The Importance Of Networking When You Have A Job

Networking tends to be the first point of thought if we find ourselves out of a job. Or it’s that piece of advice we’re given when starting out on our career path. Yet making the most out of networking when you have a job can be one of the most important investments of your time you’ll make. Networking doesn’t just help you find opportunities when you’re out of work, it can be vital to helping advance your career when you have a job. So don’t sit quietly at your desk all day long. Get up, get out and talk to people!

Build A Network Before You Need It

Simply put, networking increases your value at any stage of your career. Look to build your network and connections both within your company as well as outside the office within your industry circles. Being connected to a strong group of people allows you to increase your knowledge, learn new skills, and tap into useful resources. Importantly, you’ll have more direct access to new job opportunities or internal promotions with increased salary.

When you attend new events or start a new job, make an effort to meet new people. It can feel awkward at times yet the long term ROI on developing a wide network of relationships can be priceless. Imagine the next time you need a new position or job; you pick up the phone and get a referral to walk you through the door to a new opportunity. That definitely beats trying to stand out in a pile of resumes.

Give. Don’t Just Expect to Get

Don’t make your networking strategy a frantic pursuit of attending every industry event, picking up as many business cards as possible, and tossing them in a drawer until you need them. Nurture your network by being authentic in how you participate within your community. Find out what you have in common with people and how you can contribute to their personal success or the success of important projects.

One big point – enjoy networking and even have fun! Don’t think of it as an inconvenience that eats up your time; something that you feel forced to do only when you need something. Put the same attention and time to it as you would a valuable investment. Because that’s exactly what it is.

If you live in the Las Vegas or Nashville areas and would like to join us at some of our networking events, please contact kim@taureanconsulting.net (Nashville) or Sonia@taureanconsulting.net (Las Vegas).

How Women Can Tap The Massive Opportunities In Tech

There is no escaping the huge opportunity that tech-skilled positions present in today’s hiring marketplace. These high in-demand jobs are expanding at a rate faster than availability of talent, driving employers to develop more creative and substantial hiring packages to compete for these sought after candidates.

Despite the tech talent pool shortage, women continue to be under-represented at all levels in the tech industry. Diversity and addressing “women’s issues” has become the hot topic as many companies of all sizes have started taking action to overcome biases and improve hiring opportunities for women. It does not immediately fix the challenges that women face, but the good news is that women can take charge and be proactive in their approach to gain an edge, get hired and thrive in tech roles.

Choose a Tech Career Path

Women need to want and choose a tech career path. With today’s modern culture and economy dependent so much on software, the technology field represents a huge opportunity and females with technical skills can take advantage of this. A recent report from Cisco reveals one million job openings in 2016 for cyber-security alone. Demand is expected to rise to 6 million globally by 2019.

However, research by Harvey Mudd College identified three primary reasons why women did not choose to pursue roles in the tech industry:

• Young women did not consider a career in tech to be interesting.
• They doubted their ability to be successful at it.
• They did not believe that they would be working with people with whom they would feel comfortable.

The starting point is young women opting a tech-focused learning path. The jobs are out there for the taking, and women are in a great position to take advantage of getting trained to succeed in the tech scene.

Have a Job Search Strategy

Just as with any job search, having a plan goes a long way to finding the right company fit. For example, using online and social communities to discover or crowd-source advice prior to submitting a resume can help women address any preconceptions about the company’s culture, work environment, leadership, work-life balance, harassment, equal pay, etc.

Women can also ready themselves to enter male-dominated workplaces by setting their own tone. A critical challenge facing women is the way they can begin to feel, act, or are expected to act, when working with men. The key is for women to stay true to who they are and avoid comparing themselves to male counterparts. Everyone has their own unique progress and growth experience and women should avoid feeling that they need to take on the traits of men to advance in tech roles.

Joining a professional women’s tech-focused networking group is also a great way for aspiring female techies to get the insights, connections and mentorship to launch or advance their career.

Taurean Consulting is a 100% women-owned business and we work extra hard empowering our female tech candidates to excel in full time and contract placements. It doesn’t stop once they are hired; we remain active in providing opportunities for their continued development of in-demand skills. We also consult with hiring companies to establish how they can support and inspire the female techforce in their workplaces.

Pre-planning Lets You Make the Right Hire the First Time

For many companies, staffing is their biggest line item. If people are your biggest corporate investment, then how you hire has a tremendous impact on the success of your company. A bad hire can cost you in productivity, morale, and other ways. In fact, the U.S. Department of Labor estimates that a bad hiring decision can cost 30 percent of the employee’s annual salary: that’s $15,000 in addition to a $50,000 salary for an average employee. And it costs an average of $7,000 to replace a salaried employee; $10,000 to replace a mid-level employee, and $40, 000 to replace a senior executive.

To protect your staffing investment, it’s important to make the right hiring decision the first time. If you use the right employee assessment tools and hiring criteria, you can avoid bad hires before you interview your first candidate.

CLEAR WORKFORCE PLAN

To minimize bad hiring decisions, you need to start with a clear workforce plan.  This means identifying key employees and decision-makers, their roles, and having an HR strategy in place that both identifies your staffing needs and the expertise you need before you start filling a position. When developing your hiring strategy, you need to understand what specific skills you are seeking:

• Assess the organizational structure first. Where does the open position fit within the organization? Does the role have a clear purpose that supports the company mission
• Determine if there is there a complete job description? Has the supervisor developed a job description and has HR vetted that description? Be sure the job description is comprehensive and adequately describes the job, including possible future duties.
• Identify the minimum qualifications for the position. Are there special skills or credentials that may be needed, such as CPA, MA, MD, or PhD, or specific software or tech skills? Are certain experience levels required, or a number of years of service, or certifications?
• Analyze your compensation plan. You want to perform a competitive analysis to make sure the salary package is competitive with room for growth. You get what you pay for, so being able to offer a competitive salary will help attract the best candidates.

PERFORMANCE BASED JOB DESCRIPTION

A common mistake that many hiring managers make is writing a skills-based job description that only outlines the requirements to do the job. A better approach is to describe the role within the company. A performance-based job description provides a better measurement of how a candidate will perform based on the expectations of the job. For example, if you were hiring for a sales position, a skills-based job description would require: a college degree, strong interpersonal skills, years of industry experience, number of years of sales or customer service experience.

The criteria are broad-based and will fit a wider range of applicants. To narrow the field, you can use a performance-based job description for the same role that might include:

• Expected to book 20 product demonstrations per month
• Achieve sales quota within first 90 days
• Achieve 20 percent customer renewal rate
• Responsible for incoming query calls and routine customer questions

The performance-based job description sets the expectation for both the candidate and management. It also provides a benchmark for employee assessment before the candidate is even hired. Get specific with the tangible skills and capabilities that the position requires.

EFFECTIVE HIRING ASSESSMENT

It has also been proven that an effective hiring assessment should cover:

• Day-to-day responsibilities, such as routine responsibilities. A “day-in-the-life” scenario will weed out a number of poor candidates.
• Employee expectations, such as performance indicators, required duties, and job metrics.
• Cultural fit, including alignment with the corporate culture and potential career advancement.

Hiring for highly qualified tech talent can often prove challenging and you can benefit from partnering with a specialized tech-recruiting firm who can help to accurately review and evaluate the tech skills of candidates, and assist your company to make smart hiring decisions.

Proper preplanning and employee assessments before you hire can result in tremendous savings. It always makes sense to hire right the first time than to use trial and error. With the right tools and tests, you narrow the field before you even start your search and make it easier to find the perfect candidate.