One of the ways to prove your readiness for a promotion or why you should be hired before a sea of other candidates is to create hypothetical case histories of different business problems and discuss the problems, business ramifications, and proposed solutions in great detail. We are talking pages, not two lines on your resume. Put your remedies on the table with a deep, strategic discussion of why they offer the best ROI (return on investment) for the business situation and be willing to be graded/critiqued for your proposed fixes before or early in the interview process. It will help you get into higher level interviews sooner and more often.

It is giving away free consulting, perhaps, but in a risk-adverse job market, it may move you past other contestants. It is actually safer in this instance not to offer remedies to the potential employer’s current problems, because it is likely you will not know some choice business tidbit that suddenly makes your proposed remedy look foolish. If you write about enough different business situations credibly, you will suggest that you could make future headway on the problems of the employer you are hoping to impress even if you don’t currently have all the information to score an A+ today for the target project. It is an effective way to show you are viable for a new industry.

If you were thinking of whining about all the work I am suggesting, one of my coaching clients, who had been at $150K before being laid off, moved to a $235K salary in his next move by creating a “portfolio” showcasing his business insights. He intends to repeat the strategy in the near future to accelerate his next promotion. (He also pointed out the exercise cost less than his MBA and accomplished more.)

Another approach is to write an erudite white paper or two on bleeding edge industry issues. Write an article that gets into the WSJ or Financial Times or the leading trade magazine in your industry. You can’t plagiarize or try to “snow” anyone with these. You need to be ready to discuss any of the topics for 2-3 hours convincingly in an interview.

This process is a good exercise to test how credible you are as a candidate for a more senior role than you have had previously without long term risk to any party. Both you and the hiring manager may need to see the concrete proof of how you rank versus other candidates.

It is also good way to remove the personal stigma of having been at a failing company in a senior title. I just recommended the process to someone who has been at several small start-ups that did not make it long term.

The flip side of this strategy is that, for something like 10 years now, companies have been pulling in 10-15 candidates and giving them 40-70 hour assignments of what would they do in X situation without paying consulting fees. Then the company takes the consensus of all the hopeful applicants and doesn’t hire any of them. I first saw this phenomenon amongst high level IT Project Managers with PMPs. I happen to think this is unethical and would never work for a company that asked it. One way to defend yourself against it is to offer solutions to problems at other companies as suggested in the second paragraph, before or regardless if the company asks for “free advice” with bad intentions.

It is all about demonstrating your thought leadership in a way that allows you to hop, skip, and jump past other potential candidates.  It also allows you to grow as fast as you can rather than waiting for company projects that allow you to flex your muscles.

Topics: branding + positioning, communications, getting ahead, innovation, interviews, leadership, management skills, salary, selling skills, solving problems, technical skills, visibility | 1 Comment »

A sales person called me after a lunch with a new contact at a company where he was already doing business. He noticed himself too easily slipping into the comfort zone of using the lunch to build a friendship and losing sight of his responsibility to reinforce his business value.

One should never assume that the value, service, or integrity you demonstrated elsewhere in the company (or industry) has been transmitted to the person you are now meeting with.

Assume the new contact has unique needs and values versus others in the same company or industry.

I have noticed people who are out of work are much less likely to “close the sale” at a networking encounter. Those out the longest are least likely to try. I understand that a loss of confidence is the culprit, but if this is you, be extra diligent. Your competition is selling harder.

Many of us find it more awkward to convert the conversation to “closing the sale” when talking with good friends when actually it is the people who know us best who are more likely to walk directly in to office of a CEO on our behalf.

Have a distinct game plan before the event. While the presentation over a hamburger and glass of beer may not be formal, you need to have 3-5 key points ready to relay even if the business part of the meeting lasts no longer than 5 minutes. (And try to make it last a little longer.)

Choose your networking partners wisely and prioritize your networking time. One of my bosses reminded my sales team frequently that the first sales calls you make during business hours are those that make the most money, and you only make the calls to be nice in off hours. He never picks up the phone directly, he always screens calls. Allocate your networking time with the same mindset.

Topics: branding + positioning, getting ahead, networking, selling skills | No Comments »

In my last blog, I pointed out that even if you work for someone else, you are CEO of your own destiny. You need to take 100% responsibility for the success of your own future. Alex Neff expanded on my concept using Sales and Sales Operations examples. Below are his thoughts:

I meet people frequently who don’t know how to advance their own career. Here are the kinds of things they say:

1 – I don’t know why I was part of the group that was laid off.

2 – I don’t know how to move past “meets expectations” in my annual review.

3 – I don’t know how to get more than a 2.5% annual raise.

By comparison, the CEO of the average multi-person company expects (demands) 10-15% growth year over year. Why are you settling for less growth for your one-person company?

America rewards the entrepreneur, the innovator, the one who thinks “outside of the box.” Regardless if your passion is sales or operations, anyone can succeed by thinking as the CEO of You, Inc. and by putting you, as the customer, first. By doing both, you will help your career grow.

Examples:

If you are in B2B sales, many of you have provided a customer-centric sales story via your employer’s company that 100 of your customers used to build the business of 100 of their customers. Consider the pitch you created was worthy of being retold 10,000 times.

Check out Nike’s Fuel Band. It counts your calories, your number of steps, your time. It makes staying in shape a game that you play against yourself. It provides a message that people embrace and repeat. It adds personal value. Social Media was used to help Nike’s product go viral at relatively little cost. Can you use Social Media to do the same for yourself via You, Inc.?

If you are in operations, as CEO of You, Inc., are you creating repeatable and scalable processes to ensure the future of you the customer? Ray Kroc, founder of McDonald’s, sweated the details to ensure that the French fries one eats at McDonald’s are the same each time and at each location. The repeatable and scalable processes provide predictable consistency, and comfort for the customer. People know what to expect regardless of whether they are in the big city or the heartland. They want to experience a Zen moment, no surprises. Strive to achieve the same predictable results and peace of mind for the customer of You, Inc..

When you are working with your employer’s clients, it is important to solve their problems and needs and to provide on-going process improvement and value-add. The CEO of You, Inc. must similarly come in each morning and say “I’ve been thinking of our challenges, and I believe I may have a couple of new solutions that we should try.” Never stop seeking innovation and test-marketing alternatives of achieving better results.

As CEO of You, Inc., you need to continually challenge your company to increase value to the customer, grow, adapt, and be forward thinking. Failure to do so will cost you money and, more importantly, time. The company You, Inc. will be looking for your next client versus having prospective external clients reach out to you as a solution provider. Thinking as a CEO is something that is learned. A great career coach will help you learn it faster.

By the way, regardless of your age, planning done now should set the stage for your later success as CEO of Your Retirement, Inc.. Another reason to take command of your strategic direction as soon as possible.

Note: I don’t know if the concepts of “You, Inc.” and “CEO of You” are copyrightable. I have found several previous variations on the phrases on the Internet and in book titles. My apologies if this use of them offends anyone. Pat O’Donnell.

Topics: branding + positioning, getting ahead, leadership, selling skills, visibility | No Comments »

Just because you work for someone else, doesn’t mean you should not consider yourself 100% responsible for your own business success.

I am always surprised how many people, when asked why they were laid off, say “I don’t know why I was in the 10% laid off.” The same people frequently say things like  “I make my revenue quotas every year” without really knowing how they are viewed versus others at their current employer with the same quota track record or title. It is also typical of those who rely too heavily on relationship-building strategies.

You need to know how to make opportunities for yourself in any situation, independent of, or in spite of, the organization agenda.

Because employers will experience more and more pressure from globalization and innovation in the future, employers will have less and less ability to care for an individual’s destiny. It will be increasingly critical for you to know, defend, and augment your value to the current organization and the larger industry. It is just as important to a happy, currently working employee as to someone unemployed.

So how do you gain traction over your own image?

The key strategy is to gain awareness of your impact on the organization and customers as others measure it. You need to solicit constant feedback from your internal and external customers: What can I do to serve you better? Where do I (and we, the company) impact your business most? What do you value? What would you like me to do less of? Who are the other stakeholders I should get to know better (and serve) better? How do I rank versus your other providers? What are your unmet needs?

You need to be sincere about these questions, and ask them in an “open-ended manner” so that you hear issues other than the ones you expected.

If you have grown up in an engineering-driven or sales-driven environment, you need to become more customer-centric. The customer doesn’t care much about your agenda as provider, and will care less and less in the future as they will have more and more providers and services to choose from. You need to be seen as the preferred provider. Are you?

Career coaching is as relevant to someone happily working as to someone in transition.

Topics: branding + positioning, communications, getting ahead, management skills, networking, selling skills, visibility | No Comments »

At a recent breakfast with other career professionals, we got into a discussion of the characteristics of who is likely to be out the longest when unemployed.

The most common trait: Too little awareness of his/her value to the businesses he/she has come from versus other available resources.

In my practice, these folks fall into two sub-segments:

The Traditionalist:
• Someone who has worked for a single company for 10-20 years and after being laid off, has had no luck getting back in. Doesn’t know why.
• Doesn’t really know to what degree or when he exceeded expectations at the last employer. Not sure how he was ranked versus other employees, except that he was kept on many years and made quotas most of the time. “My boss/company took care of me.” To be fair to this person, education (and religion) in this country breeds workers to let their companies manage their fate.
• Is pretty sure he is out of work because of big business, the Democrats, Republicans, or “poor management.”

The Arrogant:
• This person has progressed through the ranks and has successfully held a number of (3-6) of senior titles such as Director or VP. But now has been out over a year and gets interviews but no offers.
• Since he achieved Director+ level, is pretty sure it can’t be his fault. On the other hand, seems to have forgotten that, at the top of the pyramid, there aren’t enough chairs for everyone to be assured a chair when the music stops. The music has stopped a lot in the last 5 years.
• Talked to one of these the other day. Has achieved CEO and President of several medical device start-ups and companies under $30 million. But in his resume all he says is “I was CEO.” Describes the mergers and acquisitions that occurred while he was at the helm but doesn’t show what mission critical strategies he owns versus other senior staff involved in the same M&A. Makes no effort to show for which future companies and problems he is the best ROI (return on investment.) Doesn’t think he should have to.

By the way, the folks with these problems are more likely to be male (women are usually more self-aware and/or paranoid,) and very likely to be over the age of 50.

So if you suspect you have a bit of these traits, what do you do? Go back to former co-workers and bosses and identify what you did better/differently than other people they have interacted with at the same title and experience level. This is not the time to ask people who will say nice things to you because they don’t want to hurt your feelings. Learn to craft the arguments that will set you above all other pitches for whatever segments you can be the best ROI for. I know how to do that if you don’t.

Be willing to admit that in today’s market we all need to sell ourselves to our workplace, industry, family, and community 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

Topics: branding + positioning, communications, getting ahead, leadership, selling skills | 3 Comments »