On Friday, the Thunderbird Finance Association held a video conference with one of the best Career Coaches of the country, Mr. Rod Colon. He is the CEO and founder of Empowering Today’s Professionals. Rod has appeared on Bronxnet “Open” cable TV show. He is also weekly co-host of syndicated radio show YOUR CAREER IS CALLING, transmitted from Rider University’s 107.7 The Bronc. As an adjunct professor, Rod spearheaded the first college course on networking taught in the United States, as part of Georgian Court University’s business management program.
Mr. Colón is an in demand speaker. He blogs on face-to-face and online networking. With his winning job search strategies, Rod has helped many people land jobs in the last 12 months alone. With 26 years as a human resource management insider, Rod’s clients have included JPMorgan Chase, Bankers Trust and consultant to staffing companies. His primary areas of expertise are job search, networking, negotiations, career search and counseling students.
He described his famous 7 step Job Search Methodology:
Step 1: Manage your career as a business. Owning your career is like owning your business and you are the CEO of Me. Inc. Your skill set is the service you provide to the customer (employer). It is important to identify what you are great at at.
Step 2: Identify a market demand. Is there a market demand for my skills? Make sure that students choose their program that will have that market demand by the time they graduate. A website that helps with this is Indeed.com.
Step 3: Identify market advocates. This is the step when you select your Networking Angel through which you must build a relationship with and subtly push yourself forward in the career search process.
Step 4: Prepare your valuation. This is ensuring you build your case able to provide documentation for the skill set you claim to have and building an effective case in support of your company, your career.
Step 5: Connect with advocates. Begin by finding a Networking Angel inside the company and present your value proposition. From then on its up to them how far they will be able to push your resume further. You need to have 4-5 angels from inside the company. This step avoids the black hole.
Step 6: Follow up. Once you have had a conversation with a connector, decision maker of the company, specify a date, time and how you will follow up with them and ensure you do so.
Step 7: Repeat the process. There will be a waiting period but you should not stop, instead continue with same process. Job fairs are a great place to have conversations with decision makers.