Читать книгу How to Find Work in the 21st Century - Ron McGowan - Страница 30

Here is another requirement for succeeding in today’s workplace to which people don’t pay enough attention. You need to be far more cognizant about who you are, what you’re good at, and what type of people and companies you want to work with. If you’re currently working on a contract, you should have a plan of action for finding your next contract. It’s always a juggling act for today’s contract worker.

Unless you’re one of the lucky ones who still has a stable job and works for a company that provides some help in mapping out a career strategy, you’ll have to take ownership of this issue yourself. Even if you’re in a stable job, you should have some kind of plan in place in case you lose it.

You are responsible for managing your own career, and the only security you have is tied directly to how marketable your skills are, how creative you are in finding work, how well you communicate, and how good you are at recognizing opportunities where you can apply your skills.

The first step in managing your own career is to be very clear on what skills you have to sell to potential employers. Most people are weak in this area. Chapter 2 will eliminate that weakness by getting you to go through a series of exercises to determine exactly what it is you have to sell to potential employers. This will set the stage for Chapter 3, which focuses on how to market yourself. You can’t sell yourself effectively unless you’re crystal clear on what you have to sell. The better the job you do in Chapter 2, the more comfortable you will be with marketing yourself.