The Value of a well made CV

Remember my post on Black Swan? Where I mentioned that I have had three different jobs at three different companies (2 multinationals) and none of them came through normal job applications (and I have applied for over a thousand jobs the normal way).

Well, in today's post, I'll share the biggest value I have gained from applying to over 1,000 jobs unsuccessfully. Though I don't know why I didn't get a job among the over 1,000 jobs I applied for normally, I gained an unlikely edge. Last year I took the whole job application game to a new level. I stopped applying for advertised jobs, I remade my CV and started pitching companies I love. I bought LinkedIn adverts to put my CV in front of big managers. I set up Google Ads to pitch myself at the CEO of some cool companies; I sort of bought their names on Google. If you searched for MTN Benin CEO, Eric Tronel, you'd see my pitch of how I was going to grow his VAS revenue by 100% in just months. The aim was if Eric Tronel searched for his name (like most people do) he would see my pitch and contact me. Great plan; no result (except loss of money on my part). I put up Facebook ads targeting people aged 40 and above working for some specific companies in the Middle East and Africa. I kept tuning my CV and making it world-class.

In the end, I landed some interviews, even outside the country. None resulted in a job, but 1 good thing happened at all the interviews -- they were all extremely impressed by my CV. And my CV put me in charge of the whole interview discussion, they kept asking me to talk about each part they found interesting. And they found lots of interesting stuffs in my CV. And the super cool part is -- I didn't include some regular details, like date of birth, and no one even noticed or asked. And some of my LinkedIn adverts got me friends from Kenya and other countries.

And that's how valuable a well made CV can be. It makes a company that's not looking for candidates call you for interview, and it puts you in charge of the interview discussion. They want to know how you did this and that, how you could replicate such in their company. And even when they won't take you, they still tell you that you've got a great and compelling CV. 

Now I've stopped applying for jobs. The one thing the HRs have against me is that I change jobs too often. It's a sad thing; you change jobs and your salary doesn't feel it. And now it's scaring away future jobs. But I have always enjoyed my jobs. So I'm focusing on secondary income sources and not a new high paying job.