Category Archives: Perseverance

How to get that job they don’t want to give you or don’t have

Posted on May 14, 2014 | Leave a comment

You may get a job by thorough persistence.  Don’t be pestilential and persistent, be pleasant, nice and thoroughly persistent.  Let me demonstrate.

My daughter Merrilee has Down Syndrome.  Her IQ is 43.  She has a lot of advantages over job seekers with down syndrome.  Job seekers with down syndrome accept what happens to them fatalistically.  My daughter with Down Syndrome got an extra half chromosome that makes it impossible for her to be fatalistic.  For example:

Merrilee loves cartoon videos.  We limited the time she spends watching them.  We locked them in the boys’ room so she couldn’t get them.  Yet she showed up with a cartoon video in her hand while I was at the computer or reading and handed it to me almost every day.

How did she get the video?  She knew that eventually one of her brothers would leave the door unlocked or the key down where she could get it.  She checked the door several times a day.  Not obsessively, just whenever she went by their room.

She can’t talk clearly, but I knew when she handed me a video that she wanted me to play it.  She gave it to me when I was busy so I wouldn’t go upstairs to lock the room.  I would hand it back and say, put it on the TV stand.  She did.   10 or 20 minutes later she brought another.  This went on until I played a video for her or put the videos away and locked the boys’ door.

She is how you should be in your job search. If I tell her, “No,” she’ll be back.  If I lock the boys’ door, she’ll be back.  She’s gentle and loving.  She’s quietly persistent.  She’s not unreasonable.  I want to help her.  She does what I ask when I tell her to put the video on the TV stand.

A job seeker with down syndrome sadly lacks Merrilee’s gentle persistence. Job seekers who feel down, just give up at the first, “No.”  There may not be a job today, but there might literally be one tomorrow.

Be persistent.  Don’t give up on the job or promotion you want.  Figure out how to gently and kindly get your qualifications before the decision maker.  Be reasonable, persistent, helpful and nice.  Take your resume to HR every time they ask.  Ask what you can do to qualify for and get the job.  Then do what they say.  After a month or two, try again.

If you make yourself qualified and have a great attitude, eventually someone will leave the door unlocked.  Someone will quit or the department will expand.  If you are kindly persistent and not irritatingly pestilent, you’ll have a great shot at the job.

You can’t have the blessing of the extra half chromosome that Merrilee has.  However, you can develop her persistence, love and patience.

Nothing in the world can take the place of Persistence.  Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent.  Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb.  Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts.  Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.  The slogan ‘Press On’ has solved and always will solve the problems of the human race.  (Coolidge)

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Something To Do Today

Is there a promotion you really want?  Are there companies you really want to work for?  Go to your job journal and write a plan for getting what you want by being persistent in a nice way.  Decide how often you can try again.  Set appointments on your calendar to try again.

Tomorrow:  Down Syndrome vs down syndrome part 2

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Posted in Attitude, Finding jobs, Focus, Followup, Networking, Perseverance, Promotions, Raises

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Resumes and levers and elephant guns

Posted on May 12, 2014 | Leave a comment

Want a job interview with a great company? Find a lever.

Give me a place to stand and with a lever I will move the world.  (Archimedes)

Or a big gun

In the old Tarzan movies a “great white hunter” is walking through the African plains followed by a couple of trusty gun bearers.  Suddenly, out of the trees, an elephant charges.  He reaches back and his huge elephant gun is placed in his hands.  He takes aim and waits.  When the elephant is a mere 30 yards away he fires.  The elephant falls to the ground at his feet.

What would happen if the hunter reached back and a bow and arrow were placed in his hands?   Well, there wouldn’t be enough left of the hunter to have a funeral.

For every job there are a few key experiences that will get you an interview.  They are the elephant guns in your job hunt.  If you have those experiences, you will get an interview.

Before you submit your resume for any job you have to ask yourself, “What is the elephant gun for this job?  Is there one? Is there a lever?”  You may have to read the job description two or three times before you know.  If you are still confused, call up the company and find out.  Ask for the person in charge of that job.  Whether you get HR (Human Resources) or the hiring manager, ask what the most difficult to find skills for that job are.

We submitted one resume for a job using an elephant gun.  The candidate did not have the college degree necessary.  He was not a CPA and had never been an auditor.   Still, the company phoned back immediately.  They were excited that we had found a candidate with the one skill they absolutely had to have.  He had several years of experience collecting the data to fill out a particular set of government forms.

We knew what the elephant gun for the job was.  The candidate got the interview.

Are you using a bow and arrow resume when you could be using an elephant gun?  You need a lever and a place to stand to move the world. Find out what the elephant gun is for the job.

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Something To Do Today

Find an ad that is picky, an ad that asks for 10 different skills and a lot of experience.  Find out what the elephant gun is for that ad.  Call the company and ask what the most important skill sets are and which are not essential. Find out where the lever can be placed.                

Tomorrow:  Am I showing up?

Coming up:  Down Syndrome vs down syndrome

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Posted in Accomplishments, Perseverance, Resumes

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Giving your way into a job.

Posted on April 3, 2014 | Leave a comment

Do you know how hard it is to get an administrative job with a symphony orchestra?

A symphony administrator told me how to do it.  A woman called him and asked for a job.  He said, “I can’t hire you, there is no budget.”

That’s not the end of the story.  She said, “I’ll work for you for free.”  It was a wage he could afford.  She did a great job for 3 months and went back to school.  What do you think will happen when she applies for her next job and has experience and great references? 

You can’t afford to work for free.  Not forever, anyway.  Can you do it for a few hours or days?  Over the weekend?  Helping people out of a bind is a great way to network your way into a job.  They will feel compelled to let others know how much you helped them.  In the programming and computer networking field it is a very common way to work yourself into a company.

I can point to specific examples where this worked for accountants, secretaries, company presidents, salespeople, office managers and more.  These were jobs worth anywhere from $6/hour to $250,000/year. These people all helped someone who mentioned they were snowed under with work.  After a few hours they offered to come in the next day.  After 2 days they said they’d help out the next weekend.  The boss, owner or chairman of the board heard about it and hired the person.

If you are unemployed, what’s the damage?  If you have a job, why not spend some of your evening and weekend time helping out with something you don’t normally do?  I know people who got promoted because they came in a few extra hours to their regular job to help their boss out on the boss’s project.

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Something To Do Today

Do you know someone who needs help?  Seize the opportunity.  Go on in and see if you can help.

Tomorrow:     Giving 30 seconds away can get you a job too

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Posted in Attitude, Finding jobs, Focus, Followup, Networking, Perseverance

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What if there are 6 ads and you really want the job?

Posted on March 14, 2014 | Leave a comment

You see 6 ads for one job you really want.  It is so good you would quit you’re your current job just to apply.  What do you do?

High Priority Jobs

Getting your resume into the hiring manager’s hands is your quest.

First gather information. 

Is there anything that makes you think the writer of one of the ads knows the hiring manager personally?

Check the date on all those ads.  When were they posted?  What day did they appear?  List when the company and each agency first advertised.  Did an agency advertise before the company itself?  They may have a close tie to the hiring manager.  Have the ads been going on for months?  The company is either getting a little desperate, has decided not to fill the job, or the job is full but recruiters haven’t bothered to pull the ads yet because they are still getting lots of calls.

How are the ads different?   Does one include a lot more in-depth information?  Is another extremely short?  Look closely.  Do any of them make you feel like the writer talked to the manager?  You want to talk to someone who has the hiring manager’s ear.

Second work your network.

Call the people you know at the company, or invite them out to lunch.  Call up recent employees. Connect on LinkedIn to everyone at the company you can.

What can you find out about the job?  Is there someone who can personally take your resume to the hiring manager?  How about to the hiring manager’s boss?  This is still the research phase.  Don’t give anyone your resume yet.  You only get to submit it once.

Is there a recruiter you trust?  Find out what information they have.  If they can bypass HR (Human Resources) or have other great connections then work with them.  For instance, there is one company I work with that requires all recruiters to submit resumes through their online system.  But I call the HR manager and tell her when my candidates go in so she can immediately extract them.  She is afraid of missing a truly hot candidate.  Other people who submit themselves are first sorted through by the receptionist.

You really do have to quiz recruiters about their connections.  If you answer a particular ad when there are 6 ads out there, you have a right to ask why you should send a resume in through them.

Third decide how to apply.

If the job is not exciting, it doesn’t matter how you submit your resume.  Just do some quick cosmetic changes and submit it through an agency or the HR department.

For the job that really turns you on, figure out who should submit your resume.  For any company it could be you, a friend, a recruiter or an acquaintance.  Choose in this order:

  1. Someone who can hand your resume to the hiring manager and personally recommend you.  It doesn’t get any better.
  2. Whoever can get your resume past HR and talk to the manager.
  3. The person that can talk to the HR manager or screener and get you past the first cut.
  4. At this point all submissions really are equal. Do it yourself, have an employee there submit you to HR or let a recruiter you trust and who gets back with you do it.

Fourth get your resume perfect

Put the bullets on your resume in order of importance.  Put a few key words in bold to make sure the screener and manager sees them.  Get rid of bullets, lines and sentences that do not apply to the job!!  A two page resume is fine for most jobs, but the second page may never get read.

Do the 10 second test with several people.  Hand your resume to a few friends and ask them to read it for 10 seconds.  Time them.  Take it away in 10 seconds.  Ask what they remember.  Do they mention your most important qualifications and accomplishments? If they do, it’s a winner.  If not, change it.

The 10 second test is critical because most screeners and managers give all the resumes a 10 second review to try to find the best ones first.  They will probably throw out your resume without further reading if they can’t see what they want in that first 10 seconds.

Fifth submit and follow up

Submit your resume.  Call up and find out what happened two days later.  Did your resume arrive there?  Did the manager see it yet?  When will he decide?

You really want that job? After your two day follow up call send a thank you note. Give them a nudge, short and friendly.  It is amazing how a thank you note can get someone to personally try one more time for you.

Keep calling back at least weekly.  Sometimes it does take a couple of months to fill a job.  Keep your candidacy alive until it is pronounced dead by someone who knows.

Take Your Best Shot

If you really want a job.  Go all out.  There may be 100 applicants.  In some cases there may be 1000.  Use personal contacts to set yourself apart from the herd.  Make sure your resume instantly says, “I’m qualified.”  And follow up in case you somehow get missed.

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Something To Do Today

Start prioritizing all the jobs you can apply for.  On your written list make sure the jobs you crave stand out.  Treat them differently.  It is worth the extra effort.

Next week:  Recruiters and the hair on the back of your neck.

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Posted in Finding jobs, Focus, Followup, Job Boards, Networking, Perseverance, Recruiters, Resumes, Time management

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What to do if there are Six Ads For One Job – part one

Posted on March 13, 2014 | Leave a comment

You see 3 job board ads with almost identical wording for a job in the same suburb.  You go online and find 3 social network ads that are almost identical from 3 more different companies.  It has to be one job, not 6 different ones. What do you do?

First decide how much you want the job, then give it the time it deserves.

You have to set your priorities first.   Would you quit your job just to apply for it?   Then it will be worth a few phone calls and some research.   Is it so marginal you would NOT quit your job if it paid 5% or 10% more than you are earning today?  Treat it differently.

Low Priority Jobs

Look at all the ads.  Are any by a recruiter you know and want to work with?  Give them a quick call.  Often you can get more information from a recruiter than from the company itself.  Ask them if you have a chance at the job.  Do you want the job?  Commit the recruiter to submitting you for the job.  Then call up in two days and ask what they have heard back.

If you can figure out who the primary employer is and don’t want to work with any recruiting agencies, just apply directly.  For low priority jobs it isn’t worth stressing out about whether an agency or a direct submission will work best.  Call the company in two days to see what happened.

High Priority Jobs

This is more involved.  We’ll talk about it tomorrow.

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Something To Do Today

Look online and find a job with more than one ad. Figure out which ones are from agencies and which is from the actual hiring company.  Make this a habit.

Tomorrow:  Job Boards:  What if there are 6 ads for the same job? – part two

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Posted in Finding jobs, Followup, Job Boards, Perseverance, Recruiters, Time management

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Your Most Valuable Assets

Posted on February 20, 2014 | Leave a comment

This true story directly applies to your job search. The heir apparent of a large family company was kidnapped and sold into slavery in Africa by his brothers. As a slave he rose to be the president of a large privately owned company. Then, falsely accused of a crime he was imprisoned. In prison he soon became the deputy warden, running the whole place. Eventually his hard work was recognized and Joseph became second only to the pharaoh of Egypt. Finally, his brothers who originally sold him into slavery came and went to work for him. Tumultuous? Yes. Fun? Not really. Slave and prison were terrible jobs. Two assets were used in every situation to create a third asset.

  1. His will to succeed. His attitude. His desire to constantly improve.
  2. His current job, no matter how bad it was.

Those two assets were used to create a third asset. 3. A great reputation. If you are still employed and want to find a new job, your current job is a valuable asset. If you are unemployed your previous job, part-time job and your job search (your current job) are valuable assets.

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Something To Do Today Take your resume and make a list of things you did in each job that PROVE your will to succeed, your positive attitude and your desire to constantly improve. Tomorrow I’ll give you a way to leverage that information.

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Posted in Attitude, Perseverance

How to be sure of your career direction. Can you?

Posted on January 27, 2014 | Leave a comment

It can be difficult if not impossible to know where your career should go.  It’s not that you can’t pick a direction, it is making sure it is the right direction.  You may climb the career ladder of success, only to find out it is leaning against the wrong wall.

Here is a great article on how to figure out where you should go.

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Posted in Focus, management, Perseverance, Promotions, Quitting or Fired

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Hallowe’en and your job search, really.

Posted on January 20, 2014 | Leave a comment

I know it is not Hallowe’en.  Humor me.

Tips for job seekers and Halloween trick or treaters are just about the same.  Think about how each of these directly applies to looking for a job.

  1. If you are scared, get your dad (a coach) to help on a few doors.
  2. Dress for success.  Look the part from your hair to your shoes, bag and greeting.
  3. The neighborhood you call on defines the size of the treats you get.
  4. Not everyone is giving out one pound candy bars, but they are all worth visiting.
  5. The more houses you call on, the more likely you will get a one pound candy bar.
  6. Go BACK to the biggest house with the best candy later.
  7. The most successful trick or treaters plan their routes and run from door to door.
  8. If you don’t knock, they won’t answer.
  9. If the porch light is out, you won’t get any candy, but you may get advice.
  10. Some of the scariest houses give the best treats.
  11. You get more treats if you start early and work late.
  12. Asking for candy in the traditional way works, ingenuity may get you more.
  13. Helping a little kid can double your take.
  14. Always say thank you.
  15. Sometimes they just ran out of treats, sorry.
  16. Going with friends (groups and social media) can make a scary neighborhood safer.
  17. It is a night of cold calling, even if you know the people.
  18. Trade candy (leads) afterwards to get what you really want.
  19. If you go to a party instead, and complain, you won’t get a big bag of candy.
  20. Don’t blow out the candle in the pumpkin.
  21. Do it again next year, only better, now that you have experience.

Wow!  I could write 21 articles based on those points.  Let me make a few quick points instead.

  1. Planning and preparation.  If you want the best chance of quick success, take 15 minutes each day and an additional 4 hours each week to review results, make lists, THINK, and plan for the coming week.  And make sure you have resumes that are attractive and get people to call you.
  2. Work hard and fast.  Actually do what you plan.  Make calls and contacts daily.  It is amazing how often luck follows hard work.
  3. Go back again.  You should be talking to your best prospects at least monthly.  If you spend 15 minutes thinking and looking for a reason to call, you can usually come up with a helpful reason to call almost anyone.
  4. Work together.  Share leads.  Offer to critique other’s resumes.  Suggest websites, books, and other job search ideas.  A lot of people find the perfect job in the castoffs and contacts from someone else’s search. Go to someone else’s house and both of you make calls at the same time.
  5. Be polite. Just because they say “No” doesn’t mean they hate you.  Say thank you and contact them again if it is a company you really want to join.  Never burn bridges or “blow out the candle” with anyone.

Have a great Halloween, and an even better job search.  Good luck finding that one pound candy bar!

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Posted in Finding jobs, Followup, Interviews, Job Boards, Networking, Perseverance, References, Resumes, Time management

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What a big house or a great job costs

Posted on January 10, 2014 | Leave a comment

I was at a gorgeous house.  It had radiant heating, an indoor basketball court and swimming pool, wonderful view, and enough room for anyone’s desires.  I loved it.  The hosts were generous and kind.  Then I decided to tally up the cost of owning a house like that.  My estimate is $24,000 per month without mortgage payments.  Owning that great house had a price tag that I can’t ever see myself paying.

Last week I also talked with people in jobs that paid $100,000 – $250,000 per year.  They are wonderful jobs.  Nice offices, private secretaries, authority over others, and a sweet lifestyle come with the jobs.  They are leading financial and accounting people. 

There is a price those people pay.  First is education and certification.  Then comes an apprenticeship with 60-90 hour weeks for months at a time during peak seasons.  Without that apprenticeship with the “right” companies, they would be earning half of what they are.  The “right” companies now means choosing from 4 major CPA firms and toiling there for at least 4 years.

With all that hard work, we still need to mention another 5-20 years of always putting in 50+ hours per week. There is a very high price for those jobs, and there is high pay. Many people try to get around the education, certification, and apprenticeship.  Notably, a few people make it without those exact experiences.  But those who get around it are either obviously geniuses, or have worked even more to rise from obscurity to notoriety than the path I outlined would have taken.

If there is a high and mighty job you want, there is also a price to be paid for it.  Go ahead, get that job.  As you earn that job, make sure that you always understand the price of the next step or two in your progression.

Both a big house and a great job have fine rewards.  They also have their own unique costs.  It can be worth it.  Is it worth it for you?

Something To Do Today            

Invite to lunch a person who has the job you want. Ask them about the price they paid in the past and they price they pay now for that job.

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Later:  What may happen in the next recession

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Posted in Focus, management, Perseverance, Promotions, Raises, talent, Time management

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Proof you are really good at getting the job

Posted on December 18, 2013 | Leave a comment

When you don’t get a particular job, sometimes you just have to take a deep breath and think about past successes.

Very few jobs are awarded to the only candidate considered.  In most situations, even internal promotions, at least 3 candidates are considered.  For the majority of outside hires more than 10 resumes are reviewed.  You never have a chance of getting the job.  But somehow, you eventually win.

Look at your current or last  job.  Who were the competitors? Why did you win? See! You are good at getting the job.

Now look at the next job you want to have.  What can you do today to give yourself the winning edge over the other candidates?

Goals can be used to give you that winning edge in an impossible competition.  Yesterday I talked to someone who spent $6000 last year to finish his degree while working full time.  Now he not only can win the jobs he looked at more easily, but he can look at a whole new level of jobs.

Set a goal to give yourself an unfair advantage in you next career move.

The average pencil is seven inches long, with just a half-inch eraser — in case you thought optimism was dead.  (Robert Brault)

Something To Do Today

Figure out when you can spend some time with your goals every day.  Just sitting with a pen and paper for 15 minutes each day can change your life if you are thinking about where you want to go.

Make sure the goals will give you a tangible advantage in your career.

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Have a great New Year.

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Posted in Attitude, Focus, Perseverance, Time management

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