The Executive Update

Engineering Your Resume to Stand Out

We talk a lot about the value of social media to promote yourself as part of your job search. We talk about what to include and where to connect and how to use the Web to build your personal brand. But very few people actually discuss the mechanics of building your marketing documents in a way to support search and the Web. You can have the greatest resume in the world or the best executive bio, but if you don’t package them properly, technology may get in the way of people reading them.

I was heartened to see a guest post on recruiter Lindsay Olsen’s blog by Derek Pangallo, a political scientist who writes about new media, offering tips to get your resume seen using social media techniques. Some of these insights had never occurred to me so I want to share them here.

As Pangallo notes, you can leverage technology to make your resume work more effectively for you. He sees the resume as an important document since many recruiters pass over the cover letter and get right to the resume looking for information. So your resume has to be able to work for you to make a positive first impression. That’s why you need to control presentation.

He recommends using PDF format instead of Word. As he notes, foreign computer dictionaries can make mincemeat out of ethnic names, company names, and titles. He uses Acrobat Professional to control exactly how the resume is opened, providing a birds-eye view, but the point is that Adobe preserve the presentation and integrity of the document and can be read by anyone without changing the format. Also be wary of how you set the controls to view your Acrobat resume so you don’t trigger any “alert” messages on the recipient’s computer. Also note that some recruiters and companies don’t like PDF format because of applicant tracking systems, so you would need to have multiple versions.

You also can use technology to track how many people actually view your resume. Pangallo uses embedded links he shortens with http://goo.gl. If you are a Twitter user you know there are a number of free engines to shorten your links, but http://goo.gl lets you take advantage of Google Analytics. You can embed the Google address in the document, like this link to our website, and although when you hover over the link you see the Google address – http://goo.gl/FrnA7 - it still takes you to your Web destination. Now to check your traffic, just add a “+”symbol to the end of your Google address, like this http://goo.gl/FrnA7+. Very slick. He also has a discussion of how to use Google Analytics to track the effectiveness of your resume, and to determine who is opening it, from which city, how long they visited the web site, etc.

You can make your resume work for you with the right formatting and embedded links. But be sure you direct recruiters and hiring managers to destinations that have value, like your online portfolio, blog, or your LinkedIn profile. If you send them to your Twitter or Facebook account, for example, all they will see is your last post, and you don’t know when they’ll hit your site.

I’d be curious to hear other tips and techniques of how you are optimizing your marketing documents for maximum impact, and how you are tracking the results.

Before You Talk to the Prospect, Do Your Homework

So we all know that job search is just another form of selling, and that to sell yourself, you need to know something about your prospective buyer. You can’t just walk in cold and say, “You need me, I can solve your problem,” without first understanding more about who they are and what their problems look like.

I recently ran across a blog post by author Geoffrey James on “6 Things to Learn About Prospects, Before You Sell Them,” and it occurred to me that the same six informational points used in selling are just as important for job seekers. So before you approach your next hiring prospect, make sure you know the following:

1. Their history. Understand why they are hiring for this particular position now, or if you are trying to create your own position, what historical occurrences have led them to need your services at this point in time? What do they know about you, if anything, and what has been their experience from the past.
2. Frames of reference. What is going to affect their hiring decision? Are there internal political forces at work, or do you understand what their objective is in making this hire? What’s the context?
3. Needs and desires. What are their objectives and how do they expect you to help them achieve them? What obstacles stand in their way and how can you help overcome them?
4. Likely objections. Where are the pitfalls that will prevent them from hiring you? Can you address those objections? How likely will those objections be “deal breakers”?
5. Capacity to act. Are you talking to a hiring authority or an influencer? Is this a warm-up or the main event? If they aren’t the hiring authority, understand why you are talking to them.
6. Decision-making style. If they are the decision-makers, understand how they achieve their decisions. Are they going by their gut feeling, your past performance, aspirations to fill a specific function? What is going to help them decide in your favor?

Developing an empathetic connection with your prospects is an important sales technique, and it’s just as important in the hiring process. If you understand these six perspectives then you will have a much better opportunity to tailor your pitch to match their needs. You also will have a better understanding of the fit and how suited you are for the job and the work culture.

How do you conduct your research? Use the web. Ask around. Use your network. But make sure you are well prepared before you approach your next prospect.

Ask the Coach: Getting a Shot at the Title

Every week, NETSHARE hosts Ask the Coach, a phone-in coaching session with leading career management experts. Here is an excerpt from our most recent session with Christine Dennison, The Job Search Coach.

What happens when you are a senior manager who has worked your way to the top of your game but you can't land the brass ring? You are the best at your profession, but you can’t seem to break through that final barrier to get the C-level title? Like a fighter who has eliminated the contenders, how do you get a shot at the title?

That was the problem posed to career coach Christine Dennison this week. A senior manager wrote in explaining that he had done the work of a CMO for several companies and is ready to wear the title. But every time he tries to land a position at the C-level he is turned down. He has gone through multiple interviews and even been selected for the final round, but is then squeezed out for a candidate who already has the C-level title.

The same sentiment was voiced by a number of other executives on the call. How do you break through that final barrier to land as a Chief Executive?

Christine noted that there are a number of companies who only look for senior executives who already have C-level experience. They don’t want to take the time to train a junior executive or take a risk. They need to feel 100 percent certain that the hire is 100 percent right. They need something concrete to support their hiring decision, and that usually means they measure past performance.

That being said, you still can fight your way to the C-level title, but you need the right recommendations in your corner. You need strong credentials that stand in place of the title. You need your marketing documents to present a strong, cohesive message about your expertise and experience. And you need people the decision-makers trust to back you up, to drop your name and speak up on your behalf. You need to make it easy for the hiring managers to see your abilities so they feel confident you can handle the chief executive’s job.

You also need to build your personal brand with outside agencies. The decision-makers need to see your name associated with industry organizations and trade associations so you are seen as an expert in your field. Special discussion groups will also showcase your expertise through your exchange with other professionals.

In other words, you need to show you can walk the walk as well as talk the talk. The trick is to convince them that you are C-level material; you have just been hiding your light under a bushel basket.

Will the Mystery Boss Sign In Please?

Remember the old television quiz show “What’s My Line?” where a mystery guest would sign in and the panelists would have to guess his or her occupation or who they were? Would you want to conduct a job interview that way? Interestingly enough, there are some companies who will shield the boss during the hiring process. Would you take a job if you couldn’t meet the man or woman you are working for?

There was an interesting article that career coach Don Orlando shared from Fortune’s “Ask Annie” career column some time ago where a senior financial executive was being considered for a position but wasn’t allowed to meet the CFO – “He’s too busy.” This seemed odd to the candidate, and Annie agreed, noting that in all likelihood, they were getting ready to fire the CFO or he was such a monster that he was scaring job candidates away. As she notes, quoting Dr. Ken Siegel, president of the Impact Group:

"If a company won't let you have in-depth discussions with your prospective boss, you don't want to work there," says Siegel. Why not? Because, he notes, reams of research demonstrate that the most common reason people quit their jobs is to flee a terrible boss. "People quit people, they don't quit companies," he says. "All any company really is, is people interacting with each other. So, if you don't know the people you'll be dealing with, you really don't know anything about the job."

So, of course you need to be able to meet your boss before you take a job. Any company that is hiding your employer behind a curtain is just asking for trouble.

More importantly, you need to be able to come to an understanding with your boss your first day on the job. Don recommends to all his clients that they set the ground rules right away. Meet with your boss on your first day, when the company is confident they hired the best and see the potential of their new arrival, and set a baseline. Don notes that this approach has the added benefit of being a more relaxed conversation since later conversations with your boss will most likely be related to problem-solving.

Specific ground rules you want to discuss will vary, but they can include even routine things, such as how your boss likes to deal with routine things such as e-mail. You also can review current priorities, get a better understanding of criteria for the first performance review, or a request to introduce you to the rest of the team. Don notes that it’s important that your new boss provide his or her backing in person, rather than through a memo or e-mail message. You also can check with your teammates or administrative assistants to learn more about your pet peeves.

The objective is to know thy boss from the outset. If you understand his or her needs, and get properly established with the team from the outset, it makes you productive right away and removes a lot of the stress.

Ask the Coach: The Success of the Deal Lies in Knowing the Prime Motivators

Every week, NETSHARE hosts Ask the Coach, a phone-in coaching session with leading career management experts. Here is an excerpt from this week’s session with Nicola James, Managing Partner of Thomas Brooke International.

Nicola James took the lead this week as our resident career coach and she discussed the question, is there such a thing as a win-win in the world of employment offers? As she recently wrote on her blog, “The key to making a truly good deal is understanding the prime motivators of all parties, and ensuring that they are addressed as effectively as possible.” Whenever anyone forgets this basic maxim, negotiations will deteriorate rapidly and the results are seldom pretty.

How can you ensure that negotiations go smoothly when arriving at an employment offer? Nicola offers some great advice:

1. Be clear about your own prime motivators, or if you are hiring about your company’s motivators. You need to know what’s negotiable, and what isn’t.

2. Be clear what motivates the other party. Many deals are lost because one party won’t bother to ask what the other party needs to make the deal happen, and why those factors matter.

3. Be clear about what it will cost of you don’t get what you want. Ask yourself if a concession is worth losing a deal, or how important that “must-have” in light of everything else on the table.

4. Put your pride aside. Your ego is not your best advisor.

5. Authenticity is your friend so be genuine.

6. Are your needs and those of the hiring company mutually exclusive? If so, you won’t find middle ground so give it up and move on.

I encourage you to read Nicola’s blog, but she offers some great examples from her archives of employment deals gone bad and the sometimes ridiculous reasons why. Here a few highlights:

Four Ways to Capture Your Target Customer – The Hiring Manager

As we have said in the blog many times, job search is about selling your personal brand. No matter what your profession, when you undertake a job search you are now a salesperson, and the product you are selling is your expertise. This is why it is useful to learn from marketers once in a while. One of the newsletters I see regularly is from Marketing Profs, and a recent article entitled “4 Ways to Capture Me and Make Me a Buyer Forever” included advice that applies equally well to job search.

When you launch your marketing program, your strategy needs to include ways to get the attention from your target hiring managers, and then turn that attention into a positive experience that will result in closing the deal; offering you the job you want. So consider how you can use these four marketing tips to capture your next job:

1. Capture their attention. Your first objective is to get noticed in a positive fashion. That doesn’t mean barging into a social media discussion or a meeting and shouting, “Look at me! Hire me!” It means you need to engage in a positive way. From a marketing perspective, you want to provoke interest and a following. In marketing, you can use giveaways and gimmicks like American Express checks or Starbucks gift cards. Be creative and come up with a new way to capture someone’s attention with a provocative question or an innovative white paper on a subject you are passionate about.
2. Capture their imagination. Once you have their attention, you have to stand out from the crowd. Say something insightful, and different. Use a compelling example that will stick in the mind of a recruiter or hiring manager, or offer a train of thought or logic that addresses their problem. Don’t talk about yourself but make a connection for your audience to show them how you can solve their problem.
3. Capture their affection. In marketing, this is the emotional bond between the customer and the product or brand. In job search, this is your opportunity to make a human connection with the influencer on the other side of the table. Tell a story that inspires or creates that emotional connection. Make it personal and appealing.
4. Capture their self-interest. This is a big one that many job-seekers forget. Job search isn’t about you; it’s about what you can do for the hiring company. Appeal to their sense of “what’s in it for me?” by showing them how you can solve their problem. If you approach an exchange or an interview by starting with “here’s what I want,” you put the interviewer on the defensive. If you can understand what they want and appeal to their needs, then you can help them sell themselves on you as the solution to their problem.

When you engage for a job interview or with a new networking contact, see if you can touch all four points. If you can capture their attention, fire their imagination, gain their affection, and ultimately offer something of value, then you will have won a new ally in your quest.

Ask the Coach: Ask the Question They Should Ask

Every week, NETSHARE hosts Ask the Coach, a phone-in coaching session with leading career management experts. Here is an excerpt from a recent session with career coach Don Orlando .

This week’s career coach, Don Orlando, offered an important insight to those listening in on this week’s Ask the Coach call: HR professionals and hiring managers have many masters, so you need to be empathetic about their challenges when you interview.

Don noted that HR people work really hard, especially since they often get conflicting orders from their management. Sometime they don’t have the right training, or the correct information, and they often don’t get a lot of respect from their bosses. And they are the ones who are expected to find the perfect candidate among the avalanche or resumes that hit their desks. They need to identify the perfect manager to fill a position when they often don’t have any real understanding of what it takes to do the job. They are under a lot of pressure.

The same is true for the hiring manager. They have to negotiate a maze of legal red tape, and be cognizant of cultural and business rules imposed by senior management. And they still have to find the right candidate who can do the job and who will meet with the approval of their boss. They have to find the right candidate and make sure that candidate will generate more revenue than they cost the company to find, hire, and retain them. Again, they are under a lot of pressure.

So what is your best approach to help alleviate this pressure? Help them ask the questions you would ask if you had to hire you!

Remember, too, that most of the managers who find themselves hiring new employees have little or no training in how to conduct an interview. They usually prepare for a candidate interview as they would for a business meeting. The business still needs to make money, so their focus is (or should be) on how you will help them boost sales or control costs. How do you fit as a solution to his problem?

Everyone is worried about the “Tell me about yourself” question. The question they should be asking is “Tell me how what you do is going to have value for my company?” If you have a good brand value statement then the answer will be clear. And that value is transferrable from one position, or company, or industry to another.

Throw them a lifeline. Ask them “What is your single greatest problem at this moment?” Or ask, “If I am hired, what do I need to have achieved after six months to succeed in this position?” This will help them focus on the right question and gives you an opportunity to listen and understand what they really need so you can market yourself as the solution to that problem.