It’s easy to go through your career taking the same paths others did before you. But small, simple tweaks can make a huge difference in your lifetime.

One of my readers, Alexander, writes:

“I’m reviewing NIH grant proposals right now and seeing your tweets made me think of something that might interest you — doing the “expected” career progression instead of the one that makes sense. Typically, biologists who want to do research as a career go to grad school ($22K annual stipend; I did this part and learned a tremendous amount) for 5-6 years and then do a postdoctoral fellowship ($40K salary; ridiculously low wages for someone who is now a subject matter expert in their research area) for up to 6 more years before becoming assistant professors ($65-70K or so starting). I skipped that postdoc stage and I’m currently a 33-year-old “senior scientist” with my own research grants, etc (the normal age for that career point is about 42). Although there’s certainly the usual mix of luck and me maximizing my exposure to luck in my having leapfrogged that whole postdoc phase, the thing that I find really jarring is this:

When I talk to friends and acquaintances who are going through grad school now, they frequently don’t even want to entertain the possibility of making this kind of “jump” themselves. I’ve tried to pitch them on it, and been told, “It doesn’t work that way.” When I offer myself as proof, I’m told, “You’re a special case.”

I though that might interest you, given your appreciation for the psychology of success. I’ve personally found it a little tiring, although I have realized that the set of peers I chose to spend time with in grad school match my outlook, which makes sense — I picked positive, productive friends (who are now doing quite well in positions at consulting firms and major biotech companies). Still, I find it odd that people don’t like the idea of jumping ahead if it’s demonstrably possible.”

Few things I’ve noticed:

• I used to hear friends complain about money, and I would rush to tell them what to do. Even when I knew the objective “right” answer, they never, ever listened to me. Instead, their eyes glazed over and they ignored me. Eventually I started resenting them for not listening (which is a ridiculous reaction on my part). After 1.5 years of this, I decided to implement what I called the Honey Pot Strategy, where I let the right people come to me, via this blog. It has been a miraculous change. People are smart: Only the right people come, and the wrong people realize this site isn’t for them, and leave (that’s why I don’t mind when people say they’re unsubscribing from this site). Read more: Bob Bly, the noted copywriter, writes about why he never gives unsolicited advice.
• People feel comfortable putting others into buckets. “Oh, you study economics” or “Ah, you’re a product manager.” I do it. You do it. We all do. But when you start doing something “weird” like doing a side job, or earning $1,000 on the side, or even doing a free internship, people generally get uncomfortable. There are a variety of reasons for this, but the most important result is that it makes us question what we’re doing. Yet if you think about it, why would you care what people who are not doing what you want to do say? The reason, of course, is we are profoundly social, and our reference groups are broad. Even if I think your job sucks, you’re still my friend, and I’m still influenced by your judgment. In some of my advanced courses, I teach people how to deal with this.
• Doing offbeat, “weird” things early in our careers can produce huge rewards. Witness this blog, my comedy blog “Things I Hate,” or even the “You have died of Dysentery” t-shirt that I created. None were created to make money. Yet each one played a pivotal role in opening up doors. The challenging thing about doing offbeat, weird things is that there’s potentially huge upside, but you don’t know for sure. In general, people don’t like doing things that don’t have a clear ROI, especially as they get older. That’s why people consistently ask, “Can you guarantee I’ll make $1,000 in Earn1k? How do you KNOW that taking people out to lunch will work?” You don’t know. Otherwise everyone would do it.

I cover specific tactics in my writings on entrepreneurship, my entrepreneurship bookmarks, and my Earn1k course.

By contrast, I quietly and systematically polished my resume for over 100 man-hours in college until it gleamed perfection. I know, I know…this is what makes me irresistible to women.

Anyway, a few months back, I got in touch with Brazen Careerist to do some co-promotion since we both have similar audiences. But I’ve held off on mentioning them until the right thing came along.

Tonight Penelope Trunk (of Brazen Careerist) is doing a “Resume Boot Camp” webcast — Wednesday, 2/10 — and I thought you guys might want to check it out.

I recently took a look at some of your resumes for an upcoming project, and they were just terrible. I wish I had time to fix every one of them, but hopefully this will help you get a good start.

It’s tonight: Get details about the free Resume Boot Camp (Wed 2/10)

I taught my friend how to negotiate an $8,000 increase in salary and a 50% boost in equity in 4 hours. And this was after she’s committed the cardinal sin of negotiating: revealing what her salary expectations were.

This is the kind of thing we all know we “should” do…but we don’t do it. Even though we can get the information for “free” online. Hmm….

In this video, learn how to:

• Negotiate with an experienced recruiter
• Rebound after you undercut yourself
• Why reading a negotiation book is not enough
• Know when to be adversarial and when to be cooperative

This video is probably worth $3,000 – $10,000 for my average reader IF YOU IMPLEMENT IT AND IMPLEMENT IT CORRECTLY.

Oh yeah…I have more videos on negotiation (thanks to Chris Whitmore for filming/editing).

Get more negotiation videos: For detailed videos of EXACT phrases, situations, and tactics for dealing with tough recruiters and intimidating executives, join the Boot Camp pre-launch list. Do it today because I’m closing it down soon.

Today I want to know this: What’s the best investment you’ve ever made? Not a specific fund or stock, but a personal investment (a course, a book, a trip, etc) that helped propel you beyond everyone else.

Some examples of investments

• My friend Paul Singh puts aside $3,000 per year to travel and meet interesting people. Any time he needs consulting work, he makes a phone call and he has a new job.
• Charlie Hoehn invested his time into working for me for free — as well as Tim Ferriss, Tucker Max, and many other people — and has done work that none of his peers can match. (He then wrote an ebook about how he did it.)
• In college, I flew across the country to meet Seth Godin, which led to an internship, which led to 2 published books, TV exposure, and much more.

So, 2 questions:

What’s the best personal investment you’ve ever made?

And why are people so obsessed with cutting their spending instead of investing in themselves for a potentially much larger reward?

Stay tuned…

If you’re a recent college graduate, you’re probably struggling with finding a decent job in this down economy. In fact, it’s tough for anyone right now. Just like with personal finance, most of us will shrug our shoulders, accept the circumstances, and assume there’s nothing we can do but wait out the storm (and complain about taxes).

Stop complaining and start dominating

The reality is that it’s actually possible to improve your personal situation and get the job of your dreams, within a year of college. My friend Charlie Hoehn was able to do exactly that, and I asked him to write an ebook on how he did it. I’m putting it up here for you because it’s one of the better things you can read during this recession.

The ebook contains the techniques he used to guarantee himself any kind of work he wants over the next decade — pretty cool since he’s continuing to work with me on several new projects. And as an added bonus, I’ve included a short video of Tim Ferriss and me discussing how Charlie approached us, and why his technique was especially effective.

How Charlie made the approach

Rewind to about a year ago, when I got an email from somebody named Charlie Hoehn. He’d recently graduated from college and wanted my help to work with Tim Ferriss. He mentioned that he had some feedback for “I Will Teach You To Be Rich,” and in a followup email, he sent me several details. It ended like this:

How I can help you: The answer to this is something I’ve struggled to come up with for both you and Tim Ferriss….shooting/editing video, and creating niche social networks…

Only a few months later, I left this LinkedIn testimonial for Charlie:

“Charlie is one of the most talented marketers and entrepreneurs I’ve ever worked with. First, some of the results he helped drive:

* He was one of the chief strategists to make my book, I Will Teach You To Be Rich, a New York Times bestseller, Wall Street Journal bestseller, and #1 Amazon bestseller
* Wrote scripts, filmed, and edited comedy videos that were collectively seen over 80,000 times
* Managed a team that created several new innovative strategies for book marketing

More importantly, Charlie understands the importance of blending strategy with rapid tactics. I feel comfortable calling him, giving him a high-level idea, and asking him to come back to me in 48 hours with a proposal for how to implement it. In fact, after working together, he now suggests ideas to me, then implements them completely on his own. He’s resourceful (he’ll take a high-level idea and flesh out every detail/resource needed to dominate it), detail-oriented (he edited our videos even further when I thought they were good enough), and versatile enough to create marketing strategies and write comedy videos. A true gem. I highly recommend him.”

How did Charlie do it? How did Charlie end up working with me, Tim Ferriss, Tucker Max, and several other popular personalities?

As iwillteachyoutoberich readers, I thought you’d enjoy this because it’s a fresh spin on the popular drivel of “find your passion and the money will come.” WTF does that mean? Where should you start?

What you’ll find in the 30-page ebook

• Why CareerBuilder and Monster are useless during a job hunt (page 8 )
• The most painless method for getting a job right out of college (page 9)
• The best graduate school you can attend… free (page 11)
• Specific email script to reel employers who “aren’t hiring” (pages 13 and 27)
• Using specific skills to earn more…which seems obvious, yet most people never do this (page 19)
• How to fix the mistake that affects many college graduates in their job search (page 21)

Enter your email below to get:

• A downloadable copy of this ebook (completely un-DRM’d — sent immediately)
• Continuing interviews with successful entrepreneurs who are working their dream job.
• Case studies of people in their early 20’s who have accomplished, in just a few years, what most people accomplish in 10.
• Specific tactics and scripts to implement the principles in the ebook

Note that this guy writes emails that are 10x too long (which is probably part of the problem), and my extremely brief replies were sent from my iPhone. I’m including all of it so you see how your emails to others are received, but I bolded the important parts so you didn’t commit suicide with an xacto knife to the eyeball.

Ryan writes:

“I graduated from XXX of XXX in December of 2005, and in less than 3 years was making 6 figures as a Software contractor in XXX at XXX. When I started at XXX in July of 2008, they told me I’d be there for 2 to 5 years. By October, the buyout of XXX was announced by XXX, and at that time the bottom fell out of the financial sector and subsequently the job market in XXX. (XXX and XXX were the two biggest employers of tech people in the area, and both were positively clobbered by the recession.) I was let go in December, but had managed to bank living expenses for about a year. (Being someone who once had 12.5k in credit card debt, I was thrilled to be in this position.)

In the past 5 months, I’ve kept in touch with as many recruiters as possible (roughly 3 dozen), who I call on a regular basis only to hear “I’ve got nothing.” Also in that time, I’ve had a whopping two interviews—one contract, one perm—and I got neither gig. I’ve found that when the candidates far outnumber the jobs, there will always be someone with a more complete skillset than you, and that person will get the job unless you are willing to make next to nothing.

What I’m trying to say is that the job situation here is dire. Meanwhile, I’ve burned through half of my savings, and this is starting to annoy me. (It wouldn’t, as much, if there was light at the end of the tunnel.) I’ve ruled out the possibility of moving thus far because I genuinely like living here, but I am increasingly resigned to the inevitability that I will have to.

As someone who has been involved in a technology startup, do you have any advice for someone in my situation?

I am single and have a car payment and a rent payment. My expenses are roughly 2 grand a month. At what point should I take a job just to take one, to protect not only my savings, but my future employability? (Granted, this particular gap in my resumé will be a very easy story for me to tell during an interview, but that doesn’t mean it looks good.) Is it worth it, at this point, for me to move across the country? How stable is the job market out there?

Thanks in advance for any advice you have to offer, and simply for taking the time to read this e-mail. And forgive me for rambling.”

- Ryan

My response:

“Well, what specifically are you doing to improve your job situation?”

Note that I usually find a one-line answer to long, rambling emails forces people to confront the horrifying realization that their email has drifted off into a pointless, circuitous morass of irrelevance.

Ryan’s response: HOLY SHIT STILL WAY TOO LONG

“I spent much of the last several months expanding my network. The job culture here is very much recruiter-driven, especially on the contract side, but increasingly on the perm side as smaller companies have been swallowed by larger ones. I mentioned in my earlier e-mail that I keep in touch with like 3 dozen recruiters on a regular basis, which is about 30 more than I was keeping in touch with before my last gig. I have pretty good coverage of the XXX-area job market through these resources, at least when it comes to Java gigs, but have come up empty when it comes to actual jobs. The only things I’ve gained from this experience was more minutes on my phone bill.

Even though I preferred to stay a contractor I did not rule out perm jobs knowing how shitty the economy is right now. I had an interview with a company two weeks ago that went great but found out today that I did not get the position. My recruiter asked if there was anything I could’ve done better, and they said no. Ultimately they went with somebody with a wider skillset. Namely, this guy was a pro at UNIX scripting, and I was not.

In a job market where there are 50x more candidates than jobs available, perhaps the best way to get a job is to have every skill-set imaginable. I realize now that I should’ve spent more time over the last several months expanding my skill-set, or perhaps starting a business of my own.

Now, knowing that I could benefit from doing that, I have 6 months before I run out of money, with no guarentee that the jobs in XXX will ever come back. Under normal economic conditions, 6 months is a long time. In the current climate, it’s almost time to become desperate.”

My 2-line response:

“I would go where the jobs are. And stop depending on recruiters. If you act like every other job candidate, you will get treated like them too. Use personal networking and improve your skills.”

Key takeaways

All jokes aside, Ryan now realizes some really key lessons:

• Build skills before you need them

• Networking is not a dirty word — make personal relationships before you need them
• If your emails to a random blogger are really, really long, your resume and cover letter are probably equally verbose and almost certainly play a role in recruiters ignoring you

One of the most important differences between rich people and non-rich people: Rich people plan for things before they need them, while others are caught treading water when something bad happens. To Ryan’s HUGE credit, he planned ahead with an enormous buffer of savings that’s allowing him to figure this out. That alone is remarkable. But from a career perspective, think about how to apply this to your life.

Book tour details: Remember, I’m on book tour for I Will Teach You To Be Rich in a bunch of cities over the next couple weeks. Sign up to meet me here and follow the tour at twitter.com/ramit

Check out how he earned more than $13,000 in 5 months (and turned down $25,000 during the same time). I’ve bolded my favorite parts.

Hi Ramit,

I feel like I’ve known you for a long time. I’ve been reading your blog since the middle of last year… and ever since, I’ve really had my financial life turned around.

It sounds dramatic, but honestly, my entire outlook on life has changed. A small bit of history before I get to the really juicy stuff.

I worked at a company for 10 years – ever since I finished college. After 10 years, I was only making about 55k/year.

Most of it was my fault – I was always comfortable with my salary since I lived with my parents and I felt a sort of loyalty to the company that took me in when I was really down on my luck. Once I got married and moved into a house… that changed.

I worked my ass off – especially the last couple of years I was there. The final couple of years of my employment, I spent at least 10 hours a day doing whatever I could to learn more about the industry I was in. I took the company up on all offers to send me to formal Oracle training. I took advantage of opportunities to learn new software products, and take on as many responsibilities as I could. When I was diagnosed with cancer (Lymphoma), I didn’t quit my job or anything else… I worked harder. I felt that if I focused my mind on something positive that it would help me beat the cancer, which it did. (today I’m cancer free, by the way!)

However, it didn’t pay me what I was worth – at least not in my view, my coworkers view, or any of my clients’ views, and definitely not in my wife’s view (the fact I could barely pay the bills despite working 10-14 hours a day really strained our marriage). Once I beat cancer, I found your blog. I spent a while just reading it and considering the various advice you gave, etc. Meanwhile, I was getting deeper and deeper in debt.

The big thing that changed my life was realizing that one should not “spend less than you earn” but “earn more than you spend”. That right there changed my life!

Immediately I asked for a raise. I was promised a 25% raise – which never came after several months. I would followup every 2 weeks (when I got paid) and I would keep getting stonewalled – one excuse after another. Finally, I stopped asking. I took the initiative to update my CV and asked some colleagues to review it. One of them, a lady I now work with, saw it and her jaw dropped. She forwarded it to a manager at her company and a few weeks later I had a job offer.

I put in my 2 weeks notice – and immediately the company freaked out. The vice president of the division made a special visit to my office and offered me not 25%, but 25 THOUSAND to stay. I was tempted, but the new job was too tempting.

I declined and moved on. In a matter of days I more than doubled my salary, all because I started reading your blog.

Now the juicy stuff!

Since then (October 2008), I’ve reduced my non-mortgage debt by more than $10,000 and increased my savings from a big fat $0 to over $3000. I’ve also increased my credit score by over 100 points. Oh! Another benefit? The company I used to work for now pays me $65/hr to do consulting work on the side… more than double what they used to pay me full time. In fact, I did 2.5 hours of work for them tonight as a side job (thanks again to your tips)! DO NOT BURN YOUR BRIDGES!

Honestly most of the things you preach SHOULD be common sense… but the fact of the matter is that most people don’t THINK that way. The sooner they do, the better off they will be.

This is a great kick in the ass for people who feel stuck at work. Note: Yes, in this economy it’s extremely difficult to negotiate your salary…but how else could you apply Todd’s principles to your own situation?

Note: In Chapter 9 of my book, I include a highly tactical script + multi-month plan to getting a raise at your current job.

Ten years ago, I was working in a lumber yard. I asked myself, “What do I want my life to be like in five years?”.

I knew two things: that five years would pass, and that if I didn’t do anything different my life would still be the same (ie, I’d still be poor).

I took computer classes. I picked the hardest classes with the fewest students. That would put me in a smaller pool of people with those skills, increasing my value.

In five years I went from making 20k /year to 90k /year. I had to pay for the classes myself, but I’ve never regretted it and I’ve never looked back.

What if you’d done that five years ago? What if you did it today?

5 related links:

• Stop being cheap and go buy something today

• Earn more money using your God-given skills
• Why the lady sitting next to me should pay $2,000 for a computer class
• Archive of Friday Entrepreneur interviews
• Archive of Personal Entrepreneurship articles

I cover lots of ways to automate your money and spend consciously (not just cut costs) in my new book, which is available for pre-order! Please order it and forward your receipt to VIP-blogreaders@ramitsethi.com so you can get early access to the chapters. More on the book later this week…

Danielle: “Uhhh I’d tell them life isnt so bad. Im 23, attached and have 85k in school loans and I cant get a job more than 14 bucks an hour. Whats my advice?”

Boomer: “Danielle – Get two jobs.”

It’s a little more nuanced, but not by much. Yes, sometimes you just need to earn more money. No, it’s not always easy. But few of us think about getting two jobs, when it’s almost always a very clear way to earn more money.

Wondering how to get a second job (even a consulting gig)? Read this: Earn money using your god-given skills.

Why do so few of us think about getting a second job?

What do you do for a living?

“I’m a student. For making money, I do the following:
- Part-time as a web designer for my school’s student government. (5 hours/week)
- Work at my school’s book-store. (20-25 hr/week)
- Donate plasma. (6-8 hr/week)
- Run a web site; income from ads. (1-2 hr/week)”

* * *

“I’m an environmental engineer within the federal government. I generally earn less base salary than others with similar experience in the field who choose to work in the private sector, but it works for me. Most of those private sector guys work 45+ hours per week and many don’t get OT for it. I’m done after 40 hours and can go home to my wife and family.”

* * *
“I’m 24 and working full time in technology. Enterprise level sales. 40 hrs @ office, but do e-mails and such at odd hours.
- I own an auto detailing business. 300-500 extra a week.
- I cross sell conciege services through my auto detailing business. 200+ a week. (I’m very consistant with one client.)
- I work at a bar on weekend nights. 250+ a week. I try and shoot for earning $4,000/month AFTER taxes.”

What do you do for a living?