Job Seekers

Add a SWOT Analysis to Your Job Search

by Larry Goldsmith on August 3, 2010

By Larry Goldsmith, CWDP, P.E.T.

A SWOT analysis is a powerful strategic planning tool used by businesses to identify their Strengths and Weaknesses, and to examine the Opportunities and Threats that menace them.  Businesses use this method to look at themselves, both internally and externally, to uncover opportunities (or challenges) which in turn they can profit from.

The same SWOT formula will work in a job search context as well.  A job seeker that takes a step back to analyze their position before jumping into the thick of things will find they can apply a strategic approach to their job search that will distinguish themselves from other job seekers.

We’ve created a SWOT ANALYSIS CHART for you.  See if you can identify the Strengths and Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats that may affect your search.  Consider these points to help you get underway. {A SWOT Analysis should be applied to each position you apply.}

Strengths in a SWOT Analysis are qualities of the job seeker that are considered important in the implementation of a job search.  Strengths might be hands-on experience, education, a strong history of achievements, special skills such as bilingual, or soft skills.

Weaknesses in a SWOT Analysis are factors that could prevent the accomplishment of a successful job search.  Examples might be the lack of a degree, limited experiences, poor communication skills or a lack of technical qualifications.  These weaknesses may derail your search without you being aware even before your search begins.

Opportunities in the SWOT analysis process are those external elements that will prove useful and provide you access leading to a successful job search.  Factors here may be a networking contact, specialize and atypical training, transferable skills or a time when you volunteered or interned. These opportunities will give you an attractive added value when view by the employer.

Threats is the fourth component of the SWOT Analysis process.  These are external factors that pose a threat to the success of your job search. Examples may be education and training that occurred a long time ago, work history that is obsolete or negative mark from your past on your résumé.

The fundamental purpose of completing a SWOT Analysis as part of your job search strategic planning is to understand what features of your job search will positively help you and what which ones will harm you.  [The theory behind this is the same as my interview philosophy.  There is only one difficult interview question.  It is the one question that you did not anticipate (ahead of time) and iron out (rehearse) the correct answer prior to sitting down in the interview chair.]

A job seeker does not always need a posted position to conduct an effective job search.  You may find by having a better grasp of what talents you bring to the table (as well as your barriers), you will be able seek out your own competitive advantages.  Pursue your own opportunities based your strengths and opportunities while minimizing your weaknesses and threats.

Think of yourself as an organization and plan your job search like one.  SWOT ANALYSIS VIDEO

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Theater Call for All Job Seekers

by Larry Goldsmith on June 18, 2010

By Larry Goldsmith, CWDP, P.E.T.

Job seekers should consider enrolling in Theater 101.  Exploring the mechanics of how to create a scene for a stage play offers unexpected rewards in upgrading your job search skills. What is a stage play but a series of activities design to engage an audience.  The audience is not told the outcome of a scene.  They are subject to storytelling through the use of staged activities. A successful playwright leaves the audience to think about the outcome and its implications and consequences.  An effective playwright uses actors to illustrate a storyline in the anticipation that the audience will leave the theater with an affirmative experience. 

Just like the audience leaving a theater, it is hoped too by the job seeker that the employer will have a positive experience from the job search encounter as well.  What if you approached your job search from the perspective of a playwright?   Every activity (telephone call, a networking event or an interview) is approached as a scene in a stage play.  Think of each of these scenes with their own beginning and ending. 

Job search is not “improv”.    Start by preparing a script on making a cold call to a potential employer.  Most importantly, your central point, is remaining true to yourself, your capabilities and future potential.  Your purpose is to prepare and present your case.   Think what are you trying to accomplish?    

  1. Write a general scenario. [Illustrate your purpose through a picture created with words.]
  2. Prepare a script [Define the call in your own words.  Compare and contrast available alternatives.]
  3. Visualize the essential elements of your scene set [desk, mirror, résumé, script]
  4. Create a storyboard like in a cartoon script [sketch your movements]
  5. Work your script [Define call in your own words / Compare and contrast available alternatives.]
  6. Walk through your script for wording [Verbalize the scene to develop your rhythm, intonation  and choice of words.]
  7. Block your scene [Blocking is your play by play.] 
  8. Rehearse your scene until you feel comfortable.

Perhaps the most exciting component of writing your scene will be that the actual telephone call or networking experience is not a surprise. You will find by working on staging your search interactions with employers that you are more in control over your job search.  You’ve already had the rehearsal dinner.  You worked out your kinks.  You have a script.  You know want is coming.  You analyzed assumptions and have alternative solutions to their responses.  You are prepared.

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For Successful Networking Outcomes – Think Backwards

by Larry Goldsmith on June 1, 2010

By Larry Goldsmith, CWDP, P.E.T.

In the context of job search, networking is the process of communication that consists of using contacts and relationships (oftentimes a third party) to gain access to decision makers in the hiring process.

Historically, in the job search preparation stage, job seekers have been instructed to create and rehearse a brief networking (elevator) speech.  The original label of elevator speech comes from the situation when a salesperson is in an elevator, and low and behold who walks in but the purchasing agent they have been trying to make contact with for the past couple of weeks.  The salesperson has no more than 30 seconds to speak up before the door reopens and the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity steps off the elevator.

While, a prepared elevator speech is essential to clear and effective networking; you are not always in an elevator, so think backwards.  It is not about you.  Give attention to the broader issue of networking.  The first obstacle you must overcome is to actually gain the other party’s attention.  Sales professionals will tell you that you cannot make a sale until you know the barriers you face.   The elevator speech that you have worked so diligently on is actually your number two speech.

An elevator speech is show and tell.  Your number one goal is not to show and tell.  If you don’t know what to show and tell, your elevator speech will not be effective.  This initial contact is the time for asking questions and active listening.  Your goal is to get the employer to commit to something or give you an angle about themselves or their organization.  Start with targeted questions.  In the course of this conversation your questions should be directed to identifying the type of employee the company is interested in, the skills and personality or behavior traits they seek and even the barriers or challenges the company faces that may be their Achilles heel.  Only when you have this information can you offer an effective elevator speech.   You have turned the table and given them something to talk about that is of interest to them and you have earned their attention.

Start thinking backwards today.  Create two networking (elevator) speeches.  The first is to open the door.  The second is to sell your talents.

NETWORKING ELEVATOR SPEECH WORKSHEET

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Is There Such a Thing as an Isolated Job Search Experience?

by Larry Goldsmith on April 17, 2010

By Larry Goldsmith, CWDP, P.E.T.

Does it sometimes feel that as if you are in the world described by the 1999 Matrix movie where humans are living in an artificial world and that the world is not quite what it seems to be and a menacing conspiracy is at work against you?  How do you unplug from the matrix and bring logic to your job search and life?

For whatever reason this thought came to mind as I prepare my final lecture for the semester.  What final wisdom can I leave my students? We have been together already (online) for 12 weeks.  {SLS 1301 Career and Life Planning}  The measured outcomes for this course are based on a student’s ability to identify aptitudes, interests, values and personality as related to their career decision-making and their personal life.

First I like to ‘ring a bell’ and remind my students to view their instructor (and other authoritarian figures) not as the sage on the stage but rather their guide on the side?  Greater longer lasting success is achieved in the classroom when education becomes student centered which translates to where students are given tools and hands-on experiences and taught to think by analyzing, reasoning and synthesizing to develop their own learning.  This is in contrast to where in the old days that we as teachers lectured and students were led to believe that the words and wisdom of the instructor is omnipotent.   (This approach would be considered instructor-centered teaching.)

I am thinking of closing this semester with the thought that a job search is not an isolated experience. All that my students learned this semester has a connection, not only to each of their assignments, but to that which they do on a daily basis as well as prior life experiences (like Experiential Learning).  For example, take something as simple as me going to the supermarket. It is not just about me going to the grocery store to purchase food.  To go to the store I have to consider whom am I cooking for this week?  Am I the only cook or will Lori be cooking this week too?  Will Lori’s mother be with us at dinner?  Are their health issues that we have to consider?  How can the food we purchase help us be healthier and live longer?  (Darn my parents!  Why did they make me leave a clean plate?) What is my work schedule?  What is Lori’s schedule?   And what about other experiences such as three weeks ago when Lori cooked a vegan lasagna that was actually good, for not having any meat.  (Do you understanding where I am going?  Do get my point?  If I was thinking of Lori’s lasagna for three weeks, how could it be an isolated experience if it was still in my thoughts?  Giving time I could bring in many more examples that a simple visit to the super market is not an isolated experience.

This premise that there is no such thing as ‘isolated’ holds true for the job search experience as well.  Like my supermarket trip there is more involved in a job search than only the specific event.  This is the message that I imparted last week when I spoke to c-level executives at the local workforce program and afterwards to ‘soon-be-graduates of our Honor College.  I like my students, with this final lecture, to understand that a job search is really a series of staged opportunities waiting for a successful experience to occur.  {Here are activities that could become staged opportunities; distributing a résumé, delivering a 30 – 45 seconds selling (elevator) speech, attending a networking business event, sitting for an interview, canvassing and cold calling, making a telephone sales call, or responding to an employer’s objections.}

Each of these activities is an event by itself.  How my students go about to achieve success in these activities now or following graduation is directly related to everything they have done in life to this point.  What they learned in their fifth grade writing class set a foundation for their résumé, or a high school speech class gave preparation for building networking skills, past work history establishing an employer’s attitude about their work expectations, or possibly accomplishments and achievements in other areas such as being a member of an association will have consider impact on what happens to them now in their job search and planning a career.   So to say a job search is an isolated experience is just not so.

I will share with my students that to be successful today, they must be mindful of all of their choices and decisions as they move through life if they want to boost their personal performance for improving job search effectiveness.  The message is to do their best, no matter.  Build success by doing everything well, whenever and wherever.  To be effective, they must keep in mind that their success is an accumulation of all their prior experiences and training that have led to this opportunity.

So where am I in preparing my final lecture?  Should the topic be, that there can not be an isolated job search (or life plan) experience?  Everything is connected.  Or maybe for now, I will just encourage my students to build a plan drawing from what learned in this course.  Write it down.   This makes it real.  Let this plan give you direction.

I have two weeks to decide.

Here’s my personal plan.  Use it to develop your own career and life map.

  1. Define Yourself.
  2. Follow a Plan. Write it down.
  3. Retrain.  Don’t let your education and time pass you by.
  4. Stay Informed in your field or where you want to go.
  5. Get Involved.  Talk to people.
  6. Stage your opportunities.
  7. Keep in the Line of Sight of Decision-makers.
  8. Measure everything – You don’t manage what you don’t measure.
  9. Job Search – Ready Aim Fire

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Long Live Objections! Objections are gateways that lead to successful networking experiences!

March 28, 2010

By Larry Goldsmith, CWDP, P.E.T. The reason that many job seekers do not secure an interview through networking may be that they approach the networking experience more as an  introduction rather than a closing.  I am talking about a closing like in securing a signature on a purchase contract.  Many networking experiences end in “Thank you, I’ll hold on to that information” [...]

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A Job Search is defined by place, period, and people.

March 10, 2010

By Larry Goldsmith, CWDP, P.E.T. [When hires do not produce positive results, the costs are Thousands of dollars, Upset customers and Loss productivity to an organization.  Business success is all about Good Hires/Bad Hire.  Employers ask, “What can this candidate do for me?".   Job seekers must think, "What can I do for this employer?"] Future Blogs on [...]

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Strawberry Shake or Strawberry Pie with Whip Cream?

March 5, 2010

By Larry Goldsmith, CWDP, P.E.T. It is Spring Break and Larry’s on the move.  This time we have a double plan.   The first plan is that you will find me speaking in Plant City, Florida offering tips on  Effective Job Search Strategies, (Bruton Memorial Library Presentation).  Plan two is that I am in Plant City, Florida during its annual Strawberry Festival [...]

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A successful networking speech is understanding the difference between marketing and sales

February 23, 2010

A successful networking speech is understanding the difference between marketing and sales By Larry Goldsmith, CWDP, P.E.T. The purpose of networking when seeking a job is to secure an appointment for an interview.  This is literally the same as walking away with a signed contract at a sale.  Most job seekers think they are selling [...]

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While many position openings are advertised; many more are not.

November 29, 2009

By Larry Goldsmith, CWDP, P.E.T. Employment Opportunities Do Exist. Keep in mind that Jobs are created by a number of factors.  In one circumstance, a job is created when an employee retires and an opening is created.  Other conditions that can lead to the development of a new job can include: a newly-acquired project maternity [...]

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Why Do I Need More Than One Résumé?

November 20, 2009

By Larry Goldsmith, CWDP, P.E.T. Do I Need More than One Résumé? Because no two jobs are really the same, you need more than one résumé. You may “get by” with one résumé if you are applying for the same occupational title each time. But even in this example, you should tweak your résumé to match [...]

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