To the brain, uncertainty is a threat. Which is why, for leaders in transition, our neurobiological safety mechanism goes into overdrive. It thinks it’s helping by tightening control and increasing vigilance in unfamiliar territory. That’s when the saboteurs show up.
It’s not working.
You’ve updated your LinkedIn profile with the help of a professional resume writer. You’ve contacted everyone in your network and beyond. You’re in full launch mode. You might have skipped the fundamental part where you’re defining what you are bringing to market.
Structure your narrative so it lands with impact. Because you’re being assessed on dimensions most interviewers can’t clearly articulate, and using criteria they’ve never been trained to evaluate, it’s important to understand what’s actually being judged.
Congrats, you’re invited for an interview for this role you applied to! This is hopefully the first step of many: you’ll have five, ten conversations, maybe more, with different people across the organization.
You’re looking for a job: don’t become a Candidate. I’m not telling you not to look for your next role. I’m telling you to remain the Leader you are while doing so. Because the moment you switch to Candidate mode, needy, desperate, it will crush you.
Poker Face Remember Casino Royale? In the 2006 movie, James Bond makes it seem like winning at poker is about decoding the opponent’s “tell”: the subtle twitch of the eyebrow, the cough, the tiny involuntary gestures that betray that someone is trying to hide something. In his book One Plus One Equals Three, Dave Trott…