Category Archives: Employment

In the Napoleon Hill classic, Think and Grow Rich, Napoleon recounts a story of how he got a job by agreeing to work for free. Yes, that’s right, for free. Actually, he agreed to work “on consignment” or on a trial basis. The gambit worked and he was employed.

If you think about it, it is a interesting option. You as the job seeker stand to lose perhaps a few days of your time. If you are already unemployed, it’s not much of a loss. For the employer it is an opportunity to observe someone in a real work environment before making a longer term commitment to that person. I would say this is a win-win.

However, I would think that you need to do your homework on the employer up front to make sure it is a company you want to work for. I also suspect this would not be an option for the companies with a “professional” personnel or Human Resources department. This means you are more likely to encounter acceptance of this concept by small to medium sized businesses where the owner or department manager is the decision maker in whom to hire. In my work with small business owners I find that they really like this idea of “try before you buy”.

If given the chance to work on a trial basis it is up to you to get the offer for full time employment. Remember, it is not just your technical competence. Equally important is how you mesh with the organization. The employer is just as concerned with how you will fit in. Will you be accepted by your co-workers? Do you fit in with the predominant company culture? This is the real advantage to the employer. They get to see beyond the model employee that everyone tries to present in the interview process and see the real person in action. They understand that unless you are trying to get a job as an astrophysicist, technical competence is much less important than the intangibles of work ethic, likeability and character.

One of the natural laws of employment is that it is always easier to get a job if you have a job. And it doesn’t really matter that much at what level you get on. For example, I know of a young college graduate that wanted to find a job in his home town. He applied for several jobs that required a degree in business which he just happened to have. No luck. After several fruitless months of sending out resumes, filling out applications and getting interviews that never resulted in a call back, he ran out of money. He just had to do something. So he took a job working in the warehouse of a national service company headquartered in his town. Four years of college and he got a job moving boxes in a warehouse. This doesn’t sound like an inspirational story except he didn’t stop there. Over the next ten years he progressed from that lowly warehouse position to several different positions in the company and is now the manager of the training division for that same company.

Companies have lots of choices today. They can take a chance on a complete unknown with a decent resume or they can offer that opportunity to someone who has already demonstrated that they have a good work ethic and a willingness to learn. These are both top of the list items when thinking about hiring a new employee. Who do you think is favored in that choice?

This is just one example. Before we became so enamored with degrees and credentials this was the rule, not the exception. Young men and women worked their way up after starting at the bottom. Today we have created an expectation that we can start in the middle. If you have a bachelors or masters degree you are going to come in and immediately be a productive team member. Maybe, maybe not. Many large companies today spend a year or more training their new employees to get them to a level where they can pay for themselves. This is important. Companies do not hire out of some noble desire to give people meaningful work. They hire people because they believe that your efforts as a new employee will increase the amount of money they make, above and beyond the cost they incur in hiring you.

That’s it.

I realize that my last few posts have kind of been on the depressing side. Yes, the job market is tough. But I think one of the biggest problems is that we frame employment in terms of someone giving us a job. It’s like we are just hanging around waiting for someone to bestow some huge favor upon us. I don’t wish to make this sound simplistic. I fully acknowledge that in today’s climate it is difficult to get a job. What I am trying to do is convince you that a new approach needs to be taken. This new approach is based on the following seven key principles:

1. It is easier to get a job if you are already working.
2. Networking and leveraging referrals is the key to finding job opportunities.
3. It is better to start at the very bottom than not get started at all.
4. Once you gain a foothold you need to use it as a platform. As you demonstrate competence you should push for better opportunities.
5. There is no substitute for doing a good job.
6. Most people will wait until someone gives them a job. You need to be proactive in finding work.
7. Employers hire people because they expect that person to add to their profitability.

My next few posts will take these seven steps and expand on then as I lay out a different approach to getting a job and setting you on a path to your life’s work. See you then.

In the old world you graduated from college and sifted through a pile of job offers to pick that one job that best matched your skills and aspirations. Your new employer was grateful for your energy and enthusiasm and for your potential to be a valued member of his team.

There was a time when a college degree was a ticket to employment. It was almost taken for granted that once you graduated, a job would be waiting for you. In my own case I graduated from college in 1978 and didn’t bother attending any of the job fairs or recruiting opportunities the university presented. I took the whole summer off and didn’t get serious until that fall when I decided it was time to get a job. I remember thinking that a lot was happening in Houston so I packed a bag and drove to Houston on a Sunday. When I got there I found a cheap motel and bought a Sunday Houston Chronicle. I spent a couple of hours looking through the want Ads and made a list of the companies I would call. The next morning I started calling and had my first interview that afternoon. By Wednesday I had two job offers and was employed by the end of the week.

Unfortunately, this is not happening like it used to….a recent article in Investors Business Daily reported that “for the first time in history, the number of jobless workers age 25 and up who have a attended some college now exceeds the ranks of those who settled for a high school diploma or less.”

Another important fact is that many recent grads are saddled with debt. Big time debt. Debt that you just can’t walk away from. Debt that is stuck to you like hot tar on a cat.

On an episode of a talk news program a couple of recent graduates were introduced to tell their own personal tale of woe. One of the recent graduates had a degree in anthropology or some other low demand degree program. She also had a big pile of debt and no realistic prospect of paying it off anytime soon.

The other graduate was in a little better shape. He had two degrees including a degree in international business. Unfortunately, he still didn’t have a job. In fact, he said that he had been told by some of the people he had interviewed with that he probably needed an MBA to get a job. Four years of hard work, two degrees and graduating Magna cum laude and still not adequate to be offered a job? This, and tens of thousand in debt and they are telling him he needs another degree to get a job? If I were him I think I would look at other options.

There are any number of reasons why things have changed, and the state of the economy is only one of them. I will let someone else delve into all the other factors influencing this phenomenon. The purpose of this blog is to show you a path forward, one that doesn’t involve the old way of trying to find someone to give you a job. You may end up in the same place, but it will be your decision.

It is not only important to know what you can do. You also need to know what you want to do. You are much more likely to succeed following your passion than just taking anything that comes along. I will contradict this in a latter post when I recommend taking a long view to getting your ideal job, but for now we are concentrating on what interests or excites you.

You may think that you already know this, but my recommendation is for you to take the extra step of testing for your interests and aptitudes. Many of you have already done this but I recommend a test based on the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator. This is a psychometric assesment designed to measure physcological preferences that can be related to occupations or work. This can be a useful exercise to help you focus your efforts on finding work that will hold your interest. It allows you to leverage your skills and aptitudes toward landing a specific type of work. I am not recommending a specific source for this testing but there are several free or low cost opportunities is you Google “Free Myers Briggs Test”.