Viable Audience and Your Next Career Move
Wishing for a promotion? Looking at new options? Perhaps you just want to be the absolute best in your current role? Think twice about what is trendy or flashy and consider your viable audience.
Here is why.
Trendy, flashy, or doing something the way it appears to sell at the employer across town may not matter very much. Surfing LinkedIn, searching Indeed, or posting your discontent on Instagram probably won’t result in anything positive.
Choose Your Audience
Too often people try to go for the biggest viable audience. They consider that all of the organizations must be searching for someone who fits all the knowledge, skills, and abilities of the advertisement they just read.
The truth is, when you say it politely, that employer likely just borrowed the job advertisement from the closest job ad they themselves just read. It is the same, or very similar.
It appears everyone wants nearly the same thing. They offer X and provide Y. They are growing and care. So they say.
That’s what they advertise.
What is behind the veil?
Smallest Viable Audience
What do you want for your career? What makes you the best candidate?
Mainstream, fitting into the average and being just like everyone else probably will make finding the right opportunity nothing more than a gamble.
Who is your smallest viable audience? Not the largest, the most flashy or trendy, not all of the employers in the ocean of opportunity.
What employers really have the niches where you shine? Are you promoting and growing the things that make you unique, or do you find yourself trying to justify your abilities in areas where you are weak?
Sometimes you just need a job. It’s true, and understandable.
Your next career move though, it should be something more than that.
If you want it to be.
-DEG
Dennis E. Gilbert is a business consultant, speaker (CSPTM), and culture expert. He is a five-time author and the founder of Appreciative Strategies, LLC. His business focuses on positive human performance improvement solutions through Appreciative Strategies®. Reach him through his website at Dennis-Gilbert.com or by calling +1 646.546.5553.
