How to Increase Your Hiring Value 30x
By John Heaney on January 18, 2010 at 2:58 pm
Featured, Interviewing, Networking, Social Media, The Search
In a recent series of eBay auctions, consumers paid more than $3600 for previously owned, everyday objects that were purchased from garage sales for $129. These were objects that should never have fetched more than a few dollars but generated bids that amounted to nearly 30x their original cost.
So, what led to this huge inflation in value? Each item came with a unique story.
The auctions were part of the Significant Objects Project, an experiment designed to test the hypothesis that “narrative transforms the insignificant into the significant.” Or, put differently, the goal was to determine whether you could take an object worth very little and make it worth much more by giving it a story and endowing it with meaning.
The projects’s originators purchased 100 unremarkable garage sale trinkets for no more than a few dollars each and then had volunteer writers create fictional backstories for each item. They hypothesized that by attaching a creative story to the item, its objective value would increase.
They were right. The stories and associations attributed to each item increased its perceived value nearly 30x.
Job seekers can learn a tremendous lesson from this real world experiment.
When you write your cover letters and prepare for your interviews, you should prepare the stories that you’re going to recout that clearly illustrate your professional capabilities and experience. Rather than tell your interviewer that you have 14 years of product design experience, you should tell stories of the most successful, creative and rewarding projects you worked on. Rather than reciting your years spent in the accounting department, detail some of the specific successes you had working with your CFO to assemble and lead an internal team to solve complex billing issues.
Nobody remembers data, but everyone remembers compelling and meaningful stories. You won’t be just another computer programmer, but the guy who created the staffing iPhone app that was downloaded over 15,000 times. You’ll be the one who stands out, the one who solves problems, the one who’s 30x more valuable than the resume sitting under yours.
Tags: Hiring, interview, Interviewing, job, Networking, storytelling
6 Comments
I couldn’t agree more about the importance of relating stories in job interviews! Spoken stories have the capacity to increase interest, engagement, understanding and trust.
The human voice is the most powerful tool of influence you have available when in interview, and how you employ your voice can create the job-winning difference between you and others with equivalent skills and experience.
1. Make sure your stories are really true! When we ‘tell stories’ involving made up elements, our words and our vocal expression (vocal language) don’t match. This creates cognitive dissonance in the minds of the interview panel. Cognitive dissonance undermines confidence (in you).
2. Re-live the story, don’t just narrate it. When we re-live the story all of us is alive, our words are natural and flowing, our feelings about the situation are authentically expressed (through tone of voice and body language) and we come across as real, alive and authentic.
3. invite your listeners to be with you in the story. By this I mean think of the interviewers as you would your friends; openly share your story with them. Here is your chance to create a sense of equivalence, rather than an inferior-superior relationship between you and the interviewers. Stories are levellers. We respect people who are on the same level or wavelength as we are.
You can find more strategies and tips on authentic vocal self expression on The Vocal Branding Blog http://www.vocalbranding.com.au/blog
You can also hear an interview I gave a couple of years back about how to have a Great Interview Voice at http://www.selectioncriteria.com.au/free-talkingtips.html
Tim Noonan
Director, Vocal Branding Australia
Great tips for the job seeker – especially about the importance of authenticity in your stories. This isn’t the time for embellishment, since one mistake can invalidate any trust you’ve established with the interviewer.
What a great resource!
Simple marketing strategies can go a long way in branding yourself. Do you want bore the interviewer with yes or no answers or do you want to establish what skills you have to do the job?
The Ebay experiment shows us that you can take anything… and with a little embellishment, turn it into gold.
Don’t sell the manure, sell the fertilizer.
Thanks for the comment, Tom. You’re so right… when engaging the interviewer, it’s essential that the job seeker ask open ended questions that elicit more than just a yes/no response. Asking the interviewer how they got their job at the company, and what they’ve enjoyed most about working there are ways to engage and become memorable.