Latest trend in the job recruitments in Sri Lanka - analyse candidates using social media

Last week I met a long lost friend of mine. Currently he is working at the Human Resources department of one of the biggest business groups in Sri Lanka. So what are you up to now? I asked. He is a social media analytic. He apparently handles social media research and analysis of the candidates and potential candidates. What the hell is that now? Well its the next level of human resource management.

No need to say, even I got bit shaken given that I too are a regular user of social media in public capacity. Though my writings or comments make sense for me, corporate aspect and personal interpretations could be insane some times.  Without my knowledge they track my social media behaviour? Well, most likely it is , he burst out laughing. Jokes aside, I can tell you more about some people than you gossip girls ever know, he assured. Now that's worth enough information for an article. I managed to get him agreed to publish some of the details.

 

 

 

(picture credit - http://socialmediastrategiessummit.com/)

The unexpected path to entrepreneurship - A great scientist shares her story (and a little wisdom gleaned from the journey)

Last week I met three science graduates.

One person was talking about the issue where even the science graduates do not have proper jobs. Second person told me that now she regret for selecting science as her field. She said, “If I manage to do a MSc, maybe I will get a university lecturer job. Third person was talking about a different issue on our mothers and sisters moving to Middle East and the social issues that come with that.

While I sat back and thought of what they discussed, I met this awesome lady, another scientist, Ms Praveena Joseph-de Saram.

 

What to do next in Sri Lanka if failed A/Ls.........?

This is for..................?

This article is not targetted at those who were lucky enough to get through the GCE A/L examination. This is targeted at the closer to 80% student population who do not have the bliss of obtaining basic qualifications to go to the next level.

Why this is .................?

This is mainly my reply to the young girl who sent me a letter in last month asking what to do when someone failed advanced level  examination. Since my reply to her can be useful to many other people, I'm publishing it here.

As I first read her mail, what came to my mind was the below dialog from the "Adventures of Alice in Wonderland".

'Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?'

'That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,' said the Cat.

'I don't much care where --' said Alice.

'Then it doesn't matter which way you go,' said the Cat.

'--so long as I get somewhere,' Alice added as an explanation.

This has all I want to say. You asked me to show the direction. But it all depends on where you want to go.

But since you trust on me, may be I can help you with some tips.

How to be a Scout in Sri Lanka?

How to be a Scout in Sri Lanka?

 

(Picture credit - www.dailynews.lk)

 

I got the opportunity to do an exclusive interview with the programme commissioner for the National Scout Headquarters of Sri Lanka - Mr. Rohan Wirasekara. He is also the Scout Leader for the Royal College, Colombo Scout Group for three decades. It is a large Scout Group with about 1,000 Cubs & Scouts.

Question - Why do you think a student should be a Scout?

Answer - Because Scouting trains the students to be fit citizens with values. Boys need to try fun and adventurous things. In Scouting students always try new things on their own. They are capable of doing many things. They handle duties, obey the orders, manage teams, meeting new friends, provide service to others and do have a lot of adventures .

How to be a professional Marketer in Sri Lanka?

This is the first article for this site by a guest writer from our renowned panel of professionals who support this worthy cause. Author of this article is Mrs Shalini De Alwis who is an expert in Marketing. She obtained her Bachelor of Business degree from Monash University Australia and completed exams in Chartered Institute of Marketing UK (CIM). Currently she is handling the marketing and product development for a blue chip company in Sri Lanka.

How to be a Marketing expert in Sri Lanka?

Author - Shalini De Alwis

If you would like to become a marketer you should have the passion for it. Many become marketers simply after they fail in what they have studied previously. Even if this is the reason still a person should have the interest and passion to be a Marketer. Most importantly marketers should have good Public Relations skills and need to be very enthusiastic in what they do. If you have the right attitude and you are serious about becoming a marketer then there are varied marketing professions that you could specialize and become a recognized marketer. However If you don’t have the right attitude then marketing is not the ideal profession for you. In this article, we will be discussing the role of a marketer in Sri Lanka and how to be an expert of Marketing in Sri Lanka.

What ‘WAS’ the Role of Marketing in Sri Lanka?

A few decades ago Marketing was not very recognized in Sri Lanka and people’s perception towards marketing as a profession was limited only for Sales.

What ‘IS’ the Role of Marketing now in Sri Lanka?

Steadily but surely this perception has changed and people have become more aware of different areas of marketing and specialized areas of marketing professionals. Hence it’s important to identify the changing role of marketing and its affects on Marketers.

Understanding the Role of Marketing in Sri Lanka

This article has identified the changing role of Marketing and skills that future marketers need to adopt in order to be successful in their career. In my personal view marketing is one of the most significant helping arms of any business.

Who is the Marketer?

There is this an saying that, a good marketer should be able to sell 'Ice' to Eskimos !!!. Its all about that.

Marketers are the people


• Who understand customer needs and wants

• Develop attractive products and position products

• Among focused customers segments

• Whilst creating the brand identity

• Conduct continuous promotions to encourage repeat purchases.


Why the role of Marketers becoming very strategic?

Currently the role of marketers has become very strategic, due to


• Technological advancements;

• Increased competition and

• Affects of modernize customer needs and wants.

These impacts have led to frequent changes in Market conditions.

How to be a Marketer in Sri Lanka?

There are many ways to be a professional marketer in Sri Lanka.
1. By completing a degree on Marketing.

2. Becoming a member of CIM - UK (Chartered Institute of Marketing – UK)
http://www.cim.co.uk/home.aspx

3. Becoming a member of SLIM – SL (Sri Lanka Institute of Marketing)
http://www.slim.lk/

Having a degree plus a professional qualification from a recognized local or International institute is an added advantage for potential marketers.

There are many internal and external degrees for Marketing. We will provide a list of degrees for marketing conducted in Sri Lanka which is approved by the university grants commission.

If you are selecting a foreign degree or an online degree on marketing, always check the rank of the university, courses they offer, subjects, research facilities and of course the scholarships.

4. Know your customers. Read as much as possible. Talk to people as much as possible. Listen to them. Log in to Internet and read every other strategy. You should feel by heart

This is an important article which I think you should refer to.
http://www.buzzle.com/articles/selling-ice-to-eskimos.html


Practical experience required to be a professional marketer.

There is a saying that the single best way to become a marker, is to “MARKET”. It is in fact very interesting job to do.

How to select an organization to start with the career?

To be an expert Marketer you need not start your career with Unilevers. But you have to start with a proper place which cater the objective and which gives you the ability to perform and guidance to develop.

Is English a must for a Marketer?

My answer is No. It just knows your market is knowing how to deal with it. However fluency in English is a definite advantage in order to gain professional qualification and to build a better career in marketing. Unless you really have a thrive to learn English, please do not enter this field. You will end up selling goods at streets.

What’s the new role of Marketers ?

Due to constant changes in market conditions and varied customer demands; organisations business strategy and the orientation of the business also has to be changed. Accordingly the role of marketing changes in the sellers and buyers markets. For instance in the sellers markets; marketing was mainly used for sales support. And buyers markets encourage marketers to focus more on customers.

However the current role of marketing requires marketers to convince organization’s management to deliver products and services that exceeds customer expectations. In order to ensure that the organizations achieve these objectives; marketers have ended up engaging in a more strategic role. The new role of marketing is all about sustaining competitive advantage. Hence marketers have focused on customer insights and they are responsible to use their expertise to retain customers.

Further the new role requires marketers to make decisions based on increased objectives and detailed analysis. Marketers are required, to understand insights regarding what customers and other stakeholder’s needs and values. This strategic role will assist marketers to focus on wide understanding of Organization interests by focusing on building long term shareholder value.

What does the current market demand from Marketers?

The new role of marketing will be repositioned. It could be repositioned as the value driver or (as the strong force) for any business, since the new role requires marketers to work closely with professional colleagues of internal divisions and external parties in order to make sure that the all aspects of the offers or products and services are aligned to deliver customer and share holder value to achieve the ultimate objective of gaining the competitive advantage.

As per the new Strategic role marketers are required to:

•  Engage in research and external environment monitoring
• Prioritize tasks
• communicate effectively in a convincing manner
• be customer experts
• lead and manage projects

Hence the present and future marketers need to be aware of these skills in order to brand themselves as expert marketers. On the other hand many organizations which have not been aggressive in marketing in the past are pushing to develop their marketing capabilities in order to defend their existing customers as well as potential customers against existing and new competitors. For instance; in Sri Lanka the Telecommunication industry has become extremely aggressive in marketing due to increased competition and threat of substitutes. Similarly various industries have become aggressive in their marketing approach. As a result it’s important for marketers to build the mentioned above skills since steadily but surely marketing has shifted from mass to individual and relationship building marketing. As identified earlier this shift has resulted mainly to gain a competitive advantage in the long run.

Conclusion,

Due to changing market conditions and increase of customer and shareholder expectations and values; presently marketers have to play a strategic role in order to satisfy organization’s stakeholders and sustain a competitive advantage in the long run. Marketing acts as the driving force of the organization. Hence marketing has become very significant in Organizations senior managements’ strategic planning. As a result existing and new marketers have to adapt new skills to achieve strategic planning objectives. Marketers have to focus on performance oriented goals whilst practicing their new skills. In my opinion marketers should at least focus on a few new skills and should be willing to make decisions quickly and execute offers that meet customer needs and wants beyond their expectations whilst building relationship marketing skills which will facilitate to sustain shareholder value in the long run.

What Next?

In our next article, we are hoping to guide you through how to market a new product. Until then, be prepared :)

Who wants to be an Accountant?

I want to be an Accountant !!!!

Many students have told me that they want to be an Accountant. Then I ask them, why do you want to become an Accountant?. If you are also in the same position, just ask your self.

WHY I want to be an Accountant?

Why? Do you really like it? Do you know about it? How do you expect life to treat you after becoming an Accountant?

I have no interest in writing their answers here. But to understand the basis of my article, I suppose its important that I share some of their views.  This is what they told me in summary.

1. "It is the easiest thing to do. I mean Maths and Science are so difficult. So we are going to do Accountancy. "

2. "I know an Accountant. He is very rich and has a nice car. I want to be like him."

3. "My father is an Accountant. So if I become an accountant, its a respect to him."

4."My aunt who is in Melbourn told me, that for Accountants, its easy to get Austrailian PR!!!".

Only a handful of students who gave me the answer I was expecting. They told me that they were so passionate about it, its very interesting to handle a  finance in a company and the whole company will depend on what they do. Amaizing. I can smell what their career is going to be.

Job market for Accountants in Sri Lanka

During last couple of years I worked with and dealt with many professionally qualified accountants. Some of them were very successful in their career where as some of them were you know just Accountants. I met accountants who have the same qualification, but one gets like 10 times  of the salary of the other. But unlike another professions which the work may vary, they were doing the similar type of work for two similar size of multinational companies in Sri Lanka. What create that difference? Trsut me guys, I know these poeple. Its not their talent which makes them differ. Its defineatly not the capacity of their brain. Its just their attitude. Its just their spirit and the will.

'Thats A job' Accountants

I've categorised the Accountnats whom I met. I will call the first category as "Thats a Job" Accountants.

Some, I can say most of the Accountants of this category just hate what they do. For them its very routine.  Monthly Accounts, Quarterly Accounts , Annual Accounts , Audit reports and this cycle repeats for the rest of their life. They consider its their job. It pay for their food, so why bother. Do something here and their, cover up things, close the computer, pack the files, go home before others !!! Surely thats a dull life. They get paid  only for that much.  

'Thats 'THE job' Accountants

A co worker of this site asked me whether I categorised my sample of accountants based on the salary scale. No. I didn't. But when I checked my data collection sheet against the salary sheet, I realised that he is not wrong. But its a co incident. I categorised based on the answers they gave to my questions. This category of people told me that "Its THE job". If you take the bigger picture, they were also doing the same things which other category were doing. Thats preparing Accounts. But their life was more interesting. They feel  they are important. They feel they are talented. Most importantly they feel they are happy. They did not have complaints. They are working for the same kind of employers who has no interest in the happiness of employees. So how do they live so happy?

They are either doing their dream job. Or else they are the sort of people who can convert any job they do in to their dream job with the commitement and thrive to learn.  They were absorbing new knowledge, practicing what they learned, implementing things at work, find the ways to do the work efficiently and effectively. Get more work  to do in the time saved. Check what could be the best for the company and for them selves. Keep an eye on the share market. Invest. You know it was interesting to talk with them atleast for a small time. They were at different ages. Some were very young. Some were quite old. But their passionate about the profession was same. It was amaizing to watch the way they were handling things. They do have a life. They have become Accountants, not by chance, but by choice.

Whats the difference between these  two type of Accountants?

 I asked the " 'Thats 'THE job' Accountants...............

"Did you request this salary in the interview"?

Most of them told me,
"No. They offered me". !!!!

They were head hunted by the companies. Market is keeping an eye on people like them. They are ready to buy such people at any rate.

And people of the previous category who became Accountants just for the sake of it, thinking it as "A job", oftenly complained about the second category earning a good salary. Some of them in this category didn't even know that there are such high salary scales exist and operating in Sri Lanka. When I asked them a rough question on market salary rates, they told me

"What nonsense. Who would want to keep an Accountant paying so much of a salary? !!!!!".

So that was their definition of their own profession. They only get what they deserved.

Who should be an Accountant?

 Like any other profession, to be a professionally qualified accountant also it takes much time and needs much hardworking. A person who could not spend that time, a person who do not have that commitment, a person who do not wish to build a career as a professional Accountant, should not aim of being an Account. There are hundred and one other jobs which suits your profile which could give you the same benefits an Accountant can get.  If you are not ready for a hard life, do not ever dream of being a high profile accountant. 

How to be an Accountant?

I will assist on this on my next article. Be await !!!