An article about >five surprising salaries caught my eye on the MSNBC website, so I took a look at it. Check it out and see if the salaries for those five jobs surprised you. For those of you that don’t want to click through to the full article, here is the list with the salaries:

• Court Reporter: $60k
• Elementary School Principal: $80k
• Paramedics: $27k
• Astronomer: $95k
• Fashion Designer: $70k

The one that surprised me the most was a court reporter. That’s pretty good coin for mastering the art of typing and typing accurately. I knew paramedics didn’t make much, which is bogus, because they help save lives every day. The second most surprising one for me was astronomers, but like the article says, it makes sense since you need a Ph.D to be one and there are only 1,700 in the country.

Know of any other jobs with surprising salaries? Share them in a comment below. But remember, picking a job or a career isn’t all about the income potential. It’s obviously a factor, but it shouldn’t be your overall factor, because money definitely doesn’t buy happiness. You can make $100k a year doing a job you hate, and I guarantee you’ll eventually leave, because happiness is much more important than money.

Career coach, J.T. O’Donnell, asked me this question a comment she posted on the site.

What are your thoughts/suggestions on ways for college students to narrow down the endless possibilities in order to focus on a career path so they can network and land a job?

1. Write down a list of what you are most passionate about. Think beyond the box of music, video games, sports, or other hobbies that you have. Are you passionate about helping people? Are you passionate about being creative or innovative? Once you narrow down what professional aspects of your life you are passionate about, then you can see what opportunities fit those passions best.
2. Choose a company that fits your personality. Get to know the office and company culture. If you’re faced with multiple offers from different companies all with a similar professional opportunity, then choose the company. Make sure you pick a company that lines up with your style of how to work and interact with others.
3. Consult your friends and family. Whenever I have a decision to make with multiple options, I always look to my wife, best friends, and parents for advice on my career options.

The reality when coming out of college is that many of you will not step into the career of your dreams. I wish that it could come true, but as much as I like to dream, I have to be real with you, too. It’s not impossible to go straight into doing something you love with a company you like, but it’s just rare. The key is stepping into a situation that will equip you effectively for your future career path or entrepreneurial endeavors.

College is when most people either continue to not care about politics or they become very interested in politics and form a strong opinion about hot political issues. I was a little different. I didn’t start caring about politics or forming an opinion about it until I left school. I started teaching myself about liberal and conservative philosophy, the real difference between Republicans and Democrats, and I researched what issues were most important to me. I didn’t vote in the 2000 election, because I had just turned 18, and I still had the mind of a child. I voted in the 2004 and 2006 elections, but I didn’t really know why I was making those votes. This general election coming up is the first time that I have really dived into the candidates, and I have followed closely every story that has come up in the past year. I’ve noticed that young people are flocking to Barack Obama, older women are voting for Hillary Clinton, and John McCain voters are just voting for him, because they don’t want a liberal democrat to win.

There are many problems with voting these days, but one of the biggest ones is people who vote based on popularity, gossip, an emotional reaction, or simply the way the candidate looks. The Millenial Generation has embraced Barack Obama. They love his charming personality, his mantra of “change”, and his willingness to connect with regular people. However, many have failed to dive into his political philosophy and the position he takes on important issues. How do I know this? Because every time I hear someone ask a young person why they are going to vote for Obama, they’re answers are all the same: “He’s an agent of change, and he’s a good speaker.” Yes, but that tells me nothing about what he actually wants to change, and what qualifies him to be our leader. Those that have taken the extra step, like him because he doesn’t support the war in Iraq, he has a national health care plan, and he wants to keep the borders open for immigrants.

When I come across young people that say they are going to vote for Hillary Clinton and I ask why, I get answers to the effect of, “I don’t like Obama, or I want to see a woman president.” From the radio shows I listen to, to the newspapers that I read, to the television programs I watch, I hear numerous callers say that they will vote for McCain because he’s the one they dislike the least. Are these legitimate reasons to vote for someone?

The common belief is that voting is a right. It’s not a legal right, because our Constitution has no national right to vote. It’s believed that voting is a fundamental human right, but I don’t want to argue about that. I want you to treat voting as a privilege. Don’t vote blindly this November. Don’t vote for Hillary, because you don’t like Obama’s pastor. Don’t vote for McCain, just because you’ve voted Republican in the past. Vote based on the issues. Formulate an opinion based on your personal beliefs, and find the candidate that lines up best with your beliefs on the major issues of our time. We cannot allow the candidates to manipulate us. It’s too important of a process to allow candidates to persuade us with empty promises and disillusioned ideas. Research their prior voting records on the issues most important to you and analyze the answers they give to tough questions. Filter out the set-up questions that talk show and radio hosts ask that don’t tell you anything. Consider your vote a privilege, and make a responsible and informed decision this November.

I saw this YouTube video about an office prank that a group of guys did, and I had to share it with you all. I don’t even know if you can call it a prank, it’s more like an episode of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition! Anyway, if you’re having a rough day, watch it to get a decent laugh for the day.

One of my favorite office pranks done on my favorite sitcom, “The Office”, is when Jim and Pam put Dwight’s stapler in a bowl of jello. Do you have any funny office pranks to share? Post a comment about them below.

Graduating from high school or college is a scary thing. You have relatives and friends constantly asking about your future plans, job offers, job leads, and anything else you don’t want to talk about in small conversation. I’ve mentioned before on this site that formal education doesn’t teach us how or where to find a job. We’re expected to figure it out on our own. During an age where everyone resorts to the internet for their main source of information and social networking, you would think that finding a job has gone virtual. But, the opposite is actually true. The old-fashioned methods of finding a job still hold strong, yet many young people aren’t grasping this concept.

Here is a list of job finding sources that tend to be the least effective:

• Newspaper Ad: If you’re looking for a part-time job or extra work, this might be a good place to find a job, but it won’t result in finding your new career.
• Private employment agencies and headhunter firms: Using these services rarely results in getting a job, especially one that you are interested in. Generally, head hunters are looking for executives, not entry positions and middle management.
• Answering ads in trade journals and publications: Again, the chance of this resulting in getting a job is very low. There is too much time delay.
• Responding to Internet Ads: This is one of the worst sources for finding a job. Most people who are looking for jobs online are wasting their time and trying to avoid real human contact to get a job they want.

Here are the best ways to find and obtain a job:

• Identify Your Skills, Research potential companies you’d like to work for, find the manager with the power to hire you, and request an interview. This is the most effective way to find a career. If you identify the companies that will suit you best, chances are that you’ll be a good fit in that company and the hiring manager will recognize it.
• A referral from a friend or relative.Referrals from friends very often result in landing a job. This is why so many companies offer referral bonuses for recommending a friend to fill an open position. Friends usually won’t refer you to the job unless they already know that you’d be a good fit for the position and you’re qualified for it.
• Using the career resource center at your university. This is how I landed my first job out of college. I saw the ad at the placement office, they contacted the HR manager directly and sent my resume to them through the mail (not through email!)

The internet has revolutionized many aspects of our life, but it hasn’t changed the way we find jobs. It does give us a reference point to know that a company is hiring, but many positions are not even posted on the internet. Stick to the old-fashioned methods when it comes to finding a job, and you’ll have much more quality results.

As young people, we are typically searching for a 101 ways to strike it rich. We fantasize about that one great idea or great opportunity that will make us wealthy. But, once you step down from cloud 9, you’ll soon realize that your career is your number one wealth building tool that you possess. This is why I stress the importance of choosing and developing a career that you love and are passionate about. You’ll invest the most time, energy, and money into your day job throughout your lifetime. So, now that we’ve established that your career is how you’re going to get rich, it’s hard to get rich if your career earns you $25,000 a year. Here are some thoughts on increasing your income and strengthening your most powerful wealth building tool.

When to justify getting a graduate degree to earn more income:

• Compare what you’ll spend on the degree versus what you’ll earn starting out once you’ve received the degree. A medical degree is costly, but the income power that it will bring you far outweighs the cost of the degree. A master’s in philosophy or history is nice, but it won’t increase your income power enough to justify the degree. An MBA is another great example of a degree that is worth spending money on, because business undergraduate degree holders can expect to earn $35,000 out of school, while MBA’s can expect to earn anywhere from $50,000 to $75,000 starting out, depending on the position.
• Consider how long it will take you. If you’re going to do this part-time, make sure that you have the stamina to finish the degree. The worst you can do is spend money on a degree that you never finish.

Certifications: A lower cost alternative to increasing your income potential.

• Seek a professional designation to bolster your resume and demand a higher income.
• Get certified by the organization most respected in your industry.
• Don’t put the initials after your name, unless it’s a CFP or CFA designation for financial advisors. People don’t know what these initials stand for, and you look like a cheese ball if you have all of these obscure initials after your name on your name plate and business card.

Seize Opportunities At Work.

One of the single strongest ways to boost your income is to take advantage of opportunities at your current place of employment. Don’t be shy to apply for a better position. Pursue new opportunities at work by bringing extra business. The more money that you make for a company, the more you are worth to that company. They will notice, and you will now have negotiating power when asking for a raise. The shy and the timid stay in cubicles. The strong and the aggressive employees are the ones that get the window view.

Start focusing on your day job. How can you improve your income potential at your current career? How can you develop a career path in a career that earns more income? What education and you get to improve the income potential at the career you love? These are the questions you need to start asking yourself. Then, develop your five year plan to make the switch.

Think about this question over the weekend and post your response in the comment section. Have a safe weekend!

Would you rather have a safe, secure job that paid you regularly or would you rather have the opportunity and resources to start your own business?

The only stipulation is that the safe job would guarantee that you never get fired and always make enough money to pay your bills, and the business opportunity would have the chance of making you a multi-millionaire but also have the chance of making you go bankrupt?

What would you choose and why?

Maybe you went to some special college that actually cared about how you functioned in society, but I attended the University of Florida, where they are more concerned about putting up more buildings and increasing their pushing you out of the graduation door as fast as possible. I love UF, and I hate talking bad about the school, but it’s like every other large university. You are just a number, and they expect you to figure out some of the most important subjects by yourself: your career and your money.

College never taught you how to manage your money: I write for a blog called Money Crashers which is a personal finance blog that I started 2 years ago. I realized that the need to educate young people about how to manage their money was extremely high. The reason for this is that we breeze through school by hearing a couple lectures here, and a couple impromptu power point presentations there, and we’re expected to know how to manage our money. There is no set cirriculum to help educate you about personal finance, buying and selling real estate, picking 401(k) investments, and picking the right insurance policies. We need to do something about this, and it starts with high school and college students. They need to be educated by people who don’t have an alternative agenda. For instance, there are personal finance courses in some high schools around the country, but many of the materials they use are sponsored by Visa or Mastercard. Don’t you think it’s a little bit of a conflict of interest for a credit card company to be teaching young people about how to manage their money?

College never taught you how to get a job or start your own business: I started this blog because of this very reason. College is supposed to prepare you for the real world, but there is no cirriculum to counsel you on how to get the right job to fit your career goals and personality. One thing I HATE about the public school system from K through 12 is that they steer kids towards the mentality of finding a good job and never towards the option of entrepreneurship. This is because Baby Boomers are young children, and they were taught by their parents to find a safe job and stick with it for a long time. This isn’t the case for us. We’ll most likely change jobs 10 to 12 times over our working career. We may even change careers a few times. There is so much to know about choosing a career, transitioning to a new career, interviewing for a job, dealing with office culture, starting up a business, managing your own business, and the list goes on. Yet, we are supposed to figure this stuff out on our own.

Maybe there’s an element to falling on your face first that helps you learn life lessons, but I think that the educational system is just out-dated and old-fashioned. It’s stuck in its ways, and it would rather spend more time on the periodic table of elements rather than practical lessons about two of the most important aspects of your life, your money and your career.

So, what’s the solution to this knowledge gap? Do we petition the government and get more cirriculum into public schools and universities? Or do we continue to strive to educate the Millenial Generation, so they can teach their kids about these subjects. I think it’s a combination of both. I think we do need more cirriculum in schools about sound money management principles and career development, but we also need to educate parents about these subjects so they pass it on to their children. What do you think? What’s your solution?

I was reading this article from Brip Blap about 15 ways to make your 9 to 5 job more enjoyable, and I thought that I would share them with you.

• Get Up Early
• Stop Smoking
• Stop Eating Junk Food
• Exercise
• Groom
• Hygiene
• Smile
• Read/Listen
• Eat Lunch With Humans
• Take Breaks
• Leave Early
• Do Errands on the Way Home
• Take a Shower When You Get Home
• Go to Sleep Early

Tips I Agree With The Most:

I really like his idea about taking breaks and leaving early. I always took a break every hour and a half when I was working in an office setting. I also always left at about 4:55pm every day. I made sure that all of my work was current or even MORE than current, and I would leave just a little bit early. Some people think that this shows you are too anxious to get out of the office, which is probably true, but I think it shows more that you worked efficiently throughout the day, and you can afford to leave five minutes early. Bosses like employees that are on top of things, not staying late every day to catch up on work. It’s also very important to take care of yourself, because this greatly affects the outlook you have on your work and work life. It also gives bosses and employees a better impression of you when you show that you care about yourself.

What I Need to Work On:

I really need to start going to bed earlier and waking up earlier. Ever since I left the conventional office life, I have been going to sleep a little later, and waking up a little later than normal. I feel so much better when I go to bed at 11pm and wake up at 6:30pm, rather than going to bed at 12am and waking up at 7:30am. I also had a hard time eating lunch with other people. I always sat out in my car, listened to the radio, and took a short nap during my lunch break. I would encourage you to consider taking short naps on your lunch break as well. I would doze off for 30 minutes during my lunch break and feel much more refreshed for the next four to five hours. It helped curb the 3pm low that we all experience from time to time.

If you have any other suggestions for improving the mundane work life, write a comment below!

I talk a lot about those that have jobs they hate and how to get out of them. But for some, making that leap of changing careers is much too scary. It does involve a big risk to drop your current job and pursue something different. Some of you find yourself in a situation where you cannot pursue something different just yet, because you’re the only bread winner in the house, and I completely understand this. Your first obligation is to always provide for your family. Don’t take a career risk unless you have an alternative source of income to pay for a roof over your head and put food on the table.

But what if you could stay at your current job and still pursue your career passions? You can do this, and I will give you three examples of how you can do it.

Example #1: Starting a Side Business. If your career passion involves a hobby that you can turn into a business, you can boot strap a part-time business to test the waters of your product or service. It won’t consume all of your time, and you can still work at your current job to make enough money to live. The idea is that if your part-time business receives a big response, you can slowly transition that into your full-time job and quit your other day job without taking any additional income risk. The point that you can transition the side business into a full-time business is the point when you are making enough money to cover all of your current and future bills.

Example #2: Volunteer in the career field you are passionate about: One of my passions is to someday coach basketball to young men. Getting into college coaching is very hard if you aren’t a prominent former player or you have big connections with other college coaches. High school coaching is a little easier to get into, so my strategy for being able to coach without dropping everything to do it is work my way up in coaching in my community and eventually look for a head coaching high school job. I won’t be in it for the money, because there is no money in it. But it’s something that I love that I can do while carrying a separate full-time job. You can also volunteer with non-profit organizations if your career passion involves helping others.

Example #3: Find a mentor in the field you want to be in. This example is all about networking. Start hanging out with people who are doing what you want to be doing and find someone willing to teach you about the profession during non-business hours. If you surround yourself with people who are living your dream, then opportunities might come your way with less effort than you thought.

The point that I am trying to make is that you don’t always have to go the traditional route for career transitioning which might involve going back to school, taking a pay cut, or quitting your job right away and hope for the best. Work for free in your spare time, and it could turn into a great opportunity. Remember, you have no experience to boast when you are transitioning careers, so volunteering is a great way to gain that experience. Starting a side business on your own is a great way to test if you can turn your hobby into a career or business. Don’t fall into the trap of being paralyzed by fear at the thought of changing careers.