40,000 Pekerja bank terima durian runtuh

KUALA LUMPUR 11 Ogos — Lebih 40,000 pekerja bank akan menerima “durian runtuh” antara RM3,700 dan RM12,000 sebagai bayaran tunggakan hasil rundingan perjanjian bersama (CA) di antara Kesatuan Kebangsaan Pekerja-Pekerja Bank (NUBE) dan Persatuan Bank-Bank Perdagangan Malaysia (MCBA).

Setiausaha Agung NUBE, J. Solomon memberitahu Bernama hari ini sebahagian daripada tunggakan akan dibayar sebelum Hari Raya Aidilfitri dan bakinya dalam tempoh 60 hari bermula semalam, iaitu tarikh perjanjian ditandatangani.

Beliau menyifatkan CA yang berkuat kuasa dari 1 Jan tahun lepas hingga 31 Dis 2011 sebagai “yang terbaik dalam sejarah NUBE” kerana ia membuka ruang baru selain menawarkan faedah baru kepada pekerja.

Antara faedah tersebut ialah cuti bersalin 90 hari berkuat kuasa semalam, elaun sara hidup, peningkatan umur bersara daripada 55 kepada 57 tahun, dan faedah perubatan sehingga RM25,000 setahun yang dilanjutkan selama tiga tahun selepas bersara.

Faedah lain ialah kenaikan gaji secara menyeluruh sebanyak sembilan peratus, kenaikan gaji tahunan sebanyak 21 peratus dan elaun makan dinaikkan 20 peratus. — Bernama

Last-Minute Interview Preparation

Even if you have less than a day before your job interview, you can outshine the competition with a little interview preparation. The following four tasks will take you about four hours (plus five minutes) to complete, and you'll walk into the interview confident you'll be successful.

Conduct Basic Interview Research

To prepare for an interview, find out as much as you can beforehand. Call the person who scheduled your interview and ask:

• Who will you be talking to? Will you meet the manager you'd work for, or will you just talk to HR? What are the interviewer's expectations?
• What's the dress code? Dress better than suggested. Most times, it's best to wear a professional suit. You'd be amazed how many candidates show up looking like they're going to class, not presenting a professional demeanor.
• Get directions to the office. Plan to leave early. Keep a phone number to call if you get stuck on the bus or in traffic. If you arrive late and stressed, the interview will not go well.
• If you don't have a detailed job description, ask for one.

That's a five-minute phone call.

Learn About the Company Online

Do some fast Web research, which will give you something to talk about in addition to the job description. Go to the employer's Web site, or search the Web for information such as:

• How big is the company in terms of annual sales or employees?
• What does the company say about its products or services?
• What recent news (such as a new product, a press release, an interview with the CEO) can you discuss?
• If the company is public, the boilerplate at the bottom of its press releases will tell you a lot.

Basic research should take you about an hour.

Think of Some Stories

Be ready to answer typical interview questions with a story about yourself. To prepare, write down and memorize three achievement stories. Tell about times you've really felt proud of an achievement at work or school. These stories demonstrate all those hard-to-measure qualities like judgment, initiative, teamwork or leadership. Wherever possible, quantify what you've done, e.g., "increased sales by 20 percent," "cut customer call waiting time in half," "streamlined delivery so that most customers had their job done in two days."

By the way, nonwork achievement stories are good too; if you volunteer for the local food pantry, write down a time you overcame a big challenge or a crisis there.

Achievement stories make you memorable, which is what you want. There's an exercise in Monster Careers: Interviewing called "Mastering the Freestyle Interview," which helps you develop these stories into compelling sales points.

Take the time you need -- at least three hours on this task.

Pick Your Outfit, and Go to Bed Early

Lay out your interview outfit the night before, get a good night's rest, and always get an early start. The last thing you want is to waste all of your interview preparation by arriving flustered and panicked because you couldn't find a parking space.

By Doug Hardy, Monster Staff Writer

Adapted from Monster Careers: Interviewing



Are you a manager or a leader?

Developing a leadership mindset, whatever your level, will get your career heading in the right direction. By Lisa Orrell, speaker and leadership coach.

The confusion between the roles of a manager and a leader has tripped up more than one business professional. Is ‘the person in charge’ automatically a leader? If you’re managing other people, are you also leading them? What is the difference between the two?

According to current wisdom, managers are principally administrators - they write business plans, set budgets, monitor progress and manage people - but sometimes without an effective leadership mindset. Leaders, on the other hand, get organisations and people to change.

Most business executives and owners have a mix of management and leadership skills. And quite often both are necessary to run a successful team.

Be a leader at any level

Here is a key point that can settle confusion for you. Even if you manage just one person, regardless of what your role or title is, you are also a leader. Even if you currently manage no one, you can still take on leadership roles such as heading up a project or volunteering to plan the company’s annual picnic. So whether you are actually in a true management role with employees, or assuming a short term leadership role, cultivating a leadership mindset is critical.

Don’t think leadership is something that only occurs once you’re in an executive role. Your leadership mindset needs to start on day one of your very first job.

Not every person in a company wants to be a senior executive or ‘lead’ the whole business. But you should embrace some fundamental, effective leadership qualities within your management style.

Have you ever heard this saying: ‘People don’t leave companies; they leave managers’? You don’t want to be the leader people choose to leave.

10 differences between a manager mindset and leadership mindset

Leadership skills are flexible, responsive to change, and future-oriented.

• leaders set a standard of excellence – managers set a standard for performance
  
  
• leaders seek employee commitment – managers seek employee compliance
  
  
• leaders are proactive – managers are reactive
  
  
• leaders create change – managers maintain the status quo
  
  
• leaders take risk – managers are risk averse
  
  
• leaders are passionate – managers are controlling
  
  
• leaders create followers – managers have subordinates
  
  
• leaders use personal charisma – managers rely on bestowed authority
  
  
• leaders give credit – managers assign blame
  
  
• leaders care about what’s right – managers care about being right.

Managers who don’t choose to embody important leadership qualities suffer. And their employees and companies suffer.

Be a manager who blends management skills with a leadership mindset, and you will succeed in any role at any level your career takes you to.

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Lisa Orrell is a speaker and a leadership coach. This article is contributed by CIMA (Chartered Institute of Management Accountants) and it first appeared in Velocity, CIMA's online bi-monthly magazine for its students. Visit www.cimaglobal.com

The Importance of Emotional Intelligence

For most of us, when we think of intelligence, we actually mean IQ. We are suspicious of anything that involves emotions as traditionally, the world of business requires sound intellect and a rational mind. However, research has proved the common wisdom that intellect and technical expertise only go so far as predicting your future success. We can all remember the academically brilliant kid at school who never got anywhere in life or the one that failed every subject but is now running a profitable business. Emotional Intelligence (EI) counts for a big chunk of your performance and it seems that the higher you go up the corporate ladder, the more it matters. Memorable managers and leaders are usually inspirational, motivational, trustworthy and approachable. On the other side are those who think that training 'soft' skills is a complete waste of time and that companies are better off spending money on technical courses. They are unlikely to make good bosses. Even if their bottom line is healthy, their staff probably are not.

Emotional intelligence is not about being emotional. It certainly is not about not using your IQ. Reuven Bar-On, an EI researcher, devised a model of EI which consists of:

• Intra-personal factors – self-regard, emotional self-awareness, assertiveness, independence and self-actualisation;
• Inter-personal factors – empathy, social responsibility, intra-personal relationship, adaptability scales, reality testing, flexibility, problem-solving;
• Stress management factors – stress tolerance, impulse control;
• General mood factors – optimism, happiness.

As the above list of competencies show, EI is about knowing how to manage inter- and intra-personal relationships successfully. In order to get on in the work place, you need to know your own strengths and weaknesses, your own true beliefs and then you need to know those of other people in order to get on with them and motivate them to produce the best work they possibly can. You need to know how they perceive you and they need to be able to trust you.

Of course, there is no point in being emotionally intelligent at work for its own sake. It might make you a nicer person but that has never been the main premise of any business. The bottom line is that emotionally intelligent people make more money. It is a success that can be quantified and expressed in financial terms. For example, experienced partners in a multi-national consulting firm were assessed on the EI competencies plus three others. Partners who scored above the median on nine or more of the 20 competencies delivered $1.2 million more profit than their counterparts – 139 per cent incremental gain. Similarly, insurance sales agents who were weak in EI competencies such as self-confidence, initiative and empathy sold policies with an average worth of $54,000. Those who were strong in at least five out of eight key EI competencies sold policies with a premium of $114,000.

EI in the new economy
Did bosses 50 years ago need the same set of skills in order to succeed? Probably not. These soft skills are indispensable in the new economy. Fifty years ago, it was relatively easy for a boss to ignore his workers’ feelings. The prevalent mode of interaction was command and control, work was no place for feelings and jobs were for life. We all know how little of that applies today. People move between jobs more frequently. Employees are getting choosy. The knowledge intensive economy means that losing a member of staff or hiring someone unsuitable equals losing expertise and, therefore, money.

Emotional intelligence can help you retain staff because a good company is measured not by the number of benefits the staff gets but by how fulfilled, motivated and valued they are. It can also be indispensable during the recruitment process. Many companies undertake psychometric testing and EI testing could be next. This is more likely to happen in professions such as accountancy and law, where the overall intellectual strength of the candidates is generally high. In other words, EI could be a source of competitive advantage, something that will differentiate you from the crowd. For example, when a large beverage firm started selecting on the basis of EI, only 6% of people left in two years, compared to the previous figure of 50%.

Another defining feature of the new economy is the breakdown of old hierarchies and the emergence of flattened structures and team-based work. Many have been rendered truly global and fragmented by various web-enabled tools. Because of this, it is even more important to build and maintain good staff relations – inter-personal skills are crucial. Research which concentrated on why young executives ‘crash’ showed that the problem was not their technical expertise but their inability to maintain successful relationships with others and work in a team. They also had difficulties in handling change.

It could be said that the only permanent thing in the new economy is constant change. Research has shown that emotionally intelligent people cope with it better. They are able to pinpoint exactly what they are feeling and they can appraise others’ emotions. This means that, even if the future is uncertain, they do not feel bewildered and powerless. They are, therefore, able to move faster and take others with them. Unsurprisingly, people with high EI make good leaders.

Emotional intelligence is a cornerstone of good management. It shows you how to manage by building trust, empathy and understanding in the foundations of your organisational culture.

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This article is contributed by CIMA (The Chartered Institute of Management Accountants), the leading professional accountancy body in the world that trains and qualifies accountants in business. It offers the internationally recognised CIMA Professional Qualification in Management Accounting. Currently, CIMA has 155,000 members and students throughout the world.

source : http://www.jobstreet.com.my/learning/hr4.htm

HR and the Learning Organisation

With the job scenario now moving towards knowledge for the competitive edge, HR will now be required to develop positive values, ethics and passion for the job. These will be the key elements to cultivate the talents, skills and creativity of the workforce.

HR will now have to re-look at its function, the broader HR system and the resulting employee behaviours, and determine how these 'architectures' can help the organisation excel.

The 21st century brings with it a new economic paradigm. The focus now is on brand recognition, knowledge, innovation and most importantly, human capital.

HR now becomes a Strategic Business Partner. It must develop systems for business performance, and it must evolve from its administrative role to driving the organisation to become a learning organisation.

In order for organisational learning to occur, individuals in the organisation must be willing and prepared to reveal their individual mental models, contrast them to one another, discuss the differences, and come to a unified perception of what that system really is.

This alignment of mental models can be referred to as developing a shared vision.

At the heart of a learning organisation is a shift of mind - from seeing ourselves as separate from the world to connected to the world, from seeing problems as caused by someone or something 'out there' to seeing how our own actions create the problems we experience. A learning organisation is a place where people are continually discovering how they create their reality and how they can change it.

(References: Peter Senge, The Fifth Discipline, Brian E. Becker, Mark A. Huselid, David Ulrich, the HR Scorecard - Linking People, Strategy, and Performance)

by Marcia Nicholas

Jobs in IT Industry and the Careers

The jobs in IT industry are some of the highest paid jobs in the market and are also very high in demand. The number of jobs in IT industry is growing much faster as compared to the number of IT professionals. The IT professionals who have made a career in the IT industry are well established are very well paid. There is a huge requirement for skilled professionals in the finance industry and the professionals are paid very well here too.

Among all the IT professionals; the software engineers are the most in demand. They are also the highest paid in the IT industry. Telecommunications and computer manufacturing sectors are some of the sectors which pay very high salaries to these software engineers.

There is also a high demand for system analysts and there are many jobs in IT which are available for these professionals. He system analysts are highest paid at organizations who design and produce computers, they are also very much in demand with insurance carriers and government firms. There are various jobs in IT for the computer programmer and hardware engineers at various organizations and the need for these professionals are also much greater in number as compared to any other position. The IT industry can provide a number of programs which can lead to a diverse set of career options and open the doors to a number of jobs in IT industry.

IT professionals hold degrees and certifications which include carious skill sets and can also include specialized fields for research and communication. The IT professionals can find jobs in IT at various positions which include computer scientist, database administrator, communications analyst, web developer and various other computer related positions. The professionals who belong to the IT industry can concentrate on particular industries and can find jobs in IT which can relate to various specializations. IT professionals can also opt for vocational courses which are conducted through the various technical institutions or universities or colleges. IT professionals can opt for various jobs in IT depending on their specialization and skills, common responsibilities of information technology and various other factors.

Winston Taylor is an IT recruitment Agencybased in London. We work with clients all over the UK supplying contract and permanent IT resources for short and long term projects.

There are many different IT recruitment agencies but it is important to partner with an agency that understands technology.

Our fees are also the most competitive in the UK with 12.5% standard permanent placement fee for salaries up to and including 40K per anum and extremely competitive daily rates for contractors. Get in touch with us on 02071833822 for a no obligation discussion of your requirements and our ability to help you resource these candidates.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Rostyslav_Dumych

Get Hired Faster By Job Search Strategy

According to most experts, the average job search takes about five months to complete. Five months is a long time to spend job searching, especially if you are currently out of work! Why does the average job search take this long? One of the primary reasons is because most job seekers are using the exact same job search strategies. Most of them are using what could be called the "wait and hope" strategy.

The wait and hope strategy is comprised of three primary steps.

1- Search for jobs which are being advertised

2- Submit a resume for selected jobs

3- WAIT AND HOPE for an interview

This is the primary strategy used because this is the way we were all taught to look for jobs.

A Better Job Search Strategy

Most people are not aware that only twenty percent of all vacant jobs are actually filled through advertising. This fact is a real eye opener for most people. If only twenty percent of jobs are filled through advertising, that leaves an overwhelming majority of eighty percent which are filled without advertising. If a job is not advertised, how is it ever filled? They are filled through the hidden job market!

What exactly is the hidden job market? These are the jobs that are hidden from public view. For the job seekers who only look for jobs through the classifieds or online advertising, they are completely left out of consideration for these jobs. Considering that eighty percent of jobs are filled this way, they miss out on the majority of jobs that are actually available. This is great news for the job seeker who is willing to learn how to tap into the hidden job market!

Five Easy Steps

You can tap into the hidden job market in five easy steps. Here is a short description of each step.

Step 1 - Develop A Target List Of Employers

The first thing you need to do is to develop a list of employers who have the type of job(s) you are interested in, in the locations you want, and are employers you would like to work for. I call this list of potential employers your job opportunity list. This list of potential employers can be very long, or quite short depending on your interests and needs.

Step 2- Do Some Research

Once you have your job opportunity list together, use the Internet to do a little research on each potential employer. Use the company's web site to read about the company, it's mission, it's products, any current news, and most importantly, find a company directory. Use the directory to find out who is the director or supervisor of the department you want to be hired into.

Step 3- Look For Advertised Jobs

No, I haven't changed my mind. Advertised jobs should not be your primary means of finding your next job, but you should still spend a little time and see what types of jobs are being advertised in your area. Pay special attention to jobs advertised by companies on your job opportunity list.

Step 4- Start Making Contacts

This is where you can start separating yourself from the competition. Most job seekers just won't make direct contact with potential employers. They are not comfortable applying for a job unless the potential employer has put up a big blinking sign (advertisement) that says, "We have a job opening, please send us your resume".

Make direct contact with the employers and let them know about you, your qualifications and experience, and your interest in working for their organization!

Step 5- Be Persistent And Follow Up

Once you are making contacts and sending out resumes, you must be determined to follow up. Just sending out a resume and hoping for an interview won't get you hired faster than your competition. Have a consistent habit of following up with decision makers after a couple of days have passed. You are NOT being pushy by doing this, you are being persistent

Summary

As you can see, this is not rocket science, but it really does work. Tapping into the hidden job market will put you ahead of ninety-five percent of your job search competitors. Don't ever hesitate to make direct contact with employers. Employers like to use the hidden job market because it is much cheaper and faster to fill jobs this way.

Gary Hawkins is a Human Resources Specialist and entrepreneur. Find out more about his job search strategies and insider job information at [http://www.find-jobs-fast.com]

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Gary_Hawkins

10 Most Common Job Search Mistakes

Here is a list of 10 very common job search mistakes and what you must do to fix them.

Relying on your own personal experience and philosophies

Most job seekers base their job search methods and techniques totally on their own set of experiences. To do so will only serve to limit your opportunities.

Think like a marketer. Marketing professionals do not design their product advertising around their own personal preferences; instead they test and utilize approaches that appeal to a broader audience. Job seekers should learn how to do the same.

Being Too Close Minded

Actually this is closely related to reason number one. Most of us have difficulty stepping outside our comfort zone and embracing new and/or alternative ways of doing things. This attitude will only serve to limit our job opportunities. Don't rely on your own personal experience and philosophies, instead study and discover other methods that will open new career opportunities for you.

Using Only One or Two Resume Versions

One or two resume versions just won't work. Don't rely on a sample resume. I've written extensively about this subject and my central message is that you have to "get inside the head" of the reader of your resume. The best clues for how to tailor your resume comes from the actual language of the specific job posting that you may be answering.

If you're providing a resume to an employer on an exploratory basis - when they may not have listed a specific job - research their website to see if you can find information about the areas of your specialty and use that language. If you still can't find information on the employer's website in such cases, take the most common ad language content from 10-20 job ads that you can find and use the most common words, phrases and ideas.

Relying Too Much of the Big Job Boards

There are no best job search boards or best executive job search sites. Only about 10% - 15% of all jobs are advertised on the major job boards at any one time. That's where your competition is the fiercest.

That leaves 85% to 90% of all jobs less visible. You've got to learn how to find them. Even among the 85% - 90% of available jobs, only a portion of them may be listed anywhere except possibly on employers own career websites. You have to learn which online job search engines to use that will search most of the employer websites from one location.

Failing to Properly Research Potential Employers

The question isn't why you research potential employers, it's how to research potential employers. You must conduct research of every potential employer that you pursue. They expect it and will almost always ask you about it.

One good method to use is to find something that you found interesting about the employer that hopefully may relate to your own job interests and skills. Be sure to bring that up during the interview when asked, and if you aren't asked, look for a way to introduce it into the interview discussion.

One potential way to do that is to when you're asked if you have any questions. You might repeat what you read in summary form, and then ask them for more information about it. This demonstrates your interest and desire to learn more.

Failing to Prepare Properly for the Actual Interview

Interview preparation tips can be invaluable. One such tip is to realize there are three types of interviews job seekers encounter that are most common and you must be prepared for each of them, or some combination of them. One is the more traditional, which usually follows the format of your resume.

The second type of interview is behavioral and this one has become very popular with many employers. It is more difficult to prepare for this type of interview, so the best way is to understand how to answer behavioral interview questions.

The third type of interview is the case interview where you are given either a real or hypothetical work situation and asked to discuss it with the interview team. These types of interviews are common for consultant, attorneys, but getting at least one mini-case question these days is very common.

Failure to Invest Enough Money in Yourself

With the coming of the Internet and all the information readily accessible to us, comes the attitude that we don't ever need to pay for anything. This usually rears its ugly head for a job seeker when they are reluctant to pay for more expert advice and access to more efficient tools and techniques to help us not only in our job search, but in our career as well.

Most people spend more eating out, than they are willing to invest in their career. You must be willing to invest in yourself not only in furthering your education, but in getting career advice as well.

Placing Too Much Emphasis on Salary Too Early

When is the last time you bounded out of bed, eager to get to your job because you made x amount of money? It isn't likely you've felt that way very often.

Most of us enjoy our work because of what we get to do, what we can learn and where our career is taking us. Of course all of us want to be compensated fairly and competitively. But to not be willing to explore a career opportunity because the first question we ask is, "how much does it pay?" is totally wrong headed.

First find out about the opportunity, both long and short term so you can understand how it may or may not fit your long term career goals, is simply short sighted.

Not having a Long-Term Career Vision

This picks up with the former mistake. If you don't know which direction you want your career to head is like a sailboat under full sail without anyone manning the rudder. You'll just end up wherever the wind takes you.

You must have a longer term vision for your career so that the decisions you make along the way takes you where you want to end up.

Not Being Open to New Opportunities All the Time

Now you've got a good job and your mind shifts totally away from looking for a job. Overall that is as it should be, up to a point.

When the headhunter calls or a colleague calls you about a career opportunity, are the first words out of your mouth, "I'm not looking or I'm happy where I'm at?" Both of those statements are true, but you should at least be open to explore the opportunity or hear more about it. Even if the time isn't right for you to make a change or the job isn't right, be open to suggest colleagues who may benefit from hearing about the opening.

Often the best opportunities come to you and without a lot of other competing candidates.

Failing to Build Career Networks 24 x 7

This is critical. Build your networks constantly and consistently so that when you need professional information or career guidance or help with a job search, you have a valuable network to rely on. It's the concept of digging your well before you are thirsty.

LinkedIn is the most valuable network for doing that. Join relevant groups there and contribute to the discussions. You'll be building your own reputation along the way. It's like creating a savings account of goodwill so you can cash in when needed. The number one rule is to give first, before asking for anything. That way, you'll have "cash in the bank" to use when you need it on short notice.

(c) 2009 by Carl Bradford - I am an Executive Recruiter with over 40 years of recruiting and hiring experience. I am also a recognized expert in this field. You will find a Members Only section on my blog with complete computer based training modules that show you how to find hidden jobs and get past the gatekeeper directly to the hiring manager.

You can find all blog posts and the Members Only link at: http://www.theemploymentguy.com/

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Carl_Bradford

How to Seek Jobs in Malaysia?

It is never an easy task to find jobs. It is a competitive world and you just have to outclass the rest. Having being a job seeker myself, I find that it's important to compile a to-do list when you are on a mission to find a job. Although it's written based on Malaysia, the same concept applies to any part of the world.

Here are a few simple items you should take note when seeking for jobs:

Search in Jobs directory. It is the place where career and human resources links are provided to you for your convenience. You could either apply directly via the sites or you could contact the HR departments of the hiring companies. There are a few famous Malaysia job directories which you could count on such as JobsMalaysia.info, Jobstreet, JobsDB Malaysia, Jen Jobs and Malaysia Central. You can search more in Google for terms such as Malaysia jobs directories, Job websites in Malaysia.

On the other hand, if you are interested to work with the Malaysian Government, they too have a portal specially for vacancies in the government sector. It is actually very simple to search for a job in the Government sector. Just google for "vacancies in Malaysia government".

Next on the list will be recruitment agencies. Some job seekers do not really favour recruitment agencies because they need to pay a fee to the agents. Sometimes it is a one-time flat fee and there are times where it is based on a sliding scale on the length of time the employee is attached to the hiring company. However, out out desperation, job seekers still end up opting to this choice. Some of the well-known recruitment agencies in Malaysia are Adecco Asia, ManPower Staffing, Kelly Services, JAC recruitment and PM Resources.

If you are an independent person and you believe that you would want to try all this yourself, then the best solution is to manually find the job yourself. How? Well, you could physically go to the companies and submit your applications to the Human Resources Department (but it is not very practical nowadays as you are rarely allowed to simply enter a company without any appointments).

Hence, electronic mail (e-mail) is your best chance. Just visit the company websites and go to "contact us" section. Usually they have career or hr emails listed on their websites. Remember to produce a presentable resume and email it to them. Wait for the good news! The rule of thumb is send A LOT of applications daily. Send at least 50-70 applications daily.

Last but not least, a conventional way of searching for jobs is still worth the try. A lot of companies STILL advertise job vacancies on the newspaper. If you are actively in need of jobs, purchase newspapers every day and dive into the jobs or classified sections.

Using the above methods helped me to find an online marketing vacancy for SEO Singapore so I hope the tips mentioned above on jobs searching are useful to everyone particularly Malaysian. Online, using the web, is the main resource for searching but traditional print and magazines can also be of help.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Ken_Mcewan