The thing is...

Now my wife is whining

Check THIS out.

I'm a whiner...and ECONOWHINER, that is.

Check this out.

New job, new contact information

David Levy
Senior Vice President, Digital

SINGERDIRECT
800 Westchester Ave.
Rye Brook, NY 10573
Tel: 212.209.1909 | Fax: 646.264.2409
david.levy@singerdirect.com
www.SingerDirect.com

Thank you for your support

I wanted to thank several people who helped me during this job search.  It’s a testament to your character and commitment to our friendship and professional relationships. 

If anyone looking for smart, ethical, sincere people to network with, or to join your company, you may want to start your search with these people listed below—forgive me if I’ve missed some of you:

• Michael Perry
• Michael Lebeau
• Julian Gross
• Erica DiPalma
• Scheron Brown
• Stacey Deering
• Adrienne W Hayward
• Jacqueline Brini
• Richard Aponte
• Dave Fiore
• Chris Parker
• Kim Hewson
• Jen Ross
• Christopher Boynton
• Josh Drew
• Ryan Saghir
• David Betz
• Bonnie Hagen
• Stephanie Hellenbroich
• Ariane Hunter
• Alex Roda
• Steve Hartzell
• Steve Solomon
• Ellen Hurwich
• Rebecca Ashcraft
• Cicely Poggi-Gedacht
• Simon Kelly
• DJ Egerton
• Bob Knapp
• Leann Taylor
• Barry Goldberg
• Phoebe Myers
• Kevin Hill
• Drew Seath
• Michael Lintell
• Jason Brennan
• Jennifer Daniels
• Rebecca Wayland
• Jason Guttman
• John Nardone
• Jeff Glick
• Brian Leiken
• Mark Lipson
• Melissa Beal
• Steven Gold
• Dan Kaiser
• David Walner
• Audrey Lidsky
• Suman Dutta
• Jevon Powel
• Scot Beck
• Karen Reutlinger
• Lori Weiman
• Danielle Brown
• Paige Soltano
• Michael Speaker
• Dave Lokes
• Julie Biber
• Mike Drexler
• David Barner
• Dave Lynch
• Kate Berg
• Cathy Swift
• Glen Mehn
• Rob Powers
• Jen Mathissen
• Mark Galley
• Bryan Owens
• Tim Stock
• John Sabino
• Jen Selverian
• Joann Abbate
• Steve Roberts
• Barb Ettington
• Doug Charles
• Glen McKlencic
• Ben Von Wormb
• Fran Quittel
• Billy Clark
• Ann Marshman
• John Karrel
• Chris Greco
• Bonnie Hassan
• Karen Finckenour

And, of course, my family

• The Pemberton clan: Adam, Julia, Andy, Margaret, Jeff, Jenny, Holly, Tom, Chris, Elizabeth and Nero

• The Levy clan:  Elaine, Howard, Debra, Dan, Sandy, Iris, all the Freierman’s and everyone else in the Family Circle

But most of all to my kids, Charlie and Sophie and my wife Heather Levy.

Happy Holidays everyone, and good luck in the New Year.

The job search is over: Success!

For those of you who may have been following this journey, I wanted to let you know that it has ended successfully (Thank you for your support...see here).  I accepted an offer at a local agency, Singer Direct, to be their new SVP of Digital.  I start in 2009.

In my initial blog post, I described a few types of situations for which I would be a good fit.  This position hits on components of several, highlighted below:

• Creating and leading an interactive or direct marketing department
• Leading business strategy
• Providing experienced leadership to a firm that needs to establish processes and operations to maintain growth, reduce costs or increase profit margins

Until recently, Singer was a family run business that Omincom purchased a couple of years back.  It’s small yet growing, and offers a value proposition that should be compelling during a down economy.

The thing is…that’s not the only thing that was successful.  As a totally biased jury, I’d declare this experiment in social media a success as well (Please offer your verdict/comments) for several reasons.

Social media expanded my reach and exposure
When I started the search, one of the first things I did was to expand my network on Facebook, LinkedIn and Plaxo.  Most people accepted the connection requests.  Each new connection expanded the web of RSS feeds.  Think of each link as another set of eyes that could participate in the search.  Moreover, the web of connections from each additional connection expanded my reach exponentially. 

Efficient distribution for my credentials
By using my blog, Facebook and LinkedIn as content platforms, I made sure that everyone who was connected to me was informed about the search and received updates without having to send a mass email (see next)

Simple call to action
In my initial post, I tried to make it very easy for people to get informed and to take action, reflected in the post title “I’m looking for work; here’s how you can help.”  At that post, there were three specific things I asked of readers: 

1. Review LinkedIn and recommend me
2. Pass the link on to people you know
3. Say a prayer

Now I don’t have the data on item #3, but I can report that many MANY of  you acted on items 1 and 2, and traffic to the blog hit its highest levels starting from the date of the first post. 

Made it easy for recruiters
Recruiters are being VERY AGGRESSIVE in this economy.  There are a LOT of candidates and few jobs (i.e., more demand than supply).   I liken it to five seagulls fighting for that last French fry in the parking lot of McDonald’s. 

Anything you can do to make it easy for them to help you is a good idea.  Sending emails to recruiters became easy.  Rather than write a long cover letter explaining my situation, I simply was able to write a few sentences and point people to my blog post and LinkedIn profiles. 

By reading my blog posts and reviewing my LinkedIn profile, recruiters were able to determine whether or not I was a good potential fit for their open positions.  That’s one may reason why recommendations on LinkedIn are so important.

Emotional support
This result was very interesting, and unexpected.  Losing a job, and then trying to find another one flat out sucks.  It can be very frustrating and isolating.  By reaching out to people via social media, I opened connections between me and friends, colleagues and acquaintances, some of whom I hadn’t heard from in twenty five years.   Exchanging notes with them and getting the occasional “hang in there” message really really helped.

There are a number of tips in this message.  If you think they have any value, please pass them on to your friends who are looking for work.

In an upcoming post, I will offer some do's and don't's for recruiters.

Another business maxim: Seek skills you can take with you

There was a point in time when I recognized that in order for me to succeed at Reader's Digest I would have to learn to "work the system" that governed the place.  I could have stayed but what would I get out of it?  Not much.  Maybe I'd have picked up some things that would be useful, but more likely I would spent months upon months learning "Reader's Digest skills." 

The thing is...You can't take "Reader's Digest skills" with you.  They only help you succeed there, no where else. 

    Now I'm not talking about general getting-around-a-big-corporation skills.  Those skills are insanely important and can help you wherever you go, even if you move to smaller work environments"

• Understanding the levers of power

• Identifying the movers and shakers in an organization

• Negotiating resources with colleagues and the IT department are all incredibly valuable

They teach you to listen.  They teach you how to persuade.  They teach you how to build coalitions.

Let me put it this way.  You'd better learn those things somewhere, somehow in your career. 

    Conversely, specific skills that are less valuable include,

• Mastering an arcane budgeting process that is based on historical knowledge (e.g., "That's how we do things here" mentality) 

• Working a proprietary IT system that exists in no other enterprise (HINT:  Lots of middleware)

• Catering to a single individual who is not leaving any time soon 

Those are too specific.  You can't take those with you.

In any situation, when it looks as though you're learning more firm-specific skills than transferrable skills, it's time to rosin up the resume.

Business maxim. The two most important words are "Thank you"

Simple message for this holiday to season.  Thank you to everyone who has been a friend, a colleague and a mentor this past year, and a special thanks to those of you who have kept me in mind during my job search and have posted recommendations of my work on LinkedIn.

The thing is...saying "thanks" is more than just an annual event.  It's a core human value, and a value that organizations should embrace.

For this Thanksgiving season, here's a reprise of a previous post

 

Short course in Human Relations

• The Six Most Important Words: “I admit I made a mistake”
• The Five Most Important Words: “You did a good job”
• The Four Most Important Words: “What is your opinion?”
• The Three Most Important Words: “If you please”
• The Two Most Important Words: “Thank you”
• The One Most Important Word: “We” 
• The Least Important Word:  "I" 

Business maxim: To get someone’s attention, ask for money in the budget

I learned this lesson while I was at Reader’s Digest many years ago.  We were building the Reader’s Digest web business called “Reader’s Digest World,” which included content from the book division, the magazine and the search engine LookSmart (remember that!). The site looks a lot different now.  

I was the lead editor responsible for bringing the US edition of the magazine online.  Jack Smith, now the CMO at Medco Health, was in charge of the newly created TV and New Media Department and had ultimate oversight over RDWorld.  

There were a lot of moving parts in this venture and most of us were just figuring it out as we went along.  But I was having a tough time getting Jack’s approval on some original content for the magazine, specifically a monthly column by the movie critic Michael Medved.  Days, weeks went by and I just couldn’t get on Jack’s calendar. 

So I went ahead and negotiated a rate with Medved, with the total proposal coming in at upwards of $75,000 per year.  I had a feeling that Jack wouldn’t go for it.

Nonetheless, I shot the details to him in an email.  Mere minutes later—and I mean maybe 5 minutes—Jack walked down to my office and asked, “David, do you have a few minutes?”  

The thing is...Asking for that money was my way of communicating that I was a serious person and I had serious ideas.  I meant business. 

During that meeting, Jack and I went over the content strategy for the magazine and how I planned to keep the site fresh over the course of the next year.  Medved was out, but a lot of other stuff was in.

Jack listened and treated me with respect.  He took my ideas and me seriously.

You can work in a place for a very long time before anyone notices.  Try to spend someone’s money, though, and your phone will ring.

Thanks for the lesson Jack.