Last week I was in Maryland and Virginia speaking to about 300 job seekers. It was a delightful trip. In one presentation someone made an indepth analogy between the job search and bass fishing.
I haven’t seriously fished for many years, and when I did, I was great at catching blue gill, but that was about it. Bass and trout and catfish was what better anglers caught. I say this because I’m going to explain what was explained to me, but I might mess it up 🙂
This job seeker explained that when you fish for bass, you need to get the lure/bait (HOOK) right in front of them. If it’s on the side, or too far in front, or too far above the fish, they won’t see it or get it.
Okay, if this is wrong, don’t tell me it’s wrong – I don’t really care how to catch bass, but the analogy is what we were going on 🙂
This job seekers was explaining that we need to make it easy for recruiters to find us. They are the fisherman, and if we aren’t easy to find, they won’t put their hook in the right place.
It was an interesting and neat analogy. However, it didn’t sit right with me.
Within a few minutes I challenged the idea and asked if we are acting like the fish when indeed we were the fisherman???
That question/thought was a showstopper.
Too often we focus on being found when in fact very few people are or will look for you.
I think it’s time to get out of passive “FIND ME!” mode, and start to do proactive “I found you – let’s chat!” mode.
What does that mean?
Big stuff.
Like, participating in the July Job Board Fast, and picking up the phone, and networking, and having conversations, etc.
How’s that going, anyway?
I like this point: “Within a few minutes I challenged the idea and asked if we are acting like the fish when indeed we were the fisherman???
That question/thought was a showstopper.
Too often we focus on being found when in fact very few people are or will look for you. I think it’s time to get out of passive “FIND ME!” mode, and start to do proactive “I found you – let’s chat!” mode.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Herein lies the difference in the successful job seeker. You need to be out there. I call it the point and click strategy. The person who applies online and hopes someone will call them… Instead of using networking to figure out who is the hiring manager or decision maker and letting them know you are interested and moreso what you bring to the table.