Episode 36 : 3 Steps To Prepare To Exit Your Job

Her Career Ladder

What is going on everybody? This is Michele Heyward. I am so happy you are joining me. Yes, no, really I am. So for those of you don't know me, I'm a civil engineer, founder tech company positive hire. And I'm all about retaining as many Latina black and indigenous women in their STEM professions. So that's what I work on every single day, for as long as I can, which will be the rest of my life. So today, I want to talk about just really focusing on three things, three things you can do to exit to exit your job, like, how do you prep to exit a job? Like, you know what? I'm done? So long? Does this this did not work? Like what do you need to be doing? How do you do it? Where do you do it? Or what do you do? Right? So first thing I want you to do, is really take inventory of every thing you do. And I don't mean like, oh, I plan this. Oh, I am, of course I get on, and I get a text because I gotta go pick somebody up. Oh, I do this. I managed, you know, I want you to go with the things that you manage that you lead that you create, your you've created, right. So if you create it processes, you manage teams, you manage processes, you help increase budgets, you increase revenue, you you improve productivity, those are huge things that you need to be collecting data on what systems and software's, do you know, do you have mastered and tell you the true Hell, if you know how to turn them on, sign up, get in and kind of work your way around? That's good enough. Cuz a lot of people don't even know how to do that. Right? So take inventory of all the things you do. And you know, from that current employer, as well as previous employers, maybe even your background, your education, maybe you learn how to do something with statistics, right? That you still somewhat handle, maybe you are absolutely a master at Excel key, keep that down, because it does matter. And it is very important. So now that you take an inventory, all this stuff, right, and you're trying to figure out like, Okay, what do I do next? What do I do next? Okay. Don't worry about what your job title is. Because for a lot of women of color, you are doing work outside of that job title. Because you have to prove yourself, right? Well, you know, you don't have the same experience, whatever, whatever excuses you're given. So they give you all have this stretch assignment work. Now, what you want to do is take that information, that inventory of stuff that you do, you go on, go over to someplace like LinkedIn like Glassdoor and look for someone or software she worked with, look for the level of excellence that the stuff that the daily responsibilities that you have, that things that you manage, the things that you have put you lead the things that you've created, and looking see what job titles pop up, you probably would will be surprised. Hey, I am Cambridge, you will probably be very surprised to find out you're doing work one, two levels above what you're currently getting paid. So what does that mean you need to do? Now you know where to start looking for jobs. Hey, Daria, were to really go to start looking for jobs to really go and say, hey, hey, this is what I do. This is what I'm worth. And you're like, Michelle, when they go to check to see if I work at this employer. They're going to find out my job title is x, y, z, Hey, your job title doesn't matter. Your ability to perform matters. So you want to take that inventory list that you had, right? We took inventory, and you go do to search in that inventory list I left off also include your kudos, where people say oh my god, I couldn't have done this part of the project without you Oh my God, without you, we would not have made this date. Right? What did you do for those people? Because that leads to how good you really are. So now you have the inventory of what you do. You found out that the job titles you really need to be looked checking for when you go to apply for things. So what do you do next, when you read, girl, you won't get your resume professionally done, based off of the key words or phrases that you're seeing in the resumes. And you're like what Michelle? Is a lot of okay, let me tell you how one easy way to figure out a way to kind of figure out what keywords to use. And you you shouldn't be tailoring your resume to each job. But let's say you're going to the National Black MBA conference. And they're going to be various employers there. All right, so it's like 10 employers 10 jobs.
I'm laughing at my mentee, because I met her place, she left to go to this event. And when she left, she told me to lock the door. She didn't leave me to key and she's like, well, you can come pick me up. Now. She realized that she goes home with her house, he when I come pick her up, I can't lock her apartment door. But no, I'm not telling you where she live. Okay. All right. So that's gonna be that's why I'm over here laughing because I'm reading her text messages. Okay. So now you you're going to use some keywords. So you can do a keyword search, just copying and pasting the words, copy and pasted a job post and put it into a Google Doc, right? And maybe do a keyword search and see how many of a certain type of software certain type of system a come up. Maybe they're saying lead supervisor, and Minister, whatever that is, pops up. When you copy and paste all of those job descriptions. Well, let me tell you a whole other trick. So you just want to take a certain portion of those job descriptions, like the most half from let's say, it's five job descriptions must haves from five job descriptions, copy and paste them you want to go do what's called a word cloud, a word where you can go I think is word cloud.com. And you've probably seen word clouds before, let me see if I can pull up one I just did a couple of weeks ago. Oh, hold on. Let me turn this off. Just a little bit. We're okay cuz I can't it hope I don't turn off my laptop at the same time. Course I don't see word cloud come up. But you want to do something. It's called a word cloud. And you've seen them before. And they'll be shaped like a heart or just be a circle. And it has all these words in hand, the bigger the words are, the more time it has occurred in wherever they're pulling this data from. So you can literally take the information from the job description, put it into a word cloud, not only will it make that designed for you, but it tells you how many of certain of words were repeated. Yes, so it gives you a list. Oh, this is repeated 15 times this is eight times this is twice. So the key words you need to be using, probably are those that I mentioned multiple times, and all across most of those job descriptions. It's not 100%. Remember, it's software, and truly some of the software's crap. Because even if you write down exactly what the job description says, on your resume, you still not getting hired, and you don't get to interview data, analysts doing nothing. So it's really important to at least try to beat the algorithm by being that specific. So those are some of the things you can do when it comes to really preparing to leave like get your resume together. And from that resume, like your LinkedIn shouldn't be just your resume. So here's a bonus update your rep update your LinkedIn. With those metrics, like how many people you manage the size of the budget, you manage improvement and productivity. Put some numbers in there because people resonate with numbers, but also put in your bio, who you help how you help them. Right write who you help, and how do you help them and what I mean? I improve out of motivation factories productivity so that they increase their revenue. So if you're a manufacturing engineer, you could say, I improve productivity for automotive manufacturers by improving productivity of their line workers in the paint shop. Right? Maybe it's on hanging doors. Hey, Becca, whatever it is be very, very specific. Hey, thanks. Hey, bubbly frown. So be very, very specific. When you do your headline on your LinkedIn who you help and how you help them and also what results you get them. But when it's time to go, it's time to go. Alright everybody, I'm gonna get out of here I gotta go pick up my mentee and leave her do a lot because this way my laptop in here she needed to catch a live back. She she gonna have a capital. I guess I could take my laptop. Oh, thank you. I know who that is. Hey, Pear girl CV I know who that is. All right, I gotta run. No, I'm not this is like a peach. Mango orange juice. It just looked really good. No sugar in here. The liquid liquid sugar. So I'm key I know you left him to like wait, I'm gonna leave my laptop in here. She can leave her pen on it. Alright, these young these young children. These young children I don't know how to do it. Alright, everybody have a happy Thanksgiving. I may be back on I'm really on a hiatus. But two nights in a row. Oh, yeah, it is good though. It is good. Brandon. I'm getting out. I'm doing like you do me Brandon when I come onto your scopes. I'm sure you can catch the replay. I'm leaving ba that's what Brandon do to me. Like really? You're not gonna hang up the two more minutes to go on with no brand like nope, gotta go. Like body and brand and be like that brand. So, but anyway, everybody, I really am going to get out of here. I hope you all have a happy Thanksgiving. If you don't celebrate it, I hope you get the chance to spend it with family and friends. Just because if nothing else. I love it because I get to see family. I don't always get to see every single day or month. It's like that one time a year. You need a full 30 minute recap with great training is called the replay. Hello and it's only going to be 30 minutes long and I saved you 17 minutes call me Geico. Hello. Alright everybody, have a good one. Bye.