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

Step 1: Identify the Barrier

Having laid the foundation on our three-step process for identifying and overcoming barriers to employment in my last article, I’ll focus here on step one, Identify the Barrier. Clearly, for barriers to be overcome, they must first be accurately identified.

What is a “barrier to employment”?
When I began my work in this field, my understanding of barriers, and therefore my definition, was quite limited… lack of experience, lack of specific education or training, having been fired in the past, and a few others. Within mere days of being on the job, my understanding deepened and my definition grew to include more and more. A barrier to employment is “anything that may be used to screen a candidate out.” Barriers include no work history, too much work history, and even a successful career with a single company for many years. They include, too little, too much or lack of specific education. It’s the way we look, where we live, how we talk, having too many children or not enough teeth, over-qualification and arrogance, immigrant status and shyness, and so much more. Anything that could result in the candidate not getting the job, is a barrier.

Who decides?
Employers decide what’s a barrier, and screen people out based on it… whether it’s accurate, fair, or even legal! Sometimes they ask questions and allow the candidate to explain, but often not. Employers may screen-out based on assumptions or realities that are illegal or uncomfortable to talk about… without giving the candidate an opportunity to respond!

Candidates may also decide what’s a barrier, and thus screen themselves out… even if the issue is unlikely to be a problem for the employer! I’ve worked with candidates who were sure their age was a barrier, and though I disagreed, it became an issue… they avoided some opportunities, told on or sabotaged themselves, attributed negative outcomes to their age and gave up. It became a barrier. I’ve also worked with older and younger candidates who felt their age wasn’t a barrier. In the end, their clarity, confidence, and willingness to explain (or even bring it up!) made it a non-issue. If a candidate believes something will be a barrier, develop solutions accordingly. We’ll focus on solution in Part 4.

Identifying Barriers by Thinking Like the Employer
Unless you’ve done a lot of hiring, it maybe challenging to “think like the employer.” Your focus may lean toward helping people secure, succeed in and develop satisfying careers. Yet, we know the employer must be also satisfied. Here’s a crash course in “thinking like the employer” so you can identify candidate barriers (and strengths!).

Introducing PADMAN!

PADMAN, silly but memorable, is the super hero who helps us (and our candidates) quickly, accurately think like the employer. His name and our “PADMAN Wheel” remind us of the six most important areas of employer focus… and that it all comes down to the bottom line.

Presentation – Will you represent the company image?
Ability – Can you do the job (or learn it in a reasonable length of time)?
Dependability – Will you work in the company’s best interests?
Motivation – Will you help achieve company goals?
Attitude – Will you fit into the company culture?
Network – Will you attract the right people?

These six areas work together as system. Like a tire on a car, a hole in one area causes the whole tire to go flat; it’s useless and you can’t get you where you want to go! In the same way, candidates who get hired have some strength in each area. A candidate who is all but motivated, or has everything but a good presentation is likely to be screened-out. From job title to job title, the amount of weight given to each are varies. We’ll explore this more as we seek to understand the employer’s perspective of barriers in the next article.

For now, PADMAN is a simple and effective way to think more like the employer and, therefore, identify barriers. Think about it! Every reason an employer hires or fires, or promotes or de-motes, comes down to their concerns and needs in these six areas. Every interview question asked is an employer’s attempt to discover if the candidate will cause them concern and/or meet their needs in these areas. So, identify barriers means thinking like the employer, considering the specific opportunity the candidate is pursuing, and scrutinize them in each of these six areas. This helps identify strengths too!

The Fear Factor
Candidates may also decide that something is a barrier. If the employer is likely to agree, simply develop solutions and move forward. However, when the problem seems to be the candidate’s perception about the issue (not the issue itself), look for underlying fear.

My experience is that fear is the biggest barrier… biggest in that it’s most common, and that it’s the most damaging. If left unchecked, it can covertly rule this process and quickly unravel great progress. Whether a candidate has recently been released from prison or a prestigious but recently eliminated position, whether they’re low-skilled and risk homelessness or highly-specialized and risk irrelevance, there is fear. We all face barriers, and in this process we all face rejection. What if? What if? What if? Fear is present and is often the underlying cause of barriers, especially barriers identified by the candidate but unlikely be an issue for employers.

What are candidates afraid of? You name it, people are afraid of it!… Not getting the job, getting the job, boredom, too much responsibility, family resentment, not fitting in, not performing well, people discovering something negative about them, relapsing into addiction, not making enough money, losing government benefits, answering tough interview questions, and so much more. To identify what a candidate is afraid of, watch, listen, ask! I often identify fears by asking “what’s the worst thing that could happen if you… showed up to all our meetings, went to the interview, didn’t get the job, got the job?, etc. If the candidate is being honest, you’ll get to the thing they hope to avoid. I actively “de-mystify” the fear factor for candidates. We interact early and often about fear, that it’s not just them, they aren’t weak or bad for feeling it, etc. By getting it out in the open, they can more easily work through before it sabotages the process.

What does fear look like? Well, it doesn’t look like “fear.” It must be observed, asked about and discovered because it manifests as various actions and attitudes… tardiness, avoidance, non-completion of tasks that create progress, bravado, defensiveness, excuses, distraction, and more. I once worked with a man who dealt with his fear of getting hired then quickly fired by being a “great candidate.” He came early, stayed late, served coffee, and helped everyone else job search. People actually thought he was on staff! He did just enough that it appeared he would soon be working, but not enough to actually get an offer. It took me a little longer to recognize the underlying fear here, but now I’m savvy to it! Fear looks like lots of things. Get great at detecting it!

How do we distinguish actions and attitudes as “fear-based”? Imagine two candidates, both of whom are chronically late and somewhat arrogant. For one, it’s habit and personality; for the other it’s fear… on some level they know that if they show up on time with a willing attitude, they’ll quickly move forward, and they can’t let that happen because what if?…. To distinguish between the two, watch for timing and inconsistency; fear often crops up as new behavior when the risk is greatest. Watch for changes in body language, or a desire to reconsider the overall direction of the process. Listen for excuses, reasons for slowing down or reconsidering. Demystifying it early and making it regular part of your conversation will allow you and candidates to recognize fear. In the end, if a candidate is clear on what they get out this process, has the information and training needed to make it happen, and has adequate support throughout, and is still not moving forward, it is probably fear.

How do we help candidates reduce their fears? In many of the same ways we reduce our own fears as life comes at us more quickly than is comfortable, and in lots of other ways… talk about it with a friend or counselor, journal or process internally, exercise, get out in nature, talk with others who are in similar situations or have successfully moved through them, gather information, partner with someone and do it together, reduce tasks to manageable steps, just go for it, pray or meditate, and more. What works for one person, doesn’t another. So, have a long list of fear-reducing strategies to suggest, and be sure they promote forward movement rather than avoidance or sabotage (i.e., I have worked with candidates who reduce their fear by getting high, getting pregnant or in some other way sabotaging this process and so much more). I limit my suggestions to what is legal, non-dangerous, and within my morale code, and I recognize that the best strategies are those that respond to each unique individual.

To overcome barriers we must clearly identify them. This means thinking like the employer so we catch everything they may use to screen-out the candidate, and recognizing candidate fear and the barriers it can cause in this process. Next time we’ll focus on understanding the employer’s and candidate’s perspectives on a barrier (step two), so we can quickly develop solutions that satisfy both parties (step three) and create success for all.

This article appeared originally in the Career Planning & Adult Development Network Newsletter www.careernetwork.org

Photo by Fabio Venni

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