Job Search Tips – A job search is really a sales effort. I know most people cringe when they hear that, but you may as well admit that it is true. Many things in life are sales efforts. Convincing your children to help with chores is sales. Talking your spouse into going to a movie that you want to see is sales. Presenting yourself to a decision maker in such a way as to have them offer you a job, or refer you to someone else who might, is sales.
Closely related to sales is marketing. You might look at your relationship building letter and resume as marketing, your relationship building meeting as a hybrid of marketing and sales, and your job interview as pure sales. Two things you should do when presenting yourself are to be honest and never be negative. Since we are looking at the resume, at least for this example, as marketing, let me present an example of a well known marketing campaign that might appear to be dishonest at first glance, but actually is very truthful.
Which brand of coffee is “Mountain Grown”? Folger’s, right? Everybody know that! Folgers has used that slogan and images of mountains to sell a lot of coffee. Did you know that ALL coffee is grown in the mountains? Well, it is! This is because coffee plants need to be grown in tropical or sub-tropical environments at high altitudes. Is that dishonest? Not at all, Folger’s is “Mountain Grown”. If they said that Folger’s was the only mountain grown coffee, that would be lying. It’s not their fault if coffee drinkers don’t know that everyone else’s coffee is also grown there.
I am not necessarily trying to get you to develop an achievement event that is something that everyone else in your position has done and make a big deal out of it. I just wanted to demonstrate that even when “all things are equal” there are ways to make yourself stand out. Using this technique will show that you understand the job requirement that relates to your achievement event. Think how much more you can be noticed by presenting your achievements in a proper way.