Submit your question for Ask Us Anything!
Networking can be the best way to land your first (or next) big job, but are you going about it the wrong way?
Too often, networking conversations end the same way: the other person says, “I’ll keep an eye out and let you know if I hear of anything that fits.”
You nod, thank them… and never hear from them again.
So what went wrong—and more importantly, what can you do better?
In this episode of The TechEd Podcast, Matt Kirchner breaks down why most job seekers leave networking meetings empty-handed—and how to change that. The difference? It’s not about who you know. It’s about how you approach the conversation in the first place.
Matt shares the exact mindset, questions, and preparation that turn a vague “I’m open to anything” into a powerful, productive dialogue that gets results. From clarifying your goals to building a smart list of target companies, this episode is packed with actionable strategies that help job seekers stand out and move forward.
Whether you’re entering the workforce or making a career pivot, these insights will help you land the right opportunity—and if you’re someone who supports job seekers, it’s just as valuable for you.
Listen to learn:
- Why being “open to anything” can actually limit your opportunities
- The 3 questions to answer before every networking meeting
- How to create a list of target companies—and why it works like magic
- A smarter way to ask for help that gets real follow-up
- Encouragement for staying persistent through rejection and uncertainty
We want to hear from you! Send us a text.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Matt Kirchner (00:08):
It's Matt Kirkner, and this is The TechEd
Podcast. You know, we aregetting questions rolling in for
our new segment called Ask usanything. We've been plugging
this on the podcast for severalweeks. The whole idea is, we get
so many great questions from theworld of technical education,
STEM education, and we want tocreate regular episodes just
(00:29):
answering your questions. And sokeep those questions rolling in.
We've got some great ones sofar. The Ask Us Anything
episodes will be our producer,Melissa Martin, asking the
questions, and yours truly, MattKirkner, answering them. We may
even take a shot at answeringsome of them together, but keep
the questions coming. Put themat TechEd podcast.com/ask us
(00:50):
anything. Just go to that URL.
TechEd podcast.com/ask usanything, one word and submit
your question.
Welcome into this week's episodeof The TechEd Podcast. My name
is Matt Kirkner. I am your host,and we're going to talk about, I
think, a challenge that's facinga lot of young people,
especially people entering thecareer world, people who are
(01:14):
leaving high school, leavingTechnical College, leaving
whatever came after high school,whether it's direct to workforce
or it's going on to a universityand then graduating with a four
year degree, maybe it's agraduate degree, what have you,
lots of folks in the job marketright now, and the job market is
not what it was. It is not whatit was just a few short years
ago. And I think we all rememberthe time 2022 early 2023 and so
(01:37):
on. If you had any kind of aSTEM degree. If you had really
any kind of experience at all ina data or STEM related field,
then in a lot of cases, if youhad no experience, it was such a
hot job market that you couldliterally just go on to indeed,
you could send a resumesomewhere. You could apply for a
job, jobs for just waiting,careers for just waiting, for
(01:58):
people. The world has changed.
And for any of you that are inthe job market right now, what
you're finding is that it'sstill, by the way, a seller's
market. It's still a greatmarket to great time to be in
the job market, but it is notlike it was two or three years
ago. And so we still have morejobs than we have people to fill
them, but it's not the lowhanging fruit we saw in 2021 22
and 23 and because of that, whatI'm getting a lot more of, and I
(02:21):
get these all the time anyway,but what I'm getting a lot more
of are people coming to me. Iknow they're going to others as
well and asking for help intheir career search. And a lot
of times, these are friends ofmy kids. So my kids are now in
their 20s, and their friendsare, in some cases, looking for
jobs. In a lot of cases, it'skids of my friends, so I've got
a friend or a contact or aprofessional relationship, and
(02:43):
that individual's child islooking for a job, and so they
reach out and they say, Hey, canwe network? Can we have a
meeting? Can you give me someadvice on my job search? I will
tell you this. And this is thefirst message for anybody who's
in that mode, whether it's you,whether it's somebody that
you're close to, the firstmessage that I would have is
make that phone call, ask thatquestion, send that text, send
(03:06):
that email. People are really,really eager to help you, and I
almost, I won't even say almost.
I never say no to somebody whoreaches out and says, Hey, can
you give me a little bit of helpin my job search? I might not be
able to give them hours andhours and hours of my time, but
I'm always willing to give thema little attention and help them
along the way. So lesson numberone is, don't be afraid to reach
(03:27):
out and make that call, makethat request. But I'm also going
to tell you that how you do thatand how prepared you are when
that meeting comes around withwhoever it is that you're trying
to network with can make all thedifference in whether or not
that networking meeting issuccessful and leads to a
potential career opportunity, orwhether you just get bounced
along and told what you want tohear, but don't really get the
(03:49):
help that you need. And so we'regoing to talk on this episode of
the podcast just where I thinkpeople are getting it right in
terms of networking for thatnext job, and where I think they
need a little bit of help, andmaybe they're not getting it
quite right. And I can tell youthat the vast majority of people
that I meet with on this topichaven't quite figured it out
yet. They're not quite to thepoint where they've got the
model dialed in, where they'resuper effective at asking the
(04:12):
right questions and asking forthe right kind of help. That's
what we're going to talk abouton this episode of The TechEd
Podcast. I will tell you I havetotally changed my approach, by
the way, with people that cometo me and ask for help with
their career search, and I'lltell you how it used to go. Used
to go like this. I would get anemail, maybe it's from a friend,
a business contact the candidatethemselves, and they would say,
(04:33):
hey, so and so is in a careertransition. Can you meet with
them? Can you give them somehelp? So the meeting would come
around, we'd get it scheduled,and we'd sit down have a little
bit of chit chat and small talk.
Where are you from? Where'd yougo to school? Where are you
living now? And then we wouldget down to business, and I
would say something like, sotell me what you're up to. Tell
me what you're looking for. AndI would get some kind of a
generic, kind of vanilla answerthat would be like, I want to
(04:55):
find a challenge where I can putmy skills. To work in whatever
fill in the blank workspace theywanted to be in, whatever market
that they want to be in to workfor a great organization. So
they'd say, I just want a newchallenge where I can put my
skills in accounting or inindustrial engineering to work
for a great organization. Okay,fine, good enough. So you gave
me a really generic answer tothe question, and then my second
(05:18):
question would be somethinglike, Have you put any thought
into what kind of anorganization that you want to
work for? What would a good jobor a good career be for you?
Where do you want to work? Andtheir answer would be, well,
really, I'm just looking for anyopportunity. I don't need to be
really specific. I'm open toanything. So let's think about
for a moment what this personwas trying to do, right? So
(05:39):
they're answering, they'regiving me really generic, really
plain answers to the question,what do you want to do? Where do
you want to work? Why are theydoing that? And think about that
for just a moment, and I think alot of us will get to the same
conclusion, and that conclusionis that they're really saying, I
don't want to count myself outof an opportunity, or if I'm too
specific about what I'm lookingfor, and this person doesn't
(06:01):
have an opportunity or isn'taware of a role in that space, I
might be costing myself anopportunity. So I'll give you an
example. Maybe I know of amanufacturing company that's
looking for, you know, an entrylevel supervisor position, and
the person that's sitting acrossthe table from me says, Well,
I'm really looking for a job inproduction planning in
manufacturing. Just to use thatas an example. Well, they're
(06:23):
worried that if they sayproduction planning, and I know
of a job that's, you know, anentry level supervisor position
that's open, that I'm not goingto put that opportunity in front
of them, because it isn't whatthey're looking for. I get that
right. I mean, we don't want tobe too specific when we're
looking for a role. We want tobe open to any opportunity. But
let me, let me explain and maybeprovide an example of the
(06:44):
challenge that we put in frontof somebody that's trying to
help us network for our nextrole. When we give them really
generic answers to theirquestions, I want everybody in
the audience. This will be alittle bit of an interactive
moment here on The TechEdPodcast. I want you to answer a
question. I'm thinking of acertain individual, and I want
you to tell me who that personis. And what I will tell you is
(07:05):
this individual, they work ineither the technical or the
technology space or the financespace, and they're running a
fortune 500 company. Who is it?
Think for a moment and tell mewho that is. And already you're
(07:25):
realizing that the ads of yougetting that right are really,
really slim, right? I mean,there are tons of people, CEOs
of technology or financecompanies in the Fortune 500 the
ads that you would guess theperson that I was thinking of
pretty slim. Let me ask you afew more questions. All right,
now I'm thinking about, I'll bemore specific, I'm thinking
about the founder and thechairman of a tech company. And
(07:49):
it's a tech company that you'reprobably familiar with, and
there's a really good chancethat maybe in the last week or
so you've engaged with thiscompany. You can go on your
phone, there's an app, and youcan shop for just about
anything, and you can order it,and it will show up on your
front doorstep the next coupleof days, or maybe a week later.
What company is that? And notjust what company? Who's the
(08:10):
person who is that founder orChairman that I'm thinking of?
And just about everybody knowsthat, of course, the company is
Amazon, and the person is thefounder and chairman, Jeff
Bezos, right? So now you had areally specific question, really
specific answer. Let me give youanother one. This person leads a
company in the aerospace market.
In the space market, they alsolead a major social media
(08:32):
platform that everybody hasheard of, and they also founded
and lead an electric vehiclecompany, right? Super, super
easy question. Everybody isthinking of Elon Musk and, of
course, the company SpaceX and xand Tesla that he leads. Really
easy question to answer. I'llgive you one more. I'm thinking
of a person who recentlyannounced their retirement.
(08:53):
They're deep, deep, deep intotheir career, one of the
wealthiest people on the planet.
They live in Omaha, Nebraska.
They've had a frugal lifestyletheir entire life, and they lead
a huge investment company, atleast until the end of the year,
when they're retiring. Okay,almost all of us know that that
person is Warren Buffett, supereasy, relatively easy, if you're
(09:15):
paying any attention to finance,to technology, to the news, to
people in the news, those areall pretty easy questions to
answer, right? Who doesn't knowJeff Bezos or Elon Musk, or, for
that matter, Warren Buffet?
Well, here's the reason I bringup this example. When you ask
specific questions like that,immediately your brain goes to
(09:35):
somebody. You've got somethingto lock onto. You're starting to
prime your brain to think aboutpossibilities. Even when I say
founder and chairman of a techcompany, you're starting to
narrow in on what I'm thinkingabout. That is the way the human
brain works. The moreinformation we give it, the more
specific of an answer we canprovide. That's not any advanced
neuroscience. It's pretty muchcommon sense. Well, let's go
(09:56):
back to that first question Iasked when I said, Hey, I'm
thinking about. A person wholeads a fortune 500 either tech
or finance company, that is thekind of challenge you are giving
to somebody who's helping youthrough your career transition.
When you say, I'll do anythingfor any company, really, I'm
open to any opportunity. Becausethe truth of the matter is,
(10:17):
there's almost no way to answerthat question. Your brain
doesn't lock onto anything. Youdon't think about any individual
company or any individual marketspace or so on, in terms of
where this individual thatyou're networking with, or in my
particular case, I'm sittingacross the table from a
candidate. There's no abilityfor me to be able to say, here
(10:38):
are some folks that I couldconnect you with. All right, so
you're trying to be amiable,you're trying to be open. You
don't want to box yourself outof a position. The irony here,
folks is that in doing that andgiving that really generic
answer to the question, you'reboxing yourself out of
opportunities because the personon the other side of the table,
this person that you have goneto because you want their help
(11:01):
in finding a job, has no ideawhere to send you, who to refer
you to, what direction that youcould go. It's really, really
hard to solve that problem forsomebody. Let's think for a
moment though about a better wayof doing this right, rather than
just going on this vaguedepiction of where you want to
go with your career and me assomeone who's trying to help you
(11:22):
grasping at thin air. Here'swhat I do now. And every time I
get one of these meetings, Iinvite the candidate, or I
invite the individual who'sreaching out to me and saying,
hey, I want to meet with you tonetwork for my next job
opportunity. I actually sendthem a magazine column that I
authored at the end of 2024 Ithink it was published in
December of 2020 December of2024 I think, as the audience
(11:44):
knows, every single month Iwrite content for Gardner
Business Media, it's publishedin several of their trade
magazines. And so I just wrote acolumn on this in December of
last year, and we'll link thatup in the show notes, by the
way. So if you want to checkthat magazine column out, we'll
link that up in the show notes.
You can read all about whatyou're hearing today on The
TechEd Podcast. So now let'stalk about a better way. Let's
(12:05):
take this new approach. Ratherthan politely closing the
meeting and wishing these peopleluck in terms of where they
should go or where they could gowith their career opportunities,
I invite them now, in advance ofthat meeting to be super, super
specific, the more specific theycan again, the irony of being
polite is that in saying thatyou're open to any opportunity,
(12:28):
hoping not to cost yourself anopportunity, is that you make it
impossible, or almostimpossible, for me to be able to
help you. And to think aboutthis another way. Who am I more
in a position to be able toassist. Is it someone who says
they want to put their skills towork for a great organization,
or someone that says, I'vealways worked dreamed of working
(12:48):
for a world class manufacturer,or I've always dreamt of been
being in the world of privateequity, or I want to work for an
investment bank, or I want towork for a media company, or I'd
love to take my career to anevents management company or to
a sports franchise. I mean,whatever it is that you're
dreaming of, doing whatever jobyou are seeking, whatever you
think your skills arespecifically and uniquely
(13:11):
appropriate for. That is therole that is the job that you
should be asking somebody tohelp you find so the first
lesson here is, let's be asspecific as possible. If they
say, Hey, I'm looking for a jobin manufacturing, my mind will
immediately go to manufacturingcompanies that I work with,
whether it's in I live inWisconsin, I can tell you I have
(13:33):
contacts at every majorWisconsin manufacturing company,
and in most cases I know, youknow, the CEO of that company of
all the largest manufacturingcompanies in the state of
Wisconsin, so I'm in a muchbetter position in that case, to
help this individual, if they'reasking for specific referrals to
specific companies or a specificmarketplace that they think that
(13:54):
they want to be in. If they say,I want to be in private equity
or I want to be in finance,guess what? I have tons of
friends serve on boards oforganizations that are in that
space. I can send them in thedirection that they want to go.
So the first thing is, thinkreally hard about what market
you want to be in. Do you wantto be in manufacturing? Do you
want to be in finance? Do youwant to be in nonprofits? I
(14:14):
mean, whatever that is, bespecific about where you want to
go with your career. The nextthing I ask people to do is be
really specific about the kindof position that you would see
yourself in, if it's a businessdevelopment role in a
manufacturing operation. Well,then say that if you want to
work in data science or dataanalytics in industrial company,
(14:35):
say that if you want to work asan analyst in finance or a
private equity organization,then say that the more specific
you can be, the more my brain isgoing to start thinking about
the answer to the Jeff Bezos,Elon Musk or Warren Buffett
question. I'm getting really,really specific. Now I know
(14:55):
where to send this person. Now Iknow how to help them. So the
final question that I askedthem, and this was actually a
lesson that I learned from agreat friend of mine, when he
was doing a job search. Thisgoes back about 10 years, and he
was so specific as to researchand make a list of the exact,
precise companies that he wouldlike to work for, or that he
(15:19):
would like to work in. So heliterally had a list of precise
businesses. There were like 25of them. He had done his
research. He knew the culture ofthe company, he knew the
products of the company, he knewthe operations of the company.
So he knew everything aboutthese businesses. And he had a
list of 25 and when he would sitdown in a networking meeting, he
would put that list in front ofthe individual with whom he was
(15:41):
meeting, and he would say, Doyou know anybody at these
companies? And he said, it wasabsolutely magic how, when he
started doing that, hisnetworking meeting, went from
people racking their brains tothink of anybody, to people
going through the list of 25companies and say, You know
what, in 20 of these 25companies, I really don't know
anybody. I can't help you, butin these five, in these five
(16:02):
companies that you haveidentified, I have contacts in
every single one of thosebusinesses, and I would be happy
to refer you to that individualor to somebody that I know
within that company. So really,really specific. So think about
what we've done. We're answeringthree questions before we even
go into our networking meeting,we're asking answering a
(16:22):
question about what market spacedo we want to be in? We're
asking a question about what isour dream job and where, what
would we really see ourselvesexcelling in? And we're saying,
This is a list of 25 companies,and maybe the list is 20, maybe
it's 40, but these are the kindsof companies that I would want
to work for or or work with. AndI will also tell you that those
companies will take a look atwhoever you're meeting with,
(16:45):
will take a look at your list ofcompanies. And even if they
don't know somebody in an exactcompany, they may say, Hey, I
don't know somebody at Siemens,but I know somebody at Rockwell
Automation, that's a reallysimilar company. Would you be
interested in a referral to thatcompany. So those are the three
questions that we want to answerwhen we are going into our job,
search, networking, meetings,what market do I want to work
(17:08):
in? What kind of a job would Ilike to have? What are some
specific companies? I would alsotell you that geographically,
it's helpful to have some havesome idea of where it is that
you want to live and work whenyou're done, are you specific to
a specific geographical area?
Maybe you've got some familyreasons or some other reasons
why it's unreasonable, or you'renot able to move to another
(17:30):
geographic location. You mightas well send that right. Say
that if you're somebody that,for whatever reason, is going to
continue your career in SouthernCalifornia, for example, it
doesn't do you any good to getto our referral to a company in
New York. You're not going andworking there anyway, so you
might as well be specific ifthere are some constraints
geographically around whereyou're where you want to go
work. Now, you could deliver allof this in a way that doesn't
(17:52):
sound like you're being toospecific or you're being too
difficult, or you're being toopicky. It's okay to say, I'm
open to a lot of opportunities,but these are the ones that I'm
thinking about. You could evenask the person that you're
networking with for a little bitof feedback on how they would
see you fitting in that marketspace, in that position, in that
particular company. Now I'llalso give one more piece of
(18:16):
advice on this whole topic, andthat is, it's okay to have
multiple answers to the samequestion. In other words, you
know, if you're going to meetwith a let's say that you're
somebody who's interested ineither working in finance and or
working in manufacturing, andyou haven't quite dialed that in
yet. Well, it's okay to have alist of companies and kind of a
little bit of a description foryourself that's specific to the
(18:37):
finance people, and then anotherone that's specific to the
manufacturing people. And then,as you're meeting with someone
who is more likely to havereferrals or to have a network
in manufacturing, then use themanufacturing list. If you're
more likely in a meeting to betalking to somebody who has more
contacts in finance or or whathave you, or in nonprofit or
retail or hospitality or defenseor energy, or whatever that
(18:59):
market space is. It's okay tohave a couple of these lists,
but be specific, that is wherepeople are most likely to be
able to help you. I'm also goingto tell you that this podcast
episode is one that I am nowgoing to send and will be
required listening for anybodythat reaches out to me and wants
to network about what their nextcareer opportunity is, take a
(19:22):
listen to this podcast andunderstand what it is that I'm
looking for and why it'simportant to be specific. I
would also encourage anybody whomaybe isn't a job seeker, but is
somebody who is getting the samekind of referral and networking
calls that I am to use the sameapproach. And what I've found
over the course of the last yearis inviting candidates to be way
more specific in advance of ourmeeting. They come to the
(19:44):
meetings way more prepared, andI'm in a much, much better
position to help them. I cantell you, as we close out this
episode of the podcast, there'salmost nothing more rewarding to
me than when I have anopportunity to sit down and
spend time with a person who's10. Taking that next step in
their career, and I make somereferrals for them, or I connect
them to some people, and one ofthose referrals or connections
(20:08):
leads to a career opportunity.
And I can tell you it happenstime and time and time again,
way more times than I couldcount, and it's certainly not
every time. And my hit rate isnowhere near 100% but I will
tell you that so many times overthe course of the last, let's
call it 10 or 15 years, I'veseen people land really, really
cool career opportunities. Andmy success rate, by the way, in
referring them to the rightopportunity for them. And as a
(20:29):
result of that, being moresuccessful in them landing the
kind of career that they'relooking for, my hit rate has
gone way up as well in terms ofbeing helpful to these
individuals. So the truth isthat people who are maybe a
little bit deeper in theircareer, I certainly would count
myself on that list, people whohave really broad networks. And
there are people with broadernetworks than the one that I've
(20:51):
got, but mine is by no meansnarrow. They are super, super
excited to help you, to behelpful, to point you in the
right direction, but we need tobe specific. So that was a
message that I thought was soimportant for people that are
trying to take that next step intheir career that we dedicated
IT, an entire episode of thepodcast to this specific topic.
If you want to read about it, aswe mentioned earlier, check out
(21:14):
the show notes. We'll link upthe specific article, the column
that I mentioned for GardnerBusiness Media not too long ago.
And with that, first of all, ifyou're somebody in my position
who is interested and beinghelpful with a job seeker and
pointing them in the rightdirection and giving them some
ideas, thank you so much forthat work. It's really, really
important work and and when youdo get that call, when you do
(21:36):
get that email, please respondto it, invite the person in. It
only takes a half an hour.
You're going to make a huge makea huge difference in a person's
life. And who among us didn'trise to whatever level of
success that we've achievedwithout a tremendous amount of
help from people that werewilling to take some time for us
earlier in our careers. So withthat, for our job seekers, and
(21:58):
this is the message I leave withall of the job seekers, all the
people that reach out to me,looking to network for new
positions. You are on a journey.
Every single thing that happensto you happens for a reason, and
that reason benefits you. Youare going to get rejection. You
are going to have people thatdon't call you back. You are
going to have people who youthink you're the perfect person
for a job, and they end upoffering it to somebody else,
(22:20):
you're gonna havedisappointment. You're gonna
have heartbreak. That is whatlife is all about. But the truth
of the matter is, stay after it,because I can tell you, every
single one of us have dealt witha little bit of those types of
obstacles in one job search oranother, and I can tell you
unequivocally that every time Ihad a setback when I was looking
to take a new step in my career.
(22:41):
I can look back on that and sayit absolutely happened for a
reason, and I ended up in abetter spot. So stay after it.
Keep reaching out, keep lookingfor the perfect opportunity. For
you, it is out there, and I wantyou to remember that as you
continue your job search. I wantyou to remember to tune into The
TechEd Podcast every singleweek. We'll be back next week,
of course, with anotherincredible guest, and really,
(23:04):
really excited for next week'sepisode. In the meantime, check
out the show notes. We have thebest show notes in the business.
You will find those at TechEdpodcast.com/and
listen to this. It's accelerate,right? Like accelerating your
career search. So it's TechEdpodcast.com/accelerate, A, C, C,
E, L, E, R, A, T, E, when you'redone there, of course, head on
(23:28):
over to social media. You'llfind us all over social media,
whether you are on Instagram,whether you're on Facebook,
whether you are on Tick, tock,LinkedIn, doesn't matter. You
will find us all over socialmedia and one parting comment,
don't forget to submit thosequestions. To ask us anything
that is at TechEdpodcast.com/ask, us anything
(23:49):
looking forward to the firstepisode of that Melissa and I
both are and that will be comingout here in the next quarter,
probably a little bit sooner,until next week. I'm Matt
Kirkner, happy job searching andhappy supporting all those folks
that are looking to take thatnext step in their career. I
will see you next week. You.
It's Matt Kirkner, and this is The TechEd
Podcast. You know, we aregetting questions rolling in for
our new segment called Ask usanything. We've been plugging
this on the podcast for severalweeks. The whole idea is, we get
so many great questions from theworld of technical education,
STEM education, and we want tocreate regular episodes just
(00:29):
answering your questions. And sokeep those questions rolling in.
We've got some great ones sofar. The Ask Us Anything
episodes will be our producer,Melissa Martin, asking the
questions, and yours truly, MattKirkner, answering them. We may
even take a shot at answeringsome of them together, but keep
the questions coming. Put themat TechEd podcast.com/ask us
(00:50):
anything. Just go to that URL.
TechEd podcast.com/ask usanything, one word and submit
your question.
Welcome into this week's episodeof The TechEd Podcast. My name
is Matt Kirkner. I am your host,and we're going to talk about, I
think, a challenge that's facinga lot of young people,
especially people entering thecareer world, people who are
(01:14):
leaving high school, leavingTechnical College, leaving
whatever came after high school,whether it's direct to workforce
or it's going on to a universityand then graduating with a four
year degree, maybe it's agraduate degree, what have you,
lots of folks in the job marketright now, and the job market is
not what it was. It is not whatit was just a few short years
ago. And I think we all rememberthe time 2022 early 2023 and so
(01:37):
on. If you had any kind of aSTEM degree. If you had really
any kind of experience at all ina data or STEM related field,
then in a lot of cases, if youhad no experience, it was such a
hot job market that you couldliterally just go on to indeed,
you could send a resumesomewhere. You could apply for a
job, jobs for just waiting,careers for just waiting, for
(01:58):
people. The world has changed.
And for any of you that are inthe job market right now, what
you're finding is that it'sstill, by the way, a seller's
market. It's still a greatmarket to great time to be in
the job market, but it is notlike it was two or three years
ago. And so we still have morejobs than we have people to fill
them, but it's not the lowhanging fruit we saw in 2021 22
and 23 and because of that, whatI'm getting a lot more of, and I
(02:21):
get these all the time anyway,but what I'm getting a lot more
of are people coming to me. Iknow they're going to others as
well and asking for help intheir career search. And a lot
of times, these are friends ofmy kids. So my kids are now in
their 20s, and their friendsare, in some cases, looking for
jobs. In a lot of cases, it'skids of my friends, so I've got
a friend or a contact or aprofessional relationship, and
(02:43):
that individual's child islooking for a job, and so they
reach out and they say, Hey, canwe network? Can we have a
meeting? Can you give me someadvice on my job search? I will
tell you this. And this is thefirst message for anybody who's
in that mode, whether it's you,whether it's somebody that
you're close to, the firstmessage that I would have is
make that phone call, ask thatquestion, send that text, send
(03:06):
that email. People are really,really eager to help you, and I
almost, I won't even say almost.
I never say no to somebody whoreaches out and says, Hey, can
you give me a little bit of helpin my job search? I might not be
able to give them hours andhours and hours of my time, but
I'm always willing to give thema little attention and help them
along the way. So lesson numberone is, don't be afraid to reach
(03:27):
out and make that call, makethat request. But I'm also going
to tell you that how you do thatand how prepared you are when
that meeting comes around withwhoever it is that you're trying
to network with can make all thedifference in whether or not
that networking meeting issuccessful and leads to a
potential career opportunity, orwhether you just get bounced
along and told what you want tohear, but don't really get the
(03:49):
help that you need. And so we'regoing to talk on this episode of
the podcast just where I thinkpeople are getting it right in
terms of networking for thatnext job, and where I think they
need a little bit of help, andmaybe they're not getting it
quite right. And I can tell youthat the vast majority of people
that I meet with on this topichaven't quite figured it out
yet. They're not quite to thepoint where they've got the
model dialed in, where they'resuper effective at asking the
(04:12):
right questions and asking forthe right kind of help. That's
what we're going to talk abouton this episode of The TechEd
Podcast. I will tell you I havetotally changed my approach, by
the way, with people that cometo me and ask for help with
their career search, and I'lltell you how it used to go. Used
to go like this. I would get anemail, maybe it's from a friend,
a business contact the candidatethemselves, and they would say,
(04:33):
hey, so and so is in a careertransition. Can you meet with
them? Can you give them somehelp? So the meeting would come
around, we'd get it scheduled,and we'd sit down have a little
bit of chit chat and small talk.
Where are you from? Where'd yougo to school? Where are you
living now? And then we wouldget down to business, and I
would say something like, sotell me what you're up to. Tell
me what you're looking for. AndI would get some kind of a
generic, kind of vanilla answerthat would be like, I want to
(04:55):
find a challenge where I can putmy skills. To work in whatever
fill in the blank workspace theywanted to be in, whatever market
that they want to be in to workfor a great organization. So
they'd say, I just want a newchallenge where I can put my
skills in accounting or inindustrial engineering to work
for a great organization. Okay,fine, good enough. So you gave
me a really generic answer tothe question, and then my second
(05:18):
question would be somethinglike, Have you put any thought
into what kind of anorganization that you want to
work for? What would a good jobor a good career be for you?
Where do you want to work? Andtheir answer would be, well,
really, I'm just looking for anyopportunity. I don't need to be
really specific. I'm open toanything. So let's think about
for a moment what this personwas trying to do, right? So
(05:39):
they're answering, they'regiving me really generic, really
plain answers to the question,what do you want to do? Where do
you want to work? Why are theydoing that? And think about that
for just a moment, and I think alot of us will get to the same
conclusion, and that conclusionis that they're really saying, I
don't want to count myself outof an opportunity, or if I'm too
specific about what I'm lookingfor, and this person doesn't
(06:01):
have an opportunity or isn'taware of a role in that space, I
might be costing myself anopportunity. So I'll give you an
example. Maybe I know of amanufacturing company that's
looking for, you know, an entrylevel supervisor position, and
the person that's sitting acrossthe table from me says, Well,
I'm really looking for a job inproduction planning in
manufacturing. Just to use thatas an example. Well, they're
(06:23):
worried that if they sayproduction planning, and I know
of a job that's, you know, anentry level supervisor position
that's open, that I'm not goingto put that opportunity in front
of them, because it isn't whatthey're looking for. I get that
right. I mean, we don't want tobe too specific when we're
looking for a role. We want tobe open to any opportunity. But
let me, let me explain and maybeprovide an example of the
(06:44):
challenge that we put in frontof somebody that's trying to
help us network for our nextrole. When we give them really
generic answers to theirquestions, I want everybody in
the audience. This will be alittle bit of an interactive
moment here on The TechEdPodcast. I want you to answer a
question. I'm thinking of acertain individual, and I want
you to tell me who that personis. And what I will tell you is
(07:05):
this individual, they work ineither the technical or the
technology space or the financespace, and they're running a
fortune 500 company. Who is it?
Think for a moment and tell mewho that is. And already you're
(07:25):
realizing that the ads of yougetting that right are really,
really slim, right? I mean,there are tons of people, CEOs
of technology or financecompanies in the Fortune 500 the
ads that you would guess theperson that I was thinking of
pretty slim. Let me ask you afew more questions. All right,
now I'm thinking about, I'll bemore specific, I'm thinking
about the founder and thechairman of a tech company. And
(07:49):
it's a tech company that you'reprobably familiar with, and
there's a really good chancethat maybe in the last week or
so you've engaged with thiscompany. You can go on your
phone, there's an app, and youcan shop for just about
anything, and you can order it,and it will show up on your
front doorstep the next coupleof days, or maybe a week later.
What company is that? And notjust what company? Who's the
(08:10):
person who is that founder orChairman that I'm thinking of?
And just about everybody knowsthat, of course, the company is
Amazon, and the person is thefounder and chairman, Jeff
Bezos, right? So now you had areally specific question, really
specific answer. Let me give youanother one. This person leads a
company in the aerospace market.
In the space market, they alsolead a major social media
(08:32):
platform that everybody hasheard of, and they also founded
and lead an electric vehiclecompany, right? Super, super
easy question. Everybody isthinking of Elon Musk and, of
course, the company SpaceX and xand Tesla that he leads. Really
easy question to answer. I'llgive you one more. I'm thinking
of a person who recentlyannounced their retirement.
(08:53):
They're deep, deep, deep intotheir career, one of the
wealthiest people on the planet.
They live in Omaha, Nebraska.
They've had a frugal lifestyletheir entire life, and they lead
a huge investment company, atleast until the end of the year,
when they're retiring. Okay,almost all of us know that that
person is Warren Buffett, supereasy, relatively easy, if you're
(09:15):
paying any attention to finance,to technology, to the news, to
people in the news, those areall pretty easy questions to
answer, right? Who doesn't knowJeff Bezos or Elon Musk, or, for
that matter, Warren Buffet?
Well, here's the reason I bringup this example. When you ask
specific questions like that,immediately your brain goes to
(09:35):
somebody. You've got somethingto lock onto. You're starting to
prime your brain to think aboutpossibilities. Even when I say
founder and chairman of a techcompany, you're starting to
narrow in on what I'm thinkingabout. That is the way the human
brain works. The moreinformation we give it, the more
specific of an answer we canprovide. That's not any advanced
neuroscience. It's pretty muchcommon sense. Well, let's go
(09:56):
back to that first question Iasked when I said, Hey, I'm
thinking about. A person wholeads a fortune 500 either tech
or finance company, that is thekind of challenge you are giving
to somebody who's helping youthrough your career transition.
When you say, I'll do anythingfor any company, really, I'm
open to any opportunity. Becausethe truth of the matter is,
(10:17):
there's almost no way to answerthat question. Your brain
doesn't lock onto anything. Youdon't think about any individual
company or any individual marketspace or so on, in terms of
where this individual thatyou're networking with, or in my
particular case, I'm sittingacross the table from a
candidate. There's no abilityfor me to be able to say, here
(10:38):
are some folks that I couldconnect you with. All right, so
you're trying to be amiable,you're trying to be open. You
don't want to box yourself outof a position. The irony here,
folks is that in doing that andgiving that really generic
answer to the question, you'reboxing yourself out of
opportunities because the personon the other side of the table,
this person that you have goneto because you want their help
(11:01):
in finding a job, has no ideawhere to send you, who to refer
you to, what direction that youcould go. It's really, really
hard to solve that problem forsomebody. Let's think for a
moment though about a better wayof doing this right, rather than
just going on this vaguedepiction of where you want to
go with your career and me assomeone who's trying to help you
(11:22):
grasping at thin air. Here'swhat I do now. And every time I
get one of these meetings, Iinvite the candidate, or I
invite the individual who'sreaching out to me and saying,
hey, I want to meet with you tonetwork for my next job
opportunity. I actually sendthem a magazine column that I
authored at the end of 2024 Ithink it was published in
December of 2020 December of2024 I think, as the audience
(11:44):
knows, every single month Iwrite content for Gardner
Business Media, it's publishedin several of their trade
magazines. And so I just wrote acolumn on this in December of
last year, and we'll link thatup in the show notes, by the
way. So if you want to checkthat magazine column out, we'll
link that up in the show notes.
You can read all about whatyou're hearing today on The
TechEd Podcast. So now let'stalk about a better way. Let's
(12:05):
take this new approach. Ratherthan politely closing the
meeting and wishing these peopleluck in terms of where they
should go or where they could gowith their career opportunities,
I invite them now, in advance ofthat meeting to be super, super
specific, the more specific theycan again, the irony of being
polite is that in saying thatyou're open to any opportunity,
(12:28):
hoping not to cost yourself anopportunity, is that you make it
impossible, or almostimpossible, for me to be able to
help you. And to think aboutthis another way. Who am I more
in a position to be able toassist. Is it someone who says
they want to put their skills towork for a great organization,
or someone that says, I'vealways worked dreamed of working
(12:48):
for a world class manufacturer,or I've always dreamt of been
being in the world of privateequity, or I want to work for an
investment bank, or I want towork for a media company, or I'd
love to take my career to anevents management company or to
a sports franchise. I mean,whatever it is that you're
dreaming of, doing whatever jobyou are seeking, whatever you
think your skills arespecifically and uniquely
(13:11):
appropriate for. That is therole that is the job that you
should be asking somebody tohelp you find so the first
lesson here is, let's be asspecific as possible. If they
say, Hey, I'm looking for a jobin manufacturing, my mind will
immediately go to manufacturingcompanies that I work with,
whether it's in I live inWisconsin, I can tell you I have
(13:33):
contacts at every majorWisconsin manufacturing company,
and in most cases I know, youknow, the CEO of that company of
all the largest manufacturingcompanies in the state of
Wisconsin, so I'm in a muchbetter position in that case, to
help this individual, if they'reasking for specific referrals to
specific companies or a specificmarketplace that they think that
(13:54):
they want to be in. If they say,I want to be in private equity
or I want to be in finance,guess what? I have tons of
friends serve on boards oforganizations that are in that
space. I can send them in thedirection that they want to go.
So the first thing is, thinkreally hard about what market
you want to be in. Do you wantto be in manufacturing? Do you
want to be in finance? Do youwant to be in nonprofits? I
(14:14):
mean, whatever that is, bespecific about where you want to
go with your career. The nextthing I ask people to do is be
really specific about the kindof position that you would see
yourself in, if it's a businessdevelopment role in a
manufacturing operation. Well,then say that if you want to
work in data science or dataanalytics in industrial company,
(14:35):
say that if you want to work asan analyst in finance or a
private equity organization,then say that the more specific
you can be, the more my brain isgoing to start thinking about
the answer to the Jeff Bezos,Elon Musk or Warren Buffett
question. I'm getting really,really specific. Now I know
(14:55):
where to send this person. Now Iknow how to help them. So the
final question that I askedthem, and this was actually a
lesson that I learned from agreat friend of mine, when he
was doing a job search. Thisgoes back about 10 years, and he
was so specific as to researchand make a list of the exact,
precise companies that he wouldlike to work for, or that he
(15:19):
would like to work in. So heliterally had a list of precise
businesses. There were like 25of them. He had done his
research. He knew the culture ofthe company, he knew the
products of the company, he knewthe operations of the company.
So he knew everything aboutthese businesses. And he had a
list of 25 and when he would sitdown in a networking meeting, he
would put that list in front ofthe individual with whom he was
(15:41):
meeting, and he would say, Doyou know anybody at these
companies? And he said, it wasabsolutely magic how, when he
started doing that, hisnetworking meeting, went from
people racking their brains tothink of anybody, to people
going through the list of 25companies and say, You know
what, in 20 of these 25companies, I really don't know
anybody. I can't help you, butin these five, in these five
(16:02):
companies that you haveidentified, I have contacts in
every single one of thosebusinesses, and I would be happy
to refer you to that individualor to somebody that I know
within that company. So really,really specific. So think about
what we've done. We're answeringthree questions before we even
go into our networking meeting,we're asking answering a
(16:22):
question about what market spacedo we want to be in? We're
asking a question about what isour dream job and where, what
would we really see ourselvesexcelling in? And we're saying,
This is a list of 25 companies,and maybe the list is 20, maybe
it's 40, but these are the kindsof companies that I would want
to work for or or work with. AndI will also tell you that those
companies will take a look atwhoever you're meeting with,
(16:45):
will take a look at your list ofcompanies. And even if they
don't know somebody in an exactcompany, they may say, Hey, I
don't know somebody at Siemens,but I know somebody at Rockwell
Automation, that's a reallysimilar company. Would you be
interested in a referral to thatcompany. So those are the three
questions that we want to answerwhen we are going into our job,
search, networking, meetings,what market do I want to work
(17:08):
in? What kind of a job would Ilike to have? What are some
specific companies? I would alsotell you that geographically,
it's helpful to have some havesome idea of where it is that
you want to live and work whenyou're done, are you specific to
a specific geographical area?
Maybe you've got some familyreasons or some other reasons
why it's unreasonable, or you'renot able to move to another
(17:30):
geographic location. You mightas well send that right. Say
that if you're somebody that,for whatever reason, is going to
continue your career in SouthernCalifornia, for example, it
doesn't do you any good to getto our referral to a company in
New York. You're not going andworking there anyway, so you
might as well be specific ifthere are some constraints
geographically around whereyou're where you want to go
work. Now, you could deliver allof this in a way that doesn't
(17:52):
sound like you're being toospecific or you're being too
difficult, or you're being toopicky. It's okay to say, I'm
open to a lot of opportunities,but these are the ones that I'm
thinking about. You could evenask the person that you're
networking with for a little bitof feedback on how they would
see you fitting in that marketspace, in that position, in that
particular company. Now I'llalso give one more piece of
(18:16):
advice on this whole topic, andthat is, it's okay to have
multiple answers to the samequestion. In other words, you
know, if you're going to meetwith a let's say that you're
somebody who's interested ineither working in finance and or
working in manufacturing, andyou haven't quite dialed that in
yet. Well, it's okay to have alist of companies and kind of a
little bit of a description foryourself that's specific to the
(18:37):
finance people, and then anotherone that's specific to the
manufacturing people. And then,as you're meeting with someone
who is more likely to havereferrals or to have a network
in manufacturing, then use themanufacturing list. If you're
more likely in a meeting to betalking to somebody who has more
contacts in finance or or whathave you, or in nonprofit or
retail or hospitality or defenseor energy, or whatever that
(18:59):
market space is. It's okay tohave a couple of these lists,
but be specific, that is wherepeople are most likely to be
able to help you. I'm also goingto tell you that this podcast
episode is one that I am nowgoing to send and will be
required listening for anybodythat reaches out to me and wants
to network about what their nextcareer opportunity is, take a
(19:22):
listen to this podcast andunderstand what it is that I'm
looking for and why it'simportant to be specific. I
would also encourage anybody whomaybe isn't a job seeker, but is
somebody who is getting the samekind of referral and networking
calls that I am to use the sameapproach. And what I've found
over the course of the last yearis inviting candidates to be way
more specific in advance of ourmeeting. They come to the
(19:44):
meetings way more prepared, andI'm in a much, much better
position to help them. I cantell you, as we close out this
episode of the podcast, there'salmost nothing more rewarding to
me than when I have anopportunity to sit down and
spend time with a person who's10. Taking that next step in
their career, and I make somereferrals for them, or I connect
them to some people, and one ofthose referrals or connections
(20:08):
leads to a career opportunity.
And I can tell you it happenstime and time and time again,
way more times than I couldcount, and it's certainly not
every time. And my hit rate isnowhere near 100% but I will
tell you that so many times overthe course of the last, let's
call it 10 or 15 years, I'veseen people land really, really
cool career opportunities. Andmy success rate, by the way, in
referring them to the rightopportunity for them. And as a
(20:29):
result of that, being moresuccessful in them landing the
kind of career that they'relooking for, my hit rate has
gone way up as well in terms ofbeing helpful to these
individuals. So the truth isthat people who are maybe a
little bit deeper in theircareer, I certainly would count
myself on that list, people whohave really broad networks. And
there are people with broadernetworks than the one that I've
(20:51):
got, but mine is by no meansnarrow. They are super, super
excited to help you, to behelpful, to point you in the
right direction, but we need tobe specific. So that was a
message that I thought was soimportant for people that are
trying to take that next step intheir career that we dedicated
IT, an entire episode of thepodcast to this specific topic.
If you want to read about it, aswe mentioned earlier, check out
(21:14):
the show notes. We'll link upthe specific article, the column
that I mentioned for GardnerBusiness Media not too long ago.
And with that, first of all, ifyou're somebody in my position
who is interested and beinghelpful with a job seeker and
pointing them in the rightdirection and giving them some
ideas, thank you so much forthat work. It's really, really
important work and and when youdo get that call, when you do
(21:36):
get that email, please respondto it, invite the person in. It
only takes a half an hour.
You're going to make a huge makea huge difference in a person's
life. And who among us didn'trise to whatever level of
success that we've achievedwithout a tremendous amount of
help from people that werewilling to take some time for us
earlier in our careers. So withthat, for our job seekers, and
(21:58):
this is the message I leave withall of the job seekers, all the
people that reach out to me,looking to network for new
positions. You are on a journey.
Every single thing that happensto you happens for a reason, and
that reason benefits you. Youare going to get rejection. You
are going to have people thatdon't call you back. You are
going to have people who youthink you're the perfect person
for a job, and they end upoffering it to somebody else,
(22:20):
you're gonna havedisappointment. You're gonna
have heartbreak. That is whatlife is all about. But the truth
of the matter is, stay after it,because I can tell you, every
single one of us have dealt witha little bit of those types of
obstacles in one job search oranother, and I can tell you
unequivocally that every time Ihad a setback when I was looking
to take a new step in my career.
(22:41):
I can look back on that and sayit absolutely happened for a
reason, and I ended up in abetter spot. So stay after it.
Keep reaching out, keep lookingfor the perfect opportunity. For
you, it is out there, and I wantyou to remember that as you
continue your job search. I wantyou to remember to tune into The
TechEd Podcast every singleweek. We'll be back next week,
of course, with anotherincredible guest, and really,
(23:04):
really excited for next week'sepisode. In the meantime, check
out the show notes. We have thebest show notes in the business.
You will find those at TechEdpodcast.com/and
listen to this. It's accelerate,right? Like accelerating your
career search. So it's TechEdpodcast.com/accelerate, A, C, C,
E, L, E, R, A, T, E, when you'redone there, of course, head on
(23:28):
over to social media. You'llfind us all over social media,
whether you are on Instagram,whether you're on Facebook,
whether you are on Tick, tock,LinkedIn, doesn't matter. You
will find us all over socialmedia and one parting comment,
don't forget to submit thosequestions. To ask us anything
that is at TechEdpodcast.com/ask, us anything
(23:49):
looking forward to the firstepisode of that Melissa and I
both are and that will be comingout here in the next quarter,
probably a little bit sooner,until next week. I'm Matt
Kirkner, happy job searching andhappy supporting all those folks
that are looking to take thatnext step in their career. I
will see you next week. You.
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