Alan De Back has over 20 years’ experience as a career counselor and trainer in the corporate, academic, and government arenas. His clients include the American Management Association, the American Psychological Association, the Department of Defense and the Virginia Employment Commission.

GET HIRED in a Tough Market

INSIDER SECRETS TO FIND AND LAND THE JOB YOU NEED NOWBy ALAN DE BACK

The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.

Copyright © 2010 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-07-163705-3

Contents

Chapter One

Know Where You’re Going

Developing Your Job Search Plan with Self-Assessments

You must know yourself and what you have to offer to a potential employer before you actively pursue any opportunities. In times of tough competition, too many job hunters immediately jump into the search without considering what it is they have to sell. It’s inefficient to market yourself without having any idea of the strengths or skills that make you the ideal “product” for an employer to hire. You will have an advantage over your competition and make yourself far more attractive to a potential employer by identifying your unique skill sets and what distinguishes you from others. You must take the time and effort to figure out what makes you stand out from the crowd!

In this chapter, we’ll review a process for thoroughly examining your skill sets. You’ll learn how to identify your strongest skills and how to articulate them effectively. You’ll also have an opportunity to examine your interests and how they relate to your skill sets. Combining your interests and skills will increase your motivation and make you a stronger candidate—always important, but especially critical in a tough job market.

MARY ATTENDS A RECEPTION

Mary had been invited to attend a reception for a friend who was retiring. She generally hated attending events like this, but she had known the colleague for many years and wanted to honor her achievements. Besides, she thought to herself, most of the people at the reception will be people who work in my field. Who knows what kinds of contacts I might make?

Mary arrived at the reception and began to mingle. She noticed a small group of friends she hadn’t seen recently and joined them. They introduced her to Sarah, another woman chatting with the group.

After a few minutes, Mary found herself in a conversation with Sarah. As they discussed their work, Sarah mentioned an upcoming job opening with her organization. Wow, thought Mary, maybe I’ve struck gold here!

“So what type of opening do you have coming up?” asked Mary. “I may be looking for a new opportunity.”

“Well,” answered Sarah, “it’s a project manager position working with one of our most critical clients. We really need to find someone with the right skill set who will also be a good fit with this client. What are some of your skills in project management?”

Mary was shocked. She hadn’t expected to be asked about her skills and hadn’t really thought them through. “Well,” she started, “I’m awfully good with people. I like people and people really seem to like me. That’s all I can really think of at the moment.”

“Oh,” answered Sarah. “Well, people skills are a small but important piece of the puzzle, for sure.”

Within a few moments, Sarah had politely excused herself and moved on to chat with another group. Mary was left with her glass of wine and her thoughts. I think she wanted to know more about what skills I could bring to her organization, she thought, but people skills were all that I could come up with.

WHY ARE SKILLS IMPORTANT?

Mary’s experience is just one example of why knowing yourself is the first critical step in the job search process. In a tough job market, you must take every advantage to set yourself apart from the competition. A major component of that process is knowing your skill sets cold and being ready to articulate those clearly and concisely. Most employers are looking for new employees who will be able to hit the ground running and begin contributing, in a significant way, as quickly as possible. In current work environments, which have often been cut to the bone, there just isn’t time to hand-hold new employees and to slowly bring them up to speed. If you aren’t seen as someone who possesses the skills needed to become productive quickly, your competition will win out.

You must know who you are and what your skills are in order to make that case for yourself.

Mary has clearly not reflected on her strongest skill sets and how she has used them. In fact, she’s not unusual—most of us never make the effort to identify our various skill sets. Sure, there are things that you know you do well in both your personal and work lives, but in your day-to-day life you are rarely asked to describe them. The job search process, on the other hand, puts you in a variety of situations where you need to be able to identify and describe those skills on demand. If you do the homework, you’ll be ready. If you don’t, you’ll find yourself in the same shoes as the bulk of your competition—struggling with how to sell yourself and your skills.

Most skills can be categorized as either technical skills or transferable skills. You need to assess both types of skills. Here are short definitions of each:

* Technical skills: These are skills that relate to a specific technical competency. Examples might be proficiency with computer software programs, fluency in a foreign language, or the ability to use a certain type of mechanical equipment.

* Transferable skills: These are skills that have to do with how you interact with or communicate with other people. Examples could be presentation skills, supervisory skills, or writing skills. Transferable skills are also sometimes called “soft” skills because they are needed in a variety of work environments in a range of career fields.

Most career fields require a mixture of technical and transferable skills in order to achieve competency. Many people find it easier to recognize and communicate their technical skills. The transferable skills tend to be hidden or taken for granted. You must make the effort to identify and describe both skill sets.

By now, you probably understand the need to better recognize exactly what your skills are, but where do you begin? How do you determine exactly what your skills are—especially your more subtle transferable skills?

HOW DO YOU IDENTIFY YOUR SKILLS?

To develop a solid overall view of both your technical and transferable skills will require quite a bit of work and introspection. You will probably need to go outside yourself to get input from others. The end result, however, will be well worth the effort. This easy-to-follow three-step process will help you, as will the accompanying worksheets.

1. Write two success stories. Using Worksheet 1.1 at the end of this chapter, write two stories that describe some sort of achievement or success you have experienced. One should be strictly work-related, and the other can come from either work or your personal life (perhaps related to volunteer work you have done or an activity in an organization you belong to). As you write your stories, describe what you did, what obstacles got in the way and how you overcame them, and what strengths you drew upon to ultimately achieve your end result or goal.

After you have written your stories, read through them several times. Let a few hours (or even days) lapse between reviews. The breaks will give you the opportunity to really think through your achievements and what went into them. You may recall additional information that you want to add as a result of your reviews. Highlight any skills (technical or transferable) that you actually mentioned in your stories and then identify other skills you may have used in the course of each example.

2. Read your current job description (and past job descriptions, if available). Most of us review our job descriptions only at the time we are hired for a job or if the fundamentals of the job are changed. Using a highlighter, review your current (and past) job descriptions. In most job descriptions, specific skills will be clearly identified. Mark those skills with your highlighter and read through them again. Are there other skills you can identify that are important to the responsibilities outlined? Note those skills as you identify them. Be sure to focus on both technical and transferable skills. As you did when you reviewed your success/achievement stories, allow a few hours or days to lapse and read the job descriptions again looking for any skills you may have missed in your initial review.

3. Seek input from your coworkers and friends. Despite your best efforts to look inside yourself, your coworkers and friends will see you differently. They will probably be able to identify skills that you don’t even realize you possess. Coworkers will be able to zero in on skills they have observed at work; friends should be able to identify skills you’ve exhibited in your personal life (often transferable skills). Have a conversation with several coworkers and friends you trust. Ask them to think about both technical and transferable skills. Can they cite concrete examples of how you’ve displayed the skills they identify?

After you’ve gone through the three-step process, make a comprehensive list of your skills. Use Worksheet 1.2 to divide those skills into technical skills and transferable skills. You will probably have many skills identified in each category.

To make the list more useful, you need to pare down your large list of skills. Think about the strength of each of the skills you’ve identified, and then categorize them by placing a check mark in the “A” column for your strongest skills, a check mark in the “B” column for your second tier of skills, and a check mark in the “C” column for your least proficient skills.

HOW DO YOU KNOW WHICH SKILLS ARE IMPORTANT?

You’ve completed the skills identification exercises and have identified your skill sets and prioritized them. Now what? How will you use this list? Even with your skills arranged in priority order, your list is probably still somewhat long and cumbersome.

First, you need to consider what skills are important to you. What skills do you most enjoy using? Then you’ll need to research what skills are in demand for the career field in which you want to work. Finally, you’ll look for the crossover between the skills you’re most interested in and those that are in demand. Here’s how you can do it.

What Are Your Preferred Skills?

Starting with your “A” skills, examine your list. Which skills involve activities you actually enjoy doing? For example, suppose that one “A” skill is review of complex commercial contracts. Although this is one of your primary skills, perhaps you’ve been doing it for years and you’re tired of it. That’s probably not a skill you want to promote in searching for your next job. Instead, let’s say you also have a strong skill in negotiating contracts and you really enjoy that part. That is a skill you may want to emphasize. Use a highlighter to examine your “A” skills and identify the ones that you would really like to use in your next job.

What Skills Are in Demand?

Your preferred skills are meaningless if employers aren’t looking for them. The next step is to determine what skills are important for the kinds of jobs for which you will be applying and interviewing. What exactly are potential employers looking for?

Use online job listings or newspaper ads to find job descriptions for the types of positions you are looking for. Read the descriptions carefully and highlight the skills that are described. Also, search for skills that are implied in the responsibilities that are described. Go back to your list of skills and highlight with a different color your “A” skills found in the job descriptions you’ve read. These are the skills that are in demand by employers in your field.

How Do You Align Your Preferences with Skills in Demand?

When you look at your lists of preferred “A” skills and your in-demand “A” skills, is there any crossover? Typically, at least a few of your “A” skills will be included in both lists. These are the skills you need to promote during your job search. They will provide you with job satisfaction in the workplace and will also be attractive to potential employers in your field. A job using these skill sets will be a win-win for both you and your employer!

If you’re not seeing enough crossover, go back and complete the same process with your “B” skills that you just completed with your “A” skills. Although your “B” skills are not your ultimate strengths, they are still areas where you have competencies that you can promote.

You’ve now aligned your skill preferences with the skills in demand in your field and have your skills “short list.” These are the skills that will most effectively market you to potential employers. You’ll want to highlight these skills in the “one-minute commercial” that you’ll develop in the next chapter. You’ll also want to be sure to emphasize these skills in your résumé. Most of your competition will not go through this detailed skills identification process, so the fact that you have done so will give you a definite edge in a tough job market.

WHAT ABOUT YOUR INTERESTS?

Although not all interests relate directly to possible job or career options, an opportunity that includes areas in which you have a personal interest will certainly be more enjoyable, and enjoyment of your work generally correlates with more success and greater longevity at your new position. You should certainly take into consideration what your interests are. You may also find it valuable to compare your interests to your prioritized skill lists and investigate which skills you use when pursuing your personal interests. Those skill sets can be valuable in ways you may not even have considered.

To help you think about your interests, and which of them might be applicable in your career field, take a few moments to complete Worksheet 1.3. This worksheet will help you identify those interests you find most enjoyable.

SHOULD YOU CONSIDER YOUR VALUES AT WORK?

Your personal values are critical to how happy you are at work. If you are doing work that isn’t aligned with your values or you work for a company whose values oppose those you find important, you’ll find yourself frustrated and potentially very dissatisfied—which doesn’t bode well for your success at that organization. Considering your values and how they relate in the workplace is critical.

Spend a little time checking off the values on Worksheet 1.4 that you believe are important. Then use the “Top 10” section of this worksheet to choose the values that are most important to you. As you pursue your job search, keep your values list handy. Are the jobs you are applying for and the employers they involve in alignment with your most important values? Many employers will provide their core values on their websites, which should make your job easier. Be sure to review them as part of your employer research before an interview.

Look at Kevin’s story as an example of an effective way to promote your skills and values when opportunities present themselves.

KEVIN ATTENDS A COMMUNITY ASSOCIATION MEETING

Kevin decided to attend the annual meeting of his community association. He had always been active in his community and enjoyed the annual association meeting. Because the meeting was accompanied by a reception, he also liked the opportunity to reconnect with neighbors and friends he hadn’t seen in a while.

After the meeting concluded and the reception began, Kevin spotted a group of neighbors he hadn’t spoken with for a few months. He joined the group and was soon introduced to a new neighbor, John. After a few minutes of conversation with John, Kevin discovered that they both worked in the same career field. John asked for more details about Kevin’s experience. Kevin replied with a quick overview of the type of work he had done, mentioning a couple of primary skills. Then he mentioned how he had helped customers with their problems and gave a short, specific example. He did not mention at this point that he was job hunting but continued an interesting conversation about common issues that he and John had faced in serving their customers.

As Kevin drove home from the meeting, he reflected on his conversations. He had enjoyed renewing acquaintances with several of his neighbors. The highlight, however, was meeting John. They had similar backgrounds and experiences and had had a great conversation about some of the mutual customer challenges they had faced. I really need to keep in touch with John, thought Kevin.

(Continues…)

Excerpted from GET HIRED in a Tough Marketby ALAN DE BACK Copyright © 2010 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.. Excerpted by permission of The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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