Brother Can You Spare a Job? Texas Man “Panhandling” for Work, Refuses Free Money

Kudos to Mr. Chester for trying something different when the usual mail storm of resumes was not yet successful. And the guys made some great comments in discussing this. But …
1) As many here realize, “IT work” encompasses a wide variety of skills and tasks and knowledge sets (which I won’t bother even attempting to list). And most of those skills can command a pay scale greater than a minimum of $15/hour, so perhaps either Mr. Chester should demand a higher rate commensurate with his real skill set, or his skill set is not yet all that deep or broad enough and he might need to work on that aspect, too, with further training, etc.

2) In 1978 I was looking for a new job and paid a consulting firm to learn how to develop a job search campaign and to market myself. I probably paid too much, or didn’t take full advantage of what was on offer in follow-up support, but I still learned some very valuable information that gave me the confidence about such searches and how to perform them successfully. It still requires a lot of hard work, but makes more sense than a simple resume flood. When done correctly, it can lead to making significantly more money over a career and/or being much happier in what you end up doing for a living. That is $100’s of thousands, if not millions of dollars. Especially when you make enough to invest an “excess” and have it grow for you as well. And it works well in both good and poor job prospect markets because it puts you at the front of the pack.

3) One of this consulting firm’s core ideas, which is no longer that new, is that any meaningful job requires networking among potential job owners. “It is not what you know but who you know that matters”. And this has to be done in a way that is not “threatening” or demanding of the potential job owners. You don’t want the “boss” to have to be the bad guy who has to turn you down, so don’t put him in that position. Instead you seek interviews not for a job, per se, but to review your background and get advice on how to proceed with your search. You may legitimately need and benefit from such advice, or just be pretending to seek it, but even busy people like to be mentors and helpful when they can.

4) During or after such a “background review” session it is expected that
a) the boss is not impressed and blows you off, but you are no worse off than before the interview.
b) the boss is impressed and offers you a job because he doesn’t want to lose the opportunity to hire a promising and successful employee. If he has to, he will create a job he did not have before, and find the budget when the prospect is promising or impressive enough. If he is a good boss, he is no dummy and recognizes talent when he sees/ hears it.
c) the boss is impressed but does not have a job opening to offer; however, he might be persuaded to discuss your background with someone else he knows who may have such an opening. “Hey, Bill, this is Steve. I talked to a Scott Ott last week and I think you should talk to him about that marketing opening you mentioned a while back.” Etc. You may have to explicitly ask for a follow-on contact, but that is what the networking campaign is all about: “Do you perhaps know of someone else I should be talking to about my skill set? Can you give me a brief introduction to him to smooth the initial contact? [and side step the usual barriers to job seekers that a person in “Bill’s” position would normally have in place, since Bill already knows and trusts “Steve”.
d) You pursue that follow-on contact, and the one after that, and … until you have presented your background to the 3 to 8 people who were sufficiently impressed to offer you a job. Negotiate what works best for you, and you are again happily employed. Probably with higher pay, more challenge and responsibility, and better future prospects than you had before.

5) Such networking is not easy, especially if you are an introvert (as 25 to 50% of the population are). But part of what I learned in 1978 helps build your confidence, via what is called Success Factor Analysis (SFA). [FYI: I just did a search on SFA and the preliminary results did not quite match what I learned in 1978.] SFA is basically a method to “know thyself”, your inherent strengths and abilities and capabilities (i.e., your success factors). These are developed from a set of (predominantly quantified) information to use in your “personal sales campaign” and to structure your resume. The analysis can be augmented and adjusted throughout your life. It might be a good idea to revisit and extend it every 5 years or so [do as I say, not as I didn’t 🙂  I ended up pretty happy with my employment over the years and thus had little incentive to seek another job. I might have advanced a little higher if I had been better at company politics, but politicking is not one of my core strengths. Good that I can recognize that, even now.] 

6) SFA is also hard work [it took me at least 30 hours to do in 1978. Might take me 80 hours now.] But the effort has great personal and professional payback. It might even be easier to do if you already have 5 to 10 years of employment experience from which to draw successful examples.
a) Take the time to cast back over your personal and professional/ business/ employment life and identify (maybe 10 to 50) situations or cases where, in your own mind [regardless of what others might have thought], you did something you considered a success. Generate a listing of those successes, and try to present them in as quantitative a fashion as possible. Maybe you generated 3000 lines of code in three weeks as part of a $5M project, or developed a sales campaign for a $10M product line, led a team of 6 or 60 people to complete some job or task or program within or ahead of budget and schedule, etc., etc. Identifying the quantitative information removes any BS factor when you discuss these achievements with potential hiring people (or if/ when seeking a promotion with your current boss). It also shows you have an appreciation for what matters to a business (the bottom line) and hints at how you can contribute to helping them achieve their profit goals.
b) Then try to identify and extract what personal inherent characteristics or factors you had and used to achieve each of those particular successes. They can be things like writing skills, creativity, analytical skills, organization and planning, people/ sales interactions, etc. out of a list of perhaps 30 to 50 such skills/ capabilities. Create a matrix, with your successes [or equivalent ID’s] across the top and the skills listing down the side. “X” in the top 1 and also ID the other top 4 or 5 characteristics for each success. You should end up seeing a pattern where the same set of 3 to 8 factors were instrumental in each of your achievements. Different factors would have had greater or lessor impact for each example, but overall a set of your prime “success factors” should emerge. And perhaps you have added new factors on the most recent successes, or other time based changes can be seen. But only 4 or 5 factors are needed; you don’t want to overdo this analysis either. [I will try to provide a sample matrix in a separate comment.] 
c) Then you can take your 4 or 5 prime factors and structure your resume around them (a capabilities resume rather than a time based or chronological resume). ID the specific qualified successful examples for those factors that you have extracted from your personal history. You now have more than enough examples to spread across your core capabilities. Add in a brief synopsis of your education and your employment history and you are mostly done.
d) Not all of your examples have to be included on the paper resume – maybe save some as additional examples during your networking interviews. But that means you have to have mastered the information gleaned from your analysis so you can spout out such examples as the conversation and situation warrant. But this approach gives you confidence that you are not BS’ing, you know yourself and what you have done and are talking about.
e) But the most powerful aspect of SFA is that it highlights your inherent capabilities, with the specific quantified examples to support them, such that they can be applied in a wider variety of employment/ job situations and opportunities. Maybe you initially worked for a technical start up, but now you are talking to a consulting firm. Or did administrative work at an insurance company but can apply those same skills to almost any other administrative situation. When you know and can sell yourself, your options are much wider than the usual mindset constrained by your past experience. You are seeking increased responsibility and challenge, along with higher pay, aren’t you??
f) I almost forgot to mention that if you have had experience in the military, in almost any branch or situation, you have probably been given greater responsibility and control over more resources than would be the typical case as the same age in the private or civilian sector. Even a private may drive a truck or a tank, be responsible for $000’s of armament or other equipment, and have to help protect all of the other personnel in his immediate area. A more senior NCO or a young or older officer can probably multiply those kinds of quantitative numbers significantly. A 26 year old captain is responsible for a 200 person company; he might have to be a 35 to 45 year old director or VP before he sees equivalent challenge and responsibility outside the military. Make sure you have captured those examples when applicable.
g) Almost forgot #2: you can also request feedback from your family, friends, and current or past co-workers as to those successes they thought you had achieved, and the factors they believe you possess that contributed to those successes. The results may not be quite as solid or formalized quantitatively as your own SFA, but can also be insightful and possibly helpful.

This has gone on rather long, but I have been meaning to capture these ideas to pass along to the young adults [OK Boomer!] or other job seekers in my circle of contacts. You may not have learned anything new yourself, but maybe there are others you know who would also benefit from this kind of feedback.

All the best to all of you on your respective July 4th celebrations, to continue our exceptional constitutional creed and successes of our great country.