Patty Azzarello's blog is called The Desired Outcome.
In case her name is new to you, here's a brief bio:
Patty was the youngest person ever to become a general manager at Hewlett Packard
at the age of 33. She ran a $1B global software business at age 35
and became a CEO for the first time at the age of 38. With a scorecard like that, one can't help but say "this feels like someone I should pay some attention to" which when I read her recent posting called "Serving or Selliing" was exactly what I did.
While the post that she wrote was focused on sales and sales strategies, it seemed to me that one could easily overlay much of what she was saying to the job search experience and process.
That by itself would probably not come as a revalation to many. After all, most of us know full well that a job search is, in fact, a sales process. What struck me about this particular post was the emphasis she placed on "serving" vs. "selling."
Naturally, we all like it when we find others who support our beliefs, so maybe this is another reason why I wanted to expose
knowing full well that there are thousands of executives in this economy who are in the middle of a job search and are working as hard as they know how to bring that process to a successful conclusion just as fast as humanly possible in reading the post I thought a great deal of what she was saying.
http://azzarellogroup.com/blog/2009/03/02/serving-or-selling/
Now is the time to be serving/giving.
You will get more business in the short term, and you will be building a foundation of good will, which will pay huge dividends in the future. People remember who helped them in tough times.
And people do business with people they are currently engaged with. Stay engaged. Help.
Even if you are not a sales person, now is a good time to help people.
You build value in your network by putting value into it.
Think of always maintaining a balance of giving more than you take. Then when you need something you will find that help is abundantly available.
In your sales process, anything you give will increase the value of what you ultimately sell.
4 comments:
Great post. What I particularly liked is the sales/job-search analogy. My frustration is that there are many people who keep meticulous track of their sales funnel, but few who take the same care with their job-search...
But I am trying to change that....
Will at
http://www.virtualjobcoach.com
I know exactly what you mean, and for sure it's true. If your experience is the same as mine, however, my guess is part of the problem lies in the difference that people feel when it comes to selliing a product/service vs. themselves.
Agreed. But I think there is more nuance as to why people can't seem to "really focus" and plan a job-search. I am sure that part of it is being uncomfortable 'self-selling' - but I think that there is also a fair amount of denial. I don't know how many times I have had people say to me "I have all the time in the world to job search". This perception then taints their whole approach to one of 'minimal planning and tracking' - even though they are losing thousands of dollars in salary by having a prolonged search.
For sure. I am sure that you have read as I have that the loss of a job is in a very real sense a "death" and if and when that happens to any of us we go through the same emotional phases as described by Dr. Kubler-Ross and certainly that includes denial.
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