My protégé, Nadeem, was very easy to work with. He was calm, and took both direct and indirect feedback well. At the time we were paired, Nadeem had been in Canada for 4 months, and I felt that he was discouraged and uninspired. One of the first things I told Nadeem was: “we can find a job together; however, you are in charge of the relationship—you will set up meetings and do the follow up.”
I told him that I heard that it takes immigrants about 2 – 4 months to secure a job in their field; and if he has not found one by now, he might be doing something wrong: perhaps, you likely have a badly written or formatted resume; or you might be applying for jobs that require more experience than you have; or you might need to identify alternative jobs based on your skills set.
After our first meeting of getting to know each other, I noticed Nadeem’s energy level had gone up—he was more open with me and we talked a little bit about each other on a more personal level. I asked Nadeem how many positions he applied to in the past week, and he said about 8/9. I informed Nadeem that in my first 10 days of landing in Canada, I applied to over 100 jobs. I also informed him that I landed my first job in about 3 weeks, and it was not at McDonalds. In fact, I worked the job for 5.5 years.
Subsequently, we worked on his resume, and after a few good interviews, he resumed as a Solutions Architect at TELUS. I’m extremely pleased with his achievement, and very happy for his family.
I asked my protégés to Take the Lead—articulate your strengths, skills and preferred outcomes/goals; and to Learn—be aware of the forces that may impact realizing your defined outcomes/goals. Realizing your defined and desired outcomes will involve making wise choices amongst alternatives. I also gave him a copy of my book “Leading and Realizing Your Career Goals.”