In this episode of Executive Connect, Melissa Aarskaug sits down with Dr. Jeremy Gartner, founder of Career Propulsion, to talk about how senior leaders actually land director, VP, and C-suite roles. Jeremy explains why most executive jobs are filled before they are ever posted, why resumes matter far less than people think, and how story, positioning, and direct outreach create real momentum. He also shares the Fast Track Framework, the difference between applying like an employee and searching like a business owner, and why networking with decision-makers changes everything.

If your search has felt slow, crowded, or invisible, this episode will change how you think about your next move.

Chapters:
00:01 Why resumes do not win jobs
00:46 Why the best roles stay hidden
02:11 What the hidden job market means
04:05 When executive hiring really begins
06:09 Why online applications break down
12:30 The fast track framework explained
19:45 Why narrative beats the resume
21:22 From engineer to career strategist
27:56 Using systems thinking in job search
32:36 How executives truly stand out
36:58 What to do before searching
39:52 The one networking lesson that matters

Jeremy

(0:00) You don’t need a resume to get a job. (0:03) For me, if you get to the interview because of your resume, you approached it wrong from the get-go. (0:09) You will need the resume at the very end for the HR people to keep them happy, so that they get something to file saying, yeah, that’s the resume of that new employee.

(0:17) But really, for me, the resume, it’s no more than a canvas for the talking points you are going to have. (0:22) So resume worth very little to get a new job. (0:26) The story, the narrative is everything.

(0:29) So for example, the way we are doing that is not by creating lots of bullet points, but it is by creating really three to four mini case studies under each one of the jobs that you had. (0:41) So it’s not just a bullet point about, oh, I was there and I did that. (0:44) No, it’s richer than that.

Melissa

(0:46) Most professionals think the path to a new job starts with a job board, update the resume, submit an application, and then wait. (0:55) But what if the best opportunities never get posted at all? (0:58) What if the roles that actually change your careers are filled quietly through relationships, reputation, and direct access to decision makers?

(1:10) Today’s guest has built a career helping executives navigate exactly that. (1:16) Dr. Jeremy Gartner is a founder of Career Propulsion. (1:21) He’s an expert in what’s called the hidden job market.

(1:25) With a background that includes a Wharton MBA, a PhD in aerospace engineering, research at CERN, and innovation work at companies like Northrop Grumman and Becton Dixon, he’s now helping leaders land director, VP, and C-suite roles that most people never even see. (1:50) This episode is about how careers actually move at the highest level. (1:56) Welcome to Executive Connect, Dr. Jeremy.

Jeremy

(1:59) Thank you, Melissa.

Melissa

(2:02) You talk a lot about the hidden job market. (2:05) For people who aren’t familiar with this idea, what does that exactly mean?

Jeremy

(2:11) It means that more than 80% of the jobs at the executive level are never advertised. (2:19) Meaning that if you are not in the race, in the interviews, you are not on the radar of whoever is going to hire you, you cannot just rely on LinkedIn job boards to find your next job. (2:33) Meaning people have to know about you before they even have a need.

(2:39) And that’s how you are going to end up getting hired because really by the time you are going to see a job, let’s say at the VP level or above on LinkedIn, it’s going to be there because of complaint and treason. (2:52) It’s going to be way too late. (2:54) So that’s not a strategy you can really rely on to get your next job.

Melissa

(3:00) Yeah, it’s funny that you say that. (3:02) I hear a lot of people complain about the LinkedIn job boards, that there’s thousands of people, that they’re lost in kind of this AI resume world. (3:13) So roughly what percent of senior roles are filled the way that we’re talking in the job market?

Jeremy

(3:21) So the stats are talking about 80% and more. (3:27) Meaning that even if you end up getting lucky, getting a job because you did apply, it ends up just being lucky. (3:35) That’s not a strategy to build your career.

(3:38) You end up just taking whatever opportunity comes your way. (3:42) You are not going to have the luxury of choosing where to go next. (3:47) So those are very, very high numbers.

Melissa

(3:50) Ready to lead smarter and invest wiser? (3:54) On the Executive Connect podcast, we unpack executive strategies for wealth and influence. (4:01) Hit the subscribe button now.

(4:03) Don’t just watch, act. (4:05) Now, how early are these roles typically decided? (4:09) So if a company is going to fill a VP role, when are they starting to decide that?

Jeremy

(4:18) Well, you got two different ways here, two different ways to go about it. (4:23) On one side, you can get the job being created for you, right? (4:28) But really the job search is going to start from the moment that the hiring manager is going to identify they have a need and they need someone to solve for that need.

(4:41) Only then, by the time they realize the pain is big enough, they are going to start speaking with their own managers about getting a budget for the job. (4:51) And then they will go to the HR people. (4:55) By the time they go to the HR people, typically they already know who they want.

(5:01) Because one of the key metrics for HR is how long it’s going to take to fill up that position. (5:08) Meaning that the hiring manager is going to make sure that they have their own people in the race before it’s even advertised anywhere. (5:17) So it’s really starting behind the scenes when the hiring manager just gets that awareness.

(5:25) They have a problem to solve and they might need someone to hire to solve for that problem. (5:31) And then they’re going to start speaking with their own network before any job description is going to be even advertised anywhere.

Melissa

(5:40) Yeah, I’ve heard a lot of complaints lately from senior leaders, C-suite, VP leaders, that the jobs they’re applying for, either to your point on LinkedIn or job boards, are not working for them and they’re not finding roles. (5:54) So many professionals in this space are spending hours and hours applying online and they’re not hearing anything back for the time they’re investing. (6:04) So why does that approach break down for the senior levels?

Jeremy

(6:09) Because the job search, the way it was designed, because of the internet, it was never designed in a way so that people could send just lots and lots of applications. (6:24) Think about it that way. (6:25) 20 years ago, 30 years ago, in order to find a job, you were going to the newspaper, you were looking at the ads, you were sending your resume by mail, not to an email, by mail, and that’s how it was kind of screened.

(6:42) Now with the internet, the system evolved to a place when there is a need, you are going to post your job on a website and millions of people are going to see that job and all it takes to apply to it is a few clicks. (6:59) So you are going to get flooded with thousands and thousands of applications. (7:05) So we are like, I’m leading your propaganda, CPA.

(7:10) We are relatively speaking a small company, about 20 people overall. (7:16) And when we did hire for new coaches, I did have within 24 hours, almost 1000 applicants. (7:27) And I’m not a big Google, I’m not a big Meta, I’m not one of those huge companies that I’m on the radar of everyone.

(7:35) I’m a small company of 20 people. (7:38) So if that’s the game you really want to play, you cannot win at it, there are too many applicants. (7:47) The competition is really, really, really too big.

(7:50) And that’s not, again, a strategy to get to your next opportunity.

Melissa

(7:55) Yeah, so tell me what happens kind of back to this LinkedIn thread. (7:59) What actually happens if you’re a VP or a C-suite person and you submit your resume online? (8:06) Like what is the workflow for that?

Jeremy

(8:09) So let’s pretend you submit your resume online and you get invited for an interview, okay? (8:15) The way it’s working, you are going to submit your resume online. (8:20) LinkedIn recruiter, by the way, I have a LinkedIn recruiter account.

(8:24) It’s a really bad, like don’t say that, but it’s a really bad platform. (8:29) I am using it to hire people and it’s really counterintuitive. (8:33) You don’t get the right people.

(8:35) They’re trying to integrate AI. (8:38) It’s not good to really get people. (8:41) But you are going to submit your resume.

(8:43) What’s going to happen is the ATS system, so the Applicant Tracking System, is going to compare the keywords of your resume to the keywords of the job description. (8:55) Now, don’t forget that the job description is typically created by an HR person with no understanding about the field. (9:03) And at a point in time when there is a very specific need, which is going to evolve, that software is going to screen all of the resumes and kind of filter them and say, okay, that’s resume number one, resume number two, resume number three.

(9:19) So the HR person is going to take those thousands of resumes and go to the top 10, let’s say. (9:25) Because the guy, the person just did a really good job at connecting all of the right keywords to the job description. (9:33) Then the HR person is just going to review the job without being capable, the resume, without really being capable to identify whether the person has the right context for the job or not.

(9:45) They’re not experts. (9:47) Let’s pretend you are going to apply for a VP of product role. (9:50) That’s not the expertise of the HR person.

(9:53) And then the HR person is going basically to send those resumes to the hiring manager. (10:00) In the meantime, the hiring manager is already going to bring their own candidates. (10:06) The people that they know, the people that they got a referral from because of a friend or cousin or colleague or something.

(10:14) So even if you are able to make it through the race, because you are really good at tailoring your resume, you are going to lose on trust because there are going to be many more applicants already with a headstart in the game because they were able to accumulate points on that trust scale because they just know someone who knows the hiring manager. (10:36) In the end of the day, it’s people that hire people. (10:39) It’s about emotions, it’s about connections, it’s not about a resume.

(10:44) So yeah, you can apply, but the chance that you’re going to be lucky is very, very low. (10:51) Let’s put it that way.

Melissa

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(11:13) And as a listener of the Executive Connect podcast, you can get it completely free. (11:19) Just visit moneyripples.com forward slash secrets and enter the promo code E-X-E-C. (11:29) Yeah, I had this discussion with somebody recently who they had applied for 2,000 jobs.

(11:39) I think they were director, manager, director role. (11:43) 2,000 jobs on LinkedIn. (11:48) And of those 2,000 jobs, they had five callbacks and several, so they had taken a job.

(11:55) So fast forward six months, they took a job of those five interviews. (12:00) And a year later, they were getting callbacks from what they applied for a year previous. (12:08) So not only did they not get callbacks or emails, some of them reached out a year later to do an interview.

(12:17) So you actually developed something called the Fast Track Framework. (12:22) And that sounds great at this point. (12:24) So what does that process look like for executives targeting their next role?

Jeremy

(12:30) So it all starts by making a choice to live your life what we call internally the CP way. (12:38) CP, the carrier propulsion way. (12:40) Meaning, yes, you are going to be proactive about your life and you are going to take control of it and you are going to design the job that you want.

(12:48) So we live from the get-go that reactive state of just relying on luck to just get a job. (12:56) We can do better than that, right? (12:59) But for that, we need to really understand that you are not applying for a job.

(13:06) You are looking for a client. (13:09) So if we were to reframe that a little bit, if you are the VP level, let’s pretend you are making 300K. (13:16) It means that basically you have your own services, your own business.

(13:24) In your case, that would be Melissa LLC. (13:27) Okay, Executive Connect LLC. (13:29) And you want a new job, meaning that you want to find a new client that is going to pay you that same amount.

(13:39) Just that you have a business model, which is to give exclusivity to that client. (13:44) So in other words, we are living that framework of being employees and we become business owners. (13:54) The fact that you have a W-2, that you have only one person that you are going to report to, that’s secondary.

(14:00) That’s the business model. (14:02) Now, how can we find, from the moment that you leave that, that you leave that identity, everything becomes easier. (14:09) Because with the identity of an employee, you are going to focus on the resume, on the job boards, on your network, all of those things, you cannot really rely on them to get your next opportunity or to get interviews where you want.

(14:24) But as a business owner, you can start focusing on your positioning. (14:29) So it’s not about the resume anymore. (14:31) It’s about the story you are going to share with people.

(14:36) People buy stories. (14:38) They don’t buy flyers, the resume, right? (14:41) So it starts with the story.

(14:43) It has to be a really good story so that when you are going to share it with people, they will be excited and they will say, oh, I do want to make this on my team. (14:51) She’s so unique. (14:52) She’s so awesome.

(14:54) If I don’t get her, no one else is going to look like that. (14:57) I won’t be able to solve the same type of problems with no one else. (15:02) So the story is really at the core and center of everything.

(15:07) Then we want to launch your own services, which are existing services, into new markets. (15:15) So for that, we are going to create a strategy, which is very similar to a traditional go-to-market strategy if you were to launch an existing product into new markets. (15:26) We are going to look at that like an investment portfolio and say, let’s pretend I want to go into big tech.

(15:35) Let’s pretend I want to go to a tiny startup. (15:38) Let’s pretend I want to go to that space and to that space and to that space. (15:42) We don’t know yet where you are going to land.

(15:46) All we can make is assumptions to assess the cost of entry into those new markets. (15:53) Because once you have your story and your strategy in place, we can leverage automation on LinkedIn so that you are going to be in front of all of the right industry leaders that are qualified to create a job for you. (16:12) And you are going to end up getting about 10 to 20 coffee chats every single week with them.

(16:19) Just by using automation, the right story, the right approach, the approach is not about, do you have a job? (16:27) The approach is not me, me, me. (16:29) The approach is you are trying to build a relationship with them.

(16:33) And if you show them that you are qualified, that you make it about them, that you are likable, that’s all it takes for them to invite you to opportunities that are not advertised. (16:46) So you take all of those coffee chats, you take all of the data, you put it back into the go-to-market strategy. (16:54) And then you can start accelerating the results.

(16:57) But really, it takes about two months, three months to start getting a pipeline of interviews consistently. (17:04) It’s just about being very systematic about how you are going to build your own business. (17:09) To attract clients that you want to work with.

Melissa

(17:13) So what I’m hearing, you’re doing more of a strategic outreach and it looks like, you know, finding and identifying the industry you want to work in, what you want to do, and then targeting the people that are in those specific roles and having coffee chats and strategically building a relationship. (17:33) So when and if something comes up, they’re thinking of you.

Jeremy

(17:38) Either they’re thinking of you or they’re going to create something for you. (17:45) For example, I am working with someone, he was a CFO and then he was a principal at AWS and he was just let go with the wave of restructuring that they have right now at all of those big tech companies. (18:02) We created a new story that was based around his leadership attributes.

(18:09) Who he is as a person, not what you achieved, but who you are as a person. (18:15) That’s what people want to know when they’re going to screen you and to speak with you. (18:19) We created the go-to-market strategy.

(18:21) He ended up speaking with CEOs of multiple companies and a company, a French company, Bonduelle, it’s a company that is making food. (18:32) They are now getting into the American market and he spoke with the CEO. (18:40) He explained about his vision, about the strategy and implementation and finance and everything else and ended up creating a job at the SVP level for him.

(18:53) That’s what we call a higher opportunity. (18:56) The job did not exist, but the match was so amazing that they said, we do have to get that guy on the team. (19:04) But for that, you need really to get all of the pieces correctly and that’s how you start attracting this type of opportunities.

Melissa

(19:12) Now, how important is the narrative versus the resume? (19:16) I’ve been hiring people for over 20 years and I’ve never really hired off the resume. (19:22) The resume gets you the interview, but really understanding the person and the narrative gets you the job.

(19:29) I see a lot of people putting so much effort into these resumes where every single white space on the eight and a half by 11 piece of paper is filled. (19:41) Talk to me a little bit about the narrative versus the resume.

Jeremy

(19:45) You don’t need a resume to get a job. (19:49) For me, if you get to the interview because of your resume, you approached it wrong from the get-go. (19:57) You will need the resume at the very end for the HR people to keep them happy so that they get something to file saying, yeah, that’s the resume of that new employee.

(20:07) But really for me, the resume is no more than a canvas for the talking points you are going to have. (20:14) So resume worth very little to get a new job. (20:18) The story, the narrative is everything.

(20:22) So for example, the way we are doing that is not by creating lots of bullet points, but it is by creating really three to four mini case studies under each one of the jobs that you had. (20:36) So it’s not just a bullet point about, oh, I was there and I did that. (20:40) No, it’s richer than that.

(20:42) There is a narrative. (20:44) You are showing the first degree impact, second degree impact, third degree impact, the type of legacy you are creating. (20:51) It’s much richer than that.

(20:53) And all of that in three to four lines. (20:56) It’s very short. (20:57) So resume doesn’t worth much, but narrative hits everything.

(21:03) 100%.

Melissa

(21:04) I 100% agree with you. (21:06) Okay. (21:06) So on that thread, I love, love, love your background.

(21:10) I have a similar kind of career shift with you. (21:16) So I want to dive a little bit into your background, which is also incredibly technical. (21:22) Aerospace engineering, CERN, innovation roles.

(21:28) How did you evolve into executive career strategy?

Jeremy

(21:35) That’s the $1 million question that everyone keeps asking. (21:40) My gift in this world is to be able to get any opportunity that I want, even though I might be the worst candidate on paper. (21:56) That’s how I ended up doing particle physics at CERN in Switzerland.

(22:01) That’s how I ended up doing aerospace engineering, developing a new, really, generation of airplanes for Northrop Grumman. (22:10) That’s how I worked in the medical device space. (22:12) We ended up getting lots and lots of patents and did lots of stuff.

(22:18) But that’s my journey in knowing. (22:20) I do understand very intuitively that to get somewhere, it’s about connecting with the right people, identifying what they need and crafting a story that is very authentic to you, but in a way that is going to resonate with them. (22:37) So I started in COVID.

(22:39) It was in 2020, six years ago now. (22:43) So it was the beginning of COVID. (22:46) Everyone started losing their jobs, left and right.

(22:50) No one could go to the office. (22:51) I had then a full-time job. (22:55) And I was, let’s just start running some experiments.

(22:59) I was, one of those experiments was just crafting a short post on LinkedIn saying, whoever lost their job because of COVID, I will help them with a resume for five dollars. (23:12) And right away, I got seven people. (23:15) And I was, huh, interesting.

(23:18) So first of all, I got those five dollars, some seven, so 35 bucks that I donated back because it was not about the money. (23:26) But what I realized was the magnitude of the gap between what those executives that came to me believed it takes to get a job. (23:37) So they came for a resume with what I know it takes to get anywhere.

(23:43) So they came for a resume. (23:45) They left with a story, with a strategy, with a clear plan of action on how to approach that. (23:52) And that was kind of the beginning of everything.

(23:56) I fell in love with that process of just helping them and hearing their stories. (24:01) It was fascinating. (24:03) And since then, it became really seen in the past six years, I would say my lifelong mission now.

(24:09) How can I help more people learning about the CP way? (24:15) Learning that there is a way to take control of your professional life, to go where you want to go, because it’s your decision and not just drifting because you have no clue about how to approach that.

Melissa

(24:28) Yeah, and I love that. (24:29) So much similarities in my career. (24:32) I think that several jobs I had, I don’t think I’ve had a job, actually, maybe one that I was qualified for, like my whole life from my first job to my job now, I would say is the first job I’ve ever taken I had a lot of the qualifications.

(24:51) I think historically, every job I’ve had, I had no experience. (24:56) I had one job that the only thing on the job description that I qualified for was I had a degree and actually maybe two and I was able to travel. (25:06) And so I love kind of everything you said, because I think right now in the world, everybody’s saying, I can’t apply for this job.

(25:16) I don’t have all these credentials. (25:17) I’m not 80%. (25:17) Of the job description.

(25:20) And so I want to chat a little bit about, you know, what did engineering teach you about systems thinking that you’re now applying to kind of where you are, you know, helping people in this capacity.

Jeremy

(25:37) Engineering is teaching you how to solve problems. (25:41) Doesn’t matter what type of problems it’s teaching you how to solve problems. (25:47) Now my Wharton MBA taught me the same thing, but with a very different frame.

(25:55) It’s teaching you, my Wharton MBA, how to solve problems, but with the business, with business skills. (26:01) So when you combine the two of them, you kind of realize, OK, we are going to run a business, but everything is going to be data driven. (26:12) We are going to create a structure, a process, very engineering, right?

(26:18) We are going to create a process that anyone can replicate. (26:22) Now it’s going to be flexible enough that process so that, because at the executive level, you don’t have two people that come with the same background. (26:32) So there is a framework, but there is no cookie cutter solution for everyone.

(26:37) That’s why we have coaching. (26:39) That’s why there are lots of other, like really in the human, aspect into that solution. (26:47) But then it’s really the data aspect of, OK, I spoke with X number of people.

(26:54) If someone is telling me, yeah, but if I’m going to send a message to someone on LinkedIn to ask to speak with them, no one will want to speak with me because I don’t want to speak with them. (27:03) Like when I get messages like that, that’s not the question. (27:06) The question is not about is he going to agree to speak with me or not?

(27:11) The question is if I were to send 100 messages like that, what percentage of people would agree to speak with me? (27:19) And now you get data and now you can start working based on that data and the conversion rates, you can work on them, you can optimize, you can increase, and then you can create a feedback loop. (27:31) So it’s really a control machine in a sense where you got input, you got output, you got a feedback loop, and it’s a machine that gets better with every new iteration.

Melissa

(27:46) Yeah, and I think there’s so much truth to that. (27:48) I think being able to solve problems is one of the number one things I appreciated about studying engineering. (27:56) And today, solving problems, being comfortable with change and innovation is kind of the constant.

(28:03) There’s so many problems that are popping up in management roles or leadership roles and the VP and the C-suite. (28:09) And so being able to solve kind of problems, being comfortable with change, time really feels like it’s compressing a lot in our world. (28:18) There’s a lot of things we can’t control politically.

(28:21) And so what lessons from your earlier days and your career still apply to you today?

Jeremy

(28:33) The game is about people. (28:36) Whether I scale the company, whether I help them solving, finding a job, whether it doesn’t matter in the end of the day, you got the formal processes and you got the people. (28:51) Meaning that when you are going to start looking for a new job, you need to understand that we disconnect for a second from the formal process and it’s about building relationships with people.

(29:05) And the way to do that is by understanding that it’s not about being manipulative. (29:11) It’s not about kind of doing things the wrong way. (29:14) It’s about finding a genuine way to connect to people.

(29:19) And it’s a skill that can be learned like anything else. (29:25) And when I speak with potential clients, for example, it is still for me the same thing. (29:31) It’s okay, they have a problem to solve, but they come to me telling me that they need a job.

(29:38) They explain that they want that big promotion and they don’t succeed to get it. (29:43) But is that, if I were to solve a people problem, is that the real problem? (29:50) Where does that impact them?

(29:55) How is that going to change their life if they were to get that job? (29:59) Is that what they really want? (30:01) And only once you start entering that frame, they start believing that you really have their interest at heart.

(30:10) Because it’s not anymore about the surface level problem. (30:13) And when you go through that process with them, they learn to do the same with the new people they are going to speak with when they’re going to look for a job. (30:25) So that’s what I took away with Meets about, okay, that’s what worked for me at the individual level.

(30:32) Now I can amplify that by teaching that to multiple people. (30:38) And those multiple people are going to implement that the same way to their own network as well. (30:46) So that’s why, again, I’m going back all the time to the CP way.

(30:51) Branding was a very big part during my MBA studies, right? (30:55) It’s about, okay, get to that thing, like the Nike that just do it. (31:00) Here, it’s very similar.

(31:02) It is the CP way. (31:05) It’s just about understanding I can take control of my life. (31:09) I can go wherever I want.

(31:11) Every interaction is data. (31:14) It’s just about integrating that feedback into my strategy so that I can keep moving forward instead of just waiting for perfection or for the right day or for awaiting that all of the stars are going to be aligned for me to start making some move. (31:33) No, we are where we are.

(31:36) We take the first step. (31:37) Then the second one. (31:39) And then everything is going to start coming together.

Melissa

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(32:14) That means you can roll gains from real estate into energy while deferring capital gains. (32:21) To learn more and get a free white paper, oil and gas demystified, just visit www.summitven.com forward slash executive connect. (32:36) Yeah, and I think that’s the key.

(32:39) It’s just, you know, getting to a place in the interview process or the job search process where you’re the obvious choice versus another candidate, because there may be several candidates that are that are up for choice. (32:55) And so how does how does someone differentiate themselves at the executive level? (33:03) How can they best stand out if there’s, you know, a few candidates for the VP role or the EVP role?

(33:10) What can they do to differentiate themselves?

Jeremy

(33:14) You need a very strong story. (33:17) You need two things. (33:18) Number one, having a really good story.

(33:21) The story itself is going to differentiate you from everyone else. (33:26) Because they’re going to realize everyone is going to apply saying that they laid the business, they had P&L ownership, leading, generating 100 million dollars. (33:36) OK, let’s say you are going to apply for a CMO role, CRO role, doesn’t matter what it is.

(33:42) Everyone is going to come with a very similar background on the features level. (33:47) What’s going to differentiate you though is the how did you do that? (33:52) What type of leader are you?

(33:56) How did you impact the culture at your previous company? (34:01) So that would be number one, having a very strong story. (34:05) Number two, when you are going to interview with them, don’t approach them attached to the outcome like I need the job.

(34:13) No, you know how to generate a pipeline of interviews. (34:19) And because of that, when you are going to speak with them, you are going to do so much work to just evaluate them, making sure they’re going to be the right clients for you. (34:29) So that if you will join that company, it will be with the fullest integrity possible.

(34:35) You will know those are the right clients for you and you are the right person for them. (34:44) So again, it’s storytelling on one side, but remembering that we end up dealing with people. (34:52) So connecting with them when you are the one qualifying them as much as they are qualifying you.

Melissa

(34:58) I love that. (34:59) And so I think about reputation. (35:02) A lot of times is such a crucial, you know, piece in getting a job as along with credibility, right?

(35:11) So, you know, when you’re looking for these roles, you have to have the reputation. (35:16) You obviously have to have the credibility and the knowledge. (35:19) But how does that play into these jobs?

(35:23) And how would somebody build credibility quickly in this process?

Jeremy

(35:30) Building credibility takes five minutes. (35:36) It takes no more than five minutes. (35:38) If you have to go there and explain and over explain and ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta, you are never going to end up getting somewhere.

(35:47) You want to be credibility? (35:48) Just care about them, not make it about yourself. (35:52) It’s that simple.

(35:54) Just care about them, be curious about them. (35:57) The problems they’re trying to solve, they’re trying to hire for someone, it’s really about just make it about them. (36:04) You are not the center of the universe.

(36:06) They are trying to solve a problem themselves. (36:09) They’re speaking with you because that’s what they care about, it’s not you, it’s their problem. (36:14) So change the frame from you to them.

(36:19) And most of the time, that’s more than enough to build credibility.

Melissa

(36:24) Yeah, 100%, I agree with that. (36:26) Try to find similarities or a way to connect things you have in common. (36:31) Not just the jobs, of course, important, but having rapport and being good with that versus transactional in your answers when they’re interviewing is really key.

(36:40) I love that. (36:42) So I’m thinking about those executives right now that are thinking about their next move or not happy in their current role. (36:52) What should they do before they even start a search?

Jeremy

(36:58) Well, it is the CP way again. (37:03) Take action, call it day one of your new change. (37:08) Stop saying one day I’m going to change, one day I’m going to do something about it.

(37:12) No, call it day one. (37:13) Start your journey, start building your story. (37:17) Start identifying where you want to go.

(37:20) Start sending outreach messages to try to connect with people in order to speak with them about them because you are curious about them. (37:30) Collect all of that data and see what resonates and what doesn’t. (37:36) So we did streamline that process so that there is no, I believe, a faster way to go about it than by following the process that I created.

(37:47) But nonetheless, if you want to go on your own, just do it. (37:54) Again, the CP way, just do it. (37:57) It’s one and the same.

(37:58) It’s about take control, call it day one and start moving. (38:04) Don’t sit in your couch thinking that you are going to start seeing some type of results by just waiting, by just reflecting. (38:12) You are going to start seeing a change by taking action.

(38:16) Doesn’t matter what it is, you will be in a better place at the end of the day.

Melissa

(38:20) Yeah, I think that’s great. (38:23) And I think it’s so true, is really getting clear on what you actually want to. (38:29) And I think a lot of times when I see executives making transitions or during transitions, they’re really unclear.

(38:39) They’re like, I’m looking for a job in marketing. (38:42) And maybe that’s the role that they’re looking for, but they’re not really clear on what that job looks like, what the industry looks like, what their role looks like. (38:52) And so I always say, kind of prepare early for whatever you’re looking into and really doing some deep dive on what you want and understanding what your strengths are for that role that you’re looking for.

(39:10) So I’m curious, in kind of closing here, career growth at the highest level isn’t just about the qualifications, the visibility, the trust, and everything we talked about today. (39:23) It’s about positioning yourself in the right conversations with the right people. (39:30) And I know the work that you do is helping executives understand that hidden job market and how to get into it so they’re not chasing these opportunities.

(39:40) They’re actually interacting with them. (39:42) So if there’s one idea that you want leaders to take away from this conversation today, what is that?

Jeremy

(39:52) Networking is the key piece that you need to keep doing all the time. (40:00) You can never stop networking. (40:04) Now, networking does not mean speaking with HR people or with executive recruiters.

(40:10) It means speaking with people that are qualified to create a job for you. (40:16) And we automate all of that so that it becomes a very, very easy to network with the people that you want. (40:26) But that is really the number one thing that everyone has to keep doing all the time.

(40:33) And networking just means build relationships with the people that are going to be able to help you in the future.

Melissa

(40:41) Yeah, I love that. (40:43) It’s so true. (40:44) I forget who said this, but it’s always resonated with me, Young.

(40:49) Your net work equals your net worth. (40:53) And so I’ve kind of always kept that in my mind and networked regardless of if I was looking for a job or looking for a board seat or whatever I was doing, just building relationships with people that were in places I either wanted to be or they were a different way of looking at things. (41:12) So keeping a broad network around the world, different cultures, different backgrounds.

(41:18) And so I want to thank you so much for being here and sharing your knowledge and time with our listeners today. (41:25) If you enjoyed this episode of the Executive Connect podcast, make sure you follow and share it with someone navigating their next career move and connect with Dr. Jeremy. (41:36) For more conversations on leadership career strategy and building long-term opportunity, subscribe to YouTube and your favorite platform.

(41:45) That’s all for us today. (41:46) That’s the Executive Connect podcast.