Create Your Own Advisory Board

Cross-posted at Sturdy Roots Blog.

Earlier today, I had a very interesting phone call with a bright, highly enthusiastic (fire-in-the-belly) new business development executive. His familiarity with the information technology space is excellent. And so too is his skill at staging successful consultative processes and converting his multi-million-dollar new business prospects to sale.

What company wouldn’t want to hire this new business sales executive?

Problem is, the executive is burned out on the I/T space and he wants out. He tells me he would like nothing more than to pivot to selling green business products and services; while he has the passion for making the planet a better place to live, he knows he has neither the familiarity nor the contact base in the green space to be successful.

We all know that in this economy, the few hiring managers that have open assignments want spot-on matches to the job spec. Even if this talented sales executive has – several times over – built multi-million-dollar information technology business portfolios from scratch, his having no prior experience in the green business space may be a non-starter…

…or is it?

After listening to this executive’s concerns, I offered up an idea for him to consider:

Right now, there are tens of thousands of entrepreneurs in the world seeking seed-investment capital to start new businesses. And while the venture’s partners may be top-notch no management team completely possesses all of the familiarities an investor wants to see before cutting that first check. So entrepreneurs often mitigate the cavities in their business plans by founding an industry advisory board made up of business leaders – skilled in the art – to counsel the management team on best business practices, alert them to competitive developments or fast-moving opportunities, and help their enterprise establish a strong and unique value proposition and long-term success.

I said to this executive, think of yourself as a new business enterprise. If you know you aren’t fully versed in green business, then why not create your own advisory board to shorten your learning curve, get fully-familiar (faster) with best-practices and next-practices, and help establish the-most solid relationships with potential client-prospects.

If we think of ourselves not as executives but as entrepreneurs, we stand a greater chance of achieving our goals; that is especially the case in difficult economic times such as these. By treating his “pivot” into green business like a new venture, the executive will bridge the all-too-common gap between will and skill.

Whether between jobs or employed in a company or market space that no longer inspires, consider establishing your own advisory board to speed your transition to a career in green business.

These times call for bold action. Go for it!

Is It Time to Revise Your CV or Résumé? Absolutely!

Whether you are gainfully employed at a company with sound financial footing or a recent addition to the ranks of the in-between-assignments cohort, now is the time to get that curriculum vitae (CV) or résumé of yours updated and built-for-speed.

When it comes to offering advice on drafting and revising such things, we executive recruiters are like a gathering of rabbis: as the old joke goes, ask 4 of us what we of think of your résumé and we’ll respond with 5 opinions.

Over the years, I’ve read through tens of thousands of  résumés and have become adept as separating the wheat from the chaff. Here are 5 insights that I believe you should keep in mind as you write, or rewrite your résumé:

1. Size doesn’t matter. I am often asked, “should I limit the résumé to 2 or 3 pages?  The answer is that it should be as long as it needs to be, but no longer…and as concise as it needs to be but no shorter. I’ve seen truly outstanding résumés that take up only 1 or 2 pages while others take up 4 pages. The long and the short of it that first you need to balance your career accomplishments and chronology, then determine how long or short the document should be.
2. Metrics! Metrics! Metrics! If the mantra of real estate brokers is Location! Location Location! then Metrics! Metrics Metrics! should be the mantra of hiring managers and executive recruiters. A truly outstanding résumé will quantify your professional career by answering questions such as these: how much new business sales revenue did you generate last year?; what was the percentage increase over “bogie” (budgeted revenue)?; how large a budget did you manage?; how much money did you save your company?; how many former clients were you able to re-activate and how much have they spent?; etc.  
3. Aim for high impact. Your first job is to grab the attention of the bleary-eyed hiring manager. Your second job is to get him or her to actually read your résumé and not put it back in the stack. The best résumés telegraph the executive’s unique value proposition, and make excellent use of blocked sections with bullet points, boldface and italicized characters. Further, I’ve seen excellent use of a second color to call out truly exceptional accomplishments. But if you do use color, avoid any hue that runs hot (especially red).
4. Consider adapting to a new out-of-the-box format. VisualCV merges the traditional résumé and the Web 2.0 world, allowing executives to share supportive graphic content such as slides, performance charts and company logos (with hyperlinks)…EVEN VIDEO. The service is free to executives and certainly worth your consideration.
5. Last, SPELL-CHECK! I often find that résumés of senior executives tend to have more typos than the ones from middle-management. I’ve seen some high-flying executives on the fast track for a great job drop from 30,000 feet (metaphorically-speaking) because of one or several typos in their all-important document.

Don’t have the time to revise your CV? Or do you prefer that someone else take a stab at it? Then contact a writing and revision resource like CVrite, which will turn your dull doc into something dazzling. I know well and respect very much the management of this firm; they are seasoned executive recruiters that know what it takes to maximize the effectiveness of your CV or résumé.

Now, get to work!

Are We There, Yet?

In other words, is this: a) downturn, b) recession, c) economic calamity almost over?

Lately, this is a question recruiters get asked a lot.

Unfortunately, I am no economist, so I cannot say with any semblance of authority or certainty that we are at the beginning of the end of this long, long, national nightmare.

But let’s face it: we’re all so impatient, looking for any sign of light at the end of the tunnel. Could economic data or trends we are hearing about on the news foretell that we have gotten through the worst?

Or are we seeing mirages?

Just in the past week we learned that:

• The stock market had a pretty good run up in March. After months of playing rope-a-dope, securities trading on the Street had a pretty good string of positive trading days. But could volatility return? People I know that know a lot more than I know say that 3 or more months of stability are needed before The Street will feel comfortable with the notion that the worst has passed. So, for now, institutional market traders may continue ratcheting up share prices to take short-term profits, but be assured that they are still looking for the bottom.
• Inventories are at there lowest levels in years. So, one might think that manufacturers and retailers may start ordering again and soon. Well…maybe they will or maybe they won’t. 
• Wells Fargo reports record quarterly profits. Great! But is this a sign that one of the largest commercial banks in the U.S. has found level footing, or are Wells Fargo’s profits the result of millions of consumers running up the balances on their Wells Fargo credit cards? Again, hard to say if this is a reliable sign.

But, these 2 things I DO KNOW:

• Hiring is a lagging indicator; typically, it is one of the last areas to witness improvement. So if you are out-of-work, or looking for a better job, expect that things will take twice or maybe three times as long. Use your time now to investigate new opportunities while seeking knowledge (or taking professional courses) to improve your value with your next employer.
• And, we need to hear about as much good news as possible. Once consumers put away the Maalox and feel better about the future, then hopefully they will start spending, again; banks will start lending to businesses; bank balance sheets will stabilize and black ink will replace red; factory orders will rise; and, more of us currently out-of-pocket will again earn paychecks.

Let’s all keep a good thought that the light some of us see means the end of the tunnel is near.

And to those who celebrate, may we wish you a Happy Easter!

Chief Sustainability Officer: Bright Green Job in a Dull Gray Economy?

Several months ago, Sturdy Roots Blog reported on the rise of The Chief Green Officer. Now, the NY Times’ Green Inc. blog reports that:

Amid mounting job woes, at least one position seems to be gaining currency: chief sustainability officer.

Read the Green Inc. blog post here.

What About Green Executive Jobs?

Twelve months ago, many of us thought that by now – February 2009 – we’d all be happy as clams discovering new job opportunities for green executive talent, or professionals looking to steer their non-green careers towards green marketing, green/clean tech, and other sustainable business sectors.

In February 2008, I joined other green business types in believing the signs looked oh-so-promising: ratcheted-up interest in green investment amongst venture capitalists; colleges and universities scrambling to develop in-demand green business curriculum and degree programs; and hiring managers discovering that green executives often made the best hires (and quickly adding sustainability and corporate responsibility practices to entice them).

The near future, most of us thought, looked awesome!

But to paraphrase Fred Willard in the movie A Mighty Wind:

Wha’ Happened?

Executive recruiters are often reliable bellwethers of the economy. We sense hiring trends weeks, sometimes months, before the mainstream media make the same discovery.

Unfortunately, the short-term hiring forecasts look pretty bleak. This week alone, I experienced a big spike in phone calls and email from aggrieved executives. In a repeat of what happened last month, I fear the economy is getting ready to shed hundreds of thousands more professionals.

Adding insult to injury, hiring in some business sectors has ground to a halt.

And what about green executive jobs? Have bleak employment forecasts turned green to gray?

To the readers of this blog and all others interested in green executive jobs, I say it’s time to take a deep breath. The plethora of green jobs we thought would be here in 2009 may not materialize until 2010 or 2011.

Meantime – while we strive to stabilize the economy and start hiring, again – we should focus our energies on learning, planning, and…dreaming.

And we’re eager to know how you’d like to empower yourself for your future great green business career. If you don’t mind, please answer these survey questions:

If we missed something, please add a comment to this post. Your interests matter!

We’re going to get through this. I promise!