job search timing w/ me

full transcript

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Hello, hello. Thanks for listening to guidance counselor 2.0. Listen, I want to give you a quick rundown of what this podcast is and what you're about to get into as you listen to these episodes. We had guidance counselors in middle school. We had guidance counselors in high school, but we didn't really have guidance counselors in college and now as professionals. We don't really have anybody to turn to to ask a quick question to learn something about the job search or to navigate your career. And so that is what I want this podcast to be for you. I want it to be a tool for you to navigate the job search and your career.

So that being said, I hope you enjoy this episode. And if you need to reach me, Taylor at vacovac.com is how to get and touch me old fashioned email social media at tdsintdesse. And then finally, please rate and review this in the app store because I want this to be discoverable for others so they can navigate their careers. Hope you enjoy the episode. So I want to talk about some things about the job search. That doesn't apply to you. Well, it applies to you, but you know, you know, when you're in a relationship and it's just not working out. You say, hey, it's not you.

It's me, right? I'm going to go over kind of some things when the job search that you probably don't realize which is why you're probably not getting a job. Right. So one of the posts I made, I made, I'm going to make today is around your job title. Right. So I want to talk about this first. If you're if you're in newer in your career, if you are more junior, if you are younger in your career and you are walking around with the C suite title already, that's going to hurt you. Right. It's going to hurt you. If you are walking around with a VP of engineering, right, and you've only been in the market for three years, right?

And the reason why I say that is because listen, that's great. That's great that you're CTO have started up with one person. I mean, at the end of the day, that's just a dev leave. Right. And I mean, really. That's where I would be cautious of. I can't tell you how many people I talk to when it comes to their job search. They put on their resumes or the LinkedIn's and I have to tell them, hey, you actually need to take this off because a hiring manager is going to get spooked. If you've got five years of experience and your VP of engineering or CTO and you want just a dev job, you have to change your title.

You have to and you're probably, you're probably like, Taylor, that sounds stupid. You're just making that up. Listen, I can't tell you the amount of hiring managers and the amount of resumes that are rejected and the hiring managers that reject the resumes because literally they are walking around with these inflated titles and it's hurting their chances. Right. So that's the first thing I want to talk about. Second thing I want to bring up is, and if you all have thoughts, comments, questions, throw them up. Let's chat. I want to hear you for sure because I think this is incredibly important to talk about because no one's talking about it.

No one's talking about the job titles and how it can hurt you. Right. Now, if you're probably Taylor, what if I've been in the industry for five years and I've worked for an enterprise company and I've justified my titles that I'm a VP of engineering? You need to talk about that in your resume and you need to make sure you sell yourself to the recruiter because you're still having an uphill battle. Listen, if you're at Google and you're like, there's one guy I know of. I've actually had him on the show. People on my team call me Sabbat. Literally came out of college, literally first I've had a college was already six figures.

I mean, guy was a stud. God was a stud. He's known as this kind of prodigy. Listen, that's fine, but we had to sell him. My team, when we got a hiring manager on the line, we were like, listen, this guy has no experience. Here's what he did in college. You have to speak to him. The thing is, is that he brought that up. He brought that up to us and we sold it. So again, if you are a prodigy and you've risen through the ranks at a Google or you or an enterprise client, I would definitely talk about that in your resume and sell yourself to the recruiter you are talking to.

Kia, what's going on? Good morning, Mohammed. One page resume or two page, please end this discussion. Listen, at the end of the day, this discussion will never be ended. In my opinion, if very few people have the communication of written skills, you talk about their entire career on one page, if you have those skills, sure, shoot one page. I have some tips to do that. I think at the end of the day, you just need to include your tech stack and what you've done and how many users and get it like one or two bullet points each. And that's it. But at the end of the day, most people can't communicate that well.

And that's okay. There's nothing wrong with that. Two pages, but again, make sure the content is there. No fluff words, no, you know, instead of I'm a great communicator, maybe say, hey, I manage five teams across the globe in different time zones and we hit all of our deadlines. Right. That, to me, proves you're a better communicator than you're just saying good, you know, good communicator. On the topic of titles, it might be we're talking about the shift from senior to staff and how that impacts the hiring process. Chris, I love to know more thoughts on this kind of what you have. I will tell you this.

There, there's going to be an impact during the hiring process, right? Same thing for mid to senior, senior staff, staff principle or however it's notated within organizations. I will tell you this. One of the things we're doing with one of our main accounts right now is we are submitting engineers, you're submitting engineers, not to a specific title because what we want to do is let the client decide. Right. So we've had some people down level from staff to senior that can leave a bad taste in your mouth depending on type of person you are. And so for me, I will just tell you this. Be aware of the title you're trying to get or how that may affect your interview process because I agree people need to be aware.

There's so much awareness when it comes to the job search that people do not realize. Here at Barrett, I love this as a hiring manager, someone will be on the first page depends on the resume. Yeah, again, right? Actually, one of the posts I'm creating today on my Twitter is around the summary portion of your resume. I think your resume needs to have a summary portion which is summarizing your main skill sets at the very top of your page. I think that's a great way to stand out. To clarify, some organizations have both senior and staff or others have either and quite yeah, I mean, again, right?

I think it's I think Chris, I think what you're saying. I think the individual needs to talk to the recruiter or the hiring manager talk about from the get, what does leadership look like with an organization, what do the ladders look like, what role do you think I'm interviewing for? You have to get an awareness with each company you're interviewing for because if you do not, you're going to be blindsided. You're going to be blindsided a lot. I also want to talk about the main thing I want to talk about, which is what the title was is around timing. Listen, there's so much timing that's involved that most job seekers do not begin to realize on the back end of the job search.

So to put in perspective, just to give you a few stories, right? I've had one story where we go through the interview process. So there's a developer, right? They go through the interview process. They're not strong enough on the skill set that they're hiring for. And then the hiring manager goes, hey, you're not a fit, but we don't have budgetary to approval yet to get you into another role. Right? Again, there's so much approving, canceling, trying to create a new role to where for me, it's all about timing. That's why I really try to scream it from the mountaintops that if you get rejected in your job search, a lot of times, not all the time, but a lot of times it's not because of you.

It's because the job search and the things that are going on with an organization is right now to get budgetary approval is a lot. And a lot of times, positions close and open during people's interview process, right? Because companies could have lost funding during your interview process, right? I think one of the best questions to ask if I'm a job seeker to a recruiter or hiring manager is, hey, is this position budgetarily approved? That's the biggest question I would ask if I were you because when it comes to the, when it comes to finding a job, the biggest thing, the two biggest things actually that get in the way of hiring managers hiring quickly is the interview stage, is the interview stage and then budgetary approval, right?

Because those two things can torpedo an entire deal really quickly. So if I'm a job seeker, what I would do is I would literally go, hey, is this position budgetarily approved? It is great. When was it budgetarily approved? Right? Was it approved yesterday? If it was approved yesterday, then it's fresh. If it was approved four months ago, I would, I would say, hey, it's been four months. Behind me, you're going to say, listen, it's been a, you know, it's been approved, I think three, four or five months. I would say, hey, listen, can, you know, can we get back? We confirmed this because I don't want to go through the process.

Alyssa, I haven't had this happen numerous times. Great tip on it. Yeah, again, ask, hey, listen, listen, Mr. Mrs. Manager, I'm so grateful to be a part of, you know, your interview for this role. Your thoughts when it comes to the, to the budgetary approval has it been budgetarily approved? Please ask that. Let's see here. Barrett, I've had resumes for the entire first page was summary bad move. Yes. Yes. Yes. Also to, I don't want to get this into a resume writing class, but your, your name and your content information should not be a third of the page as well. Keep that very simple. William, what's going on?

Big dog is great. So you can't wait to see you in Miami. Listen, this is not a paid ad. If you have not gotten your tickets to react to Miami yet, I will be there. I'm not speaking. I'm just going to go hang out with William, Jerome, Hardaway, Vets who code Kent Dodds is going to be down there. There's been on the show. There's been a lot of guests on the show down in Miami. And so I'm going to be there. So you should be there as well. Let's see here. Would recruiters be able to answer that question, Alyssa. So we are talking, we are talking about the budgetary approval question.

The recruiters should know that. And my biggest thing I always say, ask the recruiter. And if they say no, but they need to say if they say no, they should say, let me go find that for you. But we asked that. My team were like, hey, is this position before we work on this role? Is this position budgetarily approved? James comes in funny story about timing. I want to head job fall through because of little politics. As in literally US national politics, project was green, green lip. And they were ramping up hiring that it killed due to administrative change. I have no doubt again, a lot of times the job search people beat themselves up.

Right. And I get it. The job search can be so crushing. I've talked to so many senior engineers on my show and behind closed doors about how they don't even want to go on the job search because it beats them up so much senior engineers, senior engineers, right? Like a lot of people think senior engineers have a great list. And it's just as much of a grind for them as well. And so what I tell people when it comes to all this stuff is there are a lot of other factors involved in just your skill set. So again, want to highlight that. Barrett's, you know, Barrett's and Oak IV having a conversation here around what Barrett looks for when hiring Barrett also is a previous guest on the show, go connect with him.

But yeah, I mean, listen, y'all, that's honestly about it. If you have any comments, questions or concerns, please throw them up. I just want to wrap up and say when it comes to the job search, it's timing. It's not you. It's not you. Right. And I guess this idea just popped in my head. Ask how many people are either in the interview process or have gone through the interview process. Now the latter question, how many people have gone through the interview process may not be able to be answered, but I would definitely ask how many people in the interview process. Right. If, if, if, if, I can say that, right.

I mean, literally like I've had five engineers interview for one role. And if an engineer asked me, well, how many other people might go on up against, I would tell them five or four for others. Right. So again, ask the recruiter the question, hey, how many other people in the interview process, how many people have been rejected? Um, another, if they can answer how many people have been rejected, ask for feedback. Hey, what's the general feedback that you've gotten for candidates? So I can improve on it, right? Cause here's the deal. We, like recruiters, if we submit more than one or two candidates or an interview process and they interview, there's it and they get rejected.

There's usually a general theme. We have a general theme. Ah, they're not strong enough and react. Oh, you know, they're resume, you know, we're really sticky on titles, right? I can't tell you how many hiring managers are so sticky on titles. hiring managers stop that. If you're listening, stop it, stop it. Just interview the dang person because titles are subjective. I hate to say it, but titles are subjective. Um, and let's see here what else. Rejection doesn't phase me. It's a lack of response that bothers me without data. I don't know. Correct. Kio, I totally agree with you on this. Um, I am, I've, I've started to ask hiring managers more about this on my show.

There's a lot of HR stuff. If it can't be technical, I understand hiring managers, like listen. If you just have a weird personality, I have a weird personality. You can ask my wife, I have a weird personality. If you have a weird personality and it may just not gel with the team, the hiring manager can't come tell you to say, Hey, Kio, you have a weird personality. We're not going to take you because that's just weird. That's just not good. Right? Because you can't quantify a weird personality. Right. You can say, Hey, Taylor, you interrupt me a lot when you talk. I do that. I mean, counseling.

Um, you know, our, hey, Taylor, you don't listen that well. Right. You can quantify that. But hiring managers listen. If it is technical, if Kio's interviewing, let's say for your, for, for one of my roles and just Kio does not have enough JavaScript, right? Specifically react. I'm just going to tell Hey, Kio listen. Like, we, you tech down a two out of five on react skills for us. It's just not going to be enough. If you want to work on something, work on hooks, redox and whatever. Right. Again, hiring managers, please, please, please, please give quantifyable feedback. I understand not giving the qualitative feedback. The weird personality fit.

I get that. I understand that. But give, give key things, give quantitative things. Um, let's see here. I love it. Barrett given it. That's crazy. Election year again. Um, Barrett comes in again, again, green with me. This is why I like Barrett. I also like people who disagree with me. I don't like people who just agree with me. Yes, stop, especially since titles at a company mean. Yeah. Listen, um, you could be a staff engineer at one company and you can only check out even as a senior. Maybe just as a software engineer at another title, titles are subjective. Raymond, thank you so much. Um, let's see here the camp.

I love you, buddy. I love you just by your weirdest. It's good to see you. What's hang soon? Um, our, our, our, our J goes culture fit. It's something. Yeah. Again, and listen, I understand culture fit. Right. Like if I interview somewhere and you're like, Taylor, like, you're just, I understand. If I hire, a hiring manager would feel weird saying, hey, Taylor, you're just not a fit because you're just weird. And I get that. Right. I'm not. Listen, I have made enemies in my career. I understand that. Um, but again, I think hiring managers need to say, hey, listen, like, slow down the interview process, right?

Cause I will tell you this, I will take this hiring majors. And I'm kind of going around here. I tend to do this from about myself, which is like, I like going love by myself from time to time hiring majors. If you give detailed feedback, let's say RJ interviews for your organization and you email RJ, like from your email, not a general slap email, general statement. If you email RJ, like RJ, thanks for hanging man. It's going to be a no, but here's why. You've lacked this. You were lacking that. You've tacked out here low. Here's why. And it doesn't have to be super long.

I'm even three right, right? Rob, you know, RJ, thanks for interviewing with the organization. It's not going to be a fit. Here's why bang bang bang bang. And you're done. RJ's going to be like, man, I really appreciate this stuff. And maybe RJ has a friend. And because you took the time to email him back with specifics of why it's not going to work out, maybe RJ will be kind and send his friends to you. Higher. Listen, listen, it slowed down to speed up folks. And I'm trying to do that too. Part of the one of the reasons why I have this live shows to keep myself accountable, slow down to speed up.

If you send, if a hiring manager is on this and you take the time to email a candidate when they're not a fit, that person, look at this RJ, listen, I'm not paying RJ to agree with me at all, but RJ appreciate you agreeing with me. He agrees with me in that if a higher manager emails RJ specifically says, you're not a fit because ABC, but thank you so much for interviewing here. Let's say in touch. And RJ goes, Oh, shit, I got a friend that would be perfect for this. RJ's going to send that friend over and he just agreed with me. Thank you RJ.

Making enemies is all right. Sometimes the trick for them. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Chris, thanks brother. Stay weird. Yeah, everybody stay weird. I love it. RJ again agreeing with me. Sending your friends. All right, y'all listen, that's it today. I just want to hang with y'all. It's just again, it was just me. I don't want to, I don't want to belabor the point. Listen, a lot of times it's not just about you and the job search. Um, tomorrow's guest. I have Chris Rathgum tomorrow. So Chris, um, I don't know if y'all watch unicorn finders. My other podcast, go check it out on LinkedIn. Um, we have a page, the unicorn finders.

We interviewed Chris with his startup, curment in Raleigh. Um, now I'm having Chris on my show. Talk about hiring Chris is a fantastic mind. He's got a great ideas. Um, he, he understands content. He started to put out content. And I've had conversations behind closed doors on the importance as a C sweet leader to put out content for your organization. So I think we may dive into that as well. Um, so again, check it out tomorrow. Not 30 AM central wins. They have a guest Thursday unicorn finders. And then Friday as well. We got another guest. We have a very, very busy week this week.

Um, Justin comes in. I have personally referred a friend to a other didn't match up. Look at that. Higher managers. Listen, I'm not making sure that I'm just not. I'm just not, I'm not bullshit with you. Right? I'm just not. So again, it works. Hiring managers look after it. Um, but y'all, thank you so much for this morning. Those wonderful people. I've missed y'all full week this week. So my face will be plastered all of your LinkedIn. Uh, y'all go share this with you share this with you network. There are some people out there that need to hear this. That it's not about them. It's just about time.

So share this with your network. If you feel led again, check out render, uh, use my GC2 dash. Oh, code when you sign up for the event, you're going to get something fun and return as the event. But y'all, thank you again. I appreciate it. Connect with each other. Everybody who commented, everybody who commented connect with each other today. Appreciate y'all. Hey, you did it. You listened to an entire episode and I am very grateful. Cause you know why there's a lot of podcasts out there. There's a lot of episodes and I myself rarely finish an entire episode. So I appreciate you so so much for listening.

Quick reminder, please rate and review this podcast in the app store. I want this to be discoverable to others and the only way that happens is if you take the time right now and rate and review it, please like right now. Unless you're driving, then don't do it. So thank you again. If you need to reach out to me, Taylor at Vaco.com or at T-Dasting on all social media handles and I hope you have a fantastic day.