As a recent college graduate ready to launch my career, I got a heavy dose of reality entering an economy mired by the Great Recession. Lehman Brothers had been interviewing to keep up appearances and after waiting to hear back on my final round interview, I picked up the newspaper to read that they would be laying off 15,000 people. I got a call later that week stating what the newspaper had already made apparent – I was not getting hired. Nearly 4 million newly minted college graduates will be navigating a climate of uncertainty. Armed with their fresh associates, bachelors, masters or doctoral degrees, they will be wading through a tepid hiring market, an influx of candidates (i.e. “the competition”), and the uncertainty of an economy ravaged by the unknown.
Lately, I’ve been having a lot of conversations with soon-to-be undergraduate and graduate students counting down the days to their degrees with trepidation. These students have experienced a range of results reeking of 2008 – offers delayed or rescinded, no responses to their scattershot applications, or, perhaps, worse than that glimmer of hope that one of your applications might strike gold is getting the response that this position is no longer available. Here are three approaches that I’ve been recommending to graduates-to-be navigating this market.
1. Map Your Skills
While not groundbreaking, this speaks to knowing the job and types of roles that you are applying for. More than that, it speaks to knowing yourself. The first step in mapping your skills is conducting some market research and reviewing the position descriptions of roles that you are interested in. What skills do they highlight? How do your experiences match these skills?
The average resume reviewer spends 7 seconds on your resume. Many other companies have software that filters resumes for critical skills and keywords. To ensure that your reviewer spends more than 7 seconds on your resume and that your resume gets through the stack submitted, use similar language in the position description to highlight your core skills. This shows that you (1) understand the role, (2) have the skills for the role, and (3) took the added step to map your experience to what the role requires. You may have different versions of your resume depending on the positions that you are applying for.
Taking this a step further, some of the most effective resumes that I have seen are ones that highlight a specific skill in bold at the beginning of your bullet point. This naturally draws the eye to the skill and tells a story about how you demonstrated that skill (people remember stories). As you build that bullet point/story, I recommend the STAR method – the Situation/Task, the Actions you took, and the Results (what did you develop, how was it used, how can you quantify the impact?). For instance, if a role calls for strong communications skills, you might craft a bullet around one of your leadership roles or co-curricular activities that reads:
– Strategic Communications: Elected to serve as club president aligning functions across club finances, operations, and marketing, presenting and negotiating budget with college administrators, and promoting annual talent show which had a 12% increase in participants, 20% increase in attendance, and 32% increase in revenue over previous year
In this bullet, you specifically called out a skill, demonstrated skills related to communications – presentation, negotiations, planning, marketing to different groups – and showed that your effective utilization of this skills garnered results. Mapping your skills to ones highlighted in the position description will help you craft a resume for the role and identify any knowledge or skills gaps in your resume.
Mind Your Gaps
Mapping your skills to the position descriptions enables you to do your own personal gap analysis. What stories or bullets can be crafted to show specific knowledge or skills? Where is your knowledge or skills falling short? What learning or experiences are available to address knowledge or skills gaps? There are three strategies that I recommend to help you address your gaps: (1) Take a virtual course, (2) Join meet-ups/conferences, (3) Participate in a pro bono project.
The ubiquity of virtual courses seems to have only increased with so many people going remote. This opens an opportunity to take courses on-demand and add needed skills or knowledge to your LinkedIn profile or resume. There are a wide variety of options through LinkedIn Learning, Udemy, and a number of colleges have also opened up virtual courses as well with courses ranging in cost and many free or inexpensive options available.
Just as there are a range of e-learning options, meet-ups, conferences, and webinars have also been created to help you learn and engage with industry professionals. Search common professional networks associated with your industry or profession of interest and join these conferences to help you grow your knowledge and network. Take advantage of opportunities to be an active participant whenever possible by asking questions or sharing your perspective.
Many nonprofits, particularly smaller localized nonprofits, have been hit hard by COVID-19. They may need support in fundraising (project management, strategic communications), writing articles and developing content (research, interviewing, data analysis), or supporting or adapting operations (project management, process improvement, problem-solving). Pro bono work provides an effective way to give back to your local community while also building or developing skills that can bolster your resume. Consider viewing the volunteer pages on local nonprofits’ websites or navigating to aggregated opportunities through organizations like Do Something or Idealist to find ways you can contribute to specific projects and develop particular skills.
Build Your Network
Don’t let social distancing stop you from networking. In fact, you may find people have a little more flexibility in their schedule and time on their hands to have a quick 20 minute conversation with you about their industry, profession, or to provide career advice. Start by leveraging your alumni network – more often than not, you will find alumni who are willing to pay it forward and connect with you. When scheduling a meeting with them, be mindful of their time, be flexible and work around their schedule, and be specific with your request (“I was wondering if we could discuss the steps it would take to be successful in your line of work,” “I wanted to see if we could discuss how to prepare for opportunities in your profession (at your company, in your industry, etc).” These conversations may not lead to a job right away. Oftentimes, they are cumulative as the advice and feedback that you get and the comfort and confidence you develop grow with each conversation and help you to deepen your knowledge and understanding of what it takes to get a job in that field. It also helps you to gain an insider who can help you navigate opportunities within a company or industry.
One lost art in building your network is the follow-through. This is more than just a thank you note after the conversation. The follow-through is ongoing and enables you to continue to build rapport over time. For instance, you might follow-up a few weeks later to share how you used a particular piece of advice that they gave you and how it helped. You might also follow-up with a more specific question or to provide an update on your search. Of course, this takes balance and the ability to read your audience. As part of your initial conversation, you should consider asking if they would be willing to re-connect should you have any questions or updates so that you can open the door to building rapport and you should also see if they have others in their network who they might be willing to connect you with.
Navigating your career is a process and it takes being intentional about how you spend your time and energy to develop the knowledge, skills, and network for the role that you want. This will not happen overnight and needs to be part of your pre-graduation plan. Putting in the time now will pay dividends in the future and ensure you are better prepared to manage your next job search or the next economic crisis.
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