Career Plan
Treat your Job Search like a Job
In tough times, it can be hard to stay focused on the task at hand - finding your next £50K+ job. The grim news, the daily drumbeat of dour tidings, and the uncertainty of the days ahead combine to make quite a distraction.
Into that gloom, then, let me try to light a torch and illuminate the darkness just a little bit - everybody finds their next job.
Accelerate your job search with these
tips
Showcase Your Strengths
Accelerate Your Job Search - Five Tips for Creating Self-Marketing Plan.
The self-marketing plan is a valuable piece of marketing material that job seekers need to position themselves effectively during a job search. Whether in a networking context or a job interview, job seekers must always be ready to deliver their personal pitch in an exciting and memorable way. Ultimately, you want to be able to recite a message that is clear, targeted, and easy for anyone to understand. When the plan is presented in this way, you are more likely to create an advocate for your candidacy who can refer your qualifications to the next appropriate person in the networking or hiring chain.
There are five key components of an effective self-marketing plan.
Create a professional identity.
Job-seekers must be able to tell their audience what type of position they're targeting. Sometimes people confuse professional identity with the job title that is listed on a job description. These titles can be misleading and do not always fully describe the nature of the person's responsibilities. By using such titles in place of a professional identity, you run the risk of compromising your self-marketing campaign. For example, in the world of finance, many back-office administrators are simply called clerks. Such a title can place severe limitations on your marketing plan. A more targeted and effective professional identity might be a Financial Custody Administrator or Securities Administrator.
Showcase three strengths.
Highlight three areas of competency that show your value and differentiate you from the competition. Chose traits that can easily be coupled with examples of how you have helped previous employers make money, save money, save time, maintain the business, or grow the business.
For example, being proficient in Microsoft Project can position a project manager as a candidate that gets the job done expeditiously and in turn saves time, money, and resources.
Use accomplishment-focused, metrics-driven examples to support your strengths:
Just like a CV, the marketing plan must include proof that you've successfully completed job-relevant tasks. A good strategy is to marry a strength with a specific example to prove that you are accomplished at what you do. Quantify accomplishments using numbers, percentages, and pounds whenever possible.
Discuss your background as it relates to the target function or industry:
Draw on your past experiences from several positions to solidify the scope of your skillset, show career progression, and build the business case for your candidacy. Also include relevant education such as job-related or advanced degrees, industry certifications, advanced technologies, or leadership roles within a professional organization to showcase the diversity of your experiences while positioning yourself as a unique contributor.
Make a match between your experience and the skills needed for a particular job function or industry:
Bring the conversation full circle by relating your traits back to the needs of the employer or the needs of a particular industry. By doing so you prove relevancy and demonstrate why your skills are a good fit for a certain type of position.