Blind Dating is Not an Effective Job Search Strategy, Part Two

If you have not read last week’s blog, please do. The question we need to start with is how would you feel about blind dating with different people suggesting whom you should date.

Now that you put yourself into those shoes, let’s turn the tables. Let’s put on the hiring manager’s shoes. The hiring manager is now the one who is looking for a date (employee to fill a job) and potentially a long term employment relationship. You are the potential blind date.

If the hiring manager did not know you or ever talk to you and a stranger to the hiring manager suggested to her that she should commit her time to meet you, would you expect she would be interested in meeting?

This is what an unsolicited resume is to a hiring manager. They don’t know you and whether what you say is true or filled with a hidden motive. Most hiring managers don’t have the time or trust to pursue unknown people.

If your resume was referred to the hiring manager by someone she knew, would you expect she would immediately want to meet with you? Not necessarily. Certainly, in the context of you being one of five candidates coming in to be interviewed by a number of people, then the hiring manager may interview you or not. Many hiring managers want subordinates to do the first interview pass. Why? To get opinions of people whom they trust to screen unknown candidates first.

If you were referred by a trusted friend or advisor, would the hiring manager be willing to meet personally with you, bypassing the gatekeepers? In most cases, you will get the opportunity of at least meeting with them for 15-30 minutes. If they like you and become interested in you, then they would usually check you out with other advisors or, if you are at a lower level, have HR take a look at you.  During this process the company might be willing to consider including you in the interview process to see if the relationship should move toward a job offer.

Sound ridiculous? To a job seeker, perhaps. To a hiring manager, this is no different than being asked on a blind date.

The question then becomes, how are you seeking to get in front of the hiring manager?

Next week, we will be announcing our new book which walks you through the entire process and gives you a roadmap you can begin following immediately.

Blind Dating is Not an Effective Job Search Strategy

Have you ever been on a blind date? No? I haven’t either. Let’s go through what might be a typical blind date scenario. It is important to see the picture from this viewpoint. Next week we will explain why blind dating is not an effective job search strategy.

Let’s say that a stranger told you that there was a person whom you should meet and go out on a date. What would your response be?

Let’s say that someone you knew told you that there was a person whom you should meet and go out on a date. What would your response be?

Let’s say that your best friend told you that there was a person whom you should meet and go out on a date. What would your response be?

My hope is that you would ignore the stranger; period.

If someone you knew suggested a date, most of us might ask a question or two. If the answer sounded like a “WOW!”, then we might at least consider meeting the person on a casual basis first to get our own opinion. That casual introduction could start out as simple as using Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, or even email. If interest increased, perhaps a causal meeting for coffee in a highly public area might be warranted. At a minimum, most of us would still be very nervous. You never know whom you might really be meeting. Movies have been made of such things.

If your best friend told you, you would probably ask a number of questions and measure both the content of the reply and how well your best friend knew the person. You would be wise to still follow the caution of very slow steps before committing to a date.

What is the difference? Trust. You cannot trust a stranger’s opinion or motive. You may not be able to trust the opinion of someone else whom you know. You would more likely trust your best friend and at least be willing to meet the person, without initially committing to a date or a relationship.

Before we explain how this relates to jobs, please consider if you agree with my opinion. Next week’s blog will explain how this ties into getting a job.

Job Searching using Job Boards or HR leads is a Consumer Sale, not a Business Sale

If you read Job Searching is a Business to Business Sale, NOT a Consumer Sale parts one through three, you will understand why what I am about to say. If you have not read them, please read them before reading further.

Job Boards and HR are efficient ways for companies to filter the mass amounts of potential candidates for specific job openings in a company.

HR is a matchmaker of qualified leads from a mass group of job seekers. HR does not make the hiring decision; the hiring manager makes the decision. HR uses the job description that the hiring manager approves. The financial approval to make the hire is often at a higher level than the hiring manager.

HR uses job boards, company website submissions, college campus recruiting, job fairs, and other activities to help them generate leads that tie to qualified candidates.  Then the screening occurs.

Electronic screening through electronic resume submissions are often key word focused. If you don’t have the right key word, you may stay lost in internet space or Never Never land.

Paper resumes or electronic resumes who pass the screening process are then reviewed by an HR recruiter. A typical review lasts 5 to 10 seconds.

To be fair to HR, how else could they get from thousands of submissions to a target number of 10-20 that can be called for a telephone screening?

The telephone screening then leads to 4-6 candidates that may be interviewed by phone, video conference, or in person. HR usually coordinates all interviewing and maintains documentation for legal hiring compliance.

HOWEVER, it is the hiring manager or her boss who usually makes the hiring decision; not HR. So the goal of getting a job is either to run through the rat maze of job boards, HR, and interviewing (consumer sale approach) or to do what insiders do to get the best jobs (business sale approach). Jobpreneurshipä does not demean those wanting to go through the rats maze but it does focus on the business sale approach.

In every case, HR will be involved at some point. If no one is going through the business sale approach, the HR conduit is the only source for candidates. Also, HR must eventually be involved to ensure company policies are followed, government regulations are followed, and to give their review and advice to the hiring manager.

The insider knows how to make the business sale and then is directed to HR AFTER the emotional decision to hire by the hiring manager has already been made.

Job Searching is a Business to Business Sale, NOT a Consumer Sale; Part Three

How can a hiring mistake harm a company?

How about an EEOC error causing a law suit? Some companies have paid out millions.

How about a disgruntled or negative attitude hire that sours morale, spreads rumors, creates strife, or does not follow rules impacting productivity?

How about a good intentioned employee, who makes poor decisions without involving management, that costs millions in excess inventory, uncollected customer payments, wasted advertising dollars, low productivity sales teams,…etc.

How about a less than honest employee who steals from the company? I have seen cost millions of dollars.

How about a naïve or foolish employee who says the wrong thing to a customer or to the media? Customer good will is lost. Lawsuits can easily occur. Bad media and publicity exposure could unwind hundreds of millions of dollars in marketing advertising and media relations.

Just take the recent BP oil spill. Was an employee somewhere at the heart of the problem? The cost is $20 billion and counting.

Are these hiring mistakes or managing mistakes? Both. Managing starts with hiring. Ultimately, the manager is responsible for the hiring decision and writing the specification that is given to HR. If the manager makes a mistake or does not hire or manage well, her neck could be on the chopping block.

Wise managers eliminate problems (retrain or fire) and learn from them (tighten hiring requirements).  The decision is theirs. The risk is theirs. Burned once, most managers don’t want to be burned a second time. Executives, by the time they are at this level, have been burned numerous times in different ways.

You may have personally been burnt by someone spreading a false rumor, stealing from you, or worse. In business, the manager’s career and reputation is on the line. His bonus and promotional opportunities are also on the line.

That means, your fit to the job description requirements is really only 50% of the story. Your fit is merely the first step to join the pool of other technically qualified people.

The hiring decision is based upon unspoken questions, such as “can I trust you?”, “will you help me get promoted or be self-promoting?”, “will you do what I say (to manage the risk) or be a cowgirl?”, “do I like you?”.

These factors are not decided by HR or other gatekeepers. HR is there to help the hiring process just like procurement helps the buying process. But in both cases, the decision maker is the manager who is responsible – or her boss.

That means the approach to selling to a business is FAR more complicated than selling to a consumer.

The good news is that you can learn the process while your competition keeps assuming the hiring manager is just like a consumer.

Job Searching is a Business to Business Sale, NOT a Consumer Sale; Part Two

Now let’s talk more about the buyer decision for a larger company, such as a Fortune 1000. If you want to work at a company under $50 million in revenue, the characteristics may resemble more of a consumer sale.

A consumer personally decides what they want to buy. If they make a mistake, the impact is usually limited and not a significant impact to them. Buying a house or a car are large purchases but can usually be resold with limited loss and personal impact.

Note well: A consumer decision rarely impacts others outside of their family.

A business buyer usually has specific needs or consolidates consumer spending into leveraged buys.

Business commodity spending, such as toilet paper or printer ribbons, are usually purchased in large quantities in a bid process. The vendor who has the needed product at the best price with the best servicing relationship usually wins.

However, most business purchases are for specific technologies, raw materials, consulting, and items that could significantly impact their business. To be competitive, they have rules designed to control what is purchased to attempt to only buy what is needed to drive their business forward – at the lowest cost. But that cost is rarely the price paid for the product. The impact of a business purchase is immense with hidden costs and risks.

Let’s take a simple example. Say the company is buying HP laptops. What is the risk of going out and buying a Dell laptop for yourself? First, the price is probably more than buying off a corporate contract. Second, the company has to pay someone to service the laptops. By now having two vendors, the costs for parts and service knowledge, has increased. Third, the IT software strategy may require interfaces and memory/disk requirements that your new Dell laptop does not have. Bad decision? You bet. You will probably get your hand slapped.

This example gets a lot worse depending upon what is purchased for the company. If the buyer makes a major mistake, the impact can be the entire company. I have see some companies go out of business for making naïve or poor decisions. Everyone can be impacted. Management take mistakes very seriously. A wrong decision or not following the rules could easily cost your job.

The business buyer decision impacts the business. Bad decisions result in slaps on the wrist to being fired.

This has a dramatic impact on how companies buy – and hire.

Job Searching is a Business to Business Sale, NOT a Consumer Sale; Part One

One of the biggest mistakes that job seekers make is to assume that looking for a job is no different than how they shop for items that they want. That sounds reasonable. It is what most of us know. It is all that most of us ever see! However, for job seekers, it is tragically wrong.

Now, I can just tell you it is wrong or I can explain why it is wrong and set the stage for what you should consider doing.

Let’s start by comparing consumer spending to business spending.

Consumer spending is mass marketing. The idea is that if you spread the message to enough people, buyers will show up and buy your product or service. Think about TV or magazine advertisements. They play to broad audiences – whoever is watching the program or reading the magazine. Such a market could be hundred of millions of potential viewers. Further, the product may get lost among hundreds of alternative products for hundreds of millions of people to consider.

That is why billions of dollars are spent on advertising and branding to become the most predominate product in the public’s eyes, hopefully resulting in large numbers of people buying their product.

There is some market segmentation, but it is usually to broad categories like 15-20 year olds. That only contains tens of millions of possible product buyers.

The pricing of these products is usually relatively low. The products are usually commodities, like shampoo, where large numbers of competitive alternatives keep pricing competitively low. Ongoing profit depends upon large numbers of people buying their product over and over again. That is, the buying public “consume” the product and have to buy more at some time in the future. That is why the buying public are often called “consumers.”

The key term here is “commodities.” Unless you demonstrate unique value, you are viewed as one of many to choose from, i.e. a commodity. It is hard to stand out from the crowd if you are viewed as just another one in the crowd.

On the other hand, Business spending is usually divided into two categories. The first is what is commonly purchased on a routine basis. These are called consumable items or commodities. The second spending type is specified product (i.e., for raw materials or parts used in manufacturing, consulting services, computer solutions, and a host of uniquely needed and higher valued products and services). This is true regardless of the “business” you are in, including public and private sectors.

The business buying process, whether through HR or procurement, usually begins with a job description or a specification for a specific need that is already approved by management. The range of buying includes low value and low priced (low cost labor) to high value and high priced (higher skilled and valued labor).

Here is your question: Are you a low value consumer product (commodity) that people will buy (hire), use up, and buy more elsewhere? Or, are you a unique person who can bring value to a company?

The Financial Challenge for Graduates Trying to A Job

The first shock will be having to go home. The article cites that in 2009, 80% moved back home to Mom and Dad after graduation. Since the trend has been increasing, the 2010 numbers may likely be higher. You can read the full USA Today article by clicking here.

When they arrive home, many will have to start paying back their college loans. While the national average is cited as around $23 thousand, if you went to school in a top tier school in an expensive state, that number could easily be much, much higher. Unless their parents keep paying for them, the financial pressures will quickly mount.

For some, their parents may also be unemployed and financially struggling. The unforeseen train wreck may be just around the corner.

I have heard some people suggest that this year’s graduates, as well as for the last two years, will be the “lost generation.” That refers to far fewer getting jobs and lower starting salaries for those who do get a job. By starting with a lower salary, the impact to lifetime earnings can be staggering.

If you do the math, ongoing support at home + paying off student loans + job hunting expenses + risk of parents running out of money + the lifetime loss of earnings (from starting at a lower salary) = a frightening scenario for today’s graduates. Yet the article suggests that 50% of graduates are confident that they will get a job.

I hope that they do. I suspect that those who assume that the job will come to them or that simply trying to get a job the same way that their parents used to get a job will be very disappointed. The math, for most, just will not work.

So, what are their choices? The article suggests: a) staying in school, b) starting their own business, c) picking jobs that don’t fit their majors, d) taking internships to get experience, and e) accepting job offers when they get an offer.  These are all reasonable but miss the most important point; which is learning how to competitively sell and market themselves to get a job now and develop the skills that will help them develop a lifetime of success.

Of course, most people think that getting their resume updated, applying online for jobs, and learning how to interview is all that you need. That is why I am trying to get the message out about Jobpreneurshipä. If you have heard our presentations, attended our seminars, read our newsletters, blogs, testimonials, and books, then you know that our message is a paradigm shift to many but simply words of wisdom shared from insiders who want to help others. Those who want to take action can increase their opportunity for career, family, and future success.

If you agree with our message, please tell others about Job Doctors.  Thank you for helping us help others.

Helping College Students and Graduates Get Jobs

The challenges for experienced workers to get a job in today’s market are sobering. The challenges for a college student to land a job after graduation are far worse.

In today’s market, this demographic is caught in the middle. First they are competing against double digit general unemployment, experienced people willing to take a step down just to have a job, retirees wanting to return to the labor force, graduates from prior years who are still unemployed and far fewer companies who are interested in hiring anyone.

I want to help. I will need your help for me to help them. Who is “them”? It may be you, your children, friends, or friend’s children.

My program includes a new book that will be out this summer, speaking at colleges, and offering seminars designed for college students and college graduates.

Will this program solve the problem? No. However, the information that I will be sharing will provide a competitive advantage to those who have the opportunity to listen and to learn.

So, for me to help them, I need your help.

The best way for me to help that population is to work within existing college and alumni programs that are already set up for speakers and continuing education materials for career days, assemblies, student leadership gatherings, conferences, etc.

If you are interested in finding out more, please check out http://www.JobDoctorsInternational.com/speaking/college.

If you are interested in helping me, what I am requesting is that you consider either forwarding my link ( http://www.JobDoctorsInternational.com/speaking/college ) or my brochure to anyone whom you know in your college or alumni organization with any of the following titles:

• Director/Coordinator of Student Affairs
• Coordinator of Greek Life
• Director of Career Services
• Director of Residential Life
• Presidents of Alumni Groups
• Trusted College Staff Relationships
• Trusted Relationships in Associations interested in helping college/graduate students

Please consider helping me to get my urgently needed message to the next generation. For some of us that might mean helping others, perhaps even your children, get off their parent’s dole and out of their parent’s house to move on to their own life adventure.

If you need any brochures or information, please feel free to call me at 888-420-6861 or email me at Jim@JobDoctorsIntl.com.

What are Power Group rules?

Each group makes up their own rules. For example, some groups limit membership to those who have been in transition more than once. Others limit membership to those who have been in a power group before. The assumption is that there will be less learning curve and higher expectations.

However, there are general rules that are common.

First, confidentiality is absolute. Any release of information outside the group without permission is cause for dismissal.

Second, active participation (showing up) is critical. Missing meetings changes dynamics, suggests a lack of commitment, and distracts from momentum.

Third, comments are to be open and honest but with an attempt to be constructive.

Fourth, a commitment to help each other emotionally. Each member will have highs and lows, whether they will admit it or not. Problems at home, failing to get the job they “knew they would get”, no one returning phone calls, etc, need understanding, encouragement, and motivation to persist in keeping efforts high.

Fifth, bringing in leads that everyone can chase is critical. If I share a lead that can help you and you never share a lead that can help me, I will soon quit sharing leads and the usefulness of the group diminishes.

Sixth, constantly thinking about how to introduce and refer other members into your network – so they can expand their network. If you are learning to trust other group members, shouldn’t they be introduced as a trusted relationship to other trusted relationships? Here is the most powerful concept. People who hire, prefer to hire those referred by people whom they trust.

Seventh, each member should be accountable to each other. The commitment to participate, attend networking events, make phone calls, share leads, and make introductions usually means that you will be asked about your results at the next meeting. Often this pressure will drive you to keep your performance level high when you might have slacked off if no one would know better.

Finally, each member knows that a Power Group is a strategic asset but merely one of many areas that need to be developed. When looking for work, the 2 hours a week in a Power Group will not replace the 58 hours needed to follow the Roadmap to Success. Nor will a Power Group replace the need for personal coaching and training. However, Power Groups are recommended to supplement your efforts to win your next job.

How do you structure a Power Group?

A typical approach taken by members of an association is that association members who live close to each other agree to meet, usually weekly, at a local coffee shop or sandwich shop where they can buy some coffee and meet with the approval of the shop owners.

The groups are often made up of either those with common careers (sales, finance, hr, …), common levels (college students, managers, executives, senior executives…), and genders. However more diverse backgrounds are not uncommon.

For common backgrounds, if each person develops 10 leads and there are five group members, then the group now has 50 leads that can be shared. Who actually will get the job will depend upon experience, personality, culture, relationships and a host of other factors. The general belief is that “if someone is going to get the job, why not let it be one of us!”

For diverse backgrounds, there is less group competition and often a broader net of contacts. Further, diverse backgrounds can create a unique learning atmosphere where everyone can learn different perspectives and become more rounded and balanced. For example, a sales and a finance person in a group will not be competing for the same job but will know people for networking and can help each other understand how to perceive and meet the needs of other sales and finance people. For higher level jobs, cross-functional teaming is critical to company success – and being a qualified hire.

The size of the group is usually limited to around seven and most experts would recommend not exceeding fifteen members. The actual number who will show up will depend upon travel, meeting, and family commitment schedules.

The purpose of the group generally is focused upon a common urgent need, such as looking for work. Then, as members obtain work they will generally go in one of three directions. Those who appreciated the group but have still not learned the importance of networking will usually leave and not be heard from again. Those who appreciated the group and have developed trusted relationships and friendships with other members will often leave but regularly stay in touch with each other over the phone or email. Some will even continue networking through one-off times for coffee or over a meal. The third group usually decides to stay because they have benefited so much personally that they want to “pay it forward” to others and help other members, particularly newer members.

The timing of most meetings is either before or after work. This allows those getting a job to continue to participate and allows other members to focus on looking for work during prime time. However, some groups meet at various times throughout the day. The group determines what is best for them.

The bottom line is that the value of any group will depend upon the members and the level of participation by each member. If you join a group and find that it does not work for you, the problem may be who is in the group not that Power Groups are not useful.

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