The current “cash-is-king” posture of most companies makes it difficult for hiring managers to justify big six figure executive investments. This is capping demand for even the most qualified of candidates. Executives in the corporate wilderness are left with a handful of choices. They can:

• Continue to work with head-hunters and recruiters to find employment that is commensurate with their talent and experience;
• Lower their executive sights - and salary expectations - by taking positions for which they are overqualified; or
• Consider launching a consulting practice as an interim or permanent career strategy.

I believe that the third option…hanging out a shingle…can be the most compelling option for experienced, talented and well-connected/regarded executives.

The hard economic benefits linked to pursuing an independent consulting business are too many to address in a short blog, but here are a few for your consideration:

• For senior executives with decades of experience, the barriers to entry are quite low, while the prospects for profits are very high.
• An independent consulting career can reduce income-risk by spreading revenue sources among multiple clients.
• While a large executive salary may be daunting to many employers, the idea of “renting” expertise in financially manageable “chunks” is completely consistent with today’s prevailing cash-preservation strategy.

I think it is safe to say that demand for expensive executive labor is likely to stay flat through the remainder of the decade and beyond. In fact, companies are further flattening management structures in ongoing efforts to control costs, improve operational efficiencies and increase shareholder value. But there is still tremendous demand for the skills, expertise and experience that only comes with a few gray hairs. I believe that this demand will increasingly be met by consultants over the foreseeable future.

Pursuing the consulting option is not for everybody.  But if you have experience solving complex problems in dynamic environments - and you have done this in a rapid and accountable manner - then you have a serious shot at very good money and an even better lifestyle.

To learn more about how successful senior professionals are launching the next phase of their careers as independent consultants visit my site.

Lane F. Cooper is a thought leadership consultant for executives and organizations in the high-tech sector. He is also an editor and analyst who covers the impact of technology on business operations at www.biztechreports.com.

An iPhone app developer can customize an app for your company or business in order to reach more customers through the app store.  There are several different types of app developments including social networking apps; custom native iPhone apps; Web Safari iPhone apps; iPhone staffing augmentation; GPS enabled apps and iPhone game developments.

Social networking apps include such social network sites like Facebook and Twitter; there is a long list of social networking apps in order to keep a person connected to their friends and family through the iPhone.  This app could also work in conjunction with the calendar feature in order to keep up with family and friends birthdays, anniversaries and important dates.

Custom native iPhone apps are applications developed through iPhone developer classes that take advantage of several iPhone technologies including proximity sensor; accelerometer; dialer; multi-touch interface GPS; calendar and address book.  This application would work best with entertainment apps, multimedia and search tool apps in addition to many other native iPhone apps.

Web Safari iPhone apps is a Web connected application that connects to a server over cellular networks or Wi-Fi for supreme friendliness.  This app allows users to download information that relates to a definitive question or submit user information to a central database.  It also allows users to create and edit posts such as blog entries, configure mobile settings to post photographs and manage comments.

IPhone staffing augmentation is where you can set up your own virtual office and obtain quality iPhone application developers to work for you on your projects or become part of your development team.

GPS enabled apps is a wide-ranging GPS-based labor force administration answer which features detailed locations reporting to capture field data; mileage tracking; alerts incorporate location tracking; and wireless timesheets.  This app also contains weather forecasting which is automatically tied to the GPS so it knows which forecast to provide based on where you are located at that particular moment.

IPhone gaming is engaging and intuitive while easy to play, by employing complete features of the iPhone enhanced audio and graphics experience.  IPhone games make gaming accessible to those casual gamers or non-gamers in a casual and nonthreatening way so that they might build up their confidence on an easier game and after they have mastered that one, they may seek out a more adventurous and a bit harder game.

In other words, why spend the prime time of your life at Hyundai when you could be at Honda? Or at Novo Nordisk when you could be at Pfizer? True, it helps focus your decision when one company wants you and its competitor does not.

The authors state that “people also choose jobs-and, more important, become engaged with their work-on the basis of how well their preferences and aspirations mesh with those of the organization.” I’m not sold on that thesis, however. It is difficult at best to both assess corporate culture before we take a job and determine whether it meshes with our sensibilities, too.

On the other hand, it’s nice when your personal and your employer’s “preferences and aspirations” are in alignment. Philosophically, have fun, get rich sounds appealing to me, but quite possibly that sentiment doesn’t guide senior executives.

Yahoo! is an example of corporation that offers excellent global career opportunities, yet doesn’t take itself too seriously. Libby Sartain, former VP People, at Yahoo! knows something about employee engagement. She was the head of human resources for Southwest Airlines in 1998 when it scored first in the annual 100 Best Companies to Work for in America competition. “Culture is still a competitive advantage,” wrote Sartain in Fast Company. “Identify what are your cultural imperatives. Embrace that. Not every company can have a purple cow in the lobby.”

Okay, that sounds a bit extreme, but what Sartain is talking about is a “signature experience,” one that is unique to an employer such as Yahoo! From any company’s standpoint, the payoff of obtaining your loyalty and commitment (called ‘engagement’) is considerable. When you’re highly committed, you often selflessly donate your discretionary time - longer hours and more creative output. But the catch is not that many of us are highly engaged. The Towers-Perrin Global Workforce study of 86,000 employees found that only 14 percent of workers are “willing to go the extra mile to help their companies succeed.”

Erickson and Gratton observe in the article that “engaged employees are the antithesis of hired guns rotating in and out of critical roles-they’re productive for the long term.” It’s a virtuous cycle that all of us hope to find. If you’re committed, you’re generally seeing the rewards and recognition that are keys to your career success.

Yet, one reality of the modern multinational company is that it is difficult for workers to feel engaged when ground zero of corporate culture is based thousands of miles away.

Site promotions include placing the website address on all paper products including letterhead paper, business cards, return address labels and envelopes.  The website address should also be included at the bottom of all e-mails as a hyperlink so that the receiver of the e-mail can simply click on the website address and be transported to the company’s website without having to copy and paste the address into their browser’s address bar.

Marketing a website includes search engine optimization or SEO, blogging and Internet news website.  Search engine optimization is the act of placing keyword rich articles on a company’s website in order to attract the three major search engines - Google, MSN and Yahoo!  These three major search engines send out their “feelers” so that they might locate keywords and keyword phrases within the articles and among the websites and then rank the websites according to a special formula.  Keywords and keyword phrases are the words potential customers place in the search boxes on the search engines so that they could find what they need or want.  Keywords could be a single word such as ‘jewelry’ or a couple of keywords such as ‘beach dresses’.

Blogs, which used to be thought of as online diaries, are now places where businesses introduce their products and services to a whole new group of possible consumers.  Blogs are like articles; however they are smaller in the amount of text and more conversational and tone.  Additionally, blogs are usually written with some keywords and keyword phrases which count toward the search engine optimization and help to re-rank a Las Vegas pool estimates company’s website.

Internet news websites are always looking for well written and informative articles to place on their website to help inform and educate their readers about products and services they might not have otherwise heard about.  These informative articles do not necessarily have to be written about something new or something in the news, they simply should help consumers make an informed decision.

A swimming pool company could increase their customer database and their revenue by investing in an Internet presence and then employing several Internet marketing techniques and site promotions.

After all, if obesity could spread across Facebook, or MySpace, science would have a larger problem on its hands than excessive girth. Are my contacts on Facebook really that susceptible to my suggestions? If so, I have a get-rich-slowly scheme to sell them.

Still, it’s obvious that some news and ideas spread virally over the Net think about how many times you have spammed your friends or associates with jokes, links to articles, blog posts or videos. Before there was e-mail there were fax machines and (lawyer) jokes made the rounds pretty quickly, too.

Are there limits to this principle? For instance, does news about job vacancies spread virally over the Net? If I were fired from my job I imagine that word would spread quickly by voice, IM or e-mail between my friends and colleagues. But what if it’s simply “news” about a job opening in my company?

I might not spread that news unless I knew someone seeking that information. By contrast every one of my friends is constantly looking for a laugh (it’s a pre-requisite).

In this sense, maybe job vacancies are a bit different than jokes. And maybe that’s because there’s so much noise in the job world - job ads are always in our face - on search engines, e-mail advertising, website homepages, and, of course, on job boards, too.

Yet, here’s how job openings move virally on social networks:

• When you’re seeking work, you put out feelers, especially among your network of contacts, and if they hear about an opportunity they notify you.
• You can be a passive job candidate - and if there is compelling information about you in your social networking profile, a recruiter might find it and contact you. (Odds are multiple ones will.)
• For those more actively seeking employment, on social networks you can send appeals to your contact list’s contacts - an exponentially larger universe.

Rohit Bhargava, who leads the interactive marketing team at Ogilvy Public Relations in Washington DC, is an avid blogger and an adept social networker. He believes that social networking is making it possible for job searches to become viral. “It used to be that you would send an email to everyone you knew and they might send it to somebody else,” says Bhargava. On Linked-in, for example, Bhargava says you can “very easily reach [your contact's] second tier of network,” meaning friends of friends.

Although at times it may seem that there’s a bright line separating social networks in the ‘real world’ from those in cyberspace, the truth is much blurrier than it appears. Job searches fall into the category of ideas that can spread virally. Especially if you lose a job and everyone hears that you’re a free agent - that’s the tipping point.

Here’s something for social scientists to puzzle over: one of my real-life friends (a Linked-in connection) just became CEO of a company. Does a rising social connection lift all of his or her network contacts - or only the suggestible ones?

If you are in need of a job and want to work for a company that allows people to sell jewelry online there are a few basic skills one must possess in order to work online.  Several online jewelry stores have warehouses where the processing of the jewelry is completed which means opening up the mail when it arrives and sorting it into various styles such as rings, bracelets, earrings, etc. Each individual piece must be weighed and measured before and is shipped off to the melting pot so that a fair market price can be given to the customers.

Many of these warehouses have their own gold melting systems and in order to work with those types of machines, but one must have either passed a technical school degree in welding or have experience with the melting pot.

There are also jobs for people online helping those who are selling gold to the company.  There is help with processing the orders, mailing out the secure envelopes, answering questions and monitoring the price of gold.  Many of these jobs are done by secretarial staff and those proficient in various online detailed work.

There should also be a marketing department for an online gold jewelry store.  This team would implement marketing methods such as search engine optimization, also known as SEO.  Search engine optimization is the act of placing keyword rich articles on the gold jewelry company’s website in order to attract three major search engines - Yahoo!, MSN and Google.  These three major search engines send out their “feelers” so that they might locate the keywords and keyword phrases within the articles and among the websites and then rank the websites according to a special formula.  Keywords and keyword phrases are the words potential customers place in the search boxes on the search engines in order to find what they need or want.  The people in the marketing department would write the keyword rich articles for the online jewelry store website.

Besides a marketing department, there should be a shipping department. This department would handle all the shipping of the checks for the gold jewelry.  They need to calculate the amount of the check which would be the weight of the gold times the amount of the going rate of gold that day.

There are many different jobs a person could do if they were to be hired to work with an online gold jewelry store where people are allowed to sell their gold jewelry for cash.

Just ask the founders of Google and Yahoo! But then again, when friends ‘break-up’ at work, whether it’s a legal partnership, two chefs at a bistro, or heads of a public company such as Disney, it can cause a permanent rift in the relationship. The truth is it’s risky to work with friends.

Yet it turns out that working with friends - or befriending co-workers - can enhance your job performance. Nearly two-thirds of employees believe that office productivity improves when co-workers are friendly outside of the office, according to a study by Accountemps, a staffing company for financial services professionals.

For many of us, friends are magnets that lure us to a new job and the ties that bind us when we might otherwise break away. Yet balancing the chemistry of friendships on and off the job is often a bit of an ordeal.

“Usually it is friends who take things personally,” says Juliana Gidwani, former marketing manager at neoIT, a consultancy in San Ramon, Ca. “It’s harder for a friend to rationalize business decisions.” Gidwani concedes that it’s easier to be friendly with co-workers - rather than to become close friends with them.

“It’s fun to work with friends, but it’s even more fun to start work at a new job and become friends with my co-workers,” says John Eckhouse, Editorial Director of Modern Media, a conferencing and branding company in Oakland, Ca. “Good friendships created at work often outlast the job.”

In Eckhouse’s case, his boss is also a long-time friend and co-worker. “When you disagree on strategy or tactics or who to hire or who to layoff - it can strain the friendship,” says Eckhouse. He jokes that it would be tougher if his boss was also his spouse.

Just how easy is it to blow up a friendship at work? I’ve experienced it before, but then I didn’t have the benefit of reading James Mitchell’s practical work-friendship rules, which he sets forth in a post called “How to Prevent WWIII While Working With Friends.” Mitchell suggests that you do not:

• “Drudge up the past. This will get you nowhere.
• Storm out of the room. Leaving the situation won’t make it go away.
• Throw your hands up in disgust and say, ‘I’ve had it, I quit!’ In most cases, you really don’t mean it, so don’t say it.
• Think of ways to get even. It may temporarily feel good, but will certainly eat away what friendship existed.
• Apply the war to the friendship. You’ve heard ‘don’t bring work home’ likewise don’t bring work into your friendship.”

Do you want to work with your friends or simply make new friends on the job? Despite the possible negative outcomes, if you work with friends, there’s usually someone who will join you for lunch.

The reason for the varying years in law school is because there are different specialties of law like DWI or DUI, Family Law, Criminal Law, Corporate Law, Entertainment Law, Government Law or Tax Law. These categories have subcategories that get even more specific which requires more studying on the part of the law student.

Tampa DUI attorneys must study many laws and memorize many cases in which driving under the influence have been cited and the case has been won in order to help their clients.  Attorneys of all kinds need to be able to cite cases from the years before them in order to persuade a judge that their case is valid and should be at least heard before the court has merit because there have been cases similar to the one this attorney is trying to present in the past.

Besides an attorney or a lawyer, there are other jobs in a law office that an individual could perform with less schooling.  Paralegals and law clerks take depositions from clients for the attorneys which is basically writing down the client’s statement or typing it out on the computer.  There are many different secretarial jobs available in a law office that may only require a high school diploma.  No matter what the job is in a law office, the number one rule has always been and always will be confidentiality.  This means whatever the client tells anyone in the law office must be kept confidential.

A law firm may hire a webmaster in order to keep up with the digital age because more and more people are turning to the Internet to search for what they need or want overall than other media combined.  A webmaster would handle all aspects of a website for an attorney’s office.  This individual would make sure the website is up and running every day, make sure each link takes the visitor where it’s supposed to and possibly place new content in the form of keyword rich articles on the website to help the marketing department through search engine optimization or SEO.

Search engine optimization is the act of placing keyword rich articles on the company’s website in order to attract the three major search engines - Yahoo!, Google and MSN.  These three major search engines send out their “feelers” so that they might locate the keywords and keyword phrases within the articles and among the websites and then rank the websites according to a special formula.  Keywords and keyword phrases are the words potential customers place in the search boxes on the search engines in order to find what they need or want.

There are many jobs available for an individual who wants to be an attorney or work in a lawyer’s office and they do not all require years of schooling.

When times are toughest, most of us tend to wait out the storm rather than seek out other, perhaps even riskier opportunities.

In his new book, Bulletproof Your Job, author Stephen Viscusi says that your “primary objective” at work is to protect your job because it is “your most valuable asset.”

Forget the financial crisis the issue is more primal than that. “Here’s the cold hard truth: If you don’t click with your boss, all that merit and pedigree won’t get you anywhere when your job is on the line,” writes Viscusi. “What really matters is what your boss thinks about you.”

Viscusi’s job-protection strategy leverages four basic principles:

• Be visible
• Be easy
• Be useful
• Be ready

“Here’s the bulletproof truth,” he writes. “If your superiors don’t see you or know who you are, you’re very easy to let go.” I haven’t discerned the difference between “cold-hearted truths” and “bulletproof truth” but I like the confident way Viscusi sells his points.

On the topic of visibility, Viscusi concedes that perception is more than half of the battle. “You don’t actually have to pull all-nighters twice a week to show how committed you are to your job,” he assures us. However, he says, it’s important to work longer hours than your boss. Bummer!

Viscusi is a recruiter who is described on the book jacket as “America’s workplace guru.”

However, it doesn’t appear that Viscusi is big on work-life balance. For instance, he recommends that if your company offers a nifty workout facility … “whatever you do, don’t get caught using them.”

In fact, Viscusi offers a bit of politically incorrect advice that some may view as literally sucking up to your boss. If they smoke, take a smoking break with them. It’s good bonding time.

One controversial opinion he espouses are that career coaches are for sissies. “If you need a career coach, you don’t have a career!” he proclaims. Doesn’t that strike you as an odd sentiment to read in a career management guide?

Viscusi contends that many readers “don’t know how the meaning of hard work.” He suggests that you “work hard, go the extra mile and don’t complain.” Good luck with that.

As a boss your first instinct is to rattle their cage. But what will that accomplish?

Employers fret about holding onto Gen Y workers who may be less inclined than previous generations to stick around through thick and thin.  Given the cost of recruiting young talent, employers are understandably concerned about return on investment - keeping an employee long enough for them to develop into strong contributors.

Still, loyalty isn’t part of the “deal” any more between employers and employees, so it’s no surprise that, according to a new study by Taleo, an HR software company, 41% of those who are no longer working for their first employer out of college left in less than two years. That doesn’t strike me as an epidemic - a lot of first jobs simply aren’t good fits.

Taleo teamed with Harris Interactive to conduct a survey of 2,045 adults ages 18 and older, a series of questions about their first jobs and first employers.

Three out of five respondents said that their first employer did not provide a clear path for advancement. Of course, the reality is that few employers provide a clear path to anything, much less to the corner office.

Other key findings:

• Describing how their first job made them feel, 13% said they couldn’t wait for Friday to arrive, 10% wanted to quit every day and 8% felt it was a waste of their time
• 19% of 18-34 year olds wanted to quit their first job every day, compared to 3% of those 55 years old and over

There’s no real way of telling from the data whether first jobs are worse than they used to be, or whether employers or employees are primarily to blame for the gap between expectations and experience.

How well do you remember your first job? I wasn’t thrilled and I wasn’t miserable but knew I wanted to move on before the first year was complete. There isn’t always a retention solution for an employer, but money helps a little.

Maybe the survey results will strike you differently. As for me, I can’t wait for Friday to arrive and I love what I do.