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Page turners; Career books can help jumpstart job search

Source: Tribune Media Services

Check out these career-themed book if you or someone you know needs a little spark to ignite the 2010 job search.

Over 40 & You’re Hired!: Secrets to Landing a Great Job (Paperback)

Robin Ryan (Penguin, $15)

Ryan inspires readers to jump-start their careers and secure new, better-paying jobs. She encourages them to tap into the “hidden job market” (where 80 percent of all jobs are found), explains how to create targeted resumes and master the interview, and outlines how to overcome any age-related stereotypes they may encounter in their job hunt. Ryan has created a guide of valuable advice and detailed explanations culled from years of experience as a career counselor that people over 40 will find indispensible as they look for work.

Overcoming 101 More Barriers to Employment: Great Tips for Making a Habit of Career Success (Paperback)

Caryl Krannich (Impact, $17.95)

Krannich examines barriers to keeping a job and advancing careers. Some barriers relate to the lack of appropriate skills, negative attitudes, and avoiding responsibility, which can be overcome by making behavioral changes. Other barriers relate to circumstances beyond an employee’s control, such as location, outsourcing of jobs, changing technology, and layoffs due to a weakening economy. The book describes and analyzes each barrier and then offers useful advice on how to best overcome it.

Just Listen: Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone (Hardcover)

Mark Goulston (AMACOM; $24.95)

A primer on dealing with hard-to-reach people in virtually every scenario — defiant executives, angry employees, families in turmoil, warring couples — through use of well-honed psychological techniques. Illustrative snippets from counseling sessions reveal martial-arts like techniques: potent on their own, but even more powerful when you combine them. Chapter summaries feature action steps preparing readers to encounter similar scenarios, yielding a guide that is as entertaining as it is useful.

The Boomers’ Career Survival Guide: Achieving Success and Contentment from Middle Age through Retirement (Hardcover)

Ken Tanner (Praeger, $29.95)

For Boomers intent on following the right path to reach the pinnacle of their careers, who want to be prepared for common pitfalls and dead ends that can derail a midlife career, this can-do guide is a dream resource. Designed to help the nation’s largest, wealthiest, and most successful generation make the “back nine” of their working lives an extraordinary, enriching experience. With page after page of real stories about real people, it offers expert insights on how much the working world has changed in the Boomer years, and on the common workplace issues Boomers face, including second careers, age discrimination, stalled careers, and anxieties over finding your true talents and snagging opportunities. A final section provides realistic, workable advice on those ultimate Boomer dreams: starting your own business and retiring in style.

Employee Morale: Driving Performance in Challenging Times (Hardcover)

David Bowles and Cary Cooper (Palgrave Macmillan, $45)

Performance is the key outcome of high morale, and the reason why it should be taken so seriously: with research gathered from some of the world’s largest employee opinion databases and best academic centers, the authors lay out the morale-performance connection. As employee morale gets the recognition it deserves, organizations are changing everything from their structure to their processes to take account of this fact and are starting to manage themselves around the need to measure and improve morale on an ongoing basis. Starting with the hiring process to every single promotion, and via ongoing methods the authors examine in detail, high morale the goal.

Y-Size Your Business: How Gen Y Employees Can Save You Money and Grow Your Business (Hardcover)

Jason Ryan Dorsey (Wiley, $24.95)

Maximizing the performance of every employee is critical to business survival and growth. Gen Y — sometimes called Millennials — provides an enticing opportunity for employers to increase their short-term profitability and create a long-term competitive advantage. Almost 80 million strong, Gen Y is the fastest-growing segment in the U.S. workforce, comprising the entire 18 to 32 demographic. Gen Y brings tremendous potential and timely skills to the workplace. However, Gen Y can be notoriously difficult to attract, retain, motivate, and develop. Gen Y’s new approach to work makes them a growing challenge or strategic opportunity — depending entirely on how you choose to employ them. In Y-Size Your Business, Jason Ryan Dorsey, presents a step-by-step methodology for best employing Gen Y without investing a lot of time or money. A member of Gen Y himself, he delivers an insider’s view of his generation as well as more than fifty cost-effective, ready-to-use strategies that deliver immediate measurable results.

There’s No Crying in Business: How Women Can Succeed in Male-Dominated Industries (Hardcover)

Roxanne Rivera (Palgrave Macmillan, $39.95)

A book for women who aspire to top positions in companies and industries where men traditionally have held those positions. Based on interviews with women academics, engineers, politicians, mathematicians, neurologists and others in male dominated organizations as well as the author’s own experiences in the construction industry, this book will offer insights and advice about how women can succeed in these environments.

Super Staying Power: What You Need to Become Valuable and Resilient at Work (Paperback)

Jason Sieden (McGraw-Hill; $16.95)

It may seem like no job is secure during these difficult economic times, but anyone wanting to stay in their position can learn the innovative strategies needed to protect their job now. Super Staying Power shows how to stand out at work and become indispensable to your company. It will prepare you to survive the stress and pressure of today’s business climate. The information you learn from this book will make you resilient and invaluable to your organization, and it will help you shift your thinking to a new, success-oriented perspective that will make it easier for you to leverage skills you already have to achieve more, with less worry.

201 Knockout Answers to Tough Interview Questions: The Ultimate Guide to Handling the New Competency-Based Interview Style (Paperback)

Linda Matias (AMACOM; $13.95)

Employers are increasingly using a tough new kind of interview to evaluate candidates and determine how well they think on their feet. To be successful in these new competency-based interviews, job seekers must be prepared with situation-specific examples that highlight the accomplishments, knowledge, and abilities they have that employers need. Featuring a plethora of sample questions and winning answers, this indispensable guide features fill-in-the-blank exercises readers can use to prepare themselves to demonstrate sought-after competencies and wow potential employers. It’s a powerful book no job seeker should be without.

© 2009, Tribune Media Services