How to stay competitive in the job market

My aunt worked as a telephone operator in my Pennsylvania hometown for years. As technology evolved over the years, so did her job. When she retired, her daily tasks looked nothing like they did when she started in the early 1950s thanks to changing technology and business models. 

While your work may not change as dramatically as my aunt’s job, advancements in technology and business will undoubtedly influence your career and your marketability as a job seeker. One way to guard against negative influences is to make sure your skills stay neck-and-neck with innovation.

While that may sound easy in theory, you may find it difficult to decide which trainings will be the most impactful for your long-term success. After all, you don’t want to invest in training for a system or skill that will be obsolete in a few years.  

Sanyin Siang, who just won the Marshall Goldsmith Distinguished Achievement Award for Coaching and Mentoring at Thinkers 50, told me about two avenues of learning to pursue if you want to remain competitive in the job market throughout your career.

Look at the overall workforce

One way to evaluate if something is a worthwhile learning opportunity is to see how it fits into the future of the overall workforce, said Siang, a Duke University professor.

So-called soft skills, such as communication, will become more important to nearly all employers as artificial intelligence and automation handle specific tasks, for example. The tasks may be completed by technology, but humans will need to provide their unique and irreplaceable touches.

“Imagine growing up in engineering, but not being as well versed in the creative aspects of things,” Siang told me. “In today’s workplace, the creative and engineering aspects go hand in hand.”

A 2019 report about the skills gap from the Society for Human Resource Management said 83% of people working in HR have reported difficulty hiring suitable candidates during the past year. About a third of them said one reason is that the candidates lack the right soft skills.

Ask for an evaluation

Of course, you also need to worry about your hard skills, which are unique to your job. An accountant likely needs to be familiar with specific types of tax-filing software, for example.

Siang told me that you should ask a mentor or someone you look up to in the same industry for help. Specifically, ask them what skills you need to get to the next level or land the job you want.

“Maybe their career is a year or two ahead of where you want to be,” she said. “You go to that person and ask if you can have a conversation with them.”

In some cases, that mentor or more-senior person may also serve as your teacher — depending on the skills you need to learn.

“Technical skills are something you can learn in classrooms, but the nuance of professions is what you learn from people and being an apprentice,” she said.

A journalist who lacks field reporting experience may want to shadow a more-seasoned reporter, for example.

Overall, Siang told me that one way to be marketable across your career is to have a growth mindset, which is the belief that you can evolve your talents through hard work and learning.

LinkedIn’s own data supports the idea that you can evolve your career and marketability through learning new skills. Administrative assistants, for example, have been occupying a decreasing portion of the workforce as outsourcing and automation become more common. Many of those who leave the field go on to become project managers, customer service representatives, salespeople and teachers. Those moves suggest that those people are taking advantage of training and other opportunities while working in an insecure field. In other words, they're setting themselves up for future success.

As your job search likely slows down for a week or two before the holidays and you consider goals for the New Year, it may worthwhile to see what can make you more marketable in today’s and tomorrow’s job markets and put a learning plan in place.

Have you thought about your skills gap? Join the conversation.

? The follow-up:

Background checks are nearly ubiquitous in today’s job market. Your job offer will likely be on the condition that you pass a background check, for example. Danielle Korins, who is the chief people officer at Sterling — a background check company, told me about the process in the last edition of #GetHired. She said that employers most likely want to review an applicant’s criminal records, employment history and education. The good news is that most background checks come back without any issues. When something does pop up, it’s up to the employer to review that information and decide whether to hire the applicant. Here’s what people are saying about background checks.

? Other news to help you #GetHired:

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? Up next:

We’ve covered a lot of ground with #GetHired this year. From ageism to artificial intelligence, we learned how to better navigate the modern job search. As we close out the year, I want to take a look back at some of our most popular topics and conversations. Let me know in the comments which topic you found the most intriguing. 

Thanks for reading! Feel free to reach out to me if you have ideas on topics or questions I should address in future editions of #GetHired. You can also email me at GetHired[at]LinkedIn.com.