Building a Reputation Outside of your Direct Contacts
I just finished listening to The Fountainhead, by Ayn Rand, for the second time. It’s always interesting to read a book for the second time, with many years in between, and notice how the current culture or phase of life affects how the I respond to the book. The Fountainhead is especially interesting in this political and economic climate. With my recent career gyrations and changes, I was struck by the few examples of hiring in the book.
The protagonist in The Fountainhead, Howard Roark, is an architect who is uncompromisingly dedicated to his independent style, creativity, and craft. The story focuses on his ability to survive in a society that increasingly devalues independence and innovation, while heralding the will of “the people”.
Early in his career, after being kicked out of architectural school for not meeting the norms of society, he takes some drawings to his idol, Henry Cameron, to see if he can get a job. After reviewing his drawings and asking a few qualifying questions, Henry responds:
“I don’t want to see you. I don’t like you. I don’t like your face. You look like an insufferable egotist. You’re impertinent. You’re too sure of yourself. Twenty years ago I’d have punched your face with the greatest of pleasure. You’re coming to work here tomorrow at nine o’clock sharp.”
“Yes,” said Roark, rising.
“Fifteen dollars a week. That’s all I can pay you”
“Yes.”
“You’re a damn fool. You should have gone to someone else. I’ll kill you if you go to anyone else. What’s your name?”
Over the past year, with the tumult in the job market, job search advice on LinkedIn, and my own career changes; I’ve thought a lot about employment, hiring, and how decisions about them get made within a business. These have led me to the conclusion that hiring is really made based on Reputation. What is the hiring manager’s understanding of your reputation and the reputation of the businesses, schools, and organizations you’ve been a part of?
In some cases, your reputation (or the reputation of what you’ve been a part of) precedes you and there isn’t a question of whether you’ll be hired or not. This is why networking is so powerful. If you create a solid network, which means building a strong reputation with as many people as possible, and anyone in your network is looking to hire someone with your skills then you’ll likely get a strong chance at the position.
If you’ve recently graduated from a famous college, who the hiring manager has had positive experience with hiring from the in the past and your degree fits the needs of the position, you have a good chance.
The difficulty lies in the instance when you have little to no reputation with the hiring manager/business you’re applying. This is a poignant scenario for the 100,000’s of oil and gas (and other industries) professionals that are looking to switch industries.
Building a Reputation
In The Fountainhead, Roark didn’t need a reputation with Cameron to land a job, he just showed him is capabilities through his drawings. With more purely creative careers, like architecture, this is an easier proposition; carry around a portfolio of work to show potential hiring managers your capabilities. If you’re an accountant, engineer, or operations manager, how do you achieve the same goal?
The first step in building a reputation is to do a good job while you are employed. Make sure your work is something of note, meaning others notice your contribution to the company. This is the easiest way to network with your coworkers. When others around you recognize the value you can bring, it creates trust. They trust that you will do a good job, now and in the future. Which, when they’re at other companies and need someone with your skills they’ll likely remember you. If you’ve performed well, your closest network of contacts that have worked directly with you will be the most powerful resource when looking for a new opportunity. This is the easiest networking because other than doing your job well, you don’t have to do anything else for others to recognize your value. It takes additional work to expand your network beyond those you have direct contact with.
Beyond your direct coworkers, it takes more work to build a reputation. The traditional route, and still a good method, is to join organizations such as SPE in Oil & Gas and ASHRAE in air conditioning. These provide opportunities to meet more people and display your abilities. This network will have direct knowledge of your abilities and provide another layer of contacts that will be available to tap if you’re in need of a new position.
While these activities help when looking to move beyond your current company, within the same industry, they do little to help broaden your network outside your current industry.
Sales vs. Marketing
When a sales professional is targeting a customer, they’re using their direct interactions with the prospect to convince them of the merits of their product/service. This is like your interactions with direct colleagues of your network. The traditional job search is like a sales call. A “customer” is looking to hire someone to fill the needs of their organization, when you contact them about the position, typically you will send over a brochure (resume) of your abilities in hopes that they like what they see and take it to the next level.
Resume = Brochure
Most of the posts on LinkedIn regarding finding a new job, seem to focus on how to make your resume stand out. All of which is helpful, my thoughts on resumes is that you need to clearly describe the value you brought to your organization so that others can recognize how you can do the same for them. This includes using action verbs, checking your spelling, and having a clear summary. While these are all very important and must be done as well as possible, it has become so commoditized most people will have the same caliber of resume. When was the last time you bought something based on a brochure? The goal is to elevate yourself above the rest of the fray in order to capture the attention of your potential or target employer.
Marketing, on the other hand, is used by companies and brands to develop a reputation for their offering without that direct interaction. My definition of marketing is creating and distributing relevant content that will educate, entertain, and/or engage the customer with consistency. This relevant content creates value for your target audience which leads to trust. When it comes to career, not many people are actively trying the build their reputation through marketing.
The Best Time to Plant a Tree
Building a reputation through “sales”, or direct work with your network, takes time. You must work together with people and show them your abilities. Marketing is no different. It takes time to create content that is relevant to your audience and it takes time to do it consistently.
If you have done any job for any amount of time, chances are you have some experiences and unique knowledge that others would benefit from understanding. The goal of this strategy is to share knowledge consistently to bring value to others as well as build your reputation beyond your immediate sphere of influence. Regardless of your situation, starting as soon as possible to share your knowledge will help you build your reputation with the market.
Positioning
When Howard Roark walked into Henry Cameron’s office he positioned himself as someone who doesn’t care about what people think and knows what he wants (He went to seek a job with a famous architect with no experience and having been kicked out of school), and someone who wants to be measured by the value of his work. He gave his drawings as a representation of his work. Positioning is the shaping of your message so that the receiver understands you and your abilities in the way that suits your goals.
One mistake I see of my former oil industry colleagues, who are looking to move out of the industry, is they focus on what they’ve accomplished in the context of the oil industry. For instance, a highly qualified engineer posted about all the projects he worked on in splendid detail of how his slip design increased the holding force of a liner hanger by 100,000 lbs. While this is a great achievement, people in other industries don’t understand what that means and cannot quickly picture how that experience will help them achieve your goals. Instead, in this example, the engineer needs to focus on his ability to execute ideas quickly, on time, and the value that those ideas brought to the project/company.
Understanding your goals, the people that will help you achieve those goals, and then framing your content to bring value to those people. Weaving in specific details of your experience is critical, but moving up another level and communicating the steps, tricks, or overarching take-aways the reader can use when they encounter similar situations will be more valuable than how exactly to strengthen the tips of the wicker on the slip to increasing hanging force.
Content Strategies
Here are a few strategies I’ve used to share my knowledge:
How stuff works
If you’re involved with any technology or equipment, sharing how it works and what it does to add value to an operation is a prime example of educating your audience.
How do the ancillary operations surrounding your technology work?
What to look for when deciding on a technology
If you are involved with a technology, I’m sure you’ve put together competitive analysis on your product vs. others, share this thought process with the customer
To bring value, without being too salesey, just share the information used to make the decision.
Industry related commentary
If something happens in the industry, share a commentary on how that affects the business, especially your target customer
How does this apply to all businesses?
Relate your experiences with a new podcast, article, or book you’ve consumed
What was interesting from the new item?
How can you relate?
Is there anything you disagree with?
Is there anything you can apply to your situation?
I’m sure there are many other strategies, these are just a few that I’ve used.
Publishing content on a regular basis keeps you in front of your target market and helps to build your reputation as someone who is knowledgeable and helpful. This content helps to build awareness about you, but also builds a body of work that you can use to reference when discussing your experiences. First, documenting your thoughts, experiences, and knowledge keeps them fresh in your mind. When interviewing, having written these things down makes it easier for you to recall in the course of the conversation.
Distribution
While there are many places to share your insights, LinkedIn is really the only one that can achieve the goal of broadening your reputation beyond your direct contacts. Regardless of what you’ve experienced in LinkedIn, it is the only place where businesspeople are regularly going to read about business. Within LinkedIn there are two ways to share your ideas:
· Natively on the LinkedIn Publishing Platform
· Create a Personal Website and share content you post there
LinkedIn makes it extremely easy to publish directly on their platform. Under the “Start a Post” area at the top of your feed you can select Write article. Selecting this will take you to a blank article form where you can type directly into their platform or paste from another source. I typically will write the article in Word and then paste into their article form. Their software makes it easy to format, add titles, add images, etc.
The second way to publish would be to purchase your own webpage, mine is www.matthewacrump.com, publish your content to that website, and then share on LinkedIn. There are several website services that make it easy for your to quickly set up a great looking website. I chose Squarespace. Publishing on your own website provides a few benefits over directly on LinkedIn:
You own the location of your content
Highly unlikely, but LinkedIn could decide to get rid of their native publishing service.
You direct readers to your own website, it provides a platform to store other information about you
Over time you can add onto your website, such as courses, presentations, ecommerce
Regardless of how you do it, publishing (distributing) your ideas is the most important part.
Brand
You know what to expect when you encounter a Nike Shoe, an Apple Product, or a Southwest Flight, all three of these companies have spent time communicating what they represent, how they work, and the product they provide. They’ve created a brand. Developing your reputation by sharing insights, knowledge, and ideas help to build your brand. Over time, people who encounter your content will develop an understanding of what you represent, how you work, and what you can provide. Using this content to position yourself as an expert, educator, and solution provider in a broader context will open opportunities if you’re looking to change industries. Distributing your content on LinkedIn greatly increases your audience/network and therefore increases your ability to move between industries, positions, and opportunities.