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What should you expect from your employer if you want to be a first-class player and a winner?

Foremost, you should expect to be provided with an environment of opportunity in which hard work and achievement are rewarded. This means you will be encouraged to grow as fast as you can, broadening your capabilities and building your experience every step of the way. You will be allowed to assume all the responsibilities you can handle.

This environment of opportunity should allow you to take common sense risks with the assurance that you will be rewarded if you are right and not punished if you turn out to be wrong.

You should expect your employer to provide you with the assets you need to get your assignments done on time and in a manner that produces profits. You have little chance of being a winner unless you are employed by an organization that satisfies this expectation.

You should expect your employer to maintain a highly visible connection between efforts, achievements and rewards. You will not have a nurturing soil in which you can grow to be a winner in the absence of a reward system that distinguishes between doing and 'gonna do.' There is little incentive to make your best effort where the annual compensation review almost always results in across-the-board, cost-of-living raises for one and all alike, loafers as well as producers; where winners are never singled out for a pat on the back.

Over time, the absence of opportunity, the lack of resources and the failure to reward good work will kill the fire in even the most ambitious of us. These failures will also cripple organizations.

Those who are driven to be winners will be smart enough to either change such a destructive environment or leave it.

Ramon Greenwood is a former Senior Vice President of American Express. To subscriber to his f*ee semi-monthly newsletter please go to http://www.CommonSenseAtWork.com/GetItNow.

We?ve all done it - played that movie over and over in our minds of our confident entry into the boss? office and asking for - no, demanding ? that elusive pay raise. However deserved, however, reality often plays out far differently, with many relegating themselves to their boss? budgetary discretion.

Yes, asking for a raise can be tricky as there are so many factors that come into play: the business culture, company policies regarding regular job assessments and wage reviews, and the subjectivity of your boss. Asking for a raise can be more than anxiety provoking?it can be downright depressing. So, what are the throngs of underpaid, though deserving, employees throughout corporate America to do?

John McKee, a Certified Business and Executive Coach and Author of 21 Ways Women in Management Shoot Themselves in the Foot, who has received, denied and granted literally thousands of pay raise requests throughout his management career, offers these potentially profitable insights:

For those employed in companies with policies regarding wage reviews, the first thing is to find out how frequently those are supposed to occur. In most large companies, it will be an annual activity with the HR department providing supervisors with guidelines for how to appraise individuals, and what type of increases are appropriate based on how the employee is rated for performance, attitude and potential growth on the job in the future. If you are involved in this type of organization, you should take advantage of the formality and regularity of the wage/performance review annual event by preparing a self-assessment of your own job performance. This self appraisal should be honest - if you have areas that could be better, you should exactly what, and how, you intend to improve, including recommendations for any additional training that could enhance your performance. It is also important you note any and all accomplishments along with specific measurements and dates in case the boss may overlook or forget about those highlights.

Many companies - particularly small or new ones - will not have formalized policies regarding annual assessments and/or pay raises. This can be both good and bad. It's great if the company is led by someone who is enlightened and recognizes individual contributions, and rewards or compensates employees accordingly. However, those who are not lucky enough to have such intuitive bosses and feel they are not making the kind of money they should be should request a meeting with the boss to specifically discuss performance and commensurate compensation.

It is important not to get over zealous and storm in to the boss? office demanding a raise (as empowering as that fantasy is), as doing so will put the boss in a defensive mode that is not conducive to a positive discussion?outcome. Simply tell the boss you would like to discuss the subject, and ask when it would be convenience for him or her to do so. Then, prepare! Before the meeting you should have a complete record of what and how you've done since the last raise, wherever possible citing specific metric results related thereto, with dates, to show that your merit is not subjective, but rather based on performance fact.

While some may feel this next piece of advice is counter productive, I do recommend that you offer to give this self-assessment to your boss before the meeting so he or she can understand your point of view and prepare accordingly. By no means is this telling the enemy your strategy, rendering your defeat inevitable. Rather, I believe that in any negotiation - and this ?is? a real negotiation for you - it is best to lay out your cards in an honest and forthright manner. If the boss wants to keep you happy and on staff, your information will help him or her understand your value in undeniable terms. If, on the other hand, the boss has no intention of rewarding you in a manner that you feel is fair and appropriate, he or she will always find a way to justify that decision. So, providing the boss with your input prior to meeting will only make it easier to find out the ultimate, final outcome ? and you can make an educated decision regarding your future with that company, accordingly.

John McKee, a certified business and executive coach and Author of ?21 Ways Women in Management Shoot Themselves in the Foot?, is the expert and visionary behind BusinessSuccessCoach.net, an online destination for professionals who aspire to maximize their success in business. He can be reached through his Web sites at http://www.businesssuccesscoach.net and http://www.businesswomanweb.com

Accepting contract work is an option that some job searchers look at not only when they are having trouble finding fulltime work but because of the lucrative nature of contract assignments.

Typically, contract work can run anywhere from around 1 month to 12 months in length and sometimes, even longer than that.

Depending on the industry and job, contracts might differ in length but as a recruiter, this is the typical range that I tend to see available.

Depending on the specific situation, here are some possible benefits of contract work:

1. Money

Contractors typically get paid on an hourly basis for actual hours worked with no benefits or holidays paid but depending on the specific job, can often make more money than if they were doing the same job on a fulltime basis. Hence, working on contract ? especially if you can find a long-term contract of 1 year or longer ? can be quite lucrative. Plus unlike most salaried staff, contract staff get paid overtime.

2. Variation of Work

Contract work often allows you to change your jobs frequently especially if you are working short-term contracts. There isn?t much chance of getting bored if you are constantly working on new projects or for different companies.

3. Tax Benefits

Depending on your local tax laws, you might find tax benefits if you are self-employed and have the ability to write off business expenses.

Considerations

There are some possible negative aspects you need to think about when it comes to contract work. First off, some employers can be turned off considering you for a fulltime job with their company if you have a recent track record of working on contracts.

Since one of the benefits of contract work is the money you can make, hiring managers tend to be aware that many people who choose to work on contracts do so because of the monetary benefits. Therefore, they might be hesitant to hire you fulltime believing you would not stay with them long term earning a salary if a more lucrative contract appeared.

You might need to convince a hiring manager that you will stay long term if your recent work history is made up of contract work.

Also, be prepared for periods of unemployment during slow times. If you?re fortunate, you can pick up a new contract when an old one is ending but it doesn?t always work that way.

Following Y2K when I was working as an Information Technology recruiter, the market for most IT professionals - and especially contractors - went down the toilet as companies had spent their IT budget (and then some) upgrading their systems preparing for Y2K. After this, the dot com bubble burst and then September 11 occurred and by then, many IT professionals had been laid off and previously high-flying contractors were forced to take far less paying fulltime jobs just to get back into the workforce.

Finally, if you?re accepting contract work but prefer fulltime work, keep in mind that timing doesn?t always work in your favour. If you are several months away from finishing a contract and a great fulltime job comes along, what do you do? You might not be able to break your contract to take the fulltime job and the company offering the fulltime job might not be able to wait until your contract is over to hire you.

Carl Mueller is an Internet entrepreneur and professional recruiter who wants to help you find your dream career.

Visit Carl's website to separate yourself from other job searchers: http://www.find-your-dream-career.com

Ezine editors/Webmasters: Please feel free to reprint this article in its entirety in your ezine or on your website. Please don?t change any of the content and please ensure that you include the above bio that shows my website URL. If you would like me to address any specific career topics in future articles, please let me know.