Ten buzzwords to avoid in your profile, Linked-in or otherwise

Long awaited, why-didnt-I-think-of-it-before moment. Linked-in, the professional network which has 135 million members now, has come up with the most overused words and phrases in members linked-in profiles in 2011. The top ten overused words in the USA are:

• Creative
• Organizational
• Effective
• Extensive experience
• Track record
• Motivated
• Innovative
• Problem Solving
• Communication skills
• Dynamic

Apart from being heavily cliched, these words actually say nothing about a persons professional capabilities and yet we keep using them, sometimes all of them, to show the world how good we are at work. I am personally guilty of using creative, motivated (mine was one step further "self motivated) and problem solving and communication skills. 

Having seen thousands of profiles till date, I can vouch that these words do not really work in themselves. They dont improve your value on paper one bit unless you give examples of how creative you were or how you solved some problem with an innovative idea. Isnt everyone effective really? It goes to really saying that just like everyone else on this planet, you are actually doing your job and finishing whats to be done. Extensive experience and track record: Anyone doing something for more than 2 years will have extensive experience in that subject. Anyone would have a track record. Those words dont add a thing to the sentence and is slightly irritating, because I know somewhere that you have run out of things to say now. And what about dynamic. What exactly does it mean in the context of your work. If you are a bank manager are you dynamic, does that mean you can jump around everyone's cubicles all day? Or if you are a sales manager, does that mean you have a lot of energy? Is that not why you are a sales person in the first place? Once you break dynamic into smaller parts, thats when you will come up with the exact words you would like to use in your resume.

Worldwide the number one buzzword in various countries were

• Creative: Australia, Canada, Germany, USA, Netherlands, UK
• Multinational: Brazil
• Dynamic: France
• Effective: India
• Problem Solving: Italy
• Motivated: Ireland
• Managerial: Spain
• Track record: Singapore

The job market is getting more and more competitive and for senior managers, any lax in their effort at providing the company with a well formed and worded resume shows lack of motivation and effectiveness (chuckle). Therefore, the trick is to keep the words beside you and think what they mean. If there are specific examples of the traits these buzzwords describe, it would be best to line them up. Leave out words like motivated and effective and dynamic altogether, these are things which are very well expected from a senior experienced professional.

Using examples and specific instances makes your profiles unique to you and describes "you" and not another million people on this planet. And it is "you" you are trying to sell to a prospective employer. 

The fall and fall of Education in India

To add to my post on "Education and Employment" earlier on this blog, here are some more startling details which have come out today. Mint reports:

" A global study of learning standards in 74 countries has ranked India all but at the bottom, sounding a wake-up call for the country’s education system.

It was the first time that India participated in the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), coordinated by the Paris-based Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). India’s participation was in a pilot project, confined to schools from Tamil Nadu and Himachal Pradesh.
only 12% of students in Himachal Pradesh and 15% in Tamil Nadu were proficient in mathematics against an OECD average of 75%; when it came to scientific literacy among students of class X, the proficiency level in Tamil Nadu was 16% and in Himachal, 11%, as against an OECD average proficiency of 82%.

In Malaysia, 56% of students were proficient in reading and 41% in mathematics. Similarly, in the United Arab Emirates, the mathematics proficiency levels was estimated at 49% and for reading, 60%. Like India, both countries participated for the first time."

India which has prided itself historically in its education system, has to wake up and soon. There has been a lot of talkin the last year about how the US education system is faltering and how the "east" is taking over. Examples cited are from China, Japan, S Korea, even places like Malaysia and Philippines. No one talks of India. Maybe the reason shows. Mint also reports:

"Not everyone agrees. The study may not be based on an apple-to-apple comparison, says Vipul Prakash, managing director of Elixir Consulting, a recruitment process outsourcing firm.

“If you look at the entire people entering the workforce, you may find lack of quality. But if you take the top 10% then they are perhaps the best in the world. This 10% is quite a large number which is giving India a competitive upper hand.”"

Its not about having the top 10% being talked about. The top 10% of the country will end up leaving the country to pursue greener pastures on foreign shores. The rest of us will enter the job markets here. And it is the next 50% which will form the army of the biggest companies in India, the field force, the sales teams. 


The Times of India was reporting in the last few days about the lack of International Schools in Chennai, and how that has pushed Chennai into the last few cities in education standards. In any city, are International Schools then, the answer to our prayers? Starting at 12 lakhs fees per annum for a kindergarten seat, an international school is out of reach of almost everyone apart from business families and CEO kids. At least the middle classes can send their kids to private schools with no worry about the basic infrastructure. But what about government schools? Tamil Nadu's chief minister made history by providing free laptops to students recently. A great thought, no doubt, but how sustainable and repeatable is it? Will they do this to everyone every year? Can it be repeated across the country in all the states? 


And how good are teachers who we send our kids to? Recently in both US and UK, a large percentage of teachers failed basic tests. Is this country considering testing out teachers too? Which bright mind wants to come down to teaching students at a school level? With the pay structures as it is, is it surprising that not one of the bright kids I once knew have actually gone into teaching? They are bank managers, or consultants, or if any, they have gone into professorship into private MBA schools. If we dont have good teachers how do we get good students?


 Is it time the government woke up to quality of infrastructure in schools, increasing number of schools, and getting better teachers? A lot has been done for sure, providing mid day meals, monetary incentives, etc, but how much of it is tangible benefits for those who it is meant. How useful is an incentive of Rs 1000 for 100% attendance in the year (as reported in TN in today's paper). 


Organizations like Eureka Child in Chennai are working along with the school system of the government to provide students in 100 villages of Tamil Nadu a more holistic education. They build their own material, go to the village schools and create a parallel learning system along with the school syllabus. Maybe it is time to create more organizations like Eureka.

PIOs returning - India providing the right pull? (or Recession forcing NRIs to return?)

Last month I got a call from a PIO (Person of Indian Origin) finance professional from US, to talk about opportunities available in India that would suit his level of seniority and who would provide him an attractive remuneration, not comparable to what he gets there of course, but at least at par with market standards here. The reason he wants to relocate is manifold- the next big break in the US looks less lucrative at the moment, his parents are in Chennai, and he would love his children to stay at close quarters with grandparents, and of course both he and his wife, an HR professional were bound to get good opportunities at present in this country.

The Link, an Indo Canadian web news paper reports

"Krishna Kumar and Savita Murthy, a couple working for a financial institution and a telecom service provider respectively in New York, were in Bangalore in November to attend job interviews because of uncertainties in the US job market. “They mailed their CVs in early September and headhunters could line up some decent interviews for each of them. The husband has attended seven interviews and the wife attended four. Both are currently finalizing their respective new jobs and are expected to move back to India soon,” said K Shivaram, a close relative of the couple.

Another couple currently working in Berlin and Paris is moving back to Pune with their 12-year-old daughter. “The wife who works in a French bank has been pink slipped and her term ends on December 31,” said an acquaintance who did not want to be named....

What is significant is that these Indian-origin executives who are now looking to return home are coming in at salaries similar to what they were getting abroad. There are, however, certain sectors which have generated more traction than others. For instance retail, FMCG, financial services, IT, mining and power have benefitted from these highly-qualified Indians looking to come home.

Kishore Biyani-led Future Group is the midst of one such recruitment action. “We are improving our systems and processes, an area that as an organization we are focusing a lot on. The expertise brought about by these people at the back-end and supply chain management areas is something we required,” said Sanjay Jog, Chief People Officer, The Future Group, India’s largest retailer which runs stores like Big Bazaar and Pantaloon. The retailer hired a number of key executives, all of them Indians who have come from international markets, in the last couple of months. While Manoj Agarwal came from Procter & Gamble’s US operations based in Cincinnati who is now heading the project management office at the group, Anurup Pruthi was earlier with Burberry, UK, who is now the chief executive for Digital Services and heads the captive BPO and technology services for retailer. Another Indian to have joined the group is Prasad Menon from the UK operations of Nokia who is heading Product Information Management Services (PIMS) for Future Group."

Just today I got a call from a 30 year old from UK. After completing his degree there he has been working on a contract basis with one of the top 5 accounting firms. He is confident his contract will be renewed but he is currently open to check out what India has to offer for his area of expertise. And truth be told, I suspect, he wont have long to wait.

Article in Mail Today on Cyrus Mistry: Jyorden comments

Behemoth can do without surname By Lalatendu Mishra in Mumbai

THOUGH he does not have the illustrious Tata surname but Cyrus Mistry is certainly no outsider plucked from obscurity. The elevation of the 43- year- old engineer to the top post of the Tata conglomerate will only add to the salt- to- software brand value.

Cyrus, in the capacity of the member of the highest decision- making body of the Tata group and a distant relative of the Tatas, is the son of Pallonji Mistry — who owns 18 per cent of the Tata group.

Brand and marketing experts said the choice of Cyrus as the successor would in fact help the brand grow stronger.

“ It is a good choice. He is young and is very appropriate for a young country. With him in the drivers seat the Tata brand value will be enhanced,” said Jagdeep Kapur, chairman & managing director, Samsika Marketing Consultants.

“ What is important is the ability of the person to steer the group to the next level. Cyrus is a good professional and certainly has the acumen to do that,” he said.

Some analysts also believe that the Tata brand has grown so large that it does not require the surname to support it any more.

“ It has become an international brand and does not depend only on a surname that can add value to it. The name

Tata is synonymous with trust, reliability and ethics. If the new person with a different surname imbibes these values, then it would have more positive effect on the brand,” said Rajesh Srivastava, a marketing expert.

He said there will be no kneejerk reaction from either the industry or the market, as they view the development in a longterm perspective since a lot of thought has gone into the selection of Cyrus.

“ Today Tata is known as international company with Indian origin. Because the candidate has been selected merit, it has given a very strong signal of continuity of Ratan Tatas legacy who has transformed the group in the last years,” said Jyorden Misra, managing director ( India), Spearhead InterSearch.

Chandrajit Banerjee, head the CII, applauded Wednesday's announcement, calling it exemplary move that speaks volumes about the norms corporate governance at Tata.

“ CII commends the leadership in the Tata Group for setting standards which would be benchmark for large global corporations,” Banerjee said in statement

Women make better recruiters than men?

Greg Savage in his blog "The Savage Truth" finally put in words what Ive suspected all along, at the cost of being sexist. Really, otherwise, why would the majority of recruiters in any agency at any level, in any market be overwhelmed by the number of women working there vis a vis men?

The reasons Greg enumerates are quite simple

Here is why;

• I have found women are far better listeners than men. They are more empathetic. It helps, because they get deeper into the candidates true motivation, the client’s real needs… and they make a better match. Bluntly put, many woman recruiters simply care more about the human element. It might not sound ‘commercial’ but actually it means they end up with more satisfied customers, and over time, that pays.
• You are not going to like this guys (and before you lynch me, remember, I am one of you) but women are more resilient than men. Sure, often they show frustration and emotion much more readily than the average guy, who tends to suck it up and try to tough things out. But actually I have found a steel backbone in so many women in this business. They cry a lot, but they bounce back! They keep going. Maybe it’s fear of failure. Maybe it’s just pure inner strength. I can’t count the guys who have lasted 6, maybe 12 months and dropped out, telling all and sundry as they leave to go back into banking or accounting, that “recruiting is not a real job after all”.
• And then there is the money. Mostly, recruiters get paid on results. The more you bill, the more you earn. And in a world where women routinely earn less than men doing the same job, that’s very attractive indeed. Indeed, women have told me straight out. “In this job I can earn more than the person sitting next to me, man or woman, because it’s a level playing field. I bill, I earn. It’s transparent. And I love that!”
• Its all true of course, all the above reasons, and in very equal markets that may well be all. There is another reason for a market like India for this to be true. There are lots more women than men studying HR in various business schools. And they all come out into the job market, and there are so many executive search firms/ HR firms which do temping or recruitment/ placement firms out there, that it becomes a very viable career option. So at the onset, the number of women entering the workplace in this industry is more. Men would probably rather go into sales or "banking or accounting".
• There is another factor in Indian recruitment firms. The industry is almost uniformly less paid than any other. Once men have a family, if they are the primary bread earners, junior or consulting positions in placement firms might not be a viable option for them. An HR Manager role in an IT firm, for example will be more lucrative, though infinitely less interesting as a job. Unless s/he has his own company, or s/he is at a senior or partnership role, it often does not make sense for an individual with high ambition to keep going in this industry. Often it is women with families, who prefer a more friendly work environment and flexible hours, which are usually provided given the nature of the job, who make it for long years. And of course it is a job which suits them, communicating, creating relationships, handling difficult personalities and ego-s, come to women naturally due to our social conditioning.
• For the full blog from "The Savage Truth": "Sorry guys, women are better recruiters than men"