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Essential Career Marketing Tactic: Self-presentationBy: Jim Hasse
Summary:
An engaging, "crisp" self-presentation was the first of eight steps I took in launching my campaign for marketing myself to prospective employers. 
Overview
My Engaging Self-presentation Context for My Resume My 15-second Elevator Pitch Related Links Related Content Overview After I decided to officially "retire" from my job as a corporate communication executive at a Fortune 500 company in 1993, I spent nine months planning my transition to another career opportunity in my spare, non-working hours. I spent those hours going through a self-assessment, identifying my styles, pinpointing my strengths and developing a short list of accomplishments which eventually became the core of my resume. See My Critical First Steps in Building a Resume: List Accomplishments Key Success Factors and How You Can Use Key Success Factors to Build Your Resume. I was now ready to develop my career marketing campaign, and, in the process, I learned such a campaign usually consists of these eight tactics:
It's an indirect but effective marketing campaign that involves a high degree of personal contact. It's one in which you ask for information -- not a job. It's a marketing campaign that emphasizes research, a search in which you continually narrow down your job options to a position and a company that are right for you. You are in charge of that process. That means you don't always have to follow today's guidelines for submitting resumes -- electronically or otherwise -- because you're bypassing the automatic filtering process that characterizes the contemporary job application process in many companies and organizations. Becoming proficient in using each of these eight tactics requires training and practice. In an effort to provide you with guidelines about how to gain that proficiency in each of these areas, I'm writing this series of eight articles about these career marketing campaign tactics (one article for each tactic), using my job seeker experience as a reality check. That reality check is filtered because I have some physical disabilities (both speech and mobility) but no visual impairment beyond the need for bifocals. So let's explore how I developed my personal presentation in this first article. Go to Top of Page My Engaging Self-presentation I needed a self-presentation that would engage others, particularly referral contacts and prospective employers, as I conducted my information/referral interviews. I'm a writer, so that's another filter you need to consider as you read my recommendations about personal presentation. Having identified that obvious bias, however, I would like to offer this opinion: An important part of career success today is based on reputation building. A good on-the-job track record, of course, helps, but, even without a lot of work experience, you can build your personal reputation through an engaging self-presentation. My personal presentation included these two essential tools:
Picture yourself on a short elevator ride. The curious person next to you, noticing your disability, flatly asks that typically American question: "What do you do?" You need a quick response before that person -- potentially an important contact or even a prospective employer -- gets off the elevator at the next stop. What do you say? You need to describe the career side of your life in a statement that is:
Go to Top of Page Context for My Resume My one-fold resume (a 17-by-11 sheet of very light gray cover stock) included this statement of my functional experience on the second page: GAINING ALIGNMENT Planning Positioned organization to take advantage of dairy industry restructuring.
Developing Established volunteer program to promote involvement and train leaders.
Leading Directed strategic planning and visioning process for senior management.
Implementing Provided senior management with the tools needed to "walk the talk."
"Gaining Alignment" became the "hinge" for putting the pieces of my resume together. But, I had to find some short method for explaining what Gaining Alignment meant for me -- and why it was important for the business community. I decided to tap a quotation from a business guru at that time, futurist John Naisbitt. - John Naisbitt Futurist, Author I then wrote a brief explanation about why this quotation explained who I was and why it was relevant to an important need within the business community. Here is that explanation, which I placed on the front page of my four-page, single-fold resume. FORGING LINKS I develop communities of people -- people who work effectively together in using their individual skills to create a master plan and then move it from the drawing board to on-site completion. I help organizations gain that alignment among people by:
By the way, the third page of my resume listed my professional experience, my education and my professional affiliations. The fourth page was blank. Go to Top of Page My 15-second Elevator Pitch But telling my story on paper or electronically is not enough. A self-engaging presentation also meant I had to be prepared to give my 15-second "elevator pitch" at the drop of a hat. I decided to use this pitch: Refining a 15-second pitch that works -- and delivering it effectively -- in a second's notice was not easy for me, especially because I speak with some difficulty. I took the Dale Carnegie course, "Effective Speaking and Human Relations," which helped me become comfortable with just "being myself" in front of people. I also practiced a lot all by myself in front of a mirror to gain my sense of "presence" -- what my Dale Carnegie instructor liked to call "being crisp." Go to Top of Page Bookmark this article to: 
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