[Part 4]: The 7 Deadly Philosophies in the Modern Job Market

[Adapted from the Free E-Book, "The 7 Deadly Philosophies in the Modern Job Market-2013]

Dedicated to all those who are passionate about living, loving, making a difference in their world in order to create generational legacies.

The Philosophy of CVs:

“Honestly, as an interviewer, I could not really care much about how straight you sit on the chair, or how firmly you shake my hand. These are secondary. I am more interested in what comes out of your mouth (make sure you mouth is not stinking though)”

This philosophy says that before you land a job, you must concentrate on making your CV stand out amongst the rest. Much as it is important to be presentable and make a good first impression with your CV, concentrating on CV preparation only is detrimental, especially in the current job market.

The existing standards of CV preparation sharply negate the great importance of Gifts, Talents, Abilities and Aspirations while at the same time including something next to useless: ‘Hobbies and Past times’.

This philosophy thoroughly prepares people for interviews and not to be problem solvers in life. It teaches how to firmly hand-shake the interviewer’s hand, smile, sit upright on a chair, borrow a suit and a tie, brush your shoes and so on.

Honestly, as an interviewer, I could not really care much about how straight you sit on the chair, or how firmly you shake my hand. These are secondary. I am more interested in what comes out of your mouth (make sure you mouth is not stinking though). As an interviewer, I am looking at how authentic you are as a human being, not what show can you put on at the interview.

This philosophy has cost people jobs in that they put on a mask. I have been there before. I studied all there is to study about how to prepare for an interview. At the moment, you can get so much advice from the internet about this topic that you will be left dazed. Some talk about tonal variations, looking at the interviewers straight in the eyes (good point), not crossing your legs, not leaning back…don’t do this and don’t do that and so on.

Concentrating on your gifts, talents and abilities is much more valuable than concentrating on passing an interview. Building these strengths in anyway while you are waiting for a chance to be employed is much more valuable in that you might end up being an employer later on.

Concentrating on your dreams, goals and visions is much more important than preparing a CV.

“If an employer sniffs out in an interview the notion that you are not a dreamer, you are not ambitious; you diminish to the level of a non entity in an interview. However, if a potential employer gets the idea that you are a visionary and that you are a dreamer, your pedigree increases above the rest of the interviewees”

[Part 3] The 7 Deadly Philosophies in the Modern Job Market

[Adapted from the Free E-Book, "The 7 Deadly Philosophies in the Modern Job Market-2013]

Dedicated to all those who are passionate about living, loving, making a difference in their world in order to create generational legacies.

The Philosophy of Entitlement:

“What happened intrigued me to say the least. Out of the 35 people only a handful were retained by my former client. Amongst these were the 2 who only had a High School Certificate”.

This philosophy says that you are only useful in life to the level of your education. If you have a Diploma, you can never be CEO. If you have a degree, a second degree and a Masters, then you must be CEO.

You therefore have two types of people looking for a job in the modern job market. There is this group who come to the interview despite their great potential and gifts, they look like they need a favor. Their self belief is down.

The other group goes about thinking that they must be given the job solely because they have come from the heights of academic qualification. Consequently, they overlook other aspects of qualification such as attitude, initiative, innovativeness and ‘team player’.

While working in Uganda, I interviewed over 300 people for 35 positions! That tells you the frustration that employers have in the modern job market. Employers have things that they want to do and are looking for the right people. Unfortunately, it is not easy to get them because of these philosophies.

I remember hiring two individuals who at best had High School certificates. One of them I came to learn later on, was affected by the war in Northern Uganda fueled by the Lord’s Resistance Army. Wycliff’s story of how he narrowly escaped death and travelled to Uganda’s capital city Kampala is for another day.

This man was such an ‘executioner’ so down to earth that you would not know the difference between him and a university graduate. I knew him through a neighbor who is now a full Diplomat heading an embassy in a country in Africa. That is what recommendations can do.

To further dispel the philosophy of Entitlement, let me tell you what happened to me and Wycliff. Unfortunately for me, the client for who I had employed the 35 people for a project had to pull out. 

They still needed people on the ground to continue executing the project. Much as I had to render the 35 ‘jobless’ because of this move by the client, there were still 35 vacancies to be filled.

What happened intrigued me to say the least. Out of the 35 people only a handful were retained by my former client. Amongst these were the 2 who only had a High School Certificate. Later on, these handful were done away with because of one thing or another, with only 2 being retained. Guess who those two were?

Wycliff went ahead to do such a great job that he was given a whole region to manage! None of his former colleagues who had degrees achieved this fete!

The philosophy further states that you are only useful in life in the area in which you studied. If you studied sales, then you must be a salesman. If you studied philosophy, then you must be a philosopher. If you studied engineering, then you must look for engineering jobs. 

This philosophy makes people to wait to be picked instead of doing what they can do with what they have.

“Do all the good you can, by all the means you can, in all the ways you can, in all the places you can, at all the times you can, to all the people you can, as long as you ever can” –John Wesley

The present job market does not entitle anybody on the basis of their papers. That used to be the norm some decades back, but not anymore. Employers are becoming increasingly aware of a crop of jobseekers who are creative, humble, possess a good attitude, and generally hungry to succeed. If you are looking for a job purely relying on the strength of your academic papers, am here to tell you that dog won’t hunt.

[Part 2] The 7 Deadly Philosophies in the Modern Job Market

[Adapted from the Free E-Book, "The 7 Deadly Philosophies in the Modern Job Market-2013]

Dedicated to all those who are passionate about living, loving, making a difference in their world in order to create generational legacies.

1. The Philosophy of Titles:

“More than 90% of these cannot answer the question, “What can you tell us about yourself?” All they do is to tell you their names and academic qualifications”!

This philosophy is based on a lie that your worth as a human being is directly proportional to a job title that you hold. Society seems to recognize people who have some kind of title or placard on their office door and at the same time shove aside those who have not been ‘given a title’ to the level of worthlessness.  This philosophy says that you can only earn if you get a job title!

The greatest impediment with this philosophy is the attitude that accompanies it: masses are waiting to ‘be given’ that title. This happens in every country existing at the moment. The very reason as to why hordes of people look at a job as the only indication of worthiness is the philosophy of titles.

There is therefore this tendency to greatly focus on the ‘roles’ that people play in society and at the same time, there has been less and less focus on the ‘person’ playing the role. I have sat in interviewing panels over the past five years. I have interviewed more than 1,000 people. More than 90% of these cannot answer the question, “What can you tell us about yourself?” All they do is to tell you their names and academic qualifications!

This philosophy has seen what I call “One-Way-Traffic” in the job market. One-Way-Traffic is where potential employees go to potential employers seeking to be employed. Seldom do we see potential employers going to potential employees requesting them to work for them. This philosophy has worked over the years and it still applies the world-over.

In the modern Job Market, the person who positions himself in such a way that he/she is attractive to a prospective employer has an upper hand. Mostly, such a one is focusing more on what they can do with what they have. They showcase their ‘achievements’ however insignificant they might seem, and they keep a very small interval between the achievements.

The philosophy of titles is so engrained to the extent that the above paragraph is impossibility to the one affected by the philosophy.

• One major title that must be exterminated is the title, ‘Jobless’. It communicates to us that we are useless to the world up until we can be employed. Consequently masses of people get into job interviews looking like wimps, sheepish, unprepared, visionless, dreamless, and valueless and sadly, beggars. They have done nothing with themselves in anyway other than either waiting or looking for a job.

• The job title that people must take is that of Self Executive Officer. It is a full time job that entails future visioning and dreaming, goal-setting, continuous reading, continuous listening to inspirational and motivational information, working on your passion and dreams, seeking out mentors, generating ideas from your passion, being all you can be as you wait for a promotion. There is no better way to prepare yourself for the job market than to be a Self Executive Officer.

Read the full E-Book from my LinkedIn Profile: 

The 7 Deadly Philosophies in the Modern Job Market

[Adapted from my Free E-Book, "7 Detrimental Philosophies in the Modern Job Market"]

In the month of September 2013, a group of hooded terrorists stormed an up market shopping mall in the suburbs of Nairobi, Kenya hurling grenades and shooting indiscriminately at innocent Kenyan shoppers.

Amongst the rescued, wounded and the dead were small children as well as women. These terrorists went ahead to stage a three-day hostage crisis that had the attention of all major news outlets including Aljazeera, CNN, BBC, SkyNews and CCTV.

There is always a reason as to why we do things the way we do them. Christians have a philosophy. Muslims have a philosophy. Interestingly, successful people have a philosophy that guides them.

A philosophy is not just a way of thinking but is also a daily way of living. We get results on a daily basis in our lives depending on the philosophy that we subscribe to. Whether we know it or not, there is an inherent philosophy that we are operating with. 

The main reason as to why those terrorists did what they did is because they subscribed to a certain philosophy, never mind how air headed they are the persons who came up with it.

Job seekers too have several philosophies that they use. Unfortunately, these philosophies are extremely detrimental in the modern job market.

Years back, I was jobless for more than a year. I finally got an opportunity to attend this interview. I had already experienced my fears of lack or cash and food and rent. Frankly, I could not give a monkey (excuse my language) what the interviewer thought about the way I sat in the chair, the way I talked and so on. 

Never mind that this organization had a strict policy of employing graduates only and I was not one! So I answered his questions to the best of my ability. I cannot remember the last time I was this carefree. It was awesome. Needless to say, I got this job. I was a happy man.

It so happened later on that there was this vacancy that I myself did not even know existed for more than a month! A multinational Mobile Network Operator was interested in being served by my boss’ company. All that the boss needed to do was to get two seasoned employees that could become expatriates for the very first time in the history of the organization.

Let’s look at the odds against me:

1)      I did not have a Degree!

2)      I did not know that the vacancy existed, so I could not even apply.

3)     There were 55 other more eligible people before me:

a )     There was a Manager
b)     There was an Assistant Manager
c)      There was a Client Service Manager
d)     There were 10 Team Leaders
e)     There were 40 field personnel above me
f)       There were 2 others  on the same level as myself

4)     I was in bad books with the boss due to office politics

So what made the boss overlook all these odds against me and appoint me as an Expatriate? I did not even know the boss was considering me for the vacancy. To be honest, because of point no 4 above, was working in fear knowing that the slightest mistake will cost me my job.

The greatest mistake that job seekers today are doing (and I did this a lot) is to think that interviews are only done in boardrooms with an interviewing panel. I have come to realize however that life is one long continuous interview for the next level and the greatest determinants for our next level are not just interviewing panels!

Like I stated earlier, life can only be understood backwards but it must be lived forwards. Looking at my years as a job seeker and as an employer, I have deduced seven detrimental philosophies in the modern Job Market. It is my belief that these detrimental philosophies are affecting the modern job market in the following ways:

a)     Creating an Illusion of Joblessness:
b)     Wasting precious time in recruitment process
c)      Giving employers a headache in getting the right people

In the next post, we will deal with philosophy number 1. In case you would like to go ahead of everybody else and get these philosophies right away, you can download the Free E-Book from my LinkedIn Profile: www.linkedin.com/in/lawrencenamale