Job Hunting?
“Treat a job hunt like a personal development project and be the project manager.” --PENELOPE TRUNK
The Majority of fresh graduates, treading the beaten trail, trust writing their CV and sending it out to potential employers is all that’s required to land a job. I’ve screened thousands of CVs and Cover Letters in my one and a half decade career and I have to say that minimal efforts are usually invested by job seekers to customize their CVs and Cover Letters. An employer could easily get frustrated with vague imprecise words such as ‘Metric, Martial, and Carrier etc’ in CVs and sentences in Cover Letters like ‘ I’ve come to know through reliable sources that you have a vacant position and I assure you that if given the chance, I’ll leave no stone un-turned to satisfy you’. All such CVs and Cover Letters end up in piles of unsuccessful candidate files. Successful people don’t sit on haunches, waiting for miracles to happen. They make miracles happen!
Job hunting is very much similar to selling a product. It’s the process of selling the professional’s skills, ideas, time, talent, energies and expertise. It’s like being available for value addition as any other product does; and in return you get paid in cash and kind.
“Throughout your life, no matter what course it takes, you’re going to be called on to convince others to accept a product or a concept.” --VICTOR KIAM, GOING FOR IT
A company does not make profit unless the sales process is set into motion for ultimate conclusion. Things will come to screeching halt if the selling activity isn’t on the forward move. The success or failure of any organization in large depends on the success or failure of its sales activity. Thus, Sales is the starting point and the ending point of every enterprise and every industry. The salesperson is the breadwinner and the flag carrier of any organization. Selling is not necessarily innate in you, but is a craft and just like any other craft, it can be taught, learned, practiced and eventually mastered.
Treat yourself like The Chief Selling Officer of your own company, and your skills as your own products and services. Like any other well seasoned and successful Chief Selling Officer, make sure you are selling your vision and your ideas to the right people. You need to bring out your entrepreneurial skills to push yourself forward on the course of life.
“The whole theory of the universe is directed unerringly to one single individual—namely to You.” --WALT WHITMAN
Ashraf Chaudhry can be reached at ashraf@ashrafchaudhry.com
