Dan Erwin

Experience Rules in Today's Job Market

Even recent college grads had better be able to put experience on their resume and be able to talk about what they've gotten out of their experience. So says Katherine Brooks' latest blog. And she knows what she's blogging about. She has a most uniquely titled position at the University of Texas Austin: Director of Career Services for Liberal Arts Graduates. Don't concern yourself thinking she's just another ivory tower type. She wears the hat, but it doesn't fit her blogging.

When I first stumbled on Brooks' blog, Career Transitions,a couple weeks ago, her name grabbed me. I realized that she was the author of that fine book for graduating seniors with a liberal arts degree, grads looking for a job that'll provide a decent living. Her book has the catchy title, You Majored in What? And it gets right to the issues, deciphering the job market and relieving stress from grads in humanities and social science. I wrote a review of her still very timely book nearly two years ago. My blog, You majored in what? provides a bit more background for you.

There are a lot of things right about a liberal arts degree, if. . . you graduated from one of the most selective schools in the nation. Or, if you have the wherewithal and support to go on to graduate school. And if you fill in your liberal arts with a year of computer science, economics, communications, etc. If you were smart enough to get summer internships, work experience build a network. And if you got a STEM (science, technology, engineering or math) liberal arts major.

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Many liberal arts faculty don't want to become vocational school teachers. That makes sense, but it overstates the case. As a nationally-experienced executive coach, I've learned that liberal arts grads tend to be the better thinkers in business, know how to learn, are adaptable and, typically, have solid communication skills. That means they can come up to speed quickly. Just exactly what firms are looking for. So if you're thinking about liberal arts, a recent liberal arts graduate or are not certain about your major's financial future, here's the jobs' blogger for you.

Prof. Brooks' blogs are filled with great stuff, solid research and spot-on recommendations. What I most appreciate about her blogs is not the intense relevance or even her smart use of statistics, but the fact that she has a bias toward evidence-based recommendations. Brooks blogs regularly on the Psychology Today site. Here are the titles of just a few of her most recent posts:

• Employers seek proof of your skills
• Five steps for improving your job search
• The question isn't "Are resumes dead?" The question is "Are resumes enough?"
• Are you T-Shaped? The most sought after candidates are.
• How to benefit from losing the lottery.

Brooks provides a fascinating stream of research on careers and jobs. She also has her own website, Wise Wanderings, filled with practical, highly useful stuff. Her website strategy is straightforward:

Welcome to CareerArtistry, my website dedicated to helping liberal arts students and alumni (and just about anyone who is seeking a new way to earn a living) navigate their way through the 21st century job market, where linear systems are fading away and chaos reigns.

Check out Brooks' blog. I'm certain you'll find it exceptionally valuable.

What's Your Story?

Those who do not have power over the stories that dominate their lives, power to retell them, rethink, deconstruct them, joke about them, and change them as times change, truly are powerless because they cannot think new thoughts. –Salman Rushdie 

A good story is a key success factor for making a role, job or career change. What truly moves us as human beings, what prompts us into action is the emotion of a good story. Even overly rational, fact-oriented, data driven magazines and journals like Harvard Business Review, journals that think of business as a matter of pure rational calculation, emphasize the same point. Michael Hattersley wrote in an HBR article, “truth to tell, few talents are more important to managerial success than knowing how to tell a good story.”

Sure, people have used all kinds of means for developing and negotiating identities. When I started in the coaching business back in the early 1980s, one of my first jobs was awarded to me by the CIO of Pillsbury. He was an astute guy, exceptionally capable of identifying talent and helping his folk build an identity. That job--and I still laugh about it--was to take a young manager and teach him to dress for success. The CIO recommended laundered cotton shirts, new ties, better suits and polished shoes. “So you’re going to pay me that much to coach him in his dress?” That young manager has since had three superb CIO jobs at well-known corporations. Obviously, his identity worked. And, we’re still intimate buddies. 

Although people have paid attention to dress, humor, personal style and even office décor to signal who they are, the most useful approach is through the development of a personal narrative. As Hermina Ibarra notes, a self-narrative is a story that makes a point about the person. Self-narratives not only express who we are, but they also create who we are. 

Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook beginnings in his dorm room, Bill Gates’ dropout from Harvard, Hewlett and Packard’s and Steve Jobs’ garage beginnings, as well as Obama’s childhood stories are examples of self-narratives—personal stories—that are carefully crafted for public consumption. 

As a consultant, I learned early on that my personal narrative was exceptionally valuable, not only in the approach I took to my profession, but also as a tool to sell and manage to clients. I had to explain how I’d gone from a career as a minister, to that of a teacher and to that of a business consultant. My ability to relate that emotional story often was the determining factor in whether or not I got a consulting gig. 

In today’s world of free-lance, and “at will” employment, a personal narrative is especially valuable for everyone. At the heart of a new stream of research are the practice and strategy of crafting and negotiating work identities with stories. No one has completed a more fascinating study of identity stories than Ibarra’s work, dating from 2010. In her research, she ticks off some of the situations where your personal story will be of utmost value. 

• Career change
• Job change
• Team leadership
• New job
• High job stakes
• Interacting with high-status, powerful people
• Interactions with unfamiliar contacts
• Job interviews 

Having multiple personal identity stories is valuable in all kinds of situations. Even in questionable situations. In her research, Ibarra quotes an investment banker seeking to move into international development: 

With the nonprofits, the first hour of any interview was “Why the heck would somebody with your background and your pay scale be doing this?” It took an hour’s worth of credibility building; they weren’t wondering “What is your background and what can you offer” but “Are you insane?”

People not only construct identities by telling their story, they also reinvent themselves by telling new stories about what’s happening to them. They reinterpret past events and weave the past and the present into a repertoire. A repertoire that allows them to communicate their identity and negotiate it with others. 

Well, what’s your story?

Herminia Ibarra, Identity as Narrative. Academy of Management Review, 2010, Vol 35, No.1, 135-154.

Flickr photo: CTJ online

Guess Who Got the Jobs 1st Quarter 2012

An analysis by the National Employment Law Project (NELP) released in March found that the number of people 50-plus unemployed for six months or longer catapulted from 325,000 to 1.8 million between 2007 and 2011. It’s the older folk, we assume, who got the pink slips and are having the most difficult time finding work. Not quite true.

The Bureau of Labor statistics revealed some shocking statistics regarding the first quarter, 2012. Thirty-three percent (33%) of new hires were ages 25-54. That means that sixty-seven percent (67%) of new hires were ages 55-plus. Older folk are convincing employers that they can still be trusted to take on new jobs and perform at top level. According to a report in May AARP Bulletin, Who got the jobs, 788,000 workers older than age 55 got new jobs, and 385,000 younger workers got new jobs. 

When you drill down into the statistics. . .  .

It’s good news that older adults were leading the way in employment growth in the first quarter. But it’s not clear whether the new hires had been out of work for shorter or longer stretches. Furthermore, the types of jobs they ended up with are not known. I hope it’s not as a greeter at WalMart. Ummmm. . . I just remembered. Most WalMart stores have quit using greeters.   

But some disconcerting issues. . . .
There’s a significant possibility that older workers were taking jobs beneath their skill level and pay grade. Just for the opportunity to work.

Even more disconcerting, these statistics mean that younger people who might have filled those positions are still without work.

Getting Newcomers Up to Speed Quickly

As the economy begins to loosen up, more and more companies are looking for new hires. And more employees are looking to leave that old job and find a better company for their future. On average, Americans will change jobs 10 times between the ages of 18 and 37. Furthermore, with the constant state of internal restructuring, managers are being continually pushed to assimilate waves of employees. 

The key question for new employees as well as for their new company is how to transform a new hire into a productive employee. 

In a cool piece of research, Rob Cross, Salvatore Parise and Keith Rollag studied that important question. The challenges are tough. From jump-starting productivity and tapping into the new hire’s creativity to keeping them long enough to justify their training. Of course, it’s the first few months that are especially critical for new hire since the probability of quitting reaches a peak at around 18 months.   

To figure out how to overcome those challenges, Cross and his colleagues interviewed both the newcomers and their managers at a number of companies. But they didn’t stop with the usual interview approach. Instead, using social network analysis, they explored the patterns of collaboration and information flow between the newcomers and managers. 

Initial training typically focuses on the organizational culture and the person’s job. This provides the newcomer with a smorgasbord of information about company routines and technologies. However, if you’ve been through that route very often, inevitably you’ve found yourself needing far more and spending a great deal of time trying to find that information. Research outside this study has found that many, if not most newcomers stop with the info about company routines and technologies, either incapable of or unaware of the importance of the network to their success. In short, they know what they want, but aren’t certain how to get that information. 

Cross and his colleagues' research is especially seminal in that it takes a far more holistic approach to assimilation and deals with all the issues. Instead, their research finds that the single most important step for getting a person up to speed quickly is relational. 

But, changing from an informational approach about the job and the company culture to a relational approach is not a simple matter. Instead of asking themselves, “What does my new hire need to know?” they have to ask, “Who does my newcomer need to know?” This will then help them focus on generating a strategic list of key experts and information providers with whom the newcomer needs to meet. From this they can then structure the necessary interactions into the new hire’s assimilation process. 

What’s fascinating about the process is that although it requires a different kind of mental and action effort, it doesn’t require any more time than the old informational approach. Of course, if newcomers can be introduced to a set of coworker relationships, they’ll have far less need to approach their own bosses for information. 

But what if your company doesn’t provide this for you? My clients and colleagues have found it especially useful to ask the relational question themselves and gain the assistance of bosses and others in building their relationship.  It’s as simple as “who do I need to know for my job success?” and “will you introduce them to me?” 

Photo by Flickr: jannetajeda

Why Job Search is Like Throwing Darts at a Target with Your Eyes Closed

Job seekers submit hundreds of applications online, but with little hope of receiving a response. The flip side of that, as a Wharton survey shows, is that blunt-edged tracking systems instantly weed out candidates, including well-qualified ones who don’t fit the software criteria. The process is frustrating for both human resources and the job seeker.

A “broken” process from the very beginning
Applicant-tracking software makes it almost impossible for a job candidate to stand out in the initial screening. And companies have become a victim of their success in using social media tools. For the candidate, problems with the hiring process are not new, dating from the 1970s and 1980s. Three-fourths of companies didn’t inform applicants whether a position was filled 40 years ago and still don’t today. Sure, there are strong legal limitations on what companies can say about why a person doesn’t get a job. But, as Gerry Crispin of CareerXroads says, if large companies continue to treat applicants poorly, then the best might spurn them as well.

Hiring always involves a bit of luck, even for the best companies
A recent Wall Street Journal article revealed that 7.6 million people applied to Starbucks for 65,000 corporate and retail positions last year. And nearly 1 million people applied to P & G for 2,000 positions, while 2 million applied to Google for 7,000 openings. Drill down into that candidate list and you see what big companies face: only 35% of the applicants met the basic requirements of the job they applied for. 

The other worrisome difficulty for firms is that the “formulaic hiring” of software can result in a less creative workforce. Companies relying solely on the “blunt tools” of software can unintentionally rule out candidates whose expertise might benefit the company in unanticipated ways. Companies using software that focuses too narrowly typically assume that college major provides a direct line to analyze the most useful expertise. It’s conventional, but wrongheaded. Anyone who’s studied research creativity and significant contribution knows that much of the finest contributions are at the nexus of science and the humanities. To flip the conventional gray matter switches, some of the most contributive scientists also read Proust. And, shock, some of the more effective pattern thinkers in technology, for example, are musicians and English majors. Does the software pick up on this? 

Best approaches for companies
Smart employers are beginning to make their application very, very narrow. And lengthy. And seriously differentiated from competition. That discourages the thousands of folk who ship off dozens of applications. As Wharton’s Matthew Bidwell says, “The more questions an applicant has to think carefully about, the fewer applications he or she will have time to fill out.” It’s always important for employers to pull back from the mass market and focus on canvassing “internal employees, professional networks, job contracts where you work with third parties and even customers” to find the best recruiting leads and good candidates.

Best approaches for candidates
So what’s the job-seeker to do? A lot more than scanning online sites and hitting the “submit resume” button.  Since most companies have a recruiter and a hiring manager, your application had better be compelling to the recruiter-screener. If you can’t connect with the recruiter, you certainly won’t get to talk to the hiring manger.

The experts are advising candidates to make sure their resume addresses the “skills, capabilities and values” of the company. Pay close attention to the keywords of the offering and use them. Furthermore, try to find a connection within the company. Applicants for particular jobs should see if they know anyone who works there, anyone who knows anyone who works there, or even anyone who knows anyone who knows anyone who works there. A lot of jobs come out of extended networks. Take advantage of the network of the networks. That means, inevitably, that you’ll be talking to a lot of people you’ve never met. But, if you want a job . . . that’s the drill.  

Photo by Flickr: Army Strong PA

Milestone on College Degrees is Passed

More than 30% of American adults hold bachelor's degrees. That's a monstrous change, considering that only 11% of my generation of septuagenarians holds a bachelor's. 

The report, tucked away on page 16 of the Times, is far more significant than its newspaper location suggests. Drill down into the statistics and there's a lot of fascinating information. Information which suggests that careers are changing significantly. Some for the good and some not so good.

After a relatively stagnant period between 1970 and 1990, the stats reflect an increase that began in the 1990s. Significant gains are represented by all groups, but blacks and Latinos still lag behind whites. What's not so good is that the gap between whites and the rest has even widened in the last decade.

The census figures are initially heartening.

As of last March, 30.4 percent of people over age 25 in the United States held at least a bachelor’s degree, and 10.9 percent held a graduate degree, up from 26.2 percent and 8.7 percent 10 years earlier.

The statistics bear out the growing lead of women in college degrees, especially since colleges have enrolled and graduated more women than mean. The historic male advantage in graduation rates is about to be a thing of the past, although salary differences between men and women certainly don't reflect that collegiate advantage.

 In 2001, men held a 3.9 percentage-point lead in bachelor’s degrees and 2.6 percentage points in graduate degrees; by last year, both gaps were down to 0.7 percent.

It's no surprise that Asian-American are the best educated racial group: Asian-Americans remain the nation’s best-educated racial group, with 50.3 percent having bachelor’s degrees, and 19.5 percent holding graduate degrees.

Though this study didn't report on salaries, Asian-Americans have replaced Jews as the best paid in today's world. And, by the way, Asian-American Muslims are a significant factor in that high-wage world. As an aside, I've noticed that Asian-Americans are exceedingly aware of the best schools while most Midwestern college grads seem to have little interest. If, for example, I note that one of my daughters holds a Columbia University degree and another a U Chicago degree, there's a gasp from the Asian-American, and then a lot of questions. They want to know how, as a parent, I prepared them, what experiences did I provide for them, what high schools my kids went to, was it an International Baccalaureate school? Etc., etc. 

In addition to the census statistics, the article alluded to results from the American Community Survey.

One of those, examining major fields of study, shows that taken together, engineering and science are the most common areas for bachelor’s degrees, representing 34.9 percent of the total.

The persistence of men in those fields is waning, a significant trend given that engineers and people with science backgrounds tend to be in high demand, and have above-average incomes. Among college graduates 65 or older, only 23 percent of those with degrees in science or engineering majors are women; among people 40 to 64, the proportion of women rises to 36 percent; among those 25 to 39, 45.9 percent are women.

The same report also found that engineers and science majors are most heavily concentrated on the East and West Coasts, with the highest percentages in the District of Columbia, California, Washington and Maryland, and the lowest in Southern and Plains states.

Two issues are of importance from the last set of statistics. First, Richard Florida's research on the hot areas for technology and other STEM vocations merits study by parents and recent grads in search of jobs. Having spent much of my life in the Midwest, I'm aware that leaving home for a job in another state is difficult for many. Still, if recent grads want job opportunities of significance, they'd best kiss mom and dad goodbye and head for where the jobs are.

Second, the extensive jobs study at Georgetown University's Center for Education and the Workforce (downloadable free here), argues that US competitive advantage will turn on science, technology, engineering and math expertise. The report is highly nuanced, recognizing, for example, that two-year grads will have opportunities in the tomorrow's world. The conclusion for parents with kids looking to college are broadened significantly beyond the typical conversation. To wit: major in a stem discipline, or, choosing not to major in a stem discipline, get a job in a company with core stem needs. The third approach is to attend a top school (you know the list of the top 25) and major in whatever you wish.  

Are You Nice?

Typically I give the Times' Corner Office in Sunday's paper a quick skim and go on. But today's was a show-stopper. Entitled A Deal-Breaker Question for Job Interviews, Adam Bryant interviews Andy Lansing of Levy Restaurants in Chicago. After a bit of his background and how he became CEO of the company, Bryant asks Lansing what he's looking for when he's in a hiring mode.

Here's Lansing's answer: I have a pretty nontraditional approach to hiring. I hire for two traits--I hire for nice and I hire for passion. If you sit down with me, no matter how senior you are in the company or the position you're applying for, my first question to you is going to be, are you nice? And the reactions are priceless. There's usually a long pause, like they're waiting for me to smile or they're waiting for Ashton Kutcher to come out and say, "you're being punked." Because who asks that question? And then I say, "No, seriously, are you nice."

I read the interview again to make sure that was Lansing's question. Yep. That's it. My first response was self-centered to the core. "So, Erwin," I thought, "when a client hires you, is he hiring someone who's nice?" I won't tell you my answer.

But my second response was that Lansing's question was actually a very smart riff on Bob Sutton's no asshole rule. Sutton's groundbreaking book is a lot more than just a reflection about social friction among colleagues. Sutton details the kind of people who make you scream "What an asshole." Even more significantly, he musters the kind of research that ought to make any exec sit up and take notice to the assholes working for them. Bennett Tepper's research on abusive supervision is just one telling example. Tepper examined 712 employees in a midwestern city, finding that many of them had abusive bosses who "used ridicule, put-downs, the silent treatment, and insults like 'tells me I'm incompetent' and "Tells me my thoughts or feelings are stupid.'" These not-nice bosses drove people out of organizations and "sapped the effectiveness" of those who stayed. When Tepper followed up his research six months later, he found that those with "abusive supervisors quit their jobs at accelerated rates, and those still trapped in their jobs suffered from less work and life satisfaction, reduced commitment to employers and heightened depression, anxiety and burnout."

So when Andy Lansing hires for "nice," he's got his finger on an exceptionally important matter.

But my gray matter didn't stop with that. I momentarily questioned whether "passionate" people would be productive people. Obviously, yes. Passion may well be the driving component for competency. A person who's passionate about her job is going to perform at the highest level possible. What came immediately to mind was that meta-research on warmth and competency. What studies consistently find is that the person who's both nice and passionate, translated as "warm" and "competent," consistently performs at the highest level.

Warm, nice guys--friendly, helpful, trustworthy, sincere and moral--are easy to relate to and good to have around. If they're just nice, though, eventually they elicit pity and sympathy from other--get ignored, and lose their status. That's why you're reading a lot of new research about the fact that nice guys (guys who are only warm and likable) don't make it to the top.

In contrast, passionate guys--competent, efficient, smart, creative and productive--are great for their team and their company. Of course, if they're just competent, though, these cold fish, stinkers and assholes get added to the jerk heap.

But, as Lansing has found, put nice and passionate together and you've got a winner.

Sounds to me like Andy Lansing would be a great guy to work for. And I'll bet his company does very well. Which leads me to ask the question: Are you nice? And are you passionate about your job?

Retooling for the Top Ten Careers

Looming worker shortages make retooling a necessity and an opportunity.  These fast-growing fields provide unique opportunities, whether you're a G.E.D., B.S., M.A., Ph.D. or M.D.  This revealing summary of 21st century job opportunity listings in Sunday's NYTImes, Education Life, has something for everyone. But a lot of these jobs will require months, sometimes years of training.  Not surprisingly, some of them may require relocation.  

Simon's analysis is exceptionally useful because in addition to salary ranges, growth percentages and numbers, she also explains why the field is growing, lists educational demands and provides geographical info.  Here are the ten top careers.

1. Biomedical engineer.  12,000 new jobs by 2018.  If you're attracted to this field, you aren't afraid of math, chemistry, physics and engineering.
2. Network systems & data communications analyst.  56,000 jobs. Especially in the tech corridors.
3. Home health aide.  461,000 jobs.
4. Personal & home care aide.  376,000 jobs. 
5. Financial examiner. 11,000 jobs. 
6. Medical scientist.  44,000 jobs.  Most jobs are in Massachusetts, California and Pennsylvania, which have supportive academic and research institutions.
7. Physician assistant.  29,000 jobs.  More than a nurse, but not quite a doctor.
8. Skin care specialist.  15,000 jobs.  
9. Biochemist & Biophysicist.  9,000 jobs.  New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Washington, D.C. pay the best.
10. Athletic trainer.  16,000 jobs.  Work under a doctor's supervision.  Not a personal trainer

Alexandra Levit: If Something is Needed, Create It

 During this past year my colleague Alexandra Levit served on a national comittee to improve the competitiveness of American employees.  The result is a great new, interactive course for college grads. The course just launched on the web.  I've gone through part of it and know it will be exceptionally useful.  Here's Alexandra. 

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Those of you who have been reading my blog (AlexandraLevit.com) for a while may recall that I was a complete dud in my first corporate PR job.  My boss despised me and my colleagues thought I was overeager, and it took me two years to get a promotion that people with half my work ethic achieved in six months.

The second company that employed me kindly spent a few thousand dollars sending me to a professional development course that changed my career and my life.  I’d like to think that everything the course taught me about developing a strong reputation at work, being diplomatic with colleagues, and driving my career forward was a good investment since I was much more effective after that. 

The truth is, though, that not every college graduate has access to training like I had, and some really gifted people spend their post-college careers floundering because they aren’t given the chance to learn the skills and strategies that will meet with success.

I got tired of waiting for someone else to fix this problem, so I worked with the Business Roundtable, and Accenture to create JobSTART 101, a free online course that prepares college students to meet and exceed employer expectations when they enter the workforce.  It includes video and workbook components covering topics like how to establish your e-brand and how to problem-solve on the job – basically, all of the information I wish I’d had in my back pocket when I was just starting out.

If you’re a student or recent grad, I hope you’ll check it out for some decent advice, but more importantly, I hope each of you goes into work today and thinks about what’s sorely needed in your company and industry. And then if you can create it, go for it.  The world – and your career – will thank you for it.

Five Ways to Screw Up a Job Change

Since people are beginning to make a job change, have started looking for a different position, or are giving serious thought to moving to another company, now's the time to call your attention to a superb HBR article on "bungling" a job change.

The article, written by Boris Groysberg and Robin Abrahams, reminds us that the average baby boomer will switch jobs 10 times according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (Gen-Y, 12 to 15 times, or more). It also calls attention to the fact that the worker as free agent will be a reality regardless of economic conditions--all of which means it's incumbent upon us to take greater control of our own careers.  And since there are times when most of us have to accept a less-than-perfect fit for financial reasons, it's very important to remember that a job is never just a job.  It's your career.

Here is a quick summary of the five ways to bungle a job change:

Mistake 1.  Not doing enough research.  Included in that subject are failure to do homework on the job-market realities (don't be unrealistic), pay attention to the firm's stability and market poisiton, consider the cultural fit and don't assume that the job description actually fits the role.

Mistake 2.  Leaving for money.  Far too many think the opportunity for advancement and more money are the real issue.  As a result, they ignore the important core information surrounding the job.  You might want to check out my article on money as motivator.

Mistake 3.  Going "from" rather than "to."  When you're really unhappy, you'll just want out.  That can result in an even worse situation unless you do your homework before you accept that new position.

Mistake 4.  Overestimating yourself.  You're not God's gift to the universe, however competent you may be.  As a general rule most of us overestimate our contributions and our worth, ignoring the organization's contributions and processes.  Get real.

Mistake 5.  Thinking short term.  Thinking short term feeds into all the other four mistakes.  If, for example all you want is "out," you're liable to ignore your career needs, fail to do due diligence on the new job, and . . .   You get the picture.

FYI: For my money, Boris Groysberg is one of the best business researchers in org behavior.  Watch for his articles in the Harvard Business Review.  And if you occasionally read relevant business research, you can't beat his stuff.  You can get the list of his research here:   Groysberg