Hope & Practicality from Elisabeth - Elisabeth (Harney) Sanders-Park is co-author of No One Is Unemployable, The WorkNet Model and the WorkNet curriculum, and President of WorkNet Solutions

The WorkNet Model is “a model of career development and job search for people with barriers”. It’s a long name, and if we could shorten it we would, but each part is necessary. The revolutionary part, when it comes to serving clients with significant barriers, is the career development approach. After all, the average unemployed person can find job search support in many places, but few will encounter quality career development. But, we can’t drop the “job search” reference either, for two reasons. First, too often career development services focus on career assessment and planning without becoming tangible enough for so many clients, perhaps especially those facing significant barriers who notoriously struggle to transition theory into practice. The other reason we must refer to the job search from the start, is because difficult clients who need to work immediately are commonly encouraged to job search in a too-traditional way. Here are ideas on making the job search piece effective.

In any job search, there are four important steps to getting a “yes”… know what job you want, avoid being screened-out, prove you are a great match for the job, and get to the person who can hire you. Here are some tips for avoiding the traditional traps, and staying creative with people who face significant barriers and need to work immediately.

Clarify the Job Target – As always, I start with thoughts of career planning. Quick Tip: Don’t get stuck on skills! Assess not just current skills, paid work history, and formal education, but the client’s fascinations, values, unpaid and natural skills, and non-traditional or unpaid experience. People bring more than just the work they have been paid to do and the classes they have taken. The employer gets it all, so assess it all. Then, identify not just the job title (skill group) they will target, but the fields, industries, and company cultures they will focus on, based on their fascinations and values. A Receptionist job in a social service agency, a luxury auto dealership, a family-run plumbing company, and a long-haul trucking firm are very different jobs, so knowing the skills and title isn’t clarifying enough.

Avoid Being Screened-Out – Hiring employers get an average of 120 responses for each job they advertise. Their first question is, “who can I get rid-of?”. More than 60% go in the “no” pile, and the others in a “maybe” pile. The next question is, “who else can I eliminate?”, and another 20-30% are tossed. The employer has spent less than 90 seconds per candidate, screened-out 90% of them, and still has no “yes” pile. Only when they have their top 3-5 candidates does the question become, “Why should I hire you?” For most of the process, the client is being screened-out, not hired. Reduce time and frustration by discovering anything employers may use to screen the candidate out before truly exploring their strengths or making a connection with them. Look for barriers and distractions about their ability to do the job, but also their presentation, attitude, dependability and other concerns. To reduce or eliminate each issue, clients can use the five solution tools presented in “No One Is Unemployable”, change where you look for work, access a resource, learn a new skill, adjust their own outlook, and develop a good answer.

Prove They Are A Great Match for the Job – Jump into the employer’s shoes and discover their top 10-12 needs, including the abilities and experience they are looking for, but also what makes for an ideal candidate in terms of presentation, motivation and other areas of “fit”. Then, help the client prove they can meet each need and are a great match overall. Tip! Pull from their entire life experience and all their skills, whether they have ever been paid to use them. Many people I work with gained their best skills and most qualifying experience in prison, as the oldest of six or the mother of four, in an addiction treatment program, or in other unpaid or non-traditional settings, but the employer gets it, so we use it (I’ll share our strategies on this another time). The proof you have gathered becomes stories, demonstration, quantified selling points, and credible references that they use to market themselves on paper, over the phone, in person, and via references.

Get to the Person Who Can Hire You – 90% of candidates are screened-out before interacting with anyone who has the power to say “yes”, and people with barriers go first! If you want to help your difficult clients skip the screen-out process and go directly to the hiring process, teach them to use side doors while their competition is still waiting in the lobby. Side doors are techniques for meeting and talking with the person who makes the hiring decision BEFORE you submit your resume or application. Many of us have gotten interviews and job offers before submitting an application, and our clients can too. Help them find ways to casually meet and talk with the business owner, Manager or Department Head, either as a customer, the friend of an employee or associate, a volunteer, a fellow member of an association, a person doing research, a participant at civic events, or in dozens of other ways. This takes a bit more planning, creativity and guts, but it reduces job search time. In fact, it’s the way we find work.

Built upon the ideas I shared about career planning, and cultivating career resilience, these tips can help even our most difficult clients get the job. In the words of one of my favorite story tellers, Garrison Keillor, “be well, do good work, and keep in touch”.

This article appeared originally in the Career Planning & Adult Development Network Newsletter

Photo by Egan Snow