I received a complimentary copy of “Awaken Your CAREERpreneur” by Alexia Vernon for review and wanted to share it with you because it reflects an idea whose time has come…everyone as CEO of their own career. I received no other compensation for this review.

Alexia Vernon gave us a lesson on personal networking and building your All-Star team in a previous audio post. After reading her book, I must tell you, she has got it going on as a trainer and expert in career development.

In her new book, “Awaken Your CAREERpreneur: A Holistic Road Map to Get from Your Calling to Your Career,” she pulls together a spectacular process to help you to your dream career and she offers spot on coaching insights along the way. Her process goes from creating the vision and overcoming barriers right on through to crossing the finish line. I really like the written exercises she has developed including, to name a few of my favorites: writing a letter from an employer offering your next perfect opportunity, the tolerations list, the first impression questionnaire, and the sticky factor top ten list.

She also organizes a step-by-step plan for interview preparation and personal network building that is top notch. Most importantly, she emphasizes the often forgotten step of attitude and mindset prep work as a daily habit. I just love the fierce concept that she creatively intertwines into the networking chapters too.

I recommend this book and Alexia’s other work. You can find the book on Amazon.com and BarnesAndNoble.com. Also see the book website at AwakenYourCAREERpreneur.com.

Video inspired by this narrative written by Barbara Zarrella and reprinted here with permission.

Power
Just saying the word emits force. The emphasis on the first syllable, the way your mouth has to round out to form the word, the way the air pushes the word out into sound.

Power is everywhere. Consider the commercial airliner. Remember the thrust that pushes you into your seat on take-off. Think of how many people are riding with you. This huge craft can be lifted into the air by a single person! That’s power.

Power
Coveted since the beginning of time. Two generals standing in a battlefield posturing. One points to one of his men and requests that he fight and defend though it may mean certain death. That soldier runs brave and mighty to fulfill that task. The other general retreats. That’s power.

Power
Nature at her best. See the dark clouds, smell the cool dampness in the breeze. Take mental inventory of loved ones. Are they home? Safe? Check around the estate. Pick up, put away, tie down, close up. The soft dance of raindrops begin followed by battering hail, then the sound of a train. All of a sudden it is quiet and sunny as if nothing happened. The splinters and broken glass prove the devastation. That’s power.

Power
The miracle of new life. The anticipation of a new human being forming in the womb. Old life is changing forever. So many goals, so many plans, so many decisions, so many surprises. How could such a tiny creature hold our entire soul in its grasp? Nothing can match the power of a child standing with open arms looking at you. A tiny voice says “up”. That’s power.

Person-to-person job searching is the hands-down preferred method. It’s just that most people think networking works all by itself. They’ll go to association meetings and ask about vacancies or openings. They’ll collect business cards and wish they had some realistic good reason to talk to those people. They’ll haphazardly pass out resumes. They hope they’ll be remembered when a vacancy or opening turns up.

To avoid this random, billiard-ball-style networking, you need a written and re-searched plan of whom you want to talk to, how you can make or save them a bundle, what’s going on in their industry that you can key into, and a thought-out rationale and method to get in to see them face to face. You need a clear agenda for each meeting including knowing how to ask for further contacts to continue your networking plan.

Consider this too, poor networking is worse than no networking. Meeting people is one thing; making the correct impression is another. That you can meet a lot of people and have them talk with you doesn’t mean you’re getting closer to a new job. If people aren’t impressed, if they think you’re too arrogant, too pushy, too meek, too timid, too uninformed, not committed enough, too confused, too anything, all that a hundred networking contacts will do is generate a hundred poor impressions.

So, be thoughtful in creating your network and tapping into it for job search help. Most importantly, study success and know what you want.

I requested and received a free advance copy of the book Delivering Happiness: A Path to Profits, Passion, and Purpose. I always enjoy learning how successful people get to where they are. In this book I got to read about the journey of a successful person AND a company that was recently voted 15th on the 2010 Fortune’s “Best Companies to Work For” list. That person is Tony Hsieh and that company is Zappos.com.

The first part of the book is about Tony’s youth and his important  personal career development insights are highlighted along the way. He was interested in being an entrepreneur at a very young age. The first story he mentions of beginning his own business was just after his 9th birthday…and involved a worm farm!

What I found most awesome though is that he seemed to naturally check-in with himself through his school and early career and hold his own opinion of what he wanted to do as the most important one. He was able to balance that outlook with getting others to cooperate with him and he was able to build a supportive personal network.

Especially as he spoke of his college years and beyond, he focused on people he was meeting and how they got know each other’s talents. It seems Tony always kept people in mind as he continued on his journey and would get back in touch with them and bring them on board with his projects at the first opportunity.

This is basically how Zappos.com came to be. But the main reason it came to be is because Tony became aware of the importance of passion in the pursuit of happiness. He felt when he was not getting the juice he wanted from life and he stayed alert for solutions to appear…usually through his connectedness to others that he had gathered around himself.

This story of ideas, personal connections, honesty, and success of his company is compelling. The mission he is now on to spread happiness is beautiful.

You can also find the book on Amazon.com and follow the book promo tour and activities on Twitter.

• Ever notice that often you’re trained to do tasks that aren’t on the job description?

• It seems that often one only gets “meets expectations” for doing what is outlined in the job description on annual reviews.

• One thing that is kind of neat is that often the highest praise and potential for advancement comes when taking charge of something that is not on the job description.

Morale of the story: Don’t take a job description too literally —and use that to your advantage to customize a job to best match your strengths.

Here is a short careerillionaire story. It is a beautiful demonstration of something I’ve been thinking about.

You see, no matter what your work is each day you are in charge of your attitude. If you spend time resisting what you chose to do (i.e. working in order to feed yourself and your family) then you are spending a lot of energy resisting something you have decided to do. What a waste! Since you have decided to do it anyway, why not be fully present in the moment and engaged in your work cheerfully?

As demonstrated in the fast food workers’ story that I linked to above, it is when working while fully engaged in the present moment and with a positive attitude that you profoundly affect the people around you. Not only that, but you also greatly help your own cause. People love to be around such a positive, carefree personality so your networking becomes easy and natural. You begin to allow creativity and intuition to work through you. And, most importantly of all…you just generally become a force for Good!

I wrote previously about very high priced info products. My biggest question is how does the infopreneur over-deliver at those prices? It seems to me that over-delivering is such an important factor to an infopreneur’s reputation…an infopreneur that wants to sell more than one product anyway. I guess someone could consciously decide to be a one-hit wonder though especially with some of the huge product launches that some people like to talk about.

In fact, over-delivering is important for an infopreneur or careerillionaire really. The infopreneur who over-delivers sells more products and the careerillionaire who does is met with more opportunities.

Over-delivering begins with knowing precisely what you are offering and being able to appropriately communicate that to the potential client. There must also be some understanding of the client’s point-of-view too. All together, no easy task when you think about it and that is why over-delivering can have such a big impact.