003 – DREAM JOB SEEKERS: MEET YOUR FUTURE FORMER COMPETITION

“DREAM JOB SEEKERS: 
MEET YOUR FUTURE FORMER COMPETITION”

Each week, we’ll focus on one of the 7 SIMPLE STEPS TO DREAM JOB DISCOVERY. Our objective is to provide the tools and techniques necessary to power-up, streamline and optimize your DREAM JOB DISCOVERY process. When the time is right for you to ramp up your routine, I hope that you will take advantage of the tools, best practices, counsel and community at our home base at: www.DreamJobDynamic.com. 

One of the resources I’d like to share is called our QUICK-START GUIDE to DREAM JOB DISCOVERY in 7 SIMPLE STEPS. This FREE FAST TRACK TOOL may give you all of the direction you need to set your search on a productive course. Download it here: DreamJobDynamic.com/Welcome  

Today, let’s take a quick look at that process from the perspective of your friends in the group that we call your FUTURE FORMER COMPETITION. 

The value in today’s conversation will be to learn from the most common mistakes of others enabling you to avoid the missteps of the masses. By reviewing just a few of the most common errors made by your fellow Seekers, you can benefit from their missteps. Our objective is to help you to BE YOUR BEST, NOT LIKE THE REST. 

The purpose of today’s conversation is to point out some of the most common problems your Fellow Seekers will experience. Their problems will begin when they start a new search (which they will) without preparing for the process (which they won’t).  

The best advice for powering-up your personal Career Boosting Campaign is to, just for a moment, consider the fumbles and failures of your FUTURE FORMER COMPETITION. As a group, they will fail to locate and land a Dream Job, simply due to their lack of planning.  Bottom line, THEY SUCK AT THE SEARCH! Through our ongoing conversations you will be able to avoid membership in that crowded community. 

Experts tell us that, in any challenge, whatever your goal, to find someone doing it right and duplicate their process is an excellent starting point. In this particular instance, I’d like to suggest a variation on that theme. 

We’re told that fully eighty percent (80%) of all job seekers, past and present, have NEVER HAD A DREAM JOB and DON’T KNOW HOW TO FIND ONE. With so many examples of poor job search planning, there really is a lot to learn by simply taking note of what doesn’t work. 

You may think that since the vast majority have never found a Dream Job, that finding one is impossible or at least difficult. That would be FALSE in either case.

The seemingly universal problem is not that finding a Dream Job is difficult. The problem is that most people follow traditional, poorly planned search techniques that don’t set them up for success.  

The HALLELUJAH MOMENT in your own search will come when you stop following the pack down a dead end road and start fresh with a new, more direct route to ramping up your routine. We’re going to break that process down into 7 SIMPLE STEPS. 

Now, I wouldn’t expect you to take my advice concerning JOB SEARCHING BLUNDERS simply because I’ve been there and made those mistakes myself. (Which I have.) Rather, I’d like to share with you what I’ve learned by studying the job search process for over 40 years while helping many interested Seekers step up their game and  to discover their personally perfect DREAM JOB. (Which BTW, happens to be my personal Pay it Forward Passion Project). 

As promised, one way to perfect your discovery process is to watch how others fumble theirs. We will uncover what works, by highlighting what doesn’t.  

Many of your fellow Seekers will get what may appear to be an aggressive head start by blasting out of the blocks in a rush to nowhere specific. Pushing the panic button, they will  rush off, hopefully, to find some job, without asking themselves “What’s my plan?”  

A faulty plan of attack that, for obvious reasons, doesn’t generally lead to DREAM JOB DISCOVERY is: “Find a paycheck, right now!” If your only objective is to find a paycheck, the odds are actually in your favor, as long as you’ll be satisfied with ANOTHER JOB, just like THE OTHER JOB, that you LOST, LEFT or can’t wait to LEAVEbehind. 

That’s precisely why were told that 80% of all working humans: 

• Have never had a DREAM JOB.
• Don’t know how to find one. 
• Don’t expect to get one. 

Before you begin your search, the first critical point to address begins with planning (which is different than hoping) to land a DREAM JOB. It’s a point your F.F.C.s will blow right by. They will miss a critical PREP STEP that we’ll discuss in an upcoming session. We call it simple STEP # 1 – DEFINING YOUR WHY!  

An observation to keep in mind, in the words of Winston Churchill, “Failing to plan, DREAMER, is planning to fail.” Following the lead of your fellow seekers, by pushing the PANIC BUTTON and launching  a search without a plan or a prayer is not a recipe for success, regardless of your objective.  

Back to DEFINING YOUR WHY, DREAM JOB DISCOVERY requires taking a moment before you launch your search to do a quick PREP CHECK, a little DEJA VU all about you, if you will. While defining your why will test your memory, it is, in fact, a test where you and only you already have all the answers. 

The details that we will discuss and your FUTURE FORMER COMPETITION won’t, will prepare you to articulate first for yourself and later for your DREAM JOB BOSS, exactly WHO you are. WHAT you do and WHY you do it. That’s your WHY.

Launching a Job Search without knowing WHY is the reason, for most Seekers, the job search process becomes distressing and depressing. (Which it doesn’t need to be.) So, WHY ask WHY in the first place? Let me answer that question with another question: 

• SIMPLE QUESTION: HOW can you possibly expect to know WHERE you want to work, WHO you want to work with and WHAT you want to do when you get there, if you don’t first know WHY you’re looking in the first place? 

• SIMPLE ANSWER: YOU CAN’T. That’s WHY our conversation needs to begin at STEP 1-DEFINING YOUR WHY!

As I mentioned,with four decades of thinkin’ like a Boss under my belt, I can tell you one thing for certain. The best results will be acheived when you take a moment to look in your own Career-View Mirror for a  simple personal history review. 

Most of your fellow Seekers will fire up their search, while paying little attention to the planning part. I think it’s a pretty safe bet that they won’t benefit from this planning session, since like Elvis, they’ve already LEFT THE BUILDING. 

Once they decide that a new job is their immediate short term goal, experts tell us that your fellow Seekers will polish up an old resume (poorly) and head out to hang all of their hopes on the nearest Internet Job Board. 

Not to worry, because even if they get there first, your fellow Seekers will not know how to maximize their potential on those Job Boards (Which you will.) 

More importantly, when you enter the game, you will be prepared to stand out on any Job Board. At the same time it’s important to know that at least  80% of all job opportunities are never advertised and never, ever posted to any Job Board. That’s just one more point that you know and they won’t, because they skipped the first four of our simple prep steps: 

• STEP 1- DEFINING YOUR WHY
• STEP 2 – INTRODUCING YOU
• STEP 3 – YOUR SECRET SAUCE
• STEP 4 – YOUR RESUME TO REMEMBER

I can tell you that when we do get to PREP STEP # 5-YOUR LASER FOCUSED SEARCH, we’ll discuss the simple strategy to stand out from the crowd in any Job Board Search Engine. More importantly, also in STEP 5, we’ll break down the process to get LASER FOCUSED on the jobs outside of the JOB BOARD LOTTERY which includes at least four times as many opportunities, immediately available and hidden in plain site. 

Doing the math and by considering a much larger list of openings, your future DREAM JOB BOSS is likely to be waiting in that expanded collection. You need to know that their companies will be geared up and anxious to to fill an available position with your name on it and would hire you, right this minute, if the could find you. So, let’s continue the PREP PROCESS to MAKE YOU DISCOVERABLE.  

Now, let’s get back to a walk up the PREP STEPS in the order that your fellow Seekers will fumble them. We talked about how your friends will skip over critical planning STEP 1-DEFINING YOUR WHY. Now let’s take a quick look at STEPS 2 & 3.  

STEP 2 is called INTRODUCING YOU.  It is a simple lesson in common courtesey and I think, common sense. Imagine what would happen if you had an opportunity to connect with a potential employer or their Gatekeepers charged with keeping the rif-raf out of the office. 

What kind of a reception do you think you would receive if you walked up to either person, slammed your resume on the desk and demanded to know “How do you like me so far!” OK, that’s a little extreme, but to the point, don’t you think if you first walked up and politely introduced yourself, you may make a better first impression? 

In INTRODUCING YOU, we’ll talk about the importance and the specific content necessary, KEYWORDS, SIZE, SHAPE AND ALL to create a killer LETTER OF INTRODUCTION. Knowing that most of your fellow Seekers will skip an introduction, your letter will automatically stand out in a crowded pile of applicants. 

Since a letter, while proper and effective, isn’t necessarily seen as mandatory, you can think of a well crafted letter as extra credit. If you don’t include a letter, you’ll look like  most everyone else. No harm, no foul. By crafting a short, half page greeting, you have the opportunity to speak to a Screener in your own voice. It allows you to interject personality, which is missing in most of the cookie cutter resumes that they have ahead of them that day. 

STEP-3 which will absolutely be overlooked by even your most well prepared competition, I call simply “YOUR SECRET SAUCE!” I’m going to leave that secret to another day, but I can promise you, it is a game changer. This detail is an attention getter. 

It may even have the Gatekeepers of the world forwarding your presentation directly to the inboxes of their organization’s Decision Maker that will then be in the running for you to choose them as your next DREAM JOB BOSS. After all, our primary goal, this time around, is for you to be the DECISION MAKER in your own career story.

If you’ve been wondering when the subject of your resume would come up, that would be after the first three prep steps. At that point, once you get to PREP STEP #4-YOUR RESUME TO REMEMBER we’ll talk about rethinking your career story. By revamping and fine tuning your presentation, you will be set up to capture the attention of Resume Screeners and (believe it or not), even the computerized APPLICANT TRACKING SYSTEMS (A.T.S.) of the world. An A.T.S., as they are known, is a nice name for the computers in a Job Board that while sorting and selecting resumes for future consideration, will reject 95% or more of all resumes in a Nano-second.  

I won’t bore you with the failings of your FUTURE FORMER COMPETITION in this resume prep step, but be certain that they will fumble this process as well. They will likely edit an old resume, while including way too much of the wrong information. 

Here’s a clue, however, the key to a noteworthy resume begins with two directives: 

1. DO NOT TELL THEM WHAT YOU “DID”! 
2. DO TELL THEM WHAT YOU “ACCOMPLISHED” AND HOW YOU MADE A “DIFFERENCE”!

In STEP 4, we’ll also talk about KEY WORDS & KEY WORD PHRASES, the importance of BULLET POINTS, WHITE SPACE and THE PROPER LENGTH. We’ll also talk about how to know what details are important to specific employers and where to find them. That will roll us into STEP 5-YOUR LASER FOCUSED SEARCHwhich is where we started today’s conversation. 

When you get to the actual STEP 5 discussion, we’ll quickly unpack your LASER FOCUSED SEARCH to highlight the search tools and techniques that your fellow Seekers will fail to consider. We’ll talk about: 

1. How to find the 80% of all jobs that are never posted or advertised. 
2. You’ll learn how to not only find potential Dream Organizations, but how to discover what they need you to know about them.
3. You’ll learn how to connect with individuals inside your target companies who can introduce you to the Boss. 
4. We’ll also demonstrate how to identify and even connect with the decision makers directly in your choice of companies. 

STEP 6 is the main event, I like to call INTERVIEWING YOUR DREAM JOB BOSS, an intentional plan to allow you to influence a conversation in your favor. By adding more value to the conversation, through your own questions, your interviewer will be pleased and impressed by your preparation. 

By mastering the ability to define your WHY and to present it articulatly. In a face to face conversation with an Interviewer, you will enter from a position of power. Your confidence through preparation will actually allow you to direct the tone of the interview. 

Even the most experienced interviewers will have a tendancy to shift into auto-interview mode by rolling into a standard Question and Answer routine. Bringing your own curiosity and research about their company to the table will be a motivation for the interviewer to spend more time with you. As they respond to your questions, they will  begin to sell you on the values of their organization. 

Just a side note, your objective in an interview is to demonstrate your qualifications, while giving the employer an opportunity to answer your questions. Your questions will demonstrate that you understand their WHY and are primed and ready to meet their challenges.  

Staying true to form, your Fellow Seekers will be predisposed to fumble the interview opportunity in a big way. When we get to the discussion of WHAT TO DO IN AN INTERVIEW, you’ll see how your previous PREP STEPS will have set you up for success. 

Most Seekers will walk into an interview expecting a Pop Quiz of a Pass/No Pass exam. Your preparation will allow you to change the tone of your interview from an INQUISITION to a much more positive CONVERSATION with like minded individuals. Based on you prep, both parties will come to see your connection as a logical solution to  solving their staffing problem. WIN/WIN, again.

Your FUTURE FORMER COMPETITION, on the other hand, most of whom will never make it to the interview process, will have predictably failed at another critical PREP STEP relating to the question of WHY. Their first first hurdle will begin with an akward and unpolished presention of their own WHY. Of course it is essential for the INTERVIEWEE to be able to confidently paint a picture of WHO they are, WHAT they do (or would like to) and WHY they do it.  

The fact of the matter is that the second part of the equation, which refers to the employers WHY, as in “WHY should they care about your WHY?” Bottom line, if you or your fellow Seekers haven’t taken the time to understand what makes the employer tick, the odds of selling yourself as a valuable future asset are unlikely. 

By not going into an interview already knowing WHO they really are, WHAT they really do and the real reason that they do it, the interview is likely to be doomed to disappointment for both sides. It’s impossible to form a WIN/WIN alliance if neither party, the employer nor the applicant knows “WHO AM I TALKING TO AND WHY ARE WE HAVING THIS CONVERSATION?”

Finally, to wrap today’s rant, once you’ve nailed the interview, you may find yourself along side a small group of similarly qualified applicants, all with an eye on the same prize. You’ll be almost to the finish line, but don’t stop short. This is the point where you’re FUTURE FORMER COMPETITION earns their title. They will have put all of the cards on the table and headed for the house to sit and wait with fingers crossed, once again. 

While they are hoping and praying at home, you have one more hand to be playing. I look forward to sharing the critical STEP 7 – SEALING THE DEAL that has worked well for me and many of my CAREER BOOSTING CONNECTIONS. 

So when you’re in the mood and the time is right to ramp up your routine, let’s keep the conversation going. Use this link to Download your copy of the QUICK-START GUIDE TO DREAM JOB DISCOVERY IN 7 SIMPLE STEPS. 

The Guide is an introduction to seven critical components in your search process that will be forgotten or fumbled by most of your FUTURE FORMER COMETITION.  

Once you’ve had a chance to review the QUICK-START breakdown, please share your questions or concerns in the comment section below the blog, on our website at www.DreamJobDynamic.com or at any time, reach out to me via email: [email protected]. 

If a little one on one would be helpful, click on THIS LINK to schedule a chat about your career boosting challenges. Helping to plan your job search strategy is my personal PAY IT FORWARD passion project to share my experience. There’s nothing to buy here! 

Consider yourself invited to join in the conversation in our Dream Job Dynamic FaceBook community, where the goal is to LEARN SOMETHING & SHARE SOMETHING. Also, visit the website, where you’ll find a number of helpful and free resources. 

Finally, before you hit the GO BUTTON, I hope you’ll consider sending me a copy of your resume. I would be pleased to be give you my impression and suggestions from my Boomer Boss perspective. [email protected]. 

As I like to say, for DREAM JOB DISCOVERY, you CAN do it yourself, but you DON’T have to do it alone. I’m at your service. 

Boom that!