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Mon, 02 May 2022 16:42:04 GMT

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Active Executives Desiring A New Role (30’s - 60’s)

Tue, 19 Apr 2022 05:33:59 GMT

There has never been a better time to pivot to a new role or industry. Yet there is also a science to making the right choice — one that will bring the relevance, satisfaction and lifestyle you seek. Here are the three steps that have proven successful. At the end is an invitation to participate in a free quarterly Zoom session we are hosting to help those who want to embark on this journey of taking charge of your career.

Step 1 - Setting your compass

First you need to identify the career options that will meet your goals. It is equally important to be honest about those that won’t fit your goals/interests so that you can avoid pursuing them later. For example, owning your own business might feel attractive. Yet being honest about questions like these could remove that option from your list:

What is your (and your significant others) tolerance for risk?
Are you good at marketing?
How do you rank the importance of teams and culture, and your need for engagement?
Would managing the kind of work force you would need be fun?
Are you oriented more towards operations, or strategy?
What operating hours, and prep, are required and do they match your lifestyle goals?
Are you a procrastinator? Surprises happen in business, and if you have put off essential tasks you might regularly run out of time and feel a lot of pressure.

We use a battery of assessments and a career psychologist to dig out these insights. Our experience has been that our clients know some data points, yet do not have a clear composite picture. Two specific tools can help you with this step.

1. This Passion meets Purpose chart is a good starting place (link so they can return). Mark it up with what is most important to you.

2. Our five cards exercise will also help you zero in on what is most important (link so they can return).

We also use our own experience to “think outside the box” to add options that meet the composite objectives yet were not previously on your radar.

Step 2 - After Step 1 you may have five or more options that intrigue you. It is impractical to pursue that many, and the more an option excites you the more it will show!

The goal is to net down to the one or two options that excite you the most, How? By having conversations with “been there, done that” people. Go talk to people that have done what you are considering. Ask them questions like:

What do you like best about what you do?

What surprised you the most?

What is your least favorite thing, and why?

If you made the change again what would you do differently?

Listen to what you learn, and rank your options after each conversation. Eventually you will end up with one or two that are best for you.

Step 3 - Putting yourself “in the market” for the options you want to pursue. At this point you want opportunities to find you, and you want to make the most of leads from your friends. To maximize your campaign you need four things:

1. “Elevator pitch”. What is your succinct answer to “what do you do?”. The best answer is a handful of words describing what you do now, then focus on what you aspire to do - and let your passion for that new role show!

2. LinkedIn is crucial. 85% of companies and recruiters use it as their primary tool, because it provides so much information efficiently. There is so much to cover that we packaged LinkedIn tips .

LinkedIn Tips

Tue, 05 Apr 2022 01:00:49 GMT

Six suggestions for having your LinkedIn bring more opportunities to you

1. Customize your banner.

Pick one that reflects things you like, or value. For example, if you like being outdoors find an outdoor scene. It signals having energy, being fit, and openness.

2. Use a good picture.

Head and neck only, looking into the camera, engaging expression and lighting.

3. Summary: This is valuable real estate.

It is also the only place where you can let people know who you really are, and what you value. Do not make it just the “cliff notes” of your resume. Use 1st person style. Make it engaging.

4. Experiences: Pick four strengths you bring to a company.

Reasons you would hire yourself. Weave those strengths into your experiences by illustrating examples.

5. Groups.

Participation in a handful of relevant LinkedIn Groups reveals whether you are “walking the talk”, particularly when you want to change industries or roles. Recruiters looking to fill a role will even join Groups to find the thought leaders. For both reasons it is important to select Groups that reflect what you want to do next, and be active. Comment on the posts of others, and offer your own advice and thoughts.

6. Recommendations

Ideally you should have 5 - 10. Some should be from people who worked for you, some from those you worked for, and some from colleagues at work or from causes you helped. LinkedIn shows how many Recommendations you have received, and how many you have given. It is not ideal to have received 8 - 10, and only given one or two, so balance it out.

Here are several of our favorite examples:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/matthewklidjian/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/ralphdelavega/

Other suggestions for putting yourself in the market to attract more offers:

Leadership Story — Domain knowledge (experience in the industry) is less important right now vs. leadership skills. Still, when you are pivoting to a new industry and role it can be helpful to have an engaging story that illustrates your qualities and leadership style. Like your LinkedIn summary, also written in first person.
Networking strategy — Having a plan to engage and expand your network is crucial. The odds are 85% or higher that your next role will come via someone you get to know with your new focus. Success with applying on-line is rare. Far better to use your time refreshing or building your network, with a Pay-It-Forward approach. For example, go through your LinkedIn contacts and find 2 - 4 people you value yet with whom you have lost touch. Reach out with a how are you doing message, or send them a link that you feel would be helpful. They are likely to check out your LinkedIn as a result, and it provides the basis to renew the contact. Beginning your networking campaign before you are “in the market” in the right way via LinkedIn is a mistake, because everyone you meet will first check you out on LinkedIn.
Resume — Is no longer one of the first things to focus on, at least in terms of layout and format. It is now generally the last thing to update. In today’s recruiting world they are already interested in you when they ask for it. It is more crucial than ever to be honest and accurate. Any inconsistency between LinkedIn and your resume or other public sources will end their interest in you. In our opinion it is no longer so crucial to spend hundreds of dollars on a highly stylized resume.

Rewired, Not Retired (50's and up)

Tue, 01 Feb 2022 07:12:57 GMT

We have found that many executives tend to avoid calling themselves “retired”. It conjures up images of being “done”, no longer contributing.

To our parents generation retirement was a status with prestige. It meant having earned a pension, and having a few golden years to enjoy the fruits of many years of hard work.

Not many have pensions these days. Even fewer eagerly look forward to golf five days a week. Probably the top attraction is more time with grandkids, followed by travel. And who knows how many golden years we have to enjoy. Likely more than the 5 - 10 our parents anticipated.

So by many observations one of four things happens when “retirement age” is reached:

Another full-time or consuming jobs are found. Less about the money, mostly about still contributing, being relevant and staying busy. Yet it puts off “the golden years”. Travel, more time with family and pursuit of new or favorite interests are deferred. All too frequently until one spouse is no longer physically able to enjoy travel and other activities.
“Lost puppy”. The person just wanders, looking for something meaningful to do while feeling really disoriented.
Interests have been developed in prior years, and are now pursued, providing a great deal of satisfaction while also starting the benefits of the “golden years”. Still, the tendency is to continue allocating too much time and energy to continuing to work.
Finding ways to give back seem to become more important.

What is the 85/85/85 framework?

85 + 85 + 85 roughly add up to the number of weekdays in a calendar year. The idea is to allocate your time into thirds. They do not have to be equal thirds -- yet each should be a meaningful % of your time.

85 days of work — with or without compensation, doing something stimulating and rewarding
85 days of intellectual stimulation — attending conferences, reading, Ted Talks, being on non-profit boards, etc.
85 days of recreation, travel and family

Virtually everyone likes this framework — yet containing work to 85 days has consistently proven to be a challenge. This framework makes it easier to say that if one role goes up another must go down, or be eliminated. It is also conducive to staging over time. Beginning with 2 - 3 work roles, then dropping one as the other 85’s become more populated because interests have grown.

As one example, one of my intellectual stimulation 85’s is joining an angel investing group. It exposes me to a lot of new concepts, gives me a chance to participate in due diligence teams and provides a new and diverse network of leaders to enjoy.