My Path to Employment, Part One

MY PATH TO EMPLOYMENT

In October of 2007, I was laid off along with 55% of my company (an electronic payments company headquartered in Louisville, KY). Following that, I spent six months on the hunt and landed with another reputable financial services company selling a bill payment product. That product wasn’t fully developed and ready to go to market, so after four months, I was again on the market with another good reference. After about 30 days of that search, In September of 2008, I ran across a startup that was in the market for an experienced sales pro. That was never really a job, but rather a full time effort to create a job. It didn’t work and I again restarted my search in April of 2009. I landed with a solid company in July.

The purpose of this post is to share some ideas that I believe may be helpful for others in their job search and how I did them (some better than others.) I want to talk about Networking, Resumes, the internet, the elevator pitch, your ideal job description and other tools.

1. Networking
a. The very first thing I did was send out an email to my friends asking them to be praying and to ask for ideas of people I should talk to. That’s probably the right thing, but I should have put more thought into that message ensuring I gave them very specific idea of what I do, the types of companies who might hire me and to ask them if they would be willing to brainstorm with me IN PERSON.
b. If you can’t clearly articulate what EXACTLY you are looking for, then the people around you won’t be able to help. You need a very clear summary of what you’re looking for (see “Elevator Pitch” later on.)
c. Make a list of people who will take your call: Friends, former co-workers, former bosses, people you go to church with, parents of your kids’ friends, people you serve on boards/committees with, friends of your parents and in-laws, former professors, neighbors, ministers, your mailman, professionals (attorneys, CPAs, doctors, etc. that you do business with.) or even the guy who picks up your trash (really). Unless you’re a hermit or new to town, you should be able to come up with at least fifty names, hopefully more. These are your level one contacts and you should seek a face to face meeting with them to brainstorm about your job search.
d. The networking meeting – this is not an interview! You may even tell someone when asking for the meeting “I’m not asking you to hire me; I just want to visit with you about my search and to get your thoughts.” The goal here is to connect, give them an update on your search and get their ideas of what you ought to consider (if you need that) and of a couple names of people to talk to. Press for this. Better yet, see if they would call the contact on your behalf to prepare the way for your call. You should probably ask for 20 minutes, but keep the meeting to 30 minutes out of respect for your contact’s time. Pay attention if an assistant calls or comes in after 20 or 30 minutes and take that as a cue to make your exit.
e. If you have 50 names in your level one network, and meet with 90% of them and get an average of 2 names per you should walk away with a list of 90 people in your level two network. The % goes down as you move into level three and four, but you must be persistent. Job offers should start coming once you’re out to level five and six – or something else is likely wrong.
f. The last thought about networking: Don’t discount anyone in your network. You may know your neighbor is a mechanic and think he couldn’t possibly know anyone who could help me. However, maybe he’s friendly with his clients or his wife is in HR at that company you really want to get into. You never know. Don’t discount ANYONE!

I will follow this post with a discussion on resumes and other topics related to job searches. If there is a way to network and connect with other job seekers in your area, I really recommend this. You might be asking “why would I want to connect with others out of work? They can’t hire me!” The reason is for encouragement and since they are out talking to the same or similar companies, searching the same websites, talking to the same recruiters, they may run across something of value to you that they can share. First United Methodist in Tulsa has a great group for job seekers that meet weekly and I’m in process of starting a monthly workshop at Asbury, also in Tulsa. Churches usually want to help hurting people so they likely have some sort of support for job seekers. Check with your church and if they don’t have something, consider starting something. Contact me for more information about something like that.

The economy may be tough right now, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t jobs to be had. Keep at it, pray, and network like it’s a full time job. Blessings to you in your search!