Tag: career

End that interview STRONG with great final questions

Curt ConklinLeave a comment

Most of you reading this know that I am #opentowork after an illness. This is my fifth (or so) post sharing the challenges, lessons in positivity, and best practices that I have discovered along the way. In today’s article, I will offer some specific end-of-interview questions that will ensure candidates are remembered in the best possible light.

I think this is a common story. The end of a solid interview approaches. You did your research, built rapport, told appropriate stories, and demonstrated knowledge of the organization. All lights look green. But then, the interviewer asks, “So. What other questions can I answer before we wrap up?” And… you got nothing.

This question seems a natural one to ask, but it is waaay problematic (recruiters, please take note), because there is no obvious correct response. This is the conversation’s denouement, and the candidate wants it to be stellar, but the meat of the interview has already happened. There is not time to bring up a new topic, and if the interviewer has done a good job, the next steps are already known. So, slightly trapped, lowly candidates stumble forward with a perfunctory question about corporate culture or even worse, something like, “no, I think I am good.” Did the lights in here just get dimmer?

With respect to corporate culture questions, let me say simply, this is not the time. Your job in an interview – especially during the early stages – is to convince this decision maker that you kick ass and should be introduced to the next decision maker. The last 30 seconds of an interview is not the time to start a conversation about pajama pants as a business casual alternative, your appreciation of afternoon naps, or the importance of dog kibble in the break room! What you value in culture and what the company offers is a longer discussion and needs to be withheld until an offer is close. Besides, a picture will take shape as you meet and get to know the different managers along the way.

But “Nope” is not a winning strategy either. It’s the baseball equivalent to striking out shopping. It’s a fastball down the middle, and you aren’t even swinging! This is your chance to turn the tables, impress, and end the interview strongly. Be prepared. Swing the bat. Come on, swing the bat!

Having put a lot of thought into this, I have come up with two interesting and successful reponses. The first will take an already great interview to the next level but should be avoided if the tenor is unclear. The second one – well the second one is just money. Many times they can be used together.

Question number one is “how did I do?” Yup, it’s that easy. This is a winner for a couple of reasons. Assuming you already know the answer is “great!” (again, don’t ask it if you are not sure) the interviewer will likely toss you an attaboy (yay!), BUT (and here is where the hidden gems lie) they may also point out pink flags that, in your enthusiasm, you missed. Here is an example. One interviewer recently told me that she paused when I said it is important to understand the situation before pressing for change. She didn’t disagree – just paused. That is valuable nuance and showed me that the company culture embraced moving fast over excessive caution. I adjusted and emphasized my comfort with risk taking in the interviews that followed. Super useful.

The second reason I love this question is it displays vulnerability in a confident way. If you have been reading my posts, you know I preach vulnerability as power – and this one puts you out there at the end of the limb proudly unafraid of falling. People are attracted to confidence.

Question number two is simply “what did you like?” or put less succinctly, “What answer did I provide today that you think will resonate with the people with whom I speak next?”

Awkward number of prepositions aside, this is a great question. So great in fact, that the recruiter may stop the discussion to tell you – that is such a great question! It encourages them to replay the interview in their head and identify their favorite things. Then they put your best ideas into their own words – cementing them as the interview closes. It’s also likely the thought to be shared with the first person who asks, “say, how did that candidate interview go today?”

And there you are. Now you are always prepared for that dreaded final question.  Experiment, make them your own, deliver them with a smile in your voice, and signal you are prepared for an honest answer. Finally, stay frickin’ positive and remember that you are awesome. Looking for a job is your job. It’s kind of a shitty job, but it pays well if you remember that time is money. Invest that time in yourself and your family. Get healthy. Read more books. Do your chores. Love your kids. And remember that displaying vulnerability encourages people to invest in you.

#opentowork #projectmanager #seniorprojectmanager #projectmanagement #buinesstransformation #chieftransformationofficer #jobinterviews #hiringandpromotion #gethired #jobsearch #jobsearching #jobseekers #corporateculture #leadership

Online, Schmonline. Best practices for finding a job IRL! (5/5)

Curt ConklinLeave a comment

In my last post – which readers enjoyed to my delight – I offered pointers for leveraging online sources during your job search. LinkedIn is great but those submitted applications aren’t going anywhere unless a real person-to-person connection exists. Today I am going to offer best practices on how you can use THE REAL WORLD to build those relationships. Ok, lets go!

Number 1 – Own it! Your job is looking for a job. Take pride in your job and make sure everyone who cares about you knows you are good at it. This may not be easy. It is natural to want to hide your “unemployment.” It can be embarrassing, but you need to get over it. And you will. Do you know why? Because you are taking this sh*t seriously. The situation is as it is for reasons mostly out of your control, and those that were in your control have taught you a lesson. You are a better person today than you were a month ago. You are a better employee now than you were in your last job. You are a f*cking rockstar looking for a stage.

Number 2 – Stay disciplined. Disciplined people with good habits are better employees than those without. Heck, disciplined people with good habits are generally better people. Get out of bed early. Do your chores. Make your bed. This applies to your search too. Keep a notebook (I use a word doc). Write down every conversation you have, with whom, when, what was discussed, whether it was email or in person, and what are the follow ups. Return to this list every week and reach out with deliverables, reminders, and warm wishes. Be strategic and polite, but don’t fear sending a bump up. Even people who love you will forget occasionally. Discipline will keep you in their thoughts. And if you should accidentally over do it, they’ll let you know and you’ll be a little smarter.

Number 3 – Be prepared. As you meet new people, you will be sharing your story. But no one other than a recruiter or hiring manager wants to sift through your too-long resume. Have a list of 5-10 short bullets that sum up your story and can be inserted into every email that its appropriate. Next, print (and carry!) personal business cards. Sure, we don’t officially need them in the smart phone era, but a card placed in a new connection’s hand is a physical reminder of the conversation and may lead to a slot on their to-do list. Finally, understand that different audiences have different needs and prepare multiple versions of your resume. An internal recruiter may want to see that you are an expert in specific platforms, but his or her hiring manager will likely prefer that you can manage teams irrespective of platform.

Number 4 – Say yes. You never know where you will meet the person who is going to lead you to the next opportunity. But you do know that you won’t meet anyone while hiding. Learn to say yes to every invitation you receive. Go to that wine night at your gym, the social gathering at the kid’s school, or enroll in a boot camp (get fit and meet new people). Do you have old friends with whom you mean to connect but never do? Well, this is the time. Can you do one new thing a week? Great, now do lots more. Set a goal of five events each week where you can have a conversation and build your audience. This is your job. Are you good at your job? Yes. Yes, you are.

Number 5 – Seek connections with people you admire. Look within your network and find the people who work for firms you like, are good at building audience, or lead exemplary careers. Pay attention to them. Learn how they succeed, but also how you can get their attention. Reach out, tell your story, be vulnerable. Ask for help. I once read that a young JFK discovered that asking for favors achieved better support than doing favors. Get people you admire to invest in you. While you are doing this, don’t forget to look under rocks. Some of the most valuable relationships you build are with those in the same boat. Seek out other searchers. Share ideas and experiences. Show them love.

Number 6 – Use your time. It may feel like you lose a lot when you lose a job. It may feel like you don’t have much when you are unemployed. But you know what? You have been given something wonderful. Time. Now make the best of it. You have the luxury now to go to the gym more, lose weight, spend more time at your children’s school, read more books – a lot more books. If you aren’t using the extra time in ways that make you fantastically better, then you need to figure out why. Maybe you can use this extra time in therapy.

And finally, stay frickin’ positive. People are attracted to enthusiasm. Looking for work isn’t a pleasant job, but if you can find a way to love it, take advantage of the perks it offers, and use the opportunity to make yourself better, then the people who can help you will want you in their orbit. Remember, your job is audience – not applications. Applications almost never lead anywhere. Audience is filled with opportunity.

My best LinkedIn job-search secrets! (4/5)

Curt ConklinLeave a comment

I started my new career search in earnest seven months ago. I have learned that opportunities for senior managers are hard to find – even for terrific ones like me! But that’s not the only thing I have learned. Today, I am going to drop some of that wisdom with my best practices for using LinkedIn as a job search tool. Ready? OK, let’s go.

Best Practice 1) Only apply for positions within firms where you have a first level connection. As easy as it is, searching for open positions that match your title and salary needs will not work. Instead, start with your first level connections and look for openings in their companies OR find companies you like and see if you have there a first level-connection – or a second level connection that can be promoted to first level.

Note: For LinkedIn beginners, here are some definitions. A first level connection is a direct contact, such as a friend or colleague. They are your main supporters. You may not know a second level connection, but your first level connection does—ask for introductions to expand your network. A hiring manager has an open position they need to fill and makes the final decision. An internal recruiter works with the hiring manager and decides who gets interviewed. These are the gatekeepers. An external recruiter … that is a subject for a whole other post!

Best Practice 1.1) At the risk of redundancy, don’t waste time submitting applications if you don’t have a first level connection. I’m not kidding! Assume that no one is going to look at your application (see my last couple posts for an explanation). Submitting applications blindly makes internal recruiters’ jobs harder, wastes your time, and – most importantly – will whittle away at your morale. I want to make sure you never think that someone looked at your application and decided you weren’t good enough. That’s not what happened. No one looked at your application. You are still awesome.

Best Practice 2) Convert your first level connections from allies into champions. Engage them with InMails (do these still exist?), messages, emails and – best of all – phone calls and face to face meetings. Discuss the company and open position. Polish and practice your case. Convince them you are a fit. Once they are 100% team YOU, ask them to forward your resume to the internal recruiter. Only then should you hit the APPLY button. Remember, if you get hired, your champion may get a referral bonus! People like bonuses.

Protip: When applying through LinkedIn, you may need to upload a resume. This process can sometimes distort the resume format, requiring manual correction of each field, particularly in the work history section. To simplify this, use a plain text version of your resume for easy copy and paste.

Best Practice 3) Post on LinkedIn. You can write about whatever you want but I recommend writing about your job search. My favorite Einstein quote (and I am not looking it up to make sure I get it right) is “If you can’t explain something simply, you don’t know it well enough.” You will get better at job searching when you can write about it in a logical and meaningful way. But again, you can write about whatever you want if the reminder that you are searching for a job is clear.

Note: You can post on LinkedIn as either a post or an article. Posts are short, have word limits, and eventually disappear. Articles are lengthy, include a title and header image, and remain on your profile. Use posts for quick thoughts, and articles for detailed content.

Best Practice 4) Post regularly. LinkedIn is quick to tell you that people are more likely to read your posts when they show up weekly. I’m not that good. I try to post every other week … ish. But I have found that having a common theme that I can return to makes it easy to write and engaging to read (hopefully?). This is my fourth post on the things I have learned about job searching during a career pivot. I’d be thrilled if you already knew that!

Best Practice 5) Post with the #OpenToWork hashtag. For whatever reason, #OpenToWork posts generate more impressions, and will elicit better responses from your network than ones without this tag. Add other tags too. Lots.

Best Practice 6) Ignore most of the responses you get from people you don’t know. There are a lot of resume-rewrite trolls out there, and they will send a nice note to everyone who uses the #OpenToWork tag. They don’t add value. There is always a downside. It’s small. Let’s move on.

Best Practice 7) When you post, be humble and demonstrate vulnerability. These things resonate with people who care about you. It may be hard to do this at first, but you will find that vulnerability is power. Let me say that again – VULNERABILITY IS POWER. Everyone has been there and when people see you turning lemons into lemonade, they get a sense of how you would handle difficult work situations.

Best Practice 8) Stay frickin’ positive! If you have read my last few posts, the inclusion of this best practice here will not be a surprise. Looking for work is a hard job, but it is your job. Do it to a level to which you can be proud and never take it personally.

Wrapping up, remember that the goal is audience, not applications. Audience leads to opportunities, ideas, and introductions. Your job is not to apply for a million jobs. Your job is to tell your story to everyone who is receptive to hearing it. This distinction will make you more successful and your path clearer. Do it for 3-5 hours every day. Don’t get upset when you don’t hear back. Make your bed. Love your kids. Smell good. Be your best you.

Next post – best practices OUTSIDE of LinkedIn! Stay tuned.

When Blind applications work (blind applications never work) (3/5)

Curt ConklinLeave a comment

In my last well-read post talked about how LinkedIn makes it easy to find and apply for open positions, sharpen resumes, and remain competitive. It may have sounded like an advertisement for LinkedIn. It was not. It was only half the story and these tools, for all their strengths and importance, will not lead to an interview or land a job. In today’s post I will describe the situation from the other side of the table – that of the recruiting manager.

Those same tools that make it easier for a searcher to pursue opportunities make it harder for an internal recruiter to do their job. A decade ago, a gate keeper would receive a few dozen (tops!) resumes for every open position. Some would be better than others, and the best ones would likely include a recommendation from a trusted colleague. Now recruiters are receiving hundreds of applications, most containing the right skills, industry experience, and polished wordsmithery. They are all good and kind of the same. As a result, many or most applications are never viewed by human eyes.

I am applying for senior manager positions and am a competitive candidate. I have great schools, interesting job experience, and a well written CV (if you disagree, please tell me!). When I first started my search, I blindly applied for hundreds of LI positions without a single request for a phone interview. Most never even merited a “no thanks.”

Note: I am using the term “blind application” to refer to an application sent through LinkedIn without a personal connection to the hiring manager or internal recruiter. In other words, I followed the “Apply Now” path to its completion and did not take addional steps to engage the company.

So what happened? Was it ageism? Tight purse strings? A system gamed against candidates? I tested these ideas by mixing things up. I tried loosening my salary expectations and metaphorically changing my hair color. I tried customizing my resume and writing cover letters. The results were the same. The evidence is not that bias is at play, but that recruiters are not looking at or responding to individual applications.

My frustrated peers recount similar stories. The market for senior managers with technology backgrounds is tough right now, and applying for unearthed positions on LinkedIn can feel like spinning tires. This is not the fault of hiring companies. They understand the cost for senior people and do not post roles for senior managers hoping to fill them with cheaper juniors. Nor is it the fault of hiring managers. With so many strong and similar applicants, they can’t look at individual applications and must rely on other methods for selecting differentiated candidates. And finally, it is not the fault of LinkedIn. LinkedIn provides great tools for both parties – even if those tools can further complicate the process.

In my next post, I will discuss strategies for leveraging these drawbacks to get past the gate keepers. In the meantime, keep working hard and don’t take any of this personally. To bastardize the words of Sgt. Phil Esterhaus from Hill Street Blues, “Let’s stay positive out there.”

Find opps & apply easily with LinkedIn – the rest is up to you (2/5)

Curt ConklinLeave a comment

As I am learning first-hand, the market for senior managers is tough right now. But am also learning what search tools work and don’t. In this post I will talk about the ways LinkedIn makes identifying and applying for positions easy – even though landing an interview is as tough as it ever was.

Note: The following is based on only my own experience. I have not verified my explanations with anyone at LinkedIn. I’m a blogger, not a journalist. We are held to very low standards. ;’ )

LinkedIn is great for helping find open positions. There are literally thousands of job postings for any search. Furthermore, if you want a job in a specific area, at a certain level, or within a salary range – there is a filter for that. And LinkedIn knows that the same job may have different titles at different companies. I am looking for chief of staff roles, and am shown senior program manager, transformation officer, and strategist roles.

LinkedIn also allows job searchers to see how they compare for a position. Click the “Am I a good fit?” button and learn if your skills match those required for the role. Then LinkedIn will guide you to add them. It will even suggest solutions when your industry isn’t a perfect match. Once you make the changes, click the button again and – boom – you have what it takes! And I expect that this is the same algorithm used by hiring managers. If LinkedIn says you are a good fit, the company will be told the same – at least from a skills and industry perspective.

LinkedIn even makes it easy to write a professional sounding resume. Take a stab at what you want to say and then ask their AI to rewrite it. This smart tool will make your resume succinct, polish the language, and eliminate any chance of typos – hopefully putting out of business the resume building trolls who comb the site looking for searching suckers.

Finally, LinkedIn makes it incredibly easy to apply for jobs. After clicking the apply now button, you will upload your actual (PDF or Word) resume and make sure everything imports correctly. Once that’s done, all you have to do is agree to terms and conditions and answer some required demographic questions. If that’s too much work, look for the positions offering “easy apply” where you the application process is just clicking one button. Can you imagine the inboxes of those hiring managers? oi!

If any of this sounds complicated, reach out and I will step you through. Maybe I’ll even make a tutorial video. With a little know-how and some practice, you can apply for a dozen positions a week, 50 a month, literally hundreds in the course of a year.

But how effective is this? In my next few posts, I will talk about the challenges associated with LinkedIn’s application process and how you can work it to your advantage.

Not written with AI!