Accelerate Your Search™ Now

During a job search there are days when focus is hard to achieve and your search slows down or stops, we all have those days.  Those days can impact your attitude, your focus, your workflow and the pace of your search. 

You know the days I am referring to – don’t you? 

YES, those days were you wander from your email, to LinkedIn, follow a link, read an article, listen to an interesting podcast, sign up for a free webinar, talk to friends on the phone, watch TV, or YouTube and then before you know it the day is gone and it is 6:15pm.  Your family is home and there are more distractions.

Here are a couple of ways to avoid the lack of focus.  Create practical plan and time within the plan for focus and to get you on track and moving forward. 

Plan your search.  Create a plan for your day and your week.  This really helps on those days when feel lost or frustrated and you don’t know what to do or where to start. 

When those days come, you look at your plan and do the tasks on your plan.  Just get the job done; doing what is on your plan helps you focus and continue to move forward.  If you don’t do what is on your plan, you may be consumed with distractions, lack of focus, and the result is you find yourself wasting the day.

Then there are also those days that when there is consistent string of interruptions to your work flow.  For each interruption it can take you 10 to 15 minutes to return to the task at hand in a productive manner.  The time you waste due to interruptions can be massive and the impact on your focus is dreadful.   

Here is how to create space for focus and avoid this consistent time waste of those days within your plan.  Choose specific hours of your workday as your uninterrupted time.  Block the time as an appointment with yourself on your calendar.  Don’t schedule other appointments or calls during that time.  Each day during this time turn off the communication tools and all distractions, email, phones, chat, text, etc.  Educate your family and friends that you may not be interrupted during this time. 

Each day during this time work on one thing and one thing only that will accelerate your search until that one thing is complete.  My bet is you will be amazed at your productivity increase and what you can achieve in a short time.  It works for me.  Try it.  Then let me know how it goes.

Have a comment, thought or tip to share?  Post it below.

Need more ways to speed up your search?  Look to the right and request my gift to you – “162 Ways to Accelerate Your Job Search and Land the Job You Want”.

Are you struggling to clarify your message and accelerate your search? 

I often share with my clients that clarity of message rarely comes as quickly as you wish it would. Yet when it does come together, it’s like the sun breaking out at about 10am on a foggy fall morning.

 You know the mornings, those mornings that are thick, gray, the road hard to see, you feel as if you are not sure where you are going and if you are on the right road, then the sun jumps out, the color of fall is all around you.  The sky is bright; the grass green and even if the payment in front of you disappeared, you would know you are on the right road.  Trust me the message will come, if you are doing the work and the message will come.

 Many people can do this work alone without help.  They have lots of time and they enjoy solo work. 

 Others like you may not have the time nor enjoy the solo journey.  If you have discovered that having help and feedback to help you speed the process is something you are seeking, or you have a question that you want to ask to clarify your message join the next Q & A call.   I am happy to listen to your question and see if I can help you.  Have a question now?  Give me a call and let’s talk.

“Do what you love. Lead with vision and passion; use your strengths and offer unique value, the market will notice and reward you.” ~ Cindy Key

To accelerate your search you need a strategy that helps you stay focused on the “right” things to build and maintain your network.  I encourage you to balance and nurture your network online and offline.

It is so easy to spend time, energy and effort on the items that take up time yet net you little in real results from your network.  It is also easy to forget to pay attention to the little things that pay big dividends.

There are many tools to help you connect with your network – LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, Google+, etc.  Technology has made it easy and convenient to connect. 

Yet sometimes technology robs us of the opportunity to really spend quality time with friends, business associates, customers, and possible employers.  Rarely does a technology work as well as a face to face meeting.

One of the “right” things to do in marketing yourself is to meet face to face.  Face to face you have the rare chance to learn more about others and often to explain your business and what you do.

How much face to face time do you have planned for this week?

“There are only 3 colors, 10 digits, and 7 notes; it’s what we do with them that’s important.” ~ Ruth Ross

AMBITION: The eager or strong desire to achieve something.

Does your job search reflect your ambition?

Would you be convicted by clear and compelling evidence of your ambition to land the job you want?

Or is there only the slimmest evidence available to demonstrate your intent?  Think about it!

If others were ask to share what you do, how you do it, and the job you want to land, could they share it?

Do you project the end result?  Do you clearly state your end goal or do others need to guess what you do, what value you might add, or if you really could get much of anything done?

What stories are you telling?  What evidence are you presenting?

What are you doing with 3 colors, 10 digits, or 7 notes?

What are you doing with your skills, talent, ability and experience?

Is there evidence of your ambition to land the job you want?

What is the best answer or best way to sell myself to land the job I want?

Not a week goes by that someone does not ask this question – there is not one best answer or one best way.   No two people are alike and no two candidates are alike.

The most successful approach it to focus on who you are, your strengths, what you offer and your unique talents.  That’s what sets you apart from the other candidates who will interview for the job you want. 

This approach is not hard but does require focus.  Begin with an assessment of your strengths, skills and talents.  Then plan how to communicate your value in each area.  Build your marketing message and tools showing how you can and will use your talents to provide consistent, performance to help an organization achieve its crucial business goals.  

The reason this is hard for most people to sell their talent and strengths during a job search is they get too focused on the past, or on what is missing or what’s wrong.  Focus first on you and your value. 

It is easy to get focused on what you don’t have, what you need to “fix” or what your weaknesses are, and move into comparison mode, but that is a dead end road to mediocrity.  Invest some time and focus on assessing your strengths, what you do well, your talents and how you can best apply these to the marketplace. 

When you know yourself, your value, your talents, your strengths, and how to communicate what you want, then you don’t dread an interview or talking to a potential employer.  Nor do you need to spend hours fixating on re-wording a résumé or writing a cover letter to fit a job posting, instead you can spend your time on targeted interactions within the organizations who can use and are looking for your skills and talent.

What are your natural talents? 

What pertinent knowledge and skills do you offer the marketplace? 

How can you use your talent to help the organization achieve a significant return on their investment in your salary?

Can you clearly share this information with a potential employer in a few minutes?

Your job, your career, and what you do to earn a living shapes your life and your well being in many ways.  Some people love the break no job allows, some learn to make being unemployed work for them, some love to work and return to work quickly, still others buckle under the stress, don’t know what to do, how to find a new job and struggle to find employment and return to work.  How are you adapting?

The stress of not having a job and looking for a job may not only have major financial and emotional impact, the impact is long lasting.  According to the research by economists Andrew Clark and Yannis Georgellis and psychologists Ed Diener and Richard Lucas that was published the June 2008 issue of The Economic Journal, of the six life-changing events studied, only unemployment has a consistent effect for the five years after the event.  Five years! A 60-month impact!  That is significant. I see that impact daily!  The research is focused on Germans, however I doubt that is would be much different if focused on Americans.

The impact is great for some and not so great for others.  The stress of a job search with little focus, a limited plan, and poor execution can throw a talented professionals into a long drawn out search.

A long search can create financial challenges, stale skills, and adaptation to circumstances that often do become a double-edge sword.  Don’t get me wrong – adaptation is not a bad thing. It is a good thing that people are adaptable and can flex to a change in schedule, changing seasons, or 30% to 40% cut in pay – that is often the difference between a paycheck and an unemployment check.

However, I see adaptation play out on the other edge of the sword too.  Such as behaviors the lead others to make value judgments or have their biases confirmed.  Have you adapted to a more casual dress or appearance, a different view of time or activities, a different sense of urgency or sense of value, or a sense of entitlement?  How you clarified your view of what is important and what type of work you want to do going forward?

In many cases our behaviors and actions are not perceived by others as we intent.  People adapt to their environment over time, some do this with purpose and for some this just occurs.  People get used to everything, a style of dress, pace, culture, weather, and income level. It does take time to adjust but everyone adjusts.

The caution I have for those in a search is that employers know people adjust too.  If your pace, dress, or attitude has adjusted, take a look to see if this adaptation is one that the employers you are targeting view in a favorable manner.  Does the adaptation align with your values and the values or the organizations you want to join?

If the adjustment is not favorable or in alignment, the change may impact how potential employers view you and your ability to get the job done and how you will fit into the culture.  The employer’s perception is their reality. 

If you don’t at least understand the perception of your target employers, it can be very hard to address the needs or concerns.  If the employer’s concern is you have adapted to a slower pace of life or business, or different manner of dressing, and the employer wonders if you can quickly adapt to a high stress, fast pace again, or a standard of business dress, it may be in your best interest to discover and address the concern.

What adaptations have you made?

How do these changes impact your goals?

What are the concerns a target employer might have about your recent adaptations?

Have you adapted too much to being unemployed?

Focus is critical for many tasks and activities.  Your job search is one of those activities where shifting your attention, zig-zagging and shifting your attention from one thing to another without full engagement not only does not net the fastest results it can be deadly to your career.

On the highway recently I was reminded just how deadly just a little shift in focus can be, when I shifted my focus to my directions, then a map and away from the traffic around me.  I did avoid a mishap, yet those seconds of lost focus cost me hours and could have been deadly.  Just as engagement is critical to driving, it is also critical to prevent the slow death of your career.

According to productivity experts it can take 4 to 15 minutes to recover and refocus depending on the complexity of the task and other variables such as your mindset, etc.  That consistent recovery and refocus in time within your job search is inefficient and ineffective.  It may also be the reason you miss or overlook the opportunity right in front of you. 

The impact of lack of focus may be frustration, feeling lost or disappointed.  Those emotions may then create other distractions.

There are three steps to providing CPR to your job search, gaining focus and avoiding the slow costly death of your career.  Those steps are: 1) assess where you are and decide where you want to be, 2) plan how to get there and 3) execute the tasks, activities needed to get where you want to be. 

Continued shifting of focus, zig-zagging, doing too much or diffusing attention during your job search may not just be costing you time, and causing stress, it could also be deadly to your career.  Stale skills are viewed as less valuable in the market; time and stress take other tolls on your mindset and your body.  Lack of focus has been the cause of death of more than one career; will it cause the death of yours?   

Where are you today?

Where do you want to be next week and next year?

What are you willing to do to be more focused in your job search?

In Katherine Bindley’s post “Should Women Wear Engagement Rings to Interviews?”  she explores an interesting question.  She addresses elements of interviews and/or negotiations that I still find many people don’t think through completely – the perception of others.  What others think is their reality and it counts!

Everyone (recruiters, career coaches, hiring managers) I know will tell you eliminate distractions and sending the wrong message during interviews and negotiations.  I agree.  One of the best ways to avoid sending the wrong message is to be very clear about your message and to be on brand.

 When you take the time to identify, clarify and communicate your brand you create solid ways to leverage what sets you apart from the crowd and your unique value.  It is one of the best ways to avoid and eliminate distractions.

You may never change the perception of others.  However, a strong personal brand will draw your brand audience and those who value your unique value to you.

Your strong personal brand will help you leverage your strengths; align your values, goals and vision.  A strong personal brand will help you dliminate distractions.

Also with a strong personal brand you will not find yourself asking the question – Should I wear ___<you fill in the blank> ___?  … before an interview, negotiation, or performance evaluation again.  Instead you will prepare with confidence and a smile knowing what you wear is on brand and helps to send your message without distraction.  You will also give the interviewer and the world what is exclusively yours to give.

Do you have questions or comments?  Post them below.

The answer is simple.  The hiring manager considered you less of a risk than the other candidates.  An interview is more than answering the questions and presenting your skills, it is about connecting and creating peace-of-mind for the hiring manager.

Having a pre-existing relationship helps to create a connection, that is why networking is one of the best ways to land an interview (and a job).  That pre-existing relationship is also why so many positions are filled internally.  After doing your homework, being well prepared, and qualified here are keys to building rapport and the foundation to move an interview to a second interview and an offer.

Be friendly.  All things being equal, people want to hire people they like, trust and believe they would like to get to know.

Look for common ground.  What “clicks” and takes the conversation to a deeper level.  Building that initial comfort creates a foundation for building trust.

Be engaging.  Ask meaningful questions, this allows you to get to the heart of the hiring manager’s important issues, problems and/or concerns.

Discover the need.  Having a dialog advanced by your questions will help you discover the real needs and wants of the hiring manager and the organization.

The answer is simple – the execution takes knowing yourself and being prepared, creating a plan and taking consistent action.

Summer is a great time of year. Summer in New England is very different than the HOT summer days of West Texas.  I love summer and the abundance of fresh vegetables, watermelon and the ease of finding good ice cream.

One of New England’s big surprises was the number of great easy to find little ice cream shops.  To find one I discovered I could just look for where people are lined up waiting to purchase ice cream on a summer evening or afternoon.  The second part of this surprise for me was that most of the ice cream shops close on or about Labor Day! 

The impact is that it feels like ice cream is in short supply in the fall and winter.  That of course is nonsense, good ice cream is not in short supply in the fall, winter or spring, it is just not as convenient to get and takes a bit of effort to find it during the other seasons of the year.  The result, if I want ice cream in the other seasons I have to make an effort to locate it.
 
Sometimes in a job search it is easy to feel ‘lack’ or think jobs are in short supply like ice cream in the off season.  That too is nonsense. 

Once you spend a little time reflecting on where you are and what you want from your career and your next position, you will also discover an abundane of opportunities.  These may not be as convenient as going around the corner and looking for the line or opening an email with a long list of your ideal positions.

Your ideal job is not in short supply, but effort is required to locate it.  You must be willing to market yourself, and you need to know what you are looking for and be willing to seek it out. 

Your talent, skills and abilities are wanted and needed, opportunities are abundant.  Are you willing to do the work for the ideal opportunity?

Most of the people lined up outside the ice cream place, knew where to go because of word of mouth marketing.  Someone told them about the great ice cream, they went and experienced it, they told others and line grew! 

This word of mouth marketing did not happen without work, a plan and day-to-day execution on the part of the ice cream shop owners.

Are you leveraging your word of mouth marketing?   Why not?

Sure there is a shop, a place for people to go to experience and learn more, (your online profile), the unique story of the ice cream shop and the ice cream it sells.  How it is made, what makes it different and the best in the area (your USP, your brand, your story).  The shop has a sign out front, (your job title, your business card), a menu board of the ice cream they offer (your résumé). 

The ice cream shop communicates their message and they help others communicate and share their message.  Maybe in print with a flyer, a storyboard, and as people gather in the line they are talking about the ice cream.  The line and those conversations are part of their social proof that the ice cream is good (your recommendations, references, your network).

All of these marketing elements are critical to drawing people to the shop to experience the ice cream.  They built the message and their reputation over time.  This did just happen. 

The shop assessed what they had to offer, worked to understand the wants and needs of their customer, and then they create and enhance a market for the ice cream as they communicatie and encourage others to share the story.  They focus on the experience and they have customers willing to stand in the long summer lines for ice cream!

The behind the scenes to creating the end result – a great reputation, long lines, perception of short supply, and high value, began with a careful assessment of the value available, how to communicate the value offered to the marketplace, followed by the creation of a plan and the daily execution and evaluation of the plan.   Time and hard work!

Have you taken the time to assess, plan and execute your personal marketing plan to land your next job? 

What is your story? 

You are unique, in short supply (there is only one of you).  You will be available for only a short time, and you have a high value in the marketplace.  What are you doing to tell your story, to pull people and interested employers toward you? 

Wouldn’t you rather have employers seeking you out? 

What would it be like to be like the ice cream shop in the summer with long lines of people waiting for you? 

How would it feel having people standing in line to interview you, experience you, to talk to you and to want to work with you? 

Would that lead to having several offers to review and then select the ideal one for you?

Have a question about creating your personal marketing plan? Sign up and join me on the next Q & A call, ask your question and get an answer.

Need specific ways to speed up your search?  Look to the right and request my gift to you – “162 Ways to Accelerate Your Job Search and Land the Job You Want”.

Have a comment or thought?  Post it below.