Do you know that there was a study of 1,000 employers in the Indianapolis area in the 1990’s that produced a surprising result?In this study, the researchers asked employers what was the most common mistake that interviewees and candidates made during an interview? 85% of them said “THE APPLICANT COULD NOT CLEARLY STATE THEIR SKILLS.” Now, mind you, this does not mean that the applicants DIDN’T HAVE the skills; it meant that they could not clearly STATE, or talk about their skills. If you’ve got a good resume, you’d think it would be obvious to the employer what your skills are simply by referring to your resume, but this study says THAT IS NOT ENOUGH. If you do the exercise presented in this newsletter, you’ll never be at a loss to STATE what your skills are and TALK ABOUT THEM effectively. It’s a simple exercise! 1.Read the following list and check off the skills you CAN do.
2.Then, go back through the list and underline the skills you especially LIKE to do.
3.Finally, go back through the underlined words and circle the skills most appropriate to the job you’re seeking. 4.PICK OUT SIX SKILLS from this bunch and write them on a separate sheet of paper. I call this your “Skills Matrix”. 5.For each of those six words (skills), think of at least ONE TIME that you actually performed that skill and WRITE A LITTLE STORY (anecdote) about WHERE you used the skill, WHO you were with, HOW you performed the skill, WHY you were using the skill, WHEN the skill was performed and WHAT the positive RESULTS were. Knowing the RESULT of your actions or tasks is extremely important. For example, “saved time”, “made money”, “saved money”, “improved quality” are among the long list of great things you can do for a company or department. Here’s the list. Go through the five steps above and you’ve got the basic building blocks for a solid and successful interview (or resume)! It’s quite likely that you have one or many skills you’d like to talk about that are not on this list. PLEASE ADD your OWN skills to your “Skills Matrix”. Happy interviewing! ___ Advertising ___ Advising ___ Analyzing data ___ Analyzing situations ___ Arranging events ___ Assessing performance ___ Assessing progress ___ Assessing quality ___ Assisting ___ Attending to detail ___ Auditing ___ Accounting ___ Building structures ___ Building relationships ___ Building credibility ___ Building cooperation ___ Budgeting ___ Calculating ___ Classifying ___ Client relations ___ Coaching ___ Corresponding ___ Communicating in writing ___ Communicating verbally ___ Communicating nonverbally ___ Communicating feelings ___ Communicating ideas ___ Communicating instructions ___ Conceptualizing ___ Consulting ___ Correcting ___ Counseling ___ Data processing ___ Decision making ___ Decorating ___ Delegating ___ Developing systems ___ Developing designs ___ Developing talent ___ Diagnosing ___ Directing ___ Drafting ___ Drawing ___ Driving ___ Editing ___ Educating ___ Empathizing ___ Enforcing ___ Engineering ___ Evaluating ___ Filing ___ Financial planning ___ Forecasting ___ Formulating ___ Fund raising ___ Healing ___ Helping ___ Implementing ___ Imagining ___ Influencing ___ Initiating ___ Intuiting ___ Intervening ___ Inventing ___ Investigating ___ Leading ___ Lecturing ___ Lifting ___ Listening ___ Managing tasks ___ Marketing ___ Massaging ___ Nurturing ___ Observing ___ Operating computers ___ Organizing ___ Prescribing ___ Program managing ___ Programming computers ___ Project managing ___ Promoting ___ Public speaking ___ Recording ___ Repairing ___ Reconstructing ___ Reporting ___ Researching ___ Sales and marketing ___ Selling ___ Servicing equipment ___ Servicing customers ___ Supervising ___ Surveying ___ Team building ___ Team leading ___ Telephone calling ___ Tending ___ Tooling ___ Training ___ Troubleshooting ___ Understanding ___ Using equipment ___ Using the Internet
Marky Stein, Career Coach and Job Search Strategist Los Gatos, CA USA 877.WORKJOY (967.5569) Main/message 24/7 408.356.4878 Office direct M-F 10am-7pm Pacific Standard Time (California) marky@markystein.com www.markystein.com