<![CDATA[CATHERINE VANHEEST

<![CDATA[CATHERINE VANHEEST - Blog]]>Tue, 09 Apr 2024 09:30:47 -0500Weebly<![CDATA[Trello Part 3 - The App]]>Wed, 14 Feb 2018 15:47:57 GMThttps://www.catherinevanheest.com/blog/trello-part-3-the-appYes, Trello has an Android an IOS App.

It's great. Download and use it. No further instructions needed.
:)
]]><![CDATA[Trello Part 2....Easily log job leads from an email.]]>Wed, 14 Feb 2018 15:25:31 GMThttps://www.catherinevanheest.com/blog/trello-part-2easily-log-job-leads-from-an-emailUser story: As a job seeker I get job leads via email. And I don't always want to deal with them immediately if I'm obsessing about another opportunity. But I don't want to forget either. I want to just forward emails to Trello, and let Trello set up the card.

And Trello will do that for me! Just need to spend 3 minutes to complete a few easy steps.

Set it up
First set up an email address for your Trello board.
Click Show Menu > More > Email to Board Settings.
(Click to enlarge images)

Test it out
Click the link email me this email address.
You'll get an email with the subject line Trello email address for adding cards.

Then reply back to this email. It creates a new card in your Trello board. The text is copied into the card! (You can delete this garbage Trello card now).

Add Trello to Contact List
Your Trello email address is long, unweildly and hard to remember. So add it to your contact list with an easy name like "Trello". Then when you get an email while out and about you can just forward it to Trello and it's on your pile of lead cards. You can follow up on the lead when you get home.

That's it!

]]><![CDATA[Organize your job search pipeline with Trello Part 1]]>Thu, 25 Jan 2018 13:30:00 GMThttps://www.catherinevanheest.com/blog/organize-your-job-search-pipeline-with-trelloAfter working seven years supporting CRM systems, I've spent time with salespeople and picked up their lingo. Buzz words like sales process, sales stage, and opportunity pipeline. A jobsearch is essentially a multi-stage sales process: it involves multiple opportunities, each progressing at different pace, with appointments, email chains.

And with a lot of opportunities in the hopper, it can be hard to keep track of. You need a tool. You need a job search Trello board! Wait what is that??

It's a visual representation of your job search opportunities. You can pull it out whenever someone asks, "how's it going?"

Each job opportunity has its own "card", and they are arranged from left to right in the order of how far each has progressed. The details of each opportunity are stored in the card.

This is loosely based on a kanban board, sometimes used for managing agile development. (I deliberately blurred my information for privacy, but this gives you a good idea of the board.)

Here's a quick youtube from Trello.

Here's how I set mine up

Step 1: Before I signed up, I decided what the sales stages I wanted. I chose lead, applied online/presented, phone screen, onsite interview, post interview follow up, and final status.

Step 2: Go to Trello.com. Sign up for a free Trello account with the big green button Sign up - It's Free

Step 3: Once in Trello, press the link Create New Board.  Give it a cool title. Press Create.

Step 4: Click on the link Add a list and add a list for each sales stage you made in step 1. This is the column headers accross the top.

Step 5:  Then for each job opportunity, I created a card. Press the link Add a card. Add a useful title. Drag the card to the appropriate sales stage.

Step 6: Add opportunity details to the card. I add things like the hyperlink to a gmail chain, contact information, a log of anytime I call or interact with someone, a pdf of the job description. Everything I might need all in one place.

Step 7: Once job search gets into full swing, this board becomes indispensable. If you schedule an interview drag the card into the interview column. You can whip out the pipeline to show nosy folks when they ask why you haven't found a job yet. If you get a call about that thing you applied to last week you can look at the card and remember.

Step 8:  Remember to put Trello on your LinkedIn profile. It's a good keyword to have :)

Stay tuned for Trello part 2--email Trello to create cards for you...
Stay tuned for Trello part 3---use Trello on the go with your phone...

]]><![CDATA[Job Search Wisdom from Weight Watchers]]>Sun, 14 Jan 2018 03:15:31 GMThttps://www.catherinevanheest.com/blog/job-search-wisdom-from-weight-watchers I've looked for jobs before. I've lost weight on Weight Watchers before.
Sharing some lessons learned from WW that can be helpful in job search. And an excuse to try my hand at writing clickbait.

]]><![CDATA[Weekend Update]]>Sat, 06 Jan 2018 22:10:35 GMThttps://www.catherinevanheest.com/blog/weekend-updateMy goal for the week was to improve the web-facing aspects of my job search. I started this website two years ago, the last time I was job searching, and thought I could do a quick update.

Well, twelve person hours and many updates later, I now feel like it is in a better place. The critical eye of time is harsh. I hope that it is now simpler, easier to navigate, and with better images.

I did add one web page to the site, the Other Jobs page. It's a listing a selection of the random summer, high school, college jobs and a sentence about what I learned from each. After talking with friends who grew up in India or Europe, it seems that it is a uniquely American phenomenon for a person to have 5-15 smaller jobs before the get the first "real" job. I think its a huge benefit for anyone to work a variety of jobs. Do you agree? Disagree?

In lieu of a full blog post, I'm posting the link here. Enjoy Link

Photo by Thought Catalog on Unsplash

]]><![CDATA[Favorite Things]]>Tue, 02 Jan 2018 21:38:17 GMThttps://www.catherinevanheest.com/blog/favorite-thingsJust like Fraulein Maria, or Oprah, I have a list of favorite things.

Sadly my list is not set to music. This is a list of software, programs, and websites that I use professionally, recreationally, and to make this website.

Website:
This website is built on Weebly. I chose Weebly over other website providers for no particular reason. The first pages I ever created for college homework were created in notepad by writing out html tags longhand. Thank goodness technology has improved since the 90's.

Stock photos:
Photos on this site are mine, Weebly template photos, or are courtesy of Unsplash. Unsplash photographers gift their photos to be used free on the web. Don't steal photos folks; it's not nice. I try to credit the photographer where possible. You can see my single photo on Unsplash here.

Word cloud:
The wordcloud page was created at wordart.com.

Presentation Software
A co-worker introduced me to the magic of Prezi. Not another boring powerpoint.

Text Editor
I'm not too fussy, but free is better. I currently use Notepad++ but Textedit, UltraEdit, SublimeText are all fine too.

Screenshot software
Snagit or GreenShot (free).

Salesforce training I use Trailhead. (Duh).
Trailhead also has more general courses on Agile, Scrum, Kanban that I found useful. I appreciate that Salesforce makes training so free and easy online, especially compared to SAP. Sometimes I feel like I am stuck in a Blue's Clues cartoon though.

YouTube is great for learning anything: Salesforce apps, how to light the pilot light on the water heater, how to program garage door opener, etc. I don't know how I lived without it.

Python: when I need a refresh of python I go to Dr. Chuck or Automate the Boring Stuff.

Regex:
I learned Regex in half an hour via Dr. Chuck YouTube video.
Mostly I use regex in Notepad++ for minor things.

Coursera
Before Coursera became not-free, I learned a lot through their online courses studying Python, Android App Development, and Social Networking Analysis. Coursera courses are akin to a half-semester course in college and require a lot of work. I am less apt to begin one if it means I now have to pay for it.

Business Cards and Stationery
I use Vistaprint for my paper marketing materials. I have seen some nice designs from Moo as well.

Thanks for reading! Feel free to share your favorite things in the comments.

]]><![CDATA[What? A Blog? Me??]]>Tue, 26 Dec 2017 18:32:25 GMThttps://www.catherinevanheest.com/blog/testing-out-the-blog-featureSo, once again, for the third time since 2010, I'm searching for a job.
My latest position ended last week. I was a contractor working as a business analyst (May 2016-present) on a Salesforce implementation project. It was a good job, I took it to improve my marketability. (OK it was close to home and comfortable too). But it is finished and I'm looking for Project-Next.

So why am I starting a blog?

Just to try it out. I'm curious. It's a Weebly feature I have't used and I wanted to see how it looks.
I wanted to practice writing but I'm not sure I want to publish all my thoughts on Facebook or LinkedIn. This is a safe environment.
To keep myself honest. There are a lot of little steps that may or may not lead to finding a new job. Networking groups...Online training...Reading books...Meeting people. If you measure each day by the one question of "did I get a job" then you don't see all the pre-work that goes into it.

Anyways, I secretly hope nobody reads this blog, but thanks for reading!

Happy Holidays!

Photo by Nathan Dumlao on Unsplash

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