Topgrading

A players are remarkably … um … inexperienced at job hunting, and they are remarkably inept at it.  And in this article I suggest easy ways to better their chances.

Who am I to make such pronouncements?  I can point to 65,000 oral case studies in which pre-screened candidates for executive jobs told me why they left a job and how they got the next job.  (I’ve interviewed 6,500 executives, with an average of 10 jobs each, so 6,500 X 10 discussions of getting jobs = 65,000.)

Actually, most of the executives I’ve interviewed were high performers who rarely sought jobs.  They were so good that former associates sought to hire them and those former associates recommended them to other hiring managers.  “I’ve never really looked for a job,” is a sentence I’ve heard hundreds of times … from A players.

C players, however, are nudged out of jobs and companies and they become masters at getting the next job.  C players also become masters at imitating A players. They’ve read many books that teach them how to make their resumes look better and how to answer interview questions.  We Topgrading professionals flush out the fakes and teach our clients how to do the same, but that’s a different topic.

In this economic downturn thousands of companies have folded and hundreds of thousands of not just underperformers but high performers, A players, are out looking for jobs. The unemployed are from every industry and I know, from emails and phone calls, that there a zillions of super sharp people out looking for work - sometimes for the first time in their career.  And I’ve coached many on how to do a better job of getting a job.

Here’s the problem: C players become masters at imitating A players; their resumes are full of hype and conceal negatives, and their interviewing behavior is well-rehearsed.  So on the surface C players look like A players.  And the poor A player who is looking for a job doesn’t know how to convey - “Hey, my resume is truthful and so is everything I say in interviews.”

Throughout their careers, A players needing a job have simply gone to their network and asked for connections to hiring managers.  That historically has been a very productive method.  “Birds of a feather …” and when A players contact their networks and say a super sharp A player they know is available … hey, job offers pop up.

Until now.  So if you have exhausted your contacts, your network, and are still unemployed, here’s what you can do:

1.   Rewrite your resume, tooting your horn. Keep it to 2 pages and list ACCOMPLISHMENTS AND SUCCESSES.  I’ve looked at hundreds of resumes since the economic slide and I see A players being TOO HUMBLE.  Don’t include much about responsibilities and don’t state your career objective (save that for the cover letter).  Don’t puff yourself up - stick to the facts.  But make it clear when YOU accomplished something and not just the team, of which you were a member.

2.   Rewrite your cover letter. Cover letters are usually boring and canned.  Speak from the heart, say what you’re looking for, but here is the key…

3.   Make it clear that your bosses in the past decade would give you rave reviews. If you have received overall performance ratings that are tops, say so.  Humble A players rarely do this - too bad because C players don’t do it for a different reason (it ain’t true that bosses gave them top ratings!).

4.   Offer to arrange personal reference calls with your former bosses (and subordinates and peers, too). Only A players CAN make such an offer and actually follow through, but again they are too humble.  In the past their network got them a job and they knew that others were singing their praises, so they were simply their usual understated self.  In this economy if you won Olympic gold medals, you’d better display them if you want to get on the team.  It frankly impresses the heck out of recruiters and hiring managers to read and hear that your former bosses would praise you and that YOU do the work of arranging the phone calls.

5.   Don’t accept low pay. In the past few months I’ve seen some companies take advantage of people they are recruiting and hiring, knowing that even A players are desperate.  Trouble is, when the economy improves, A players who KNEW they were worth more than what they were paid, leave.  Companies you would want to work for won’t try to cheat you in the short term.

SUMMARY:  If you’re an A player looking for a job, the way you can differentiate yourself from C player candidates who portray themselves as much better than they are is to toot your horn - let prospective employers know you have received consistently top performance reviews and that you are willing to arrange the phone calls to prove it.  This is the job hunting equivalent of displaying your Olympic gold medals to prove you are good … no, great!