What’s Your Ideal Job Portfolio?

Laura B. Moore Now and then, we all need to look for the next adventure, the next job, the next project. Often, people tend to look for jobs with a certain title “Sr. Project Manager”, “Business Analyst”, etc. Another approach is to look in specific organizations of interest. The trouble with this is that it limits your options. What you might want to consider is building a Job Portfolio; that is, looking for a job based on the traits of the job, rather than on the title or the organization.

The Ball of Change
Probably the first thing to do is to accept change. The ball of change is in motion, and you need to decide if you’re going to be a bowling pin, or a catcher’s mitt. You need to decide if you are going to let change race towards you and take control of you, or if you’re going to stand in the ready, positioning yourself just right, to catch and take personal control of the change. To quote Mr. Gedde Lee (of the band Rush), “if you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice.” You need to determine what your choice will be.

Once you’ve done that, you can act… or not act… accordingly. For the purposes of this article, I will assume you’ve chosen to be a mitt. There are a few things you will need to do, and I will do my best to provide tools through which you can succeed. But before we get to the tools, there are some basic questions on what you’re willing to accept.

Where Do You Want To Land?
Whether you are in a large company, or a small family oriented company, or somewhere in the middle where you are really comfortable, looking external to that company may be not ideal and for some, even frightening. I thoroughly understand that! I work for a wonderful and large company that provides amazing opportunities, benefits, incredibly intelligent people to work with daily. Those things would definitely influence my decision on whether I would decide to look for jobs only internally, or externally as well. On the other hand, if you worked for my company, you may decide you can’t stand corporate America and only want to look externally. The decision is yours and yours alone. But you need to make it.

What Do You Want?
Once you’ve decided the WHERE, you can start looking at the WHAT. Now, I implore you to forget about job titles and organization titles. Look at the job traits. What is it about a specific job that makes you like it? Do you like a job because it is analytical, because you are developing something, because you get to get into the operations of a system or organization… what is it about those things that you like? Likewise, what type of personality traits are you looking for from your co-workers? This one is a little tricky because co-workers change. However, you can look at the group dynamics, which generally only change if a force comes in to instigate change. At the end of this article, you will find a worksheet to help you identify the job and personality traits that suit you.

Now that you know what you’re looking for, how do you look for it? Of course, there are the standard job postings. Whether internal or external, there are websites that post all kinds of jobs. That said, only a small percentage of jobs are actually posted. So what do you do? NETWORK!

Networking:
I use to dread the word “Network”. It sounded so impersonal to me and fairly superficial. I got over that. Networking is really just getting out there and meeting people, talking to them about them and you; making connections. Networking can be done anywhere, and does not have to be formal. There are also groups that meet strictly for networking purposes, and some that meet with networking as a side benefit. Look around your company and your community and you are bound to find several groups like this. But if groups and meetings aren’t your thing, that’s okay. You are also making a network of connections with every person with whom you interact on a daily basis. Most people are open to others contacting them about information on potential jobs. Besides, the worse that could happen is that they say they don’t want to help (or don’t respond). That’s okay, that’s their right. But if you don’t ask, you’ll never know. The main point with networking is to get out there and make yourself and your interests known.

Resumes:
When was the last time you updated your resume? I’m hoping you said it was recently, even if you are quite content in your current position. You should always have an updated resume on hand. Let’s say one of your networking contacts hears about a job that fits your job profile perfectly and you have to submit a resume that day. Wouldn’t it be a shame to lose out on that opportunity simply because your resume was outdated?

If you’re like me though, updating your resume is not up there on the top ten list of most exciting things to do. But then again, neither is laundry and we all know what not doing laundry will get us (smelly & dirty eventually… right?). So stop squabbling about it and do it.

Okay, but how? Excellent question. There are about as many resume formats as there are clouds in a March sky. This is where you have another choice: do a resume that fits your style or do several versions of your resume to fit the specific industry standard for the job for which you are applying. My recommendation is to have a baseline resume, then cater your resume to the specific job for which you are applying. Often, resumes will be filtered by key words. Therefore, if you are looking at a job that requires financial background, you want to make sure you have verbiage to that effect in your resume. If not, even if you are a CPA, your resume may be thrown out simply on the key word match. Basically, know your audience and what they are looking for.

Once you have your baseline resume, please make sure to have it reviewed, and reviewed, then reviewed again, by several objective individuals. These people can be friends, mentors, co-workers… your mom, child, partner… just have it reviewed. There’s a couple of reasons for this. You know what you do, and if you wrote it, it probably makes sense to you. However, someone who is not familiar with your daily workings may catch something you thought you said but in actuality omitted. Also, a co-worker may catch something that you said it a few words, but downplayed. Your co-worker may help you find the right words to really highlight the accomplishment. For example; I wrote that I turned around a department that previous to my involvement received nothing but complaints. I did not say what the workload was and what I did to turn it around. The verbiage eventually turned into showing the percent of overtime decreased, the actual dollars saved, as well as the compliments that started coming into the department after only a 6-month period, with no complaints. My mentor helped me quantify the “turnaround”, helping the reader to really understand what that meant. Resume writing is not the time for humility. If you have a hard time with that, pretend you’re writing for someone for whom you have no problem boasting!

One other big piece is to remember to add the “so what” factor. Okay, so you turned around a department… so what. What did that mean to the business? Why does the reader care? Now, keep in mind, this means probably writing in paragraph form rather than simply bulleting accomplishments, and that’s okay. That is particularly okay if you’ve been in the workforce for several years. I was handicapped for a while because I held onto what my high school career counselor said, which was to keep my resume to one page. Well honey, this ain’t high school anymore. You’ve worked hard over the last few years – let that shine. You may even be amazed at how much you’ve accomplished!

Grounding:
Odd maybe that this is last, but you kind of need to know what all of your options are prior to solidifying your grounding. However, you need to have your grounding prior to taking action on your options. So, what do I mean by “grounding”? You need to have a firm grasp on where you’ve been and where you are, as well as where you are going. You need to have your action plan and know what your goals are. You need to know what the current employment environment is, and your strategy for taking it on. This all provides your grounding to jump to the next step. You can not jump if you don’t have grounding. Even if your grounding is a little soft, you still need it. This means, you need to do your research. Otherwise, you may still move, but you’re just casting yourself into the wind versus jumping to the next step. It goes back to whether you will be the bowling pin or the catcher’s mitt. Are you going to let change take control of your future, or are you going to capture the change and take control in your own hands?

So What?
That’s right, so what? That’s the question you always need to ask yourself in this process. You will be a sales person for yourself and you need to have a strong “so what”. You need to identify all the attributes that make you a hot commodity and you need to be able to describe them. Everyone with whom I have talked has ended up discovering that they really did much more than the credit they gave themselves. Only you can decide which path is best for you. Others can help you decide, but ultimately you will need to choose. So, are you going to be the pin or the mitt? And with what ever you choose, may you find exactly that for which you seek.

Job Profile Checklist
Date:
Resume Last Updated On:

This is YOUR job profile. You do not have to share it with anyone, so be specific and honest with yourself. That will better enable you to find exactly what you’re looking for!

My ideal job is:
check box
 Internal
check box
 External
check box
 Either

My ideal job has the following characteristics (specific job titles not listed, only characteristics of a job):

check box Analysis check box Research check box Financials
check box Innovative/Creative check box Development check box Execute/Implementation
check box Maintenance check box Supervisory check box “Fix-it”
check box Technical/systems check box Strategic check box Individual Contributor
check box Advisory check box Sales/recruitment check box Customer Facing
check box Event Planning check box Employee Support check box Recognition
check box Programming check box Writing check box Process Design
check box Problem Solving check box Network design check box Trouble shooting
check box Interaction w/ others check box Organizing check box Public Relations
check box Leading check box Conflict Resolution check box Facilitation
check box Negotiation check box Decision Maker check box Plan
check box Evaluate check box Data driven check box Design
check box Construct check box Advocate check box Team Building
check box Forecasting check box Instruction/training check box Mediation/arbitration
check box Influencing others check box Policy development check box Legal/Regulatory work
check box Building consensus check box Helping customers check box Fundraising
check box Employee development check box Change management check box Counseling
check box Cause/Effect check box Task oriented check box Results oriented
check box Quality assurance check box Programming check box Statistical
check box Planner check box Artistic check box Specific steps
check box Abstract/creative steps check box Inventive check box Operate
check box Inspection check box Manufacture check box Brainstorming
check box Invent check box check box

Work-group Profile:

check box Interactive check box Task focused check box Serious
check box Fun check box Creative check box Analytical
check box Competitive check box Specialized assignments check box Creative
check box Collaborative Efforts check box Individual Efforts check box Driven
check box Supportive check box Organizers check box Open Minded

Now you need to start thinking about all of your accomplishments, but where to begin! Here are some basic questions that should help you get prepared for writing your resume. Apply these questions to all of the jobs you think might be good on your resume. If you’re not sure if you should list a specific job, answer these questions to help determine if it’s “resume worthy”!
  1. Job Title
  2. Job Description (what did you do on an average day/week)
  3. “Catch phrase” for this job – like a teaser line to a movie (e.g. Jaws would be “big fish attacks small town” or something). An attention getter line.
  4. How long did you work at this job?
  5. Did the job change at all from when you started to when you finished/right now?
  6. Were you instrumental in making those changes?
  7. If your job stayed the same, did you obtain increased responsibilities or did you become the mentor/go to person for new employees?
  8. What did you do to help the company? (list all if more than 1 action)
  9. How did that help the company?
  10. What skills did it take to do this job?
  11. Were/are there any specialized skills for this job? Special systems, machines, etc.?
Once you’ve answered these questions, you can pull from them to get a summary of qualifications list, a list of specialized skills, and descriptions of your work. You will also want to jot down your education, including any vocational school, work training, anything that was educational in nature to help train you. Also note any extra curricular activities that could provide insight into your talents. For example, if you tutored Jr. High-school kids, you can show your teaching abilities, your abilities to relate to others, etc.

About the Author
Laura Moore (PMP, M.A. Social Psychology) has an eclectic background that includes not only project management, but clinical research and social work as well. Currently, she works as a Senior Project Manager in the telecommunications industry and does, what her team calls "guerilla project management", that is, taking urgent, high impacting issues and resolving them within a matter of days. Laura lives in California with her husband Lorin, and their two amazing daughters Lily Faye and Layla Blue.