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Maximizing the Potential of Future Opportunities
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The Future-Oriented Opportunities (FOO) letter is one of the most powerful tools you can use in your job search, and one of the most underutilized. Clients are often either uncomfortable with the process (i.e. What is the value of congratulating someone on their promotion if they do not even know me?), cannot determine what an event might mean for their functional orientation, or just do not ever see anything of interest. My advice is to get comfortable with the tool and open your mind, or you will risk missing some of the most interesting possibilities in the marketplace.
So just what is a FOO? It is an event or series of events in an organization that creates the possibility for corporate-wide or position-specific hiring. There is no guarantee that the hiring will actually occur, but rather the expectation that circumstances would dictate such action. As indicated in Strategies for Success, a FOO requires that you making an assumption and go forward from there. It may be that your assumption may be wrong, and your efforts are for naught. But if you are correct, you are virtually without competition.
Some of the more obvious FOOs are new product announcements, acquisitions, building a new facility, or securing joint venture funding. All of these events suggest that an operation is growing and needs the additional staff to support that growth, no matter what the function. The FOO letter to the CEO, President, or Vice President for the appropriate functional or geographic area indicating that you are aware of what is going on in their organization and see how you can play a role in it is pure marketing, and generally pretty enticing to the reader.
p>There are others, still not too obscure. Think of what happens when there is an executive change in an organization, such as a new CEO or Chairman of the Board. I have been through several and can tell you from experience that there are always folks running for the door or being shown the door. And it is not just the senior managers who leave, but employees from across the ranks who choose to move on before being asked to or do not want to go through yet another reorganization or reassignment of responsibilities.
Earnings reports, good or bad, are also fertile ground. If the report is good, you want to contribute to bettering that stellar performance; if it is bad, you can help turn around the situation. Other ideas – securing an exclusive contract to distribute or manufacture a product, winning FDA approval on a drug, having a manager recognized by a national trade or professional organization, making a publication’s list for the fastest growing, best employer, or for an outstanding service or product - the possibilities are endless.
So where do you find these future oriented opportunities? Just about everywhere. Daily papers have a business section full of both national and local companies and generally have weekly updates on People on the Move, Business Awards, and Business Changes. Most metropolitan areas have a weekly business journal with special features and profiles on industries, firms, and individuals. Then there are always the national publications (Business Week, Wall Street Journal, Inc., Fast Company Magazine), most of which can be accessed from our website.
A FOO can also be found closer to home, such as attending a program where a representative from a company is speaking, seeing a great advertisement for the product in the paper, or even just buying the product. Writing a CEO and telling them that you bought their product because it was the best one on the market and, by the way, ”I would love to be part of an organization which still prides itself on quality” may seem a bit far-fetched but it is effective.
Sometimes you might need to be creative and work backwards to find an opportunity. I recommend that my clients develop a list of the top 25 companies that they want to work for, then review press releases, product information, or even mission statements on the company’s website to find some point of interest and relevance. Alternately, a visit to general business websites such as stockmaster.com can provide a wealth of financial and operational information that can serve as a great introduction.
Remember that the FOO letter should just serve as a teaser to the reader so that they will be intrigued enough to invite you in for an interview or at least be receptive to your follow-up phone call. You just want to touch on the event that stimulated the letter in the first paragraph, and then tell the reader what it is that you can bring to their organization in either a bullet or short paragraph format. Do not forget to advise that you will be calling to further discuss your background and set up a time for a meeting. Then do the follow-up!
When I was out in the marketplace, I enjoyed working with future oriented opportunities since they allowed me to successfully sell different parts of my background to very diverse audiences. I capitalized on my international business background, foreign language skills, and Masters in International Business degree to target the companies doing businesses globally, and the writing, training, marketing, and local business-to-business experience for those with just domestic operations. The control I gained by presenting a different product to the market depending on the potential need certainly outweighed the time required to identify these opportunities. It also gave me a head start for the informational and informal interviews that I generated through these efforts.
So grab a newspaper or get on-line and start looking. You can always contact your consultant for inspiration, or have them review the FOO letters that you put together. I can assure you that you will find the effort worth the rewards.
Source : Global Career Management |
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