Job search is NOT one-size-fits-all.

What I mean is that a single version of you does not fit every job that you apply for. Whenever you can, present the version of you that best fits the job opportunity.

To do this, first you need to identify what the hiring company is looking for by carefully thinking about the company and the job opportunity. What characteristics are likely to make an applicant particularly attractive to this company? Think about skills, experiences, interests, and accomplishments that may be relevant to the job you’re pursuing and what you know about the company. You may have to dig for some of this information, but it’s worth it.

Once you’ve identified these characteristics, carefully consider what you have to offer that makes you an appropriate, and hopefully the best, applicant. Take these characteristics that you have to offer and describe them in the form of personal accomplishments and achievements. With this information in hand, you can now customize your personal marketing effort for this job, presenting the version of you that best matches what the hiring company is looking for.

Customizing includes revising your resume to highlight your achievements, skills, and other characteristics that are highly relevant to this job; preparing a cover letter that demonstrates your interest in and ability to perform this job; and preparing to demonstrate the same things in a personal interview.

Job search is more competitive than ever before. Most jobs have many applicants and employers have the luxury of choosing the very best. A generic version of you is not likely to be the most attractive applicant. For success, you need to customize your personal marketing efforts to each job that you pursue.

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If you’re a job seeker, you’re in “sales”.  What you’re selling is you, hopefully to some employer who has a job available.

To be an effective salesperson you need to understand your buyer.  You need to think like the employer you’re trying to sell to.  This will allow you to understand what the employer wants, so you can present yourself as the right solution.

To start with, you need to recognize that employers don’t want to increase their payrolls with more employees.  Employees are expensive.  Employees also add complexity to the workplace.  Employees have needs.  They have their own goals and agendas, and their own problems and limitations.  None of this is helpful or attractive to the employer.

Employers add new employees only out of necessity – when some sort of work absolutely has to be done, which can’t be done by the existing employees, and can’t be taken care of in some other way (such as with technology, or outsourcing, or some other solution).

In other words, employers would rather not hire you.  Employers hire as the last option because they have a situation that can’t be fixed in any other way.  And they fear that a new employee may bring more costs and trouble than he or she is worth. 

What does this mean to you in your job search?  It’s not about you!  It’s about a job that the employer needs to have done.  If you can’t completely take care of this job, you’re irrelevant to the employer – unless you’ve already been hired, in which case you’re an expense that needs to be eliminated.

This may sound ruthless, and it is.  The faster you know this the quicker you can prepare yourself correctly for the job opportunity.

Preparing yourself correctly involves learning and thinking about the job the hiring employer needs performed.  Then it’s about presenting yourself as the best solution for that need.  It’s about the employer’s needs, and not about you. 

You have to tell the employer you can take care of the employer’s needs, and prove that your promise is credible – that you can and will deliver the goods.

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