edu or visit www.neverstoplearning.net/bw.

UC San Diego Extension partners with World Wildlife Fund

This August, the University of California San Diego Extension and World Wildlife Fund (WWF) will launch a new international certificate program in Advanced Terrestrial Carbon Accounting.

This unique program will train professionals from around the world on how to measure forest carbon – a key step to unlock new public funding to protect forests and fight climate change. The clearing and burning of more than 10 million hectares of tropical forests per year spews almost 200 tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) per second into the atmosphere, causing an estimated 15 percent of global human greenhouse gas emissions.

The Kyoto Protocol’s emissions–trading framework creates economic incentives for nations to reduce greenhouse gas emissions cost effectively. Developing countries can find funds to preserve their forests, which in turn helps save the earth by reducing carbon emissions. This creates a need for a new breed of ecological protector, the terrestrial statistician.

“This course will equip the emerging generation of scientists, government officials, and society at large to understand this large driver of climate change with advanced skills – UC San Diego is recruiting some of the best instructors in the world to ensure this course’s quality,” says Hugo Villar, director of Science and Technology at UC San Diego Extension.

By using the latest cutting-edge scientific tools and methods to measure forest carbon, participants of the carbon accounting course will be able to provide rigorous estimates of how conserving tropical forests avoids emissions of greenhouse gases. In turn, the new certificate course will help participants advance major global initiatives such as Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation in Developing Countries (REDD+). REDD+ is a global initiative aimed at helping developing countries secure international funding to preserve their forests, which in turn reduces carbon emissions.

Lou Leonard, Vice President, Climate Change at World Wildlife Fund said, “We are on the threshold of proving that pay-for-performance conservation can work at large jurisdictional scales. These efforts have momentum and new funding, but require more detailed science on how much carbon different ecosystems hold, and how many emissions can be prevented through conservation. This collaboration between the University of California, WWF and other partners will help us cross this threshold by making some of the world’s best conservationist scientists even better.”

“There is still a large capacity gap in professionals who can accurately and transparently measure and model terrestrial carbon,” said Benoit Bosquet, of the Forest Carbon Partnership Facility at the World Bank. “Advanced training programs like the one being offered by the University of California San Diego will supplement existing efforts and ensure that REDD+ continues to evolve toward higher standards of credibility.”

The course will be held over four weeks in August 2013 on the UC San Diego campus in Southern California. The certificate will cover IPCC Good Practice Guidelines, remote sensing, Geographic Information Systems (GIS), emissions factors, activity data, various new technologies and methods to estimate carbon, statistics, uncertainty analyses, and communicating results.

Partial scholarships will be awarded to qualified applicants. However, all applicants should fully explore opportunities with their host country government and/or organization for financial support before applying for a scholarship.

Application and scholarship information can be found at http://extension.ucsd.edu/TCA. The deadline for applicants outside of the United States that require a visa is April 15. American applicants have until June 15 to apply.