What skills to learn to get hired at the company you want? A quick trick, 6 steps & tips from an executive recruiter
📜 Table of Contents
 |
| Follow Us for Free Career Advice to Prepare for Your Next Career Move |
磨刀要磨在刀刃上！掌握这些技巧，有针对地学习专业技术，你就能很快找到心仪的工作😄
Summary
I recently published a post, How to get a job faster in the future - tips from an executive recruiter. To further elaborate one of the important topics on how to focusing on learning the specific skills instead of the general trending technologies to get a new job faster in the future, I’ll show you a quick trick and easy way to find out what specific skills you need to learn now to get a new job faster in the future, and the steps to use the trick with examples. You’ll learn how to make yourself more employable in the job market, ensure your own job security, and make yourself feel happier.
I have been on both sides of the high tech job market for a long time, details on About Us, as an engineer in three countries, and as an executive recruiter based in the San Francisco Bay Area for tech companies in the US and China, and a high tech career coach. I’d like to share my insights on jobs here at MichelleYouBiz.com to help you prepare for your next career move. Keep reading to learn more and follow us for free career advice.
See the big picture first
Technology today is evolving at such a rapid pace, all these buzzwords, such as metaverse, non-fungible tokens (NFTs), blockchain, artificial intelligence (AI), augmented reality (AR), drones, Internet of Things (IoT), robotics engineering and so on would make one’s head spin. These emerging technologies are fascinating and enable exponential growth of many businesses in the tech industry. They also have more impact than ever to traditional industries, such as banking, retails and manufacturing.
It is important to keep yourself up to date with the current trends of technologies, particularly the industry trends in your own field, so that you’ll understand the big picture of your industry, have a better idea about what is happening in the world, and how it will impact your industry, your field and your own career.
As a young professional entering into the tech industry, or a seasoned professional working for a tech company, or a professional with a curious mind working in any industry, if it’s exciting for you to learn these cutting edge technologies and follow the latest trends in your industry, it’s a very good indicator that you have chosen the right industry for your career.
Find target with this trick
Many job seekers did start early to prepare themselves and have worked hard to follow the trends in their industry. But often time, when they started to look for a job, they were still lack of one of more essential skills required for the jobs they want, made it hard for them to get a job interview. Why? Because they have been focusing on the industry trends but didn't really acquire the specific skills for their next job.
To prepare more effectively for your next job and achieve your career goals, you need to find the right target - the specific skills that are essential to the future job you desire, and make a sustainable plan to acquire these skills. By spending your limited time and energy wisely, focusing on learning the specific skills targeting your desired type of job, you’ll make yourself a more competitive candidate in the future for the job you want to apply for.
Having been on both sides of the job market for a long time, I have found so much valuable information for my own career change, my international headhunting and other businesses just by doing one simple trick - searching for current job openings that are relevant to my needs, and find the important information from the job descriptions.
By following the simple steps below, you’ll learn how to use this trick to find out what specific skills to learn that will significantly increase your chances of getting the type of jobs you want or get hired at your desired company in the future, how to prepare more effectively for your next job, when to reevaluate your choice about your future job, and how to adjust your career goals, and what are the immediate psychological benefits for you today.
Use the trick in 6 steps
Preparing yourself wisely, it won't be hard for you to jump to another company and get a new job faster at a higher position with a higher pay. Usually, it’s the fastest way to increase your earnings instead of waiting for a promotion or a raise at your current company. Even if your new job is at the same level as your current one, you’ll get a nice boost to your salary from your new employer as an incentive for you to join them.
For example, if you’re a Software Engineer who wants to advance into a Senior Software Engineer position in the future, or an experienced Business Development Manager who wants to get hired at another company as a Director of Business Development in a couple of years, or if you are a college student with little experience who will look for a job in one or two years, or a career changer planning to get a different type of job in the near future, you can use the same trick to find the information you need. Just follow the simple steps below to find out what skills to learn and how to prepare well for your next job.
Step 1. Search online this way
Go to any of the popular job sites, search for your desired type of job positions, find the current job postings at the leading companies in your field, or at your desired company, or at various sized companies from a big tech to a small startup, depending on your own career goals.
For example, if you want to get hired at Google, you can just visit Google Careers to find out all their job information. But if you go to a popular job site, you'll find the most recent job postings from Google. Big tech companies have branches all over the world, the technical skills required for the same job title may be quite different depending on the projects they are working on. If you want to get a job at Google as a senior software engineer and stay close to Mountain View, California, look for this type of jobs at this office, not the senior software engineer jobs in London, UK.
Step 2. Find the specific skills
Read their job descriptions to find out what technologies they’re currently working on, what tools they’re using, what skills are essential for the jobs, and what skills are optional but nice to have for the jobs. You'll focus on learning the essential skills for your targeted jobs, but also pay some attentions to the optional skills if you're very interested in learning them too. Sometimes, if you're very strong in one or two of the optional skills, you may stand out of the crowd as long as you already possess the essential skills. I'll talk more about this when I get a chance in the upcoming posts.
Step 3. Target these jobs only
It’s very important to target the jobs within your reach, you’ll be motivated to learn and it’ll be easier for you to follow through your own career plan. Comparing your desired jobs and their required skills to your current job and skills to see how big the gap is, and find the jobs that you believe are within your reach.
For example, if you only have about ⅓ of the essential skills required by your desired job, it means that you have a long way to go and you need to work harder and learn faster. The gap may be too big for many people. But, if instead of being intimidated by the big skill gap, you feel excited about the challenge, want a big room to grow, anxious to start learning now, and you are truly a fast learner, you may feel that this type of job is within your reach.
On the other hand, if the skill gap between your current skill set and your desired job is too big for you and make you feel very stressful, you may not want a big leap for your career, then you can adjust your career goals and take a small step, such as targeting a lower level jobs or a different type of job that fits you better. For example, you may be more comfortable with another job position that you already have ⅔ of the required skills, the task of learning new skills is more manageable for you, you'll feel more confident to achieve your career goals, then it may be a better choice for your next job.
Generally speaking, people with different types of personalities and backgrounds will react differently to similar challenges. You really need to know yourself well to make sound decisions about your career and understand what jobs will fit you better. Check out this post to learn the easy way to improve your self-awareness to set clear goals for your next job.
Step 4. Find best way to learn
Find the best way to learn the technical skills and soft skills targeting your future job, figure out a sustainable plan to learn at your own pace. For example, you can find many machine learning books to learn the technology and advance into this area as a software engineer, enroll in a community college or an online class, and find other ways to learn the technical skills you need for your next job. But don’t overdo it, you don’t want to burn yourself out and lose your interest in the technology. So pace yourself and enjoy the learning process.
Compared to technical skills, soft skills can be trickier to assess and harder to acquire. For example, interpersonal skills and the strong ability to influence other people are essential to advance your career as a business development professional. Many people focus on learning the tactics without a deep understanding of the reasons behind them, and often use the right tactics in the right situation but to the wrong people. What to learn to improve your soft skills? I talked about it on this post - The science every professional should learn to prepare for your next career move and live a happier life. I'll write more about this big topic in the future.
Step 5. Adjust your career goals
You may need to adjust your career goals in the process when necessary. For example, after learning new skills that are essential to your desired jobs for a while, if you find yourself not really enjoying them or having a very difficult time learning such skills, you may want to reevaluate your career goals. But, don’t be discouraged, because it’s actually provide you a great opportunity to make sure your career goals are feasible, adjust your career goals when necessary, and make a better decisions for your next job.
To learn more about how to set clear goals for your career, read this post - How to prepare now to get a job faster in the future - tips from an executive recruiter to learn my solutions, identify your strengths and weaknesses, change your strategy to pursue a different type of job that fits you better, find a job that will let you play into your own strengths and avoid competing with other stronger job candidates in your weak areas.
Step 6. Staying on track
You need to keep up with the job market to stay on track to learn the right skills for your next job. For example, in about a half of a year, you should check the similar jobs again as you did in Step 1, make sure you’re up to date with your desired jobs, and keep yourself staying on the track to learn the specific skills targeting the jobs you want or a job at your desired company.
By following these six steps, you’ll be better prepared with the essential skills for your next career move and land a job faster in the future. In the meantime, you’ll also get the immediate psychological benefits once you start your preparation this way. Keep reading to learn why it’ll also make you happier.
Immediate benefits for you
You'll enjoy the immediate psychological benefits soon after preparing this way for your next career move.
First, following the industry trends and the new technologies relevant to your field will keep you up to date with the current events and make sure that you’re in the field that is growing, not declining. It will make you feel good about your career choice. It’s also a great way for you to socialize with fellow professionals in your own industry and give you a good sense of belonging to this group and make you feel happier about your career in general.
Second, usually, the specific skills that are essential to your targeted jobs are closely related to your current job, learning these skills will make you feel more confident about yourself today, perform better at work, and less concern about your job security. It’ll also make it possible for you to take on more responsibilities at your current job, have more valuable experience and acquire new skills at work that can be added to your resume and make you a better candidate for your next job.
Furthermore, when you’re ready to look for a new job in the future, your self-esteem will be boosted by your newly acquired skills targeting the job you’re applying for, you’ll become more competitive than other poorly prepared job applicants, perform better at your job interviews, secure a job offer faster; you may even impress your new boss and have a great start at your new job. Thanks all to your well executed preparation.
In short, by preparing yourself this way, you’ll create a virtuous cycle of learning and performance for yourself that will make you a more confident, more employable, much happier person which will be a wonderful thing for your family too.
I hope you have learned something valuable for you from this blog post, leave your comment below to share your thoughts and experiences with us. Follow us for more free career advice like this, and start to prepare for your next job now.
Keep reading the related posts on jobs on this blog and learn more at MichelleYouBiz.com.
▸ Read - the related posts below for more free career advice
▸ Search - with the button 🔍 at the top-right corner
▸ Share - with the button below via email or social media