But it is a skill that you can’t miss to master because according to a study by LinkedIn, millennials go through an average of four job changes before age 32, many changing to entirely new industries as well.

Being able to stand out among potentially hundreds of other talents and competitors especially when you embark on a 180 change is something that you can learn and apply over and over when you know the framework behind it.

And that’s the good news here – pitching yourself effectively can be learnt because it’s a skill and there is some science behind the madness of how to get chosen!

So if you’re ready to learn how to score – then let’s dive in!

A couple of weeks ago a few of my girlfriends came together for a cooking class and as it is, there is also a lot of chatting going on. Of course- also about boys.

2 of the girls are single and we were talking about a new dating app that requires you to fill in an essay about yourself.

One of the girls said she doesn’t use it as she wouldn’t know what to say about herself and that it feels awkward. Both of the girls were joking that they’d need some help with branding themselves and I should write their profile summary.

Although it was a joke- it’s something that is more common than you may think.

In fact, I hear that day in day out from my coaching clients: They’re missing out on interviews, promotions or job opportunities because they don’t know how to sell themselves.

It’s exactly the same when you date. You may miss out on the love of your life because you don’t know what it takes to position, marketing and sell you’re your point of difference.

And I get it.

Because honestly- who says ‘I’m first – let me tell you about myself and why you should choose me’.

It feels yucky just thinking that we have to brag about how good we are and everyone’s afraid of coming across like a douche or ‘too full of oneself’.

But being able to answer the question ‘why you’ confidently can make or break your career (and probably also your dating) success. Now do I have your attention?

Excellent!

Then let’s get into the nitty and gritty of how you can market and sell yourself (the non-sleezy way), especially if you’re ready to change careers (disclaimer: I’m taking no responsibility for your romantic success).

1. To ensure that you catch the eye of your prospective employer, you’ve got to effectively market your skills.

KNOW YOUR STRENGTHS (+ YOUR WEAKNESSES)

The first step to marketing your skills is knowing what you have to offer! The clearer you’re with your strengths, the more confident you are communicating your value and how a company can benefit from it. That’s already a big gamer changer because it’s not only your competence people buy- it’s also (if not more so) your confidence people are attracted to.

There are a few ways to find out your strengths and weaknesses

1.) Take a test! I love the Enneagram test as well as the 16-personalities test. The results often give you some valuable insights that you couldn’t put a finger on and will help you to add words towards something that you do naturally already because it’s how you’re wired.

2.) Go through your career history and identify the projects you’re most proud of. Then write down the results you achieved and how you actually achieved them- aka: what skills did you use?

3.) Ask your peers, friends and family: We’re too close to our own good so a great and easy way to find out what you’re good at is to ask people you respect in your close proximity. You need to be specific though with your questions as otherwise you’ll get wishy-washy answers.

a. What 3 words come to mind when you think of me? Or which words describe me best?

b. What are some areas that I can improve on?

c. Why are are friends?

This is a powerful question as it can go very deep when you keep asking ‘why’.

It may start off with a superficial statement like ‘because you’re funny’ or ‘you’re reliable’ but it often ends with ‘you just always make me feel [insert feeling] – this is the real value you provide as those emotions are what people value in you and make you stand out

Once you gained some clarity and also evidence of your strength, be honest about how much you enjoy applying all of them. Just being good at something doesn’t necesaarily mean you also enjoy doing it.

It’s called the curse of competence, so let’s not fall into that trap! Rate the skills you’ve listed on a scale from 0-5 and focus on those that are a 4 or higher to get ready for the next step:

The time to communicate it and share that with your decision makers. The important factor here is that you:

2. COMMUNICATE HOW YOUR SKILLS TRANSFER

After you’re clear about the skills you’re good at, you enjoy doing and want to focus on moving forward, it’s time to contextualise them for where you want to get into. Simply listing the skills isn’t enough.

You need to demonstrate their value to your next decision maker. The key here is to think about how you can apply these strengths to the company, profession or industry you want to get into rather than how you applied them in previous roles.

Write out some quick notes about your experience.

For example, in your previous roles as a project manager, you:

Set up and managed timelines (transferable skill: project management)
Researched potential vendors, partners and suppliers (transferable skills: research and communication)
Liaised with various internal and external (transferable skills: communication with multiple stakeholders)
Responsible for the project budget & allocate budgets appropriately (transferable skills: budgeting, high attention to detail, commercial acumen)
Analysed metrics and reporting of results to shape future strategy (transferable skills: data analysis, organization, planning)
Led team of 3 people (transferable skills: management, leadership)

You see, when you dive deeper you have a ton of transferable skills- you want to get to the bottom of each and build from there.

So first, you need to get clear about the tasks you did and then you want to identify the transferable skills that are required to complete those tasks.

Now all of a sudden you have a range of skills you can add to your marketing material but also have supporting evidence from listing the projects you worked on.

Now it’s time to match your skills with requirements from the field you want to get into. This is where market research and informal interviews come in.

What do job ads list as requirements?

What are some of the experiences and insights from people already in the company or profession? What skills do they list that are required to make it in that field?

These insights will help you to focus on particular keywords you want to include in all your marketing material – from your resume, your cover letter (if that’s still a requirement for some roles), your own website or portfolio and of course – your LinkedIn profile.

Especially on LinkedIn, you have the opportunity to boost your credibility and verify those skills even further when you ask for recommendations.

Make sure that - when you reach out to peers you worked with, previous managers but also study colleagues, to specifically ask them to recommend you for those skills you want to be known for and list them in your request to make it easy for them to commend your for the right ones.

As you already know- if you can’t ask for it and call out what you want, you get what others think. So don’t rely on others being able to read your mind. Spell it out. In this case- it’s literally spelling it out 

3. NETWORK LIKE IT’S GOING OUT OF FASHION

Let’s not beat around the bush:

Chances that you get your next career opportunity through a plain and mainstream online application are quite slim. LinkedIn conducted a study where 90% of people stated that they network while looking for jobs and of those people, 53% said it helped them land their current role.

It’s for 2 reasons:

1) Majority of jobs are actually not getting advertised. The first step in hiring processes is to go through and then reach out to an existing network or ask for referrals. It’s much quicker, cheaper but also more effective as the person we talk to already know us, what we’re like and what we’re after.

2) Especially when you want to switch industries, it’s even more important that you have someone advocating for.

These connections may not necessarily be the decision maker but often they’re the ones who can provide advice, leads, make introductions or even a referral for an open position.

Whatever the case, they need to understand your goals and value before they can help you effectively. So make sure you start the conversation and let your network know what your next goals are. Do it the right way following this structure:

Where are you now?

What is your current role? Don’t forget to include any extra curriculum activities you do- from volunteering to freelancing, attending further education … whatever it may be as this often shows your commitment to change and that you’re already pro-active with getting more experience and exposure to it.

How did you get to where you’re now?

This is where you can tell your story and make sense of your journey. No one else can compete with your background which has also shaped the person you’ve become. So own it and focus on the key highlights or moments that have led you to where you’re now.

Think about what’s relevant for the decision maker?

Don’t go all the way back to day dot when you were born. Instead focus on 1-2 key moments in your life that have had the biggest impact on your current and future career trajectory.

What’s next and why?

Why do you want to change industries? Your job is to connect the dots here by explaining how your experience, strengths, and career interests create value for the environment you want to get into.

So it comes back again to you knowing what makes you the perfect fit but also having a clear understanding of what is requires to be successful in this (new) field.

Like any change, transitioning between careers or industries can be daunting and seem impossible. However, it’s something that is becoming more the norm in this fast changing world of work. The era of staying in one career forever is over so the earlier you’re getting comfortable with how you can marketing and sell yourself effectively, the quicker you’ll be able to make the switch and the further ahead of your competitors you’re.

Future of Work Agile Carer impaCCCt Petra Zink

Now if you want to fast track this journey, then listen up!

You can tap into a proven and repeatable process that walks you through step-by-step what it takes to create our own career opportunities. Today and in the Future of work:

I’ve developed the Agile Career Course that teaches you everything you need to know to do exactly that: create an agile career you’re in control of and be able to apply the learnings over and over as you’re going to learn the principles and strategies of career development; not just the shiny and fancy tactics (which are still part of the course but put in context so you understand how they work)

We’ll go all in:

· clarify your career sweet spot based on getting crystal clear on your goals aligned with your lifestyle and personality

· how to spot career and work trends and ride the wave rather than being crushed by it

· learn how, where and when to market yourself effectively, online and offline

· simple but effective strategies and tactics to fast track the progression when you’re clear about the direction you want to head into and

· learning hacks that ensure you’re always on top of changes and with that, the talent in demand.

You can join the wait list as we are going to kick off in January!

When you join as founding member, you get all the goodness that comes with being an early adopter – from bonuses that haven’t been published anywhere else, to 1:1 support to access to additional resources that will fast track your learning journey even more.

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Sounds like it’s something right up your alley?

I can’t wait to have you part of the team who aren’t just talking about making 2021 the year of their career but actually doing it and doing it with a bang!

How to market & sell your point of difference (without being sleazy)