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Your First Big Job: How to Get It
Insights from Authentic Happiness on Careers
Everyone wants to find their dream job, but it might take you a few tries before you actually get it. A number of successful people in business, philanthropy, and the arts have told me they had to have a few different gigs before they landed their dream job.
So what is a “dream job”? Simply put, it is a job you love. And, as the saying goes, “Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life.” But even if you do not get it on the first try, you can still find a job you at least enjoy. The key is to match your character strengths (what makes you who you are) with the job you want.
Dr. Martin Seligman from the University of Pennsylvania emphasizes how important it is to identify your top character strengths. In his book Authentic Happiness, he states that if you find a career that utilizes your strengths, you will have higher job satisfaction.
Dr. Seligman has made it easy to figure out those strengths by providing the VIA Survey of Character Strengths. I strongly recommend you also take the Authentic Happiness Inventory and the Grit Survey. Click on the Questionnaire Item on the menu at the top of the page. Take the questionnaire titled, “VIA Survey of Character Strengths (Measures 24 Character Strengths).” This questionnaire takes about 50 minutes, so do not rush through it. You will be asked to create a username and password but do not worry about that. They will not contact you for any other purpose. The purpose is to identify you as a unique subject for their research. It also allows you to return to the site and take other questionnaires.
Once you find out your top character strengths, discuss them with your family, friends, and advisors. Ask them what they think of the findings (you will be surprised how much they agree with the results), and then ask them to help you think of careers that would utilize these strengths. For example, if you like science and you are good at working with others, you might be happy with a career in the medical field. Or if you prefer solitude and are interested in computers, you could look for a career in information technology instead.
If you do not figure out your top character strengths before you search for a career, you will have no real criteria for choosing the kind of job you want. When you chose your major, you already took some steps in defining your career interests. However, your major is not always a reliable indicator of where you will find job satisfaction. Several students change majors, and many graduates end up in fields unrelated to what they studied in college.
Wisdom from What Color Is Your Parachute?
Now that you know your top character strengths, it is time to start looking for a job. In What Color Is Your Parachute for Teens, Carol Christen lays out four basic steps to finding your dream job:
Conduct informational interviews.
Cultivate contacts and create networks.
Research organizations of interest.
Begin a campaign to get the job you want.
Conduct Informational Interviews
Informational interviews might be one of the most fun things you can do. Basically, you are having a conversation with someone in a career you are interested in. Since you are both interested in this line of work, you will have plenty to talk about. Ask how they chose their career. What skills are required to get a job in the field? What do they like and not like about it? What are the salary ranges? What are the challenges in this particular industry? Finally, can they introduce you to two or three other people in the field that you can talk to? Your job is to get them to talk and then to just listen.
You might not know anyone with your dream job, but it is easy to find someone in the field who will talk to you. Most people are willing to help a young person with career advice, just like someone helped them in their own careers. Search online for organizations in your field and reach out to the person that’s best to talk to. Or you might even know someone who knows someone who knows someone else.
Cultivate Contacts and Create Networks
People you interview become part of your network. Keep in touch and ask them to let you know when there are any openings in your field. Friends and family can also be a part of your network, and they might be willing to help you in your job search.
LinkedIn is another good tool to develop your network. Start an account while you are still in college and add students who will graduate before you. Also, almost all colleges have an alumni/ae network you can use to meet graduates in your field. Try visiting the alumni/ae office for advice on how to connect with them.
Most importantly, stay in touch with your contacts, not only during college, but after you get your first job. On average, employees only stay about three years at a job, so you will want to keep those contacts for your next search. In addition, you should pay it forward by helping other young job seekers. Keep in touch with your alumni/ae group for those kinds of opportunities.
Research Organizations of Interest
There are two times to research organizations in your field. The first is to find companies you would like to work for, and the second is when you have been invited for an interview. A simple Google search can help you find companies in your field, and online recruitment sites will give you a sense of how well a company treats its employees and potential salaries it might offer. Also, you can often find articles that list the top companies to work for in your city.
When you are researching a potential employer, you should try to find answers to these questions:
Is the company financially stable?
Does it treat its employees well?
Is the company ethical?
Does it have significant competition?
Do employees have well-defined career paths?
How are the employee benefits?
The Inverted Pyramid of Hiring
Eric Schlesinger, the former Senior Director of Human Resources at the World Bank (and my good friend) says that most new hires are found in a way that’s completely opposite of what most people would think. He calls it the “Inverted Pyramid of Hiring.”
Given this hiring structure, Schlesinger has this advice for job seekers:
80% of vacancies are not advertised, so the best way to find job openings and get an interview is to network. The best people to network with are the Four F’s: Friends, Family, Faculty, and Former employers.
Do not focus on job listings. You can apply to these, but they represent only 20% of current vacancies.
Once you get an interview, remember that the employer is not really interested in what they can do for you; rather, they want to know what you can do for them. You should be able to say, “I see you have a problem. I can solve it.”
While you are in college, get as many internships as you can. Career counselors say that 80% of internships lead to a full-time job offer.
Internships
If you have had retail or service jobs, it likely will not impress a potential employer nearly as much as an internship. Of course, a lot of students have to take part-time jobs, but you should first try to find a paid internship. A professional development or career center at your college can help you find internships and might offer stipends to help with unpaid opportunities.
Mount Holyoke College recently introduced a program to give students stipends so that they could take one or more internships (Townsley et al., 2017). They found that along with GPA, the graduates with more internships had higher odds of being employed six months after graduation. A recent Gallup-Purdue survey also found that employers valued work experience more than a student’s GPA when hiring.
Resumes
In What Color is Your Parachute, Carol Christen says, “Resumes are not a very effective job-search tool for adults. They are even less effective for younger workers. Usually younger workers lack experience in the jobs or fields in which they most want to work” (2015). Instead, she says it’s better for job seekers to create a website. My experience is that websites are the expected vehicle for people in creative fields, such as copywriters, cinematographers and artists, but companies will still want to see resumes. For graduating job-seekers, the classic “skills-focused” resume highlights your strengths and your work experience. Your school’s career center can help you refine your resume. Temple University’s Career Center has a number of sample resumes from students from a variety of majors.
Currently, there is debate about whether resumes should be one page or two pages long. The existing wisdom is that two pages is perfectly acceptable. However, Eric Schlesinger cites research that one-page resumes are read more often than two-page resumes, and conversely, two-page resumes are more often ignored. Whatever the length of your resume, it should be well designed and contain no errors or fabrications. Any errors will show sloppy (or unethical) character and get you rejected fast. Even if you do not get caught fabricating anything at first, you could be fired when it comes to light.
The purpose of the resume is not to sell yourself but to get an interview. You want to make a good impression; eight seconds is the average time an employer spends initially looking at your resume. After that, each resume goes into one of two piles: “Fuggetaboutit” and “Maybe.”
You might feel angry it only takes eight seconds to be rejected or accepted, but there are a lot of candidates out there similar to you. As much as your parents and teachers praised your “uniqueness,” others out there are just as “unique” as you. In order to make your resume stand out, you should think of the qualities that make you a better candidate than other applicants.
Most candidates have multiple resumes to emphasize different skills they have. For example, let’s say you are good at engineering and at making sales. You want to emphasize your strength in sales for a sales job and your engineering ability for an engineering job. In other words, your resume should be custom tailored to each job opening.
Cover Letters
Always send a cover letter. The letter should show you have knowledge of the organization and be addressed to the appropriate person. As with your resume, it should be one page and customized to emphasize your skills. Temple’s Career Services has some sample cover letters that you can check out.
The Job Interview
When you are invited to interview, the employer has decided you likely have the minimum skills required for the job, and now they want to find out more about you. Think about what they might want to know and what questions they could ask. You will need to come up with your elevator speech. Imagine you happen to get into an elevator with the CEO of a company you want to work for. You have about one minute to get them interested in you. Practice this elevator speech to prepare for your interview.
Your college’s career center likely gives practice interviews, and some even have alumni/ae conduct the interviews themselves. Make sure your answers are no less than 20 seconds (or you will appear to lack communication skills) and no longer than 2 minutes (or you will appear too self-involved). Talk half the time and listen for the other half. Ask for more details about the job and company.
Remember: the employer is not interested in what they can do for you; they want to know what you can do for them. As I said before, this is when you should do some research into the company. Find out what they are trying to accomplish and what challenges they face. It could be that they want to make more sales, or it could be that they lack organization. Whatever the case may be, you can use your research in the interview. Show a detailed understanding of the company and let them know how your skills fit their needs. Essentially, to manage a company is to confront a series of problems every day. If you show your potential employer you can help solve their problems, you will be golden.
Job interviews are for both you and the employer to see if you are a good fit with the organization. However, the probability of each of you figuring this out in one or two interviews is very low. There are even researchers who say that face-to-face job interviews are useless in gaining any information that will tell the potential employer whether you will be a good employee or not. That is why you need to do a lot of research about the organization (and possibly even about the person who will be interviewing you) ahead of time.
Show Them You Will Be an Engaged Employee
But that’s not all! Here’s the secret sauce that will almost certainly get you a job offer: signal that you will be an engaged employee. Every employer wants engaged employees, workers who are committed to the goals and values of the organization. The Gallup Organization has built a large consulting practice around measuring employee engagement. In a 2015 telephone survey of 80,000 workers who worked for American organizations,Gallup found that:
The percentage of U.S. workers in 2015 who Gallup considered “engaged” in their jobs averaged 32%.
The majority (50.8%) of employees were “not engaged.”
Another 17.2% were “actively disengaged.”
The 2015 averages are largely on par with the 2014 averages and reflect little improvement in employee engagement over the past year.
The percentage of engaged employees has been essentially flat since Gallup began taking the survey in the year 2000.
The biennial Gallup Employee Engagement Survey in 2017 showed the number of engaged employees essentially constant at 33% vs. 32% in the 2015 survey. What employer would want to hire another “not engaged employee?” Yet American organizations are stuck with the vast majority of their workers being “not-engaged” or “actively disengaged.”
Do your research and show the potential employer that you are familiar with the company’s values. Almost every organization has a mission statement and code of ethics on their website. Prepare a short (but sincere sounding) speech that shows you understand and identify with the company’s goals and values.
Recent evidence shows that signaling you will be a committed employee will give you a good chance of getting hired over a somewhat more qualified competitor for job. In a recent article in The Wall Street Journal, “Afraid You’re ‘Too’ Qualified for a Job? Here’s What You Can Do”, Heidi Mitchell (2019) reports on the work of Oliver Hahl, assistant professor of organizational theory and strategy at the Tepper School of Business at Carnegie Mellon University. In Hahl’s study, hiring managers were given the resumes of both highly qualified and just sufficiently qualified candidates. They were told that the candidates’ commitment level to the organization had been assessed and they were determined to be either “neutral” or “committed.”
In the case of two “neutral” candidates, where there was no mention of loyalty to the company, the less qualified candidate was more likely to be hired. When asked for a justification, Hahl reports that hiring managers stated their belief that the more qualified “neutral” candidate might not stay and would be difficult to manage. Among candidates who were deemed to be “committed,” the highly qualified applicants were more likely to be hired. However, if hiring managers were provided with a “neutral” candidate and a “committed” candidate, the “committed” employee had a more than 50% chance of being hired over a more qualified candidate. And when given two equally qualified candidates, the “committed” one is more likely to be hired. Hahl concludes, “Managers are concerned with selecting not just the highest-ability candidate but the one who is both capable and committed.”(Mitchell, 2019).
Always Send a Thank-You Note
Job hunters send out lots of resumes but often receive no response, which is rude on the part of employers . You, the applicant, should respond to each rejection letter or email and ask if the employer knows of any other job openings or employers that could use your talents.
Also, after every interview, always send a thank-you note. For job seekers, it is not just common courtesy but an important competitive advantage. It will help you stand out, and it gives you the opportunity to emphasize two or three things you want them to remember about you. At the same time, if you misstated something or did not represent yourself well, the thank you note gives you a chance to clear things up. Even if it is obvious from the interview you are not going to be hired, you can use the note to ask if they can let you know any other organizations that could use your skills. I guarantee your courtesy will be rewarded.
Do Not Take the First Offer (Maybe)
Do not ask about salary too early in the interview, as that can make you seem only interested in yourself. However, it is perfectly fine to ask for information about benefits, though you’d be better off waiting until you are near the end of the interview. Read the interviewer and decide for yourself if it seems like you are a good fit for the job. Obviously, if it is clear you and the organization are not a match, asking about benefits is a waste of time for both of you. When you do feel like there is potential, though, asking about benefits is an easy way to lead into asking about salary without appearing greedy.
Benefits vary widely from company to company and should be considered when making a decision about a job offer. Base your choice on the total compensation package you are offered, not just the base salary. For example, in 2019, the average annual health insurance premiums for an individual were about $8,000 and about $20,000 for a family of four. Most companies ask employees to pay 25-50% of the premium as a co-pay. A co-pay reduces your salary dollar for dollar.
You should also factor retirement benefits into your decision about a position. Most organizations offer a 401(k) Retirement Plan. Under a 401(K), employees authorize a payroll deduction (typically 3-5% gross salary) and the employer matches some or all of that amount. A 401(k) is valuable as those deductions are tax deferred; you pay no taxes on your contributions or investment gains until retirement. Besides retirement and health, benefits like vacation, childcare, and tuition are also important parts of your compensation.
If you do feel like it is okay to ask about salary, do so gently. Try saying something like, “Can you give me a sense of the salary range for this position?” As with everything else, you should research the salary ahead of time. Websites like Glassdoor can give you some sense of a company’s salaries, and many industry associations take annual salary surveys you can find online. Getting the employer to quote the salary first lets you make a counteroffer, one that’s based off your research. Emphasize that you want to work there but need a more competitive salary.
When thinking about your salary, you should also take the cost of living into account. Living in San Francisco or Manhattan can cost twice as much as living in Kansas City. There are many websites (like this one) that can help you compare the cost of living in various parts of the United States.
I say maybe you should not take the first offer from a company because it often depends on the size of the company you are negotiating with. A medium or large company (over 50 employees) will have established a competitive salary range. Your offer should be in that range. If you do some research and find that the offer is competitive, you might want to accept it without trying to negotiate. However, do not forget: benefits are extremely important to the total compensation package, and you should try to negotiate these if they are not in line with similar positions.
If you receive an offer from an organization of under 50 employees, the company might try to offer the lowest salary possible in order to keep their costs down. If that happens, you should point out that their offer is not competitive and try to negotiate a better total compensation package. Since the company has decided they want you, they should be willing to increase the offer. If, on the other hand, they are not willing to increase their offer, this will show you what type of managers they are.
How to Ask for More Money
Negotiating a salary is different than negotiating a one-time transaction. When you buy a car or a house, you will likely never see the person again. The seller’s incentive is to get as high a price as possible, while the buyer wants to pay as little as possible. If you pay too much, well, you can get angry, but that is the end of the transaction. However, once you are employed, you are expected to work for the good of the organization.
In any case, if you are ever in doubt, ask for help! A career counselor will have access to all kinds of job resources, and your family and friends might have some wisdom to offer you. I also recommend reading What Color Is Your Parachute? by Richard Bolles, for some helpful rules for salary negotiations.
Drug Tests
Generally, companies have zero tolerance for drug use. In certain fields, you will almost always be required to take a drug test as a condition of employment. These include jobs in public safety, childcare, the federal government, and medicine.
The Last (and Definitive) Word on Job Searches
Searching for a job is more art than science. I have already said that networking is the best method to find job openings and hopefully get an interview. However, the most successful job hunters are those who have the same conviction of Winston Churchill:
“This is the lesson: never give in, never give in, never, never, never, never – in nothing , great or small, large or petty – never give in except to convictions of honour or good sense.”