Targeted Job Searching

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When searching for your ideal role, it’s going to be important to be targeted in your approach.

We typically talk about this as being either a corporate beggar, an oddity, a hire, or a specialist. A corporate beggar will take any role that comes their way; they’re simply desperate.

A commodity higher is more limited in the roles that he will take, but if it’s within his relative pay range, role type, or level of seniority, he will go for it. The commodity hires our most brothers, who are black executive men. They got the education; they got degrees; they got the credentials; they know how to do the job. But their careers have not been explosive or taken off. They are not unlocking their limitless potential in order to sit in the Bahamas, drinking a whiskey sour, and knowing that they are playing full out professionally.

The specialists are incredibly good at identifying exactly what they want in their next role.

In fact, they know that their next role is only a stepping stone to their ideal role at the highest level of achievement in their career, including their highest level of total compensation. So if you’re moving from a VP role to an SVP role and you want to take the specialist framework and you know that your ultimate desire is to be in the C-suite, here’s how you do it:

You would get crystal clear on the two or three industries that you want to be in.

Within those two or three industries, there are 10 to 15 organizations that would be ideal for you. Keep in mind that those 10 to 15 are going to be for either large, medium, or small companies. As a specialist, you perform best in one of those companies, and you need to know what that is and stick with it.

Think about it. McDonald’s sells burgers for $.99, whereas Morton’s sells steaks for hundreds of dollars. But it’s all beef. And both of them are successful. It’s a matter of what they do best. Similarly, it’s a matter of what you do best.

Once you whittle it down to 10 or 15 organizations in 2 to 3 industries, that will give you up to 20–45 companies that you should be doing deep research about.

If, at this point, you want to research the senior leadership team—where did they go to school?—listen to them on a podcast to get their insights and perspectives. Do you want to research the company's financials and know if they’re a profitable company or if things aren’t looking so hot? You want to know the innovation within that organization within the last 10, 20, or 30 years and what they plan to work on for the next 10 years? From there, you’ll be in an excellent position to begin engaging people at those organizations.

The next step you want to take is to begin engaging in informational interviews to understand the culture of that organization and determine if it’s in line with your own professional goals, mission, and values. You want to get in touch with the recruiters and touch base with the hiring managers so that your face and name are familiar. And you want to go on their website and begin tracking what positions are available for you.

If I were you to save a tremendous amount of time, I would hire a virtual assistant to do about 90% of this work for you so you can go about your life and simply have this information delivered to your inbox.

If there was only one email to read about how you can land your dream job as a Black executive man, this would be it. Everything you need to know on a structural basis is laid out in the writing above for you to tap into unlimited opportunity, no matter the racial climate, financial climate, or economic conditions.

Don’t wait for a recruiter to give you the limited options they have available for you based on the open contracts they have at that time.

Don’t wait on a headhunter that you have to pay for upfront, or they will get a percentage of your initial salary, which will make it harder for you to negotiate what you want.

This is something that you can take action on and have full control over.

If you’d like, help with the details of this plan and how to implement it most strategically, so you have a hot network of ideal job leads coming to your LinkedIn inbox for the rest of your life, doubling or tripling your total compensation package, enabling you to show up as your authentic self to work, and leaving a legacy in the process, schedule a consultation with me today.

Will get everything you need set up and get you executing this plan immediately. However, if you’re not interested in your dream job, leaving a legacy, or playing full-out professionally, this opportunity is not for you.

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