In part one and part two we looked at the marketing process and what you are actually employed for, e.g. the way you think respectively.
Today we look at how to identify the unique features of product, you.
Understanding the product – You, Your Abilities, Competencies & Transferable Assets
Many of us realise that every interview has been competency based, in some cases the employer does not realise this but by definition the questions they asked were trying to find out how you work. Other times and increasingly so they are very specific in terms of what they are looking for and want to find out about you.
As previously mentioned you need to demonstrate how you work, your thinking, your competencies.
There is a way to do this effectively. Like most things there is good news and bad news to tell at this point.
Let’s get rid of the bad news first
If done well it will take you about 5 to 10 days of hard work.
The good news
You will be:
- Prepared for every interview/meeting you go to as you will understand the product (you) in full
- Able to decipher job/contract descriptions and answer the real question/s being posed
- Able to write tailored personal pitches in a very short period of time as all the hard work will be done.
Graham Hastie the Strategic Director of London Business School says “Spending the time doing the preparation as the Fausts suggest is one of the best investments you can make in your career progression”.
There are 3 steps:
Step One
De-construct your work, social and education life by writing the longest CV you have ever written starting with the last project you did. No one will ever see this apart from yourself (mine was 56 pages long). For each project assignment use the following technique:
- What were you trying to achieve?
- What was your initial thinking to overcome the issue?
- What you did?
- What was the result?
This will leave you with many stories each telling you something about how you do what you do.
Step Two
Analyse the two middle sections of each story e.g. your thinking and what you did.
This will tell you the ability you used. When you do it you will realise how easy this is
Step Three
You now have many abilities that are demonstrated and evidenced by events from your life. This is the easiest step as all you do is put each event that demonstrate an ability under the heading.
If you do this well you will understand the product and have maybe 10 abilities with about 10 events to prove and evidence each one.
You have created your own personal Career DNA Bank.
Pitch Yourself is available at all good book shops and online at Pearson Education
