Door64 Tech Fair Hosted Brian Massey and “The Market for Me: Surviving Job Loss and Building Your Lifetime Career Network”

Wow, long title, and yes posts about this session from the recently held Door64 Tech Fair (@door64_texas) are already all over the Web.  But, I have to put in my two cents!  I feel strongly that the messages delivered by Brian Massey (@bmassey) are well worth covering and repeating!

Brian Massey Gets Ready to Present

The oversubscribed session at the Door64 Tech Fair was filled with many technology experts currently without a company to call home.  They were the ideal audience for Brian’s message.  Many audience members were using traditional job board applications as their method for job seeking.  But as Brian so eloquently pointed out–it’s your network that will get you hired–not a job board application.

Authoring a new book, The Market for Me: Surviving Job Loss and Building Your Lifetime Career Network and teaming with Joshua Shipsey’s CardboardResume.com (developed the software to go along with the book)  Brian outlined the success strategies needed by today’s job seekers.  He opened the session by asking “How many people in this room have recently applied for a job?”  After the large show of hands he asked, “Why didn’t you e-mail me to see who I know in my network that can connect you to that job?”  That clearly drove home the point!

Line to Get In--Many Were Soon to be "Skill Holders"

Reiterating the well known fact that 75% of jobs aren’t posted fed into his message about a new way of looking for a job.  He also stressed the necessity of creating a market for your skills so that you decide who can buy them.  Instead of being a “Job Seeker” you become a “Skill Holder”.   And you are a skill holder with a wide network that knows about the availability of your skills.  Plus, you’ve become a smart network manager who applies that golden rule of networking–providing help and helpful information to your network.  It only takes a second for a LinkedIn connection to provide an introduction for you.  It helps reinforce their network and grows yours.  So always remember to offer something to your network.  It will pay you back ten-fold.

Brian will be presenting along with Bridge Austin’s Kim Brushaber (@kim_brushaber)  at an upcoming workshop entitled “Get Hired!–Job Search Strategies That Work” to be held in Austin on May 27th.  You can get more information and register for the event here.

Brian's New Book: The Market For Me

Once again, I’m underscoring the dynamic day and content at last week’s Door64 Tech Fair.  If the job seekers in that room didn’t turn into skill holders by the end of that session they weren’t paying attention.  But I know they were because the questions and enthusiasm showed through loud and clear.