How the Concentration Strategy Was Developed
The concentration strategy was developed through the efforts of a classmate of mine when he was out of work. This talented person, whom we will call Ed, had a most unusual background that began with his graduation from the United States Military Academy at West Point. During his ninth year of military service, his second tour of combat duty ended when he was severely wounded in Vietnam. He spent the next six months in the hospital and then was discharged from the Army. From the Army Ed bummed around Europe for a while, ending up in Greece as a sponge fisherman for a year, and then returned to the United States. He enrolled as an MBA student in a western university and on completion was hired by a small company starting a chain of health food stores. Ed was successful in building this chain for a year or so, and then left this operation for one of a series of entrepreneurial activities. At that time he met a young executive of about his own age (he was then in his late thirties or early forties) who was the chief financial officer of a major corporation listed by the New York Stock Exchange. This kindred spirit convinced Ed to come aboard as a director of new business development in what was to be his longest stint with a large company up to that time: one and a half years. This period of relative quiet in Ed's career ended when both he and his friend were fired because someone discovered that they were apparently trying to take over the company.
Ed then reentered the realm of entrepreneurship, and he and his friend co authored and self published a book on entrepreneurship.
The Challenge
At the time that Ed obtained, he was between activities and his money was beginning to run out. He called me immediately after reading my book, highly excited about the techniques described in it, and he stated that he had seen the one and only job that he wanted advertised in The Wall Street Journal that very day. He asked if he might come to my home to discuss it with me. I agreed.
Ed entered my den with a fragment of a torn piece of The Wall Street Journal grasped in his hand. On it was advertised the job Ed wanted: vice president of a division of a major motion picture studio. Needless to say, I was somewhat surprised.
Ed asked whether it was possible for him to obtain this job. Now, the opening was for a vice president of new business development, and Ed had been director of new business development with the only other large company he had been with. Also, new business development implies a certain background of entrepreneurship credentials, which Ed held in spades. However, the chances of his getting one single great job like this were very small. I explained to Ed that while it was possible, he faced considerable risk of failure and that perhaps if he wanted to be a company officer with this title in a major company, a mailing to a number of companies might be a better route than relying on only this one job opening. However, Ed was not to be deterred, and as his friend I decided to help him.
Clearly, Ed already had a positive mental attitude, and he also had defined his personal professional objective explicitly. What he did have to do, however, was to plan his job campaign, develop a superior resume, and decide on the exact strategy that should be used to approach this job opportunity.
Ed and I spent several hours together going over his background in some detail, establishing all his experiences, and documenting them as accomplishments. After some probing, we came up with some impressive achievements. For example, he had started up a new concept for a beverage and had already sold 100,000 cases before it was even manufactured. A marketing plan he had developed for the major corporation that he'd worked for had been implemented and had resulted in the company's stock increasing by 300 percent. And, of course, he was co author of a book on entrepreneurship.
The Strategy
We decided on using a third party campaign strategy rather than simply responding to the advertisement and the personnel manager listed. Acting as third party, I would find out to whom the position reported, speak with this person, and attempt to get an interview or at least learn all that was possible about the job.
I called the major motion picture studio and asked for the name of the president of the appropriate division of the studio. I then asked for him, spoke to him myself, and said that I had a friend who had learned about the opening for this particular position as a vice president and wanted to know more. In this way I found out more about what the job required than was revealed in the advertisement. I also described, some of Ed's outstanding accomplishments. The president of the division, let's call him Jim, agreed that my classmate sounded like a good candidate. However, he also advised me that the hiring was being handled through his personnel manager. I then suggested that Ed send a letter describing his qualifications to Jim with a copy to the personnel manager, Joe.
After my conversation with Jim I called Joe, telling him that I had spoken with Jim and that Ed was sending a letter directly to Jim describing his qualifications and that he, Joe, would be receiving a copy. At that time Joe advised me that they had received 500 resumes (not letters) in response to their advertisement so far.
Ed developed his letter, which was written in the format recommended for responding to advertisements, but mentioning my conversation with Jim.
Several weeks later Ed got a call from the personnel manager. He was you are going after one job, this is not true. You have no other job offer to help you out psychologically with the peaks and the valleys of your campaign, nor do you have any hard evidence of other offers which you can use to bring pressure on your target company and your prospective employer to get an offer.
To summarize, the concentration strategy can work. It works because you are able to concentrate all your resources on one single target, something that your competitors will probably not do, even if you have 800 or even 1,000 of them. Therefore, without question, you will be an outstanding candidate for this job. On the other hand, because of the increased risks, the personal idiosyncrasies, and other strange happenings in any job finding situation, there is considerable risk of your not succeeding.
