manage.your.job.search

Manage Your Job Search

Johanna RothmanNew: Hiring Geeks That Fit

@johannarothmanwww.jrothman.com

[email protected]

© 2013 Johanna Rothman

The Problem With a Job Search

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It’s a big complex project

It’s overwhelming

Your emotions are all over the place

It’s so easy to get interrupted

It doesn’t end until you have an offer

in hand

Which means you have to iterate


Why Learn a New System?

A complex project requires a

system that breaks down the

complexity into something that

works for you

You need to prepare for your

success

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Plan to Iterate

How you look for a job

Where you look for a job

On your resume

On your networking

On everything

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We Have a System for Iteration

It’s called “agile”

Helps you get feedback

But agile is built for cross-functional teams

You are not a team; you’re a person

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You Need a System for Flow

Personal kanban helps with flow

Helps you see small achievable steps to get to the next

place

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You can use personal kanban inside one-week iterations to manage your

job search project

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Let’s See an Example

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© 2013 Johanna Rothman9

A Possible First Week for a Newbie


A Possible Second Week

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Keep Iterating

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You might iterate on your resume:

Write draft 1

Get review from Sally, John, and

Dan

Do several other things in order

(1, 2, 3) while you are waiting, such

as request references

Later, write draft 2. That would be

a separate sticky


Decide What’s Next

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You decide what to do next week

based on your accomplishments and

what’s important now

You don’t over-commit

You write down everything you

need to do

You retrospect to assess your

progress


Keep Your Todos Small

We like to make progress

We are not good at multitasking

The way to keep your spirits up and to

make progress is to keep your todos small

You won’t get confused with an

interrupting phone call

You can make progress with small

chunks of time

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Retrospect

Many ways to reflect

Plus/Minus/Change

Proud/Sorry

Facilitated Conversation

MindMap of your week

Quantitative data of your week

Five whys

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Tips to Make This Work

You can finish every todo in

two hours or less

You can finish the week’s

work in the time you have

for your job search

Your todos are independent

from each other

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Avoid These Traps

Keep going

Perfection is the enemy of the good

Don’t beat yourself up

Don’t have too much work in

progress (todos in the In Progress

column)

Know that you will never have the

perfect resume

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What Questions Do You Have?

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Let’s Stay in Touch...

Manage Your Job Search on leanpub

Hiring Geeks That Fit on leanpub.com, Pragprog.com, Amazon

Much more on www.jrothman.com/blog/htp

Pragmatic Manager:

www.jrothman.com/pragmaticmanager

Please link with me on LinkedIn

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