This is THE handbook on what to do with the rest of your life! I read this many moons ago when I first graduated from high school and then a few years after that when I had a college degree in my hands. The book is a must-read guide to navigate the confusing job search we all encounter from time to time.

I was so curious as to whether the new edition would hold up in a cyber dependent world. The answer is YES! The book still offers invaluable advice as to resumes, interviews and prioritizing your wants and needs in the adult world. There is no end of information on occupations and the requirements and payoffs of each. And now, there are literally hundreds of web links and sites listed to aid you in your job search.

Included in the newest edition is a chapter on how important your online presence is to your job search. There is information on Linkedin, networking and everything in between.

Thank you very much to the publisher and the wonderful folks at Blogging for Books. They sent me a copy in exchange for my honest review.

A friend of mine, a consultant, once described his line of work as "you pay a consultant to tell you what time it is." This book is, basically, that sentiment bound in paperback.

Okay, in all fairness, that's not entirely true, and I do credit the book for providing some structure to the job hunt, an otherwise disorienting time. The book is updated annually and does include a good list of resources.

But make no mistake: this book is, for the most part, completely unoriginal. Now, originality may be beside the point to most readers, but it raises questions of, like, what advantage one ascertains by reading it, if any.

I'll give Dick Bolles the benefit of the doubt in presuming he wants his readers to find good jobs, if only to sell more books. However, sometimes I was suspicious: the book reads very much like a self-help book, lathered in a thick layer of optimism and peppered with conventional wisdom, a perfect recipe for those presumably in need of a boost.

This is a really powerful book for anyone who is Career oriented and would like to define where or what they want to become.
I came to know about this book at a seminar where someone kept on reffering to The book. It has equipped me withn skills to become an interviewer and to basically see what interviewers want to fish out when interviewing.
The highlight for me is the "flower exercise" absolutely phenomenal!
There are so many resources on this book to equip all who look to end up in employment...I think I will keep reffering to the book going forward.
I also like the way the Author kept reffering to books that you can read to become a better person.
A good read!

This is the ultimate job hunters and job changers book. I'm not in the market for a new job, but I chose to read this book again (I read it many years ago) to see what it had to say about finding your passion or mission in life. I'm pleased with the fact that this edition has a "green" section in back which deals with this very idea. Although he writes about mission from a Christian perspective, he focuses on what's important in life.
The part of the book that I didn't really read but skimmed again was the "Flower Exercise." This is the part where you do the work to find out what kind of person you really are. Sort of like Myers Briggs, but a lot more in detail. If I were to change a career or look for new work, I would consider working through this part of the book because it is so in depth as to be useful. This book is a must read for anyone looking for a job, changing careers, or interested in knowing more about who they are as a person and what type of work is good for them.

I highly recommend this book to anyone graduating from high school or college, finishing their Peace Corps service or looking to change their career. Great activities and advice. Helped me develop my personal mission and redefine what I'm looking for in a career. Check your local library for recently published editions.

Now this book had more to do with my part of the job where I am a Student Guidance Counsellor and the fact that my second year students have to think about where they want to go with their study career and what they would love to do when they grow up. They still think that a career is something that is set in stone, when over the years I've learned that reality is usually more flexible than that. That it's about keeping on developing yourself and taking chances.

Well if that's your attitude to life and work, Bolles' book is a great help if you consider changing jobs or careers. He makes it an adventure, more than a struggle. The core message of his book is: know who you are, what's important to you, what you like to do and you find the most important thing in life you leave behind when you leave this world. A career more than a job and maybe a path in life that's about expressing what's important to you and not just what the neighbours or your parents believe you should do.

The book is filled with tests and Bolles talks to you from the pages. Making it a useful and entertaining book to read, even for people who are not considering a career change, but want to know what they find important in their work.

www.whattoreadandwhatnot.blogspot.com

This book is widely recognized as the top guide to finding a job. Various editions of this book have sold MILLIONS. It is easy to see why. The author has extensive experience in the field, and backs up his ideas with impressive evidence.

► THINGS I LIKED THE MOST ◄

♦ Insight into the actual interviewing process--especially the suggested time min/max for your responses. Bolles provides "Conversation Tips" to prepare for. This section alone is worth the price of the book. They are also "Ten Commandments" for the applicant.

For example, "Conversation Tip #12" Employers don't care about your past; they just ask about it as a way to predict your FUTURE behavior.

♦ Even more, the tips on answering the usual question, "Tell me about yourself." Bolles notes, "How you answer that question will determine your fate during the rest of the interview."

♦ The 5 key questions that the applicant must know:
-Why are you here?
-What can yo do for us?
-What kind of person are you?
-What distinguishes you from other people?
-Can I afford you?

♦ Six Secrets of Salary Negotiation. I was already aware of some of these, such as not being too quick to mention a salary first.

♦ Suggestions on how to best use social/networking sites like LinkedIn. The author points out the importance of completely filling out your user profile, so that prospective employers (who will search these sites) can get an accurate picture of your qualifications.

♦ Also, I had no idea how important it was to have your PICTURE on these sites. Bolles notes that surveys always show that not having a picture is a turn-off.

♦ Explanation as to how the job hunt as changed in some ways, but in essence is still the same.

► QUALITY OF EDITING ◄
Excellent editing and book design. Someone has spent a lot of time getting this right! The book is well laid-out into logical sections. The Table of Contents points to each major section.

► END MATERIAL ◄
Even the appendices are impressive. The first appendix will certainly be the most controversial, because the author makes his own religious beliefs clear. This is a very meaty, thought-provoking section called, "Finding your Mission in Life."

Bolles defends his inclusion of religion in a book on job-hunting by this stat: In the U.S., about 89% of the population believes in God. So, he reasons, "Leaving out a section that 89% of my readers might be interested in, and helped by, in order to please 11% of my readers, seems to me insane."

Finding your mission in life will not be trivial, and will not be quick. The author points out that being forced to find a job can also have beneficial effects on our whole life. It offers "a chance to make some fundamental changes in our whole life. It marks a turning point in how we live our life."

► OTHER APPENDICES ◄
The other, less controversial appendices include:
"A Guide to Choosing a Career Coach."
"A Ten Minute Crash Course for Vets."
"Sampler List of Coaches"
"Recent Foreign Editions" (well, okay, this one does seem a bit self-serving.)
"Final Word from Author"

The author's "PostScript" is a very poignant missive--almost a pleas, to the reader. When faced with a job crisis, you can abandon your beliefs, or rethink the things that have been your core principles. "While we are out of work, we can reach toward a larger conception of our God and of ourselves."

√ HIGHLY RECOMMEND! This review doesn't do justice to this oustanding work. This is a COMPREHENSIVE, well-written book by perhaps the #1 expert in the field. Honestly, if you are struggling finding your next job, you would be nuts to not read this book.


♫ A Review by Chris Lawson

[Note: I do not know the author of this book, and no one requested I write this review.]

I first connected with What Color Is Your Parachute when it was recommended to me by a college advisor almost 20 years ago. While the premise and content have stayed consistent, this 50th-anniversary edition has been updated to include timely and relevant guidance as we head into 2021.

What has made What Color is Your Parachute the best-selling job-hunting book in the world, is also what makes it unique. This book offers an incredible and accessible look at helping job seekers first understand themselves and the power that gives you when picking and/or changing your unique career path. I love that he values not just surviving in your career but thriving and this comes from better knowing who YOU are, not only as a job applicant but also as an individual.

This timeless advice helps you not only understand yourself better but also highlights what you have to offer to the world. In addition to practical and research-based advice, there are also many actionable steps in this book. The timeless flower exercise guides you through a thorough self-inventory. Each of these seven "petals" ultimately deciphers seven ways of describing yourself in relation to the workforce. What makes this book so powerful is that Bolles helps his readers better themselves and what their passions are versus just looking at their skills.

In addition to his tried and true methods and exercises, "this manual has been fully revised for 2021 by Vanderbilt University Career Center Director Katharine Brooks, EdD, with modern advice on the job hunt strategies that are working today (during the Covid era), such as building an online resume, making the most of social media tools to network effectively, interviewing virtually with confidence, and negotiating the best salary possible."

What Color Is Your Parachute was first released in 1970 and it is amazing to see the things that have stayed consistent and what has changed with the times. Whether you are going into the New Year looking to change things up in your career or just trying to better understand yourself as a professional, this book has something for everyone.

Thank you to Random House Publishing for the gifted copy in exchange for my honest review. As always, all thoughts and opinions are my own. You can read this and other book reviews at genthebookworm.com

I've read this book and completed the exercises twice during my adult life, and it has helped me tremendously in answering the age-old question, "What is my mission in life."

For those of us who live to work, and not work to live, this is the book for you. I highly recommend completing the exercises, or "homework" as I call it, and you will uncover your talents and dreams that have been buried over the years.

It will take a little bit of your time, maybe an hour a night for a week or two, or over two weekends. But aren't you worth it? You will have to write 5-7 short 1-2 page stories of your past successes, or how you overcame problems, do an inventory of your skills, and think about what you really like and dislike about jobs.

For the person who is not looking for their mission in life, this book gives great advice on how to find a job when "there are no jobs." Trust me, there are always jobs out there, you just have to know where to look. And sometimes you will find one even when you're not looking.

Bottom line, if you are out of work, treat your job search as a full-time job. You will have to hit the pavement, meet people, and get your name out there with a face to go with it. Printing out 1000 resumes and faxing them to companies or organizations will get you nowhere.

Bolles' 'The Flower' exercise (Ch 7 in the 2015 ed.), where you map out your desired workplaces, jobs, and fields of interest and then compare that with your current transferable skills, talents and past experiences, is an excellent exercise in introspection. There is plenty of guidance on how to work through the exercise, and the final result can give you a great overview of what you want to find in a career.
My only advice would be to try and complete the exercise over a couple days. Make sure you have lots of time to consider your answers; Bolles will constantly remind you to jot down everything that comes to mind to help create the final version of your Flower.
The rest of the book is pretty easy to skim through to find what is relevant to your current situation.

TL:DR ch 7 helps you flesh out your transferable skills and unique talents, that can be very useful for a visual learner when trying to write a resume, cover letter or college application.

What Color is Your Parachute? by Richard N. Bolles is a classic for job hunters for the past zillion years, so I won't bore you with how great it is and how you need to go out and buy it. The fact is millions of people already have gone out and bought it. What I am going to talk about is what I have learned from it as a freelancer.

I have always heard from the time I was little about how I should get a job that I loved and how I should change the world. Like so many in college, I pursued a degree that I prayed would land me a job that I would love. Many college students change majors over and over again trying to find a good fit. I stuck with one major, Graphic Design, but wondered if I should have explored more options. For me, I have always come back to graphic design and the issue of what to do with my life has been more of a confidence issue: was I do the right thing and am I actually any good at it?

After doing the exercises in this book, I found that my main passions, the things I can talk forever about, tended to be about art/design, history, travel, finances, Bible, and books. When I wrote out my roles and skills in each job that I have had, I found that I have often dismissed the things that I did naturally and with ease. I found that this book did more for helping me see my career with clearer vision and in a realistic perspective of my field and not the unattainable thing I created it to be in my own mind.

Mr. Bolles wrote this book from the perspective of his Christian background as a pastor before his years upon years of experience in career counseling. This means that he sees our career as being part of our God-created mission in life. That doesn't mean that the only really good career is in some sort of ministry, but that we were each created unique and have something unique to contribute to the world. In my mind, I immediately envision having some sort of cosmic world-changing mega-corporation that affected thousands of people, but this book actually has a more realistic scope: to work moment by moment, day by day to make the world a little bit better of a place than it was before using your own unique abilities. In that perspective, our mission is to just find a worthwhile task to do today and do it.

As I looked over my resume of 15 years of random designing tasks, I found that there was a surprising unity to all have done. I had blindly just found people who needed some sort of help with graphic design and just did what they set before me. I had not seen myself working while doing some of these projects. I was just helping out and doing what came naturally. Many of these projects were never even listed on my resume even if I had been paid for it because I had been just helping. When I organized all of this "helping out" from its unorganized mass of freelance tasks with varying fees and odd levels of responsibility, I discovered that I had a busy career focused very heavily in working with churches and non-profit organizations.

Wow. I guess I had a mission the whole time!

I am very glad I read this book and followed his advise. I now feel more confident to pursue the work I was created to do.

The job search. Probably, it’s not your first rodeo; that dreaded and exciting process – finding a job – is something you’ve done before. But perhaps a few things have changed since the last time you were an applicant. Or perhaps this is your first rodeo. In either case, knowing how to navigate today’s post-social media, and the post-recession landscape is essential to finding a successful match.

Because that’s what it is, after all – a match. It’s not just a lottery, where you buy a ticket and hope for the best. You, like any potential employer, have a lot of control over what information you share, how you communicate that information, and what your expectations are. So take a deep breath, brush up on your interview and negotiating skills – and enjoy the ride!

To improve your chances of landing the job you’re after, always prepare yourself as best you can by doing ample research before your interview. Keep in mind that there are actually a lot of jobs out there that need to be filled by a qualified professional such as yourself. So think of yourself as a great resource for your potential employer, and never think of yourself as being desperate.