Ask The Right Questions?

What do you do? What are you looking for?

What are you good at?

While at first glance, these look like questions I might encounter in the course of networking or somewhere equally random that would trigger my "elevator pitch", nothing could be further from the truth. These are the questions you have to ask YOURSELF before you ever get to that point. As a matter of fact, I WISH the question "What can't you do?," was the one people asked at cocktail parties, or better yet, interviews!

Personally, and I'm sure I'm not alone here, I feel that editing your life into a 3o-second commercial is probably one of the hardest things you'll ever have to do. Maybe that's just because I'm a story teller and not a big fan of sound bytes. I remember earlier in my life I used to think I had to define myself by my job. Notice, I didn't say career. If someone asks me what my career is, my honest knee jerk answer would be 'finding jobs that interest me.' But we all know you just can't do that. While I've done a lot of things in the same general arena, I didn't stick to one narrow path. Since for me, the question is, "What can't I do?," I guess I've spent my working life trying to answer that question!

Part of me knows that being good at lots of things is a double edged sword. My whole life, I've heard my mom tell me that I'm so smart, I'll be good at anything I 'set my mind to.' Gee Mom, thanks for helping me narrow it down! When someone tells you the world is your oyster, that's a lot of oysters, and a lot of pressure! Many times if I lament about my current situation, well-meaning friends say, "Just pick SOMETHING." Guess what, guys... it's not that easy! Just because Ifind a position intriguing, or think I'd be well suited for it, does not mean that the company, industry, or person with the position in question agrees with me. So I realize that even with a targeted resumé, it's difficult for a hiring manager (or worse, the poor newbie in human resources faced with the task of sorting through the masses of incoming resumés) to connect the dots to see how I would fit into a position that seems 'off course' from what I've done previously. It's happened many times, I'm sure. Yet, I know that if they could just meet me, talk to me, and get 'the big picture' instead of the slice that a resumé presents, it would be a whole lot clearer.

That's why a really good resumé is so important. I've had many people review it and everyone has different, valid opinions. If I had to re-design my resumé to tailor it to every job I applied for, honestly, I wouldn't even bother saving it to disk, because I'd be writing it from scratch several times daily. While targeting your resumé to a job seems to be the hot topic du jour, and it definitely isn't practical, it looks like I better get on it, or I may be writing this blog forever!

Does this ring true with you? I know I'm not the only one out there who ran into this. I think I got through it, but I feel the issue of who you are/what you do 'in life' versus 'on paper' needs to be acknowledged for the giant hurdle that it is.