How To
Get A Job You're Not Qualified For
Liz Ryan Influencer
24
de jan de 2015
Several years ago we met Margaret, who was very unhappy. Margaret came
to an event where I was speaking, and chatted with us afterward.
"I interviewed for a Marketing Manager job," said Margaret.
"I had every single qualification listed in the job ad. I met with each of
the two company founders, one after the other. Both of them were very
distracted when I talked with them.
"I wasn't that optimistic when I left the interview," said
Margaret. "I could hardly keep the second founder's attention when I was
explaining my background. I went home figuring I didn't have a great chance at
getting the job. I got a short 'no thank you' email message, but then you won't
believe what happened!"
"What happened?" we asked.
"A guy I know of got the job. I don't know him, but I know who he
is. His name is Doug. He's my boyfriend's younger sister's ex. My boyfriend's
sister Trish ran into Doug at the mall, and he told her he got the Marketing
Manager job at Angry Chocolates. I know Doug's background. He isn't the
slightest bit qualified!"
We listened intently to Margaret. "This Doug is the guy," we
realized.
"Doug is the guy we'll help our clients to become!"
We dug in and developed the Whole Person Job Search approach that we
teach today. We wanted to teach job-seekers how to be Doug -- how to spot the
real Business Pain that is seldom if ever mentioned in the job ad, and then how
to address it.
How did Doug get the job when he had none of the qualifications listed
in the job ad? Doug wrote a compelling letter, first. That's how he got the
founders' attention and got an interview. Now we teach people how to write Pain Letters.
What did Doug do once his interview was scheduled? He went to the job
interview. He didn't talk about how he met each of the requirements on the job
ad. Doug had none of the qualifications that the job supposedly required.
That's okay!
Doug asked questions. He asked probing questions to learn more about the
Business Pain facing the two founders of Angry Chocolates.
Doug realized quickly that the two founders didn't need a traditional
Marketing person, even though they thought they did when they wrote the job ad.
By asking questions about what was and wasn't working at Angry
Chocolates, Doug figured out that they really needed a Business Development guy
like him -- someone who could start relationships with grocery stores and other
retail chains.
Doug didn't accept the job ad as gospel. He ignored the job ad. When
you're in front of the decision-maker, why focus on a job ad that may have
zip-all to do with anything?
We can all learn from Doug. We have to realize something important:
As formal and well-planned-out as the business world may look from the
outside, in reality it's chaotic on the inside. Critical decisions often get
very little thought.
There is no reason to think that hiring managers actually know what they
need when they write job ads. When they write a job spec, they're often
throwing spaghetti at the wall to see what sticks. They may need someone
completely different than what they describe in their job ad.
That's why you can get a job you're not qualified for -- on paper. In
reality, you may be supremely well qualified for the job!
If you were an HR person like me for twenty-some years, you'd know that
the standard process for creating a new job spec is as flawed as can be.
Somebody invented a bureaucratic recruitment process back in the
nineteen-thirties or -forties, and we're still using it today. We create a new
job spec by writing down a list of Essential Requirements that somebody pulled
out of thin air. The Essential Requirements on the job ad may have nothing to
do with the actual job.
We use the faulty system we inherited because we're used to it. The tail
wags the dog!
I'm sure you've seen job ads that ask for a person with 20 years of
social media experience, six certifications and two degrees, the way I have. We
make it hard to hire people when we load up our job specs with unnecessary
requirements, but old habits die hard.
When I read delusional job ads I see a movie in my mind. It's a movie
about a poor hiring manager whose every desire in life has been so frustrated
that when the manager finally gets a little power -- the power to set his or
her hiring requirements --- the manager goes hog wild. The manager is a kid in
a candy store, then.
Let's
get someone who has a taxi driver's license and speaks ancient Greek!
That's a great idea - and let's have them tap dance and know card tricks, too!
The manager writes a job spec that describes an imaginary, magical
person who doesn't exist on this planet. A compliant HR person takes the spec
from the manager and publishes the job ad far and wide, no questions asked.
Most of us have drunk a lot of toxic lemonade that tells us the right
way to screen job candidates is to list qualifications on a job ad and then
screen people in or out based on how closely they match the bulleted
requirements.
This is an idiotic system! It turns a thoughtful, contextual human
process into a clerical exercise. It's insane -- bad for our customers, job
applicants and ultimately shareholders.
We can recruit more intelligently. We can ask better questions of our
job applicants than "How many years of PowerPoint experience do you
have?" We can ask human questions and start a real conversation. We can
see their brains working, and they can see ours.
It may take years for a majority of employers to get on board with the
Human Workplace recruiting approach, called Recruiting with a Human Voice.
That's okay! You don't have to wait that long. You can get a job you're not
remotely qualified for on paper. You can get the job without having the essential requirements listed in the
job ad.
You have to change your approach first. You have to view your job search
the way consultants view their new-client outreach efforts. First you'll develop
a Pain Hypothesis about the Business Pain most likely to be
bothering your hiring manager, and then by writing a Pain Letter that asks the
hiring manager "Would this be your pain, by chance?"
Doug used that approach, and when his interview day came he didn't sit
in the chair and answer questions like a Sheepie Job Seeker.
That's a good thing! The two founders of Angry Chocolates would have
quickly run out of questions for Doug. They didn't want to ask questions. They
wanted to know "Can you help us?"
God bless Margaret -- when she interviewed for the job she thought was a
Marketing Manager job, she wanted to answer interview questions. She wanted to
be the star pupil, getting straight As and pleasing the teacher.
Doug spun the table and asked each founder penetrating questions about
his business pain, and got hired two days after his interview.
We talked to Margaret a few years later, when she was happily employed
at another company. "Have you ever talked to that guy Doug, your
boyfriend's sister's ex-beau?" we asked.
"My boyfriend back then is my husband now, and we have an
eight-month-old baby," she said.
"How wonderful!" we said.
"I've met Doug a couple of times," said Margaret.
"I got over being resentful that he got that job I wanted, way back
when. He does Business Development, and I have no interest in doing that. It
turns out that Angry Chocolates never needed a Marketing person, but they
didn't know it, and I was too inexperienced in those days to ask the questions
that would have clued me in.
"There was one big one clue that I missed. The two founders were
very distracted when I was talking with them. They weren't tuned in, because I
wasn't talking about anything they cared about. Now I know better!"
Pesquisa,
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