Many people look for a job that they feel passionate about. But can I search for and find a passion without having already explored the subject in depth? The beer lover who brews top-fermented and bottom-fermented beer in his garage probably wrinkled his nose in disgust at the first sip of beer in his life. And as an opera fan, I couldn’t explain to myself at the first performance what it had to do with love when a couple shout at each other at the top of their voices on stage.

Peter Näf

The beer lover’s passion probably developed over time when he acquired a refined taste through “practice”. For me, too, my love of opera only grew through intensive study, through the development of my sense of hearing and through the guidance of a competent friend. So, I didn’t look for this passion, it developed.

What does this mean for your career? Here is one of my own career stories.

Passion is often where I don’t expect it

After eleven years as a personnel consultant and headhunter, I set up my own coaching business many years ago. My business plan was not very sophisticated. Like many of my acquaintances in the same situation, I entered the market with the idea of taking on any coaching problem.

But I knew one thing for sure: I wanted nothing more to do with job searches, applications, CVs, or job interviews.

My start as an self-employed coach was quite disillusioning. I had built up a good reputation as a personnel consultant, but I couldn’t transfer this trust from my clients to my new field of activity. Out of necessity, I decided to offer job application coaching and job interview training, among other things. I had credibility in the market in these areas. What I had planned as a temporary venture eventually developed into a passion. What had happened?

Firstly, things turned out differently…

I discovered that there is more to the application documents than the question of whether and where the date of birth belongs on the CV and whether to mention marital status or hobbies. And the job interview is also more than just practising supposedly perfect answers. Instead, it is about how people tell themselves and others their own stories, how they perceive themselves. The underlying themes are self-confidence and self-marketing beyond the job application. And ultimately, this is where I have found my passion: Counselling my clients on self-perception, positioning and ultimately communication and language.

I think many people understand passion to be the bushfire of falling in love and initial enthusiasm. However, true passion for a topic grows over time, just like love for anything. It is associated with joy, but also with setbacks and disappointments, and often it is simply a matter of staying with it.

So, always commit yourself fully to what you are currently doing professionally, even if it is not yet what you want to do in the long term. You may discover a passion exactly where you least expect it. After all, your appetite comes with eating.

#career #personalbranding #strategiccareerdesign

I often hear from my customers that the most important thing about a job is that it’s fun. Is fun a meaningful category for assessing a job? Wouldn’t terms like satisfaction or fulfilment be more appropriate? Or is this all just meaningless quibbling? I think that our choice of words has a lot of influence on whether we are satisfied with a professional situation or not.

Peter Näf

Most people will agree that work should also be enjoyable – after all, nobody wants it to be a burden, although unfortunately many people do. At first glance, there seems to be nothing wrong with the term «fun» and if fun were the only requirement of a job, I would have no objection to it.

However, most people equally want to be able to develop in their job and do something meaningful. But most development takes place during a crisis: We come across a problem that we can-not overcome with our previous solution strategies. When working together, we may be con-fronted with people with whom we cannot get along. In this respect, even the diversity that is rightly demanded to achieve above-average performance is not pure joy.

We don’t grow in the comfort zone

And so, the fun ends in everyday working life and we are forced to leave our comfort zone. I assume that people have a natural drive to learn and develop. And that is often exhausting: if we want to grow, we must jump over hurdles, question ourselves and endure uncertainty; all things we would not consciously choose to do.

Professional satisfaction is realistic

I describe myself as very satisfied with my career. I also experience fun in my day-to-day work – more and more frequently over the years. This happens, among other things, when I get on well with my coachees and the collaboration runs smoothly – coaching then feels like dancing. However, I have learnt the most from my coachees, with whom the collaboration was exhausting, sometimes even frustrating. This was and is an ongoing investment.

In addition to consulting, there are also tasks in my company that I would not do voluntarily: I must take care of the IT, get the printer that is on strike up and running, do the bookkeeping, settle the VAT, optimise processes, etc. But there is one thing I have learnt in the process: if I dedicate myself to something with full concentration, I enjoy doing it over time. Enjoying work therefore also has to do with personal attitude, possibly even with working technique.

The same applies in our leisure time: when we enjoy skiing today, we have forgotten how difficult it was to learn when we were young. But back then we probably didn’t expect life to be fun.

Perhaps, based on these considerations, we would be better off saying: «My job has to be fun from time to time.» And – isn’t that a bit of wordplay? I don’t think so, because: Words create expectations. And unrealistic expectations are poison for a fulfilling career.

#career #strategiccareerdesign #personalbranding

Many of my clients are not very confident about their professional experience in small or medium-sized companies. They think that experience with large, international brands is worth more. I’m happy to speak up for people with SME experience, and not just because I’m one of them.

Peter Näf

My client, with whom I did a personal and professional assessment, had worked for a small consultancy firm for many years after graduating. When discussing his career to date, he expressed his regret that he had stayed with the company for so long and – as it didn’t have a famous name – had missed out on something in his career. He thought he would be in a better position today with a background at a major international company.

At first, I took his view. I had never heard of this company before and, based on his negative assessment, I assumed that he hadn’t learnt too much there.

Storytelling brings it to light

When I asked him for examples of consulting projects as part of the storytelling process, my picture changed dramatically: He told me that the company had been involved in projects in which internationally renowned consultancies had also worked. So, his former employer had played in the top league. What was more important, however, was what he himself had contributed to the projects. He gave me an impressive picture of a project meeting: he took part with the partner of the consultancy firm and presented the results for which he was responsible. Another consulting firm involved was represented by a partner. He presented results that employees several hierarchical levels below him had developed. In addition, my client had independently managed large projects early on in his career, from acquisition to analysis, solution finding and the final meeting.

However, he did not realise how much responsibility he had already taken on at a young age compared to someone who had joined a large consulting company after graduation.

The CV does not speak for itself

I had similar experiences as an employee of a smaller recruitment consultancy. Although I was convinced by the company and our performance, I had the feeling for a long time that my experience was not particularly presentable. Until I realised that at a so-called top headhunter I would probably have spent the first few years doing research and making appointments for the senior consultants. But I was already approaching and meeting people in the first few weeks in direct search. During the first year I worked independently on search mandates and after a further three years I was jointly responsible for the company as a partner.

So, pay attention to your framing: the listeners take on your interpretation of the experiences you have had – after all, you need to know what they are worth.

Just as my client had a misconception about alternative careers, people from large companies can’t properly assess his experience at an SME unless he explains it to them. The CV doesn’t do that!

#career #outplacement #personalbranding

Already as a personnel consultant over 20 years ago, I was amazed at the importance of grades in the selection of graduates. As far as I know, no scientific evidence has yet been found to link good grades to professional success. This recruitment practice puts people with unusual CVs at a disadvantage, not only for the applicants concerned, but also for the companies.

Peter Näf

Apparently, not much has changed in this situation, as the following example shows: Some time ago, a young man came to me for job application coaching shortly before graduating from a university of applied sciences. He was struggling to get an entry-level position in his preferred field. Recruiters had turned him down twice on the grounds that they had preferred an applicant with better grades. His grades were average, but not bad.

There are professions where grades can be relevant: Research-related or quantitative-analytical tasks require good academic performance in certain disciplines. However, companies usually check these skills again during the recruitment process, as the performance assessments of different educational institutions are not easily comparable.

It’s the overall picture that counts

For the business functions for which my client was applying, grades were not that important. I was particularly surprised by his rejection because his other qualities would have been evident in his CV if recruiters had looked closely.

Briefly about his background: He had completed an apprenticeship and then continued to work in the company where he was trained; even then in a position of responsibility. He then completed a one-year vocational baccalaureate programme and – although full-time – continued to work alongside this. During his business administration studies at the university of applied sciences, his choice of subjects and coursework already showed his interest in the field he wanted to enter after graduation. His studies were again full-time, but he also worked 40% of the time at a financial services provider in customer service. His certificate confirms his strong social skills, which were also evident in personal contact. He was also in the military for about a year and a half and held the rank of first lieutenant. And yes – what else is important to know: He was just 25 years old.

Be proud of your career!

There is widespread agreement that, in addition to a good education, certain personal skills are important for professional success. My client has already demonstrated these at a young age: Only those who are at least willing to perform, resilient, goal-oriented, ambitious, and well-organised can produce such a CV.

I was shocked by the effect the rejection had on my client: He had the feeling that something was wrong with his career, that he had made the wrong decisions in his career to date and should have invested more in his grades. If you have a similar background, I advise you: Please don’t doubt yourself, don’t let anyone tell you otherwise and be proud of what you have achieved. I am not the only one who recognises such careers for what they are: Outstanding.

#application #career #personalbranding

What do you have to do to ensure that a joke – assuming it’s a good one – is guaranteed to fail to make an impact? You could tell it badly but explain the punchline to make sure everyone gets it. Not funny? But many applicants do the same thing in job interviews – no kidding!

Peter Näf

My client, with whom I did job interview training, had a complex CV. It alternated phases in academia, including a doctoral thesis, with international research and work stays. He had written scientific papers on topics that he would have to deal with in the job in question. He also had experience in related fields, which was not obvious at first glance. So, communicating his background was quite a challenge. We simulated the interview, and I asked him in the role of the recruiter to tell me about his career to date.

If you’re in a hurry, slow down

As if shot out of a cannon, he told me about his career at what felt like twice the speed of speech. He was obviously trying to give me as much in-formation as possible in 3-5 minutes. He explained to me what I was looking for according to the job advertisement and that he could offer exactly that. I learned little about how he had acquired his knowledge and where he had gained his experience. In addition, he seemed stressed – and so was I.

I was unable to listen as quickly as he spoke. And because I had missed his flash start, I was behind in listening and was rushing after him with my attention. This problem was easy to solve: I asked him to wait two seconds after each question before he started speaking. He was also able to slow down his pace of speech after he realized that if he spoke quickly, the recruiter wouldn’t even get half of the information anyway.

Describe, don’t assess!

Above all, however, he should stop explaining to me what I was looking for and instead trust me to recognize the match between his knowledge and my requirements. I made the comparison that, as a recruiter, I grabbed like a hungry dog for all the information that was relevant to the position. All he had to do was put the nuggets of information in front of me.

And that’s where the problem was: he evaluated himself but gave me little information with which I could have assessed his background in relation to the position. His conclusions were based on information that was not available to me. Or to stay in our image: He explained the punchline to me but didn’t tell the joke properly.

We then clarified the roles in the job interview: as the recruiter, I assess his suitability for the job because I know it; he provides me with information. If he wants to assess for himself whether the job interests him, the roles are reversed: he assesses because he knows his needs and I give him information about the job and the environment.

The aim of the interview is for the recruiters to find you suitable and not for you to find yourself suitable. Or as the saying goes: it’s the hunger that must enjoy the bite, not the cook.

#jobinterview #application #storytelling

Many of my clients only see success as such if it is overall. In doing so, they overlook partial successes that they have achieved and at the same time blame themselves for circumstances beyond their control. As a result, people who I see from the outside as very successful con-sider themselves unsuccessful.

Peter Näf

One outplacement client had an interesting career in finance and had worked for renowned industrial groups. We did a personal and professional assessment and prepared her application documents.

Finally, we practiced a job interview for a position she had applied for. During my preparation, I wondered why she thought she was suitable for the job. The tasks and responsibilities went far beyond what I had learned from her previous experience.

Evaluate your experience properly!

When asked about this during the job interview training, she told me that she had held exactly this position in a previous job. This was not evident in her CV and we adjusted it accordingly.  She had only been with the company for 18 months and had treated this position rather neglected in her previous descriptions. She felt uncomfortable talking about it. What had happened?

She moved to this company together with the CFO and supervisor at her previous employer. It turned out that the finance department was underdeveloped and did not meet current requirements. My client therefore completely reorganized her area of responsibility: She set up a modern financial planning and analysis department and recruited new teams for four international locations. One challenge was to establish new reporting standards at the head office and at the subsidiaries abroad. And finally, she evaluated and implemented a new financial software. She managed all of this in just 18 months alongside a demanding day-to-day business – an incredible achievement!

Success is what you acknowledge as success

The company was in financial difficulties in the medium term, which my client was the first to recognize due to the improved figures and she warned those responsible several times. The people in charge did not want to see the problem. For this reason and because of the excessive workload over a long period of time, she finally resigned.

She regarded this phase of her career as a failure and was ashamed of it, as she had not been able to avoid the problems. Nor was she comforted by the fact that in retrospect she was right: The company was restructured months later, and key people lost their jobs. As she would only have seen her performance as a success if the company had been doing well, she did not recognize her own outstanding contribution as such. Instead, she blamed herself for developments that she could not influence.

With this mindset, she does not feel successful and communicates accordingly. Her listeners perceive the world through her glasses and thus adopt her point of view.

Always remember: What recruiters think about you depends crucially on what you think about yourself.

#career #personalbranding #storytelling

First: I cannot tell you whether your application documents will be selected using artificial intelligence. However, based on my recruitment experience, I do see narrow limits to the use of AI, at least when recruiting highly qualified applicants. More on this in a moment. Even the recruiters I know still work primarily with their natural intelligence. I am therefore even more surprised by the certainty with which many commentators claim that AI is being used across the board and that CVs should therefore be optimized accordingly.

Peter Näf

The headlines about artificial intelligence in recruitment are crisp and the articles create a spine-chilling sensationalism. It’s no wonder that many representatives of the writing profession are keen to address this topic. Unfortunately, they have a negative impact on applicant behavior, as the following example shows:

A customer had prominently described herself as a team player on her CV. I advised her not to mention soft skills – although they are important in recruitment – in her CV, as they can only be meaningfully tested in a job interview. She replied that the advertisement was looking for a team player. The term had to be included in her CV so that she would not be rejected by the algorithm that selects applicants. What do we make of this?

AI isn’t quite that stupid after all

Successful recruitment is about selecting the most suitable applicants from a large number of CVs. If the process were so simple that I told an algorithm to search for terms such as team player or certain hard skills, I could be selected with an unsuitable background, provided I placed the right search terms in my CV. A highly qualified applicant who had not AI-optimized her CV would not be considered using the same logic.

Companies that can afford such an approach are not experiencing a skills shortage.

Optimization can be counterproductive

Even with more intelligent algorithms, the following challenge remains in recruitment: in my experience, there is no correlation between the quality of applicants and the quality of their applications. Outstanding professionals are often bad at selling themselves. And applicants who have less to offer tend to invest more time in CV optimization to improve their chances.

For an algorithm to achieve the best results, it would have to weed out all those applicants who try to trick it through optimization. We know the problem from search engine optimization: the algorithms have to be constantly changed so that users cannot gain an advantage in the results ranking through pure optimization.

The problem with many CVs is not the lack of AI optimization, but that they are written carelessly and are therefore incomprehensible. Anyone who prepares their experience and knowledge properly automatically uses the terms that are mentioned in a job advertisement for which they are being considered.

In my opinion, more optimization is not necessary and should – if we assume algorithms that deserve the name intelligent – be sanctioned.

#application #cv #strengths #selfmarketing

What’s going on in the job market? It seems that the bad habit from the world of online dating, where people suddenly disappear into thin air after long chats, has reached the world of work. And this phenomenon affects both sides: Companies and applicants. More respect in the workplace seems to me to be urgently needed – from all market participants.

Peter Näf

Recently, a client I am advising in an outplacement program told me about her experience: she is a young, highly qualified applicant with a sought-after technical background. In the past few weeks, she has been invited to interviews by three companies, among others, and even to the second round of interviews at two of them. The interviews all went well. At the end of all meetings, the recruiters had given specific dates by when my client would receive feedback on how to proceed.

Liability is a form of respect

None of the companies kept to their own promises and my client contacted all three of them sometime later. Again, she was given dates by which she would be informed – again, no response. Two of the companies did not get back to her after she contacted them again.

Anyone who has ever been looking for a job and knows their own vulnerability in this situation can understand what such behavior by companies does to applicants.

From my own experience as a personnel consultant and headhunter, I know about the many possible reasons why recruitment can come to a standstill and the difficulty of not always being able to be transparent about this. But it is part of the recruiter’s toolkit to deal with such situations in a communicative manner.

Ghosting on the applicant side

The situation is similar on the candidate side: Recruiters tell me that applicants don’t show up for scheduled interviews without an excuse. It even happens that they don’t show up on their first day of work after having signed a contract without letting anyone know and remain untraceable. This is a phenomenon that is occurring more and more frequently and can become a problem for companies.

You only have to imagine how many resources are wasted when recruiters often call several internal interviewers for interviews that then don’t take place. Not to mention the problems if a position cannot be filled as expected. This may mean that commitments to customers cannot be met or can only be met with a considerable additional workload for existing employees.

Players on both sides of the market may excuse their own behavior by claiming that they themselves have had many negative experiences with the other side. However, their behavior often precisely affects those applicants or companies who behave respectfully, such as my client.

Good character is demonstrated by those who maintain their integrity and style even when they are treat-ed badly from time to time. Those who see unpleasant experiences as a free pass for their own bad behavior turn the workplace into a combat zone and lose the legitimacy to complain about the inappropriate behavior of others.

#application #recruiter #jobinterview

The challenge for recruiters in a job interview is to clarify many questions in a short period of time to be able to decide whether they want to invite applicants to the next round of interviews. You can think of it as a list of checkboxes that need to be ticked. Sometimes applicants manage to tick a box without the interviewer noticing.

Peter Näf

A client in outplacement was facing an important job interview for which I was training him. He was highly qualified and ideally suited to the position in question. He also had an impeccable appearance and was a good communicator.

Nevertheless, the interview was a headache for him as he had been dismissed from his last job. The rea-son was a difference in opinion between his line manager and him about the strategic direction of his department.

Security is contagious

I found this reason for dismissal understandable and easy to communicate. Moreover, he answered my question in the positive as to whether he would have resigned of his own accord sooner or later due to the differences in opinion.

If recruiters had noticed his insecurity during the interview, they would certainly have asked him persistently and looked for alternative reasons for dismissal. Since the reason given is understandable in terms of content, the candidate’s uncertainty can only mean that he is covering up the real reasons for termination or that something else compromising had happened.

My client therefore had to come to terms with himself to successfully communicate the reason for termination. We were able to clarify this in coaching. I also advised him to practise his argument out loud so that he wouldn’t be frightened by his own words the first time he listened to himself in a job interview.

Successful communication is prepared

Since I thought he was rhetorically skilled, I suggested another communication trick to him: As mentioned, you can imagine the recruiter’s questions to be clarified as a task list with checkboxes in their brain. I therefore suggested to my client that when answering the expected first question (e.g.: «Please introduce yourself briefly»), he should also check the «reason for termination» box.

This worked as follows: My client prepared himself well and described his career to date in reverse chronological order and then briefly mentioned the termination but went over the reasons with a general formulation. He then drew the interviewer’s attention to the red thread of his previous professional experience and explained the motivation for the new position.

He formulated this so elegantly that the interviewees didn’t come back to the reason for his dismissal – apparently the box was ticked for the relevant question.

Professional recruitment is different. I think that in-depth clarification of the reasons for the termination is essential in a situation like this. But my client didn’t need to worry about it – he got the job and was very happy and successful in his new position.

#jobinterview #application #outplacement

Many people find it difficult to make career decisions: «Which career direction should I pursue?» «Should I accept the offered position or stay in my current job?» One of the reasons for this difficulty is the unrealistic assumption that there is only one absolutely correct answer to all these questions.

Peter Näf

The idea of one right decision is probably based on the unconscious assumption that we humans are personalities with consistent behaviors, attitudes and characteristics. We constantly recreate this coherent self-image to safeguard our mental hygiene by subsequently rationalizing our emotional decisions. In making decisions, however, this simplified image of ourselves puts us under unnecessary pressure.

When Goethe’s Faust moaned about the two souls that dwelt in his breast, he was probably understating things.

We are many

In reality, we humans tend to be home to a whole group of souls. Friedeman Schulz von Thun created for this the beautiful image of the inner team. He describes our drives, emotions and needs as sub-personalities that make themselves felt in different compositions depending on the topic and demand their rights.

When it comes to career decisions, the following sub-personalities could make themselves heard alongside others: The career-conscious one who wants to get ahead as quickly as possible; an internal finance minister who is concerned about securing her existence; the bon vivant for whom a good balance between work and private life is important and who also wants to have fun at work, as well as the strategist who wants to get her career on the right track in the long term. All representatives of reasonable concerns.

Now, the art is to mediate between these inner parts, to lead them to a joint decision and possibly to compensate those who have lost out.

There is not just one career path

According to this view, there cannot be one 100% correct decision. All needs and wishes can never be satisfied equally. Instead, you set valid priorities for the moment and give greater weight to certain concerns. In later career decisions, other aspirations will prevail.

In younger years, the career-conscious and the finance minister may win out, which corresponds to the life phase. Whereas in later career phases, the strategist is likely to have a stronger voice and may then be supported by the newly joined health-conscious player.

This inner team set-up with a changing composition also makes sense because not only do your priorities and values change over the course of your life and therefore your career, but also the external circumstances. Economic and social developments require flexible adaptation and diversity within you is just as helpful as it is for real teams in the company.

And don’t worry: you don’t suffer from a multiple personality disorder if you hear different inner voices;-)

#coaching #career #outplacement