“No Problem, Mon”: A Lesson in a Jamaican Job Search You Can Apply Today

by Duncan Mathison

I was at the boat yard last week and got an unexpected reminder on how to conduct a networking based job search from a Jamaican boat worker.

He was an older man with the rough weathered face of someone who has spent a lifetime working in the glare of the sun on the sea. He was repairing the boat docks at the yard with a few hand tools and stopped to talk.

At first I did not understand why he wanted to chat. He was working and I was trying to figure out how soon on my boat would out of the boatyard and back in the water.  Idle discussion was a distraction. But after a few minutes, I realized he was working on getting his next job. Not obviously, but with a studied casualness that was very effective and worth a close look for anyone who is having a networking conversation with a potential hiring manger.

So let me share with you what he did and break each part down to five steps important to any job search networking meeting or job interview. These tips are essential whether you are a boat worker or a Vice President of whatever.

Five Easy Jamaican Lessons to Improve Your Networking and Job Interviews:

Step 1 of the Jamaican’s Job Search: Like most potential hiring managers, I was focused on something very important to me but related to his business interest: my sailboat. He started the conversation by making an observation about the design of the hull and asked what I thought about it and in particular what I liked about. Of course, I love my boat so I happily responded.

The Lesson: Engage the hiring manager to talk about something important to them such as the company, the work or the profession. This small talk sets the stage for what comes next but it’s not random. It focuses the discussion on a mutual, business related interest. Be sure to skip the golf game, comments about the family pictures, or the nick-knacks on the desk. They might get a hiring manager to talk, but it will be in the wrong direction. Instead make an observation or ask a question about their work. If you are at a loss of what to say, start with “How’s business?”

Step 2 of the Jamaican’s Job Search: After a brief discussion of boat woodwork, he then told me he was born in Jamaica and survived as a child spear fishing for his own food. “I never got a chance to go to school” he said, “I had to learn through experience.”

The Lesson: Provide a “hook” to pique interest. Everyone had something interesting that tells people about their character.  Did you work for someone famous? Did you live somewhere unusual or challenging? Or grow up in a small town far away? Choose something you have found that gets you an “Oh Really?” reaction without being shocking or scary.

Step 3 of the Jamaican’s job Search: After that, he then told me that as a teenager, he moved to Kingston where he worked odd jobs to survive until one fateful day a wooden yacht, damaged in a storm limped into the harbor. He started by running errands for the yacht owners and spent more than two years working on the boat and serving as a deck hand where he learned the ins and outs of being a shipwright.

The Lesson: Link who you are to the work you do.  Hiring managers need to assess who you are, what you know and what makes you tick.  Be able in two sentences to describe your profession, something about the level of knowledge and experience and what engages you about the work. It could be about fun, satisfaction, a sense of purpose or how you define success.

Step 4 of the Jamaican’s Way: He then went on to say that his friendship with that first boat owner continues today. Just recently, he said, the owner had him visit Northwest for a cruise in the San Juan Islands. The message was clear, “I am trusted, I know my way around boats both on and off the water.”

The lesson: Offer 3^rd party proof to the quality of your work.  It might be enough to talk about accomplishments but don’t forget to talk about what your boss or the company brass thought about your work. Be gracious, be humble but be clear about how the value and the quality of your work has been recognized. Recognition takes many forms. It could be an award, a promotion, a saved customer or a new policy or product implemented as a result of your innovation. The important thing was that it was recognized by a third party in authority to whom your prospective manager could relate.

Step 5 of the Jamaican’s Way: Up until this point, I had assumed that my Jamaican friend was an employee of the boat yard. But he then made a point to reveal that he was an outside contractor who had been brought in on and off for the last six years to do woodwork. He then mentioned he was available to work on boats for any number of small jobs. I actually found myself putting together a mental list of projects even though he not once asked me for a job.

The Lesson: Reveal Your Situation and offer availability. Maybe this seems obvious and it would be if you are interviewing for a specific job opening but don’t be so sure. Many times I have had networking meetings with job seekers and left the meeting unclear about what type of a position they wanted. Besides, in any job interview it is always helpful to “close” (a sales term) the hiring manager on the next step in the hiring process.  For example, “I am currently looking for a new position, what is your timing when you would like to have someone on board?”

And if the hiring manager is Jamaican, the answer might be, “Ya Mon! You’re hired!”

Tags: career advice, Duncan Mathison, hidden job market, interviewing, interviewing tips, job interviews, job search, prospective boss, Transferable Skills

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 20th, 2010 at 8:16 am and is filed under Blog, interviewing, job search, networking, Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.