Is There any Benefit in Funding Employees Continuing Education

Is There any Benefit in Funding Employees Continuing Education As an employer, you might wonder if financing further education for your employees has any worthwhile benefits. While its obvious that gaining better qualifications will be a big bonus for employees, the advantages for the employer arent so obvious at first glance. But if you take a closer look, youll see why investing in your workforce can be a great idea. Your Employees Will Have Better Skills The more knowledge and skills that your employees have the better they will be able to do their jobs and help your business prosper. Plus, having a highly educated workforce will always be a benefit to you when potential clients check out your business online before they decide whether to work with you. Being able to highlight your commitment to helping employees gain advanced degrees will signal that your staff are up-to-date with their skills and have the competence to deliver the best service. The Tuition Costs Are Tax Deductible As long as the education program meets certain federal guidelines, the cost of tuition is tax deductible. The course you pay for must be related to your business and the college offering the course needs to be an accredited school like New England College, which is accredited by the New England Association of Schools and Colleges. According to the IRS you can deduct up to $5,250 per employee, per year, for tuition related expenses, which would allow you to recover a significant portion of the cost of a two-year course; or even the entire cost of a degree program spread out over a longer period. You’ll Attract Staff with Drive and Ambition What’s better for your business, staff that want to give you their best every day, or staff that are happy to coast along? It’s surely good business sense to pick candidates with drive and ambition over clock punchers. The go-getters will look for employment opportunities that can take them new places, and if you offer funding toward further education as part of the remuneration package, then you’ll attract the most motivated candidates. Will Employees Need to Take Time Off to Study? No. Todays degrees, both at the bachelor’s levels and the master’s level can be taken completely online, so your employees can fit their studies in around their work commitments. For example, if you run an accounting firm and you want to offer employees the opportunity to study for a master of science in accounting online, they would need to spend around 15 hours a week on their online MSA program, and those hours can be split between evenings and weekends. Won’t People Take Their Degree and Run? Not necessarily, since providing good employee benefits like ongoing education, actually encourages loyalty and improves staff retention. It’s best to seek the advice of an employment lawyer to find out how to structure your offering so that it complies with relevant laws. Investing in your employees makes a lot of sense, but it wont be the right choice for every business. Talk things over with your advisors, and ask other business owners about their experiences with funding employee education before you make any firm decisions. . Images via pixabay.

3 Best Practices For Resume Writing

3 Best Practices For Resume WritingIn this article I am going to share with you the three best practices for resume writing. With just a little bit of effort you can easily come up with an amazing resume, but if you don't take the time to make it great. This is what we will discuss.In order to write a great resume, you must first know who you're trying to get a job from. This may sound like a very easy thing to do, but it's not. You need to understand why someone is applying for the job in the first place. If you don't understand the criteria that is used in the hiring process, it can be quite difficult to write a successful resume.Next, once you know who you're trying to attract to the company, you'll have to start thinking about what you want in your resume. There are some simple tips that you can follow in order to make a quality resume. The first tip is to go into a local bookstore and browse through a book or two on resume writing.Remember, no one can know about your education a nd experience better than you can. As long as you take the time to research a bit, you should be able to write a resume that is unique and stands out from the rest. It should be something that people will be able to relate to and will get you noticed by the company.One more tip is to include all of the necessary information about your education and experience. You should take a moment to document your education and experience for a resume. This will show a prospective employer that you've put the work into your resume and you really know what you're doing. If you don't provide any documentation, you run the risk of someone calling your application false and you'll find yourself in a lot of trouble.Finally, write your resume as if you were looking at it for the first time. Don't just glance over the resume, but make sure that you read through it very carefully. It should look as though you spent a lot of time on it. This will make you stand out among the others and it will also help you stand out from the rest of the pile.When you're finished, go back and give it a quick rewrite to include the needed information for the job description. Now you can begin filling out the resume and get ready to send it off to the company that you're interested in. Since they're used to seeing these resumes, you won't have any problems getting the interview.Once you finish writing your resume, keep in mind that the job description is the most important thing in getting a job. Make sure that you apply for the job because you feel that you're the best candidate for the position.

Career Prospects As A Social Worker

Career Prospects As A Social Worker Photo Credit â€" Pixabay.comThere’s no shortage of positions in social work available for people willing to expend a lot of their professional time and energy to helping others.To break into this field, you can utilize continuing education programs in social workdesigned for working adults. There are nearly 650,000 active, licensed social workers, with 59 percent getting their master’s of social work before entering the field.Social workers are saints in disguise, so to speak. So, what kinds of work do social workers do? Here are a few, which are only the tip of the iceberg.Serve Rural Areas evalAs with teaching, there is always plenty of work to be done. There are a plethora of government-based resources in the form of grants and programs specifically aimed at increasing the number of social workers in rural areas, areas with relatively few government resources.Much of the U.S. population gravitates toward urban areas, leaving many rural communities scrambling for qualified soci al workers. These social workers need a broad background in social work, everything from directly helping people to trying to change policy through advocacy.“In a rural setting, a social worker has to be an all-arounder,” said Goutham Menon, professor and director of the University of Nevada, Reno’s School of Social Work. “You cannot really just be one thing. That is, I cannot just specialize and say, ‘I will only work with kids.’ In rural settings, they don’t have that luxury of having specialized treatment options.”People in rural areas have a limited amount of resources at their fingertips. A counselor or drug/alcohol center may not be within a two hour-drive.A social worker can act as an intermediary to provide resources and referrals to give people the care they need. A whole small community can be impacted by a tragedy, for example.Although approximately 18 percent to 22 percent of individuals in America live in a rural community,the social work profession has historically focused more on urban environments despite the challenges that exist.Domestic Violence VictimsSocial workers help abused women or men find options for shelter and safety. They’re the people who respond to individual needs when it is time to look for solutions to the problems the victim is facing. They also help the victim, perpetrator, and children involved to change the family dynamic.evalHelping people rebuild their lives is not an easy task, and can be stressful and draining. But helping victims change their lives in meaningful ways is a rewarding career experience for the dedicated.According to the National Association of Social Workers,they offer screening for domestic violence, make plans to protect the victim, and help find housing, counseling and other services. Knowing domestic violence and abuse case law is also required.School Social WorkersThere’s a wide range of jobs available for school social workers, which could be why it is a common field of study w ithin the social work paradigm.Working with students, parents, teachers and school administrators to ensure academic and personal success are a few of the duties of school social workers. Students have a lot of pressure coming from different angles, so a school social worker is another person a student can have on his side.evalIn an educational environment, school social workers address bullying, violence, school attendance, learning disabilities, substance abuse, etc.They can also make home visits, provide counseling, make referrals for those facing economic hardships and emotional issues, and provide opportunities for other students to get involved in mentoring and peer counseling.Health CareThere are many types of social workers specializing under the healthcare social work umbrella.Specialized fields of healthcare social work focus on specific populations during different times of their lives, and a master’s degree is usually required for healthcare social workers.If someone i s diagnosed with cancer, for example, a medical social worker counsels patients throughout the diagnosis and treatments stages. They help patients make plans for coping with illness. They also help patients get their ducks in a row in terms of education, counseling, discharge planning, and referrals to other services.A geriatric social worker assists elderly people and their families in home healthcare and meal delivery services. Sometimes a geriatric social worker will ensure a smooth transition into assisted living or nursing care facilities. An aging Baby Boomer population is creating a large demand for geriatric nurses.Mental Health AdvocatesClinical social workers are the largest groupof professional mental health advocates in the U.S., providing over half of all counseling and therapy services. They treat mental health conditions such as depression, anxiety and substance abuse problems; plus provide coping skills for individuals, couples and families.Clinical social workers ca n either work in the general field at private practices, mental health agencies, in-patient residential treatment centers, and hospitals, or specialize in some of the areas mentioned above, including child welfare, family practice, and rural communities. Mental health social workers are also known as psychiatric social workers.It can be tough for psychiatric patients to be reintegrated back into their families and society. Through individual or group and family therapy, social workers help set patients up for success by connecting them to community and hospital resources.evalBeing a social workeris one of the many careers to have in the mental health field. If you enjoy helping others, have the personality and education required, you can find a satisfying career while positively impacting people’s lives.As for social work in general, it’s a field that covers a wide variety of career options. It all depends on the type of degree you get and what you’re really passionate about. Maybe you want to work with specific groups of people or in a particular work environment.But don’t expect to get rich in the field of social work.According to U.S. News, the average salary for child and family social workers was $46,610 in 2015, which is a higher average salary than a mental health counselor at $45,080 and a substance abuse and behavioral counselor at $42,920. Marriage and family counselors earn about $53,500 and clinical social workers make about $54,000.

[Infographic] The 10 Scariest Job Seeker Mistakes - CareerEnlightenment.com

Why Being FRESH Rocks

Why Being FRESH Rocks Giant Door Sticker by Pulaton Back in Jan of 2011, I wrote a post called  The Benefits of Being a Beginner (or, Why It’s Awesome to Not Know What The Heck You’re Doing). I can hardly believe it was almost 2 years ago since I was in that place, and I know I needed an update to where I was back then. But since Im no longer a beginner, I asked Halley Gray (who guest posted here before) to write down her take for us. Halley just launched her new site and service  last week, so she knows of whence she speaks. The PROs tend to intimidate with their well-trodden blogs and dazzling websites. They have arm-long testimonial lists and a waiting list into 2031 plus they cost $$$ per hour. So when you decide that its time to take your game-changing skill from free or swapzies to getting paid for it, you create a website. And you realize youre kind of stuck. Because when you do your market research you compare your FRESH biz and ZAP! All of that momentum fizzles. Im here to tell all of us clinging to the bottom rung that being FRESH is down. right. SEXY. Being FRESH means: *You value your clients *Youre easier to approach *Youre innovative *Youre not jaded *You invest more energy and time into your product/service *You are affordable *You can change everything easily *Your mistakes arent big enough to notice *You can experiment When people sign up to my  Quantum Leap Pack  I make sure that I pour my creative energy and focus into their pack. My end goal is for them to rave with besotted joy. Im hungry to show them their trust was perfectly placed. I make it clear on my blog though that my current price is ABSURDLY low and that Im doubling it in December. I know from my previous clients that Im worth it but right now I need to prove it to the inter webs. Once I do? Sky isnt the limit, Milky Way is. Heady feeling, right? Tips on being FRESH faced: *Dont compare yourself to the pros, please! *Put a time limit/client limit on low prices *Remember you can do this *Gather evidence of how youre magnificent *Work with your clients to make sure the product/service leaves them tingly jazzed up *BE 100% TRANSPARENT *Dont pretend to be an expert *Reveal in your FRESH-ness This is where everyone starts and trust me when I say that the Sarah Vons, Alex Franzens, Danielle LaPortes all felt the same way when they were in our places. Keep moving forward. Halley is a Marketing Strategist at  Evolve. When not crafting personalized  Quantum Leap Pack  for solopreneurs and small business who dont want to go extinct online she can be seen drinking a flat white in windy Wellington and bull-shitting with the nearest humanoid or felinoid. ****************** LAST DAY to  answer my survey   get a chance at a $100 Etsy gift card! Win-win!

Resume Examples Are Essential For Job Hunting

Resume Examples Are Essential For Job HuntingMany new job seekers today are focusing on searching for the best resume examples that could make their job search easier. It is true that you would want to look for good examples of resumes if you are looking for any type of job and it is also important to remember that there are some types of jobs that require you to have a good resume example. However, not all kinds of job listings require a resume that is formatted the same.There are many employers who prefer to look at different forms of samples when looking for applicants or current employees. For instance, if you are applying for a job in the nursing field, there are not a lot of nurses out there who would be willing to do such a job for free. The reason why is because most nurses will receive payment for this job.Resume examples need to be very well designed. It is important to note that a good resume will demonstrate your writing skills, so if you are an expert in this, then you h ave nothing to worry about. In fact, a resume is nothing more than a piece of paper that describes a person's experience and qualifications. Since the applicant already has a job, he would need to make sure that he can present his resume properly in order to impress the employer.Employers want to see how you present yourself as an employee and how you display the things that the employer can look forward to. If you have not practiced writing your resume, then there is no reason why you would be able to do this effectively. All you need to do is find the best examples of these job listings that you can and then practice writing them.It is important that you keep this in mind when you are using your resume examples for a job listing. You may have all the experience that you can possibly have, but if you do not know how to present it, you would not make any sales, nor would you get hired. You have to remember that your resume example is going to be read by the hiring manager and the pe rson who read it should see everything that the hiring manager could see.With that said, it would be best if you made sure that you had printed the resume examples on the hard copy examples. This would make it easy for you to look up these examples whenever you need them. This way, you could actually practice how to use them every day.There are thousands of free resume examples that you can use, but they may not be as much effective as a professionally written one. Therefore, it would be best if you were to print out a few of these samples and you can try to use them every day.

Lyft to Uber Drivers Youll Get Extra Money With Us

Lyft to Uber Drivers You'll Get Extra Money With Us Lyft has a new pitch for drivers: You’ll make extra money with us â€" and not with Uber. Officials for the ride-sharing company announced in a statement on its website Wednesday that Lyft drivers have received $200 million since the app launched. “Our drivers have continuously gone out of their way to make people’s days,” the statement said. “That’s why, since day one, we’ve made it easy for passengers to say thank you by allowing tipping right from the app.” Lyft differs from its top competitor, Uber, by offering a tipping option for passengers on the application, a difference highlighted in the statement. “It’s clear our passengers value our drivers, and so do we,” the statement continues. “That’s why we’re committed to continuing to treat them better with programs that allow for same-day payments, affordable rates on rental cars and lower fuels costs with Shell.” The statement also pointed to a survey conducted by research firm Ipsos that found Lyft was more “friendly,” “welcoming,” “cool,” and “trustworthy” than “other ride-sharing apps.” This survey came before Uber was met with a host of criticism, ranging from the Uber CEO Travis Kalanick’s involvement in President Donald Trump’s economic advisory council (he later resigned) to former Uber employees speaking out about sexism within the company. Uber is still larger than Lyft, as the two are valued at $70 billion and $7 billion, respectively, USA Today reports. Lyft announced Thursday it has expanded to 131 more cities since the beginning of 2017.