Career progression or just more money?

When discussing a jobseekers motivations for looking for a move, two of the most common reasons I hear are career progression and for a payrise. The two are closely linked, with the first generally taking care of the latter, but too often they are confused as one and the same thing.

In many circumstances it seems that a jobseekers idea of career progression correlates to earnings and earnings alone. Understandable that this is seen as a positive move, but if you’re really looking for career progression, the salary of your next position shouldn’t really come in to the equation. Naturally, very few of us are prepared to take a drop in salary, but when considering your career earning potential, the salary you earn over the next 12 months will have little to no bearing on what you might be earning in a few years time. It’s the work itself that will make the difference.

If you want to significantly increase your earning potential, be patient and don’t focus on what your monthly income will be over the coming year. Think about what your earnings will be over the next 5-10 years. A position paying £3k more than another has the short term appeal of the higher salary, but as a stepping stone will the position itself help you climb to the next step up in your career faster than the other? Of course it could, and if so – result! If not however, the role with the lower salary but better development could be the sensible option.

Consider a Sliding Doors situation. On one universe you take the role paying £3k more and 5 years down the line you’re doing the same job as you are now and are again looking for a step up in your career. Meanwhile in the parallel universe the other you, who took the lower paying role, has already gained 5 years experience in a more senior position, developing their skills and experience accordingly. Chances are they’ll have already overtaken your earnings and now they also start looking for a new job, but in this scenario they’re looking for a job two steps higher up the ladder than you are. If they stay on their toes they’ll remain the higher earner right through till retirement and their overall career earnings will dwarf yours.   

Of course, it’s not always as clear cut as in this example, and it’s not every day we find ourselves with two job offers on the table. However, the same logic should be applied if after resigning your current employer tries to persuade you to stay by matching the salary on offer elsewhere. A short-term win perhaps, but how will staying affect the long-term path of your career?

CV's can't talk back - so why not discuss any question marks with the consultants who sent them?

When using recruiters, if you are prepared to instruct them to assist with a role and represent your firm to market, you should have faith in their ability to find suitable talent and to identify the closest match to your requirements, regardless of whether on a retained or contingency basis.

I’m not suggesting that recruiters never get it wrong (and why continue to use those who often do?), but the best hiring managers and HR Coordinators will take time to seek advice from them on why you should meet with those they’ve recommended, and to challenge any concerns they might have when reviewing a CV.

The best talent won’t necessarily have the best looking CV, so relying on the document alone is ignoring the experience and judgement of a recruiter who will have rejected countless of other applicants they’ve met in person, ahead of the shortlist they have ultimately sent through. If your faith in a recruiter’s recommendations results in interviewing irrelevant candidates, you will at least have identified that this is a recruiter you shouldn’t be working with in future.

The problem may be that too many recruiters have been instructed or that those who have are sending far too many CV’s, so some ruthless filtering has to be applied to narrow down the shortlist, but that’s a blog for another day.

I’ve recently been asked by a new client to assist with filling a vacancy that has already been on the market for a close to two months. My first thought has to be to consider whether this is going to be a wise investment of my time? If it’s taken so long already and nobody has been found, is there actually anybody out there who can do this job, or is the client being unrealistic in their expectations?

Having completed my due diligence with the HR Coordinator on the position, it was clearly a good opportunity, paying market rate salary and with reasonable expectations on the experience required. I asked why it had proved to be so difficult to fill, and was told the line manager had rejected CV’s due them lacking relevant industry experience, or for having too unstable a career history.

Perfect, I thought! I know an excellent candidate who has 6 years legal sector experience with the same firm who would love this job and would be able to hit the ground running. Unfortunately however, his CV was also rejected at introduction stage by the line manager. There was no discussion about the candidate before the rejection, and no opportunity to talk through the reasons why with the line manager whose decision wasn’t challenged by the HR Coordinator, just a straight ‘no’ based on the CV alone.

If I wanted to, I could pose several questions about an individual’s experience, ambitions and drive from reviewing a CV, but unfortunately paper doesn’t talk and without meeting or speaking to that individual those questions remain unanswered. I can make assumptions of course, but is this really a good way to judge someone’s worth? I think not. Had a recruiter who’d met the individual sent their CV to me, the very least I would do is speak to them to find out a little more.

It transpires that nearly every CV submitted had been rejected at introduction stage for a whole host of different reasons by the line manager who had no direct contact with recruiters and didn’t wish to hear explanations/responses to his concerns.

The consequence: a vacancy which takes months to fill despite high calibre talent being available and a series of recruiters feeling their time and effort has been wasted and would be better spent in future focussing on competitor businesses.