I picked up another personal coaching client yesterday. Actually she picked me.
A few weeks ago there was an article in the local regional Sunday newspaper about how LinkedIn is hugely helpful for the underemployed, when used correctly.
So last week I received an email from an exec at a very large corporation who read the article and decided it’s time to move on, and her question to me, to decide if I am the right coach to work with, or should she work with my competitors:
how can she show “why her” better than what is on her resume?
Now that’s a question I love to answer.
And I did; during our discussion she told me she had paid someone to write her resume (and was not really thrilled with the end result) and she now wanted to have someone rewrite her LinkedIn profile. I gave her my opinion on the resume, as a great article I came across yesterday reinforced my contention, it is “dumb, mute and defenseless.”
The matchmaking began by phone, with my proposal to work with her over 4 sessions. One look at her personal LinkedIn profile as I listened to her, and I knew we had a handle-able challenge on our hands.
We.
She has to rewrite it in her own words, I explained, but with my guidance, I will pull from her themes and threads to tie her rich experience together in a functional review of her past that makes her who she is today, and where she wants to go in the future. Resumes just can’t do that. Her LinkedIn profile will complement her resume, so prior expenditure is not a waste.
Somewhere in the dialog we both decided we had a nice match of personalities and she emailed yesterday to say I was hired. Nice.
I am awaiting a signed proposal by fax or scan, so perhaps I shouldn’t speak too soon. But I take her at her word.
Let’s see:
- newspaper : e-news
- paper mail : email
- fax : scanned document
- resume : LinkedIn
Antiquated 
concepts : today’s versions.
Get with the program. We have moved beyond a Model T.
Fortunately, honorable business dealings still prevail.
