Author: Michael Spinale

Mike Spinale is a corporate Human Resources leader at a healthcare information technology company located outside of Boston, Massachusetts and is an adjunct professor at Southern New Hampshire University. He has over eight years of experience in HR and management including career counseling, recruitment, staffing, employment branding, and talent management.  Mike has dedicated his HR career to modern views on the field – HR is not about the personnel files – it’s about bringing on the best talent, ensuring they’re in the right seat, and keeping them motivated and growing in their careers. In addition, Mike is the author of the CareerSpin blog where he offers advice and opinion on job search, personal & employment branding, recruiting, and HR. Mike is a certified Professional in Human Resources (PHR) and holds a Master of Business Administration degree from Babson College. He is also a board member of the Metro-North Regional Employment Board, a board which sets workforce development policy for Boston’s Metro-North region, and an active member of the Society for Human Resource Management and the Northeast Human Resources Association.
Career DevelopmentEducationJob SearchPersonal BrandingReputation ManagementSuccess Strategies

Build Your Brand Through Developing Your Self-Awareness

A key component of developing your personal brand is to understand your strengths and weaknesses. It can be difficult to step outside of our self-perceptions and take a critical look at ourselves, but the process of doing so is imperative to increasing our self-awareness and focusing our brand towards areas where we are confident we …

Career DevelopmentJob SearchNetworkingPersonal BrandingSuccess Strategies

Building Your Personal Brand Through Volunteerism

Whether you’re in between jobs, in school, or working full time, volunteering is a great way to build your personal brand. Sharing your time with non-profit organizations can help you build your network and develop your skills while doing some good for your community.

Volunteering shows you’re team oriented.  When you give your time to …

Career DevelopmentInterviewJob SearchPersonal BrandingRecruitmentSuccess Strategies

Actions Speak Louder Than Words

When it comes to personal branding, you can invest all the time and effort you want in to creating well-worded profiles, resumes, cover letters, and “About Me” websites, but if you don’t back up your written communications with constructive interactions, all of that work will be for nothing.

Your personal brand is best developed through …

Career DevelopmentInterviewJob SearchPersonal BrandingRecruitmentSuccess Strategies

Do You Have Any Questions? Preparing Questions for Interviews

When getting ready for an interview, it is important to not only prepare yourself to answer the questions you may be asked, but also questions that you can ask the people who are interviewing you. Many job seekers get so excited about finally getting an interview opportunity that they forget that interviewing is a two-way …

Career DevelopmenteBrandJob SearchPersonal BrandingReputation Management

5 Rules of Thumb for Proper E-mail E-tiquette

I’m currently recruiting for several positions, so I’ve been receiving tons of e-mails from job seekers applying for our open jobs.  It was while going through these submissions that I got the inspiration for this post.  One of the messages I received was a very brief e-mail with a resume attached.  The e-mail simply stated …

Career DevelopmentInterviewPersonal BrandingRecruitment

Rules for Protecting Your Brand in the Waiting Room

Everything counts when it comes to finding a job – and your demeanor in the waiting room while you wait for your interview is no different.  I’ve always asked the company receptionist for their opinion on a candidate they’ve met. While they haven’t interviewed the candidate, they are certainly in a position to observe a …

Career DevelopmenteBrandJob SearchNetworkingPersonal BrandingRecruitmentSocial Media

5 Tips for Protecting Your Personal Brand on LinkedIn

LinkedIn has become arguably today’s most valuable job searching tool, providing it’s users with endless possibilities for networking, connecting with colleagues from the past, and promoting and developing their businesses. But did you ever stop and think that the way in which you use LinkedIn could actually hurt your job search prospects?  Well it can!  …

Career DevelopmentInterviewJob SearchPersonal BrandingRecruitment

Expect the Unexpected: Good Interviewers Ask Follow Up Questions

As an interviewer, it always amazes me how often I trip people up by asking follow up questions. It seems all of these interview prep books and websites like to just list out questions and canned answers but they don’t prepare job seekers for the possibility that the person conducting the interview is going to …