You Really Can Call 10 a Day

Please share your experiences about finding a job or your reaction to this post

One of the vital behaviors to land the job you love: call 10 people a day.

Most people roll their eyes, shudder, and dismiss the idea immediately when they hear or read this. They don’t even hear the rest because they already reject the idea. They continue to believe the outdated idea that good jobs get advertised, and that they cannot call the company because the website said not to. I agree do not call human resources unless you want a job in human resources.

Chad’s Story

Chad spent 15 months looking for a financial analyst job. He had sent 1,798 resumes in the 15 months. Less than 100 responded. Auto responders accounted for most of the 100. No one offered to interview him. No one offered him a job. He became despondent, but did not give up. He still sat in front of his computer 8-10 hours a day sending out resumes.

A neighbor recommended he come to us for service. We introduced him to “the 10’s”. He blanched when we explained making 10 phone calls a day and scheduling 10 face-to-face meetings a week. He thought we meant 10 job openings a day and 10 job interviews a week. We did not.

He relaxed once he realized the 10 phone calls included thank you calls, friends, people working in companies that were not advertising. He especially appreciated when we taught him how to find 10 people a day. He calmed even more when he realized the 10 meetings included due diligence meetings.

He started making his phone calls the next week, and had 3 job offers within 5 weeks.

Call 10 People a Day and Get a Job Faster

You will get a job faster by calling 10 people a day. Our group tested this hypothesis with people, like Chad, who sought jobs paying $40-250,000 annually. In every situation, once they understood and began making the calls (and setting the meetings) they found work within 5-8 weeks. We next tested it with people in lower income brackets (minimum wage –$13.00 per hour). 80% found work within 6 weeks (40% found jobs in 2 weeks). People in the last group faced serious obstacles to finding work: felony arrests, disabilities, and behavioral challenges.

You must make a couple of changes in your paradigm to see the value of 10 phone calls a day. We discussed these paradigms in previous posts: How People Really Get Hired, Where to Find the Best Jobs, and Do Your Due Diligence. Review those posts to remember the reasons for the 10 calls.

Purpose of Your 10 Calls a Day

Your 10 phone calls serve three main purposes:

1. Do your due diligence by discovering and verifying with friends, potential co-workers and support staff whether your past experience (use home run statements) would benefit the organization or team
• What tasks, responsibilities, or projects the decision makers want done; or what problems or challenges the organization needs resolved
• Nature of the organizational culture, environment, and work teams—and how well you would fit into that organization or team
• Management’s expectations for their return on investment and how your past ROI meets their expectations
2. Set appointments to prove to decision makers how you can help them achieve their goals or resolve their problems.
• Refer to the people you talked to in the calls outlined in point 1.
• Verify that the essence of the information they gave you was accurate
• Present your home run statements that apply to the hiring authority’s goals or challenges
• Ask if your experience is what they want on their team (not you, yet)
• Set a time and place to meet to discuss how you can help them achieve their goals or resolve their problems
3. Follow-up on previous meetings with decision makers, sources of information for your due diligence, or sources of additional people you talked to or with whom you met (I’ll discuss follow-up in a later post.

Some Final Tips to Enhance Your 10 Calls a Day

• You can identify all 50 of the people to call in 2 hours on a Monday morning or Friday afternoon (which are lousy times to call or meet people anyway) from the sources we discussed in Where to Find the Best Jobs
• Keep phone calls to 3-8 minutes maximum. Any longer and they may worry that you might monopolize their time if they hire you. Instead prove you can conduct business briefly and appropriately
• 4-5 brief phone calls over a couple of weeks, with perhaps a face-to-face meeting with a key source, builds better relationships than one long phone call
• Do not ask if they are hiring at that moment or if they can help you get a job
• Do not tell them you are unemployed
• Focus on how you can help them achieve what they want
• Practice your phone calls with your job coach, friends, and close network contacts before calling the company you really, really want to work for (make your mistakes where they don’t count)
• Always say “You have been very helpful. May call you back if I have more questions?” and “Is there anyone else you suggest I talk to?”

Calling 10 people a day really can shorten your job search. While it seems intimidating, talking to people reduces the despair or isolation that follows spending 8 hours at a computer.

Join us next week when we discuss scheduling 10 face-to-face meetings/interviews a week

What do you think? Please share your experiences or reaction to this post