Page 54 - James Caan - Get the Job you Really Want

Matching yourself to employers’ needs

Be proactive too in understanding a potential employer’s needs.
Read between the lines of any job advert. If you see an ad
saying: ‘Go-getter salesperson needed’, that seems obvious at

first glance, but think about what the employer is really telling
you.
The message here is, ‘I need a sales person who is highly

motivated, can operate independently, and can sell in large
quantities.’ Straight away you have three areas to focus on,
allowing you to craft your experience to those needs, coming up
with examples of how you have delivered precisely those things
in your current and any previous jobs. If you can prove you are

motivated, independent and a good seller, that employer is
going to say, ‘I need this person on my team.’
Here’s an idea to bear in mind which allows you to prove that

in a very direct – and challenging – way.
I was really impressed when one candidate said to me,
‘James, I don’t know about you, but I’ve always found that with
interviews, it is quite di≤cult to work out whether this is the
right opportunity for me and whether from your perspective

I can really make a di≠erence to this organization.’
He went on to say, ‘What I wanted to propose was this: how
would you feel about me coming in and spending a week here

actually doing the job – at no cost to you, entirely at my own
cost – to demonstrate to you that I can really make a di≠erence?
And most importantly to prove that I can add value to the
position that you are o≠ering?’

42 get the job you really want