Last week, Jack Miller, an old friend of mine, gave me a call. Jack said to me, “I am looking for a job will you help me with my résumé?” I replied, “Sure, Jack.”
In our first meeting, Jack and I identified his skill set and what industry most likely would require someone with his background. Jack has no college, has limited work experience, and his work experience has been somewhat haphazard. However, with a little effort and some creative thought processes, we developed a good résumé and 25 target companies.
I briefed Jack on how to approach each company, and within a few days, Jack had handed off his résumé to specific people in each company. He asked for and received the business card and e-mail address of each person that he handed the résumé to. With the e-mails we set up an e-mail program where Jack could personalize a template based e-mail to each person. With this done, I told Jack to send an e-mail to each person, simply reminding the person of his résumé and that he was interested in following up when the time was right. A simple e-mail. It’s what I call a résumé touch.
Sure enough, within a few days, Jack had a call from a Company and was asked to come in for an interview. We spent about three hours going over the interview process, questions and answers about his résumé, career, and personal skill set. A week later he had the second interview, and a few days later he had the third interview and a job offer. It was for all intense purposes a successful activity. But the career hunting process does not stop there, it is a continual networking process.
Once Jack had the first interview, I told him to send another e-mail, personalized of course, to each person that he had dropped his résumé off to, and inform that person that he was in the final stages of an interview with one of his target companies, but that he was still open for further discussions should another company be interested in his services.
After Jack received the offer, I told Jack to send another e-mail to these people, and Jack asked me why. I said, “Well, you need to get multiple touches. First, half the people will believe that you don’t have another interview, you’re simply putting them into a competitive interview position and likely discount your e-mail. But over time, with multiple touches, and once you finally accept a job, they will then see all your e-mails totally different. Remember, the career process is one that you normally approach in five-year time frames.”
In other words, as I told Jack, “This first job that you’re going to get in this industry may not be the job that you wind up with in three years. But more than likely one of the other people that you sent your résumé to will be one of the people that come back to you a couple of years from now, once you’ve been trained by someone else and offer you another job. And you will have multiple contacts with them through these e-mails, so they will keep you in mind. They will see your career progress. Doubts they may have had will have gone away, and positive things that they have thought about you, your résumé, and your contacts, will be reinforced. This by the way,” as I explained to Jack, “is networking in the real world.”
When Jack finally had his job offer, I then asked him if he knew anybody else in the industry, and he said yes. I said, “Well, call them on the phone, be as discreet as you can, tell them what you can about this company you’re interviewing with, and ask them their opinion on whether or not this is a type of an offer with the type of a company you should accept.”
Jack said, “Why?” He said, “I don’t need their opinion. I can make my mind up on my own.”
I said, “Jack, again, this is networking at the highest level. These people will have an opinion and will be happy to share it. First, you may learn something at the least, and you’ll establish a new touch with these people. After you have their opinion and after you accept the job, they will believe and perhaps rightfully so, that their opinion was a part of your job decision. They will always remember that. Later, when you provide multiple additional touches to them about your job, they will act in some degree as a mentor for you.
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