Experience or Mindset?
*Original article on andersonmatias.co
Have you ever noticed how you would describe yourself in terms of skills and capabilities? Have you put some effort to reach a conclusion about it? Very often we hear from several candidates to job positions how they got stuck whenever asked about who they are and why he/she should be hired. Why is that? Well, a lot of factors may contribute to it, but to me, it all comes down to not actually knowing what you are selling to them.
That’s right, “selling”. Even if you are, for example, working for big corporations and do not own a business, you are selling something. In most cases, results based on a number of aspects they value, such as background, hard skills, soft skills, you name it. What a lot of people have not yet realized is that it is increasingly necessary that we see ourselves as a company-of-one and behave like we are a business. This brings absolutely all kinds of analogies to the table: you have your own development department, marketing, human resources etc.
Investing in a personal brand is definitely not a matter of being fancy, it is a matter of survival in the next 5 to 10 years, if you will. Even before, the importance of it was always there, it was just not that acknowledged on an individual level. For sure you can relate to moments where you look at someone and think: “the funny”, or “the efficient” or maybe “the snake”. These are all brands that, knowingly or not, are being reinforced and advertised by them. The point of acknowledging it is that by figuring out what kind of personal brand you provide versus what you want to show, it is easier to draft a strategy that works for you.
Now let’s focus for a moment on a slow-and-steady shifting trend I’ve seen happening for a while: experience to mindset. Have you ever noticed how we tend to describe experience in terms of time? Well, this is of course still very relevant, but saying you have X years of experience on something does not really describe how dense is the learning during given amount of time. It also does not establish the variety of situations you have been prepared to deal with. Let’s compare two scenarios: while one works 30 years on a department having the same year of experience 30 times, another have been consistently rotating every 2 years for the past 20 in several different areas of the business and exposed to increasingly levels of challenge. Who is likely to be more prepared to a higher level of responsibility in an organization? The more accountability is required, the more experience density will be critical to land that job in an easier way. The previous generations were more comfortable in staying a long time at the same company and pursuing a career in it. Some of us still are. Currently, in a world of startups, agility and adaptability, mindset and how you fit to a company culture are more important. We simply cannot afford to waste time on things that do not add value. That is why job hopping seems to be slowly demystified, it is a sign of new and more dynamic times, where how you think is gaining more importance, in opposition to how many hours/months/years you have been doing something.
Important to say: there is no right or wrong. You ultimately decide how you direct your career, the most relevant point is, you need to figure out what you sell! Are you extremely specialized on something and is considered an expert on your field due to the several years you’ve been working on that research? Show it! You can’t just settle? Keep moving! Are you strongly motivated by a fierce sense of purpose on searching for ways to improve people’s lives and are eager to learn and contribute, although often considered too young and inexperienced? You got your place too! Nowadays is probably the best moment ever to start something new, to have access to information and figure out new ways to do things. The opportunities are limitless, it is a matter of looking inside before running for shadows.
Back to branding, after you know which direction you want to take, only then you will be able to effectively understand how to optimize the storytelling. It is not a matter of making things up, you are not supposed to do that, I say storytelling because it is a matter of which side of the story will you focus on (which means one side does not exclude the others) and how you deliver the message. For more traditional and established organizations, it might make sense to consider focusing your professional background description in terms of education, professional experience and accomplishments. On the other hand, on environments where you have the proper space to showcase your ideas and where the cultural fit is more critical, mindset may play a bigger role on how you perform, although I see mindset as critical on absolutely everything. I particularly like the idea of balancing. Develop both hard and soft skills, make the most of my time to learn and experience things, while at the same time constantly exercising self-awareness and reflecting about how I perceive everything, together with the strong belief in my capacity to pursue and accomplish anything I decide to. This is what has been working the best for me so far. It is a continuous improvement process though, so this may or may not change at virtually any second. The real challenge is how to link the short-term fluctuation with the longer-term strategy and make it work.
So, what about you? What’s your pick: experience, mindset or a bit of both? How do you showcase yourself? What do you sell?
Think about it, and tell the story to the world. . .
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