To all who succumb to the occasional sin of looking down our nose smugly at other cultures whose norms and institutions may at times appear super-righteous or simply peculiar we need to simply look in the mirror.

The profession has long aspired to a strategic business partner role with the proverbial seat at the table. Perhaps, now is the time to declare victory and set new goals?

Seems compensation is again connected straight-line to another disaster.

The success of professional networking sites reflect the fact that today our culture is one where people's affiliation is primarily directed towards their profession and, at best, is secondarily oriented towards their organization. The implications are profound.

While most of us spend our time focusing on headlines about the unemployment rate, the very nature of employment has changed.

I saw a guy at the gym today with a big tattoo across his back that said "SUE." Beware the permanent and the absolute! That is something you learn early in HR.

Employees remember the "good stuff" differently from the "bad stuff"; many organizations may now have to face the consequences for actions taken in the downturn that left a bad taste for employees.

Editor’s Note: Steve Browne is a good friend of Rehaul and has conducted local HR forums in Cincinnati for several years. Check out this take on career management and leave your feedback below. Check out his other posts here and here and you can also follow Steve on Twitter.

This topic of career management is too often overlooked – especially in today’s economy. People are numb and fearful about just keeping their jobs, the idea that we should manage our career just seems foreign to us. We don’t manage our careers due to several reasons:

• We get comfortable - Remember, when people get comfortable, they fall asleep and more often than not, they are picked off by companies when cuts are made, and they didn’t even see it coming!
• People don’t want to ask for help - This is sad. Independence is a myth. It is okay to rely on others because, even though you may come across some people who are only “takers”, the vast majority of people want to help others. Don’t be a lone wolf. It will limit you everywhere you go.
• We have a narrow focus - How true! It’s as if we all have blinders when we go to work. We get in our role, put our head down and crank out work. Meanwhile the world and the company culture could be rapidly changing around us and we don’t even notice. Time to take the blinders off.
• People don’t know how to manage their careers - This is unfortunate, but true and the root of this entire topic. Recently, I heard a person with the best quote about this: “Today, it’s not about the joy of having a career, it’s about the survival of having a job.”

So, is there anything we can do to truly manage our careers? I think so. I put together a list of 10 suggestions that can help you with this.

Now, I am by no means a list person. Too often when people give lists people either think they’re silver bullets to sure fire success, or they’re loathed because someone is either a list hater, or they disagree with the content. This list was honestly just a way to consolidate some very effective factors for managing your career. Take a look at see what you think.

1. Know what you want to do - We all need to reflect on our career and determine if what we do each day is really what we “want” to do. We shouldn’t be in the survival mode. Not healthy at all.
2. Network inside and outside the company - You’d think that we wouldn’t have to even have to mention this anymore. But people still refuse to effectively network. We need to understand that networking isn’t about a job search, it’s a business tool that keeps you as a vital commodity to not only your company, but your profession.
3. You can’t help yourself until you help someone else first - You will see countless rewards if you reach out first vs. expecting someone else to reach you first. It honestly will make you healthier when you need help yourself because you’ve taken the time to put others first. It only helps!
4. Intentionally seek professional development - The business world moves now faster than the speed of light. If you aren’t seeking to be ahead of the curve, you will fall back exponentially. In the past when the pace of work was slower, this wasn’t a big issue. Now, if you don’t seek to develop yourself and your skills, you can be forgotten and never found again.
5. Make it a priority - Like all things, we think we have time to always get to managing our career and then one day we’re “transitioned” and wonder where that time went. This is something that is as important as any aspect of your job. Know where you stand and where you want to be. It doesn’t automatically mean that you have to change jobs. It just means that you are aware of where you are at all times and therefore less likely to be caught by surprise.
6. Don’t be a lurker or a slug - Managing your career isn’t anyone else’s responsibility. If you have the “woe is me” approach to your career, others will move past you and not even notice. Be active in all forums you are involved with including – your job, your presence on social media, and your connection to your profession!
7. Volunteer and be broad in your scope - Be a giver outside your narrow focus of your job. Find out where you can add value from a civic perspective and get involved. You will be more well-rounded and be a better human. That is good no matter where you are in your career!
8. Your career is just one facet of your life so be balanced - Sounds wonderful doesn’t it? One of the greatest facts about the newest generation entering the workforce is that this is something they expect. It’s time we all took their example. It would make us more productive and valued people.
9. Involve recruiters in your career management - People never network with recruiters just to know them. That’s a mistake. They are a great resource and if you have a genuine networking relationship, they may reach out to you when you weren’t even looking and get you to the best opportunity you never knew was there! Don’t just use recruiters as your “placement agency.”
10. Stay relevant - Seems basic, but too many people become irrelevant each and every day. This isn’t a technology/social media speech, but the landscape we all work in is changing and becoming more and more fluid especially electronically. If you aren’t contributing in these forums, you aren’t relevant. They will continue to evolve and if you aren’t in the mix, then you will become archaic and won’t be able to catch up. Get engaged!

Now it’s your turn. Leave a comment and let us know if you feel that managing your career is worth doing.

Do you measure and pay for performance consistently based on when the performance occurred and when the bonus is actually earned?

I had a good conversation with Chris Cabrera, the CEO of Xactly Corporation, last week. We spent an hour talking about Software as a Service (SaaS) and why people should care. He is definitely one of the people most passionate about this topic that I know!

For those who don’t remember, I wrote an article called “Buy the Car, Rent the Car or Take the Bus” which explains the difference between on-premise, single-tenancy and multi-tenancy.

“Many people are confused about what SaaS is, and about the benefits of a pure SaaS solution” said Cabrera. “Many companies use the term incorrectly to be buzzword compliant. That’s too bad because some people start to believe it is only a marketing gimmick.” I asked him why people should actually care about if a solution is SaaS or not. Playing the devil’s advocate, it would seem like most potential customers would not care if a solution is really a SaaS solution versus hosted, or multi-tenancy versus single-tenancy.

Chris mentioned 6 reasons why potential customers should care:

1. It is in the client’s interest for the vendor – their technology partner – to be around long term. On-premise solutions are not cost effective because they have so many technology stacks and versions of the software that need to be maintained and supported. With SaaS solutions, some of the savings are passed back to the client, and a significant portion of the revenues are reinvested into the infrastructure as well as in the development of new features.
2. SaaS vendors can focus on improving a single software version, used by every customer. Every engineer is dedicated to improving a single source of code. This allows the vendor to release new features and improvements much more quickly than is typically feasible with an on-premise solution.
3. Upgrading a SaaS solution usually happens ‘behind the scenes’. New SaaS software releases are tested extremely rigorously before being released. A quality problem would impact thousands of customers and hundreds of thousands of payees. On-premise solutions often transfer the quality ownership to the clients who must perform their own regression testing after an often labor intensive upgrade process.
4. Non-SaaS solutions are not always scalable. For example, with 10, 100 or even 1000 customers, an on-premise solution might work. But the real test will be when a solution is used by thousands of customers – will a non-SaaS solution really be able to scale up? “Probably not” said Cabrera.
5. SaaS vendors constantly measure and monitor their environment. They make a significant investment into that infrastructure to ensure an optimal performance for all of their customers.
6. SaaS solutions are usually sold on a basis of $ per payee per month. Solutions such as Xactly Incent all of a sudden become cost effective for even small companies which can avoid a high upfront infrastructure and license cost.

Chris Cabrera is convinced of one thing: SaaS is the future. “On-premise solutions might still be appropriate for a very small share of the market, but SaaS is appropriate at least 98% of the time.” Looking at the market trends, I would say he’s right. Most vendors realized the benefits of SaaS and are rushing in that direction.