Press and PR
Article in RE News October 2008.
We now know that for many people the credit crunch will be commuted into a career crunch and as the casualty list rises, no-one can be sure when the flow of redundancies will be stemmed.
Most employers do not offer outplacement programmes to departing staff, but for those that do, they maybe having a re-think about the expenditure in the current climate – or if the ‘crunch’ is truly terminal, there may be no money left in the bank to pay for such programmes anyway, no matter how well intentioned the employer may wish to be.
Career Navigation Consultants offer an alternative solution in their career management programmes. Their executive-funded (as opposed to employer- funded) service is designed to help senior executives develop their career, sometimes in surprising directions.
A slice of this market is working with securely employed high fliers, who may not have the time to explore new options and/or want assistance in exploring their ‘inner self’ to discover entirely new sectors and fields in which to work. Leaping from the City to a charity is daunting for almost everyone, no matter how keen they are in theory.
Inevitably in the career crunch age we live in, another slice of the market is those executives who now have to face redundancy. If outplacement services are not on offer, then Career Navigation Consultants’ service can be a life saver for the hard pressed HR person braking bad news across the desk.
“No matter how many times you have had to do it, telling people they are out of a job is invariably a miserable process” says David Jensen CEO of Career Navigation™. “Being able to offer some hope, some crumb of comfort across the desk at a time like that, can make all the difference about the way the news is received, as well as how resilient the firing manager is about telling one person after another, the bad news.”
Career Navigation™ programmes are self funded by the executive, so the employer has some feel good factor but it costs them nothing.
Margaret Sheppard, Director of Professional Development, takes up the story.
“The very first thing we do is to invite the individual to a face to face meeting, entirely without obligation. The last thing I want to see at this stage is their CV – it is the wrong starting point.”
The reason Margaret says this is that she believes, in many cases, it becomes a straight jacket that confines the individual to a view of themselves based entirely on what they have done so far, and devoid of any liberated thought on what they might become. It is vital to get executives to stand back from defining themselves by such narrow parameters and to open their minds to what it is that really drives them. What would they find fulfilling? What is their time scale? What would motivate them? What constrains their dreams?
The initial free consultation can take 2 hours – but it is an investment in getting the foundations right. The output of that meeting is a bespoke Career Navigation™ proposal detailing a personal programme weighted to those services the individual executive needs.
If an executive arrives with a lack of focus or clarity about their next career step, then front-end loading of some executive coaching to help surface the issues and concerns is more appropriate. If however someone arrives with a clear objective such as ‘I want to work for one of these 5 companies’ – then a research weighted programme might be more suitable.
Career Navigation’s unique ME+™ personal branding strategy is a tailored approach to personal presentation evolved on a case by case basis, depending on what opportunity is being pursued. Conventional CVs are ‘out’ in most cases for senior level recruitment. They are just too narrow or one-dimensional. Producing a clear personal brand, that showcases the individual, and is tailored to the opportunity they wish to pursue, is vital. That can cover everything from the written word, to interpersonal skills and personal presentation. “You’d be amazed” explains Jensen “sometimes the highest calibre executives are lacking in some simple basics – it is so long since they had to stop and think about these kinds of issues.”
Access to Venture Capitalists and the unadvertised job market, tracking down the best, most relevant head hunters in the world who are working with the most desired destination employers of the executive, deep research capability and a Personal Career Manager to guide the executive all the way through this programme, are integral to the service.
In this “career crunch”, a large number of roles are disappearing, and will continue to do so. The next opportunity on a well thought out career path may simply no longer exist, making it even more important for individuals to look to the transferability of their skills and a new “customer” for those, rather than just a new employer.
“Modern ways of working and a proliferation of ways in which we can engage or contract with a buyer for our skills, opens up the field considerably”, Margaret says. “However the creativity needed to identify and seize these opportunities can be difficult, or even impossible, to generate for oneself. We would already have done so if it were that easy. At Career Navigation Consultants we ask the “Emperor’s new clothes” questions and ensure our clients do not miss an opportunity simply because they cannot think of it.”
