One thing Many Successful Job Seekers Do to Be on Top of Their Job Search

Are you ready to talk about your value and the key attributes you bring in to the table at any given time?

It won’t be easy talking all about yourself, especially when a team of professional strangers is surrounding you at an event or while having to sit across from an employer while conducting an interview. The fact of the matter is, if you want to get ahead of the rest, you got to describe your strengths and values that you are capable of bringing to the organization. There’s a special tool built for professionals like you to help you prepare for these complex conversations. Therefore spare a few minutes to get to know more about the Brag Book.

What is a Brag Book? It’s a book of documents that hold records of all your professional success. Some may also call it the Wins Journal. No matter what you call it, this tool will help you gather all your important achievements and major contributions that took place at your workplace or even outdoors, where ever your skills and qualifications were put into action.

Below are some useful tips on how you could maintain a Brag Book to boost your career.

Select a Format

Storing your documents where ever you wish is all in your hands. It is advisable to get hold of a format that’s convenient for you to update and edit at any time quickly. Many of you prefer having a small notebook and a pen to take down important information and some others may prefer to track down notes on Google documents or even use an app like Evernote which enables you to update and edit information from any mobile phone device. Before keeping track of your achievements, it’s important that you remember to store all of this information on your personal drive and not on a company device, so that you can retrieve it anytime.

Brainstorm Your Contributions

If you are having doubts on what information to include, think back at the most recent incidents and then gradually move back to the earliest accomplishments that are relevant to your job title. For example: Did you receive positive feedback from a boss or colleague lately? If so, add these high five moments in your book. Has any customer gone out of the way in thanking you regarding your service? Don’t forget to keep a record of these little details. Have got a pay hike or accepted any new responsibility as well? Try including all of this information. You also have the opportunity to include details from your most recent performance evaluation plus happy emails you’ve received from clients. Hope you are getting the hang of things now.

Quantify Results

Documenting any notes of your accomplishments is important when defining your quantitative achievements. Like expressing how you’ve been able to move the company forward, what you have done for the organization to generate additional revenue, save money, improve productivity or increase customer satisfaction. There also may be times where you are unable to state numerical figures to these statements, at times of such, try expressing how you contributed to making things happen smoother, faster and more efficient.

Don’t Forget to Include the Little Details

Your Brag Book will very soon add immense value next time when you want to update your resume or even request for a salary increment. Therefore, make sure all the information you add is thorough and transparent. Don’t forget to add in little details such as location, date, names of the individuals and companies that were involved in the program or project. When you open your brag book after some time, I’m sure you’ll not remember half of the essential details you’ve noted down.

Update or Add Information Each Month

The brag book will become a useful tool only if you keep continually updating it with new information. You could allocate half an hour on your calendar every month and sit down to add important details to your tool. Or even 5 minutes once a week would do if there’s something from work to add in or anything special outside of work to be included. You may also then remember that you’ve got more additional detail which you could include in your projects that you happen to record sometime back.

Reflect on your Glory Days

After a few months of regular activity in your Brag Book, take some time to go through and review over the information you’ve added and start searching for patterns and new trends. Are there any commonly found themes on your Brag Book? Is there any specific type of skill that you would like to leverage in your career? Do you intend to do your best when collaborating with coworkers or do you do better when you are tasked with a problem that needs to be solved alone?

Take the information presented above into consideration to highlight your skills, core values and the specific working environment where you happen to thrive. It’s crucial you keep these details in mind next time you are looking for a job, so it would be easier to look for a position that would match your strengths and values. These details will also come in handy when you are about to prepare your pitch for a job interview and networking on certain events.

The moment you feel it’s the right time to request for a pay increase, bring out your brag points to remind your boss and show off the results as your achievements. It’s not about walking into the HR department or meeting your boss in the room with a whole load of prints with all your accomplishments. Instead, keep these track records as a mean of remembering all what you have done as a study guide to help you practice on what points to focus when speaking to your boss during the salary negotiation process.

A Brag Book cannot be built in a flash or overnight so make up your mind to get started today! The Job Helpers can surely help you with more details on any topic related to getting you that dream job. So why the wait, email us for some perfect career advice.