tips

5 Things You Must Do After College

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Being a post-grad is one of the most exciting, yet trying, periods of time you will face as your education finally reaches its climax. I’m writing this in February, then, as a way to hopefully help get people thinking about this now, rather than later.

This is the time to prove yourself. Really, your 20’s are all about proving yourself. This is it! Your first step into the so-called real world you’ve heard so much about.

It’s only been 1 year since I began my post-grad journey, so I’ve compiled a list of things that will hopefully benefit you once you’ve finally finished your undergrad.

Keep in mind that some of these tips are more or less applicable depending on what you actually studied in school, with communications being my experience for writing this.

1. Learn How to Budget

Yes, you may already know how this works and have been doing a fine job through school. This tip isn’t for you. This is for the post-grads who didn’t work much during school and had their parents handle their finances.

It’s time to get it together. Learn how to do your taxes. Learn how to save money. Watch your parents do it. Figure out what you need to make and how much you can spend before you make other big decisions, like where you’re going to live and what kind of job you’re going to apply for.

It amazes me when people don’t know how much money they want to negotiate for a salary. How do you even have grounds for what salary is “necessary” when you have no idea how much money it will take for you to survive? Think about this now so you can be ready.

2. Plan for your Student Loans

Most of us have plenty of loans to pay for once we’re done with school, and this is something you absolutely cannot go into unplanned. You don’t have much time after school ends before the bills start coming in, so plan ahead. Find out how much you’re going to have to pay and apply for different payment plans if you need to early, so you don’t end up paying way more than you can afford.

3. Stay Busy

In other words, do part-time work. This may mean putting other things on hold, such as relationships and social activities. Why? This is a time of rough transition, and you need to be prepared for anything. As a new professional, you are the most susceptible employee to unexpected layoffs and pay-cuts.

Be prepared. Part-time work, especially related to your profession, helps supplement income and develop even more skills that you will need as your career advances. I highly recommend online tutoring. It’s flexible, pays pretty well, and is a great way to keep your mind active when you’re tempted to zone out on the weekend.

4. Avoid Commitments

I say this with a heavy heart, especially since many people I know get married and have kids shortly after college. That’s fine for them, but I don’t recommend it. This is mostly because you have no idea where your profession is going to take you, and making lifelong commitments with someone who may not align with your career creates intense problems.

Plus, most people just aren’t ready for that level of commitment during this time of transition. I highly recommend that you take a year or more to get settled into your new lifestyle and worry about family life later, when you are more ready for it. You will avoid a lot of problems if you do.

5. Develop a TON of Experience

This is especially important for those of you going for grad school. Education is a great asset to your resume, but don’t rely on it too much. Other people just as educated as you are applying for that same job down the road, only they probably have experience along with their education.

If you wait too long to develop experience through internships or part-time work related to your career, that makes your resume extremely unattractive to employers. This obviously doesn’t apply to every field of study, but it is mostly relevant for people in communications.

The bottom-line is: don’t get lazy or complacent. Once you’re done with school, plan for your future and be prepared for anything. Don’t pigeonhole yourself into one thing, because you might get stuck with it for the rest of your life. Experiment. Have fun. Get your life off to a great start. Prove yourself.

Like what you read? Connect with me further via twitter @JonNegroni. I’ll follow back if you seem like a real person. You can also subscribe to this blog by clicking the “follow” button in the top-left corner.

Don’t forget to check out THE JON REPORT every day, updated at 8am for a list of today’s main headlines as selected by my editorial team (me) 

5 Social Media Rules to Live By

Image Courtesy of pavementspecials.blogspot.comThere are a lot of social media rules out there, but they really only cater to businesses, brands, and social media managers. What about writers, bloggers, and young professionals? Well, here are 5 rules that I think most new professionals can benefit from implementing.

Oh yes, keep in mind that I break these rules all of the time.

5. Show more love than you receive. Unless you’re a household name, your presence online is really just a numbers game. The more love you give out, the more people will reciprocate.

4. Use your own image as a profile. Your picture is the first thing people see when they look at your Facebook, Twitter, or Pinterest. It says a lot about you, probably more than you know. Not having one, or just using the default unfortunately makes others think that you’re lazy, or not confident enough to share what you look like with us. That might not be true, but it’s the cold truth of what people think. In some cases, your logo can be appropriate, like in WordPress, but for sites like Twitter and Linkedin, we want to follow people, not shadows.

3. Either be good at writing, or find someone who is. Your words are the second thing people see, even on YouTube. Good grammar and just plain wit in your writing goes a long way in establishing credibility and branding yourself. Do whatever it takes to learn good copy, proofread, and maybe even find someone who can help you.

2. Create content just as often as you share others’. I talked about this earlier in the week, and it still rings true, especially on Twitter. People don’t like following someone who only retweets. They want to read your tweets, hence they followed you. While it’s great to show love and share the work of others (while crediting them of course), it is just as effective to put your own ideas out there.

1. Be genuine by being simple. It’s pretty obvious that coming off as genuine and honest helps your personal brand, but many still miss the mark. This can be because they’re trying to do too many things at once. Simplicity is better. This is easy on Twitter, when you’re forced to keep tweets to a certain amount of characters, but it can be tricky when navigating other social media sites. Shoot for saying more in a sentence then you could in a paragraph. That’s what people respond to, because chances are, no one is taking the time to read your 1000 word essays on Facebook or LinkedIn.

Writing this, I couldn’t help but think of other helpful idioms, but the title says “5” and I’m sticking to it. If there is one last thing I can say, however, it’s that you need to take a break periodically. Social Media, like everything else in the world, follows a progressive rhythm. Taking days off and regrouping your thoughts is a beautiful way to perfect your own, social media rhythm.

Like what you read? Connect with me further via twitter @JonNegroni. I’ll follow back if you seem like a real person.

Don’t forget to check out THE JON REPORT every day, updated at 8am for a list of today’s main headlines as selected by my editorial team (me) 

What I Learned About Writing From Ian Flemming

Image Courtesy of theparisreview.org

Ian Flemming created one of the most iconic figures of modern times. James Bond. He wrote the original novels that would someday become immortalized in one of film’s biggest, and greatest achievements: the first real franchise for movies.

I recently watched a documentary about the James Bond franchise, called Everything Or Nothing. It’s the full story of how James Bond came to be, both in print and on film, leading up to the release of the latest Bond film, Skyfall. The documentary was definitely fascinating for a Bond fan like me, and you can catch the whole thing on Netflix.

One of the biggest takeaways I took from the documentary was how Ian Flemming became a literary success. He came into writing as the Cold War began, and he went into writing almost like it was his life’s mission to translate his experiences and imagination into a book. The character of James Bond is really what Ian envisioned himself to be, which is why the lore would become such a staple. James Bond represents pure escapism.

When he first wrote the books, he would write over 2,000 words a day, everyday. He would write in very short sentences, the documentary explains, in order to capture the characterization of James Bond. What immediately comes to mind is how this has carried on in every James Bond movie (well maybe not the Timothy Dalton ones), where the titular character responds in short, clever responses to what happens around him.

I obsess over making sure my sentences count, and I prefer to keep them as prolonged as I can without disrupting the flow of what I’m trying to say. With Flemming, we have a writer who understood that this doesn’t always work for characterization.

When crafting dialogue, which is something I’m poor at, it is essential to say as much as you can in very few words. This is a lot like copywriting, but with a twist: the character you’re reflecting has to be believable. This isn’t always the case with advertising, since their time on screen is short. The dialogue of a character in a story, however, has to have a consistent and precise personality.

We see this in James Bond, for sure, especially since Flemming put so much of his own personality into the character. That makes crafting other characters a huge difficulty when writing, which is a main reason why most people are not that great at it. Empathy, understanding, and world-building are key in writing.

There is one more thing I took away from Flemming’s success. When he first wrote the James Bond novels, he made them exactly the way he wanted to. He used themes that would not go over very well with many people, such as the use of womanizing, overt sexual themes, and even sadism. The result was initial backlash.

It would have been easy for Flemming to give up at that point and conform his style of writing in order to please the masses and find success. How many of us have been faced with that decision? Instead, Flemming wrote what he wanted to write, and the ultimate result was that he was a pioneer. His work became legendary because it was something no one had done before.

The whole story of how James Bond became immortalized in film is full of huge risks and gambles, hence the title of the documentary, Everything or Nothing. I highly encourage anyone to see it, whether they be a Bond fan or just a lover of rags to riches stories.

Regardless, I will be sure to write according to these principles inspired upon me from one of the most underrated  writers in his time: Write what you want to write about. Take risks. Put yourself into your work. Make it count.

Of course, putting yourself into your work may not be a great idea if you’re not that interesting. Mean?

Like what you read? Connect with me further via twitter @JonNegroni. I’ll follow back if you seem like a real person.

Don’t forget to check out THE JON REPORT every day, updated at 8am for a list of today’s main headlines as selected by my editorial team (me) 

10 Tips to Becoming a Better Liberal or Conservative

politics_rev

Want to be politically relevant without alienating your friends and colleagues? Hey, most of us do.

Here are 10 tips to helping you become better at taking an ideological stance:

1. If a liberal/conservative doesn’t take you seriously, don’t take that seriously.

2. If a liberal/conservative points out something about your base that is negative, but true, address it and move on. Don’t act like you’re line of thinking is full of perfect people.

3. You don’t have to agree with everything your “party” agrees with. That justt means that you actually think for yourself and are still willing to make a stance.

4. If someone asks you a question that you don’t know, say, “I don’t know.”

5. Research when someone asks you a question that you don’t know the answer to.

6. Digest news that is skewed towards the other perspective.

7. If you read something that affirms your viewpoint very strongly, get the other side of the story before sharing it.

8. If you feel very strongly about something politically, do something about it instead of arguing with people online.

9. If someone is a liberal, don’t automatically assume they want socialism and class warfare. If someone is a conservative, don’t automatically assume they hate poor people and women.

10. Ask more questions than you answer.

JN

Oh and one more. Don’t refer to a political enemy with a name that makes fun of them, such as “Obummer”, or “Mittens.” It kind of makes you seem extremely unpleasant.