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Archive for the ‘Motivation’ Category

We made Top 50 TEAMS in the NATION!!!!!

Tuesday, August 10th, 2010

 For the first 1/2 of the year we were ranked in the top 50 nationwide. We came in at #33 and are very excited. We went down a couple of spots from March-April, so we are pushing to keep that ranking. We have one of the hardest working teams out in the market place!!! Thank you to all of our Buyers, Sellers, and Asset Managers who trusted us!! We a

Tyler Smith % Team make TOP 50 IN THE NATION

re here to serve!!!

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Layoffs, buyouts spur many to rethink and retrain

Monday, October 5th, 2009

7B4HARNUMBIZ

Jason Harnum of Roseville, shown above with his cat Charley, started a pet ID business after he lost his job as a mortgage broker. His company, Pet ID for Me, lets pet owners create ID tags online. The tags look like driver’s licenses, top, and owners can add their pet’s name, breed, color, contact information and photo.

Editor’s note: This one in an occasional series of stories about how Sacramento area workers are reinventing their careers during a period of high unemployment.

Maybe you’ve been laid off, accepted a buyout or taken early retirement and now are thinking about your next step.

Whether it’s a job-training program, a return to college or a venture into a small business or franchise, today’s rugged economy has led many to reconsider their career path.

At the Sacramento Employment and Training Agency, more than 50,000 people visit its 12 Sacramento Works career centers each year seeking résumé assistance and career counseling, said Robin Purdy, SETA’s deputy director of work force development.

Nearly 15,000 job seekers sought the centers’ help in the past three months alone – a 9 percent increase from the same three-month period last year, Purdy said. Many are looking for ways to retrain.

“We are seeing more and more people interested in improving their skills and looking for occupational skills training” in burgeoning fields such as health care and careers tied to green technologies, Purdy said.

Experienced workers are also retooling, re-entering the campus and the workplace. The numbers of students 59 and older enrolled at California State University has steadily grown over the past five years.

In fall 2004 semester, 1,677 students 59 and older were enrolled at CSU campuses. By fall 2008, the number had climbed to 2,117 – 182 of those at Sacramento State – with the majority in graduate studies.

For some seniors, the situation is more dire. They’ve absorbed a late-career layoff or buyout or have watched their 401(k) retirement funds disappear. They’ve forestalled retirement or have been forced to return to the job market.

“We’re seeing a lot of skilled people coming back to the work force,” said Bob Rice, a project director for AARP Foundation’s WorkSearch program in Sacramento, which helps mature workers re-enter the workplace. Officials estimate registration in the program is up 40 percent from the same time last year.

“Frustration is showing up with a lot of the people we work with,” Rice said. “They’re running out of money, they’re losing their house. There’s a lot of desperate people out there.”

At Los Rios Community College District, enrollment this fall at the four-campus district has swelled by 5,000 students from fall 2008, and classrooms are stretched to the limit.

Though officials say the reasons for the spike vary widely, among the incoming students are job seekers and employees squeezing into classes to boost their skills or jump-start their chances on the open market.

“We do have job seekers returning to our colleges. They’re coming to us because their out of work or they’re afraid of losing their jobs,” said Susie Williams, a district associate vice chancellor.

Some 70 El Dorado County residents signed on in June to a program for job seekers organized by Green Valley Community Church in Placerville. After the eight-week program ended recently, five came out of the program with jobs, said volunteer instructor Michael Dugan.

“We wish the numbers were higher,” he said, but in today’s economy, “we’re delighted that anyone’s getting jobs.”

Another 100 job seekers are signed up for the current eight-week module.

In a Sacramento-area market where the jobless rate sits at 12 percent, more people are looking for ways to stay afloat or chart their own destiny.

Now is the time, AARP’s Rice said.

“When you’re laid off and that is a gap in your work life, it gives you a chance to figure out what you want to do.”

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2009 Football schedules are finally here!!

Sunday, August 30th, 2009

As usual we send football schedules, however this year we have something better. Pick the Pros lets football fans really participate by matching their picks against friends or local sportswriters’ picks. Every week of the season your customers will find each game’s favorite in the newspaper, write it down inthe book, and make their own picks. When the games are over, they’ll record the final score and calculate their own won/lost precentage for the week. Weekly schedules have the divisional lineups that show game listings by the pro football weeks, from 1 to 17. Each week lists the specific game dates and indicates which teams have an open date.

09footbakl

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Get on your hobbyhorse

Thursday, August 13th, 2009

There’s a phrase that says all work and no play makes jack a dull boy. I don’t know about you but lately I’ve been a pretty dull boy. The effort needed to meet the challenge of today’s market has had me putting my nose to the grindstone in a way I haven’t for years.
 
Recently I rediscovered one of my hobbies, however, and I realized that part of me had been missing. Maybe you’re a writer, a musician or a painter. Perhaps you like to golf, read, jog or do some gardening. There are probably another 200 I didn’t mention but in an environment like this it’s so easy to forget those things that put a spring in our step and the joy in our journey.
 
So just a little word to the wise; make sure you’re making room for those interests that make you who you are. Get on your hobbyhorse…because nobody wants to be a dull boy.

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Aloha!

Wednesday, July 29th, 2009

Webster’s online dictionary defines a vacation as a “scheduled period during which activity is suspended.” Well I’ve just gone through a very busy season so I’m taking a little vacation for a few days with my friends in Maui. This is our week for a suspension of activity before we jump back into the fray, and now that we’re here it’s a clear reminder of how necessary rest and recuperation truly is.

DSC00104

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How is this for a financial solution for the country?

Monday, July 27th, 2009

This is from an article in the  St. Petersburg Times Newspaper on Sunday.   The Business Section asked readers for ideas on  “How Would You Fix the Economy?”    I think this guy nailed it!

  Dear Mr.. President,

 Please find below my suggestion for fixing America ’s economy..  Instead of giving billions of dollars to companies that will squander the money on lavish parties and unearned bonuses, use the following plan. You can call it the Patriotic Retirement Plan:

   There are about 40 million people over 50 in the workforce. 

  Pay them $1 million a piece severance for early retirement with the following stipulations:  

 1) They MUST retire.  Forty million job openings -  Unemployment fixed.

  2) They MUST buy a new American CAR.  Forty million cars ordered - Auto Industry fixed.

 3) They MUST either buy a house or pay off their mortgage -   Housing Crisis fixed.

 It can’t get any easier than that!

 P.S. If more money is needed, have all members in Congress and their  constituents pay their taxes…   

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Is it time to freak out???

Monday, June 29th, 2009

If you watch the nightly news, listen to the politicians and surf the net on a regular basis, you might as well get it over with and have a complete and utter meltdown. Although I have a desire to be informed, do my research and stay current with the market trends, I’m developing an allergy to the media and the messages from these outlets. And as much as I try to stay positive and focus on my attitude, I found myself recently being surprised with good news.

One of my mentors who knows a contractor who informed me he’d been contacted in the last three weeks about building a couple of really large homes. And I found myself being surprised by that. My friend Hilary and I went out to dinner last week at a cool little Mexican restaurant in Sacramento. When we asked the waiter how was business, we were prepared to provide compassion and empathy for their slowdown. “Business is really good,” he said, “we’re opening up next door to expand our capacity.” I hate to admit it but both of us were surprised.  Why am I surprised? Because I’ve allowed the negative voices to creep in to my thinking and heard too much from the self-serving authors and media pundits who need drama to make money.

Is business booming like 05 and 06? Absolutely not and I hope we never see days like that again where people were taking equity loans at a record pace to spend money they didn’t have, on things they didn’t need to impress people they didn’t know. So yeah, it’s time to freak out. It’s time to get the messages from the freaked out media, the politicians and the pundits out of your head and life. As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he. I choose the good, I see the best and I believe my best days and yours are still to come. You should too!!

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Time to spring back into action.

Monday, June 8th, 2009

If I spent my days reading the news and listening to talk radio I’m not fully convinced my mind wouldn’t turn to jelly. A couple of times this year I’ve found myself doing so and have noticed how it begins to quickly affect me. So I get back on the wagon of putting the good stuff in and letting action rather than reaction define my days.

Now that does not mean I’m walking around with my head in the clouds; I know that we are in the midst of troubling times and this uncertainty can bring a feeling of imbalance and fear. Thing is, I cannot control the outcome…and none of us can. I can’t predict the future and neither can anyone else. So I focus on activities. I go to work on what my needs are for me today.

It is not my job to grind my teeth in frustration or disapproval. Neither is it my job to read comments on the economy from every crank out there with web access. My job is clear and that helps me stay focused.

A recession is a terrible thing to waste. Spring has sprung and there’s work to be done.

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