Job
searching is difficult for most people, even in good times. Every now and then
someone slams the door shut on unemployment and finds a job quickly, without
spending gobs of money. While luck plays a part, most of their
success is attributable to their own job search creativity.
The
most recent example I know of is a sales executive who was laid off in mid
November and got two job offers before the Christmas holiday. We worked
together on her resume and cover letter; neither of those documents landed her
the job. She got the job because of her own creativity. In addition to working
other search tactics, she developed creative one, attending a conference of
C-level executives in her industry.
She
looked at the attendee and speaker list for the conference and quickly decided
she needed to be there. She signed up, got plane reservations and a hotel, and sent emails to 125 attendees, requesting a few moments of their
time to chat over a cup of coffee. She got some good responses and made connections
at the conference. She never sent out a resume or cover letter; we had not yet
completed that exercise. She found out their needs and sold herself as the solution. The
result was she got two job offers by the end of the week by thinking “out-of-the-box”.
In a
second example, a sales professional researched some companies very thoroughly
and found out who their key customers were. He then looked at other competitors
in the industry and discovered who their customers were. By comparing who was
selling to whom, he hypothesized that the target company he was interested in would
love to land one of their competitors customers. He applied to the target
company and didn’t get an immediate response. He then learned all he could
about the products of the company, and went to work trying to sell the products
to the competitors customers.
One of the competitor’s customers he called on
happened to be an account the target company had been trying to land
unsuccessfully. He sold the customer who then called his counterpart, the hiring manager in the target company, and proceeded to tell him how impressed he was with the salesperson, who he incorrectly assumed worked
for the target company. The hiring manager was so impressed he immediately
offered a job to the candidate.
While
finding a unique, creative way to search is not going to happen for everyone,
none the less it’s worth spending time to see if one of these or other approaches
might work. One key to successful job searching is discovering the hiring manager’s
problem by preparing yourself with solid research and then finding a way to demonstrate you
are the solution. Hiring managers hire solutions!
Find out more about Job Searching
by visiting http://www.hoochresumes.com or by
emailing me at kl@hoochresumes.com.
