Work dignifies people and it is a fundamenal part of personal accomplishment of every individual. Being jobless is one of the biggest difficulties a person may face in life.
In this article we discuss some important aspects to be considered, not only to find a job, but also to keep an strong employability over time.
First of all, let’s define employability as a series of attributes of an individual that enable them to land on a job and keep employed over time. But, what are those attributes? and, how can we project those attributes and make them visible in favor of our own employability?
There are many employability attributes; here we offer an small list of fundamental ones:
- Technical skills and knowledge
- Human skills
- Education
- Reputation
- Expertise and Motivation
- Presentation and CV
- Continuous employability
Recent Technical Skills and Knowledge
My father uses an expression that is very applicable here: When someone asks him for a favor, his first question will be “What am I good for?”
A not-so-obvious part is how recently and frequently have we exercised or practiced those skills?
For example, a person may have done formal studies about economy and bursatile markets, but has spent the last 3-5 years focusing on medical equipment sales with lots of success. This evidences that the financial market knowledge and skills – in this moment – are secondary for that person and his or her skills in the field of medical devices sales are now their strongest part.
What are your most recent strong skills and knowledge?
Human Skills
Here we refer to things such as communication, assertiveness, articulation, emotivity, diagramation, organization (personal, mental, professional), establishment of goals, vision, leadership, civility, and a long etcetera.
In contrast to technical skills and knowledge, human skills never go out of style, they keep being a constant value for a lifetime.
Education
I don’t forget the phrase I’ve heard at an employee-forum at Intel by some business director more than 10 years ago: “acquire the best possible education in that thing you do”.
College degrees and integral education, especialized certifications, update courseware, extra-curricular activities (volunteering, hack-a-thons, meet-ups, internships, mentorships) all stack up.
In that ample range of educational aspects, the ability for self-education and generation of practical expertise keeps being super imortant.
One fundamental aspect also is one’s efforts to share knowledge, and disseminate science through from blogs, vlogs or even peer-reviewed science publications. Those are also profoundly educative experiences.
En esa amplia gama de aspectos educativos, la capacidad de auto-educarse y de generar experiencia práctica sigue siendo súper importante.
No doubt that education is personal transformation and growth.
Reputation
This aspect refers to your business network. That is, the people you have worked with in the past. What do they have to say about your work and your capacities.
In this aspect there is a big role of social networks such as LinkedIn, Reddit, Discord among others where your knowledge and skills are manifested.
Expertise and Motivation
This domain describes which companies and projects you’ve worked, what has been your legacy in terms of achievements and impact on the teams you’ve worked with. It is important to highlight your recent expertise (i.e. comparing your old work fixing laptops, vs. your recent expertise as software architect) as well as your continuously growing expertise (leadership, mentorship, consultorship, publications, patents, etc)
Expertise is often expressed in years, but it is also useful to express it in more elaborated ways as achievements measured in terms of objective improvement, such as % of enhancement of processes or performance optimization of code, etc.
One more relevant aspect is your motivations, what do you like to do? do you like to create things? or do you like to help others grow? or perhaps solve complex problems?
This is no small deal, your motivagion defines your attitude against challenges and difficulties, and your attitude defines your level of perseverance and your ability to find resources and be successful without excuses.
Presentation and CV
As a final point, it is important to elaborate on the way we project ourselves to the world, whether it is to find employment or to normally perform in whatever it is that we do.
A doctor with a dirty coat, or a dirty office doesnt offer much hope to his patients.
Give your best look and best face to life, and life will give its best face in return.
Regarding the CV, some things that I find of fundamental importance:
- Your CV should generally be concise, succint, highlighting the most recent adn important aspects. Putting first your expertise, achievements and capacities.
- If you apply to an English speaking job, please, send a CV written in English.
- It is always a good idea to keep an up-to-date version of your CV online.
- If you are a multifacetic professional and you are looking for employment, you may consider having different versions of your CV highlighting areas according to the different types of job or position you may be applying to. For instance one version could highlight your software engineering skills, but another may highligh your leadership and managerial skills and another your musician skills and one last version with your inventor or electronics engineering skills.
Continuous Employability.
Always (always) we must keep in mind that our employability is our personal responsibility. It is not the responsibility of my employer, nor of my boss, nor of my family, nor of my frends, but mine. It is me who has to define my goals and take actions, find resources, keep myself up-to-date on my careeer and ask for whatever it is necessary to provide my best version in whatever it is I do.
Having said that, remember to keep a balance between our professional and personal life; in our family relationships which most of the cases will be our real reason to excel in our professional activities.
Keep on, learning and giving your best to make of this a better world through your professional and personal actions.