I have a couple of suggestions for job seekers who need some advice on how to approach the issue.
Let’s start with an example: If you wanted to publish a book 20 years ago, this was to a big degree a matter of luck and a very long process of labour. Writing the book itself is a long, effort-taking, detailed process that requires patience. But I’m talking about getting a book published, not writing one. The only way to publish a book 20 years ago was to go around to the publishing houses and try to convince the publishers. Thus your work needed to be evaluated by many editors and evaluators to be found worthy of publishing.
Let’s look at today. If you have a written book at hand, you can get it published within one week (including its physical print). (See Amazon and CreateSpace)
What changed?
Not it’s not difficult to publish the book but o reach the target audience. This is the theme of the modern age. There are millions of books, and millions of readers. So the real value isn’t in the publishing of the book. It is now in the book’s reaching its audience. So the deal is with the marketing.
In this world of plentifulness (there are approximately 2.3 million books in Amazon now), it’s not a skill to have written and published a book. The skill is presenting that book to related people.
This example I have given of publishing a book and delivering it to the reader is a characteristical one,, a metaphor of the era we are in.
Producing something good is no longer the guarantee for it to sell.
Composing a good song is no longer the way to fame.
And.
Having great skills and qualities is no longer the guarantee for getting a job.
There’s so much to learn for those who complain that they are seeking a job, see they have good skills yet cannot see their value.
The real value today is in being visible. In being reachable. In being able to steal seconds from people’s limited attention. So this is the most basic reality that job seekers and those who plan to develop themselves in marketing need to understand clearly.
While candidates spam companies with hundreds of applications, the companies do the same to the candidates by publishing countless ads. Imagine a chat between two people where both of them send ten messages each time. Communication would be impossible. Systematically we’re living a similar lock-up (kilitlenme). The most basic fact we need to learn to go beyond this is that today (and probably for the following 50 years) the most basic value is “attention”.
I won’t try to answer the question “How to draw attention in an ethical, effective and honest way?” Because this is just the question for marketing. But I have other suggestions. The clearest thing I will say is this: Just as there’s no being lazy if you want to publish and sell a book, there is no creating a good CV and being lazy if you want to get a job.
You need to work by:
- Being active in the related area both offline and online
- Following effective jobs in the area
- Making qualitative, not quantitative, network
- Most importantly; doing works that tell about you, that being you visibility, producing.
I want to emphasize again the last one. If you want to stand out and be noticed, the most permanent way of doing it is to produce something. If you are unsure about what to produce, I suggest you first work on making your own story clear.
A footnote: I find sayings “Marketing yourself” or “self-marketing” off-putting. I’m not talking about a person’s arrogantly praising himself here. On the contrary, my main point is to let your work and doings speak for you. Also, don’t hesitate to say “I have done this” when necessary.
Check out these articles too:
Leave a Reply