Richard Maun

Author: moderncareers

  • How To Keep Your Job

    Your graphs can go up up up! It's all in the book!
    Your graphs can go up up up! It's all in the book!

    Welcome to Book Four! I can hardly believe that I now have four books out there in the world, paddling their little canoes through the choppy waters of sales and marketing.

    It took me a while to realise that writing books is the easy bit… what requires real energy is selling it. I do something every single day to sell books, whether it’s checking Amazon rankings, or setting up tweets, or jotting down blog ideas. It all feeds in to the process of chatting to people and pointing them at Amazon and like all good processes, it leads to good outcomes. It also leads to new friends and more support.

    And what progress so far? Well… Job Hunting 3.0 has sold out at Amazon and new stock is due in on 27th July. It’s going to be reprinted in February as a mass market paperback. And then there’ll be a film, probably staring Brad Pitt as me I would think.

    Oh hang on, one of those statements is false. Sorry Brad, you’ll have to find something else to do next year.

    And I’ve been asked to go ‘from book to brand’ in a quest to focus a bit on getting a bigger reputation as a Modern Careers writer and expert coach. (I coined the term Modern Careers, as the words ‘careers expert’ bring back uncomfortable memories of my careers master at school, who was to careers advice what Darth Vader was to charitable works.)

    Now, you might be wondering what this has to do with How To Keep Your Job. And the answer is simple:

    1) Do something everyday to sell yourself in a positive light. Maybe smile at a colleague, share good news with your boss, or make the tea.

    2) Think about your own personal brand. How would you describe yourself in three words? What would your colleagues say? Do the two views overlap or diverge?

    We all have power and we can all assert ourselves, find our voice and make a positive difference to our future.

    Two years ago I didn’t have a book deal and knew nothing about social media. Today I’m about to start planning book five and have built strong networks on Twitter and Facebook and LinkedIn. And I recently found out that Marshall Cavendish now account for your social media reach when deciding on whether to commission you. So, all my work is paying off and I love being a writer.

    And here’s the thing: If you want to keep your job you can take your power and use it to really make a difference. I did. And so can you!

    Good fortune!

    PS… My first book, called My Boss Is A B@$T@*D, was featured in The Guardian on Saturday. Please click on the link now if you want to read the article on line.

  • When Is It Okay Not To Practise?

    Practise hard to make sure you hit all the right notes on the day!
    Practise hard to make sure you hit all the right notes on the day!

    I thought I’d pose this question because last week I was working with a client the day before she had a job interview.

    When I asked if she’d like some time to practise her interview answers together she laughed and said ‘no, that wouldn’t be necessary.’

    …Apparently she was a confident interview candidate and had taken part in many ‘good’ first and second interviews before.

    This was worrying.

    Worrying, because if someone thinks they’re okay when they’ve had lots of interviews, they’re missing the point: They’re supposed to get a job.

    Having lots of interviews can mean that they have a great CV, but tend to under-perform in some way when put under pressure. People shelter under the notion that lots of interviews must mean they’re doing something right. Wrong. It’s a warning signal that they’re stumbling somewhere and need help to find out why.

    I chatted all this through with the client and she laughed again, in a hollow kind of way, that suggested I was right. We did a little demo interview and sadly I was. However, after a sharp 30 minutes of practise-review-practise-review she was much improved and could now:

    1) Keep her answers to about 60 seconds. Any longer and it’s called ‘waffle’.

    2) Include numbers in her answers. Numbers tell the story for you and show the scope and scale of the good work you have completed.

    3) Answer the question. A common question for a manager to be asked is: ‘When have you overcome resistance?’ A snappy answer using the STAR technique is a great way to impress, so learn to anticipate common questions and rehearse your answers, because it will help to reduce the pressure you’re under and to increase your ability to clinch a job.

    With the STAR approach all you do is STate the issue, talk about the Actions you took (I, not We here)* and finally outline the positive Results for you and the organisation.

    So, going back to the question in the title, the answer is, of course: Never.

    It’s a trick question really, as there is never an interview, speech, presentation, debate or sales pitch that isn’t improved by a bit of practise.

    So, as you look ahead to your work over the next two weeks… What do you need to practise for?

    Go for it!

     

    *Talk about ‘what I did was…’ because they’re not interviewing the team. They’re just interviewing you. Hiding behind ‘what we did was…’ looks woolly and your contribution is hard to spot.