!
  + 
# The Offer Equation
***Energy + Love + Security = Offer***
You need to round these three important bases to get a home-run offer in today’s acute care hospital environment. Let’s deconstruct the offer equation:
#### ***Energy***
***Energy is an ingredient missing in most interview advice, but it’s likely the most important element for interview success***. Even if you’re in full control of your faculties during an interview, if your energetic delivery system isn’t switched on, you simply won’t make it to the offer stage.
Interviewing energy isn’t about perky or calm, extroverted or introverted. Rather, it’s a notable enthusiasm for interpersonal engagement that goes well beyond scripted responses and is, rather, attached to passion for the work, its workforce, and its service beneficiaries.
Extroverts may have it a bit easier, but consider massive influencers of the quieter kind. Gandhi, Mother Teresa, Mandela. They got it done! Introverts can actually teach us more about interpersonal excellence than extroverts, as they typically call upon personal reservoirs of reflection to bring a clear, focused, relevant message to every conversation.
In any case, whether introvert or extrovert, a requirement of interview excellence is that nothing is canned, contrived, or scripted. Authentic, content-rich interchange delivered with energy (which can translate to focus) is a power ball that knocks the interview out of the park.
#### ***Love***
During client interview debriefs, positive feedback sounds like, “We *love* the candidate!” Typically, there’s no discussion about experience and skills. It’s just a composite response, framed in an emotion called love!
Debrief drill-downs indicate love happened because **1)** the candidate was engaging and prepared, **2)** they were wired for interpersonal excellence all day long and displayed their abundant research of the organization and parent corporation, and **3)** they displayed mastery of relevant data in their background, reinforcing their value.
The days of “show up and throw up” are over. ***Preparation is key.***
#### ***Security***
Create security for the interview panel.
The hiring manager and administrative stakeholders want the security of knowing you understand their vision and culture and you’ll hit their institutional goals.
Peers and staff want the security of knowing you’ll be great to work with and you’ll add value to their personal and professional lives.
Everyone seeks assurance that you truly heard them and won’t apply template solutions unrelated to their unique challenges and organizational DNA.
> ***Energy + Love + Security = (Excitement, Inspiration, Hope, Assurance, Optimism) = Offer***
It’s a winning formula.
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# Stay on Track! A Resume Checklist
There are four points on the resume-writing compass: format, design, content, and relevance. Here’s a checklist to help evaluate if you’re on the right path! For each element, just ask yourself if your resume nails it. If not, take steps to improve the element.
**FORMAT**
* Format, length, and tone are appropriate for the targeted position and you as a candidate.
* The resume is in a modern format, meeting current standards.
* The resume is error-free: spelling, punctuation, capitalization, grammar, syntax.
* Information on the resume is easy to locate, facilitating productive and informative skimming.
**DESIGN**
* The resume is obviously not a template.
* The resume is visually appealing, easy to read, and includes sufficient white space.
* The resume will stand out compared to other resumes.
* Appropriate fonts and sizes are used throughout the resume. Limit variety to about 2 fonts and/or sizes per resume. Get out of Times Roman if you’re still there. Times Roman has gone the way of two spaces after a period and AOL. Use design elements (lines, bolding, bullets, color, etc.) appropriate for your industry and target reader.
**CONTENT**
* The resume is an effective, future-focused marketing document, not a work-history obituary with long bullet lists of job descriptions and responsibilities. The resume tells a compelling story of your accomplishments that expresses your value and sustains the reader’s attention.
* Your value proposition is immediately visible on the resume, especially in the executive summary at the top of the first page.
* The resume makes it clear what position or role you’re targeting without making an “Objective” statement.
* The resume effectively communicates your value in any of the following areas where you:
* Made money / Saved money
* Reset company goals
* Designed/launched new products, processes, initiatives
* Built relationships / Attracted new customers / Retained existing customers
* Redefined corporate culture / Contributed to corporate culture or success
* Received awards or recognition / Got promoted / Assumed additional responsibilities
* Recruited staff / Retained staff
* Improved processes / Saved time
* Expanded business / Built volume
* Solved a specific problem / Mitigated risk
* Elevated your company’s competitive posture
* Improved the community / Contributed globally
* The resume contains powerful, concise, accomplishment-oriented statements designed to increase the reader’s interest in having a conversation with you.
* The resume speaks the reader’s language with industry-specific terminology and keywords throughout that are relevant to your goal.
* The resume contains persuasive, high-impact statements that promote your qualifications as the best candidate.
* The information provided is appropriate to the targeted job and is detailed enough to support your qualifications and desired salary.
* The resume includes specific accomplishments that highlight a problem/challenge, action taken, and/or result, with quantified values, such as how much, how many, how big, percentages, dollar amounts, how long, how quickly.
* Highlighted accomplishments support your job goal.
**RELEVANCE**
* The entire resume is targeted and supports your job goal.
* The resume does not include personal information, such as a photo, hobbies unrelated to the job target, or personal data.
* The resume does not include a reason for leaving any job or other negative information.
* Relevant jobs detailed typically cover the last 7–15 years. The right span depends on the goal of the resume.
Take this compass with you on your resume-writing journey, and you won’t get lost!
# The Resume Writing Journey
Landing a new position takes ***a lot*** of strategic action. And until such time as it’s not required, a resume is part of that effort. Here are some foundational resume-writing guidelines:
**Know your goal**. The resume is a marketing document supporting the achievement of your goal. A goal can be a title or a role. You want to display your goal at the top of your resume under your name and contact information. You can have more than one resume, but only one role or title per resume. Be clear on your purpose. It informs the reader and sets their focus.
**Create an Executive Summary** at the beginning of your resume that can occupy up to 1/3 of the first page. The Executive Summary will speak to your specific qualifications for the goal you’re pursuing. You can include text, bullets of key attributes, competencies and/or strengths, quotes about you, an axiom that guides you, special awards you’ve received, aspects of your background you want noticed, etc. ***This section may be difficult to compose and is best written last.***The executive summary ultimately synthesizes the data in the body of the resume and alchemizes into your brand, so it requires a good degree of thought.
**Career History**includes a succinct summary of each organization where you’ve worked. Include company statistics: size, type, notable distinctions to establish context. Make it short. The goal is to keep the reader engaged and moving along while providing relevant information.
**Title/Role Description****.** State titles in your job history followed by a short statement of scope of the role. Scope replaces job description bullets and includes relevant size/type statistics, such as departments reporting to you, budget managed, number of direct/indirect reports.
**Achievements/Accomplishments**follow title and scope. This data is critical. Create 3-7 bullets of achievements, accomplishments, and/or outcomes (AAOs) per position, with ***quantified data***wherever possible, that will create a **“Wow”** in the reader’s mind. “Wow” statements constitute your demonstrated track record and your UVP (unique value proposition). AAOs in your most recent positions matter most, but even AAOs further back in your history can display the trajectory of your career.
**Test of a successful resume**: Only your name can appear at the top of your resume. If someone else’s name can go on it, it’s not distinctive to you and your unique contribution. You need to dig deeper.
Creating a resume with substantive, compelling data is time consuming but likely one of the best investments you can make to leverage your past into a position that’s just right for your next step!
# Honey, Do I Look Fat?
## ***The Skinny on Writing Your Resume***
When a loved one asks about their weight, you’re in a dreadful position, but you’re stuck in a corner that requires a response. The counterpart dreaded question on the professional side is “When can I get your resume?” It’s an inevitable question, the prospect of which, for many, is considered worse than a root canal.
Yet it’s inevitable. ***The day will come when you need a serviceable resume.*** You should actually always have a serviceable resume handy so you can quickly respond to a shooting-star opportunity that unexpectedly drops in your lap.
***So how do you whip up a great resume?*** Here are 2 preliminary tips:
1. **Hire a professional resume writer.** Seriously. This is an effective cut-to-the-chase approach that gets it done. Resume writers are some of the best career professionals out there, and they’re incredibly adept at working with you to extract gold nuggets hiding within your career. They know what’s important and how to alchemize your background into a serviceable document, meaning the resume pops, gets skimmed in 6 seconds or less, and the reader goes back for a second read because it got their attention.
2. **Do It Yourself.** Of course you can if you want to. To learn to write a modern resume, a great resource is “***Modernize Your Resume…Get Noticed…Get Hired,”*** by Wendy Enelow and Louise Kursmark, recognized subject matter experts in the resume writing field. They explain the whys and hows of building a modern resume and have samples galore in this treasure trove book.
In either case, ***the content for a modern resume requires you to accumulate data of your achievements, accomplishment, and outcomes, quantified wherever possible***. This data is the backbone of your career history and strength of your UVP (unique value proposition). ***The equally important data you’ll want to present is your target role or title, core competencies, and an honest, well-articulated description of the who, how, and/or why of you and what you bring to an organization.*** No clichés, and limited use of adjectives. Just good, solid information that substantially explains your career trend and aspects of your leadership.Ultimately, a great resume is in line with the broad trends of social media, where ***easily consumable content and authenticity reign*** to connect on a relevant plane and move forward into conversations that establish fit to the role and organization.
# Raise Your Hiring Success to 80%–90%!
If you’re like most acute care hospitals, ***your new hire success rate is about 50%*** despite your best-intended gut read of the candidate slate.
***That’s not a very good metric***, and it runs across industries because the failure is attributable to a vulnerable hiring process, not a specific industry.
According to a three-year study released by Leadership IQ in 2015, ***46% of newly hired employees will fail within 18 months***, and ***only 19% of those who survive will be deemed an unequivocal success***. Which means ***of all new hires, 35% are meh.***
The study contributors were 5,247 hiring managers from 312 public, private, business, and healthcare organizations who hired more than 20,000 employees collectively during the study period.
***How to improve these statistics?***
***Embrace the exodus from gut-based hiring to objective, predictive interview processes.*** After all, healthcare seeks evidence to support best clinical practices…why not apply an evidence base to interviewing practices to add predictability to a hire?
***Here’s a best predictive practice***, and it’s catching on globally: the “***working interview***.” You only want to run the top two or three finalists through this end-stage process. It’s time consuming, so reserved for the “down-to-the-wire” decision.
***A working interview is a simulated, or “sandbox” environment*** where the candidate is asked to ***display a skill, solve a problem, or create a strategy*** so you can observe their ability to meet the requirements of the position. The simulation helps you determine if the candidates have the business, communication, and soft skills for success in the role.
Although a relatively new concept at the executive level, don’t worry about candidates shying away from a predictive simulation. ***A-player candidates relish the idea of displaying their skills in real time***, while average performers aren’t as eager. Take reluctance as a flag. A lack of enthusiasm for a simulation may indicate your open position is above the candidate’s current competency level.***The working interview is an invigorating addition to an executive interview palette*** to ensure the person you hire truly meets your technical and soft skills requirements. A resume, traditional interview, or front-door reference check won’t give you this degree of assuredness of a successful hire.
# How to Hire a Rockstar
Be forewarned…***recruiting a Rockstar from one company doesn’t ensure they’ll be a Rockstar at yours***. Their competencies and DNA have to match those of your specific organization.
***So how do you determine the fit?***
***You create a candidate scorecard***, which becomes the Holy Grail for a hire, and you use it without exception for all candidates in the interview process. The scorecard is a standardized candidate grading system that identifies concrete markers of success
To quantify the qualities you’re looking to hire, ***every stakeholder in the recruiting process needs to agree on the scorecard***, and the search can’t begin in earnest until everyone agrees on the elements. The scorecard becomes the equalizer that reconciles differences of opinion as to what’s truly necessary for the role.
***Scoring is done on a 1–10 scale,*** with 9 and 10 being Rockstar levels, although don’t expect any 10s. Tens live in perfect candidate land and don’t show up for interviews.
If you want a Rockstar culture, ***you’re ideally looking to hire 8s and 9s for every element measured across role fit (competencies) and DNA match. A 7- or 8-scored candidate has Rockstar potential*** and deserves consideration. Although you can entertain 7s, any candidate below a 7 should ultimately be removed from the process.
**Step 1**in creating the scorecard is ***envisioning what success looks like***. To do this, role play a scenario 18 months post-hire. What would need to have been accomplished for the hiring manager to enthusiastically re-hire the candidate? What specific, quantified benchmarks were achieved? Insert the benchmarks on the scorecard under “Competencies” for scoring. By essentially having the scorecard ask, “Does the candidate have the competencies to achieve the benchmarks?” you’re facilitating a predictive hire.
***Step 2***. ***Define 5–7 daily accountabilities*** this person would need to successfully execute to achieve the benchmarks identified in Step 1. This is attaching daily tasks to desired outcomes. ***Does the candidate have the competencies to execute these tasks?*** Insert the necessary executable tasks on the scorecard under “Competencies” for scoring.
***Step 3.*** ***Determine the candidate’s DNA***. It’s as important as competencies and more predictive of success within your organization. ***DNA is not culture fit***. DNA is the candidate’s hardwiring cemented into their persona over the course of their lifetime. ***DNA is a fixed attribute***. Does the candidate’s DNA match the 3–5 non-negotiable criteria you’ve identified as “must haves” that match your organization’s DNA? List each criteria for scoring.
***A candidate’s final score is an average of their competency and DNA scores***. A 9 or 9+ is a proven rock star. A 7–8 blended score is a potential Rockstar and could be a great hire. Part ways with candidates below a 7. Wish them well. ***Don’t settle***.
Consistently scoring your candidates during the hiring process will ultimately improve your organizational performance. ***Play to win!*** Keep score.