Bless up from your feet to your head top

We go again

Since I was young I have made it my objective to help find people their space in the marketplace. Help them see what their capabilities are live up to them and put them on display for future employers.

It has been my pleasure over the years where I can say I have put dozens of young black people into positions to succeed in their fields. Be it real estate, Fashion, Art, Marketing or sales.

I find, It’s not about the overhaul of someone’s character overnight, it’s to allow them to see what their potential is.

Now I live with a true discerning eye and am not easily excitable by what someone thinks they bring to the table, however when I see that spark of someone who wants to do more than they are doing now because they know they are capable. Well, I can’t help but to see teenage me in that persons posture.

I was a young teen having to get up and go after it as if I didn’t do it myself there was a queue I had to be a part of before seeing my own. So to say, there are many people asking for someone to give them something but there are few people who decide to get up and go.

The get up and go route has you hitting ceilings without the right mentorship and recruitment is an industry but negotiating your worth is a value in personal development. You pick one. Whether you want to look good on a stack of papers not dissimilar from your own or you get up and go after it and negotiate your price with the market. There are hybrid choices however you either have the latter skill or you don’t, there is no half measures

The market decides the value of someone with particular qualification. Only you can negotiate with a price you accept.

That being said learning to do that and imbuing people from 18-31 with that ability one after the other is a joy to see. There are people who prefer I link them with someone in my network however that favour is not easily gifted to someone who wants such a route.

As I see it there’s 3 principles of negotiating your price after you have seen what value someone like yourself brings to the marketplace.

1) Can you Transform your Skill

Knowing what the market is asking for. Degrees aside. Skills are the true value. What I have seen is many skills by degrees are transferable, there are few technical requirements an industry asks for that being said there a chosen lot of skills, in a manner of speaking there has to be a bag you’re a part of to be seen. Do you display them and do you have them with your education/degree alone. Like I said fancy degrees aside, there are many people on paper that have done what you have done and possibly at a better place.

The key differentiator is what is your work experience like and what key experiences have you had that can grace your CV/Resume in such a way that they matter enough to an employer.

2) Can you get in front of people

Second is crucial, do you have hustle enough to get in front of the right people, let me say it in a different way. Do you have the ability to get you experience to be seen by someone who is actually hiring and will hire you.

Many people sit on LinkedIn with a well structured CV that is well worded with a good structure and believe that should be enough. Maybe for the top one percent, maybe even 10 however if you are in the 90% with the rest of us there’s a ladder that you have to climb that isn’t built of lucky breaks but consistent work over time. Your network shows you who you are, my small key is do you have unnameable proof that despite your education and experience that you are here to work and not just have a job. Does your network, not of recruiters or hiring personnel but of peers and mentors, allow you to have a shot in the market place.

3) Can you start from the bottom

These are all resting qualitative and quantitative performance indicators that express to all in your industry peer mentor and otherwise that this person means business and will be a value to any organisation that they’re a part of. And everyone is pleased to have them there, in fact if they weren’t there performance of the team would falter because they bring the energy of someone who is key to growth and industry.

Third is just as important. Are you ready to start from the bottom and prove yourself. Can you be humble even when your skills and experience tell the story of a well qualified endowed personnel member that will work well enough to show their value in a matter of days. ‘Above and beyond the call of duty’ some people call it, but it’s true. Like I said in key 2 are you here to work or are you here to be part of payroll. Thousands of people are here to be a part of payroll, are you unlike those enough to really say you are here to work.

Those aren’t the dime a dozens, and the happy to be here types they are the keys to a company dominating in the marketplace. Applying to all industry and are represented as such in many organisations across the world