Jumpstarting Your Career: Tips & Hacks to Crack the Job-Search Code

Jumpstarting Your Career: Tips & Hacks to Crack the Job Search Code

By Adam S. Najberg

Table of Contents

Introduction

Part I

Crafting Your Professional Narrative

The Long Odds Against Getting Noticed – and How to Overcome Them

Start by Crafting Your Professional Narrative

Your Adjectives Define You and How Recruiters Will See You

Skills That Define You

Be an Achiever, not a Doer

Lights, Camera, Action: Tell Compelling Stories to Cap Your Professional Narrative

Part II

Buffing Your Résumé

Keep it Short & Sweet

A Breif, Inspiring Bio Section Can Help You Stand Out

Keeping Your Job Entries Tight

Nailing the Education Section of your Résumé

Wrapping up Your CV with a Bang or a Whimper?

Almost Last, but not Least

Formatting and Aesthetics

Part III

Crushing Your Job Interviews

Time to Research and Prep

There’s no script for an interview:

Get to know your interviewer:

Know the basics of the company:

Craft the List of Questions You Think You’ll be Asked:

Coming up with Answers to the Anticipated Questions:

How to Prepare for Your Remote Interview

Live Interviews & Interview Etiquette

What to Wear at Your Remote and Live Interviews

Get Ready for the Live or Remote Meet & Greet

Check Your Energy Levels

Wrapping Your Interview with the Q&A Session

What’s Next?

Introduction

Congratulations. If you’re reading this, it means you’re looking to take charge of your own career, to jumpstart it. I’m going to help you do that by cracking the seemingly impenetrable code. I’m going to offer tips to clarify an opaque process that heavily favors the employer. And through that, you’ll start to identify some of your own advantages and gain confidence in crafting your own personal narrative, résumé and when you attend job interviews. Whether you’re gainfully employed, looking for a job or wondering if you should change what you do to be more satisfied, we’re going to start by stepping back and not falling into a pattern of actions designed solely for companies to get who and what they need, not one that was set up at all for your ease or satisfaction.

There are many resources out there, on LinkedIn, self-help blogs, guru websites and on the broader internet to help you improve your résumé. You can find thousands of free and premium résumé templates, subscription sites for résumé-building and sites that will build your résumé through artificial intelligence, or – for a price – a human being will do it for you. Maybe you have a friend who has experience helping others find jobs or have seen advertisements for expensive professional career and job counselors. There are bits and pieces out there that can help you, no doubt about it. But I’ve yet to find a single person or system that puts it all together, one that starts where most problems in the job-search process begin – and that’s well before you ever think about writing a résumé or attending a job interview.

That’s where I come in, and I hope you’ll read on and let me help you and my method get you thinking and acting differently and more confidently as you look for your next job or to reshape your career.

I’m a public relations professional who spent 25 years as a reporter and editor, most of them at Dow Jones & Co., Inc. and The Wall Street Journal. I’ve been a boss since 1997, when I also started recruiting. I’ve sat on both sides of the interview table for three decades and conducted hundreds of interviews. I receive and read at least a half-dozen notes or résumés from job seekers each month. I’ve mentored nearly 150 people, cultivating young talent, helping mid-career journalists get to the next level or transition into news jobs in new industries. I’ve provided professional advice and confidence-boosters to everyone from recent graduates going for their first jobs to hardworking people who were laid off or downsized after over a decade at the same company or job, to C-suite executives who are looking to change their path and priorities.

I’ve offered my résumé-critiquing and career-advice services free for years via LinkedIn, but in the post-Covid world, I’m finding myself spread quite thin, with a lot of people seeking help. I continue to offer pro bono 30-minute consultations. And my friends will always have my ear. But I recently decided to go pro and offer a premium tier of paid services, including this ebook and related video series at a reasonable price, along with even deeper one-on-one, tailored service at a fair price for those who want to work with me over a series of sessions to get their business lives and career in order.

I am doing this because I really believe that the system of finding and applying for jobs is broken. It has become depersonalized, automated and saps energy and confidence from good, smart and hardworking people who can’t figure out how to penetrate it in a way that makes it work for them. On the employer side, recruiters are overwhelmed by applications and have a hard time sorting the wheat from the chaff.

Advertising and applying has become so digitized and so easy, that very little thought now goes into the application process. And for employers, the sheer numbers of applications mean there’s barely any time for brilliant assessments of skills and talent. I also believe that a résumé and interview skills are only end products that allow a job seeker to tell a clear, inspiring story about themselves and their skills and uniqueness. To get there, they first need to do a deep self-assessment, look back at who they are, their habits, attributes, skills and achievements and from that craft a strong professional narrative that is reflected in the résumé and job interviews they use to sell themselves to employers.

I know how difficult, discouraging and demeaning the job-search process can be and how overwhelmed you can get trying to sift through your long-term career prospects. Just remember, though, that no matter how many applications you have to lodge, no matter how often you’re ghosted, most of it has nothing to do with you, and everything to do with a crummy, dilapidated system that has, paradoxically, gotten worse because of technology.

It’s because the hiring process is supposed to be about human beings and people skills, handshakes, polite