PERFORMANCE REVIEWS: BEWARE! | Honest HR Nitrous Ep.194

[00:00:03][snorts] H yeah, Ricky Jervase. I don't think that's a real person.

[00:00:08]It's like back in the day when people were famous for for nothing. I think Paris Hilton was leading the charge on that. She was famous for like having a certain type of nose or something. Uh anyway, hello everybody. Welcome to Honest HR Nitrous. I am Bill, the company's expert. Thank you for joining me today. Uh this is the live stream I do a couple of times a week where it's a Q&A. It's your shining moment, your moment of glory where you can ask me a question. Think of think of how many wish they were in your shoes right now.

[00:00:39]Um, yeah. So, uh, basically, if you are a subscriber to my channel and you have been so for, uh, any amount of time, you should be able to see a chat box somewhere in the vicinity of the video feed, uh, depending on what device you're watching this on. And if you are, uh, get into the chat box and let me know what's up with you, what you're struggling with, what you're wondering about. Uh, and I'll do my best to help you out. That's the whole point of these. Uh, this is the, uh, the 194th episode of Honest HR Nitrous. It's called performance reviews beware. So, this is the first time I think I've ever talked about performance reviews um in a general sense. So, we're going to get into that. Um, also just a shout out to my YouTube channel members and my subscribers uh my Patreons and my super thanks donors. Those are always nice to get.

[00:01:38]Um, thank you and also to my viewers and participants. You guys are awesome. Um, join my channel. Okay. Uh, so let's dive in here. I think that's all the public service announcement stuff over with.

[00:01:54]Uh, we got eight people here. Thank you for joining me today. And let's jump in.

[00:01:59]So, performance reviews. Yeah, hopefully everybody knows what these are. Okay, so just just so we're all on the same page, performance reviews are you're working at a job and every once in a while, okay, uh, usually at least once a year, they do a performance review. And in my experience, it's always been closely accompanied or tied to an annual meeting they have to do with you anyway, which reviews your compensation. So if there's like an annual cost of living increase or get a promotion or anything like that or if the way you're compensated is with performance pay in any way like they say here's your base salary and then here's performance pay component that you could get depending on if you stack up and you meet certain goals or whatever. Um they have to have a meeting with you to say here's how you did right. So, uh, in my experience, what hiring managers like to do is tie those two together so it saves time. So, they sit you down, they tell you how you did. They say, "Here's what we think of you." And then you have a big discussion about that and then at the end of that, then they move into, so here's how your compensation is going to change for the coming year or whatever, right? So, it's all kind of part of one meeting. Um, technically, however, performance reviews are supposed to be like a constant thing.

[00:03:23]uh it might not be a formal, you know, performance review, but you are supposed to get feedback, at least in a perfect world, from your boss because if they wait a year, if they wait 12 months to tell you you're doing something wrong, uh not only is that a sign of a totally incompetent employer, but uh that's not good for you, right? to find out from your boss that for the last 12 months you've been doing this thing that they care about wrong and they're only telling you now, but now they're raking you over the coals for doing it wrong for like 12 months, right? So, so yeah, these make uh performance reviews a very political kind of thing. It's not just about how you did, it's about all kinds of other stuff. It's about visibility, number one. It's also about politics.

[00:04:12]It's about whether you tend to click with your boss or the person that's doing the performance review. Uh that's a big part of it. And there's all kinds of stuff that comes into this. There's company strategy. I do believe I did speak at one point about something really stupid in the corporate world called stack ranking uh that a lot of companies were doing back in the day. And I think I it sort of fell from favor for a while and then now it's back. Um it's where they basically say like look you have to review like to every manager you have to review your employees every year. Um you have to categorize everybody into like A, B and C and A would be the top performers, B would be the you know average people and then C would be the underperformers.

[00:05:03]And what makes it stupid is they say, "Okay, you have to have 10% of your direct reports have to be A's and 10% have to be C's and we're going to fire all the C's." Right? They they do everything with numbers as arbitrary numbers and they say, "Okay, you have to rate 10% of your employees as a C and then we're going to let the C's go."

[00:05:28]Right? And the A's are going to get like a massive bonus. This is the thing I think. Uh, so General Electric, GE used to do this. Uh, I think they still do as far if I'm not mistaken. Uh, Microsoft did this. There were a whole bunch of big American blue chip companies that like this was their official HR policy, you know, and it fell from, as I said, it fell from favor for a while and then it came back with a vengeance. So, uh, well done.

[00:05:56]Um, the award for the first person in the chat goes to Tol Tolga Ericson.

[00:06:04]That seems slightly familiar from last time. My old company that used to work for that I used to work for typically does performance reviews, but they haven't done mine for 3 years. Awesome.

[00:06:16]So, uh, so they're really on the ball is what you're saying. actually performance reviews um outside of being tied to the annual cost of living increase or annual pay revision, a lot of employers don't do them because the way they're implemented in in certainly large enterprise like large organizations is backasswords. They they don't do any good. Um the way that they're implemented when done correctly, performance reviews are awesome. It shouldn't be once a year. It should be like at least once a week, you know what I mean? Uh where you would have some kind of feedback from your boss and they say, "Well, you know, you're doing great at this, you're doing great at that. You know, this thing, if I could get you to make this change, you know, that would be perfect. You know, things like that, that would be perfect. You get that feedback, right? Obviously, that's informal."

[00:07:10]Um the problem is that they make it mandatory for all the managers to do these things uh usually once a year. Sometimes it's twice a year, right? Depending on where you work, but uh but yeah, that that's the the the one sort of reason that they have to do them is uh you know, when it's tied to your pay. Anyway, I just want to remind everyone that um you can ask questions about anything related to careers, job search, anything. I'm talking about performance reviews if that's what people want to talk about. But I'm here to talk about whatever you guys want, not the other way around. So, uh get in the chat, let me know what's on your mind, and uh we can go wherever you guys want. Um, I did a public opinion poll on my YouTube channel a couple days ago.

[00:08:05]Uh, what is it? It's the 22nd today. So, on July 20th, I did a public opinion poll and it said job interviews tend to favor these types of people or these people.

[00:08:19]And there was like four choices. A B CD was uh A was introverts, B was extroverts, C was people who just landed on the moon and I didn't actually do it cuz cuz I ran out of time, but D was going to be people who have just rebelled against the German government.

[00:08:40]And I did put that in the comments though, but nobody got that. [laughter] It didn't seem like anybody got that.

[00:08:45]Um, so get in the chat, let me know if you understand that. This was two days ago on July 20th. Job interviews tend to favor introverts, extroverts, A introverts, B introvert, uh B extroverts, C people who just landed on the moon, or D people who just rebelled against the German government.

[00:09:05]Let me know if you if you know what I'm referring to.

[00:09:08]Just as a as a sort of brain tease, because we all love those.

[00:09:18]Yep. Get in the chat. Um, or else I'll be forced to talk about my courses and you don't want that. Nobody wants that.

[00:09:24]That's when the count goes right down to zero. Um, yeah, if you are struggling uh to find a job or any other career related question, let me know.

[00:09:40]Uh, Sumare Nuclear is here who says, "Hi, Bill."

[00:09:44]Hi, Sumari Nuclear. That that your name is a mouthful.

[00:09:50]Sum says, "No, I don't get it." Um, does that mean I don't get it in? Is that German?

[00:10:06]Like is not ver is that mean truth is not? So that would be like I don't get it.

[00:10:12]Yeah, I don't speak German unfortunately. So, uh, it's going over my head.

[00:10:19]Um, no Hoba. That kind of thing. No Hoba, dude.

[00:10:26]Uh, Tulga Ericson says, "When your performance reviews go south, go south for the winter, is that a good time to look for another job?"

[00:10:37]Okay. Well, here's kind of the deal for performance reviews. It's kind of like the last step in something that should have begun a long time ago. Okay, hopefully everybody knows and and don't shoot the messenger here. I didn't invent this. I'm just reporting on it.

[00:10:54]But um what makes your boss think you're good? Well, obviously if you're good at your job and you do what you're told, that certainly helps. But is that the be all end all? No. Now, there's a lot of introverts out there like myself who would love that to be the beall endall.

[00:11:14]You just do your job, keep your head down, you do what you're told, everything goes fine, no issues, right?

[00:11:21]Uh but as pretty much everybody knows who has worked in an organization, it's not quite that simple. Another obvious thing is that you need to be visible. People need to know who you are. Your boss needs to know who you are. If you're just a faceless person who numbers among their employees that you know they don't really they barely even know your name, they never hear about you, they never think about you, that's not good because that signals that suggests that you're not important to them, right? If they barely remember your name, they don't think about you, right? They're not they're not depending on you. They're not relying on you.

[00:12:03]They're not counting on you. They don't think about you. You know what I mean?

[00:12:08]So, if there's another employee that is all of those things, they're highly visible. They're always interacting with the boss. When the boss has an assignment that they have to give to one of their team members, they think of that person first cuz that's the person they always see.

[00:12:27]All things being equal, they're going to tend to like that person more. they're going to tend to think that that person is contributing disproportionately more than someone like you who they never hear from, they never think about, you know, you're never around, they're never interacting with you, you know, that kind of thing, right? So being visible is important to a degree. Um, this is where it descends into office politics.

[00:12:53]Right? Now you can imagine if you're in a situation where I was referring to earlier stack ranking where at the end of the year the ma all the managers are required to rate their employees as A B or C. A are the outperformers, B are the average people, and C are the underperformers. And 10% of all employees have to be C's. And then the C's are fired, right? That was stack ranking. It was an official HR policy. Now, that's an extreme case. Most places where you work, they don't have that. But the principle still applies. Okay? in a sort of informal loosey goosey subconscious kind of thing, right? If they have to promote one of their employees, who are they going to promote? Are they going to promote someone like you, or are they going to promote the most visible employee who may or may not be as good at their job as you? Well, they're going to promote the most visible employee.

[00:13:56]That's how that works. That's human nature. And as and here here's the here's the trick.

[00:14:02]As much as you think that you would behave differently, you won't. You're a human and this is human nature. Um there are very real reasons why people think like this and there are very practical reasons to win over even the most practical of people uh to this kind of thinking unfortunately.

[00:14:20]Uh so we can spend our time rebelling against it or we can embrace that. Now what I would say is if you don't want to be in this position because this is me answering your question. It might sound like I'm talking off the top of my head about everything and nothing, but but I'm not actually answering your question. This is for Toga Ericson. Um, you should do a [clears throat] token minimal amount of things to be relatively visible to say, "Hey, I'm still here. Remember me?" Right? Think of me if you need something done or think of me as one of your good employees.

[00:14:57]Right? That's what indirectly that's signaling, right? So, go and interact with your boss. It's also a good idea intrinsically to go and check in with your boss. Say, "How how am I doing? Is this kind of meeting your expectations so far? Do you have any pointers for me?

[00:15:12]What's going on? Is there anything coming down the pike?" etc., etc. That signals that you're interested signals that you're engaged, and it reminds them, oh yeah, you're here, too. Right?

[00:15:22]So, if you've done that, you shouldn't be in this situation that you brought up here. If your performance review goes south, and if your performance review is going to go south despite all this, you will know a lot sooner and you'll have had the ability or the opportunity to look for another job far sooner than when this happens.

[00:15:44]That's what I'd say to that. Um, Shon Pepion, that's an extremely French name.

[00:15:51]Uh, that's the Frenchest name I think I've ever come across. Um, self assessment regarding performance reviews. Interested to hear your thoughts, advice on that. Um, yeah, I suppose you can do it, but it's not going to be accurate. It's It's almost like um evaluating yourself on your ability to do a job interview by recording yourself and then playing back the video. Um, yeah, it's revealing to a point and you can assess yourself to a point, but it's not going to be very good because you can't be objective about yourself, nor do you really understand what the criteria is from their perspective. So, yes, you can do that. But what's far more valuable than self assessment is like I mentioned earlier, go to your boss, preferably do this once every couple weeks throughout the year.

[00:16:44]just knock on their door. Like if they have an office or something, knock on their door. If not, just go up to them.

[00:16:48]You know, when they're not stressed out, like it's Monday morning and they're they've got a million things on their plate. You know, all things being equal, like I always say, go to them just after lunch on a Friday. If you don't know anything, you know, about somebody's schedule or somebody's patterns, that's usually when they're their least stressed in the week. It's Friday.

[00:17:08]Everybody's thinking about the weekend.

[00:17:09]And it's just after lunch break, you know, their their lunch break, whatever that is. Uh so they're they've had some food, they've they've had a break, so they're, you know, relatively less stressed. So you go talk to them then and you say, "Hey, you know, um you got a couple minutes."

[00:17:26]Let them say yes. And then you say, "So, you know, how am I doing? Like uh h how are things going with me? Do you have anything that I'm doing that you would prefer I do differently?

[00:17:37]You know, and this does two things.

[00:17:40]Number one, it has intrinsic value. You get answers to those questions. They give you little tips. They might say, "Oh, actually, now that you mention it, if you could do this little change, that that would be great." Right? You say, "No problem." Uh, also, it signals that you care. You're trying to do well.

[00:17:56]You're trying to appease them, give them what they want. That that gets you in their good books, generally speaking, right? So, so I would do that rather than do all kinds of self assessments instead of playing a guessing game. Just go and get the information right from the source, you know, and do that every couple of weeks throughout the year, you know, it just takes 2 minutes every couple of weeks and it makes all the difference.

[00:18:22]If you're going to work somewhere, you might as well have it go as as easily as possible. You know what I mean? And these are one of the things you can do.

[00:18:33]Uh, let's see. Self- assessment performance reviews.

[00:18:37]Yeah. Okay. So, I I I got that correct.

[00:18:40]Sean Papio.

[00:18:43]I don't understand. Uh, now I Let's see if I can do this.

[00:18:54]Reos.

[00:18:56]So, it's what is going on with the German government apparently according to Google Translate. Okay. So, here's the answer that I said at the beginning.

[00:19:04]Okay. Uh, this poll came out on July 20th.

[00:19:08]Uh, it's sort of a little inside joke.

[00:19:11]Uh, I guess among me and people who know history. So, uh, the Americans landed on the moon on July 20th, 1969.

[00:19:24]Right? So, that's the significance of July 20th. I asked the poll on July 20th and The third answer C was people who have just landed on the moon. That's where that comes from because that took place also on July 20th. And option D was people who just rebelled against the German government. The other thing that leaps to mind for me is the July 20 plot in World War II where a group of German officers tried to assassinate Hitler.

[00:19:53]They failed. Um, and the jury's out on how to regard these people because they did the right thing, but they waited till the last possible moment to do the right thing. So, I think I think they in my personal opinion, they deserve the credit for what they did. They stepped up. They were incredibly brave and they paid with their lives. Um, you know, uh, it taints it a bit that they waited so long, but, you know, anyway, I'm not here to comment about that, but that was the significance of that. So, I don't think anybody got that. I was quite disappointed. I didn't get one comment that suggested that people understood those answers.

[00:20:33]But there you go. Hopefully. So, so now you know if if there's one thing you learn with me here today, it should be that.

[00:20:41]Uh, KitKat says, "Can you discuss salary negotiations as an internal applicant?

[00:20:45]Job posting states salary range.

[00:20:47]However, internal applicants should expect less than 10% of their current rate." Uh, where do I begin? Um, principle number one, nobody wants to give you more money if they don't have to. Why would they have to? You're already here. Uh, yes, you can threaten to leave. And, uh, they are familiar with that. And in my experience, everybody, all the managers know that's a standard thing people say, but it's 90% of the time it's a bluff because everybody loves to say they'll leave and then they actually are lazy and they won't put their money where I'm being unkind, but I'm just saying managers know that you won't actually leave 90% of the time when you threaten to leave.

[00:21:27]Right? So that's why their default reaction to give me more money or I leave is no, sorry. They do it politely.

[00:21:34]They say, "Ah, you know, I I wish I could. If I could, I would, but I can't.

[00:21:38]It's not in the budget, you know, or something like that, right?" And then you go, "Oh, okay." And you just accept it and they go, "Right, they go like that." Have you ever seen like a really fat guy in a suit do that? Like, you know, they kind of hunker down behind a desk. You go, "That's your boss, right?

[00:21:56]They're fatter than you think." And they're doing that. Um, okay. Okay, so that's the attitude towards giving people a raise. They've done god knows how many data-driven studies on this over the last h 100red years. And um it turns out that everybody thinks they deserve more money even when they don't.

[00:22:16]Like everybody thinks they're above average even though 50% of them aren't.

[00:22:20]Uh and everybody thinks they deserve more and they're paid too little for what they do. That's a universal feeling. So everybody wants more money.

[00:22:30]Usually, all things being equal, businesses, even when they can pay more money, they don't want to because what they're doing is they're taking money out of their pocket and giving it to you because you ask. When was the last time you did that?

[00:22:43]Somebody asks you for more money that you have to pay them out of your pocket and you say, "Oh, here we go." So, that that's why they don't want to do that.

[00:22:50]The other reason is that they already have you, right?

[00:22:54]Um, you know, so they'll use every trick in the bag about that. So that that's basically how negotiations go. That's what you're up against. Okay? And what I've seen, the only thing that works if you really want to force somebody's hand is if you are a truly valuable employee that they recognize as being valuable, and that's not the same thing as being valuable, uh you have to threaten to leave and then leave. And then what I've seen several times is that person then gets the call at home first day after they're gone. They say, "Come on back.

[00:23:29]Got your money."

[00:23:31]Right? That's usually what it takes. But that's assuming you are indeed very valuable and they recognize that two things that are kind of big ifs.

[00:23:43]Okay. So basically all the negotiation which really isn't negotiation uh you know when you ask for more money as I slap my microphone around um is basically a little song and dance that's more persuasion than it is any kind of negotiation because negotiation is based on having options and you know you control your actions. You don't control somebody else's actions. what you're trying to do is influence their actions by making them think that you deserve more money, you know, and that's what that is.

[00:24:20]Um, and and the end result is that that can go any way depending on the relationship you have with the person you're negotiating with.

[00:24:29]So, I'm sorry if that was a big non-answer. I just I don't know how to summarize the entirety of negotiation into like a couple of minutes, but but anyway, hopefully that makes sense. It's the the way you force someone's hand. If you want to make more money, the bottom line is go out and find a better job.

[00:24:45]Get an offer in your hand that pays you more money. Then you can go back to your boss and say, "Pay me more money." You know, and whichever way that conversation goes, you come out on top.

[00:24:56]Either they match the offer or or beat it, in which case you stay and you get a raise, or they say, "No, sorry, we can't." You go, "Okay, fair enough. I understand." And then you put in your notice and you go somewhere where they do pay you more.

[00:25:12]Um, but thank you for your question, KitKat.

[00:25:19]I don't recall seeing you here before.

[00:25:21]It's nice to have you here, and that was an intelligent question. Uh, Tulga Ericson says, "What's your opinion on the phrase, "Your reward is working hard. You're working."

[00:25:32]Hopefully, they didn't trip over their words and fall flat on their face like I did. Your reward for working hard is more responsibilities and more work for the same pay. It seems to be very common these days and is thrown around quite a lot. Uh let me let let you into a little secret that's not new. That's not just these days. That's been happening since time immemorial.

[00:25:53]You want to know traditionally what how that worked. Okay. How it worked was this. You have two options. One is to be a better employee and be more visible on one hand.

[00:26:07]On the other hand, you can keep your head down, try and be invisible, try to not be picked for stuff, try to not um attract attention. Right now, it's a game of risk. Option A, you become more visible. You become better regarded.

[00:26:25]You are more valuable to them. The the upside is that they will try to get you rid of you last. If there's layoffs or anything, you'll be the last one out the door, which is a good thing. The flip side is that the downside is that um they will pile more work on you, right?

[00:26:44]With a possible upside of they will think of you first if there's a promotion in the discussion. They give you more responsibilities. They give you more work. They vet you. They they time test you. They go, "Yeah, I can rely on this employee. This is a good employee." And then they promote you if there's a promotion happening. Uh option B, you keep your head down. This also applies to things like you are not available to answer people's questions. You don't give them full and complete information with a smile on your face because you don't want the them to come to you whenever they have a question. Right?

[00:27:21]It's the same idea. Okay? That's your option B. You're invisible to your boss.

[00:27:28]You're never picked. You never volunteer. The upside is that they don't come to you with a lot more work when it's important. So great, you know, easier time for you. The flip side is that you're the first one out the door when they have to lay off or uh they have to get rid of somebody, right?

[00:27:46]Because you're the least valuable to them, right? So you have a choice. Now, option A or option B, not neither of these options is universally the best option for you. It's going to depend on the situation you're in. Okay? Sometimes option A is clearly the way to go. You get promoted whereas other people get let go. Option B sometimes is the way to go. There are no promotions.

[00:28:12]Extra work is not rewarded and it's a pretty stable, secure situation. I wonder where that occurs. Government.

[00:28:20]So, uh, you know what I mean? Those are your two different options. And that's kind of the risk, you know, what do you call it? Like, uh, payoff kind of chart.

[00:28:31]So, you make your decisions accordingly.

[00:28:36]Um, Sage, is that Sage? They're going to promote the employee that goes golfing with the supervisor. LOL. [laughter] That clearly shows you don't understand.

[00:28:49]And yes, you're right. And that person doesn't seem like it's going to be you.

[00:28:53]Uh Shansson Papon says to clarify on self assessment. In previous jobs, we had to rate ourselves out of 10 for XY Z and also do written self appraisals on achievements, things to improve. Should we give ourselves 10 out of 10? Um there is no right answer. It depends on what the person reading this wants to hear.

[00:29:15]And this is where logic goes out the window.

[00:29:19]Uh because for example, you give yourself 10 out of 10. One person says that's awesome. That's confidence.

[00:29:26]That's uh at least some ability. That's good. Right? Another person will read that and go, "Oh my god, the arrogance, right? You give yourself 10 out of 10.

[00:29:37]Not only is that incredibly arrogant, but it's also measurably problematic because that suggests that you're not open to improvement. you're not open to uh constructive criticism. So that's not the type of person we want working. See how that works? There is no right answer. It depends on who is evaluating it and what their interpretation is and what their wants, wills, and needs are.

[00:30:04]So you need to sort of figure that out.

[00:30:07]Okay. Now, if you don't know, if like you can't get any information whatsoever, what I would do is I'd say like I don't know, I'd give myself an eight, you know, maybe a nine somewhere in there, but not 10. Absolutely not 10.

[00:30:19]I mean, that's this is all like just playing on probabilities, right? It's going to work some of the time, but not others. Okay? But what I would do if I were you is I would try and go to your boss.

[00:30:32]You know, this is somebody makes a joke.

[00:30:33]Somebody just made a joke about the person who goes golfing with the supervisor. What do you think they talk about while they're golfing, my friend?

[00:30:41]They could talk about, you know, the crap we're talking about now that Shaon Papion just brought up. You know, should I rate myself this or that? Well, you would need to know about your boss if they're going to be reading it, what they want to see, what they consider good. This will inform you of what that is. So those people that go play golf, they're the ones that get the right answer on these self- assessments among many other things. And they're the that's how they win. It's not nepotism, it's intelligence.

[00:31:11]Okay.

[00:31:16]Sean Papio, I was translating from the previous chatter who posted in German.

[00:31:20]Apologize for confusion. Yeah, I thought that was a different user. I thought that was was that Suman at the uh Yes.

[00:31:27]that was speaking in German or whatever that was some kind of uh Slavic uh European language, you know, primitive dialect lost to the passages of time for good reason. Uh languages like that.

[00:31:50]Uh let's see here. Um, many German scientists were involved in the moonlanding. Yes, many Canadians do. But do we do any of us get any credit for it? Absolutely not.

[00:32:03]But that's okay because we're not bitter about it.

[00:32:08]Especially considering the last 5 years.

[00:32:12]If I recall, I think it was the Brits gave them the big breakthrough on how to make the atomic bomb, right?

[00:32:21]They kind of then immediately negated that by also being the vector in in from which the uh the most significant Russian spy got into the Manhattan project. But but you know, we'll forget about that for right now.

[00:32:36]So it all works out in the end, I suppose.

[00:32:40]Um Sue says the job market is rough in Western Europe currently. It's rough in most places. What's the unemployment rate in in Western Europe?

[00:32:51]Do you know? I'd be interested in hearing that if you know that. Um, okay. 1846. Says, "I was laid off from Fortune 500 bank tech management role um 19 months ago and haven't been able to replace my job yet. How to overcome the gap by 55 years age and stale hands-on tech skills in a bad market.

[00:33:17]Um, okay. Well, that's a series of questions.

[00:33:23]Let's see here. Uh, okay. The first thing, like to start at the beginning, the fir because I because I don't talk about this enough on this channel. I think people complain, I sound like a broken record, but um number one, the first thing you you got to know if you don't know this already is that something like 80% of jobs are out there and you can get them, but they're not posted. Okay? So, just looking at job postings online is not the way to go.

[00:33:50]You can apply for those jobs. That's fine. It it has its own quirks. You're going in the door with like 800 other people whenever you apply for those jobs. But, um but you can do it. But don't let that be your only thing. Um there are many many more jobs that are not posted than there are jobs that are posted. So go after the ones that are not posted. And in order to do that, it's a completely different process.

[00:34:15]Okay. The answer in one word of how to get those jobs is networking. Um now if you're an introvert, which I suspect you are, you're like me. So way to go. Um, networking if you never if if you don't know, it's kind of not what you're thinking it is. It's not about knowing a million people. It's not about going and sch smoozing with people or whatever.

[00:34:39]Um, you could do it from home.

[00:34:42]The simplest thing you could possibly do, uh, assuming you don't know a ton of people and can get a referral, um, that would be the simplest thing. But the the the next thing, the simplest thing you can do if you know nobody is something called direct outreach. I've talked about it on my channel many times. It's very simple. What you do is you find all the uh employers, all the organizations that are near you that could employ you because they employ people like you. You find all of them and there's a lot more than you think. Okay? Uh I've done videos on this. There's one that's linked in the description box under this video. It's called How Successful People Get Jobs. Go and watch that video. How successful people get jobs. description box below, it's linked. Um, find all those uh employers and then once you found the employer, the employer will be like a company or something. Um, get on things like LinkedIn and go look within the company to the individual people like who would be the hiring manager that would supervise the department that you would conceivably work in, right? You know, and you send that person a message just like you blast out job applications when you apply for jobs. You blast out these messages. You know, they're mostly a template. You can tweak them a little, right? But they're mostly a template.

[00:36:03]You just basically say, "Hey, um, my name is X. I specialize in this. I kick ass at this. Is the problem I solve. If ever you're looking for someone who can do that, please let me know. I live nearby. I'd love to work for your company." That's it. Now, if they're not looking right now, it's moods. It just goes into a void. Uh but if they are looking for someone like you right now, okay, you slip in there as candidate number one that they're going to consider first. And if that's the case, a common response would be for them to say, "Hey, um you know, send me your resume or or maybe they've already seen your profile." They could say, "Let's get together and have a chat. You know, how about tomorrow?" You know, that kind of thing, right? because if they are looking for someone and you just landed right in their lap, that's great for them. If you work out, they can just hire you and get on with their lives.

[00:36:56]Um, and that happens a lot more than you think. So, anyway, that's direct outreach. There's many other ways to get jobs to do with networking. Uh, but that's probably the simplest way that I can explain in a couple of minutes. So, uh, that's for that. How to get over the gap. Um, if you get a job this way, the gap doesn't matter because they're hiring you based on what they've seen.

[00:37:18]They've seen someone who's articulate, someone who takes initiative, someone who clearly wants to work there. That's why you're reaching out to them. All of that stuff trumps any kind of gap. They don't give a rat's ass about that. If you can deliver value, um, what was the other question? Uh, age. Oh, and the age thing. Well, once again, uh, that's harder to answer because it's going to affect a minority of people.

[00:37:48]Excuse me. [cough] The big question when there's genuine agism against old people, okay, either it's like something physically to do with the job, like for example, you want to try and be a cocktail waitress and you're 97 years old. uh that's maybe not going to work out because they're looking for somebody attractive. It's biased against people that are young and attractive and someone like me for example is not their doesn't look like their ideal candidate. Um the big so it's either that where it's something tangible why you know there's a disadvantage for you specifically doing the job. It's based on looks. it's based on, I don't know, something like that being, you know, being like being able to do physically demanding jobs or something like that. Um, or it falls into the other category where they're wondering, wait a minute, this is kind of a low-level job. Why are you old, but yet you're still in like a almost like an entry-level job? That suggests you're not very good.

[00:38:55][clears throat] If you're old and you have been doing this for a while, one would think you would have moved up a little further, right? Some jobs are like that.

[00:39:04]Sometimes you encounter that. That's the root of the bias, right? Because they're making that assumption. They can't help it. They see you, you're obviously older. They make that connection whether it's true or not. Right? So that's the other reason for it. Now once again, you know who is not biased against the 55year-old? Another 55year-old.

[00:39:31]So if the hiring manager is 21 years old and you're 55, chances are it's going to be more of a thing. But if the hiring manager is 60 and you're 55 and you know you would be their employee, uh you know that's going to be less of a problem.

[00:39:48]Just don't give the impression that you are that you have some of the cliched stereotypical bad traits of being older.

[00:40:00]Number one, one of those is not being trainable. Number two is not being open to the way to new ideas. The third one is not being able to work with younger people because you know you always feel that you're superior to them and can't accept that they tell you anything. You always have to put them in their place.

[00:40:20]You know, things like that, right? God knows I don't have that. Um so, you know what I mean? Just don't exhibit any of those things in your interaction with with the recruiter or the hiring manager, whatever you're doing. Um and that really really helps.

[00:40:37]Okay, so that's that's about all I can say in a couple of minutes, but hopefully that makes sense. Check out some of my stuff there if you're really stuck. Uh 1846, uh starting with that video that I referenced that's in the description box below. And I also have a course here that lays everything out like from beginning to end, all my advice in one place if that's the kind of solution you're looking for. For everybody else, that's this. So check that out. link in the description box below. If you're looking for this kind of thing, you want to see where everything is at, how it all works, um, check this out. This teaches you how to get hired in the posted job market. It also teaches you how to get hired in the hidden job market. And, uh, it lays everything out with templates and, you know, processes and all that kind of stuff. Uh, is linked in the description box below. And there is also a video I've made that explains the course in great detail that is linked also in the description box below this live stream.

[00:41:36]So check it out if that's the type of thing you're looking for. Very popular course that's helped a lot of people. Um Suman says, "Do you like Montreal, Bill?" I'll tell you what was great about Montreal uh like 30 years ago. The night life. Oh my god. Now listen, I'm coming from Winnipeg, okay? which is like practically dead to Montreal. I've never seen so many people out on the street just partying and hanging out and having a generally good time uh you know just amazing amazing very uh very formative experience on me in my youth.

[00:42:14]So that's the biggest thing that sticks out in my head when I think Montreal. Um yeah, Suman says, "If you consider people actively looking for a job, it is 3% in Switzerland and 8% in France. In other countries, I do not know, but there are very limited job postings whatsoever." Yeah, but you can't go by job postings, right? We've already established that something like 20% of jobs are posted. The other 80% are not posted, you know?

[00:42:44]And increasingly as we go into the future, what we've se what we've seen the last three or four years certainly is that post jobs have been dwindling.

[00:42:55]Posted jobs, not jobs, posted jobs have been dwindling. So more of them are in the hidden job market. That's why it's even more important to, you know, be looking there as a component of your job search.

[00:43:09]Okay.

[00:43:14]Somebody's talked to me on Michael Page.

[00:43:16]I don't know who Michael Page is.

[00:43:21]I have no idea who that is.

[00:43:25]Recruitment companies are shady. Well, once again, you know, you need to ward against generalization there, my friend, because I can I agree some of them kind of are and some of them aren't. You know what I mean? They fulfill a certain purpose. And some of them are genuinely shady that are doing stupid things and unethical things. But some of them are not. But people like you think they are because your expectations of what they should be doing doesn't match what they actually do. So it's not that they're doing anything bad, just they're not doing what you understand or what you think they should do. That's a different thing.

[00:44:07]Um, so I wouldn't make these blanket statements like these are always bad.

[00:44:12]You know, it's like no.

[00:44:15]Uh, stork on a fork. There's a handle says, "Hey, I'd like to hear your opinion on this. I had a final round interview. They said I did good."

[00:44:24]Uh, well, you you did well. I'm assuming Superman does good. You do well. Uh they said I did good and I I'd hear back that week. I followed up and they said, "Sorry, but we are still interviewing two weeks." Yeah. Welcome to uh getting a job. That's that you're going to be fed a neverending stream of lies, obfiscations, and general BS. Welcome to the world. You know, um it doesn't matter what these people say, okay? Stop listening to them. If they have a job opportunity and they invited you for an interview, go do the damn interview and then forget about like like stop thinking about them, you know? Now, if they call you back, great. I hope that you know it works out and I hope that uh you know you you get offered a job or whatever and and it works out. Great. That'll be wonderful. But in the meantime, stop thinking about them. You will never know what's going on with them. They sometimes don't even know what the deal is. Are they still hiring? Where are we with this? Because behind the scenes, maybe somebody wants that position to be filled, but yet another group of people don't want it to be filled now. So, what's the plan exactly? It's still kind of up in the air. And then you ask them what's going on. They are normally going to lie to you anyway and say some nice sounding thing so you'll go away happy, right? uh even though it's a complete lie uh but they genuinely don't know on top of that. So you have no idea you you will never find out. Get used to that.

[00:46:05]What you need to focus on is generating another opportunity. So go apply for more jobs. Go do more networking. Go send out like direct outreach messages to hiring managers and get somebody else that wants you to come in for an interview with them. That's your only job in this process. And if they want to talk to you, you go talk to them. You do the best you can and then you don't sweat it. You forget about them and you move on to the next thing. And if people call you back, great. But you absolutely don't want to be sitting by the phone proverbally waiting for it to ring because not only is that not productive, but it ruins your mental health. Okay?

[00:46:47]And you don't deserve that, my friend.

[00:46:49]So keep moving forward.

[00:46:55]Um, oh, I'm sorry. It continues. Okay, great. Uh, Stoke on a fork says, "I guess I'd just like to hear your thoughts and if I should keep following up." No, don't follow up. If if it's like a dream job, like like a once in a-lifetime opportunity, yes, follow up a couple of times. Other than that, don't waste your time. They wanted to talk to you, you talked to them, you gave them everything that they wanted. You answered all their questions. um the ball isn't now in their court. They can decide what they want to do with it and get used to the idea that a lot of your efforts are not directly going to pay off. Okay, that's just the nature of this game.

[00:47:35]It's essentially the sales process.

[00:47:37]You're selling yourself.

[00:47:40]You're pursuing leads. Um but this process is going to yield a bite more out of statistical probability than it is through any direct action. Does that make sense? That's that just the nature of this.

[00:47:58]Uh like for example, a salesperson, think of this sales, this is how sales works. Salesperson knocks on a 100 doors, you know, would you be interested? And then they get the door slammed in their face, right? Um they know that 5% of the time somebody will buy their product, right? 95% of the time they get the door slammed in their face. Right? Now, imagine if you knew that ratio.

[00:48:25]5% say yes, 95% say no. Imagine you knew that. That's actually a good thing because it means that if you want to make five sales, you know exactly what to do. You have to knock on around 100 doors, right? All things being equal. If you want to make 10 sales, you know exactly how to do that. You have to knock on the neighborhood of 200 doors.

[00:48:46]Right?

[00:48:48]Prepare to get 190 doors slammed in your face, but that leads you to 10 product sales and selling your product 10 times might mean the equivalent of 20 $20,000 or something, you know? So, that more than makes up for the effort, right? So, that's kind of like this game. If you knew that you had a 0.1% chance of getting hired, that means you have to reach out to a thousand people.

[00:49:20]Now, can you send messages to a 100 people in a day? Yes.

[00:49:25]Can you find 100 targets in a day? Yes.

[00:49:29]In 10 days, you might have a job.

[00:49:33]I'm just saying like I'm just illustrating the principle, right?

[00:49:39]Okay, Alex Rosa says, "Why do you think that most of the jobs are not even present on the company sites directly?

[00:49:46]You would expect to see them there." No, you wouldn't.

[00:49:50]Uh, for example, let's say Flextronics.

[00:49:53]You would expect to see a job on Flextronics site, but natada.

[00:49:57]I don't know what Flexronics is. I assume that's a company. Um, but no, you wouldn't see them there. Okay. Speaking as a former CEO, former hiring manager, um you know how expensive and timeconuming it is to like post a job, think about it. How much do they pay your boss per hour on average? You have any idea? How much do you make? And then multiply that by like, you know, maybe 1.5 at least. Okay.

[00:50:26]Right now, how much do they pay the recruiters? Maybe the same as you or less than you, depending on what the deal is, right? How much do they pay all the other people involved?

[00:50:37]Add up the amount of man-hour to sit in these rounds of round after round of job interview uh time in meetings spent drafting, job postings, requirements, duties, uh you know discussing the salary range and then all the meetings discussing the candidates you know well I like this one because of this, I like that one because of that. You know how many hundreds of manh hours that is all to get a stranger, someone you don't know? Oh, sure. You've spent an hour with them, maybe two hours if you've done two interviews if you're lucky. Do you really know them? No, you don't. They could have been lying about everything. They could have falsified everything for all you know, right? Does that make sense to you? The alternative is kind of what we're talking about here. When I say things like direct outreach, you're blasting out your availability to all these companies around you, companies that hire you.

[00:51:34]They're an engineering company. You're a fully qualified engineer. You send a message directly to the engineering manager.

[00:51:42]You say, "Hey, fully qualified engineer.

[00:51:44]If ever you're looking for someone like me, let me know. I live nearby. I'd love to work for your company. I know you guys do this."

[00:51:51]Now, think of that situation. the engineering manager just realizes they got to fill a position, right?

[00:52:00]And someone just landed right in their lap. A fully qualified engineer just landed right in their lap who is not only um in available now, but they are enthusiastic about this company. they know of the company and they have the initiative to go out of their way to reach out to the company. Thus proving that they're passionate about working there specifically and in the process showing off certain skills like how professional they are they are how persuasive they are. They're giving you a sample of their communication skills.

[00:52:33]It might even be a little sample of like what it's like to deal with them, right?

[00:52:38]which is far more than you get by the way when you're interviewing candidates who post posted who apply to a posted job, right? How much money have you spent so far to find this candidate that already has given you more than you would get in a standard uh you know the standard hiring process with HR?

[00:52:57]Zero. You spent zero to find this person, right? This negates you having to spend any more money on this process if this person works out, right? So, not only is it way cheaper and quicker, but you get a candidate that's superior to what the process would yield if they canvased it to the public.

[00:53:27]That's why the hidden job market is much larger in terms of the jobs there than the posted market. The only reason there's a posted job market is because the hiring manager doesn't happen to know anyone that would be good for this.

[00:53:42]HR doesn't have any resumes on file that, you know, would be good for this of candidates that would want this uh and be qualified for it. Um the manager hasn't received any referrals. They've said to their team, all the other engineers, they've said, "Hey, look, we're looking to add another position here." And nobody has come to them saying, "Hey, I've got a brother or a cousin or a former co-orker that would be perfect for this. I know they're free right now. Shall I tell them to send you their resume?" They haven't received anything like that or anything that for anybody that would work out, right? So, their last resort is to canvas it to the public, right? That's how it works in the private sector. There are exceptions to this like in government where they have to post everything just as a default. But do they consider the applications they get publicly like you know just from strangers with no connection whatsoever? Usually not. They they like to give the impression they do but a lot of times it's not quite that forthright unfortunately. Right. So it actually makes so much more sense to hire someone on the hidden market. What they call the hidden. It's not hidden.

[00:54:50]just they don't post the jobs.

[00:54:53]From the employer's perspective, it's cheaper, better, faster.

[00:54:59]And I've done this.

[00:55:02][clears throat] Alex Rosa says, "I have ex-colagues that leave in my neighborhood. Does that mean live in my neighborhood, but that doesn't guarantee me a job even if they send my CV to them?"

[00:55:17]No. What? Nothing guarantees you a job, you know, at least nothing that leaps to mind.

[00:55:27]Nothing guarantee. You're not given a job because you're qualified or because you have the right to a job. It doesn't work like that. You have to provide something useful to somebody else. And just like you have the freedom to work anywhere you want and to quit any job you don't want to work for, they have the right to hire whoever they want to.

[00:55:42]It's their money they're voluntarily paying out. you know, the only exception is when it's like government money that they're paying out. So, sometimes there's it's more complicated than that, but in the private sector, certainly that's kind of how it goes.

[00:56:01]Uh, we got 20 people here. We reached the end of the chat. Uh, we got some great questions so far. Uh, get in the chat, let me know if you got questions.

[00:56:11]Um, [clears throat] in the meantime, just a reminder, uh, check out my course if you are wanting to go the whole nine yards. If you're kind of needing to get a job and you got questions about job search or careers or any of that stuff and you want to go the whole nine yards, this is all my advice all in one place. Uh, it tells you how to get hired in the posted job market and how to get hired in the hidden job market and it's geared specifically for introverts. So, if that's what the kind of thing you're looking for, if I can uh still speak, if that's the kind of thing you're looking, if this is the kind of thing you're looking for, this is the thing for you.

[00:56:48]I can tell you that much.

[00:56:50]Uh link in the description box below for a link to this course and also to a video explaining the course in great detail, how it works, and what you get.

[00:57:01]Uh very popular course. I do have others, but this is like the main one for for how to get hired.

[00:57:12]Um, serious cat 5,000.

[00:57:16]So, you're one cool cat.

[00:57:20]You know, usually if you're going to say that about a person, you have to imagine a white leisure suit, throw jewelry, that kind of thing. What about the strategy of searching for people in your area with LinkedIn profiles similar to skill sets to your own and looking at where they're working in the past?

[00:57:43]Yeah, that's pretty indirect, but uh yeah, has a certain logic to it. Now, just cuz something has a certain logic to it doesn't mean that it it it's correct. But um that doesn't sound like the stupidest thing I've ever heard.

[00:57:58]That sound it it's it's very indirect.

[00:58:00]Like what I would do, it's kind of a variant of what I recommend and what I've done, which is instead of looking for people and seeing where they work last, look directly for the employers, right? So, check out that video I I mentioned before, a free video. I just referenced in the description box. It's called How Successful People Get Jobs.

[00:58:19]And what I'm doing is I'm actually I'm not talking about something where you see my face. Instead, you see my desktop where I'm showing you here's Google Maps. Here's how you find all the employers. Here's LinkedIn. Here's where you, you know, find for I can't remember if I if I go on LinkedIn there, but I certainly do Google Maps. Here's how you find the actual employers. And then the idea is once you know, say the you know, you have a whole long list of company names or other organizations that are near you that would employ you. Then you go to LinkedIn and you look inside those companies to the individuals. who's the right individual you should contact and you can see their profile, you can see who they are and it's also the means to send the message to them, right? So that's that kind of twostep method, right? Google maps and then LinkedIn.

[00:59:14]Uh, you know, I talk about that in my course. If you want all the details on on that, check out my course, my get hired course. That's where I put that stuff in. I mean incidentally you use that process not just in job search you use it for like sales you know if you're an entrepreneur you're trying to find partners or customers you know like it's the same thing it's how you connect with people that have a specific need or are likely to have a specific need right in this instance you're selling yourself as like here you know I will work for you you have a need for people like me working for you employed a a lot of them before. Well, I am a really good candidate for that. You know, it's the same idea, right? So, uh yeah, I used to teach this in university, taught it in a post-graduate management program that I had my students actually go out and do this, you know, but but a little more advanced stuff where they were doing informational interviews with CEOs and this kind of stuff, you know, I talk about that in my course. It's something you can do. It's something introverts can do. I'm an introvert. Uh don't be fooled by the fact that I can sort of talk a lot. Uh you know what I mean?

[01:00:29]It's a whole different thing. This is an alternative to going and you know connecting with people in person, going to events and things like that, which I've also done. Uh but I found it a less effective and b just not as enjoyable.

[01:00:44]I'd rather do this from home to be honest. Let's face it, all you introverts out there, I think you know what I'm talking about when I say, uh, not only are we not as interested in talking to people, we just don't care about people, you know, as I don't need to know all the opinions and detail, mundane details of a stranger's life.

[01:01:06]You know what I'm saying? Like, if you give me a reason to care, then it gets interesting. Then it's cool. But just meeting people in general and hearing about them in general is just not super super interesting to me. I can admit this now that I've got a YouTube channel and I've burned my bridges in the corporate world. That's what allows me to be on here and I can say this stuff.

[01:01:27]I think all introverts kind of feel that. You know, I think that's the big difference between introverts and extroverts. You know, extroverts might care more. You know, it's not a judgment on people.

[01:01:40]Well, it just it just I'm just stating it. Um anyway, let me know if you agree with that or I'm actually curious to hear the reaction on that one. Uh if that rings true or that's the stupidest effing thing you've ever heard in your life. Uh let me know.

[01:02:03]Um 618 says, "Yes, thank you." Okay. I'm not sure what that was in uh relation to, but uh I'm glad you're getting something out of it, my friend. Um Stoke on a fork. I've been following your advice and have been doing direct outreach on LinkedIn. No talk about jobs. The problem is my free month is gone and LinkedIn is limited. Any other methods to message them?

[01:02:28]Uh yeah. Okay. So, the the Oh, can you look? Stupid question.

[01:02:35]Stupid question, but can you create another account? Like if if if paying for the the what I what do they charge for LinkedIn premium? Is it like an arm and a leg? But if it's absolutely not an option for you, could you create another email address like a derivative of your email address? Create a whole new account, put up a new profile that's like a carbon copy of your existing one, I don't know, do it that way. Is is that a possibility? I'm not sure, you know? I mean, I don't know. I would just say get the LinkedIn like if the LinkedIn premium is that useful for you. I would say, is it like 30 bucks a month or something or it's 30 bucks Canadian, so that's probably like $10 US or something, whatever it is. Uh, I would have thought you could just get it, but I understand if you can't. Um, I imagine you'd have to go that route, wouldn't you? or you find a way or you you you create the free account, you use it to do your searches and then maybe connect with them over your main account. I I don't know if that's possible like some variant of this. You know [cough] what I did is I got the LinkedIn premium for when I needed to do those searches.

[01:03:52]the only thing of any value for me in the LinkedIn premium package or whatever you call it. Um, everything else that you get with LinkedIn premium as far as I was concerned is pointless. But, uh, so I I I'm not sure. I'd have to think about that one. I'm not I'm not a big user of LinkedIn anymore. Ever since Microsoft bought them, they've really they've just added more and more effing crap to it without adding anything of value. So, they keep watering it down. The search and discovery is still as useful as it always was, but they've just added so many other things that are all stupid, you know, and ineffective.

[01:04:37]So, which is what Microsoft does pretty much, at least on the consumer side.

[01:04:42]just ruin everything they touch.

[01:04:46]Um yeah, that's all I can say really about that one.

[01:04:54]Um that's why I try and advise people like do all your searches like you know in that first month like just get on there every day for hours and just do searches and searches search you know like do all this kind of stuff uh get the most out of it.

[01:05:11]Yeah, I guess there's no way around it unless you can find a way to do it with another account.

[01:05:17]Interesting question. I've never been asked that.

[01:05:27]Okay. Uh we got 16 people here. Thank you for being here. Any question you have about job search or uh careers, that kind of thing, uh let me know. I'll do my best to help you out if I possibly can. Um, just as a reminder while we're waiting for the next questions to roll on in, check out my course. Now, I have other courses, too. Uh, this is the other big one. If you are looking to improve your communication skills, check out this.

[01:05:55]everything I learned on my journey going from a supervisor when I started my career to a CEO, which was the pinnacle of my corporate career.

[01:06:05]Everything I learned about communication skills along the way, I put into this course. So, check it out. I've also taught a lot of this stuff in university for what that's worth. Uh, you know, in management programs and things like this. Um basically uh in terms of what you can get out of it first of all uh the number one tangible thing you can get out of improving your communication skills and that's written and verbal is you will make a much better first impression. That's the number one thing.

[01:06:35]You see, when people first meet you, the first thing they go on is what you look like, right? So, your grooming and your attire and that kind of stuff. But the moment you open your mouth, they're judging you in your communication skills. And as a lot of introverts and other people will test attest to, you can have a lot of value inside a package that doesn't have a very good veneer.

[01:06:58]And the veneer is the communication skills, you know. Uh so number one, you'll make a much better first impression which helps things go well for you. Opportunities come your way.

[01:07:10]The other thing that you can get out of this is very clear communication that's tuned in to all the politics and all the levels that are going on. Uh and something else that's very useful is uh just through a series of best practices it is possible to explain any topic no matter how complex and you can write it down and you can do it in such a way that nobody will have to ever reread a sentence you've written because they understood it first time.

[01:07:45]So you can break down an extremely complex topic. You talking about quantum mechanics, you could talk about cellular biology, you know, whatever. You can break it down and people can read it and they can understand it first time. They don't have to do the thing where they read a sentence, they go, "What?" And they have to reread it and then they often go, "What?" And then they reread it again and then, "Oh, okay." And then they continue. Right? It's actually very efficient, very easy to read, very clear. So, if that's something that you're looking for, any of these things are or what you're looking for, um, check this out. Okay, that's what this course does. It's about writing, but it's mainly about what to say or how to respond. So, it applies to verbal responses also. So, if you're looking to improve your communication skills, check this out. Link in the description box below. And there's also a video accompanying it that's also linked below that explains the whole thing, what you get, how it works, etc. Okay. Um, store on a fork says $40 a month on my end. Okay. Now, is that US dollars? Uh, that that is kind of steep actually for what they give you. Excuse me. Um, I'll look into the email thing. I'll see if I can scrge up the $40. Thanks for all the help. Yeah, I mean, uh, if you think about it, there might be some other options to get around it or sort of get around it. Um, you know, because I don't know how it works, but if you create another account, maybe they offer that account, the free directory month, and maybe there's a way to use that to your advantage. It's not your main account, but it's another account. I I'm not sure.

[01:09:35]But once again, I don't I don't recall ever being asked that before. So, uh I wish you all the best.

[01:09:42]Uh I am premiering a new live stream, not today, but tomorrow in in like roughly this time tomorrow. Uh it's called AI bubble watch. And we're going to be talking about AI. We're going to be talking about uh the nature of the AI bubble. Hopefully, everyone is aware there's a bit of a bubble around AI.

[01:10:03]It's it's interesting because it's got like some of the characteristics of a bubble, but it's also got some of the characteristics of not a bubble. Like it's got strong business fundamentals underneath it. So, it makes it a very very interesting situation. Um, what does this mean for jobs? What does it mean for the future? What does it mean for changes to uh how you add value and how you do your job and all this kind of thing? The nature of the work people are going to need. and also to a small extent what does it mean for investors and this kind of stuff the financial side of it. So that's what I I I honestly don't know if people here have any interest in that kind of thing. So I set up two episodes of this and we'll see if anyone shows up and um you know we can we can go from there. I I'm very much like making this up as I go along. I will talk about whatever people want to talk about whatever aspects of it people are interested in.

[01:11:06]Uh so we can if you're interested in that show up tomorrow and we'll see where it goes. I mean I can speak to it on multiple different levels. I I ran a company. Uh I have a master's degree in finance so I understand some of the investing kind of side of it, the financial side. Um but also I'm a lifelong entrepreneur. I believe in entrepreneurship. I encourage people to uh you know do side hustles and things like this gives them security gives them more money you know so we're also looking at it from an entrepreneurial point of view and then finally what it means for the world of work what it means for people like you know in terms of like your job security and then in terms of the form your job will take and what is in demand for companies now in light of all these disruptive changes. So, uh, I could go in any direction people want. So, so, uh, I figured I'd just throw it out there and we'll see. So, show up tomorrow and we'll we'll go from there.

[01:12:04]Um, 6018 says, "Wow, we'll tune into the AI check radio." Okay, great. Well, that's encouraging.

[01:12:16]Yeah, you know, it's been It's ironic. It's been a long time. I just realized uh yesterday, it's been a long time on my channel since anyone really asked me how to answer a job interview question. That was like the thing that started my channel like 6 years ago or whatever was answering all the job interview questions, you know, tell me about yourself, what is your weakness, you know, that kind of stuff.

[01:12:38]Nobody asks me about that stuff on on these live streams anymore, you know. Uh they used to be like it would almost get tedious for me. I'd be asking I'd be answering the same questions over and over and over and over on the live streams and I guess be careful what you wish for because now nobody asks me about that stuff. It's all about the hidden job market and things like this. So, so yeah.

[01:13:06]Anyway, um we've been going for an hour and 20 minutes nearly. So, let me know if you have any uh final questions. I'm actually back in 40 minutes. I've got another live stream, another episode of Honest HR nitrous starting in uh 40 minutes. So, I will be back. But if anyone has any last minute questions, speak now or forever hold your peace.

[01:13:31]Um something I didn't mention uh that I will do right now is if anyone is interested, I also have this uh this makes more sense when I talk about entrepreneurship, but if ever you've wanted to learn business, check out this course. Business is the scientific study of how to make money. So, as you can imagine, that's kind of important to know for a couple of different reasons.

[01:13:52]Uh an interesting fact that not many people know is uh if you are rich, if you come from like a rich family, uh in order to control the family fortune or in order to uh have any control over you know financial wealth like like your your wealth or the wealth of your family, it's pretty much in many most circles you pretty much have to know finance which is a component of business. Uh, finance deals with money in the future. You know, accounting deals with money in the past, finance deals with money in the future.

[01:14:28]So, if you're thinking like what should we do with our money? What what should I do? Uh, that's finance. If you're thinking of like, okay, what happened?

[01:14:36]Did we make money? Where did the money go? That's all accounting, right? So, finance is kind of a requirement to be able to manage money. So, you don't piss it away. Uh, and you actually have it grow.

[01:14:50]And in order to make money in the first place, a component of that is finance, like understanding how it works. Finance is the language of business. Anyone interested in business would know finance. Now, if you want to learn business, check out this course. This is the best bang for the buck around. Uh for $100, you basically get something that covers all the content that you would get in a two-year brickandmortar university uh MBA, masters of business administration. Uh the catch is that it's self-study.

[01:15:24]So you get the books like, you know, you can get them for like literally $5 on Amazon and stuff like that. Uh these are the same textbooks that are used in some of the top MBA programs in the world including places like Harvard Business School in their MBA program. Uh and then I've done videos where I guide you through it. So you're not learning it directly from me. I'm giving insight.

[01:15:44]I'm giving pointers. I'm indicating where the more valuable material is and where the less valuable material is. Uh things like this. I'm sharing examples from my experiences as a CEO and things like this. Uh so it's extremely flexible. If you just want to skim the whole thing, you can. If you're only interested in one area, like say marketing, you can. You can just do that. Um, so extremely flexible. Anyway, check it out if you're interested in this kind of thing. Link in the description box below. And there's also an accompanying video that explains the course at length so it's as transparent as possible. Um, yeah. And those are my three courses. We talked about this one, the main one for how to get hired. all my advice on that.

[01:16:31]And then we talked about the MBA and then we talked about uh the communication skills one.

[01:16:37]Uh the most popular here is the get hired one because that's what most of my YouTube channel is about.

[01:16:48]But there you go. Uh get the course today.

[01:16:54]Okay. Last minute, last call for questions before we uh before we wind this down.

[01:17:00]I will be back in 40 minutes uh with another live stream. We got 19 people here. Thank you for being here.

[01:17:06]We've also got some some really intelligent questions today, including like at least two things I've never been asked before.

[01:17:15]So, that's really cool.

[01:17:19]Okay. And the drink of choice is Sugar-free Red Bull. Always a crowd-pleaser.

[01:17:29]If you drink Sugar-free Red Bull, too, you too could look like me in only 45 years.

[01:17:40]Okay, we're going to wind this down.

[01:17:42]Thanks everyone. You guys are awesome. I will be back in Oh, we got Oh, save by the bell. We got We got one question here.

[01:17:49]Uh, someone says, "A friend got an answer from a job application where the company is asking to record a video answering three questions." Yeah. For for that personal touch, right? Um, answering three questions like telling about yourself, experience, what attracted the company tips.

[01:18:09]So, basically, how to answer tell tell me about yourself um is what you're asking.

[01:18:16]So, how do you answer tell me about yourself? This is how you would do it in a face-to-face interview. Not quite the same thing as recording yourself, but uh this is what you would say. So, somebody says, "Tell me about yourself."

[01:18:31]And you say, "Well, as you can see from my resume," that's the first line you say. That line is optional. It also depends on how you say it. Don't say it in a condescending way, but you basically go through your resume. You summarize your resume in 45 seconds.

[01:18:49]Okay?

[01:18:50]Why 45 seconds? Because you're not here at this interview to talk about stuff you've done with other companies. You're here in this interview to explain to them what you can do for them. That's what you want to get to. Here's what I can do for you. Here's why you should pick me instead of anyone else. That's what I'm here to talk about. So, you want to get off this question. You want to answer a play, but you want to get off this question as soon as possible.

[01:19:16]Okay, maybe that doesn't apply in a video interview that's just going to AI.

[01:19:20]I'm not sure.

[01:19:22]Um, then [clears throat] the reason why you go down your resume is because you see they're looking for any reason at all to eliminate you. Uh, most of the time, traditionally, they interview the a six people. So, six candidates would be brought in for an interview. Now, of those six, they have to eliminate five, right? So, they're looking for any reason to evaluate you because usually what it boils down to is the six people that they bring in are all technically qualified to do the job.

[01:20:00]They could all do the job if it was given to them, right? So, you're having to pick between six people who could all do the job. question is which one would you prefer? Right? So, they're going to do two things. They're going to look for whether they like things about your personality and your soft skills, things they don't like about your soft skills, and they're also going to look about look at risk factors. For example, if you just quit your last 10 jobs after one month, uh they are probably not going to hire you. You're a high-risisk candidate. if they were to hire you, you're likely to quit this job after a month also. Highly likely. So that would be a risk factor looking.

[01:20:45]Okay. Now, the tell me about yourself answer that's mainly going to slot into what they like about you or don't like about. Now, you don't know what they consider good or bad.

[01:20:56]In my most popular video on this channel where I answer this question, I told a story about me being present for a job interview where I observed the hiring manager eliminate a candidate because the candidate said they supported a particular sports team. You have no idea what you know is grounds for them loving you or hating you because you don't know these people, right? So, the best thing to do is to keep it safe. Now, the material on your resume is safe. You sent in the your resume to them. They read it and they did not eliminate you.

[01:21:32]They gave you an interview. So, that suggests that there's nothing on your resume that will get you eliminated. So, if they give you an open floor and you're having to dodge like a minefield, but you don't know where the mines are, just stick to the material that you know hasn't got you eliminated. It's also intelligent.

[01:21:51]They're wanting to know who the hell you are. It's logical. You start with an overview of your resume. That's who you are. I have this education. I worked here for 2 years and I worked here for 2 years in this role. And uh that's what brings me here and why I'm excited to learn more about this opportunity. And that's how you end. That's what brings me here and why I'm excited to learn more about this opportunity. Right? So it starts with a line. You summarize your resume 45 seconds. education first, then experiences oldest to newest to most recent, and then you end with the phrase, and that's what brings me here uh today and why I'm excited to learn more about this opportunity. In a face-to-face interview, you want to steer the conversation towards this opportunity. You don't want to spend half an hour talking about what you did in some other job that has nothing to do with this job, right? So, some of these translate over to the world of like an AI reading your answer, like looking at your facial expressions. Some of them don't, right? Okay. Um, what attracted to you you to this company? Um, that is another standard job interview question.

[01:22:59]It's another way of saying, you know, why do you want to work here? Uh, the answer is you have done 2 minutes of research about who the hell these people are and you say it. you say like well you know you're first of all you're located near me uh secondly I know you guys are a player in this industry you do this kind of work uh the thing that makes you competitive is this other competitors they're doing like like multiple different types of business you're just doing this one you're a pure play company you just do this uh focus on this and that's your greatest strength I think that's great I think that if I work in this operation I can tell you guys care about this operation because this is your only operation. So, it's probably going to be run well. It's probably going to have attentive management, attentive leadership. And that's a good thing. I don't want to feel like I'm insignificant. Nobody cares about anything I do. I want to contribute. I want to feel like I'm contributing. You guys are leaders in my business. You're close by. That's why I'm here. I think it's a fantastic opportunity. Something like that.

[01:24:05]Okay. So, does that does that make sense? Good question. And we will get into the whole AI interview thing like where you know you you record a video and then an AI watches it, looks at your facial expressions, makes judgments.

[01:24:19]We'll get into that in a in a future live stream. That's a great topic.

[01:24:24]Okay, thanks everyone. You guys are awesome. We'll see you soon. Take care.