Ace the Job Interview: Know Your Value Proposition
Don’t ever forget when you are on a job search that you are in business for yourself, or should I say the business of self. Yes, you represent your own corporation, i.e. YOU, Inc. As the CEO of your start-up company you must also put on all the hats that a solo business owner must wear, including the marketing hat.
Any savvy business owner knows that he must not only produce the product or service, he must also have a clear picture in mind of just who needs/wants it and be able to sell the customer on just why his particular offering is better than that of the competition. In other words he must craft the value proposition for his product or service.
For you, the customer is the hiring manager. She may be scanning scores of resumes to decide whom to interview. She will likely interview a number that meet the basic qualifications that have been determined for the position. So what will make her hire you over those others who may be equally qualified? In other words, what makes you better than all the other people who are competing for the same job? That’s what the hiring manager wants to know.
When a business owner is marketing his product or service he takes time to research his market. Have you researched your target company so that you can specifically answer that implied (if not directly posed) question being asked by the hiring manager? Did you check out websites and other information about your target company before sending the resume? You must find out who they are, how they think (company culture), their challenges, and what they need or want. Did you then customize your resume to highlight what you can deliver to that customer to fulfill that specific need? When you were called in for the interview did you use that research to plan how you would communicate your value in their language?
You know, your competition for a job may not even be equally qualified, but may be great at marketing themselves and attracting an employer’s attention. That can give them a real advantage.
Be not only the best qualified, but also be the candidate who can best articulate her unique value and benefit to the organization, thus showcasing her assets. Now that’s a sure fire job search strategy!
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!
Job Search for Executives
For C-level executives especially, a traditional resume might not be the ticket to the next rung up in the corporate world. Many executives are harnessing technology and using more direct methods to showcase themselves. Methods include developing a personal marketing website and using sophisticated direct mail campaigns that put their best foot forward and directly in front of decision-makers.
There are online companies that allow one to develop a personalized site using templates to add narrative, photos, work samples, video and audio content. Some, like www.visualcv.com, are free. Others cost thousands of dollars, but offer coaching and consulting to perfect your value proposition (What’s that? It’s critical. See my next post), identify a target market, develop the campaign and produce a perfectly crafted and quality-printed direct mail letter. But when you are worth a salary in the 6 or 7 digit backet, a few thousand dollars would, of course, be seen as a wise investment.
Do you want to find a consultant of this type? Contact me for referral to one I can highly recommend.
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!
Do You Really Even Need a Resume?
For years career specialists like myself have been emphatic that a resume is a must have for any respectable job search. And I still stand by the fact that every career-minded professional should have one ready, polished and updated at all times to be ready for the next opportunity that might present itself (whether actively searching or not).
HOWEVER, in some cases a resume may only be a part of the packaging of You, Inc. In the more rarified job search atmosphere, where executives are a high end commodity and over 46,000 C-level (CEO, CFO…) jobs are available but not publicized every single month, you just may not get there from two pages laser printed on ivory, 32 lb, 100% cotton.
In those upper echelons of job search there are more sophisticated protocols to follow. What are they? Watch for my next post.
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!
Defining Your USP: Marketing Yourself In Your Job Search
In the marketing world the term USP is often used. USP refers to the Unique Selling Point of the particular product or service being offered. Before a product is put “out there” the USP is defined and utililized to position the product in the market place, creating it’s niche.
When you embark on a job search you, too, are entering the world of marketing and must also begin to think in those terms. The product is of course YOU. Before you get “out there” you should define your unique assets and be prepared to sell them in relation to a specific job opportunity.
The question that may not be put directly to you, but the one in every hiring manager’s mind is “What makes you different from the other people being interviewed for this position?” To put it more simply “Why should this company invest in you?”. You see, you are a commodity that the company hopes will ultimately increase the bottom line by adding value in some way.
So how do you go about defining your USP? Well, everyone is unique in some way. Your strengths (abilities, skills, personal style) are like a fingerprint that differentiate you from the competition, No two people have exactly the same combination of success factors. So what’s unique about you? How can you benefit this organization you want to join in a way that no one else can? Put that into words and you have your USP.
Of course it may not be so easy to find those words for several reasons. We have becomed conditioned to think that to talk positively about ourselves is boasting. Another barrier could be that you don’t have the precise language needed to describe those assets. Beyond that, you could even have a blind spot regarding our attributes. Therefore, to be really successful in framing your USP you may want to take some specialized assessments like the Highlands Ability Battery and the DiSC Personal Profile assessments I offer on my website. With those tools you will have the words you need to shine in the interview and enable you to answer that unspoken question with clarity and confidence.
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!
Prime Resume´ Real Estate
A resume is an outline, not a detailed narrative. It’s purpose is to persuade the reader that you should be invited to an interview. There are a number of resume formats that are acceptable and sometimes a nontraditional approach may work, although most hiring managers don’t have time or patience for over-the-top attempts to gain attention. You should aim for a direct and easy to read document that will get to the point quickly. Remember you may only have a few seconds to pique the interest of the reader. 
Critical information should be laid out clearly and in a format that will give the big picture of who you are as succinctly as possibly. The optimal place to do this is right under your name and contact information header. You might consider that area as prime property that can be developed into the Boardwalk.
Unfortunately many resume writers treat that space more like Baltic Avenue and then wonder why they aren’t getting much income from it. You’re on Baltic Avenue if you have a Job Objective section occupying that corner. What a waste of prime real estate that is! Who cares what your job objective is but you? Obviously, you are applying for a specific job in a specific company. Hopefully your employment objective and that position opening are a potential match or you wouldn’t even be applying, so why waste valuable space and the hiring manager’s valuable time with that useless information?
You want to put your hotel on the Boardwalk! That is what you will be doing if you insert a Profile Summary as the first section of your resume. This lead-in statement serves as an executive summary and should be designed to capture the reader’s immediate attention. This section will tell the reader about your key qualifications without the need to abstract them from your resume.
The advantages of using a well-honed profile paragraph are that it provides the reader with a quick overview of your unique assets and that it allows you to bring key elements from your past to the top of the resume.
There are four elements you can include in the Profile Summary:
- Who you are as a professional
- Your key areas of competence
- Your greatest strengths
- General statement of your accomplishments
OK. This all sounds good, but how do you get it on paper? Some of us just draw a blank when it comes to describing ourselves. That’s where you may need to do a little introspection or even get help pulling those words out. If you get stuck contact us. We can help you develop a Profile Summary or an entire resume so that you can PASS GO AND COLLECT YOUR $200.
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!
Will You Pass the Seven Second Test?
A resume is a very important piece in any job search. It won’t get you a job–ultimately only you can sell yourself to the Hiring Manager. But it can play a great supporting role in your search by setting you apart from other job seekers.
Basically you have about 7 seconds to introduce yourself through your proxy. On the average that’s how long a busy hiring manager will take to glance at your resume and decide whether or not it’s a keeper. That means she or he may not even scan the entire thing before deciding what to do with it. In many ways the HM is looking more for ways to eliminate rather than consider you for an interview. An interview is a major commitment of time and that equals money in any company. Plus, much can be quickly gleaned about you through this writing sample. A resume with poor formatting and glaring grammatical errors loudly broadcasts a lack of commitment to quality. And what company wants to hire someone who doesn’t take pride in his or her workmanship! You may not be a graphic designer or a spelling champion, but there is no excuse for a resume with obvious shortcomings, given spell checker and the variety of resume templates included with most word processing software.
Now is your resume’s appearance alone going to get you an interview? No, but it will keep you in the running. And there’s something else that you can do to make those 7 seconds pay off for you. This is something that many resumes lack and including it will give you an edge. What is it? Stay tuned for my next post.
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!
Happy Resume´ Month!
You won’t find a special section of greeting cards in your local Hallmark Store to commemorate the occasion; nonetheless, September is recognized as National Resume Month. Now I don’t know how they come up with these “tributes”, but I will take the nudge and remind you to get out your resume and check to see if it is worthy of the honor.
You might wonder why you should bother since you are content with your present employer. But you must admit that you don’t know what the future holds and it’s possible to be out on the street faster than you can say “downsizing”. Or almost as sad, your real dream job could be posted and filled before you can locate and elongate your one-pager. If those scenarios aren’t reason enough to go immediately to the file cabinet and start searching, why not take a more strategic view for having a polished and ready resume?
Every worker is like a company, You, Inc., if you will. A resume then is a sales brochure for the product you are offering. It should be honest and forthright, but it should also highlight your best features and, along with the collateral cover letter, offer the potential “buyer” (hiring manager) a tailored solution to his problem. It won’t tell the whole story; but it must be enough to convince the buyer that this is a brand worth examining more closely.
So how effective is your current sales brochure? Looking at it from the “buyer’s” perspective, would you want to take a closer look at the product it promotes? If not, stay tuned for future posts in honor of National Resume Month and have better marketing material by the end of September.
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!
