An elevator speech is a brief statement about yourself, prepped and ready to be reeled off at a moment’s notice if you’re lucky enough to experience an elevator ride (or other momentary chance encounter) with a person of influence. Whether you’re hoping to impress a CEO, an angel investor, or a client, an elevator speech is generally regarded as A Good Thing to have in your arsenal of communications tools. But there’s another side to them, and Laurie Ruettimann from Punk Rock HR had some pretty harsh words for the elevator speech recently.

Do you have a personal elevator speech? Honest to god, I hope you don’t. Elevator speeches are needy, and as we’ve established before, no one wants to hire a needy person.

Ruettimann’s rules for impressing someone in a chance meeting are 1) to be able to describe yourself in a clear and concise way and 2) to understand your strengths and weaknesses. Sounds good! Where she diverges from other HR advisors is on her last point:

Don’t do business with anyone who will only give you 27 seconds to talk… You don’t want to work for someone — either an employer or a client — who wants you to distill your existence into a soundbite.

This is good advice. It departs from the conventional advice about elevator speeches, and delves into the deeper issues of what it really means to have an audience with someone. What may be necessary in Hollywood (the ability to pitch a movie in 12 seconds to jaded millionaires) is not necessarily going to work with your highly personal and meaningful career search. Punk Rock HR has given us all something to think about here.

Nonetheless, I still think it’s valuable to keep an elevator speech in your back pocket (figuratively, that is). It is extraordinarily useful to have given some thought to the correct way to respond to the inevitable quick question from strangers: “So, what do you do?” Executive Coach Dale Kurow is a huge advocate of the elevator speech, and here’s her take on it:

An elevator speech is a short (15-30 second, 150 word) sound bite that succinctly and memorably introduces you. It spotlights your uniqueness. It focuses on the benefits you provide. And it is delivered effortlessly.

Kurow’s top advice is to keep your speech from being a yawn by framing what you do in terms of benefit to the listener. For instance, she suggests changing, “Hi, my name is Stanley Manly, and I’m a public relations executive with 20 years of experience,” to “Hi, my name is Stanley Manly, and I help inventors tell the world about their inventions,” and “Hi, I’m Sally Hopeful, and I’m an executive recruiter,” to “Hi, I’m Sally Hopeful. I partner with companies that need to find talented people to help their business growth and become more profitable.”

To write your own elevator speech that will help get people interested in what you do, here is what Kurow suggests:

1. Write down your deliverables.
2. Craft a great opening line to go in front of them.
3. Make sure to leave your listener wanting more.
4. Practice the speech until it rolls off your tongue with ease.

Ultimately, I think it’s a good idea to follow these guidelines to put together an elevator speech, because you never know when you will have a few moments with an influencer. But to Laurie’s point, I would caution you not to seem too needy. Position your speech to give your listener the idea that they need you — and then let them come to this conclusion themselves.

Not long ago, most workers considered merit raises a pretty sure bet, counting on them coming around every year along with their annual performance review. In boom times, even sub-par performers usually got some kind of token raise, and top performers were well rewarded.

However, as the recession continues, we find this particular compensation model increasingly falling off — although pay-for-performance in general is still big.

The problems with merit raises? Well, they’re the cost that keeps on costing — year after year, the increase is built into an employee’s salary, and percentages only build from there. A one-time bonus can be a smarter way to recognize stellar performance. Another issue is that these types of raises are not always implemented fairly — and yet, attempts to smooth out percentages to make them more “fair” (people talk, after all) can alienate top performers.

In her blog post “The End of the Merit Increase,” Ann Bates of Compensation Force declares, “Pay for performance is here to stay, but merit increases — possibly the longest running and most prevalent form of performance pay — may be on the path to extinction.” Bates explains that base salary increases are not a terribly effective method of rewarding performance, and makes a case for variable pay increases instead:

Unlike merit increases, the variable pay slate can be wiped clean each year, allowing more room and opportunity for experimentation … and for mistakes … and for reactions to unanticipated course changes.  This helps create flexibility and agility in reward plan design, enabling organizations to adapt to a fast-changing business environment.

A May 2009 study from the Institute for Corporate Productivity (a.k.a. i4cp ), detailed in “More Companies Adopt a Pay-for-Performance Program,” breaks down the most recent trends. Between 78 percent and 84 percent of polled companies say they do tie pay to performance. As for poor performers, more than half of the companies (54 percent) said that they do not grant merit raises to low performers. (This leaves 46 percent giving merit raises to low performers, which indicates that what we call “merit” increases are perhaps not truly tied to merit.)

The study also revealed that most organizations offer only slightly higher merit raises to their high performers than to their average performers. Average performers were most often awarded between 3 and 4 percent. High performers clocked in between 4 and 5 percent — which seems frustratingly close to the typical reward for average workers.

Explains i4cp research analyst David Wentworth:

Companies are becoming more willing to withhold merit raises for poor performers, but in general they are still not truly distinguishing the top performers from the average. This could be due to a fear of creating a perception of unfairness when they are trying to find the fine line between the good and the very good.

So, what percentage increase really feels like a merit raise to the employee? Three? Four? Five?

Try seven percent, according to Jason Shaw, professor of human resources and industrial relations at the University of Minnesota’s Carlson School of Management in an article called “Money and Meaning” by Jack Gordon.

In today’s economy, even employers who haven’t had to cut or freeze pay might be forced to choose between small, across-the-board increases for the many or bigger merit raises for a few star performers. Shaw has found that a bump of at least 7 percent is required before the average recipient perceives it psychologically as a “merit” raise. Keep that in mind when you look at your resources, count your stars, and do the math, he suggests.

If you’re lucky enough to still be at a company that gives merit increases, it’s time to do some serious thinking about which approach you are using with the salary increase budget you have on hand. Differentiation has more impact with employees than uniformity does.

“That man deserves a raise!”

While it might not show up in the history books, there is at least the possibility that phrase was shouted above the din by a stressed-out deck officer a little over 98 years ago, as the Titanic sank beneath the frosty waves.   Having witnessed the fine work of a calm and steady stevedore loading panicky ladies into the lifeboat, the officer made a mental note:  “If we survive this thing, that man deserves a raise.” 

Things weren’t looking too good, but good work still got noticed. 

The recession of 2009 is not on a par with the sinking of the Titanic in 1912.  We may have hit an iceberg, but cool hands on deck are still steering ahead.  If you’re one of those cool hands, the recession is no reason to forego a request for a raise, or to negotiate a better package in a career transition.

Prepare and proceed.  Keep your eyes on the prize and your feet on the ground.  In other words, be rational and realistic — and just a little opportunistic. 

Here are four tips for getting the salary you want during the recession you don’t –

1. Know your worth and defend your knowledge.  Research pays off . . . as in “pay.”  Know your industry and your peers and the appropriate salary.  Shoot for the high end, but have a bottom line in mind.  This leaves a little wiggle room.  Salary level is, after all, a negotiation.  The centerpiece of the negotiation should be the value of your performance.

“A promotion or raise is not necessarily related to the current economic crisis. It should be tied to performance, and people should always feel like they’re getting paid what they’re worth,” said Robert Chope, president of the National Employment Counseling Association.

2. Think it through.  Salary negotiators don’t roll over; they make decisions based on logic and business realities. They also look at everything from what you’ve done in your previous position to the ghastly tie you wore or the mismatched shoes and the odd “thingy” in your hair.  They’re human.  Make sure you’re ready to put your facts and your best foot forward.

3.  Stop, look and listen.  Remember what your mother told you about crossing streets?  Negotiating a salary or a raise during a recession is like standing on a busy corner, waiting for a break in the traffic. 

Stop: you don’t dash out.  Stop and give your boss a chance to speak first; he or she may praise you and provide you with some more negotiating points. 

Look:  assess the recession’s impact on the company and address it directly, especially if you can point to how your actions have or your abilities will soften the recession’s blow.

Listen:  Don’t be so relieved at having unloaded your request that you let your sigh of relief blot out the words of response.  Remember, this is a negotiation.  It doesn’t end with the request.

Sharlyn Lauby, the HR Bartender, notes that “we’re in this together.”  Companies want to ride out the recession and retain their talent.  In addition, companies are recruiting for smoother sailing in the future.

4.  Be fair.  You’re not the only one loading the lifeboats.  You want to be fairly compensated, but you do have colleagues.  If you consider your performance superior, make your point, but don’t reach too far beyond the the going rate for others with your level of skill and responsibility.

Jim Moniz of HR-Worldview says that recession or not, personal performance is still key and still valued:

Savvy companies recognize that in both good times and bad times, the ultimate key to success is their talent pool.  Likewise, they are also well aware that it is precisely at the trough of a recession that the labor pool will be at its deepest and wage pressures at their lightest.

It is a labor pool. It may be deep; there are obviously pressures.  But if you keep your head about you when everyone else on board is in a bit of a panic, someone may well shout out, “That man deserves a raise!”  Go for it.

When you market your company — not to customers, but to employees — to attract and retain best-in-class talent, you are practicing employer branding. The concept was hot during recent boom times: companies worked on everything from their benefits packages to the language on their careers page to strike the right note with talent.

But in this poor economy, good talent is easier to access, and retention rates are up without undue effort. What’s more, there is pressure to cut costs, and some insist that it makes little sense to focus on the brand when there may not even be any open jobs on the career page.

So why practice employer branding during a recession?

“The fact is that the talent marketplace has a long memory and, long after this recession ends, potential candidates will remember how you keep your employer brand alive during this period,” writes Mark Schumann, HR blogger and co-author of “Brand for Talent.” In his post, “Why an Employer Brand is Essential During a Recession,” Schumann definitely takes the long view, advising companies to work on their online presence through sites such as Facebook and YouTube, to help build a “fan base” for the talent pipeline. He also suggested pitching news media stories to help keep the company in the public eye.

External vs. Internal Branding

The discussion over at Brand For Talent got even more interesting when a reader commented that all of the tips were external facing and that most companies turn inwards in a recession. The reader argued that employees are the brand ambassadors and that some focus should be on them so they contribute to promoting the brand. It seems that a blend of external-facing PR efforts, combined with an evangelical team of employees, is the best formula.

This leads us into another recent post on the topic. In her post “Employer brand vs. internal brand,” Sharon Habib of Outsidein Consulting compares these two terms, which many use interchangeably (not her!), and talks about they fare during a down season.

During the hiring crunch and “employees’ market” of just 12 months ago, companies were pulling out the stops to brand themselves as a great place to work. At the time many were under the false illusion that the employer brand was all about your recruiting strategy. Suffice to say, a lot of marketing of the company as an employer was happening  both externally to potential new hires, and less so, but also internally to the valuable employees they wanted to keep.

Habib explains that in her consulting practice, the internal brand is the employer brand plus an aspirational aspect, where the employees themselves collectively decide the qualities of the culture and community. She notes that many companies have slowed down on promoting their brand, but that it is not something to be abandoned lightly.

Takeaways:

• Employer branding is important, even in down times, because the talent marketplace has a long memory
• Your “employer brand” and your “internal brand” are similar, but not the same thing
• The best campaigns combine outward-facing efforts (social media, PR) with internal efforts (with the staff that already exists)

What about your company? Is there any support for branding programs, or have they fallen by the wayside in tough times?

I remember the shockwaves when I made  ”the big move” many years ago, switching from a pure journalism career as a small-town newspaper editor to accept a position in public relations with a huge corporation.  Mouths dropped open and fingers wagged. You would have thought I’d put my mother on a Greyhound bus with a one-way ticket to a destination unknown.

I mean . . . who goes to college, prepares for one career, commits to it for a lifetime and then switches for . . . gasp . . . the money?

I did.

This “sell-out”  — as my purist journalistic comrades called it — changed my life. I had new challenges and greater opportunities.  I came to realize that most of us really aren’t cut out to make lifelong career commitments, nor will we receive a guarantee of such in return.

Times have changed. Switching horses midstream doesn’t look like such a dangerous and acrobatic move anymore.  Plus, I bailed (albeit in ignorance) before the newspaper industry began its downward spiral into redefinition. It turned out to be good timing.

Hopping Off the Horse You Rode in On

In today’s economy — there we go with that again — many people are exploring career switches.  It may be time to hop off the horse you rode in on.  

Kris Dunn of The HR Capitalist cites a Newsweek study that says an emerging structural shift in the U.S. economy has led to shrinking sectors such as construction, finance, and retail.  Kris says employees in these fields need to get the skills and training to move into the growing fields of education, accounting, health care, and government.  

Moving from construction engineering to hospital management will take a little saddle-switching for sure.  Ah, the lure of a fresh horse — and a steady paycheck.

These days, companies are actually more concerned with a candidate’s core skills and how those can be applied in their industry.  Recruiters realize people from outside an industry bring new perspective and new ways to approach old problems. Casting a wide net in a job search improves the chance of success. 

Take your base skill — maybe it’s in accounting, computer technology, engineering or marketing — and re-tool it for a new industries. A marketing manager for a manufacturer of airplane components can shift his skills to become a marketing manager for an medical supply company, moving from a slower industry to a faster one, riding on the same skills.

Here are three tips for saddling up and sitting tall as you conemplate a career change:

1.  Identify your core skills.

Most of these will, of course, be workplace skills.  The tried and true.  But don’t overlook skills you’ve gained through volunteer work or life experiences.  These may apply to your new career even better than they did your old one.

2.  Sell your skills, not your past.

You’ll have to move beyond the basic resume.  A bare list of past positions and responsibilities could read like an “I don’t fit here” memoir.  Go beyond the facts and focus on the application of your skills.  Convince the potential employer that the skills you carry with you are transplantable and productive in his environment.

3.  Project confidence to seal the deal.

Don’t appear desperate, with statements like “If I had known that technology would have made my career obsolete, I would have chosen differently.”  Instead, project confidence:  “I’m interested in being where the future is and I can tell it’s here.  I want to be a part of your success.”

Whether you change careers because you want to — you’re bored, you want a better salary, your mother-in-law moved in next door — or because you have to — your industry tanked, your current career is a mismatch, you feel stymied in your path — you can do it. 

Get ready to loosen the reins; the stream is just around the bend.

When (and what) to text?

Texts have a lot going for them. They’re cheap to send, quick to create, and delivered almost instantaneously. Even their drawbacks (they’re short) can work for you (so make your message short and sweet). Best of all, nearly every working professional has a mobile device that is on their person, and physically turned on, between eight and 18 hours per day.

Despite all these advantages, a lot of recruiters are still unclear on the best way to use text messages to their advantage. We turned to the blogs to find out the best ways to deploy a truly killer text.

TIP 1: Create an easy way for candidates to follow up using “text and tag” services. 

Kristin Gissaro at TalentMash recommends using text and tag so jobseekers can have a shortcut to research a job later. A simple message similar to an American Idol vote (”text the word JOB to 12345″) is easy to remember or jot down. This is great when the job is being advertised in a medium that goes by quickly, such as radio or TV.

TIP 2: Text time-sensitive messages.

Texting feels urgent; use that feeling to your advantage. Some issues are truly time-sensitive, and while texting lacks formality, a candidate on the road to an interview will appreciate a last-minute reminder or agenda change sent to their phone — not to their e-mail. In writing about the way mobile communications are changing the talent acquisition model, Izzy Leizerowitz at Mobile Marketer has some great suggestions about the way text messages can be used to save time and help candidates be agile when faced with last-minute changes.

For potential candidates the recruiter will use mobile technology to send interview schedules, briefly write up job descriptions, maintain employer contact information, and get directions to make sure the candidate has everything in the palm of his or her hand before going to the interview and is very well prepared. Using common short codes the recruiter is able to provide the ability for the candidate to respond to his messages, confirm the interview and send a message if he gets delayed.

TIP 3: Texts are great for transactional messages.

They may not be the best for nuanced discussions or salary negotiations, but texts are fabulously direct when used for simple transactions such as timesheets, referrals, and reminders. Thomas Shaw of Recruitment Directory shares his favorites, complete with sample text: 

• Notify job seekers when a new role matches their profile “Thomas, 2 new roles with CLIENT, PAY, LOCATION. For more info URL”
• Remind candidates about attending interview. “Thomas, just a reminder you have a interview with CLIENT, TIME/DATE, LOCATION. Problems call me”
• Administration “Thomas, 5 new resumes from JOB BOARD” or “Thomas, JOB AD TITLE is about to close”
• Referrals “Do you know a JOBTITLE? LOCATION, PAY RATE, REFERAL REWARD more info URL”

So there you have it — three tips for making texting work for you. They’re easy to remember when you consider that they all play to the greatest strength of a text: the fact that it is short, quick, and direct. If you deploy your texts according to these rules, you’ll be seeing great success in 140 characters or less.

Grief counseling. Office space. Group seminars. While your laid-off workers won’t turn down the range of services that traditional outplacement firms provide, what they really want is to find a new job — fast.

That’s why RiseSmart takes a more direct approach with its Transition Concierge service. We assign each employee a job-search specialist, whose primary role is to deliver that employee a continuous stream of qualified job leads. The specialist uses RiseSmart search technology to match each jobseeker with job openings culled from hundreds of thousands across the Web.

By leveraging technology to focus exclusively on the jobseeker’s most pressing need, RiseSmart improves employee satisfaction in your outplacement offering — at a fraction of the cost of traditional outplacement solutions.

BusinessWeek touts RiseSmart’s approach to outplacement as making “a lot of sense.” The San Jose Mercury News says, “RiseSmart typifies the valley’s knack for using technology to disrupt standard business practices.” And we’ve already earned the business of some of the most forward-looking companies in the Fortune 500.

To encourage you to try RiseSmart Transition Concierge, we’re offering a promotional trial opportunity — but only if you respond by July 31.

Go to www.transitionconcierge.com/contact.php or call 1-408-213-8130 today to learn more!

RiseSmart. The shortest distance between two jobs.

Too many applicants?

Recruiters have a standard hiring etiquette, but with unemployment rates so high, their inboxes are overflowing with candidates pressing for a response. On the other side of the fence, job forums are filled with complaints that applicants never heard back from Company X.

Neither side is happy. There is intense competition for jobs right now, and recruiters (often working with a reduced staff themselves) just cannot fully connect with each and every applicant.

So we ask: faced with a glut of applicants, what’s your “glut-iquette”?

Barb at HireWellBlog recently tackled this topic. She says:

I had been asked to join them to specifically discuss Hiring Etiquette and in research prior to the show was surprised to find that most of the articles in a Google search were about the rudeness exhibited by companies during the hiring process. Candidates complain that companies are not getting back to them in a timely manner or even at all. We ask candidates to write cover letters specific to the position, email their applications in a certain manner, and to leave work early to participate in interviews. It is only fair – and mannerly – to let them know where they stand in the process.

This is the ethical and responsible reaction, certainly, and what everyone should aim for. At the same time, the reality is that many recruiters are overwhelmed by the sheer number of applicants. In this age of copy and paste, it only takes a few minutes for someone to apply for a job that may be (let’s be honest) totally unrealistic.

Multiply that by hundreds of hopefuls, and where does it leave you?

The HR Maven gives us some straight talk about exactly how many resumes she sees and how much time she can devote to each candidate. In a candid post, she admits that two thirds of the resumes sent to her company have no chance because (1) they aren’t targeted to the job, or (2) they don’t have a cover letter. Here’s how she’s handling the glut:

I have a personal philosophy of returning every call and email. It is a reflection of my employer and my commitment to exceptional customer service. Most employers do not have this philosophy. However, please do not mistake this with personal interest in you, your application and your status. I am not your ally nor am I your advocate… Remember that any position for which you apply will likely have a number of applicants. If you call our office and speak to one of us, please be respectful of our time. I don’t need to hear your pitch and I am not interested in small, chit-chat conversation. I am busy. You will be notified when we start our screening.

Can you relate? As a recruiter or hiring manager, how do you reconcile your overflowing inbox with your own standards of etiquette?

Take this poll and then check the results –

[Image source]

“The toughest job market in decades” is becoming a cliche.  Tough or not, there is still a job market. The problem is, job candidates and potential employers are matching up for interviews in this market with the pressure of the Super Bowl without the pre-season warm-ups, early season matches and first-round playoffs.

Everything feels like it’s for all the marbles. 

Fortunately for all involved, while it may not feel like it when you’re walking through the thick glass door into the inner sanctum for the interview, you’re actually both on the same team, pulling for each other.

“Let’s make this work” is your shared team slogan.

So first, de-stress. Then focus on how to impress in the big game — er, interview.

Show Your Moves

Eamon Duede, in a recent post at HR-Worldview, noted that the tight job market is bringing out the competitive spirit in jobseekers.

According to Eamon, one job candidate sent a resume wrapped as a present and said his skills were a “gift to the company.” Another staged a sit-in in the lobby to get a meeting with a director. Still another candidate washed cars in the parking lot.

Bold moves? Yes — and ones that can pay off, like an unexpected long bomb to a wide-open receiver.

More conservative maneuvers speak well, too, and can help you break free from other candidates.

Cut-and-paste interview preparedness won’t cut it anymore, if it ever did. Interviewers lose interest quickly in jobseekers who don’t know the who, what, when and where. 

A wide receiver can’t expect to succeed just by running fast enough to catch bombs. He also needs to know the pass patterns.

Study the company; visit the Web site; know the products; check the history; put it in perspective with the future. Have something beyond a smile and a resume.

Share the Ball — and Don’t Give Up

Interviews are about give and take. Speak up; listen well; respond appropriately.  It sounds simple, but it takes focus.   

Sure, you’re prepared and you have some points to make. But you’ll need to think on the spot as well. Provide targeted information in response to questions, honoring the preparation of the interviewer. If some of the questions you anticipated aren’t asked, toss out your tidbits of information to keep the process going your way.

Much as you’d like to carry the trophy right out of the interview, it’s likely that in this tough economy employers will make slower hiring decisions.  Don’t wither and disappear. 

Send a follow-up e-mail with enough information that the interviewer will be reminded of how well your interview went. Be nice; say thanks. 

A snail-mail thank-you note will make a good impression, too. It sends the message that you really do want the job.

De-stress. Then, impress.

You probably won’t have to wash cars in the parking lot to get your next job, but indicating your willingness to do so sure won’t hurt.

Liz Ryan at Yahoo had an interesting article today identifying what she called the “worst 10 boilerplate phrases” on candidate resumes. As a hiring manager or jobseeker, which of these 10 do you rate the worst?