“ABILITIES OPPORTUNITY MAP” HOW CAN YOU USE IT
TO CREATE YOUR DREAM JOB?
N
ot so fast. If you want a career and to be fulfilled and engaged at work, don’t overlook these four essential things in your job search. Because now is the time to
G.R.O.W. your career.
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Recognize Your Results To leverage your existing skills, experiences, and talents to build your vocation, it is impera-
tive that you know and can articulate the advantage and impact of each of these in your hiring interviews. Results are the value you provide to your new company and the currency you will use to ap-
G
Get Clear If you are not clear on the experiences and ca-
ply for a position that may be considered a “stretch” for you.
pabilities you possess, it is difficult to imagine how you can
use them to guide your job search to advance in your profession.
Go back to your resume and answer the following questions for
To have the vocation of your dreams, you need to be clear. Clarity
your current position:
drives your success. Let’s do a Career + Life Walk. This is a power-
1. What were my quantitative outcomes? So what? Quantitative
ful process that enables you to methodically assess each profes-
results can be counted, measured, and expressed with numbers.
sional role and
Identify each quanti-
position through-
tative outcome, and
out your career
then ask yourself the
history, as well
“so what?” question.
as your volunteer
Numbers without
service. It is important to include your volunteer service because there may be
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context allow other people to tell your story. You need to tell your own story
R
experiences and
and clearly com-
ap titudes you
municate the value
gained through
of the outcome you
volunteering that
achieved.
can be valuable to you now.
For example, you increased supplier diversity by 35%. So what? This promoted innovation in your company through the introduc-
Open your freshly updated resume and for your most recent role
tion of new products, services, and solutions. It provided multiple
answer the following questions: What was your specific job? What
channels to source goods and services, and it drove competition
were you responsible for? What did you do? Focus on the actions
(on price and service levels) between your company’s existing and
you performed as part of your responsibilities. These are the physi-
potential vendors.
cal, tangible steps you performed. Here’s a hint: all actions start
2. What were my qualitative results? Qualitative results are
with an action verb.
descriptive and conceptual. They can be categorized based on
For example, develop, analyze, or coach. Remove any abstractions,
traits and characteristics. For example, a member of your team
assumptions, or MBA school jargon. The goal is clarity. Now, review
enhanced their communication skills to be more succinct, precise,
your response to question number three, what did you do, and
and factual in their presentations to your customers.
identify the following: Themes or clusters of actions that you want
3. What was my overall impact in the role? When I started in this
to ensure you use in your new job. Actions that intellectually stimu-
position our revenue was _________________, our customer service
lated, challenged, fulfilled, and motivated you. Repeat this process
ratings were _________________, the team’s engagement level was
for all your employment and volunteer roles. You will come back to
_________________, the team’s internal reputation was _________________
this information in the final step in the G.R.O.W. process- Where and
and the team’s contributions to the company were _________________
What else?
_________________. If some of the above items are not relevant to you
68
VOL 22
JANUARY
CEO GLOBAL MAGAZINE.COM
