Getting to The Interview Part 1

This is the first part of a 5-part series.

The accumulated layoffs of the last year have made the job market unusually competitive. As always, networking is the key, but what does "networking" even really mean? And, what do we need to do, to elevate ourselves above the competition?

I'm a career coach for the San Francisco Job Forum. There are seemingly limitless job search resources available online, but the people we help don't want to read volumes of information - quite the opposite - they want the least amount of information necessary to get their next job. That will be the goal in presenting this short series of articles - to distill the best and latest wisdom into bite-size chunks.

There's a lot to cover so we'll break it down into 5 parts:

1. Know What You Want, and Who Will Help You <- this installment
2. Build Your Team of Advocates
3. How To Approach Companies Where You Have Advocates
4. How To Approach Companies Where You Do Not Have Advocates
5. Putting It All Together

The articles will focus primarily on what you need to do in 2023, up to getting an employer's attention and getting an interview scheduled.?

Part 1: Know What You Want, And Who Will Help You

In this installment, we'll prepare a first draft of your target list of companies, and we'll identify who among your contacts will help you.?

Step 1: Draft your target company criteria

Make a list of your criteria - here are some possibilities:

• Size of company
• Industry
• Location / length of commute / remote
• For profit / non-profit
• Their mission / values / leaders / culture align with your own values

Step 2: Draft your initial target company list

Listing your criteria may already have triggered ideas of places you'd like. Here are a few more sources to consider:?

• The companies your friends and family work for
• Fortune's best companies to work for (free online resource)
• The Business Times Book of Lists

The Business Times is a weekly publication available in many US cities, and they publish an annual Book of Lists in each of those cities. For example, there is the San Francisco Business Times, and each year they publish The San Francisco Book of Lists. The Book of Lists includes lists of many different subjects (I think there's a list of best local restaurants) ... AND lists of local employers! The lists include lots of related data, like location of the company, number of employees, etc. That's the kind of information we're looking for.

It also includes lists of local employers receiving Venture Capital (VC) funding. You very likely have never heard of most of these companies - they're mostly small startups - but those companies will probably use that money to hire additional employees. If you're open to working for a startup, the VC investment list might be among your best resources!

You can go to your local library to find a paper copy of your local Book of Lists, or you can purchase it here:

https://promo.bizjournals.com/bookoflists/

Step 3: Download your LinkedIn connections

1. Google "Export connections from Linkedin," then download your LinkedIn connections.
2. Import the file into MSExcel or GSheet, and sort on the employer
3. Scan the list of employers, and identify any to add to your target list

Step 4: Research your target company list

1. Check Glass Door to see what people have been saying about your target employers. Be aware that most every employer will have some people saying they're awful, and some saying that they're the best ever. Ignore the outliers at either extreme, and get a sense of what the majority are saying
2. Search Google News for the last month or year of notable headlines about the companies
3. Search LinkedIn to make sure your target companies are posting openings for the kind of jobs you can do, and that you can qualify for.
4. This research can be time-consuming, so you could restrict it to only the handful of companies you have the strongest feelings about.
5. Make note of which companies you have connections at. And you don't want any connection - you're looking for connections you feel confident will act as advocates for you - they will be willing to speak positively on your behalf.
6. For the companies where you don't have a strong advocate, move those to a separate list. Don't worry, we have a plan for those, but it's a different plan than for those where you already have strong advocates.

Step 5: Sequence your target lists of companies

• You now have two lists of target companies - the ones where you have strong advocates, and the ones where you do not
• Rank the companies in your two lists, based on your interest in them and your criteria from Step 1.?

This isn't really a "ranking" as much as Sequencing - you want to determine which company you will go after first. It would usually make sense to put your favorite company at 1, unless they're not currently hiring but you expect them to soon, or if you feel you might not be competitive for their roles right now, but will be in the near future.

That's it for now. The next installment will focus on how to build your team of advocates (networking!), so watch for it in the next couple days.

The individual articles:

1. Know What You Want, and Who Will Help You <- this installment
2. Build Your Team of Advocates
3. How To Approach Companies Where You Have Advocates
4. How To Approach Companies Where You Do Not Have Advocates
5. Putting It All Together

#connections?#network?#career #jobsearch