Interim Career Solutions

Is a recession a good time for interim managers and management consultants?

High-end interim managers and management consultants thrive in economic downturns. Many interim management appointments are for company turnaround work and clearly in a recession this is in demand.

Many companies finding it tough in a recession might not necessarily need a turnaround specialist or company doctor however maybe they do need to appoint an interim manager or consultant before committing to a permanent position. In economically challenging times short term contracts make a lot of sense.

So, many interim managers are benefiting from these troubled times; indeed a lot of interim management agencies and recruitment consultants will tell prospective candidates “trade is brisk – come onto our books, we have lots of jobs.” That may be true but it’s not all good news. There are now more and more interim managers and management consultants who didn’t choose the independent route – they just found themselves on the scrap heap due to redundancy or even old age (over 40?!) As more and more talented and experienced managers move from the permanent job market to the temporary market the pool of talent gets deeper which is only great if you are an employer.

I spoke to an executive recruitment consultant recently who said that there are indeed a lot of temporary executive jobs and interim positions available, however whereas a couple of years ago they would put forward to a client 3 or 4 strong candidates, now there are 10-20. And all 10-20 are top quality. It’s getting very competitive out there.

It gets worse for management consultants at the ‘discretionary expenditure’ end of the scale – for example training and development consultants where company training budgets are often one of the first things to be cut in a recession.

So, what do you do while you wait for your next interim management or management consultancy assignment? The Internet gives us all a golden opportunity not only to find that next job but also to turn our talents and experience into money while you wait. You might even want to do what I have done and carve out a new career for yourself and be one of the next wave of Internet entrepreneurs.

Come and join me – it’s fun!

 

Richard Wall set up Interim Career Solutions to help interim managers, management consultants and other professionals promote themselves and set up additional income streams on the Internet. If you are suffering from the downturn or you fancy another income stream, Richard’s Residual Magic eBook will help get you started, free download link available here.

Our Residual Magic Newsletter has moved

One of our key aims is to help interim managers, management consultants – indeed anyone in between assignments, in between jobs, or wanting a career change – promote themselves on the Internet and set up additional income streams.

Richard Wall’s Residual Magic newsletter has useful tips and links to help you. From August 2009 we have moved the newsletter from our Wall to Wall Potential Ltd. company website walltowall.biz to this interim career solutions site. We hope you find it helpful.

Here are the contents of the August 2009 issue:

  o Welcome

  o Quotes of the month

  o Are you making the most of the Internet?

  o Oprius Contact Management Software – free 30 day trial

  o Video of the month – Five Rights by Brian Tracy

  o Guest article – The Lamest Success Secret Ever… by Mike Dillard

  o Technical nuggets

  o Book of the month: Residual Magic by Richard Wall

If you are looking for more work – either as an interim manager, management consultant or someone looking for another job - the 5 page ‘Are you making the most of the Internet’ PDF document will show you how Breeze can help you promote yourself or an existing business or start something completely new on the Net.

You should find a nugget or two this month – even if it is just you are experiencing slow broadband / ADSL connection speeds the free broadband speed checker tool will help… or if you are looking for a contact management, autoresponder system there’s an excellent free trial, or if you are just anxiously looking for a way to make money on the Internet and don’t know where to start there’s a link to my updated Residual Magic eBook. If you are actively looking for another income stream there’s an excellent 2 minute video from Brian Tracy about what to look for.

Millions of people are struggling with the economic downturn. For you and me these are very exciting times if we are prepared to learn new skills and jump aboard the Internet bandwagon… it’s only just begun and there is opportunity everywhere.

Click here to see the August 2009 issue of the Residual Magic newsletter and don’t hesitate to phone or Email me if you need any advice.

Richard Wall – Interim Career Solutions. North Yorkshire, UK.

How to do a MS Word Mail Merge to Email

If you want to promote yourself online – either as an Interim Manager, Management Consultant or maybe as someone in between jobs and wanting to add another income stream while you are waiting – one of the golden rules is you need to build an Email list. That means getting autoresponder and list management software like aweber, getresponse.com or the excellent new Oprius system (free Oprius 30 day trial here). It means getting people to opt-in i.e. give permission for you to send them information.

However in many cases that can be over the top – what if you just want to send out a personalized Email to your friends, family or contacts without them having to ‘opt-in’ to a list?Maybe you want to tell all your contacts you have changed Email address and you want to put ‘Dear Fred, Dear Sue…’ to make it personal? Or maybe you want to send out personalized party invitations. Or maybe you are wanting to send your CV to a number of Interim Management Agencies or Recruitment Consultants.

Well, if you use Microsoft Office (or at least Microsoft Word) you can do a Word Mail Merge, linking up to your names and Email addresses in Microsoft Excel and outputting individual personal Emails to Microsoft Outlook. This short video by Richard Wall shows you step by step what to do:

Interim Career Solutions will be producing many more Technical Nugget short videos like this to help you be more productive with your computer… stay tuned!