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Learn a Simple Way to Personalize your LinkedIn Brand

December 3, 2019 By Katherine Burik

Learn a Simple Way to Personalize your LinkedIn Brand and find a job on LinkedIn using Job Search Tips with the Interview Doctor.

Katherine Burik is a Job Search / Career Coach and, in this video, she shares her top tips to brand your LinkedIn profile to help you have a profile that will help you be found on LinkedIn so you can find a job, faster.

Get more Job Search Tips from the Interview Doctor and Network with confidence on LinkedIn! You can purchase our digital product, How to Setup Your LinkedIn Profile and get started with your profile and brand on LinkedIn!

Negotiating Pay should always be Win / Win

November 26, 2019 By Katherine Burik

Why does negotiating pay give most people a bad case of the shakes?

We all work for pay – well almost everyone. Why can’t negotiating pay be a win / win with the employer so you are paid fairly and the company pays its employees (you) fairly?

Talking about pay is scary. Negotiating pay is the last step in the job search process after often navigating a complex interview exploration process. After getting that far, we don’t want to jinx anything or take the chance that all that hard work gets flushed by talking about money.

But talking about pay is the way you maximize your family coffers to get the most value from your hard work. It behooves us to improve this skill to achieve win / win, the optimal outcome.

Everyone wins when you improve your salary negotiation skills. The company hires the person they want for a price they are willing to pay. You as the candidate win because you get paid fairly compared to the market and compared to others in the company. We achieve a happy balance point.

You need some ammunition to make negotiating salary a win / win. Don’t just go into negotiation unprepared. That is the surest way to accept whatever the company offers which might be less than you want or less than you are worth.

Research competitive salary. Get actual data from sources like salary.com, glassdoor.com or payscale.com about how other people are paid for your job. Checking several sources is a good idea to create a clearer pictures of how companies compensate people doing the same job. You want to be paid within the competitive range for the work you do. Notice we are not referencing what you were paid at the last company. Strive to be paid competitively to achieve win / win.

Consider the big picture. Base salary is often only one part of a total compensation package. What other element of total compensation are important to you? Would you trade a little pay for more paid time off? What kind of bonus do you want? Are you willing to put more of your total compensation at risk in commission? These other elements can add up.

Think in terms of range, not a specific number. This is where your research comes in handy. What is the lowest amount of money that is still within the competitive range that you are willing to accept? This forms the lowest rung of your competitive range. Stay within the competitive range according to your research but allow yourself to dream a little to come up with a top end to your personal salary range. You can’t get it if you don’t ask!

When to talk salary. A couple of ground rules:

Defer discussion about salary until you know they are ready to give you an offer. “I am sure we can come to terms when the time comes.” “I am comfortable with compensation within the competitive range.”
EXCEPTION: If a headhunter working outside the company asks your salary history give him or her the details. Otherwise they won’t work with you. An outside headhunter has incentive for you to get the best salary package you can.

Make it a poop sandwich. When the company is ready to make an offer, the negotiations can sound something like this:

“I am really thrilled about this opportunity.”
“I would be comfortable with a salary within the competitive range for this position, which is $LOWEST NUMBER YOU WOULD ACCEPT to $IN MY DREAMS.”
“I am so excited to get started.”

Then shut up! Silence implies confidence. If you keep jabbering away nervously, the company will not take you seriously. A solid company will be willing to pay its employees a salary within the competitive range.

Lead off with the salary range but don’t forget the other compensation elements that are important to you. That could sound something like this:

I know that base salary is only one part of the compensation package.
I am curious about paid time off. I was getting four weeks at XYZ Company. That seems only fair.
Let’s discuss incentive pay [or the other compensation elements].

Your fear of rejection should not overcome your personal interests to be paid competitively. You work hard. You deserve to be paid competitively. That is the essence of a win / win salary negotiation!

Check out The Interview Doctor’s “Tell me about yourself” Worksheet to be sure to win the right to negotiate salary for the job of your dreams!

How to Be a LinkedIn All-Star to Supercharge your Job Search

November 19, 2019 By Katherine Burik

How to Be a LinkedIn All-Star to Supercharge your Job Search and find a job using LinkedIn using Job Search Tips with the Interview Doctor.

Katherine Burik is a Job Search / Career Coach and, in this video, she shares her top tips to optimize your LinkedIn profile to help you have a profile that will help you be found on LinkedIn so you can find a job, faster.

Get more Job Search Tips from the Interview Doctor and Network with confidence on LinkedIn! Get your free copy of the “7 Tips for Career Success for the Shy Person” and begin to step out and onto a new career path today.

Want to learn how to Find a Better Job? Register for this FREE Job Search Training from the Interview Doctor – Get instant access here.

Put your embarrassment and disappointment in perspective at a Job Interview

November 11, 2019 By Katherine Burik

I remember it like it was yesterday. Sitting across the desk from the boss and hearing those words, “Katherine, we are making some big changes at this company and we are going to be letting you go.”

Even writing the words brings back those terrible feelings from anger to embarrassment to self-doubt and disappointment.

I am not alone. Angela is still so traumatized that she can’t bring herself to talk about her situation to neighbors, even one year after she lost her job. Tony stumbles over his explanation for why he left his last company. Both are extremely talented leaders. Their current job search situations were not their choice, but they can’t get over it. Their anger, embarrassment, self-doubt, and disappointment transfers to others, undermining their efforts to find their next gig.

Lots of situations can make us feel like failure faces. Sometimes I feel like the poster child for failure face! Here are a few of my personal favorites not related to my numerous terminations:

Spilling coffee across the table at a big meeting.
Tripping up the stairs in a skirt and heels.
Trying to golf with the company President in the longest afternoon of my life.
Getting stuck in traffic then arriving 45 minutes late to the biggest business meeting of my career, a meeting I was supposed to lead.

Some of those situations happened years ago but still make me shudder. Easy enough to say, “Buck up, girl!” But actually dealing with the feelings is harder than it sounds.

According to Fred Luskin, PhD, director of the Stanford University Forgiveness Project, in a Prevention article, “the biggest obstacle to self-forgiveness is our tendency to wallow in our guilt.” He says, “It’s not just that we feel bad because we know we’ve done wrong…But some of us actually draw those bad feelings around ourselves like a blanket, cover our heads, and refuse to stop the wailing.”

Sh** happens. To everyone. It’s what you do about it that is important. Until you deal with it, that whiff of failure oozes out of your skin like garlic. Putting complicated, embarrassing situations in perspective helps you put them behind you so you can move forward with a positive perspective that makes people comfortable with you.

Here are a few tips if you find yourself with a big old failure face:

Maintain composure. Find and repeat a calming word or phrase. Count to 10 and take deep breaths.
Keep a sense of humor to put the situation in perspective. Find the absurd and you can get a good giggle about it, making the whole situation a lot less toxic.
Think about a role model. How would your favorite leader (or super hero?) handle the situation?
Fake it till you make it. Slap on a big smile and pretend if you have to. A little acting might reduce that whiff of garlic. Positive body language like power poses proposed by Ann Cuddy in her famous Ted Talk, help you take up more space and hold your arms and legs away from your body. Like Wonder Woman, you will instantly feel more confident.
Practice your explanation in advance of job interviews. Find the fewest words to explain what happened. The more words you use in a long explanation, the more the listener will believe YOU were the problem. “The company restructured.” “I’m not a good golfer.” (You can tell that one really bugs me.) Short and sweet.
Live in the present. Focus on what you want instead of what you did. “The company restructured. I am really interested in this role. Tell me more about…” If you don’t make a big deal about it, others will move on too. The simple act of focusing on the present will make the past incidents dim in perspective.

Everyone stumbles. Forgive yourself and change your perspective to get what you want next! Use The Interview Doctor’s free “Tell me about yourself” Worksheet to clarify your interview responses so you put your embarrassment and disappointment in perspective to present the best possible YOU during your next job interview.

Storytelling Tips for Job Seekers

October 21, 2019 By Katherine Burik

Storytelling is a great way to express your experiences in a memorable way. Turn your accomplishments and experiences into stories that invite the listener into your life.

Once you find five to ten stories, we have to figure out how to organize this information so the story comes out clearly and concisely. You always want to walk a balance between engaging the listener, while avoiding boredom. Keep your stories concise so that every word supports your strategic plan.

Every story should have four parts:

The beginning sets the stage. “There was this time we had this big problem with…”
The middle describes what you did about that situation. “I pulled together a team to…”
The end describes the outcome. “In the end, we reduced employee turnover by 5 basis points.”
“What I learned” ties back to one of your strengths, which should be something important to the listener. The listener will remember the “what I learned” so make it good. “I learned that it is important to communicate well with the team.” Each story can have several things you learned so you can use one story to emphasize several points.

Write out your stories in this format, then say them out loud. I don’t know about you but nothing comes out of my mouth the way it sounds in my head, unless I practice out loud. Practicing out loud also imprints the story in your head so you can access it when you need it.

You can bring out the right story at the right moment if these stories are prepared in advance. Prepare stories that support what you want the hiring manager to know about you, your strengths, and your accomplishments. The hard part will be selecting which stories to share!

Edit your stories to about a 2-3 minute length. You know you can always talk for hours about topics that are important to you, but until you see that the listener is engaged, keep stories shorter or you risk boredom.

Some of you are saying, “Katherine, that story telling process sounds a lot like a good response to a behavioral interview.” Good catch! This four-step process, coincidentally, is the way you respond to a behavioral question that starts with, “Tell me about a time when…” Sometimes this interview technique is called EARL or STAR. I just refer to it as telling a story in four parts. It is easier for me to remember!

If you have 5 to 10 stories, you don’t have to prepare different responses to behavioral questions than you might prepare for Frequently Asked Interview Questions. If someone asks what your strength is, you can pull out a story to illustrate that strength instead of just saying one word. The story is memorable. That one word statement is not.

Refer to your stories in your LinkedIn profile too to add consistency between your in-person interviews and your online profile. Instead of saying, “Exceeded quota,” consider a headline that adds a story. Something like, “Landed the largest account in company history enabling the sales team to achieve a record sales year in 2018”. What a stronger impact, just from adding a story to your LinkedIn profile!

Check out The Interview Doctor’s free training, 5 Tips to Kick off a Successful Job Search or Career Transition, for more tips on improving your online presence to improve your job search and career.