Your resume, your networking enemy.
The number one rule on the networking scene? Leave your resume at home! Many still think networking is about collecting business cards and distributing resumes. But shuffling your resume under the nose of a person you just met will rarely have a positive outcome.
1. Why you should never take your resume to a networking interview
Let’s pretend you are the networking contact. You took time out of your busy schedule to meet this person. You checked his/her profile and you think you might give them useful information. But the moment you sit down, this person makes it clear he or she has zero interest in you. Not only are they rambling on about how great they would be for the job that just opened at your company, but they also slide over their resume to your side of the table.
15 minutes later, you are walking back to your office with the resume. In the worst case, you toss the resume in the bin. Or you decide to drop it on the desk of the HR manager. But when that person asks you about the resume, you can’t say anything about that person and you are not particularly willing to do so. Result: that resume gets on the stack of resumes. The difference with applying online? None, except a serious loss of time on both sides.
2. But how do you share your resume then?
There is another technique. This one is where you ban the word “resume” from your head. You prepare well for your interview, check your contact’s LinkedIn, think about questions to ask. It makes you feel more relaxed because you are here to get information on a job or a company, not to share your resume.
The day of the interview, your networking contact is flattered by your to-the-point questions, both on his/her profile and the company. He or she asks about you and that is when you drop your pitch. The interview ends with a smile and a “Let’s keep in touch.” You send a Thank You-message, you keep your contact updated on how your job search goes. And then you get an urgent email: “Can you send over your resume?”
Indeed, your networking contact has gotten the chance to get to know you. A new job popped up at his or her company and it only took 2 seconds to realise that you might be the ideal candidate. And the difference with applying online here? You are cutting the queue because you have someone from the inside pushing out your resume with a warm recommandation.
Have you ever used one of these techniques? Did it work out?
