Welcome to Career Connection! In this regular column, experts provide advice on building your anti-fraud career. Whether you're a new fraud examiner or a veteran CFE looking to begin a new business or somewhere in between — this column will provide solid information for your next step. For even more tips, visit the ACFE Career Center.
In this issue, Donn LeVie Jr., veteran hiring manager, writes on jumpstarting your career by developing your "brand" in the marketplace. LeVie has more than 20 years of experience as a hiring manager for the U.S. Dept. of Commerce-NOAA, Phillips Petroleum (now Conoco-Phillips), Fisher Controls, Motorola SPS and Intel Corporation. He's reviewed thousands of résumés and cover letters and hired hundreds of professionals for technical, marketing and communications positions. He was an adjunct faculty lecturer with the University of Houston system in the College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics. Writing as J.T. Kirk, LeVie is the author of "Confessions of a Hiring Manager Rev. 2.0," and "50 Things You Can Do NOW to Help Keep Your Job." He has presented at the 2010 and 2011 ACFE Annual Conference Career Connection, at which he also conducted personal career consultations with attendees. He'll present on this column's topic at the 23rd Annual ACFE Fraud Conference & Exhibition. - ed.
With the economy on the upswing and the job picture improving, it's a great time to reassess your career goals, determine if a job change or a new career is around the corner and rethink how your peers and hiring managers perceive you as a professional in the marketplace. The times, they are a-changin'.
In 1982, best-selling author John Naisbitt wrote in "Megatrends" about society being in a "time of parenthesis" — the time between eras, a time of change and questioning; a reconceptualizing not just of society but also culture. Certainly the recent recession — the worst since the Great Depression of 1929 — created another period of change and questioning for citizens of this globe, but it also created opportunity for many.
When I worked for Intel Corporation, one of the key strategies that contributed to the company's success and ability to withstand the onslaught of economic downturns in the semiconductor industry during 2001 through 2004 was its strategy to accelerate product development when all its competitors were cutting back on R&D budgets.
Intel understood that, eventually, the recession in its sector would end, and rather than ramp up product development when the bad times were fading in the rear-view mirror, they were poised to take advantage of the improved market by launching new products at the first sign that the economic recovery was a trend and not just a single data point.
The recent recession has only magnified the rapid changes already underway in global demographics, economics and technology. These paradigm shifts are influencing the restructuring of domestic and international corporations and their allocations of all forms of capital. One of the important strategic and tactical shifts is in the workforce arena — the effects of which reverberate through the entire employment chain. Hiring managers now seek candidates who have quantified their achievements as problem solvers and "game changers" — those who've tackled challenges in mature and emerging economies.
Creating and promoting your "professional brand" will help you take advantage of opportunities you can't even see yet. My work in technical and marketing communications within different markets has taught me that building brand value involves two important components: making others aware of the brand in question and creating a brand image that generates positive associations.
The same principles apply in the workforce arena regardless of your situation. If you're looking for permanent or contract employment, wanting to move up the rungs in the company you work for or promoting your own business and seeking clients, here are your tasks:
- Create positive associations among your quantified accomplishments, professional skills, knowledge, and experience and the people with a need for that expertise.
- Others will create your brand based on your perceived professional and personal reputation as a fraud examiner. So, take the initiative and give them the right components.
Here are a few ways to get your name embedded in the "associative models" of others:
- Write articles for peer-reviewed journals (such as Fraud Magazine).
- Give presentations or workshops at ACFE meetings and conferences and with other associations.
- Network with other professionals in the fraud examination field.
- Use social media (blogs, YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc.) to expand your circles of influence. (Be sure you have something valuable to say; the virtual world is already overflowing with mindless blather.)
- Write a book on fraud examination principles and issues.
Intel offered me a job back in 2000 based on a single phone call — and I wasn't even looking for a job. The hiring manager who phoned read my recently published paper in a peer-reviewed journal, saw my articles in management newsletters and had heard me speak at several national conferences in the technical communications industry. So, he contacted me to see if I'd be interested in a management position with the company.
He told me over the phone, "I've read your articles and papers for a couple of years and have heard you speak at conferences … it's as though I feel I know you already." Without knowing it, I'd created brand awareness in this hiring manager's mind, which enhanced my brand equity. I enjoyed a successful six-year career with Intel from that one phone call.
A positive brand image helps solidify your position in any job or career opportunity. It can differentiate your expertise from your competition and move it toward "preferred candidate" status. A positive brand image can command a higher salary and encourage hiring managers to seek you out.
Donn LeVie Jr. has more than 20 years of experience as a hiring manager for the U.S. Dept. of Commerce-NOAA, Phillips Petroleum (now Conoco-Phillips), Fisher Controls, Motorola SPS and Intel Corporation.
Sidebar:
How to build elements of your professional brand
Three important elements of building a brand image will determine how hiring managers will respond to you (the "product"): favorability, strength and uniqueness of your offering.
- Favorability relates to how strongly you've honed your interpersonal skills; it's the "likeability factor" hiring managers seek. They want to know if you'll be a good personality fit with the team and if you can integrate into the corporate culture.
- Strength addresses the degree of your development of the requisite and optional skills and how well you might utilize those skills on current and future projects.
- Uniqueness of your offering is determined by these questions: What differentiates you (as a "product") from other candidates for the position? What separates you from the competition? The more unique those differentiations (and the more value employers perceive you have), the stronger your brand image.
Unique brand associations fall into two major categories: attributes and benefits.
- Attributes relate to your intrinsic and learned performances on the job in all areas: managerial, technical and non-technical.
- Benefits are the specific brand features you project and that hiring managers value. Benefits can be functional, which represent your features. They can be experiential, which are linked to your technical expertise and your fit on the team or group. And they can be symbolic, which relate to the hiring manager's self-concept, his or her higher order social and self-esteem needs and even how he or she sees her standing in the entity. Don't underestimate the importance of symbolic benefits tied to your brand. If the hiring manager believes that bringing someone on board with a strong brand like yours enhances his or her self-worth or self-esteem, then you're as good as hired.
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