Feel stuck in your present position? Peel off your old label, slap on a new one, and position yourself for something different.
Whether you're a branch manager who wants to go into commercial lending, or an operations person who dreams of being a trainer, the challenge you face is the same: you have to convince people that, even though you don't have experience, you can handle the new position.
It's a little like show biz: you play the same role for years and then you get typecast. It can be difficult for people to believe that you can play a different role. To move on to new challenges, you have to negotiate into the new job by offering seemingly unrelated skills as an added benefit to the employer. The key to these negotiations is "positioning" yourself.
Positioning
Simply put, positioning yourself means stating your skills and qualities in a way that makes it easy for the prospective employer to see you in the new position.
You may want to stay in your present company. In that case, you are positioning yourself to the person in charge of hiring for the particular department you want to enter. Or, you may want to go to a new company or even a new industry. In this case, you are positioning yourself to a new employer. Either way, the steps are the same:
- Decide what skills and qualities your prospective employer wants.
- Search your background to see where you have demonstrated skills that would apply.
- Write a "position statement" and use it as the basis for your resume.
- Use the position statement to sell yourself in an interview.
Your position statement says it all. It should sell your ability, experience, and personality. It brings together all your accomplishments.
The rest of your resume should support the position statement. For example, if the statement says that you're a financial wizard, the resume had better support that. Remember, it is completely within your control to tell whatever story you want to tell. You can emphasize certain parts of your background and deemphasize others.
Thinking through your position statement is not easy, but it focuses your entire job hunt. It forces you to clarify the sales pitch you will use in interviews. A position statement is not the statement many people put on their resumes. They say they want "a challenging job in a progressive and growth oriented company that uses all my strengths and abilities." That says nothing at all, and it doesn't do you any good.
Bring Something To The Party
When it comes down to negotiating yourself into a new position, seemingly unrelated skills from former positions may actually help you get the job.
For example, some of my background had been in accounting and computers, when I decided to go into counseling. My chief financial officer (CFO) experience helped me ease into that career. I applied at a ninety person career counseling company and agreed to be their CFO for a while providing I was also assigned clients to counsel. They wanted a cost accounting system, so my ability to do that for them was what I "brought to the party." I was willing to give the company something they wanted (my business experience) in exchange for doing something I really wanted to do (counseling executives).
Combining the new with the old, rather than jumping feet first into something completely new, is often the best way to move your career in a different direction. You gain the experience you need in the new field without having to enter at the entry level. Equally important, it is less stressful because you are using some of your old strengths while you build new ones.
Coming from a different background than the one to which you are applying can also give you a bargaining chip. If you are looking at an area where you have no experience, chances are you will be competing with people who do have experience. You can separate yourself from the com petition by saying, "I'm different. I have the skills to do this job, and I can also do other things that these people can't do." It works! Examples of positioning (summary) statements are listed below. Others appear in the chapter on resumes. Positioning statements go at the top of your resume" and set the tone for the rest of it. They are usually under the heading "Summary of Qualifications."
