How to Land Your Dream Job from Your Couch: The Winning Online Networking Formula | Greg Langstaff | Skillshare
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How to Land Your Dream Job from Your Couch: The Winning Online Networking Formula

teacher avatar Greg Langstaff, Certified Resume Strategist. Fun Guy.

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Taught by industry leaders & working professionals
Topics include illustration, design, photography, and more

Watch this class and thousands more

Get unlimited access to every class
Taught by industry leaders & working professionals
Topics include illustration, design, photography, and more

Lessons in This Class

    • 1.

      Land Your Dream Job from Your Couch

      2:05

    • 2.

      5 Simple Steps to Networking Your Way to Your Dream Job

      3:36

    • 3.

      Selecting Your Target Job / Industry

      3:28

    • 4.

      LinkedIn and Other Online Networking Tools

      5:29

    • 5.

      Who to Network With & Your Networking Worksheet

      5:30

    • 6.

      Breaking the Ice Online

      9:31

    • 7.

      Informational Interview Goal 1: Make Friends

      3:38

    • 8.

      Informational Interview Goal 2: Learn

      5:50

    • 9.

      Informational Interview Goal 3: Take Action

      4:14

    • 10.

      Informational Interview "No-No's"

      3:52

    • 11.

      Following Up and Staying In Touch

      3:57

    • 12.

      Sealing the Deal: From Networking to Landing Your Dream Job

      2:55

    • 13.

      Get Comfy on Your Couch and Land Your Dream Job

      1:18

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About This Class

Are you tired of applying to jobs online and never hearing back?

Have you seen less qualified people land better jobs because they "know the right people"?

Does the idea of "networking" make you feel awkward or uncomfortable?

This class is the answer!

 

In this class, we're going to cover how to build an awesome networking of allies and mentors who are going to help you land your dream job and continue to grow throughout your career!

And...

We're going to do all of it from the comfort of your very own couch. You can even wear your pajamas!

In this course, we'll teach a simple formula to online networking that will help you : 

  • Find the right people who can really make a difference in your career
  • Reach out to complete strangers in a non-awkward, non-creepy way that will actually make them want to talk to you
  • Get powerful people in your corner through some simple, low-pressure relationship building tactics
  • Convert your new network into the job opportunities you've been dreaming of

I've helped hundreds of clients and thousands of students land jobs and the lessons in this course have been the absolute most essential to finding success fast!

Meet Your Teacher

Teacher Profile Image

Greg Langstaff

Certified Resume Strategist. Fun Guy.

Teacher

Hey there! I'm Greg Langstaff, a Certified Resume Strategist and Interview Coach registered with the Career Professionals of Canada. I've spent 10+ years as a recruiter and hiring manager, and I've also spent the last 5 years helping people get great jobs. Next, I'd like to help you!

I believe that we're all excellent people, and that some of us just need a little help expressing how great we are during our job search. That's where I come in. Check out my courses to learn how to market yourself as an ideal candidate for your target employer :)

When I'm not writing a resume, or face-lifting someone's LinkedIn profile, you might find me watching basketball (Go Raptors!), or putting together a comedy show with my friends.

 

Thing... See full profile

Level: Beginner

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Transcripts

1. Land Your Dream Job from Your Couch: 85% or more of all jobs are gained through networking Now. This makes a lot of sense because foreign employer, the quality of their staff, is the single greatest determiner of their company's success. So hiring is a huge risk, and they want to mitigate that risk by hiring people that they're familiar with. And that, for us, is why networking is so important. You've probably heard the phrase It's not what you know. It's who you know, and this phrase is true. But what's unfortunate is that a lot of people use that in sort of a discouraging tone. And the mistake there is that getting to know the right people who can help us find our dream job is completely within our control. Matter of fact, it's not that hard, and that is exactly what I'm going to teach you how to do in this course. So whether you are lying in bed, sitting on your couch or even in the bathroom, all you need is your phone and the lessons that we're gonna cover in this class to help you to start building an amazing network of professionals who can help you land your dream job , Picture this scenario, You walk into your next interview. You already know half the people on the hiring panel and they're saying to everyone else, this is the person that we were telling you about. We're gonna get you there. My name is Greg Langstaff. I'm a certified resume strategist and I'm a professional job search coach. I've also got 10 years Experience is a hiring manager. I was recruited for two years and a personally spent several years myself traveling around Canada and the United States looking for jobs. So between all of my experience, I know most of the tips and tricks that we're gonna find on both sides of the hiring table . In this course, I've distilled everything I've learned about online networking. That's gonna help you land your dream job, meet all the right people that much faster. So if that sounds like what you're here for, that sounds like something that you need in your career. Then you're in the right place and I'm very excited to get started 2. 5 Simple Steps to Networking Your Way to Your Dream Job: Thank you so much for joining me for the second video of this course by deciding to take this course, you have now committed to yourself that you are no longer going to be one of those thousands of people who applies to a job online and then just closes their eyes, crosses their fingers and hopes for the best. You are taking control if you follow the lessons in this course properly. When you apply to a job online, there's gonna be someone waiting on the other end for your application and immediately penciling you in for an interview. Sounds pretty great, right, But we are going to get you there. So how do we build a network off online allies and mentors who are gonna help us to find our dream job in this smooth and confident way? Here's out. First, we're going to identify our target job and or industry. Next, we are gonna find people within and outside our network who are doing the type of job that we want to do and or working at the types of companies that we want to work for. Next. We're going to connect with these people in a warm, respectful and effective way that will maximize the chances that this person is actually gonna want help us. Then once we've found a useful person in a a useful position who is willing to help, we're going to deepen that connection through a person to person conversation. Then finally, we're going to use all of our new allies to continue expanding our network until someone connects us with a job opportunity. No, I want to It just acknowledge something before we move on. Um, so yes, networking. It takes some time and effort. It takes some energy. But I'll say this. You know what also takes a lot of energy. Maybe more energy is sitting on our couches for years, regretting not pursuing our dream job or even more so getting up every morning and just dragging ourselves to a job that we don't love. So whenever you're nervous or stressed or overwhelmed, throw this whole networking process. Just remember why you're doing it. You're doing it for yourself, doing it to take control and make your life the life that you're dreaming of. Okay. Sorry about the rant. Um, I just I don't want you to give up if you get discouraged at any point, Um, although a lot of you may not get discouraged at all because this process is fairly easy. Um, so before we move on, I just want to tell you a couple things that this course is not so in this course we're gonna be talking a lot about using linked in, and I don't have any content in this course on how to optimize your linked in profile. However, I do have a separate course and dedicated entirely to building an amazing linked in profile that you can find on my teacher Page. Um, I've also got courses on writing the winning resume and cover letter as well as how to crush your job interviews. Um, and all of these will be very, very helpful along your journey. In fact, if you follow the steps in this course, you may need a lot of those things sooner than you think. So in the next section, we're gonna start identifying jobs and industries that we're gonna be targeting in our networking efforts. So let's get to it. 3. Selecting Your Target Job / Industry: We're super lucky to live right now. In a time where networking has never been easier. As a crudely mentioned earlier, you can even do it from the bathroom. But that doesn't mean we want to just be networking blindly and wasting the time of ourselves or our other people. It's good to know exactly what jobs or industries that were targeting going in. Now, that doesn't mean you necessarily need to have decided exactly what job you want. In fact, networking is a great way to explore career options as well. So whether you're still exploring or you know exactly what you want, you need to have a plan and to build that plan I've got a worksheet that I'm going to show you that looks something like this. As I mentioned, we've got a few rows here because not all of us have our careers down toe. One single goal eso. If you've been deciding between a few ideas, this activity should really help you to prioritize eso for each area of work that you're considering. Philo a row with the following information. What is the job title? And this can be general if you don't have a specific job title for what you want to do. What is the industry that you want to do that job in? And you could leave this blank. Or you can write a few if you're flexible. Um, then on a scale of 1 to 55 being the best, how much would you enjoy this job? Ah, And then again, on a scale of 1 to 5, how realistic is it that you would be hired to do this job if you had some quality contacts in the industry? Finally, you're gonna add those two numbers together for a total score. I'm gonna do a couple right now just so you can kind of see how it works. Eso Let's say I've been thinking about playing shooting guard in the n b A, which I have, um, I would find that extremely enjoyable. However, I think if I knew the owner of the Toronto Raptors, well, even, let's say if I was the owner of the Toronto Raptors, I probably could not get a spot on the team. Um, although my jump shot is money, but that's beside the point. So I'm gonna give myself a one for realistic. I total Those scores together. Six out of 10. Now, let's do another one. Let's say I wanted to become a motivational speaker in the self help industry, which I do. Um how much would I enjoy this? Well, it's no n b a contract, but I think it's still really love it, so I'm gonna give it a five. How realistic would it be for me to break into the industry if I had some quality contacts who are already doing this kind of thing? Well, im gonna say, quite realistic. So I'm gonna get myself a four for a total of nine. Eso. If I were choosing between these two career paths, motivational speaker would be my top priority once you've completed. Ah, ro, for every job that you're considering, we're gonna pick our top two or three. And that's how we're gonna build our networking plan around those things. Does that sound good? Great. Okay, so if you haven't already, take some time now and complete that activity on your own. And when you're done, move on to the next section where we're going to talk about some essential networking tools 4. LinkedIn and Other Online Networking Tools: if we refer back to our five simple steps to networking your way to your dream job. Step one was identified Target job slash industry, and we did that in the previous section. The next step is to identify the individual people that we want to connect with in order to start this whole networking process. However, before we do that, I want to introduce you to some essential networking tools. Ah, the first and most important is, of course, linked in ah. LinkedIn dominates the space of professional oriented social media. LinkedIn has approximately 300 million active users per month and 120 million active users per day. At any given time, there are roughly 20 million jobs posted on LinkedIn. If you are serious about landing a job, whether you intend to do it with online networking or not a strong link in profile is a must. Why is that? Because employers, if they're seriously considering your application for a job, they're going to check you out on Lincoln whether you applied through linked in or not, it's also our best chance to connect with new people who might be able to help us with our job search. Um, of course, we're gonna be reaching out to new people to expand our network and hope to find a great new job. And obviously we want to make the best impression we possibly can. Um, and Lincoln is a great place to do that. So I always say that actively networking without a well made linked in profile is kind of like trying to sell your house while you have dirty dishes in the sink and cat hair on your couch. It's not impossible, but it's gonna be much harder. And the offers are not gonna be nearly as good. Eso If your linked in profile is subpar, make sure you take some time to upgrade it before you start this process. Um, I mentioned this earlier. I have a very helpful course on creating an amazing linked in profile. So if you've got a chance, I'd highly recommend checking that out. No, Some of the best features linked in offers that are gonna help us with our networking are things like groups. There's plenty of industry based groups that you can join to start to figure out who the major players are in your field. of choice. I've got a news feed where we can do all sorts of useful things, like post engaging content, comment on the post of other people within our network just to maintain relationships. And we can also just keep ourselves informed on industry industry trends. Um, another really helpful tool we're gonna explore later is just seeing who are. Mutual contacts are with other people on linked in very, very useful for for getting introduced to the right people. Um, people's profiles are really, really helpful. So say you find someone who's doing a job that you want to do, you can check out their profile, see what kind of experiences they had prior to this job and and how they got to where they are today. And honestly, there's just a whole lot more. Um, so we're gonna talk about how to use LinkedIn effectively later. But for now, I just wanted to talk about how much I love Lincoln. Um, so another great um, where there's several other great online networking tool with po. How did that sneak in their whips? Um, other great online networking tools. You can use your other social media platforms, so depending under industry platforms like Facebook, Twitter, even Instagram could be a great place to connect with potential networking partners. Um, of course, if you're using these platforms to build your network, same advice applies. Make sure you have a nice, neat, tidy profile that represents you as a professional. In fact, even if you're not networking using these profiles, I'd recommend tidying them up. There's nothing stopping a potential supporter or employer from scrolling through your Twitter feed. Um, even if you reached out to them through Lincoln Eso outside of social media, there's a few other ways you can connect with people who might be able to help. Um, so many companies leave their employees directories open to the public. So if you're there's a company that you really want to work for work with, you can do some searching around their websites, even get in touch with or find a contact for someone who you can get in touch with their, um, and a little later, we're gonna talk about how you can kind of reach out to people out of the blue in like a non creepy way. Um and then also a lot of people. If they're prominent and they're passionate about their industry. They might have a personal website or a blogger. Um, and you So you can search for these people and see if they've got their contact information on their personal website. I know. I certainly do. I have had some people reach out to me through there, of course. Um, so there's a lot of ways you can build your network online, and also there are offline options. So, you know, if you're speaking to people and they ask you how you're doing, recommend that you're in this networking process and see if they can connect you to anyone who might be able to help us. Well, eso that it is pretty much it for our online networking tools. And in the next section, I'm gonna introduce you to your networking worksheet, and then we're gonna start adding people to our list of people we want to meet 5. Who to Network With & Your Networking Worksheet: so networking can seem daunting. But whenever we're faced with a daunting task, what's the advice that we always seem to receive? Break that big task into small, manageable steps. So in this section, that's exactly what we're gonna do. So if you please take a look at the activity for this section, which I have dubbed the ultimate networking worksheet to. This is a really useful document that I use with my job searching clients all the time. And it's helped a lot of people not only to land jobs quickly, but also to develop some serious self confidence that has carried them through their careers. I found that a lot of people who go follow through on this networking work she quickly shift their mindset from one that kind of sits back and hopes good things happen to them into a mindset of someone who takes control and gets what they want on. That's us. Go. It's gonna help you your whole life. Um, so the purpose of this worksheet is really to help you make a list of everyone that you want to connect with and strategize on how you're going to connect with them and then track your progress along the way. It's a really great tool to kind of break this big process down into small steps on and also hold yourself accountable for networking. So in a minute, we're gonna talk about who you're gonna put on this list. But for now, let me just give you a quick tour. Eso first. We're going to list, obviously the person's name and then the way that we're gonna reach out to them, then we're gonna sort of track our progress as we reach out. Um, do we know the person? Yes or no? Do we have a mutual contact? Because that's obviously going to determine our strategy to reaching out to the person. A swell. And then hopefully, by the end, we can schedule ah phone call. A chance to talk with them in some way or another. Um, and it's fairly simple. I think you'll agree. Eso Now, let's let's talk about who to put on this list. What names do we adhere on? Where do we go to find those people? Um so for now, don't worry about reaching out to anyone just yet. We're just gonna talk about filling up this list eso I have four tactics for you to use to add people to your list. Um, and for now, we're gonna make the list as long as we want, and we will, because we're not going to reach out to have one right away. So don't worry about that. We just want a nice long list. Eso First, we're gonna start with anyone who we know, and these could be people who maybe have a job that we would like to have, or they work at a company that we'd like to work at next. We're going to search on lengthen for people who have job titles that we listed earlier in our targeting activity. Um, you can do this by typing the job title into the linked in search far and then selecting the in people option. Um, And then what will happen? You'll see a list of people and next to their name, you might see a little number. Um, and so anyone who's a first or a second add them to your list. Uh, those who are second, you'll see that you have some shared connections with them down here. Um and so include one of these names in your under the mutual contact column of the worksheet. Oh, and if you don't have any first or seconds, that's okay. We're just gonna have to do it the hard way. But even the hard way really isn't that hard. So just leave the mutual contacts. Ah, blank or put in any there. Next. If there is a company or two that you are dead set on working for, search that company on Lincoln and again select in people Option. Now, if you see anyone there who is a second degree connection, our first great and if not, just add whoever looks friendliest. If Lincoln doesn't yield great results for this, you can go to the company's website, Um, and just search around for a bit. See if you can find some contact information of individual staff members that you might be able to reach out to. In my old job, I was an industry leader in online orientation for universities, and I had people reach out to me this way all the time, and it was sure was a little bit weird, but it worked because I would take the calls and meet up with these people on, then finally you can. You can try other social media platforms, so you can either search the soda social media platforms or you can kind of put a call out to your to your network. And the way that I recommend doing that is maybe a post something like this, Like a hay friends. Um, some of you may know I'm exploring a career in whatever. And if any of you know anyone in the industry, I would love the chance to chat with an insider about their career journey of it. Thanks so much. And honestly, if you post something like this, you would be surprised at how fast people will jump to help you. Eso Those are really my four excellent tactics for adding names to your list. Hopefully, they're gonna help you build on unnecessarily long list of names of people who are gonna help you on your quest to your dream job. So in the next section, we are going to talk about how to get in touch with these with these people and get them to agree to chat with us over the phone 6. Breaking the Ice Online: Okay, so we know who we want to talk to. A great start. But how do we reach out to them in a way that's going to get them toe, wanna connect with us? And once we get to connect with them, how are we going to build that relationship? So they're actually willing to help us out in our career? Well, the first thing to know is that it's not gonna work out every single time. Not everyone we reach out to will want to get in touch with us and chat with us. And not every person that we talked to it's gonna be willing to help us out. That's totally okay. For two reasons. One, we are playing kind of a numbers game. You've got a lot of names on that list and you're gonna methodically work through them. And some are gonna work out fantastically and some not. And that's okay. And the second reason is that it only takes one amazing connection to change your career forever. In this section, we're going to cover how often you should be reaching out to people how to start a conversation. If you know the person that you're reaching out to well, how to start a conversation. If you don't know this person well, or even if you've only met them just once, Um, we'll go over how to get an introduction if you are a second degree connection with a particular person. And finally, we're even gonna cover how to introduce yourself if you don't know the person at all. So first off, how often to reach out? I usually say Start with 7 to 10 people per week. Um, if you do this, you can probably expect two or three of them to actually get back to you and maybe one or two of them to agree to talk to you over the phone. As time goes on and you get more comfortable with this, feel free to adjust this number up or down, Aziz, you see fit. So next. As for reaching out to someone that we know well, this is generally the easiest element of networking, but it can also be the most delicate. We don't want to damage any relationship, so just make sure you're not pushy, and you're just very grateful. Um, I'm also I'm not a big fan of the idea of buttering someone up was small talk before asking them for a favor because after the fact, that small talk will just sort of look kind of disingenuous. So my advice is, be polite, but get to the point. Eso If you were to email, one of these people are message them on linked, and it might look something like this. Hush, Therese. I'm not sure if I told you this before, but I'm pursuing a career in digital marketing, and I know that you're doing pretty well in your role at Hershey's. I'm hoping you might have 15 20 minutes to chat over the phone so I could learn a bit more about your journey and what it's like to work in digital marketing day to day. If you're willing, let me know a couple times that would work for you. And if you're not available right now, no worries. I appreciate you either way. Thanks. See in this week were polite or to the point, and we don't put too much pressure on them either. But we also include an action statement so we can get things moving a sap, and if they're not interested, we can no that right away and just move along. We also have that little no worries piece just to kind of take the pressure often. And I think this is important because even if it does lower our conversion rate on getting people to agree to a phone call, it also makes those who accept the phone call feel less pressure and then probably more likely to help us out in the long run. Eso next. Let's talk about reaching out to people who we don't know very well. Um, we've all had that person or people in our life who we've met or we've seen, and they're totally awesome and we feel like we know them until we go to talk to them and we realize we we don't really know them all that well, um, this is gonna be a bit tougher than reaching out to a friend or a family member. But if this person knows us in any shape, way, shape or form, we've got a decent chance of connecting with them. So in this version of reaching out is gonna be the same kind of thing. We're gonna be polite, get to the point we won't pressure them. But we're also going to remind them how we know each other. Eso here is an example of that. Hi, Daniel. I'm I'm not sure if you remember me, but we met two years ago when you came to my biology class at the University of Toronto. Ah, to do a guest lecture. And I stuck around after class and we chatted. Microbiology for 10 minutes or so, I found your lecture really helpful, especially at the beginning when you shared a bit about your career journey. In fact, I think back to your your career path of the career path you took often when I'm trying to visualize where I want my career to go. I'm currently a year out of school, and I'm still doing a fair amount of thinking about my next steps. I was hoping you would be willing to chat for 15 to 20 minutes over the phone so I can ask you a few more questions about how you got to where you are today and learn a bit more about your work. It would really mean a lot to me. So if you're willing, let me know a couple of times that would work for you. And if you're not available right now, no worries. This is a bit more formal, and we do take some time to remind them of our interaction. Previously, and also, why did we specifically think of them as someone to reach out to Now? These convey be a bit more delicate, and I don't want you to be discouraged. If the success rate is a bit lower, that's natural. So next let's talk about how to get an introduction to a second degree connection. So if someone you know has already offered to connect you with this person, this part's very easy. But let's say you're reaching out out of the blue toe. Ask for an introduction to one of these contacts that you've identified in your search. Ah, so this might look something like this Highclere. I'm not sure if I've shared this with you, but I'm currently pursuing a career in management consulting. I see you're connected on LinkedIn with House Stone, who works a T T l consulting. Doing the exact job. A moment to do one day. Do you know Alice well enough that you'd be willing to introduce the two of us s so I can ask her a bit about her professional journey and learned a bit more about our work. Um, if you're able to introduce me to Alice, it would mean a lot to me and really helped me out. If not, no worries at all. Exact same formula were polite quick into the point. But we also don't want to make any assumptions that are contact, Actually knows this person all that well because we all have random contacts on LinkedIn. If they say no, just move on to one of your other mutual contacts with this person. And if you don't have any others, then you can just add our target contact to the list of people who were going to reach out to who we have no contacts with. And I'm gonna teach you how to do that right now. So this situation I'll be honest, is usually a bit of a lower success rate. But this is kind of a numbers game, so just try your best. And if it doesn't work out, move on to the next one. When you reach out to this person, you want to break the ice a little bit. So I'm gonna give you a quick formula for the first message to this new, helpful stranger. Um, so in sentence one, we're going to disarm them with a totally honest sentence. This is gonna kind of act as a screening tool. It's gonna make us seem immediately relatable. It's going to start to build our relationship. It might scare some people off, but those air, that kind of people that probably wouldn't be willing to help us in the long run anyway. Um, and just the mere fact that you're reaching out out of the blue is going to scare a lot of people off anyway, So we're kind of just going for it here, and I'll show you what that looks like in a second. Next, we'll just explain out explain why we're reaching out to them in a very complimentary way. We're gonna ask them to connect, and then we'll throw some action steps at them, and we'll kind of take the pressure off just like we did in all the other messages. So here's a quick example of what that might look like and honestly feel free to copy as much of this directly as you want? Um hi, Pat. I know we don't know each other and half the messages, random messages I get on LinkedIn are totally scam me. So I'm half expecting you to ignore this, but I thought I would try you anyway. Smiley face, I'm reaching out because I'm looking to shift careers and move into a user experience design position similar to what you do. I took a look at your profile, and it looks like you've taken a really interesting career path, and I think I could learn a lot from you. I hope this isn't too much to ask, but I was hoping you'd be willing to chat over the phone for 15 to 20 minutes sometimes So I could pick your brain a bit about your journey and also the work you do. Now, if you're willing, let me know a couple of times that would work for you. Ah, and if you're not available right now, no worries. And that's that. You now have strategies to connect with pretty much anyone in the entire world, which is very, very cool. Uh, the opportunities. Surely you're gonna be opening up. As I said, not every single one of these things is going to work out, and not every outreach will result in a connection. But that's why we'll reach out to multiple people, and it only takes a couple before your career is really influenced by this networking eso. We're going to spend the next few sections covering what we're actually going to do when the person agrees to speak to us over the phone, and how do we make the most of that? 7. Informational Interview Goal 1: Make Friends: All right. So we've found some people who might be able to help us in our job search. We've reached out to a few of them now, and at one of them at least has agreed to chat with us over the phone, which is great. Eso what on earth do we do next? Well, during these conversations, which are sometimes called informational interviews, we have three you'll three goals. Ah, the first is to make friends. The second is simply to learn, and the third is to take some action. So in this section, we're going to briefly cover the make friends aspect because this is a huge, huge part of networking. It's not enough simply to know the right people. They also have to kind of like you if you're gonna get any significant help from them in the long run. Eso How do we make someone like us in a way that's ethical and natural and not contrived or fake? Well, honestly, if if you are not a horrible human being, this will actually be pretty easy. Um, you would probably do a lot of these things naturally, but I'm just going to remind you so you have all the tactics fresh in your mind. Eso first. Just be grateful. Be grateful of their time. Say thank you several times before, during and after the call just so they know that you appreciate them, taking the time out of their day to help you up. Next, listen attentively. This doesn't happen often, but I've had the odd informational interview conversation where someone has called me and asked me if they can learn from me. And then when we get on the phone, they spend most of the time just talking about themselves. It's quite off putting, and it definitely did not make Make me want to help that person. Next just relax mean let the conversation flow. You're you know you're gonna come in with some questions prepared, of course, and I'll teach you how to do ah to prep those in the next section. But your highest priority is to just have a good time and start building this relationship . Um, so if they start talking about the weather this weekend or the dog or something, just just go with it. And And don't be afraid to pepper in some personal details about yourself. Um, they might latch onto something that you have in common, and then the relationship can start to be a bit more deep. Next, don't force anything. Um, if you're overtly pitching yourself or blatantly asking for a job or just trying to kind of impress them with no regard for the flow of conversation, they're probably not gonna like this. Um, of course, if you can find a way to naturally mention like an impressive internship or relevant job experience that you've had like That's great, you can definitely do that. Just just don't force it on the same ghost with the social conversation. You know, they start talking about sports, and maybe you're not really into sports that don't pretend to be into sports. Just just be honest, be yourself and don't force anything. If you be yourself, you're polite and you're relaxed. The odds of you making a connection with someone who's gonna really help you with your career of much higher Now, in reality, not every one of these calls is gonna work out perfectly, and that's totally fine. That's why we're reaching out to so many people. Remember, it only takes one quality connection to change your career forever. So let's move on to the next section, where we're going to talk about the second goal of an informational interview, which is learning, what questions should we ask, and how do we make sure that we capitalize on the small amount of time that we have with this person? 8. Informational Interview Goal 2: Learn: The second thing we want to accomplish in our networking conversations or informational interviews is to learn from this person. Now, honestly, this part's gonna be really easy, because if you've reached out to the right people, which you have, there's a whole lot that you can learn from them. So the thing that we want to do here is coming with plenty of good questions so we can maximize our time with this person. But also show them that we're the type of person to do our research and come prepared. This will leave a great impression and make them all the more willing to help us out. Eso I'm gonna teach you how to do both of those things. But first, what is it we should be learning during these calls? There are three main things that I'm going to encourage you to try to learn from these networking conversations. Ah, first, how did the person get to where they are today? Next. What is it like to do what they do, slash work where they work and then finally, anything else that you really want to know? This should be fairly straightforward for you, but there are some nuances to getting this information. So let me give you some advice on that. Um, obviously we want to learn. But like I said, a part of the game, it's also to kind of subtly impress the person we're talking to as well. So here's how we do that. First, we're gonna do our research. So the person we're talking to, we're gonna look them up on, linked in. We're gonna google them. We're going to see if they have a blogger or something. We're gonna read, uh, posse's much on them as we can. We're also going to read up on their company's website and, ah, check if their company has been in the news to see if there's anything relevant there. And finally, we're also gonna look up their job title on Lincoln or indeed, and read through a few job postings for positions like there's just to see if there's some elements of their job that maybe we didn't know about. All this research is going to allow us to ask very specific questions. Now I can't stress enough. How much better oven impression you're gonna leave if you're asking specific questions that are informed by your research rather than very generic questions that anyone could ask. Ah, this is going to start to kind of validate you as an insider in the community, and it's also gonna let them know that you're the type of person who does their homework. So a couple examples of non specific questions and much more impressive and useful specific counterparts include instead of asking, Can you tell me a bit about how your career led you to where you are today? You could ask, How did you go from a degree in psychology to a job as the social media marketing coordinator at Coca Cola, One is kind of boring and bland. What is impressive? Another example. Instead of asking what kind of training did you receive that supported your career Success , you could ask. I see you took quite a few courses that Barker Sales Academy have those been helpful throughout your career again. One very generic. He could ask that to anyone. One shows that you've done your research and you're willing to put in the time to learn about the person you're talking to. Another example. What's it like working for your company? Boring versus I read that Air Cool Limited merged with Willis heating and cooling last year . Has that transition affected your day today? Much? Wow, this person really did the research impressive? One more example. Just for good measure. What is your typical day look like? Well, that's all well and good. But what if you could ask something like this? I was looking at a few job postings for senior business analyst rules, and it looks like there's a good mix of hands on work and management. What's the balance like for you again? One very generic. You could ask that to anyone. This shows you've done your research and you really care toe learn about this exact job opportunity. Ah, sometimes generic questions are okay. Ah, I generally say, if there's any sort of question that his of their opinion, um or you could really were you just really want to know and and there's no other way to ask it. So you might ask something like, What's one of the proudest moments you've had in your sponsorship manager position at Lemon Fresh Co. Um, what's the office culture like it? Office Files Inc. No, these are questions that they're gonna be able to answer? Hopefully, honestly. And really, it's only gonna be them who could possibly answer this question. So it's, you know, these these air. Okay. Now, as for how many questions we should have, um, I usually say, come with 8 to 10 questions. That should be plenty. Um, but be prepared to only ask half of them, just in case time is tight, or you kind of get off track or you start having fun talking about something else. Um, now I've prepared ah, worksheet for you where you can record your questions in advance. And then I also suggest you sword them out or you prioritized them so that you can ask, you know, your most pressing, most important questions at the beginning. And that way, if you don't get to all of them, you will not miss out on, well, you'll miss out on less and less valuable information as time goes on. Um, so you can take a look at the work shed that created questions for my informational interview. Um, for some guidance on listening and prioritizing those questions. Next, we're gonna talk about closing these conversations with some takeaways that can help you on your journey 9. Informational Interview Goal 3: Take Action: Okay, So we found someone at a company that we want to work for, doing the job we want to do, Got them on the phone or having great conversation. Great banter. We're learning a lot. Now. How do we close the deal? How do we get them to help us? Well, unless you know this person very well, we're not going to directly ask them for a job. Now, our goal is the end of the conversation. They say something like, You know what, Greg? You are exactly the type of person that we're looking for in this company. And I have, ah, colleague who has a position opening up. Would you mind sending me your resume? And I can forward and onto her and tell her all about you? Now, that's our best case scenario. But that's not likely to happen if we reach the end of the phone call. And we say something like, So can I have a job? Um, just I'm normally I'm a very direct person, but this is not the place for it. So how do we capitalize on this excellent opportunity, this new relationship and help have this person help us with our career. I'm gonna tell you about that right now. Well, if they don't directly offer to help us get a job, we're gonna ask for three things. First, do you have any advice for me as I'm trying to transition into a insert job title role? Ah, this one is great because they're usually going to give you some awesome actionable stuff. And it also might prompt them to offer to help you a bit more directly, but it's not too forward. Next you can ask them. Would you mind introducing me to one of your colleagues so I can learn a bit more about the industry. Now, I found that this one meets with a pretty high success rate, even if the person is not much of a helper. Ah, there. Still usually willing to at least pass you off onto someone else that they know. Um, that maybe that next person is the one who you're really going to connect with and who's gonna actually help you with your career. Um, this also it just helps us to keep learning and keep expanding our network. Next, you can ask God, Do you mind if I check in with you every once in a while as I continue my career journey. Um, this one also is usually pretty successful because for someone to say no to this, they have to be a very direct and be very rude or very busy. Um, either that or you did something tremendously offensive during the phone call from. But as I said, they're probably going to say yes to this one as well. So, um, the reason we asked their permission to do things like follow up with them is then, you know, if we haven't already added them on LinkedIn weaken do that. But also say you got an interview with their company in the future, you can reach out to them and ask them a bit more about the role that you can talk to him about the hiring committee themselves. Um, so those are three takeaways that have found that most beneficial at the end of a networking call or informational interview. Ah, if the calls ending abruptly and you only have time for one of these things, I would stick with number two just to kind of keep your networking chain moving. Um, so as you go through this process and you set up more calls, you'll find that some people are not. They're just not gonna want to help you. Um, and maybe they took the call because they didn't know how to say no or they felt obligated . But there are also plenty of people who do want to help. And really, it only takes one person helping you to substantially change your entire career. So don't worry about the bad calls. Don't worry about the so so calls. If you keep at it, it will not be long before you find someone that you really connect with that's gonna really help you with your career. Um, so now we've covered pretty much everything that you need to do to take advantage of these informational interviews. And before we move on, I just want to talk about in the next section. Ah, some things that you need to avoid during these conversations. So let's get to that right now. 10. Informational Interview "No-No's": you're all adults. So a lot of the stuff that we cover in this section is going to be common sense for you, But I wouldn't be doing my job and I wouldn't feel as though I had fully prepared you if I didn't at least touch on some of the things that you need to absolutely avoid in these informational interview conversations. So we're just gonna touch over this briefly, and then we'll move right along. One. Don't just ask them for a job. This means don't say things like, Can I have a job? Do you know anyone who could help me get a job for? I need help finding a job. Why not? Well, for one, they already know that you are job searching and that you need help. People don't typically set up these kinds of networking calls unless they are, so. These questions are already somewhat implied on if they want to help, they will offer. Secondly, it just puts way too much pressure on them and puts them in a very awkward position very early in your relationship. You want to give them some time, let the relationship develop, and when they are ready to help you out. They are going to offer next. Don't talk their ear off pitching yourself. Uh, honestly, it can be really tempting to get on the phone with someone who is in a position that you want to have one day and think. Okay, I have to show them I'm worthy. Honestly, I have done this before. I've been on I as a job searcher. I've done this. I have been on the other end of it as I'm trying to help someone. And it's very frustrating on my side when someone calls and asked me to learn from me. And then they spend the whole time talking about themselves. So, yes, you can tell them about yourself. Definitely. Ah, you can slip in the fact that you did this impressive project or you one salesperson of the month last January. That kinda stuff is fine. Just don't talk that you're off, You know, make sure the conversation is natural and balanced. And if anything, it should be more about them. Third, just don't don't act entitled or ungrateful in anyway. Um should be pretty easy if you're naturally nice person. But just remember this person they didn't have to take the time out of their day to help you out there doing your very nice favor. Um, if they have to go early or they're a little late, you know, be graceful about it. Say no problem. I'm grateful for any time that you're able to give me, um and just thank them. Thank them for their insight for their advice on and, you know, don't Don't be rude at any point in time, because even if they're not gonna help you out, who knows who they might tell if you if you do or say something unprofessional, So just be nice. I'm sure you were already going to do that anyway. Next. Ah, don't come in un prepared. We talked about this. Have your questions ready. Do you research? You're gonna be fine. Also, if you can make sure you're taking the call in a quiet place, so you're not gonna be distracted. Uh, just so we could make sure this goes as smoothly as smoothly as possible. And finally don't don't lie. Don't exaggerate. Just be yourself. Be totally honest with where you're at in your career, what you've done so far, where you see yourself heading. We want to be Aziz genuine as possible, because that's how we're gonna find the best fit for someone who's willing to help us out. Um, Now, as you progress through your networking journey, you're gonna get better and better having these conversations, you'll probably be able to add your own no nose to these little to this list of things that you know work for you and don't work for you. Um, so, honestly, don't worry so much if your first few calls don't go incredibly well cause you're gonna be a master networker in no time. 11. Following Up and Staying In Touch: Okay, So after we've had this great productive conversation with a new contact, the last thing we want to do is disappear from their mind. But we also don't want to be pestering them every couple of days until they offer us a job , because that's not gonna work either. So here are two things that you can do immediately after the call to cement that good impression. And then three more things you could do consistently down the line to make sure that your top of mind of them when the right opportunity comes along. So within 24 hours, you should be sending a thank you message to express your gratitude to this person for taking the time to chat with you. Things you can include in that email a message are several more heartfelt Thank you's some highlights of the things you enjoy discussing and learning from them and a recap of any action items that you agreed upon. Um, now, if you did agree to take any action personally following this meeting, do it. Ah, one of the things that really grinds my gears is when I introduce an eager job searcher to someone in my network, and they never bother to even reach out to that person if or if they say they'll send me something and then it takes a couple of days or even weeks, Um, so just consider the action that you agreed upon with this person to be kind of a trial for how you might perform on the job. How well can you deliver out quickly out professionally? Next? Of course, you want to stay in touch with this person in the long term. Eso How do we keep on their mind without emailing them every few days, asking if they have a job for us yet? Well, there's a few tactics that I'd like to share with you first stay active on Lincoln. Now this is a great way to stay in touch because Lincoln, uh, it's not quite as full of content as some of our other social media platforms. So even if you're posting something once a week, that's plenty of, um, content for them, even if they're just a casual user toe log in and see in their news feed. Ah, you can share things like news articles related to your industry. Ah, you construct blogging about your professional journey. You can share any professional updates or accomplishments, Um, or even you can just share other people's posts. And ah, and that's Ah, another great way to be seeing on Lincoln. Um, so if you're not sure exactly what to post on, lengthen, just scroll through for a few days and see what other people are posting and just kind of get the feel for it next. If if this person is someone that you're following on LinkedIn or another social platform, you can take some time to comment on their posts. Don't do it every single time, because that's creepy. But every once in a while it's a great way to start another conversation. And finally, you can still send them a message from time to time. My only advice here is make sure that message is has some substance to it. You don't want to just send Ah, how are you? How have you been? Because I find those tend to peter out pretty quickly. Um, so maybe if you have, you know, some follow up on some advice that they gave you, or you see an article that reminds you of a conversation you add with them. Those are great ways to restart that conversation and just ah, keep yourself on their mind in the long run. So now that you kind of know how to continue to make a good impression with these people after your call was over, they're gonna be much more likely to think of you when the right opportunity comes up. That kind of fits your profile. Um, so this is a great way to kind of translate that great connection you have with someone into possible job opportunities down the line. Eso next. We're gonna talk about some of the other tools that you need in your tool belt, so that when someone does decide to help you, you're completely ready to take advantage. 12. Sealing the Deal: From Networking to Landing Your Dream Job: as I mentioned, our best case scenario is one of these networking conversations ending with something like , Wow, you know, you are exactly the type of person we're looking for. Send me your resume and I'll see if we can get you in for an interview later this week. Or maybe something like, uh, you know, my friend has a position over at GNS that might be just perfect for you, so I'll send you the link to the job posting. Let me know when you've applied, and I'll tell my friend to look for your application. Or maybe it might be something simple. Azaz. You know, it was really nice to get to know you were not hiring right now, but send me your resume will keep it on file, and I'll reach out next time. There's something available in your wheelhouse. Now, if you keep working at this networking on and continue to build relationships, eventually one or more of these situations is gonna happen to you. Now, each of these good news examples requires a few things. First, you gotta have a top quality resume ready to go. The last thing you want to do is go to all the trouble of making a great impression on this new valuable connection, have them go out on a limb and offer you some sort of opportunity on Lee to have you send them a low quality resume or make them wait a week or more for you to get something together. Ah, Second, in most cases, you're still gonna have to be able to pull together a cover letter fairly quickly. Now, obviously, this is only applicable if they ask you to apply for a specific job. But in the case that they do, this is something you have to be ready for. And finally, you're still gonna want to be very confident with your interviewing skills. No matter how well that your networking, you are very likely to still be asked to sit for an interview. So this is an essential skill. Now I will say this networking is probably the most important part of your job search. But all your good work can be completely derailed if you are not ready to deliver on these other essential elements. Luckily for you, I have spent 10 plus years refining my expertise in each of these areas and I have got classes that will cover each one of these topics, just like we covered networking here today. So if you are serious about landing your dream job and you haven't already done so, I urge you to check out my other courses on how to write a winning resume, how to write a winning cover letter in less than 20 minutes, how to crush job interviews and how to create an amazing linked in profile. I have had literally thousands of students. Now take these courses and I could not recommend them more highly. Make sure you are absolutely prepared when the perfect opportunity comes their way. Now, before we go, I'm gonna share some final thoughts on your networking journey. 13. Get Comfy on Your Couch and Land Your Dream Job: our team. Congrats. You made it to the end of the course. You are now ready to get this online networking journey started. Your dream job is closer than you think. And you are totally ready for this. Think about it. You know who you're going to reach out to. You know how to get in touch with them. You know how to break the ice in a non creepy way. You know how to get them on the phone. You know how to build a relationship, Learn from them, get them to help you land your dream job. You know everything you need to know. And now you are no longer going to be one of those people who just applies to a job online and then sits there and waits. You are taking control and you're gonna land your dream job that much faster. The first person that you should reach out to Arlington is me. Greg Langstaff. That's lengthen dot com slash in slash Greg Langstaff Had a lot of people reach out to me over the years. It's really, really rewarding to hear from my students how this class is helping them out. So please don't hesitate to reach out. I love to hear of all about your journey and how you're working towards landing your dream job, which I'm sure is gonna be very, very soon. If you follow the lessons that we went over here today. Take care and good luck.