Defining Risk

One of my candidates turned down an offer from our client this past week. The position was remote, and he instead took a position with a local firm, with a lower salary, for a variety of reasons, but the one that seemed to stand out was that he felt more comfortable with a firm close by, a team to work with, and people that he knew. All good reasons for sure. And all the more understandable since he was the in the job market due to a layoff at his prior employer.

I got the impression that it seemed a 'safer' choice to him than the opportunity I presented.

But it got me thinking about risk. For example, people typically view stocks, bonds, commodities, etc as 'riskier' than savings accounts, CD's and other insured deposits. However, financial advisors frequently point out, that there is another type of risk with insured investments, and that is the risk that these 'safe' investments will generate lower returns over time (say 3 or 4% annually), than stocks or bonds, which might generate 5-10%. The risk is that when you retire, you may end up with substantially less with a 'safe' investment, than with a 'risky' one.

The same can be true of career considerations. Taking the safe career path, avoiding the risk of failure, may seem the safer route, certainly more comfortable for many. But after years of looking at resumes, you rarely see executives, business owners, or investors who usually took the 'safe' route. They almost always took risks, took them regularly, and usually made some mistakes along the way. But they typically identified those quickly, made adjustments, and moved on.

In this day of frequent and often surprise corporate acquisitions, divestitures, expansions, contractions, bankruptcies, etc, becoming accustomed to risk and being able to assess it quickly and accurately may be one of the greatest assets a person can have. Seemingly 'safe' choices can turn out not to be, sometimes surprisingly quickly. As with investing, you may find upon retirement that having consistently taken the 'safe' path throughout your career, may not leave you as well off as having taken more risks along the way.

Career Coaching, Career Counseling

A couple of anecdotes came my way recently regarding 2 related subjects. Career Counselors' (as in an academic career counselor) and paid career coaches or job finders.

One came from Linked In: A fellow had apparently been burned by one of these outfits that claimed to have "the secret to the hidden job market". My take on anything related to career search that you as the candidate pay for: No one has the secret to the hidden job market. Only you know what fits you. The most that these places will do is spam your resume' out to a bunch of recruiters and industry contacts, probably ones that they don't know well or at all.

There are cases where you might pay someone for career help; interview coaching, resume' writing, or other discrete tasks, or training on how to do your own search, research, write cover letters, identify prospects. But the less work that you supposedly have to put into it, the less valuable it will be.

The other example came from a network security candidate, a new college graduate. His career counselor at the college cautioned him against pursuing 'too narrow' a field, like network security, and advised him to take a broader curriculum. He then graduated and contacted us about a network security career, and guess what: he didn't have enough studies in the field. He was extremely upset, and rightfully so; I've never met a career counselor that had enough expertise in multiple fields to be making any kind of specific recommendations on a particular career. What they should do, again, is provide guidance on how the student should go about making a decision, the pro's and con's of a broad vs. a narrow curriculum, statistics on growth in particular fields etc. But I would never caution someone with a passion for a particular area to avoid it. Just the opposite; I think the real path to success lies in pursuing your passion, not just 'finding a job'.

Opinions are a dime a dozen, mine included. Your best career resource is going to be you, when you've studied and researched and evaluated numerous opinions of others. Never rely on one person or entity to make decisions for you.

Another note: My impression is that there are plenty of generalists out there. In any field. I frequently see such people struggling with job changes, finding a fit, etc. Top notch people in any field will rarely have trouble finding work, so your goal should be to be one of them. And just make sure that field is not a dinosaur. If you pick one that turns out to be headed that direction, re-train yourself in something related and growing and move on from there. Again, a top notch person will not have much trouble making the transition.

Your Résumé and ATS Systems

A small tidbit of advice:

Most recruiters and hiring organizations use some sort of ATS (Applicant Tracking System) today for managing and storing applicant résumés.

Some of these tips have been shared in other places, but it's worth a reminder:

Try and keep the formatting fairly simple; too many tables, boxes, graphics and other creative effects to show off your skills, can get either lost completely, or corrupted, sometimes leaving the document unreadable.

Try and minimize graphics that end up bloating the file size.

Name the attachment something useful; not "Résumé", or the modified date, but your preferred job title (e.g., VP IT Services), or something else descriptive. Many of the ATS systems default to the document name for the title of the record when they are imported, and if the recruiter forgets to edit it, you end up in the system under some undecipherable heading.

Identify preferred locations, travel ability, complete address info, and identify phone numbers as office, home, cell etc so the recruiter can document your info properly and quickly. Make sure to include the info on the Résumé since it is probable it will be separated from the email you sent.

Wallowing in Self Pity

Evidently the economy is slowing down. I've been slow to see it in ROI's business, but am starting to see the signs of frustration in some groups of candidates.

There's always going to be those who do well more or less regardless of the current economy, and those that struggle regardless. I suppose the difference between a good and bad economy is how it affects the majority.

I posted a new position for a fairly junior level opportunity this week, (2-3 years experience) and was amazed at some of the negative emails regarding the salary (right at market level base on Payscale data.

The position was posted to a regional job forum, where a lot of folks hang out looking for work.

One of the dangers I've seen of a job support type group, is that you have a group of people facing some challenges, and who need above all else to maintain a positive frame of mind, some enthusiasm, etc. Yet, there is a strong tendency, that must be fought vigorously, to wallow in self-pity, complain about this, that or the other thing (in this case companies, the economy, outsourcing, government, recruiters, advertising, H1B visas, NAFTA, politicians, executives, or [add endlesslessly to list here ____].

I've had a number of occasions where I've had an opportunity in an arena where perhaps there aren't many jobs, but with an employer who wants to find a certain someone, etc. And I run across someone. But their cover letter conveys a certain frustration or resentment, or it doesn't, but it comes across when we speak on the phone. So I move on. And they've completed the vicious circle once again, not recognizing that they are the ones once again responsible for their situation.

The last thing I'll do is present someone to a client, that comes across as bitter, or unenthusiastic, or resigned, or whatever. These people need to stay positive and focused, and they need to cull anyone from their circle that doesn't help them do that. Having others telling them they're being 'preyed upon' or 'undervalued' or whatever, is NOT helpful.

No one on this earth is guarenteed a long life, or prosperity, or career satisfaction. You have to work for it. And no other person or company or government is responsible for giving it to you. You have to either find it or create it yourself.

If your situation isn't to your liking, either change it, or shut up and live with it. It's no one else's responsibility to do it for you.

"Poker Tells", Recruiting & Life

It's funny how a topic can seem to surface repeatedly in a fairly short period of time.

The subject of 'tells', like a poker tell, or behavior that serves as an indicator to others, has popped up several times recently.

Several movies and shows recently touched on the subject:

"Lucky", with Drew Barrymore, Eric Bana, and Robert Duvall, revolves around poker playing, including "tells", both at the poker table, and in life.

"Next", with Nicolas Cage and Jessica Biel, stars Cage as a Las Vegas magician of sorts, who makes some side money playing poker using some special abilities.

"2 1/2 Men", with Charlie Sheen, recently had an episode that referred specifically to poker tells, when Charlie was playing cards with his nephew.

About the same time I saw the above, one of ROI's recruiters and I got into a discussion about 'tells' on the part of candidates.

One of the most critical dynamics in recruiting is the give-and-take of information sharing between recruiters and their network. Trying to recruit without trying to sincerely help candidates, doesn't work very well. Likewise, candidates that want you to find them a new job, without helping you, don't provide a lot of motivation to the recruiter.

However, the sharing of information takes at least a little time to develop. I give a little, you give a little, I give a little more, you give a little more.

We've discovered that as long as we, as recruiters, are being reasonably generous with our time, and sharing, that we frequently get a pretty accurate and consistent 'tell' on the quality of the candidate based on how they respond.

Candidates who are a bit insecure, have had sort of average, or bounce around type of careers, or are more junior level, frequently don't want to share information on their contacts and friends. They give the perception of either mistrust, or fear that one of their contacts might win out over them for either a position we are discussing, or some future position, so they don't want to increase their competition.

High caliber candidates, on the other hand, typically have the attitude that there are plenty of jobs out there, the right one will come to me, and I want to help my friends and contacts so they'll help me. If someone I know is a better fit for a position than I am, then they should get it. They are more discerning about positions they go after, are quicker to disqualify themselves when it doesn't seem to be a fit, and frequently volunteer other contacts without even being asked.

Is the Career Becoming more like a Business?

From Linked In:

Seems to me the obvious answer is yes.

If you look at human history, for all except the last few hundred years, and the last century primarily, most people were responsible for their own income, welfare, health maintenance etc.

It is only recently 'we' (most) started looking at corporations, government, etc for taking care of all of our needs. For a few decades in the US after WWII, people were able to look at lifetime careers in corporations, but personally I think that was the anomaly period. We need to devote more attention in our education system to preparing people to manage their lives and have the ability to create and produce, rather than just check off a bunch of coursework in college, and come out waiting for someone to hand them the rest of their life.

Recession? Where?

Business is really booming at the moment, but if you listen to the media, doom and gloom is everywhere. There are certainly pockets, the stock market, the real estate market, mortgages (I guess that's a good size chunk isn't it?), but the tech sector seems to me to be still motoring along.

I am getting occasional comments recently from tech people that things are "slow". Seems they aren't feeling the love from recruiters and hiring firms like they have been the last couple years.

ROI currently has more openings than ever, so it almost seems like a bit of a disconnect.

It's funny; people have a love/hate relationship with the recruiting industry sometimes - they want to be called and sought after, but can get annoyed sometimes, and particularly by the wrong recruiters.

On the other hand, when things slow down, they start to wonder why the calls aren't coming in any more.

I get questions from people sometimes about how things are going, what I see happening in the industry as a whole. I pick up a lot of intel talking to people, but I always caveat my responses this way: ROI is small. Our piece of the universe is not that large, and what we see may or may not be representative of the whole. Recruiting is like real estate, where they say "all real estate markets are local"; recruiting tends to be ""local"" in the sense that a particular firm or recruiter's business (which may not be geographically focused) will represent just a small slice of what's going on.

It's not unusual at all for two more or less similar firms in a region to be seeing different results, or even 2 comparable recruiters in the same firm.

Things haven't tanked yet, but there are some signs around.