THINKing

Out Of Work? Don’t Be That Guy

Now, this is not aimed at you, regular reader of THINKing. You are a smart, capable person who understands how the world works, and who understands digital personal branding. This is aimed at the hapless person who just happens to stumble by and who needs schooling on this particular topic. Regular reader, go do something else while I give “that guy” a piece of my mind.

You know who you are. You are the person who finds himself out of work.

You have not kept up with your contacts but now you need a job. I know what you will do next. You will begin calling and emailing everyone you have ever known to see if they can help you. You’ll scour Facebook to find every person you have ever met in your life. Maybe they can help? You’ll begin following thousands of people on Twitter, then tweet your fingers off to let everyone know that the remarkable you is available for work.

You should have been doing this, but you didn’t. Now, you need to read this.

To you, it’s all about volume, or mass marketing. You’ll resort to what I call To Whom It May Concern Marketing as you try to find a job, any job. Today, whether you are selling yourself with a cover letter and resume or selling a product, it is a one-to-one world.

You won’t take the time to try to figure out what you want to do with the rest of your work life and then identify the companies where you might be able to do it. Whether you sell products to customers, yourself to a hiring manager, or story ideas to journalists, you need to target people who have an interest and provide them information about how they’ll benefit.

You aren’t going to change, and in this environment, you aren’t going to find a job because you are that guy. I don’t feel sorry for you because you brought it on yourself.

End of sermon. I feel much better now.

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