How to Ace a Job Interview: A Visual Guide to Landing a New Job

When you’re out and pounding the pavement looking for a new job, it can be easy to get lost in the shuffle of things. In these tough times, it’s difficult just to land an interview, so you have to be on point throughout the entire process.
From searching for a new job, to nailing an interview, to answering tough questions with grace, the following infographic guides you through the job hunting journey from start to finish. Make sure you know how to stand out in a crowd of stiff competition.
Click on “Launch Infographic” for an expanded view. 

Artical By:- mint.com

3 Signs You’re About to Be Ripped Off By the “Government”

If you’re a business owner in Indiana, maybe you received a recent invoice from the Secretary of State’s office. It’s a bill for a $125 annual fee for “record keeping and processing of a company’s annual minutes.”
And it’s bogus, according to the Secretary of State. There are no fees for record keeping, and the payments are mailed to a UPS store, according to a report.
The fraudulent form is just the latest in a series of scams in which criminals impersonate a government organization. Here are three signs you’re about to be ripped off by the “government.”

Someone says, “Trust me, I’m with the government.”

That’s not just a movie cliche. Scammers are posing as government officials in an attempt to get your personal information — and they’re getting away with it.
South Dakota’s attorney general recently issued a warning to be on the lookout for telemarketers claiming to be government representatives and tricking victims into giving up personal identifying information.
“Consumers and businesses alike tend to take phone calls or emails from government officials very seriously,” said Marty Jackley, South Dakota’s attorney general. “These unscrupulous attempts to obtain personal or sensitive information is just another example of what lengths these scams artists will go to make a buck.”
Armed with the information, the scammers commit all the basic ID-theft crimes you’re accustomed to. The only way to avoid it is to verify the caller’s identity and never to click on a link that comes from an unsolicited email.

They flash a government logo and then ask you to pay up.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau recently shut down two mortgage-loan modification services. One of the operations claimed that they could help people get benefits from programs offering government-sponsored relief for homeowners, for a price.
In fact, you don’t have to pay anything to get the benefits of these programs, according to the CFPB. You just have to qualify.
Anyone who flashes a seal, logo or badge with one hand and has another hand outstretched, waiting to be paid, should be suspect. The mortgage-modification operations closed by the CFPB were so successful because they found people who were desperate and wanted to believe they could get government aid.
Had they taken a few minutes to investigate the government-sponsored relief programs for homeowners, they would have known they were about to be scammed. Another tip: It sounded too good to be true.

The President promises to pay your utility bill

Last summer’s big “government” scam involved a hoax that the President would pay your utility bill. Untrue, of course.
A Public Service Electric and Gas Company warning spells it out in painful detail: It starts with utility customers getting a phone call that the federal government has a program to pay utility bills on a one-time basis. The thieves then ask for your Social Security numbers to “apply for the program.”
They also provide you with a Federal Reserve bank routing number to use when paying their bills online. Customers who use this number are led to believe that their bills are paid. But they aren’t.
What made last summer’s scam so awful is that it might have been true. It was an election year, and the federal government had a well-established track record of generous aid programs, like cash for clunkers and the stimulus program.
Plus, it was one of the hottest summers ever. Add a little social media to the mix, and people could be forgiven for thinking that President Obama would pay their utility bill.
Instead, the scammers made off with people’s Social Security numbers and set out to steal their identities. The only way to figure out this was bogus was to call the utility company before taking advantage of this federal “program.”
These are just three warning signs, but the scammers continue to innovate, so watch out. Anytime someone tells you they’re with the government and they’re here to help, don’t take their word for it.
Christopher Elliott is a consumer advocate who blogs about getting better customer service at On Your Side. Connect with him on Twitter and Facebook or send him your questions by email.

Artical By:- mint.com

What You Should Do, Financially, Before Quitting Your Job

At some point or another, quitting your job can seem like the best option. You might not be getting much out of your current position and want to explore other career options.
Or, you might want to devote more time at home to raising your kids. No matter what your reasons are for leaving your current position, you want to be sure that you are financially secure and that you’ll be able to maintain your standard of living.

Talk it Over

If you’re single and don’t have kids, you have more leeway when it comes to quitting your job. You don’t have to worry about how your decision will impact others.
But, if you are in a relationship or married, you need to discuss your plan with your partner before you quit. If you have kids, you need to remember their needs before you do anything, too.
Ideally, the two of you will hash out the different options you have and develop a plan that covers a number of financial bases:

• Income
• Insurance
• Retirement

Another thing to discuss is how long you plan on not working.
Are you going to look for a new job or go back to school to train for a different career? If you are leaving your job to become a full-time stay-at-home parent, when do you plan on returning to work (if at all)?

Money In

One of the most immediate concerns when quitting your job is finding a way to cope with the loss of income. If you have savings, do you plan on dipping into that to support yourself while you look for new work?
Figure out how long your savings can sustain you if you have no other source of income. It’s imperative that you are financially secure before you quit, which might mean you need to postpone your quit date for some time.
If you are looking for a new job after you quit, allow enough time to find your next one. The standard recommendation is to allow one month of searching for a job for every $10,000 you earn.
That means if you pull in $60,000 a year, you can expect to look for an average of six months, in a good job market. Remember that in a tougher market, it can take longer.
If your partner works, the big question becomes, can you both live on one source of income? Some couples find that is possible to do so, as long as the one partner earns significantly more than the other.
Switching to a single source of income can mean you need to adjust your spending habits, though, and pay more attention to your budget.

The B-Word

Review your budget before quitting your job so that you know how the switch to one income or to living on your savings will work. Although the goal is to maintain your standard of living, you might have to make some sacrifices when you quit your job.
But, if you find eventually find a career that you love, those sacrifices will pay off in the end and you’ll be back to your old standard of living soon enough.

Get Properly Insured

Insurance is a big issue when you quit work. Don’t leave your current job until you have a plan for replacing your health insurance, if offered by your employer.
Changing your health insurance plan might be as easy as joining the plan offered by your partner’s work. But if you don’t have a partner or your partner doesn’t have health insurance through his or her employer, you’ll need to weigh your options carefully.
Review several private insurance policies so that you end up with one that meets your needs without busting your budget.

Retirement Replacement

Depending on your situation, you might need to find a new home for your retirement savings. Figure out the best solution for your 401(k) before you leave your job and be proactive about any rollovers.
You don’t want to have to deal with the hassle and penalties of having your 401(k) automatically cashed out by your former employer.
Do you plan on contributing to your retirement plan while not working? If you are married, you can contribute to an IRA in your own name, as long as your spouse has earned income. If you aren’t married, you don’t have that option.
But, if you planned in advance and saved sufficiently, you may have enough in your retirement account to make up for any time you aren’t contributing.
Voluntarily leaving a job should never be a snap decision. Even if you are very unhappy at work, take the time to carefully plan your finances before your exit. You don’t want to quit your job only to end up finding a new job you like even less.
Kelly Anderson is a financial planner who blogs about financial advice you can use in your everyday life. Connect with her on Twitter, Facebook and Google+.

Artical By:- mint.com

The Key to Health, Wealth, and Happiness: Track Your Spending

Can something that takes as little as five minutes a day change your financial life?
Absolutely, say the proponents of that so-often-recommended piece of financial advice: track your spending. They believe it can be the key to a wealthier life, and research shows it may make you healthier as well.
There’s no doubt that tracking what you are spending can help you get a better handle on where you spend your money. The insights you gain — I spent how much on that? — may prompt you to curb your behavior in order to achieve your bigger financial goals.
Two years before they quit their jobs to take their dream trip around the world, Warren and Betsy Talbot started carefully keeping track of every penny they spent.
“Right after we started tracking our expenses we sat down for our monthly review together and discovered that our #1 expense after the mortgage was eating out,” says Warren.
He continues, “We found we were spending $1,500 per month on all our dining out. Just by cutting this back to $500 month we were able to save over $24,000 in 2 years, which ended up being the same amount we spent in our first year traveling full time around the world.”
[Related Article: Can You Really Get Your Credit Score for Free?] 

It’s About More Than Money

But what if tracking your spending did more than just shed light on where your money is going?
In his book, The Power of Habit, Charles Duhigg shares research by two Australian researchers, Ken Cheng and Megan Oaten, who designed a four-month experiment where participants were instructed to write down every purchase.
It took some time to get into the habit of recording expenses, but once they did, there were some surprising results.
Not only did the participants’ financial lives improve, but they also smoked and drank less, ate less junk food and even found they were more productive at school and at home.
Duhigg writes, “As people strengthened their willpower muscles in one part of their lives — in the gym, or a money management program — that strength spilled over into what they ate or how hard they worked. Once willpower became stronger, it touched everything.”
[Related Article: The Ultimate Credit Report Cheat Sheet]

Your Brain on Tracking

I recently interviewed money coach Mikelann Valterra, co-founder of MoneyMinder Online, on my radio show. She’s been tracking her spending for some 15 years and helps all of her clients do the same.
She shared some of the research into why tracking can have a powerful effect on your spending, and not simply by creating awareness of where your money is going.
She shared the following insights:
The big key is dopamine, a neurotransmitter. I suspect a lot of us have heard about dopamine, it’s a feel-good ‘drug,’ similar to serotonin. And what we now know, we’ve actually known for the past ten years since we’ve been able to see a little bit inside the brain with an MRI machine, is that when people go to spend money, a really interesting couple of things happen in the brain.
“Like me personally, I just love shoes. So if I am at Nordstrom and I am looking at a really cute pair of boots, what happens is the pleasure center in my brain lights up and it gives me a hit of dopamine, and that’s actually normal.
When I go to pay for the shoes, when I see the price, when I think about the money leaving, then what happens is the insula in my brain lights up and it’s pain. It’s that part of the brain that lights up when you think you’re going to slam your hand in the door: pain.
So it’s this weird dance between pleasure-pain, pleasure-pain. Pleasure, I want it, it feels good. Pain of paying and losing the money to buy these boots or whatever they are.
So, what we know now is the act of tracking, that act of either tracking in the moment or the act of knowing I’m going to go home and I’m going to have to write down what these shoes cost … I’m going to have to write this down, what happens in the brain is it balances out the brain chemistry.
It’s not that tracking will keep me from buying the shoes. But if I don’t track, if I’m not going to track what I actually spent, my brain literally oversaturates in pleasure. It oversaturates in dopamine. There’s nothing to balance it out.
When you don’t track — or let’s say you put something on a credit card and you don’t think about it until you go to pay your bill next month — it actually anesthetizes you against the pain for having to pay for something.”

Being Mindful and Staying Connected

Valterra says some clients record what they spent as soon as they get home, while others might make a routine of doing it in, say, the morning at breakfast. Either way can work.
What doesn’t work, she insists, is simply reviewing your credit card or bank statements to see where you’ve spent your money in the past. “If people look at how they already spent their money it’s too late. It’s already gone and there is no chance for another decision,” she notes.
“We are talking about mindfulness; people being mindful and connected. If people are not mindful and not connected, they are disassociated with their money,” explains Karen McCall, co-founder in MoneyMinder Online and author of Financial Recovery: Developing a Healthy Relationship With Money.
“Healthy thinkers connect the consequences with their behaviors in one thought process and make the appropriate decision. Unhealthy thinkers disconnect the consequences and rationalize why it’s OK to spend,” she says.

[Related Article: The First Thing You Must Do Before Paying Off Debt]
There’s another benefit to tracking a purchase as soon as possible, Valterra insists: “Tracking slows you down and that’s a good thing.”
The Talbots, meanwhile, continue to track their spending carefully, and they even publish their monthly spending online. They’ve turned their trip around the world into a full-time life of travel, and published several books, including Dream, Save, Do.
And it all started with the simple act of tracking where their money was going.
[The full interview with Mikelann Valterra is available online here; for download here; or on iTunes here.]
“The Key to Saving: Track Your Spending” was written by Gerri Detweiler, Credit.com’s Personal Finance Expert. She is also the co-author of Debt Collection Answers: How to Use Debt Collection Laws to Protect Your Rights, and Reduce Stress: Real-Life Solutions for Solving Your Credit Crisis as well as host of TalkCreditRadio.com. 

Artical By:- mint.com