Carpe Diem
Forgive the brevity of this entry and the lack of colorful graphics. We are leaving for the U.K. soon, and there are about 100 other things I should be doing. That said, I just took an exam and earned my Executive Coaching Certification today (hooray!), so this is my way of winding down. Work will just have to wait.
Some of you may already be aware that I was passively networking for opportunities with a coaching, leadership development, and/or training focus. I had zero intention of leaving a job I like that I happen to be good at (according to feedback I have received) until after graduation, however, as this blog entry states, sometimes when opportunity knocks, you have to answer the door. I will begin employment as a Talent Development Manager at a global technology firm starting December 5th. This role combines everything I am learning in school, both in my MBA coursework and also in my coaching certificate program. I am really excited about this new opportunity to transition from coaching students and clients on managing a successful job search to coaching professionals to be more successful on the job.
If I may brag on myself for a moment...I was eager to share with my readers and students I coach, that I really did do everything I advise them to do as it relates to the job search process. I branded myself for the type of roles I was looking for based on feedback I received from friends, faculty, and my mentors. I researched the organization (extensively, so much so that they were surprised I knew many of their acronyms already). Perhaps, most importantly, I used every tool in my tool kit, i.e. I conducted information interviews with anyone who would talk to me about the organization and this type of role, requested mock interviews and coaching from my professors and friends in HR, and I appropriately thanked every one of them in a timely manner. Mind you, all of this started in the midst of a module where I was taking three courses during our busiest time of the year in my day job. Needless to say, making this interview process a priority was no easy task. Fortunately, it all worked out - at least until I start and have to establish credibility all over again!
If I had to briefly summarize the three steps I took that I believe most strongly correlated to my success in this process they would be:
Share Your Story: Prepare a powerful elevator pitch (or several) so that you are ready to tell anyone and everyone who will listen about who you are, where you've come from, and where you're going - being sure to articulate your transferable skills. I shared my story with a woman I now call my "Career Management Fair Godmother" who put the wheels in motion for me to meet my future boss after the ten days I spent with her in Israel this summer. It was a fortuitous friendship that formed, but it was how we leveraged it that mattered.
Do Your Homework: I did quite a bit of reading and informational interviewing before I interviewed with my future employer. To be more specific, I read the Hoovers, Annual, and third quarter earnings reports. I had conversations with three classmates and a friend who work for the organization. I spoke with five of my professors to seek their advice, two of whom conducted mock interviews with me. My Career Management Fairy Godmother also conducted a Skype mock interview with me. Only one of these people offered up said services on their own volition. I asked for assistance from the rest, and they were all eager to help. The point is - don't be afraid to ask for help!
Reward Your Network: At a minimum, I believe it is critical to call or thank anyone who assisted you in the pursuit of employment, regardless of the outcome. If possible, I try to send some sort of thoughtful gift or gesture, i.e. a mug and bag of Starbucks beans for a professor who mentored me, an afternoon at the spa for my Career Management Fairy Godmother, a six-pack of Belgian beer for our department chair who hails from that part of the world...you get the idea. If I don't have enough intel to send a 3D thank you gift, I will at least attempt to get a card in the mail within 24-hours or at the very least an email thank you when time is of the essence. Altruism may have been enough to motivate my network to help me, but I guarantee they will be more likely to help me again down the road or pay it forward to help someone else because I took the time to express my genuine appreciation.
One final note on branding...one of my coaching certification classmates has a blog to share her own stories. We talked about doing a blog swap and a supremely dorky management book club, so feel free to check it out: Echo's World. I met some amazing people in these classes and I look forward to staying in touch with them as we continue to use the skills we learned in the classroom out in the real world.
HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!
I’ll Have a Job with a Side of Fries, Please
Remember how I mentioned that another U.K.-based firm offered to post content on my blog? I had intended to save it for when I was “in the weeds” later in my semester, but lo and behold, I am already there. It is timely too, because I have been engaging in conversations with quite a few alumni and students who seem utterly perplexed about how to conduct what I lovingly refer to as an “adult job search.” Below you will find some job searching tips from reed.co.uk, the U.K.’s #1 job site as well as a career blunder and video which address how to engage in a more meaningful job search process.
Job Searching Tips Courtesy of reed.co.uk:
For those students graduating in the coming months, the real world of work is looming. Whether you’ve just finished a Bachelor’s degree or are finishing up your postgraduate studies, the question of what to do next is a pressing one. Though the recession has meant that job hunting is undoubtedly more challenging, there are still plenty of places that graduates can go to find out about the latest vacancies and get tips and advice on finding the perfect role.
Open up your local or national newspaper, for example, and you’ll find a wealth of ads about current vacancies. If you’re hoping to work close to home, local newspapers can be a good way to find out what’s available in your immediate area. If, however, you’re not restricted to one particular area, national newspapers like the Guardian and the Times [or the Dallas Business Journal/Dallas Morning News] inevitably offer more varied and numerous job ads.
Recruitment agencies and job centres are also a good place to head to in order to get help and advice on job hunting, as well as a wide variety of vacancies in lots of different sectors. Job hunting from home can sometimes feel like a long process where you aren’t achieving very much, so getting out of the house and down to an agency or your local job centre can help to keep the momentum going and stop you from feeling too disparaged.
Compared to other job-seekers, graduates are quite lucky in that they have various resources on offer, which are targeted specifically at helping students move into the world of work. Websites like prospects.ac.uk [or U.S.-based entry-level job search sites] have both job listings and tools to help graduates make the most of their skill sets and decide which career direction to head in.
And, of course, there are plenty of job sites like reed.co.uk that advertise jobs for graduates and jobseekers alike. These sites generally have vacancies helpfully divided by sector, area, and type of contract, and also feature advice on CV writing, cover letters, and interview techniques. They can form a good base for your job hunt, though of course you want to have as many feelers out there as possible in order to make the process both speedy and effective. Ultimately, perseverance and flexibility will be the key to finding your first job as a graduate. Don’t lose hope thanks to reports of doom, gloom, and the recession – making the most of the resources available to you will help you on your way to the world of work.
Big Mac Career Blunder:
Applying for posted jobs is only half the battle. An alumnus of the university where I am employed visited my office recently requesting that I spread her resume to candidate-seeking employers and that I include her career documents in a resume book. I politely informed her that Career Services is not an executive search firm and that even if we did have a resume book, employers are looking for soon-to-be grads, not alumni. In spite of what I thought was a clear explanation of how to conduct an “adult job search” she still pressed me to essentially "order her up" a job.
In addition to the advice I shared in a previously written blog entry, Don't Blame it on the Rain, I encourage job-seekers to first identify several job functions of interest and then a list of organizations for which they might want to work (taking geography, organizational culture, and advancement opportunities - among others - into consideration). Once they have found an intersection of the two, I suggest leveraging their network of human gatekeepers to identify contacts in these organizations who can help introduce them to or get their resumes in front of the right people. Conducting a “hidden job search” is not easy, but it is how 80% of jobs are sourced. In my opinion, this kind of search produces the best opportunities. Check out the video below courtesy of ABC News and Writer, Speaker, and Job Search Expert, Tory Johnson for more advice on networking in the context of the Hidden Job Search.
Memory
You know you’re crazy busy when, not one, but two British career sites (one of which offered to pay me!) send you content to post on your blog and you can’t even take the time to compose a short introductory paragraph to accompany said posts. The good news is that I survived a busy eight weeks of work and school, specifically six papers, six quizzes, three homework assignments, two final exams, and a whole slew of reading – not to mention weekly and sometimes bi-weekly career events on the campus where I work (in between serving an average of 50 students per week), several new clients, and a job club catering to transitioning job seekers. I also barely observed to major Jewish holidays and missed two friends’ 30th birthdays, a baby shower, a wedding shower, and a lot of social gatherings. Needless to say, I am happy to have my life back and happy to be writing to you! Thanks to those of you who kept me in your memory during my hiatus.
Now on to the post…Position Ignition, a U.K.-based career-coaching firm graciously provided the following entry related to resumes and getting yours noticed by an employer’s Applicant Tracking System (ATS). I think you will find that the advice is not all that different from what you might hear on this side of the pond. Speaking of sides of the pond, I am excited that the founders of Position Ignition offered to meet me when I’m in London next month. Career coaches uniting across the globe – how cool!
Post by Nisa Chitakasem of Position Ignition
The way that hiring companies and recruiters are storing, evaluating and shortlisting new graduates’ resumes is already drastically different than to when I was a new graduate. Before, a recruitment agent or an employer’s in-house HR professional would go through a whole pile of resumes that had been submitted to them for just one graduate position. As you can imagine, the individual sorting through these documents only had time to quickly scan each submission for the type of keywords they were looking for. The keywords they were looking for were those words and phrases that indicated a particular candidate was right for the position.
Manually skim-reading each application was never going to be the most scientific or sophisticated way of identifying these all-important keywords, so it’s little wonder that recruiters and employers have embraced new I.T. technology with open arms in order to digitize the process. Nowadays, anyone in the business of hiring and with sufficient resources uses a computerized Applicant Tracking System (ATS) to rank resumes in terms of how pertinent they are to the position they were submitted for. Whilst this is good news for the employer, it’s potentially bad news for you, the graduate job seeker, if you don’t know how to tailor your resume to get you the highest ranking possible. Help is at hand though, with these tips on ensuring your resume impresses any ATS.
- Start your resume with a concise summary that’s rich with keywords pertaining to the job you’re applying to.
- Follow up the summary with short, bulleted points detailing your qualifications and accomplishments, again including keywords that match up with the advertised position.
- If you’re not sure exactly what keywords are relevant to the role on offer, look at the job specification and candidate criteria and identify the words that seem the most integral to the text.
- Be warned that the most advanced ATS technology will take into account the context in which the keywords are used, not merely the actual keywords themselves. Surround keywords with content that actually describes your relevant experience and expertise.
- Don’t misspell words. Misspellings are bad, not because the ATS will pick up on them, but because it won’t. If you misspell a keyword, the ATS won’t notice that word and the word won’t contribute to your resume’s ranking.
- Similarly, it’s wise to avoid using abbreviations, because the ATS may not recognize them. For example, when talking about your degree, type out ‘honors’ instead of using the abbreviation ‘hons.’
- An ATS can also be confused by complicated formatting, so keep the format of your resume as clean and clear as possible.
- Including logos or, in fact, any kind of graphic on the resume is a big no-no for the same reason.
- How you send your resume is almost as important as what you put on it. Before your resume even gets stored on a company’s ATS, it still has to get pass the organization’s email security screening. Attachments may automatically be marked as suspicious so copy and paste the contents of your resume into the body of the email message instead of setting it as an attachment.
- Because of belligerent spam filters, it’s also important to watch what characters and letter-strings you include in the email. Do not, for example, include any exclamation marks or potentially spammy words/letter-strings in either the text of the resume or the rest of the email. For example, if you went to high school in Penistone, England it’s perhaps better to just say that you went to high school near Barnsley in England.
- If you have the option of uploading your resume directly to the company ATS through the employer’s website instead of emailing it, do so.
- Submitting your resume via the website may require you to fill in additional fields as part of the online submission. Fill these fields in even if they are optional. Recruiters often use these optional fields to initially filter out a percentage of the original applications. Make sure you survive this first cut by putting the relevant information into all the fields.
- As the resumes may get sorted out according to these optional fields before they are even opened and read, it’s worth including relevant information in the fields even if you’ve already put it in the actual body of the resume.
So what do you do once you’ve emailed or uploaded your resume to an ATS? Of course, it’s a case of playing the waiting game to some extent but don’t forget to keep an eye on your spam folders when you’re waiting for that email reply to come through. Often, an ATS will automatically generate an email reply to your submission and such an automated email may well end up being recognized by your email filter as spam, even if it’s legit. If you check your spam folder and find that there is indeed an email marked as coming from the organization but you’re not sure if it really has or if it’s a phishing scam, it’s always best to check before opening it. Call up the company to see if its ATS would have started automating replies by now.
Once you receive the email reply, attentively follow any instructions it gives you. If the company wants you to contact it to take your application further, contact the company using the method it has indicated and within the time frame it gives. You will not only be guaranteed a response by doing so; you’ll be guaranteed the fastest possible response.
By following these best practices from start to finish, you have the best chance of negotiating a recruiter’s or employer’s email screening system, spam filters and ATS with optimal success. With the ATS in particular, it’s important for first time job seekers to know that there really is no mystery to it. It’s as simple as giving the ATS what it wants and pushing its buttons—and if you’re applying for jobs you’re actually suited to, pushing all the right buttons is not that difficult at all.
About the author:
Nisa Chitakasem, created Position Ignition to help support professionals through their career challenges. She has co-authored a range of ebooks to help people through various career challenges including: How to Get the Job You Want, How to Ace the Interview, 125 Twitter Job Search Tips, 125 LinkedIn Job Search Tips and 135 Networking Career Tips.
You can also find more career articles from Nisa on their Job Search and Career Advice Blog.
I Think I’m Gonna Like it Here – II
I had my last Strategic HR class this week and I was legitimately sad about it. Weeks of raising my hand and having something intelligent come out have come to an end now that quant classes are about to return. My friend E is probably saying “nerd alert” if she’s reading this right now. Plus, I earned a 98% on a paper I wrote about Cultural Intelligence (or lack thereof) in reference to an article highlighting the cultural incongruence of American-owned businesses operating in Israel. It was nice to feel smart while it lasted!
Getting an ego boost wasn’t the only good thing that came out of class this week (although it did feel really good to get that paper back – just saying). We talked about the importance of culture and the four major types. During our break my professor and I spoke about how sad it is that entry-level employees often give culture and overall fit with an organization little consideration when evaluating potential job opportunities. This is incredibly unfortunate given that those of us who have held a full time job would likely cite a cultural mismatch as the number one reason for job dissatisfaction (or a close second behind a lousy boss).
Here’s a quick (finals week, folks) overview of the four types. Where does your organization/department fit in?
We talked about several types of organizations that closely epitomized each culture type within the context of the Competing Values Framework. It's worth noting that most organizations are a hybrid of two or more, but knowing the differences can still be helpful. Check out this nifty color-coded image courtesy of the University of Michigan.
Clan (Collaborate): Southwest Airlines and Zappos (now Amazon - see their video embedded in this post)
Hierarchy (Control): Auto companies, utility companies, and the military
Adhocracy (Create): Netflix (they don’t track vacation days – where can I pick up an application?) and Apple
Market (Compete): GE and most professional services firms
Do you remember my entry from a few weeks ago on the changing nature of HR? Well David Ulrich (who created the HR model) got together with K.S. Cameron and R. E. Quinn (who used the Competing Values Framework) to combine the two models into something resembling this handy chart. The pieces all started to come together after I commented to my neighbor that Adhocracy is the ideal culture for my personality. When I looked up at this slide (after I eventually stopped running my mouth), it all became clear – I live for change. What’s your ideal culture? Does your current employer offer it, even in hybrid form?
Resources: Diagnosing and Changing Organizational Culture by K.S. Cameron and R. E Quinn .San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, http://competingvalues.com/
When I GROW Up
I had started writing this blog entry yesterday by expressing my true feelings about the textbook we are using in my coaching class. My husband happened to notice original paragraph number one and astutely advised me to avoid publishing said paragraph for two reasons – 1.) The author happens to be from the U.K. (where I hope to live and work someday) and 2.) his name is preceded by “Sir” thus making him critically important on the other side of the pond. In spite of my skepticism about the parallels he tries to draw between athletics and business, he introduces a particularly useful framework to approach a coaching assignment called the GROW model (Goals, Reality, Options, and Will). Our instructor even gave us a handy little card to keep it top of mind. Try it out the next time a friend, family member, colleague, or client asks you for advice or guidance. I hope you find it helpful!
What are your GOALS?
The first step is to help the client (I’m using this this term loosely) identify his or her short and long-term goals. For sake of time in class, we usually encourage the client to think of one goal he or she needs targeted and focused assistance with achieving and we set realistic expectations around what is feasible to accomplish in the time provided. I like to ask the question, “Holding everything else constant, what would the ideal future scenario look like once you’ve achieved this goal?” Hypothetically, let’s say that the client decided her goal was to transition out of a role in event coordination to a role in creative marketing. She might describe her desired future state as one in which she is responsible for designing the social media strategy for a cutting edge organization.
What is the REALITY?
Next, it’s important to get a sense of where the client is currently with regard to the progress he or she has already made toward achieving the goal. As her coach I would need to know what tangible action steps she has already taken to move herself in the direction of a marketing opportunity – and what her skills and qualifications are. I would ask probing questions like “how has your education prepared you to take on a role like this?” and “What informal and formal training have you already had in your previous experience related to social networking?” and perhaps “Could you describe your existing network of contacts who either work in this capacity now or can connect you to others who do?” Notice how all were open-ended questions to get the client thinking about where she is now and to start to think about where to go next. This is also the time to intervene if the client needs a serious reality check. For instance, if my client told me she didn’t know what Twitter was, I would ask her for permission to share some specific advice – namely that she might want to consider another vocational direction or get up to speed on social media in a hurry.
What are your OPTIONS?
One of the primary objectives of coaching is to help the client understand that he or she has the answers within him or herself. The coach should be the enabler – helping the client to uncover numerous possible options/next steps he or she could consider with regard to achieving their goal. The text advised us to let the client brainstorm as many options as possible (probing when necessary) and when he or she has provided the “last” option, the coach should ask the client to think of one more. Twice, during my coaching sessions in class – this new option turned out to be the best (and most realistic) option for my classmate. In the case with my hypothetical client, she might offer options including: joining relevant professional associations, pursuing a Marketing certification, and researching related opportunities at her current organization.
What WILL you do?
In this stage, the client should choose the best and most realistic options and commit to action, i.e. what WILL they do? Each action item should be structured like a S.M.A.R.T. goal (specific, measurable, actionable, realistic, and time-sensitive) – the same goes for the actual goal itself. The client should also identify any obstacles that could stand in the way and any resources he or she might need, as this could lead to a better defined goal and new action items. As with the students I see, I would ask this client what she thought she could realistically commit to before we meet again, and she might say, “return next week with a list of at least five local professional marketing organizations/on-line social networking communities and ten job postings for social media roles.” These action items meet the S.M.A.R.T. objective and they get her in both a networking and job search mindset. Before the conversation concludes it is important to provide a recap of the discussion, action items, and any follow-up required on the part of the coach or client.
Does this work? you may be asking. Well, it worked splendidly in class, but not so well when I tried to coach a friend who called me for advice this week. We got to the option stage and I flat out said, “friend, I was trying to be a good coach by asking you good probing questions, but now I have to intervene. Do you really think [insert client option] is a good idea? I made three mistakes according to what I’ve learned in class and from our readings, a.) I asked a closed question with a Yes/No response b.) I expressed judgment, which contradicts the perspective that the coach should “hold the coachee as naturally creative, resourceful, and whole” (kumbaya, I know), and c.) I veered us away from her coaching agenda. When coaching, it’s all about the client and not about the coach – not something easy for a talker like me! Moral of the Story: Keep trying…as with anything else, practice makes you better.
Resources:
Coaching for Performance, GROWing Human Potential and Purpose , John Whitmore
Performance Consultants International - The GROW Model