Employment Advice

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Permalink Reply by susan holaday on September 23, 2008 at 12:55pm

I just e-mailed a recruiter friend and sent him a link to your post. Perhaps he can answer the question.

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Permalink Reply by Jo Lynne Lockley on September 23, 2008 at 5:16pm

The more the merrier, but I thought I had done that. Kind of, anyway.

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Permalink Reply by Jo Lynne Lockley on September 23, 2008 at 1:03pm

Yes, I do. I have been in the recruiting industry way too long. I thoroughly understand the recruiters.

First you need to know why employers are concerned about consultants. The choice may and frequently does indicate:
1) The person cannot take direction well but needs to give it.
2) An individual who cannot play well with others.
3) Someone who gets bored easily, cannot commit to the repetitive tasks inherent in a management of BoH position and needs constant change.
4) Someone who cannot get a job in a standing or quality group because they have dirtied their nest and so needs to work for themselves.
5) Someone who thinks he knows more than he does. Arrogance often paired with lack of information is a frequent characteristic of consultants. While there are many great consultants, simple logic would indicate that the really good ones don't go back to the job market.
6) Someone who has not worked, has been in prison, been strung out, had other factors which obstructed real employment. The term "consulting covers" a lot of sins.
7) For this and self employment in general, you have been responsible for your own time and habits, and there's nobody I will probably know who will tell me "Yeah, he's a great guy" or hint at issues. You are a risk. You may have spent all of your time chasing the service staff around the walk in for all I know, or have had your hand in the till, or just sat around with a bottle of Grand Marnier. (That one I didn't make up). You were accountable to you.

Especially if you did not build a stable record of focus and commitment before you went entrepreneurial, choosing consulting raises red flags. I have at time placed people who have made the choice and regretted it.

Add to the above some of the issues with the self employed, which are:
1) At leas a recent history and habit of calling the shots interferes with ability to take direction, even when it is wrong.
2) The loss of the political and territorial sensitivity which goes with employment in a group of people.
3) The presence of entrepreneurial urgency, doing things when they need to be done out of habit, which often results in not following channels of communication necessary to make a team effort function.
4) A lot of people who opt for their own businesses do so without sufficient previous experience. That makes them bad candidates for management positions, as they have reinvented the wheel, probably not quite 360 degrees round, and miserable candidates for subordinate positions.

The potential employer says, "if he as any good at it, then why isn't he still at it". Not a bad point. "If he had the sense we need, he wouldn't have got into that field to begin with". Well, maybe.

So please don't argue. I am just stating my experience. Whether or not it applies to you is not my problem. That recruiters are reluctant to go out on your limb, however, is a given. Unless they really know you, you are a pig in a poke with enormous potential grief for them.

So, buddy, you are probably on your own. At your level, however, it shouldn't be much of a problem for you to source out potential employers. Not everything needs to go by recruiters.

How to deal with it:

1) Reconsider your consulting jobs. If these can be honestly presented as employment, do so. You were VP Ops for one of your clients - Sounds doable, if the employment was continuous: Resume should read:
On your resume show each job with its operational and developmental components and the time period worked. Also add the principal's or contract giver's name and number with title. Say "I worked for this group on contract in this capacity for this long".

Finally, Large corporations often simply refuse to accept consultants. They want a current and verifiable job history. Small and nascent groups tend to be more flexible.

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Permalink Reply by Mark Moeller on September 23, 2008 at 1:23pm

Wow, thank you. My apologies for the use of the term "head hunter". I agree with much of what you posted. In fact, when I was in my corporate positions, I had all of the same concerns. I did not hire one consultant when I had the hiring. I did interview some though; I weighed their other work experience with their consulting experience. No arguments but .....

I do have 22 years working for companies, reached the Director level, prior to going entrepreneurial. Always progressed, had great reviews, never fired (laid off twice due to company being bought). I got pulled into consulting by a friend who needed help with his restaurant, then was found by another and so on. I enjoyed helping and using my operations, training, multi-unit management abilities to benefit others. I was definitely accountable to my clients; in fact 3 of them hired me at Director level and above. The last one I mentioned and still with, that is winding down for the reasons previously mentioned.

I formed a real company, hired others, have a website to show my clients that I was not a fly by night person who put up a shingle as a stop gap until I got a "real" job.

Am I better off removing the consulting company completely from my resume and list the positions that I held? Doing so would leave me with a one year gap in employment; I did take half that year off to help with my newborn twins. Am I being honest by removing the company or just not 100% truthful? I have a big issue with lack of transparency. Is showing an entrepreneurial spirit a negative? Would you be willing to review my resume and make suggestions?

Thank you,
Mark

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Permalink Reply by Jo Lynne Lockley on September 23, 2008 at 2:45pm

One year is not bad, two is. I think you should leave it on with details. I also think if you get into something at all, you will find gaps to get on. Being precise about what you did for whom for how long is helpful. The twins thing I would leave off. Too much sharing. Resume rule number one is never lie or dissimulate. Resume rule number two is not telling everything is not lying.

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Permalink Reply by Keith Bernhardt on September 23, 2008 at 2:55pm

Mark,

I'm sort of in the same boat. I 've had 24 years in the travel industry, and I'm trying to figure out what's the best route to take next. I have consulted on travel and amrketing issues, but those have been few and far between. I'm tryng to get into some form of advertising or marketing, where travel and tourism play a part.

I would like to suggest that you take a look at www.travelrevolution.net

It has beena godsend for me, and the network there, complements the network on FOHBOH. In fact many on FOHBOH are on TR.

Best of luck with your endeavors.

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Permalink Reply by Jo Lynne Lockley on September 23, 2008 at 6:57pm

The economy is part of your problem, too. The last downturn sent a lot of highly experienced professionals into entrepreneurial situations, since they could not get a tumble from the now younger hiring authorities in the corporate environment. One thing to do is again to make an end run around the recruiters and try to find some grown up contacts with decision making power. Did I mention chambers of commerce?

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Permalink Reply by Mark Moeller on September 24, 2008 at 5:34am

No you didn't, I have never used the Chamber of Commerce to find a job. Or are you refering to looking for consulting clients?

The jobs are being posted and I am sure my salary requirement hinders the search sometimes too. I have to look at making my resume more attractable and play down the consulting I think.

Do you have a few minutes to review my resume and give me a couple of suggestions?

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Permalink Reply by Jo Lynne Lockley on September 24, 2008 at 8:11am

I meant both. If you are looking locally, which at what I assume to be your level complicates things, you need to know who is available and who is involved. Sometimes chambers have mixers. I have at times connected people at these. Furthermore with the rise of search firms (we are generally good, but the paradigm has shifted sometimes too far from simpler and more sensible connection paths and re channeled potential employee review through offices which work on laundry lists, including no self employed and no consultants. That would be HR, fantastic people when they are qualified, but not all of them are. You are fighting compartmentalization and over organization to some extent, so you need to get to an individual. A chamber is one way to find that person.

Using groups like the Chamber of Commerce you can at times bypass the lowest rung of HR, which is really just a filtering clerk. That is by finding out who is likely to be interested in someone with your qualifications. The person in charge of concept development who gets a note from someone who has had an independent R&D lab, for instance, is going to be more interested than an office worker who ploughs through seventy resumes looking for someone to take over the development of recipes for a new concept.

This is not a good time to have a history of extremely high salaries. I am working with a few people who are making twice their street value, and they are having a tough time

HR example: I was working with a chef several years ago. African American, he was one of the best technicians I have known, having gone to Europe to work with the top chefs there when this was not all that common. He was up for a restaurant job at a San Francisco hotel, and while he was waiting I plugged him into a local neighborhood joint for rent. HR called me and asked me had he really worked at this Pacific Heights location. I said yes, but he was back from a series of Michelin starred locations. Yes, HR, testily, but did he work at Joe's? I repeated that his background was stellar, I knew him well, and forget Joes, he worked with Mosiman and at Le Doyenne, in St Moritz and at the Bellevue in Berne etc. Pause - HR: "Well, does that really matter? Is that something important?" I think you get the drift.(I called the Hotel Executive Chef and the h got the job).

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Permalink Reply by Mark Moeller on September 24, 2008 at 5:34am

Thanks Keith, I will take a look. Good luck on your search too.

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Permalink Reply by Keith Bernhardt on September 24, 2008 at 5:54am

Thanks Mark.

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Permalink Reply by Keith Bernhardt on September 24, 2008 at 6:06am

I've got a couple of other options for you.
I will send you a Private message.

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