Invincible Career - Claim your power and regain your freedom

Have you experienced one of those one-way video interviews during a job search? It can feel a little intimidating to talk into your laptop camera, knowing it’s recorded and you’re not speaking live with another human being.

I recently helped my son prepare for one of these interviews. We focused on three main strategies to ensure his readiness.

* Analyzing the job description

* Talking with current and past employees

* Preparing for this new type of interview

In this podcast episode (scroll up and hit play), I discuss each of these strategies in more detail.

By the way, I recently launched a new Introductory Coaching Call → 30 minutes of coaching for just $20! Note: this service is only available as a onetime initial call. Check it out!

I’m Larry Cornett, a Freedom Coach who works with you to optimize your career, business, and life. My mission is to help you become a more "Invincible You" so you can live your life on your terms instead of being controlled by someone else's rules. I live in Northern California near Lake Tahoe with my wife and our Great Dane.

“I’m putting in long hours and working harder than ever. Why am I not getting promoted?”

Do you know how many times I’ve heard that complaint?

Sure, working harder than your peers can get you promoted during the early years of your career. But you will soon find that what got you where you are today won’t get you where you want to be tomorrow.

Most people play checkers with their careers. They hop around the board, marching ahead, step by step, and don’t think more than one step ahead.

The game board looks similar. In the early days of your career, you and the other pieces are making the same moves—trying to get head, space by space. But you eventually find out that strategy won’t cut it.

Your career growth is limited when you behave like a checker piece on the corporate chess game board. Unfortunately, many people experience that. They think more of the same will continue to move them ahead.

* Working harder

* Working longer hours

* Taking on more work

Sadly, that is the path to stagnation and abuse. Yes, abuse. I’ve watched many people get used by their employers. Many managers love dumping work on the people who work hard, don’t complain, and never ask for raises or promotions.

So, if you want to avoid being stuck in checker mode, there are five things you must do:

* Become a valuable chess piece

* Use strategic long-term planning

* Leverage pattern recognition

* Make sacrificial moves when necessary

* Play leadership chess, too

1. Become a valuable chess piece

If you want to play chess, you must qualitatively change how you work and transform the value you deliver. Leaders don’t get promoted because they work harder than their peers. They get promoted because they think differently, add unique value, get results, and know how to make 1+1=3.

World-class chess players don’t randomly flail away moving pieces on the board. They never think one step ahead and hope things work out.

So, stop behaving like an interchangeable checker piece. In the game of checkers, every individual piece has the same capabilities (i.e., hopping one space forward). You can easily be replaced if you are a commodity with the same skills as everyone else. Heck, maybe they can even find a cheaper piece to replace you! And if they can do that, they will.

I watched that happen many times over the decades of my career. A senior employee was often replaced with a more affordable junior employee who could do the same work.

I remember an executive saying, “Why should we pay this much for a U.S. employee? I can hire three designers in country XYZ for that salary.”

A basic U.S. checker piece was often replaced with more affordable international pieces. Basic pieces were also frequently put on the inevitable layoff lists about every six months.

However, the employees who had leveled up to provide unique strategic value were never replaced. Their cost was never questioned. Instead, they were assigned the best and most challenging projects. They were the ones promoted when the review cycles rolled around every year.

I often ran into the unfortunately common belief that tenure will eventually lead to a promotion. Some employees thought they would keep moving up the career ladder if they stayed with the company long enough. I’m sorry, but higher-level promotions simply don’t work that way.

A pawn that has been with the company for 5 years—but still acts and performs like a pawn—won’t be promoted to knight simply because of tenure. Level up and transform yourself, or be stuck where you are forever.

2. Use strategic long-term planning

Professionals who end up succeeding in their careers are thinking many, many steps ahead. They aren’t simply focused on their next career move. They have a vision for where they want to be several years from now—sometimes even decades. Every move they make is intentional and sets them up for the next move and the next.

They use strategic thinking instead of scattered and mindless hopping.

One of my old colleagues and friends had a clear vision for where they wanted to end their career—as a C-level executive in a public company. Every move they made was deliberately planned to help them advance toward that goal.

* New projects

* New connection in their network

* New skills and experiences

* New domains

* New jobs with the right employers

* Seizing new opportunities when they appeared

Over the years, I watched them make smart moves until they finally did land that C-level role. It was definitely a clever game of corporate chess, not checkers.

📞 Schedule a free strategy call with me if you’d like to work on your long-term career plan.

3. Leverage pattern recognition

My grad school advisor was really into chess, and I mean really. He was an excellent player, but he was also a psychologist who researched expert players.

Great chess players have a stronger conceptual knowledge of the game and are better at recognizing familiar patterns. Similarly, successful professionals master the rules of the “corporate game” and start to recognize familiar patterns in company dynamics, organizational politics, and individual behavior.

Leveling up your corporate “chess game” beyond checkers requires deep learning of corporate rules, how organizations function, and individual motivations. The more experience you gain, the more you should start recognizing patterns and how to quickly and successfully navigate them.

4. Make sacrificial moves when necessary

With a long-term vision and strategy, you can focus on the big prize instead of being distracted by the short-term benefits. If you've ever hiked to a mountaintop, you know it's never a straight and obvious shot to get there. The nearby moves may seem counterintuitive. You move sideways. You move downslope to transfer to other trails.

For example, one job might pay more immediately, but another might set you up for later promotions and better long-term earning potential. I often discuss how this is essential in searching for your next job. How do competing employers compare in terms of factors like:

* Better leadership

* More supportive management

* More challenging projects

* Learning a new technology

* Gaining more powerful skills

* Access to talented people

* Building relationships with movers and shakers

* Creating a stronger professional reputation

You can become a more powerful piece on the professional chessboard of life instead of being stuck in checker mode forever.

5. Play leadership chess, too

If you move into leadership roles, the chess vs. checkers strategy comes into play again. It’s about recognizing that your team members are not simple checker pieces to be placed willy-nilly on the board. Each person has unique talents, experience, and goals. For example, you don’t want to treat a queen like a pawn and give that person a project that doesn’t leverage their strengths. You also don’t want to overload a pawn with a complex project far beyond their capabilities.

Additionally, playing chess means understanding that people are not interchangeable checker pieces. You must learn who to invest in retaining and growing, who will benefit from mentoring and coaching, and who isn’t playing well with the other pieces on the board. You can’t simply swap in a new person and expect them to behave and perform like everyone else.

Finally, successful leadership does require strategic vision and planning several moves ahead. You must start recognizing behavior patterns in other leaders to anticipate their next moves, plan your move, and survive the inevitable politics of playing at that level. Leaders who play the corporate game like checkers (e.g., only focused on executing the next move) don’t tend to last long.

Start playing chess

If you’re happy with your job, don’t care about promotions, and focus more on work-life balance, there’s nothing wrong with playing checkers at work. Do good work, get paid, and go home to your friends and family to enjoy your personal life.

Believe me, I get that! That’s why I left the corporate world behind in 2010 to build a lifestyle business.

However, if you are ambitious and you really want to get ahead at work, move up the career ladder, and reach your biggest goals, then learn the rules of the corporate chess game. Become more powerful and more valuable. Play strategically and be prepared for how hard your colleagues/competitors will play.

Top leadership positions become increasingly rare as you advance in the organization. Playing checkers won’t put you in those seats, but playing a clever game of corporate chess just might.

By the way, I recently refreshed my Invincible Career community and have started rebuilding it from scratch on my Discord server (instead of Slack). If you’re interested in joining a friendly, supportive community of ambitious peers, upgrade your newsletter subscription so I can send you an invitation!

I’m Larry Cornett, a Freedom Coach who works with you to optimize your career, business, and life. My mission is to help you become a more "Invincible You" so you can live your life on your terms instead of being controlled by someone else's rules. I live in Northern California near Lake Tahoe with my wife and our Great Dane.

In this episode, I share an overview of my upcoming course. Play the audio to hear my description of each of the steps below.

10 Steps to Prepare for a Successful Job Interview

* Research your target employer

* Identify their biggest problems

* Map your expertise

* Tune your resume, LinkedIn, etc.

* Find your inside champions and connections

* Prepare and rehearse

* Setting the stage

* How to crush your interview

* Follow up

* Maintain relationships

By the way, if you need some 1-on-1 coaching to help prepare for an interview, you can schedule time with me here.

As I mentioned, this article's actual content is in the podcast audio. So, scroll up and hit play to hear it.

Do you know someone who will soon interview for a new job? They might find this episode helpful! Hit the button below to share it with them.

I’m Larry Cornett, a Freedom Coach who works with you to optimize your career, business, and life. My mission is to help you become a more "Invincible You" so you can live your life on your terms instead of being controlled by someone else's rules. I live in Northern California near Lake Tahoe with my wife and our Great Dane.

No one ever said the job market was fair. That’s even more true in the current economy which has been plagued with layoff after layoff.

Now, in this race for a new job, some candidates are clearly driving race cars, while others are struggling to make it around the job search track with an underpowered engine or even a flat tire.

Why is that?

Let me play with this metaphor for a bit, starting with the diagram below. Note: I go into a lot more detail in the podcast recording. So, scroll up, hit play, and listen.

You can think of “Capability” as the engine of the race car. It includes:

* Talent

* Skills

* Knowledge

* Experience

“Drive” is one of the tires. It includes:

* Grit

* Determination

* Persistence

* Confidence

* Consistency

“Reputation” is the second tire. It includes:

* Your professional brand

* What people say about you

* What you’re known for

* Your proof

“Interview” is the third tire. It includes:

* Your job interview process

* Your interviewing skills

* Communication skills

* Presentation skills

* Questions asked

* Follow up

Finally, “Champion” is the last tire. It includes:

* Your inside champion

* Inside connections

* Inside influencers

Lighting it all up to get hired

Three of my clients and community members recently landed new jobs:

* One leveraged networking, finding an inside champion, and my 1-on-1 coaching to create a new role that hadn’t existed before. They also negotiated a higher level and a lot more compensation!

* Another used networking, my coaching, and my Career Accelerator to land a job with a former colleague that was in the “hidden job market.”

* Finally, the last person used my Career Accelerator, some of my coaching, and an inside champion to land a great new job in Silicon Valley.

Weak engine of Capability

Sometimes, your engine is underpowered for the role you’re seeking. I always encourage people to stretch themselves, but do so within reason.

Flat tire of Reputation

You may have everything else going for you, but people know you’re a pain to manage and worth with. The industry is always smaller than you think, and people talk. However, you can repair your reputation and get back in the game.

Flat tire of Drive

Grit and determination will often carry the day. But, if you lack confidence, don’t consistently put in the work, and give up too soon, you’ll find it hard to land jobs that others do.

Flat tire of the Champion

I frequently talk about the power of having an inside champion. Champions, influencers, and insiders can tip the balance of a job interview in your favor. Just ask my clients who leveraged them to land great jobs quickly! But, if your Champion tire is flat, be prepared for a long, slow crawl in the job search race.

Flat tire of the Interview

You could have everything else set up, but still bomb the interview. No champion can save you if you don’t prepare well enough. Your capabilities and reputation won’t matter if you can’t demonstrate your knowledge, experience, and wisdom while speaking with the interviewers. I don’t care how much drive you have. It won’t help if you can’t communicate well, present well, and generally interview strongly.

Winning the job search race

Light up your engine, and all four tires, and you’ll be well on your way to speeding around the track and landing your next great job!

As I said earlier, most of the content of this article is in the podcast audio. So, scroll up and hit play if you want to hear it.

I’m Larry Cornett, a Freedom Coach who works with you to optimize your career, business, and life. My mission is to help you become a more "Invincible You" so you can live your life on your terms instead of being controlled by someone else's rules. I live in Northern California near Lake Tahoe with my wife and our Great Dane.

In this podcast episode, I share a sneak peek at my recent Invincible Career Job Search workshop I hosted on April 1st.

In the previous podcast episode, when I shared a preview of the workshop, I talked quite a bit about the Connecting strategy.

In this episode, I discuss positioning (e.g., LinkedIn, resume, cover letter) a little more and then dive into the Broadcasting strategy. If you want opportunities to come your way, the professional world has to know you exist.

Enjoy!

I’m Larry Cornett, a Freedom Coach who works with you to optimize your career, business, and life. My mission is to help you take complete control of your work and life so you can become a more “Invincible You.” I live in Northern California near Lake Tahoe with my wife and our Great Dane.

In this episode, I share an overview of the presentation materials to give you a sense of the 2-hour workshop I’ll be hosting on April 1st. So, make sure to play the audio since I’m not including 2 hours of text material in this newsletter article.

➡️ “Find a Better Job Using 3 Essential Job Search Strategies”

The price for the workshop goes up again next week. So, if you're interested in joining us, grab a ticket now. Or, use the advice I share in this episode for free!

​⏰ This is the last time I will host my Invincible Career Job Search workshop this year. I won't offer it again until 2025! So, join us now or wait until then.

​Note: I record video of myself and the presentation, which I share with all the attendees after the workshop. So, if the time doesn’t work for you to join us live, you will have the homework document and the video material to use later, just like a course.

The Workshop Agenda

* Who is this Larry Cornett person?

* What’s going wrong — with your job or job search?

* Breakout discussion 💬

* My 3 essential invincible job search strategies

* All about you (so you can sell yourself for your ideal job)

* Defining your ideal job

* Defining your ideal employer

* Defining your ideal boss

* Breakout discussion 💬

* The Connecting strategy

* The Broadcasting strategy

* Breakout discussion 💬

* The Targeting strategy

* Q & A for the last 20 minutes

Play the audio for this newsletter and podcast episode to hear my description of each part of the agenda.

Win a Free Coaching Session!

​​Refer your friends to join you in this workshop, and you could win a FREE coaching session. Share the link to the workshop with your friends and ask them to provide your name when they register.

​​Winners will be determined by the total number of referrals.

* ​​First place wins a free 1-hour coaching call worth over $300!

* ​​Second place wins a free 45-min coaching call worth over $240

* ​​Third place wins a free 30-min coaching call worth over $150

I’m Larry Cornett, a Freedom Coach who can work with you to optimize your career, business, and life. My mission is to help you take complete control of your work and life so you can become a more “Invincible You.” I live in Northern California near Lake Tahoe with my wife and our Great Dane.

This is one of the worst job markets I’ve experienced in quite some time. It seems like new layoffs are being announced every day.

In this podcast episode, I talk more about what’s going on, how to tell if a layoff might be coming, what to do about it, and how to get back into the game after one happens.

I’ve linked some of my past articles you might find useful if you’re concerned about a layoff or recently went through one.

Have you ever considered starting a business to escape the stress of worrying about layoffs?

I know that sounds strange, but that’s exactly why I launched my first solopreneur business. I had just lost my job, needed to support my young family, and wanted more stability. So, I put my trust in myself instead of leaving it in the hands of a fickle employer.

If that sounds interesting to you, I'm hosting my next live workshop on how to build a lifestyle business on Feb 26th!

"Build a Lifestyle Business to Escape Your 9-5 Job"

I'll record the workshop and share the video with you later. So, if the time doesn't work for you, you'll have the workbook exercises and video to use just like a course.

Grab your ticket now, because the price goes up next week.

Would love to see you there!

Hi, I’m Larry Cornett, a Personal Coach who can work with you to optimize your career, life, or business. My mission is to help you take complete control of your work and life so you can become a more “Invincible You.” I live in Northern California near Lake Tahoe with my wife and Great Dane.

The most successful people in your industry and profession may not be better than you. They also may not be more intelligent, talented, or hardworking than you.

However, I bet they are great at something most of us usually are not:

Promoting themselves.

Of course, self-promotion isn’t enough. You do need a baseline of competence in your job.

However, I think we’ve all noticed that management will promote someone who is good enough at their job — and great at getting noticed — more often than someone who might be even better at their job, but no one is aware of them or what they do.

How did things turn out for you last year with your performance review?

* Did your boss notice and appreciate your hard work?

* Did they promote you?

* Did you receive a significant raise?

* Are you happy with the recognition you’ve received?

Or did you get passed over for a promotion this cycle? Are you frustrated with working hard and doing all the right things but don’t seem to get ahead at work?

Well, that’s why I write this newsletter and share my career advice. If you work hard and are good at what you do, you deserve to be treated well at work. That should be recognized and reflected in your compensation. I want you to be successful and happy, so I will share some advice to help you get ahead this year.

Here are five things successful people tend to do better than most. Note that 3-5 tap into the self-promotion skill.

* Focusing

* They focus passionately on being great at something.

* Helping

* They help others and generate a lot of goodwill, which encourages reciprocity.

* Networking

* They network intelligently and consistently.

* Marketing

* They’re good at capturing attention and converting it into opportunity.

* Selling

* They understand that selling is all about building relationships and solving people’s problems.

Let’s dive into each one of these in a little more detail.

Focusing

If you’re a jack-of-all-trades, becoming an expert at anything is challenging. Yes, our jobs require a wide range of knowledge, skills, and tasks, but there should always be a primary focus.

The folks who rise to the top know how to focus their time and energy on what matters the most for their job. They do everything they can to improve at that one thing (e.g., sales, writing clean code, elegant design, strategic thinking, relationship building, persuasion, writing, playing guitar, statistical analysis, research, etc.).

What is the one thing that represents excellence in your profession?

Note: this will change as you climb the career ladder. What got you to your current level will not take you to the next level.

For example, I started my tech career as a designer. Doing great design work efficiently and effectively got me promoted to more senior levels as an individual contributor.

However, as I moved into design management, my design skills were no longer what made me stand out. Effective leadership was much more important than my ability to design interfaces.

Now, this doesn’t mean you can drop the ball on the many requirements of your job beyond the “one thing.” But don’t ever prioritize those over your most important focus area. I’ve seen people do that (e.g., an engineering manager writing great code but doing a poor job of managing the team), and then they wonder why they’re no longer getting promoted.

Helping

The most successful people help other people succeed. It creates a virtuous cycle.

Rising to the top of your career ladder by climbing over the bodies of your fallen colleagues isn’t a smart strategy. I think we all know some people who have done that. But, eventually, those chickens come home to roost, and these people fail.

Industries are small, and people talk. The selfish folks soon find that no one wants to hire or work with them.

Be generous with your time and advice. Obviously, don’t overdo this to the point where your work or personal life suffers. But help when and where you can.

For example, I spent about ten years helping people with their career issues and connecting them with potential employers for free. Friends, old colleagues, and connections in my network would reach out, and we’d meet over coffee or lunch to discuss their career goals.

Fast forward ten years, and I started a career coaching business to help even more people and make it my primary focus. Many of my first clients were the same people I’d helped in the past. Many of those people referred more potential clients to me.

People like to help people! And the most successful people make it part of their lives.

Networking

Intelligent networking creates opportunities. You shouldn’t only do it when you need a new job. Thanks to my network:

* I landed every single one of my tech jobs.

* I’ve been invited to speak at events (some were paid engagements).

* I’ve been invited to participate in panels and speak on podcasts.

* People reached out to hire me for consulting engagements.

* I found talented people to hire for my teams.

* Founders and CEOs asked me to sit on their boards.

* People hired me to be their career or business coach.

* I’ve made some amazing and ambitious friends who help me grow my business.

Your network is one of your most valuable resources if you build it wisely, protect it, and nurture it. Nurturing your network means keeping it fresh with consistent contact.

* Send people interesting articles.

* Pull folks into the right conversations.

* Support each other on social media (e.g., like, comment, share).

* Send job opportunities to your acquaintances.

* Refer business to your solopreneur friends.

* Reach out to catch up over Zoom, coffee, or lunch.

* Check-in to see what folks have been up to.

The most successful people treat their network well. They balance giving and taking. They introduce good people to good people. They build communities and engage with other communities.

Marketing

Marketing did not come naturally to me, and I still struggle with it as an introvert. Most modern marketing means spending time on social media, creating videos, and writing content.

Lots and lots of content.

However, writing is the one thing I do enjoy (hence this newsletter). And it has helped me grow my business and find new clients.

The most successful people are great at marketing. They know how to capture attention and convert it into a useful opportunity. They pay attention to psychology and learn what people like. What gets clicks. What turns attention into conversion.

People in the broader industry should know who you are, what you do, and how amazing you are — beyond the walls of your employer. I always talk about how important that is. If you want to become an opportunity magnet for the best things in life, people need to be aware of your existence!

But marketing also applies inside the corporate walls. People inside your company need to know who you are, too. I know it’s hard to talk about yourself and promote yourself. It feels icky for many of us. So, don’t! Instead, talk about the work, the team, and the mission of what you’re doing.

When you promote the great work you and your colleagues are doing, the spotlight also shines on you. Smart leadership will recognize that you’re behind the work, and you’ll get a chance to show people how you think.

Promotions happen when you’re great at what you do, and the right leaders know about you. Don’t be shy!

Selling

“Oh, but I don’t work in Sales.”

Yeah, I used to think that, too. I was a designer and wanted to be left alone to do my job. I didn’t need to learn anything about sales, right?

Besides, the idea of “selling” made me feel dirty. When I was younger, I briefly held telemarketing jobs and did door-to-door sales.

I hated it.

So, for most of my early career, I deliberately avoided anything that felt like sales or marketing. What I learned later — and wished I had fully understood earlier — is that many things in life require being good at sales.

* Interviewing for a new job.

* Negotiating your job offer.

* Asking for a raise.

* Asking for a promotion.

* Selling your cool idea to management.

* Persuading coworkers that you’re right about something.

* Convincing others about a mutually beneficial opportunity.

* Launching a new business and finding your ideal customers.

The most successful people in life are pretty damn good at sales. They know what they want, they know that persuading other people is a necessary part of life and getting what they want, and they know how to do it well so everyone feels good about it.

Sales doesn’t have to be a dirty word.

What are you going to do?

If any of this sounds like something you need to work on, the question is:

What are you going to do about it?

What will you change this year to get better at these five things so you can be more successful in your career and life? It’s time to set a goal and make a plan to make it happen.

On that note, my goals workshop Achieve Success with the Invincible Goals System is coming up in less than 2 weeks! The first 25 people who use this coupon code get 25% off: N468OA

Hope to see you there!

I’m Larry Cornett, a Personal Coach who can work with you to optimize your career, life, or business. My mission is to help you take complete control of your work and life so you can become a more “Invincible You.” I live in Northern California near Lake Tahoe with my wife and Great Dane.

This year, I spent hundreds of hours researching and writing newsletter articles — and recording podcast episodes — to share with you. I listed the top 10 below.

If you found my advice and articles helpful this year and would like to support my continued writing and podcasting next year, please consider upgrading to a premium membership that also grants you access to:

* My private Invincible Career community of ambitious professionals (from entry-level to executives). Note: I now offer a lifetime community membership option for folks who aren’t crazy about subscriptions. Pay once, and I’ll invite you into my private Slack community, where you can stay for as long as you want!

* Live 1-hour workshops throughout the year. This is a value of more than $500!

* Weekly exercises delivered to your inbox to support the new monthly workshops.

* Exclusive office hours every Monday with the other premium subscribers and me.

🌲 Take advantage of my Holiday Special and save 50% when you join us before the year ends! ☃️

Your support means a lot to me. Thank you! 😊

Welcome to my December wrap-up that summarizes everything I published this calendar year.

When people ask for my advice on a career, work, leadership, or entrepreneurial topic, I can usually point them to a specific article that I’ve written on that very issue over the last four years. You may already be a loyal subscriber, but I know that it’s easy to miss something over a year.

So, enjoy this recap, and feel free to share it with friends who might find some of the advice helpful!

My Top 10 Articles

I reviewed the stats for my articles, newsletters, and podcast episodes. These ten rose to the top for the year.

* How to Create an Intentional Career Path Instead of Letting Others Determine Your Future

* How to Stop Competing and Truly Start Collaborating

* How to Get Ahead in Any Job

* Succeeding as an Introvert - Tim Yeo, Founder of The Quiet Achiever

* Find a Job by Hunting, Trapping, and Planting

* Do People Forget About You?

* Career Questions (and My Answers) that We Discussed in My Last Fireside Chat

* Are You Underpaid?

* Invincible Tip - No Unpaid Work

* Invincible Tip - How to Regain Your Confidence

You can always access my full archive of 500+ articles online and use the search feature to find topics of specific interest.

By the way, this year I shared my book chapters on my other newsletter and podcast, Invincible Life. Also, for the folks who are interested in entrepreneurship, I publish a newsletter and podcast called Invincible Solopreneurs.

Your support helps!

I’m looking forward to writing more articles, interviewing new guests, and recording new podcast episodes for you next year. If you have suggestions for topics that you’d like me to cover, please leave a comment below or send me a message.

BTW, I have no employees, interns, or even an assistant. The newsletters and podcasts are a one-person labor of love. This is my passion and how I earn a living as a solopreneur to support my family.

If you’ve found my advice helpful, and you’d like to help support my efforts to produce it, please consider subscribing to the premium weekly newsletter. Take advantage of my Holiday Special and save 50% when you join us before the year ends!

Again, this gives you access to:

* My private Invincible Career community for ongoing advice, feedback, and support. As an option, I also offer a lifetime community membership if you don’t want the monthly subscription free.

* Live 1-hour workshops throughout the year (a value of more than $500).

* Weekly exercises delivered to your inbox to prepare for the new monthly workshops.

* Exclusive office hours every Monday with the other premium subscribers and me.

Thank you for being a loyal reader this year. I appreciate your support. Enjoy your holidays!

I’m Larry Cornett, a Personal Coach who can work with you to optimize your career, life, or business. My mission is to help you take complete control of your work and life so you can become a more “Invincible You.” I live in Northern California near Lake Tahoe with my wife and Great Dane.

Why do some people hear about opportunities before you do?

* Are they that much smarter than you?

* Are they liked more than you?

* Are they better than you?

Before you get angry with me, let me say it’s probably none of the above. When this happens, it’s usually because:

* More people know who they are.

* More people see their work.

* People think about them.

But why are more people thinking of them more often? Well, the answer lies in a lesson about how memory works. The big “neural network” of your personal connections behaves much like the smaller neural network in our brains.

Two things are at work:

* Long-term potentiation

* The Priming Effect

People who are receiving more consideration and opportunities are lighting up and frequently strengthening connections between nodes in their network. Let me be nerdy for a minute and remind you of the neuroscience you probably learned in high school.

Long-term potentiation

Long-term potentiation boosts neural pathways to facilitate the transmission of signals and the creation of long-term memories. This occurs when more activity between neurons boosts neurotransmitter production, increases receptor formation, and builds stronger synaptic connections. Yes, that is a simplified explanation, so don’t come at me if you’re a neuroscientist. 🤣

A low-frequency event triggers a weak response (e.g., posting something once in a while that someone rarely sees in their feed). This may create a short-term memory for someone, but it won’t result in a long-term memory. For example, they’ll briefly wonder what you’ve been up to but get on with the rest of their day and forget what you posted by tomorrow.

However, when high-frequency events trigger a stronger response, it changes how the memory is formed. This can happen when you consistently post content or reconnect with someone over Zoom, coffee, or lunch. In other words, someone will remember you, what you do, and what you’re seeking for a longer period of time. Several months later, they will think of you when a relevant opportunity presents itself.

So, at the individual level, interacting more frequently and deeply with the people in your network can lead to stronger memories of you. You are triggering changes in their brains.

What’s kind of cool and exciting—if you’re a nerd like me—is what then happens at a higher level across the broader network of people. You can think of each person as a neuron within a human web of connections that behaves like a neural network.

You are more strongly connected to some people than others. The intensity of that connection matters, of course. You have a deeper bond with your close friends and family than with your coworkers (I hope!). The frequency of interaction affects the connections, too. You will forge a stronger relationship with people you work with every day vs. an old college roommate you haven’t talked with in over 20 years.

Stimulating activity in one person (e.g., mentioning that you’re looking for a new job during a coffee chat with a friend) can pass that information through their network to more nodes (i.e., people). The more frequently people are thinking and talking about you, the more often your name will come up when exciting opportunities arise.

For example, Susan tells Bob that she’s struggling to find a great design manager for her team. Bob says, “Oh really? I know a talented manager who might be looking for a role like that. Let me send you their LinkedIn profile and tell me what you think. I can make an introduction later if you like.”

The more you interact with people, the more powerful your network becomes. Relationships grow stronger and more valuable. More people light up in that web of connections, and those people have their own networks that now link to yours.

Conversely, when you let your network connections go stale, people forget about you. I know this can happen when you’re busy with work and life. But it has an undesirable impact on your career and future potential.

You will not be in the consideration set when someone is looking for:

* Someone to hire into their organization.

* A person to recommend for a friend’s new role.

* A speaker for an event or panel.

* A partner to help them with a workshop.

* A service provider for a potential client.

This might be upsetting, but you can’t really blame anyone. We are all busy with hectic lives at work and at home. If you haven’t been doing anything to stay fresh and relevant in someone’s mind, it’s no wonder they remember someone else who has been keeping more active.

If you want people to think about you, periodically strengthen connections with folks in your existing network. Make a list of folks to reach out to every week and month. Schedule a bit of time to make sure it happens.

Be authentic and make a genuine effort to reconnect. Don’t be that person who only reaches out when you need a favor. Don’t lead with, “Hey good buddy, how ya doing? I’m looking for a new job. Do you know anyone who is hiring?”

One great way to strengthen your relationships with people is to express gratitude (Happy Thanksgiving, by the way!). I know I’ve talked about this before, but how often do you do it? For example:

* Let a past colleague know you were thinking about them and remember how much you enjoyed working together at company ABC.

* Tell a coworker that you remember how much they helped you with Project XYZ and that you still appreciate that.

* Reconnect with an old boss who looked out for you (e.g., “Hey, I don’t think I ever thanked you for being such a great boss. You really took care of us, and I learned a lot from you. Just wanted to say thanks!”).

* Reach out to someone you met at a conference who made an impression on you with their talk.

Build new connections so thoughts of you transmit more readily throughout the broader network. Your close friends and colleagues probably have a lot of overlap with your network. So, if you want to expand and meet new people, you have to seek out folks you don’t see all the time.

However, there is another factor at work when people think of someone’s name when an opportunity comes up. It’s almost as if they’ve been primed to remember them…

Priming Effect

I want you to visualize chopped carrots, fresh peas, diced potatoes, and cubed chicken. Now, fill in the blank letter in this word:

S O _ P

What word did you complete? You most likely came up with SOUP instead of SOAP unless you use a very strange kind of soap for your showers.

Scientists have described priming effects as “a sort of rational bias, where the mind interprets ambiguous new perceptual information in a way that is consistent with information it has recently perceived.”

You can use this psychological bias to your advantage. When you frequently prime others with your name, who you are, and what you know and do well, it can stimulate faster recall of you later when appropriate opportunities arise.

* Who is the best mobile app designer you know?

* Who knows sales better than anyone else?

* Who should I talk to about the future of AI?

* Our marketing is not going so well. Who could help us?

* I need help to find a new job. Do you know someone who can coach me?

For example, I’ve worked hard for the past seven years to write hundreds of articles and thousands of posts on social media to build awareness of my coaching. So, I’ve had people tell me they think of my name when someone says they need “career coaching.” And now people are thinking of me when they hear the term “lifestyle business.”

Great! That is intentional.

I didn’t accidentally create this priming effect between my name and coaching. I deliberately built it with a consistent habit of writing about careers, leadership, job searching, and solopreneurship. Every week, I add more content to the internet to strengthen the word associations I want.

The more specific your niche is, the better your chances are for dominating it. For example, I don’t even try to be known for general coaching, leadership, or entrepreneurship. There are way too many players already in those spaces and people with bigger names than mine. Instead, I’ve focused on making a name around helping tech professionals create invincible careers. I’m also building a name for helping mid-to-late career folks design sustainable lifestyle businesses when they’re frustrated with their jobs and ready to escape the 9-5.

So…

* What do you want to be known for?

* What do you actively do to strengthen that association with your name?

* How do you reinforce that priming effect every day?

* How many people think of you that way?

* How many people talk about you when those words come up in a conversation?

You can—and should—intentionally invest time and energy in linking your identity to the roles you desire, skills you’ve mastered, and outcomes you want to be known for producing. It’s great if your inner circle of peers, coworkers, and managers knows all about you. But, one day, you’ll be in the job market, and you will want people to seek you out because you are known for what they need.

Leverage that priming effect so your name comes up in those conversations.

By the way, do you want to expand your professional network? Check out my career community!

I’m Larry Cornett, a success coach who can work with you to optimize your career, life, or business. My mission is to help you take complete control of your work and life so you can become a more “Invincible You.” I live in Northern California near Lake Tahoe with my wife and Great Dane.