Critical Notes

Yesterday I was at a network meeting and a guy said something like “I’m a very private guy, but I made a goal to tell 10 people that I’m in the market and what I’m looking for. Last week I found 10 people and told them.” I think its great to let others know your situation (unemployed, underemployed, whatever), but I think there might be a better way. Here’s an e-mail that I get from a buddy that is looking for a new position right now (note: the changes in blue are an attempt to keep him anonymous):

Jason,

I got a call in mid-January from a recruiter who knows me. He???s looking for a president of a $10 billion Salt Lake City based maker of widgets (the kind you see at Babys-R-Us, for example). The job looks like a nice fit with my goals, and the recruiter thinks I???m a good fit with the specification. I heard last week that my resume passed the first hurdle.

My lean manufacturing course is complete and I have submitted my project assignment. The final is February 22, so I???m reviewing and preparing.

This month I am particularly interested in high level contacts at widget manufacturing companies. Example targets include WidgetPros, WidgetMakers (owned by All Things Widgets), WowzeeWidgets, Widgiwidgits, AWC (Another Widget Company) and Acme Widgetry (just purchased by Widgipro Asset Management). If you know anyone at any of these companies, please let me know.

I???ll keep you posted.

John Doe
1234 Main Street
Small Town, UT 12345
Phone: (555) 555-5555
Email: john.doe@mail.com

Author of “Experts In Widgets” at: http://widgetexpert.blogspot.com

Ok, here are my thoughts on this:

1. I think its excellent that the guy I met yesterday personally spoke with 10 people - and he’ll probably speak with another 10 this week. But after 4 weeks how is he going to keep those 40 people (10 people each week) up to date on what’s going on? This is not a replacement for talking to people, but another tactic to keep your vast network updated.
2. I really like the length - this is not going to be a pain to read and digest.
3. The e-mail came personally addressed to me. I did not feel like I was getting spammed - this is a good friend of mine and I want to help him. Having my name there was an extra touch that I appreciated.
4. Telling me the position and size of company of a good prospect is critical - it helps me know what to look for. Huge difference between the president of $1M company and a $10B company, right?
5. In the e-mail he told me what the company does, and gave me a tangible example. This really helps me because so many company names are NOT descriptive of what the core business is, but now I can ask others who they know at widget companies.
6. Knowing that he is a LEAN expert is also important because it helps me quantify his skillset. This may be a transferrable skill, further helping me understand what this dude does.
7. When he says “this month I’m particularly interested in…” helps me udnerstand that part of the purpose of this e-mail is to help him. This is not a passive “we’re doing great - hope you are too” e-mail. Rather, this is a call to action.
8. Telling me the names of the companies (and even parent companies) is huge - now I can ask my network for specific information. The difference between “I’m looking for manufacturing companies” and “do you know anyone that works at Company X, Company Y or Company Z” is huge - and critical.
9. At the end of that last paragraph he calls me to action. Nicely, respectfully, but it is clear that he wants to know if I have contacts there.
10. His signature gives me ways to get in touch with him. I already have him in my JibberJobber database - we’re buddies! But he makes it easy for me to find his number - and if I want to forward this to anyone then they can have it too.
11. And, he ends with a link to his blog. This is an excellent way to remind me that he is a thought leader in something, and gives me substance that I can forward to my network. I’m sure you can include a resume with this e-mail also.

So there you go - another excellent example for you to follow. I did not do this in my job search last year but I see the value in sending this type of e-mail out to people to proactively work my network.

Who should this go out to? Everyone in your network. People care about you and your welfare. Include friends, family, past customers, past vendors, etc.

I can’t wait to get the e-mail that says “I landed my dream job! Thanks for your support during these last few months…“

I got an e-mail from a new friend in South Carolina a few weeks ago which basically said:

I hope that you could possibly offer me some advice. I live in Charleston, SC and I have read your article that was posted on the CharlestonJob Network and I have attempted to follow your advice to the tee, but without success.

I’m leaving out details, of course, but my reply listed the best practices that I could think of… I’d like to present these seven things to you so you can ask where you stand on each of these things:

1. Have you read Never Eat Alone? Simple stuff, common sense, especially for a sales veteran. But there are lots of things in there that might be reminders, or something like that. It might be educational or motivational (for me it was both) ??? but it should be read. (Another great networking book I just finished is Thom Singer’s Some Assemby Required - different than Keith Ferrazzi’s book and style, I consider it very complementary)
2. Do you have a tight relationship with a recruiter? This can be someone local, or someone far away. But you need to be able to get coaching from a professional recruiter before an interview, after the interview, with regard to your resume, etc.
3. Would you consider a career coach? I “work with” or at least network with a few career coaches. I think that when you are in a state of despair its so helpful to have someone that can help you, hold you accountable, and their focus is to help you move on to that next step!
4. How effectively do you network locally? 30 interviews is a ton, and now you know some important people in lots of companies. Do you go to any networking meetings? I’m not talking about the job seeker meetings, but industry or niche associations? These are smaller, tight-nit groups that focus on their specialty, but the relationships there are usually really valuable. I never did this because I was too busy working, but now I’ll never NOT do it.
5. Do you work on personal branding? From what you told me you could be an established authority in the sales space. There are tons of specialties, like you mention (you are B2B software) ??? are any of them underserved, or can you transfer your knowledge from your specialty to help in another specialty? You would do this with a blog (see my Monthly Winners in my blog for excellent examples) or by writing articles. You need to be THE AUTHORITY, someone that is a superstar, and undisputed ??? and you can do this through your personal branding strategy.
6. Do you give service regularly? I had a blog carnival where I basically said “Yikes! You just lost your job and your network has been neglected ??? what do you do now??” Seth Godin replied with “Do service for 6 months!!!” It was an amazing answer, and I think many felt it was unrealistic, but doing service allows you to substantiate yourself, and rub shoulders with other execs, hiring managers and professionals that want to give back ??? these are excellent network contacts!
7. I think you are a prime candidate for a professional resume writer. I would have cringed to think about paying for that because its such a simple document, but you clearly have issues with your moving around (I don’t think they are issues but you have to figure out how to communicate it both on the resume and in an interview!). I could be wrong here because you have already had 30 interviews (which leads me to believe you need to network more ??? apparently getting an interview isn’t a problem), and you need coaching on the interview (and how to answer questions regarding moving/job changes). This is NOT insurmountable, and I wish I could tell you the answer, but it ain’t my thing.

This is stuff I didn’t think about a year ago, but might constitute my response for best practices in a job search. What do you think - are these things you need to reconsider?

I remember many small successes last year that brought my job search to a halt. It might have been the most incredible interview. It might have been establishing a really “powerful” network contact. It might have been finally finishing a resume packet (or at least a customized resume/cover letter) and getting it sent in to the target company.

There were times when this success made my job search go backwards. For example, one incredible series of interviews was going really well (I thought). After the first interview I was about 100% sure I had the job. This was an extremely exciting opportunity for me as I would be working under an ex-Microsoft hero (supposedly), in a super-cool new high-tech startup that was well funded, and in a capacity that I wanted to be in to expand my depth in that area. The salary was a little low but everything else had “dream job” written all over it.

So I actually spent time, in my mind, doing the job! I thought about systems and programs to put in place. I thought about how I’d work to fit into the culture. I thought about the thing I’d need to accomplish in the first year. I thought about what would happen if there was an acquisition or IPO. I even took my handy-dandy notebook and began to map all of this stuff out.

After two more interviews I got the wierdest e-mail. It was some lame canned e-mail - something about “we have chosen someone else for this position…” This was wierd was because:

1. In my interview process I found that no one knew there was a position open
2. I found that there weren’t any other candidates (remember? There wasn’t a position open!)
3. I had spent a good four or five hours with these people, and we were getting to know eachother pretty good. Why did the tone of our discussion go from “interview mode” to “canned e-mail”… ?????

This was the absolute lowest part of my job search. I read the e-mail about four times and then did something that I hadn’t done for a long time - I worked out for about 30 minutes (I hadn’t allowed myself time to do this before because I was too busy looking for a job). I was speechless. I was hurt. I was confused.

I vowed to not get emotionally involved in this process again.

But I did - the next big thing, as the interviews progressed, was too exciting. I found myself thinking about what I’d do in the job, mapping out a strategy, and all that.

The problem, I found, is that when you get too wrapped up in a pending success you put other things on hold. And for me, getting wrapped up in something that wasn’t a sure thing only took away from my job search.

So celebrate the successes, but the best thing to do after an excellent interview is to get another interview! The best thing to do after an excellent phone call is to get on the phone again! Don’t get sidetracked and steal time from your search - rather, build on the successes to have another one.

And now, if you don’t mind, I’d like to share my last success with you, just to prove that I still don’t abide by the above (when mind = jelly, its hard!)…

My most recent success turned my mind into jelly. Yesterday I started seeing multiple signups on JibberJobber by the minute. Everyone was saying they were coming from Yahoo.com… so I went to Finance.Yahoo.com and didn’t see anything special. Finally, a new signup told me it was on the front page of yahoo.com - and it was amazing! I had a very hard time concentrating during that time - it was only about 3 hours (and then they put different content up), but it was amazing. Welcome to the hundreds of new JibberJobber users! And thank you Yahoo!