Executive Resumes, Personal Branding & Executive Job Search

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In my previous post, I discussed how to power your job search by using the LinkedIn Posts feature. In this post, you will learn tips for creating content within LinkedIn to help you build your brand, mindshare, thought leadership, connections, and ultimately give you a serious edge on getting the job of your dreams.

So, how is publishing on LinkedIn relevant to executive and professional job seekers?

As a creator of content on LI you can pursue a number of career advancing strategies:

You can build your thought leadership and brand, deepen your connections, and extend your online footprint to impress prospective employers. Anyone who works in technology functions or fields should show how tech and LI savvy they are by using this method.

What are some easy ways you can push out content?

• Use the Share an Update feature on your home page. See it towards the top of your home page. Your update will be brief and may or may not include a link to a longer blog post, article, white paper, resume, etc.
• Write a Post using the Publish a Post feature also on the menu bar on your home page. This is LI's long-form publishing feature. When you publish an article/post, it will be viewed by some subset of your connections. People may Like, Comment, and Share your content thus distributing it even more broadly.

Before you generate content, be sure your LinkedIn profile is complete and strong. That way, when all the people you inspired by your published words come to your profile they will see you in the right light and see your brand. So be sure to communicate your target position and industry, what you excel at, what differentiates you, and your values and style. Good luck!

 

Don't neglect getting expert help to create a "blow your socks off" executive resume that can make a HUGE difference in getting hired. It does for my clients and for the clients of many of my top-tier colleagues.

Become a power user of LinkedIn content and reap the rewards for years to come!

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So, what is the reason the market experts give for why Microsoft (MS) bought LinkedIn (LI)? You won't be surprised to know that they don't all agree. The most interesting reason, I think, was put forward in Forbes: Content. It is a play on Content is King. Turns out the content on LI has the advantage of being current and some of it is great!

This morning I turned up posts on how technology is disrupting the consulting business, another on how making little changes can make a profound impact on your career and earnings, and the 3rd gave me an idea for an important book to read that was on Bill Gates' suggested Summer Reading list. And those are just the ones I read of the 40 or so post titles I scanned!

So, how is this relevant to executive and professional job seekers?

As a consumer of content on LI you can pursue a number of career advancing strategies:

How do you leverage content on LI to propel your job search?

Quickly scan Posts each morning. Find it in the drop-down menu to the left of the Search bar at the top of your screen. Then quickly scan the Posts that pop up. LinkedIn has an algorithm to provide content that has some relevance to you in some way.

As a job seeker, you can find a whole other collection of Posts.You can narrow down by subject using the Search feature at the top of Posts. Enter your target company or companies where you want to work. You will quickly find out what's going on in terms of the thinking, culture, business plans, innovations, trends, hiring etc.

You can also search by subject matter. For instance, if you want to be a Channel Manager in the cloud industry, see what comes up in Posts when you search on some or all of those keywords.

Read the 1-3 most interesting Posts you find.

Don't stop there!

• Make a comment after the posts you found interesting. Your name with a link to your profile will be included. The company employee who wrote the post will appreciate your interest and contributions. Do this regularly and you will be building your thought leadership and well as your social reach.
• Check to see if your target companies (where you really want to work next) are seeking to hire someone like you and have posted a job on LI. If so, send an InMail to the recruiter. Mention that you've been following their posts and name one thing you found particularly interesting. Say that you have an interest in the target job and suggest that they review your (great) LI profile. Then follow the directions and apply.
• And/or search among your connections for an employee of the company. The posted job on LI will pop them up when you look at the job ad. Contact them via InMail or directly, if they are 1st degree connections, and ask if you can talk with them for 10 minutes or so about where they see the company heading or what the culture is like. (These questions go over way better than "Can you help me get a job?") After building the relationship, if it feels comfortable, ask if they would take a look at your (great) executive resume and give you feedback. And ask if they would submit your edited resume to their company. Resumes submitted in this way have 10 times the chance of getting you hired! And employees are often compensated for referring a person who gets hired, so they have some motivation to help you!

In my next post I will discuss how you can improve your job search and career by becoming a creator of content on LinkedIn!

Don't neglect getting expert help to create a "blow your socks off" executive resume that can make a HUGE difference in getting hired. It does for my clients and for the clients of many of my top-tier colleagues.

Become a power user of LinkedIn content and reap the rewards for years to come!

 If your career is a car, are you driving down a straight road? Or, do you picture yourself going around a rotary, seeing a number of exits, and then selecting one? In other words, is your career path more like a straightaway or a rotary? This is an important question to understand as you go about your personal branding,executive resume writing, and career management.

Let's imagine you are a VP of IT. Did you get there by starting out as a programmer, progressing to managing a team as a Team Lead, then a Project Manager, then moving up to Program Manager, then Director of IT, and now VP of IT? That's the straight path.

Many of my clients have progressed along a straight and logical path very similar to the one just described.

But sometimes my clients have gotten to the VP or C-level by different routes. Maybe they did a stint in product management, operations management, or finance, then added technical responsibilities and finally moved into their current leadership position in IT.

Is one better than the other? What is your opinion? There are benefits to both. The straight road folks have a sense of IT at both big picture and granular levels and deep expertise in how IT should operate. The rotary people bring to IT perhaps a broader grasp of overall business needs and the role IT can play in leveraging technology to meet business objectives.

Which is an easier sell to recruiters? Probably the straightaway applicants, at least for now. But, the rotary applicants have a strong case to make too. They deeply understand how IT and business can work together to drive corporate growth.

The interesting thing to me is the shift that is taking place. Because the 2000s have experienced so much financial disruption, job stints have gotten shorter and many people accepted position because they were the only jobs on offer in the constricted hiring environment. The new position may well have taken them off the straight path into lateral roles and/or different functions. That would be the rotary career

I'm glad that recruiters are viewing shorter stints as not always negative. And that they are more able to view different functional experience as conferring unique benefits. It means there's more room to be YOU in your working life and that is always good!

Look ahead, is your career going to branch out or steadily climb within your function over the next 10 years? In both cases, make sure you keep your eye on trends in hiring and functional roles. The latter are changing rapidly with the adoption of cloud computing.

The new IT leaders are expected to REALLY know how to leverage IT to be a true business partner. If you want to be a VP of IT via the more predictable path, make sure to get cross-functional exposure via projects and consulting within the business to strengthen your credentials.

If you come into IT managmeent from an adjacent functional area, don't fail to tap the deep dive expertise of technical teams and project managers to guide your leadership decision making.

Remember, if you have a rotary-type career, be very careful in how you write your resume. Clearly articulate and support your unique value proposition. And shape your more varied career in such a way as to make your value for the desired job obvious. Good luck!