Week In Review:

Toronto - Intermediate PHP Developer (Internet) Details / Apply
Toronto - Online Marketing Analyst (Finance) Details / Apply
Toronto - Product Manager (Computer Games) Details / Apply
Toronto - Project Manager, Professional Services (Computer Software) Details / Apply
Toronto - eReader Product Manager (Internet) Details / Apply
Montreal - Music Marketing Assistant (Computer Games) Details / Apply
Vancouver - Account Manager (Marketing & Advertising) Details / Apply
Vancouver - Business Analyst (Market Research) Details / Apply
Ottawa - Account Development Rep. (Computer Software) Details / Apply
Ottawa - Marketing Intern (Internet) Details / Apply

For the full rundown, log-in to Vestiigo.com

Some weekend reading
Career Savvy: The Death of Downtime
Career Savvy: 3 Ways To Avoid Sabotaging Your Job Search
TED Talk: Michael Norton: How to buy happiness

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One of the biggest assets you can have in terms of landing a new job is networking. A recommendation from a director could nuclear charge your resume and send it to the forefront. Networking is an art. Like all other non-technical skills, perfection takes practice. It is a useful skill which extends far outside work-life.

Networking is more than just a ritual of introductions, shaking hands and an exchange of business cards. Rather it is an exchange of ideas and rapport building. In short, it is about having a good conversation with someone you just met.

All it takes is just building up the courage to say hi and introducing yourself! People are generally open and receptive. To those who aren’t, it probably isn’t worth your time.

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Let’s be honest, how much downtime do you actually enjoy on any given day? If you feel the constant pull of everything from emails and phone calls to social network notifications and meeting requests, it’s likely you suffer from some form of acute downtime deficiency.

In his article “What Happened to Downtime”, Scott Belsky discusses the value of a concept in psychology known as the creative pause. It’s defined as the ‘shift from being fully engaged in a creative activity to being passively engaged, or the shift being disengaged altogether’.

More commonly, we know it as that point in time when the minute we stop thinking about a particular problem and focus on something else, the solution often presents itself. The trouble is that these crucial moments of downtime and disengagement are increasingly difficult to come across.

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Week In Review:

Toronto - Inside Sales Representative (Internet) Details / Apply
Toronto - Data Visualization Specialist (Market Research) Details / Apply
Toronto - Training Manager (Internet) Details / Apply
Toronto - Small Business Writer (Information Technology & Services) Details / Apply
Toronto - Account Supervisor – Publishing Services (Marketing & Advertising) Details / Apply
Ottawa - New Business Development Manager (Computer Hardware) Details / Apply
Montreal - Mobile Media Buyer (Marketing and Advertising) Details / Apply
Vancouver - Marketing Manager, Demand Generation (Market Research) Details / Apply
Vancouver - UI Designer (Internet) Details / Apply
Ottawa - Sales Support Role (Internet) Details / Apply

For the full rundown, log-in to Vestiigo.com

Some weekend reading
Career Savvy: What Do Jeremy Lin and Angry Birds Have in Common?
Career Savvy: Interviewing - Like a BOSS
TED Talk: Elizabeth Gilbert on nurturing creativity

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Whether you’re looking for a new career or already working in one of Canada’s major cities, there’s a lot about the employment landscape you may not know.

To do our bit, we’ve pulled together some interesting stats on salaries, bonuses, and commute times as well as other key areas that impact daily work life in Canada.

Salaries – Calgary owns top spot for the highest average media salary at $59,596, closely followed by Toronto ($57,823)

Commute Times – The longest average one-way commute times in Canada are Toronto (36.8 minutes), Montreal (30.5 minutes), and Vancouver (29.7 minutes) respectively. Happy motoring.

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As a meritocratic society, it’s little surprise we place such a high value on “success”. It also goes a long way to explaining our obsession with dissecting said success and trying to replicate it. However, we frequently come to the wrong conclusions and the myth of the overnight sensation is probably the best example of it.

The Myth

You’ve seen the headline somewhere or read the article that describes the meteoric ascent of someone to the very top of their discipline, seemingly at random. Whether it’s the story of Jeremy Lin, the New York Knicks point guard that led the team to a string of unlikely victories earlier in the year, or the run-away success of the game Angry Birds, the timelines are presented in terms of days and weeks.

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Week In Review:

Toronto - Data Analyst (Market Research) Details / Apply
Toronto - Key Account Manager (Market Research) Details / Apply
Toronto - Web Application Developer (Internet) Details / Apply
Toronto - Search Strategist (Information Technology & Services) Details / Apply
Toronto - Customer Operations Analyst (Consulting) Details / Apply
Waterloo - Product Marketing Manager (Computer Hardware) Details / Apply
Montreal - Manager, Internal Communications (Marketing and Advertising) Details / Apply
Vancouver - Technical Writer (Market Research) Details / Apply
Vancouver - Junior Art Director (Marketing and Advertising) Details / Apply
Ottawa - Sales Support Role (Internet) Details / Apply

For the full rundown, log-in to Vestiigo.com

Some weekend reading
Career Savvy: 6 Ways To Say More With Your Portfolio
Career Savvy: Why You Should Avoid Big Decisions
TED Talk: Sherry Turkle: Connected, but alone?

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Whether it’s because we like the sound of it, or the sense of accomplishment we feel when make one, for better or worse we like to make big decisions. These are the kinds of decisions that we belabour, discuss, agonize over, and review constantly. Yet, there’s much to suggest we should be making smaller, not bigger decisions when it comes to our work and careers.

The Problem with Big Decisions
The reality is big decisions are complex, take a long time to assess, and often have a decidedly uncertain outcome. This means they’re risky. After you’ve taken all that time and effort you’re banking on it paying off, but if it doesn’t you’ll have a costly mistake on your hands.

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Week In Review:

Toronto - Communications Intern (Computer Games) Details / Apply
Toronto - Writer/Editor (Internet) Details / Apply
Toronto - Video/Screencast Guru (Internet) Details / Apply
Toronto - Vendor Manager (Internet) Details / Apply
Toronto - Innovation Strategist (Consulting) Details / Apply
Montreal - Community Manager (Computer Games) Details / Apply
Montreal - Software Developer (Computer Software) Details / Apply
Vancouver - Customer Success Intern (Internet) Details / Apply
Vancouver - Software Developer (Mobile) (Internet) Details / Apply
Ottawa - Training Services Coordinator (Computer Software) Details / Apply

For the full rundown, log-in to Vestiigo.com

Some weekend reading
Career Savvy: Run Your Career Like A Political Campaign
Career Savvy: 10 Resources For Negotiating Your Salary
TED Talk: Larry Smith: Why you will fail to have a great career

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Multitasking, in my opinion is actually counterproductive – and it’s relatively easy to prove. Studies have shown that multitasking increases the time to complete a task by an average of 25%. Suppose you have two tasks to complete in a work day consisting of 8 hours. Each task will take three hours to complete. Completing the task one at time will require 6 hours of work in total. If we jump back and forth on each task, it will take an additional 1.5 hours to complete.

The above example does not take into account quality of work as the definition changes with each objective. However, one can conclude that it decreases due to not being able to focus on a single task over an extended period of time. Yet despite knowing these facts many of us are guilty of multitasking.

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Whether you’re a recent grad’ or a long time workforce horse, the unemployment gap is no stranger to many of us.  Luckily for us, employers are plenty familiar with it as well, and they have a couple tips that might help downtrodden job-seekers keep their resumes from falling into the discard bin. 

1) Take a class
This doesn’t necessarily have to mean going back full-time.  After all, the last thing most of us want on top of joblessness is another couple thousand dollars in debt.  It can be something as simple as attending a few professional seminars or taking a certification course.

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We tend to think of our career as a series of moments – such as when we change jobs or decide on a major career change – but the reality is it shouldn’t be such a fleeting thought.  Much of the difficulty and duress we endure when it comes to applying to a new role or deciding what it is we want to do next comes from the sporadic consideration of this question. 

It shouldn’t really be a surprise – how good can you be at something if you only try it once or twice a year [insert obvious sports analogy here].

A recent article in the Harvard Business Review by Dorie Clark entitled “It’s Not a Job Search, It’s a Permanent Campaign” raises the interesting comparison between your career and that of a political campaign. Clark points out that we need to think of our career more than just during “election time”.

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