The Proximity Principle

by Ken Coleman

  What works is getting in proximity to the right people and the right places. That’s what’s going to move your resumé to the top of the pile. You can leverage your resumé to get interviews for the jobs you want. But it requires two things: the right resumé in the right hands.

  FORGET EVERYTHING YOU’VE BEEN TAUGHT

  To create the right resumé, I need you to forget everything you’ve been taught or you think you know about writing resumés. Why? Because every resumé template you’ve ever seen is truly awful. You might be thinking, Surely not every template, Ken! I think my traditional resumé is pretty sharp. Nope! Your resumé may not be completely terrible, but the way it’s currently written isn’t going to get you the results you want. But before I tell you what to do on your resumé, let’s talk about three things not to do.

  1. Don’t Add Too Much Information

  2. Avoid Using Cookie-Cutter Templates

  3. Stop Relying on a Piece of Paper

  Don’t Add Too Much Information

  Believe me, it’s time to start from scratch. Most resumé templates ask you to add way too much information. And it’s tempting to load it up, because you want to make sure hiring managers and producers know that you can do the job. But adding unnecessary details to your resumé makes it overwhelming. Your resumé isn’t your life story, so it shouldn’t include a list of everything you’ve ever done. Don’t be like Andy from The Office. No one cares that you were president of an a cappella group your senior year (especially if that group’s name was “Here Comes Treble”)! It’s simply too much information.

  Avoid Using Cookie-cutter Templates

  You’ve also got to avoid the cookie-cutter templates that everyone else is using. Remember, your resumé is sitting in a pile with hundreds of others, and the hiring manager is looking at multiple variations of the same format. If yours looks like everyone else’s, it won’t capture the hiring manager’s attention. Think about your regular commute that you make day after day. It only takes a few days for you to stop noticing the same buildings, same lights, and same signs. Yet if something changes, like a new Mexican restaurant pops up, it catches your eye right away. Imagine the same thing happening to producers as they look at the same exact format through stacks and stacks of resumés! If yours looks different, it may just get pulled out of the stack.

  Stop Relying on a Piece of Paper

  Okay, last thing. Here’s the most important thing you need to do. Let go of the idea that your resumé is “the thing” that’s actually going to get you the interview. It’s not. You cannot convince anyone to hire you with a piece of paper, no matter how great it is, because producers hire people for jobs—not paper. So stop relying solely on a document to get you where you want to be.

  THE RIGHT Resumé

  That said, resumés are still a key tool to help put you in proximity of your dream job, so I’ve designed a unique resumé template that will stand out and highlight your connections to the company you’re applying for. You can easily download my free resumé template at kencoleman.com. I really encourage you to try it. Listen, this stuff works!

  Remember my caller Kristen from the start of this chapter? Well, she went back to the drawing board. She reworked her resumé and crafted each one she sent out, leading with her connections in those companies. Rather than mailing out fifty at a time, she did her homework. On a super productive day, she sent out five. Her mind-set had shifted from working in mass production to hand-crafting each resumé.

  When Kristen called back into the show, she reported that she was getting more responses and interviews from her researched and focused approach than she ever did when she was blasting out the traditional resumé template. Eventually she landed an interview for the role she wanted as a controller at a company that was a great fit for her—all because she put the time and intention into building her resumé the right way.

  PREPARE TO WIN

  After you’ve put in the work to design hand-crafted resumés, you can expect to hear back from the companies about the opportunities you’re applying for. Landing an interview is an exciting next step, but the truth is interviews can be a little bit intimidating. We’ve all been in those moments where we feel like nerves could take over any second, especially if it’s a job we really, really want! When your dream job is on the line, the desire to say the right things and make a good impression can completely rattle you! But did you know that nerves are the body’s response to opportunity? They give you a burst of energy, and you can harness that energy and use it to prepare to win. As the Hall of Fame basketball coach Bob Knight was fond of saying, “The key is not the will to win—everybody has that. It is the will to prepare to win that is important.” With that in mind, here are three strategies you’ll need to implement to win the interview:

  1. Prepare to Perform

  2. Present the Best You

  3. Follow Up

  Prepare to Perform

  When you’re preparing for an interview, you’ve got to start at square one: preparation and research. In order to identify specific ways that you can help the organization, you should do your research and discovery well in advance. You should focus your research on the company or organization and the person you’re interviewing with.

  When you’re prepared to win in the interview, you show hiring managers that you’ll be prepared to win in the actual role!

  Researching the company will help you get a clear understanding of the organization. This is such a great way to show you’re passionate about the work they do and to make a good first impression. Get familiar with the company’s website before the interview. Preparing yourself before the interview will give you confidence, and it will empower you to talk intelligently to the hiring managers about their business. Most importantly, getting answers to relevant questions will help you know pretty immediately if the job is a right fit for you.

  Next, you’ll want to research the person or people who will be interviewing you. Doing this research allows you to ask meaningful questions about their role and have better conversations during the interview. If you discover that the hiring manager went to Duke University, you can drop a “Go Blue Devils” into the conversation and make a connection that is more personal than professional. This can help loosen up an interview that’s feeling a little too formal and help the hiring manager see you as a person with interests beyond just the hiring process.

  Now listen to me, your level of preparation is an indication of your dedication and desire. When you’re prepared to win in the interview, you show hiring managers that you’ll be prepared to win in the actual role!

  Present the Best You

  You’ve heard people say, “Don’t judge a book by its cover.” And while in an ideal world people wouldn’t judge each other by first impressions, the reality is they do—and they will. That’s a harsh truth, but you’ve got to understand that in the interview process your first impression matters. The first time the hiring manager lays eyes on you is important. So your job is to present the very best version of you. How do you do that? By focusing on two simple things: appearance and attitude.

  Appearance

  In an ideal world people wouldn’t judge each other by FIRST IMPRESSIONS, but the reality is they do—and they will.

  When it comes to appearance, presenting the best you can be as simple as getting a haircut and wearing clothes that are clean and pressed. Your goal is to match the dress code for the company and role. You don’t want to show up wearing a formal suit if the company is a jeans and sneakers sort of place!

  In today’s world where social media is used by nearly everyone, you can’t focus just on your physical appearance. Take some time to clean up your digital appearance as well. You don’t want your college spring break party pictures to keep you from landing an interview for your dream job. And this seems obvious, but I’m going to say it anyway: you’ve got to delete any pictures, posts, or comments that link you to irresponsible, illegal, or elicit behavior.

&nb
sp; Attitude

  Bringing the right attitude to the interview is just as important as your appearance. This is where you’ve got to turn on the charm. If you have a more laid-back personality, you may feel like you are coming across as fake, but try not to overthink it. You just need to show real energy, a big smile, and a grateful attitude.

  During the interview, your sole focus should be on the interviewer. This is also true for phone or video interviews. Those might feel less like a real interview, but they are still your one shot to make an impression.

  Bringing the right attitude to the interview is just as important as your appearance.

  A couple final tips are to never eat, drink, or chew gum during an interview, and, most important, to always keep your phone on silent and out of sight. You don’t want to be tempted to glance at your phone or pause the conversation every time someone texts you. If you’re easily distracted in an interview, the hiring manager may assume you won’t stay focused on your job either.

  By doing all of these things well, you will present the very best you to the company. So do your homework, take the time to prepare, and knock their socks off by giving them a fantastic first impression.

  Follow Up

  After preparation and performance comes follow-up. This needs to be done the right way and soon after. This is where some people drop the ball—even if they nailed the actual interview itself. The right way to follow up involves touching base with the relevant people in a series of communications that I like to call the “Touchpoint Timeline.” It’s a straightforward, step-by-step process that you can use for two things: following up after an interview and thinking through whether or not you want to take the job. You can check out samples of the follow-up notes and questions I recommend using in the Touchpoint Timeline on my website at kencoleman.com.

  A GOLDEN OPPORTUNITY

  The interview process can be nerve-wracking and intimidating at times. We’ve all felt overwhelmed by the pressure that comes along with interviews, and most of us have experienced our share of good ones and not-so-great ones. But you don’t have to approach the interview process with dread. Instead, you can look at it as a golden opportunity to get in front of people who can literally change your future. If you follow the practices we talked about in this chapter—if you prepare, present your best self, and follow up well—you’ll put yourself in a position to win the interview and land your dream job.

  If you want to win at any opportunity you encounter in life, you’ll want to adopt a proximity mind-set. This is the last practice you’ll need to implement on your journey to work that matters, and we’re going to talk about it in the final chapter. Keep reading! Finish strong.

  Chapter 15

  Adopting a Proximity Mind-set

  Ability is what you are capable of doing. Motivation determines what you do. Attitude determines how well you do it.

  —Lou Holtz

  The mind-set of my friend Cody powerfully impacts everyone around him. He is super talented, and he immediately began building his influence within Ramsey Solutions from his first day on the job. Cody was a key member of the team that helped me launch The Ken Coleman Show—and, believe me, I needed a lot of help! I honestly couldn’t have done it without him. Cody now works in a new position unrelated to the show, yet he still takes time from the responsibilities of his new role to send me useful research or to pass on great ideas that help me improve.

  I call Cody’s approach to his work and the work of others a “proximity mind-set.” He’s focused on doing his own job well, but he stays alert and receptive to opportunities to help the organization win as a whole. When he sees the chance to help someone else do well, he doesn’t hesitate. Cody’s killing it in his role, and his attitude and approach make everyone want to work with him.

  THE PROXIMITY MIND-SET

  So far in the proximity practices section of this book, we discussed how to create a web of connections, how to make those connections count, how to build a resumé that will land you interviews. This final piece—how to adopt a proximity mind-set—is absolutely crucial. But how do you know when you’ve adopted a way of thinking? That may seem really abstract and difficult to measure. What does success even look like? It’s really not that difficult. When you approach your work with a positive attitude, exceptional effort, and a winning disposition, that’s when you know you’ve adopted a proximity mind-set.

  Whether you’re starting out in your own zip code, a place to learn, a place to practice, a place to perform, or a place to grow, you must cultivate this way of thinking. To do so you need to do three things:

  1. Know Your Role

  2. Accept That Role

  3. Maximize Your Role

  Let’s walk through the steps of a proximity mind-set.

  Know Your Role

  You need clarity on what it means to win in your role.

  Your passion for what you do can have a lasting impact on the people around you, but in order to make that kind of impact, you must first know your role. I’m not talking about your job title here. To me job titles are essentially meaningless. You’ve got to find out what’s expected of you in your position. You need clarity on what the organization wants from you and what your supervisor wants from you. One of the unique things about working at Dave Ramsey’s company is that each member’s role is clearly defined. All team members have a job description with clear, distinct, and measurable responsibilities. We call it a KRA: Key Results Area. Not every company is this transparent, which can make this part of the process tricky. But even for people whose job descriptions are clearly defined, it’s still important to investigate this further. Sit down with your employer, immediate supervisor, or boss and walk through your job description bullet by bullet. You want to get pin-point clarity on what it means to be truly successful in the job you have. I like to call this “winning in your role.” If there are any expectations outside of what’s on that piece of paper, write them down. You want to know the expectations your boss has for you, no matter how small. Then do some research to get some big-picture context. How do your peers or other professionals achieve results in similar roles? How have those in the role before you performed well? How might you possibly add value above and beyond their performance?

  My friend Tim is a great example of how to do this. Tim played college football as a linebacker for a university in the Big Ten Conference and had the chance to try out as an undrafted free agent with a professional football team. When he arrived to work that first day, he asked the coaching staff what their expectations for his role would be if he made it onto the roster of that NFL team. He knew he wasn’t going to play linebacker right away like he did in college, so he needed to get clarity on his role as a special teams player, covering punts and kickoffs. He talked with his coaches, stayed late after practice, studied film of the people who were winning on special teams, and asked the veteran players for tips about how he could be more effective. Ultimately Tim was able to determine what his coaches expected from him—what winning looked like—and what he needed to do to go above and beyond as a special teams player. You know what all that extra initiative got him? A place on that NFL roster!

  If you’re struggling to pin down exactly what’s expected of you in your work, my friend Michelle’s story may help show you how to cut through the fog. When Michelle joined a local publicity firm, she immediately went to work clarifying her job responsibilities. She knew that her primary role was to generate media stories for the firm’s clients. Specifically, she was going to handle radio campaigns. Michelle had to learn everything she could about how to organize, pitch, and follow up on pitched stories—as well as make sure her clients were well-prepared for their interviews.

  She outlined every single step it took to pitch a story successfully so that she wouldn’t drop a single ball. She even went as far as asking her boss how many interviews she needed to schedule each week to help the firm meet its goals. By being proactive in clarifying her responsibilities, she qu
ickly understood what success looked like in her new job. This freed her up to work effectively to help her team, surpassing her boss’s expectations. That’s definitely a win! You can help your organization in the same way by getting a clear understanding of the expectations for your role. Then you’ll know what winning looks like for you—and you’ll be able to get wins for the company as well.

  Accept Your Role

  Once you know the exact expectations for the job you’re in, you need to fully accept that role—no matter where you are in your climb up the mountain. Accepting your role is all about attitude. Honestly, this can be a challenge for all of us at some point because it’s human nature to want more. It’s completely normal to get distracted from the day-to-day goals because you have your eye on the summit and want to keep climbing. I would even argue that it’s not only normal but it’s healthy to want to grow into more responsibility and advance up the career ladder. Most employers are looking for people who want to push themselves to grow and improve! But there’s also a danger in looking past your current role toward the future.

  Every stepping stone has the real possibility of becoming a cornerstone for your long-term career success!

  Although it can be tempting to rush ahead and move on from the role you’re in, you should never take what you believe is a stepping-stone position for granted. Why? Because every stepping stone has the real possibility of becoming a cornerstone for your long-term career success! While it’s great to keep your eye on your ultimate goal, you also have to stay focused on winning in the present. Remember, there are goals to reach in your current position too! Don’t be so obsessed with the next that you don’t focus on the now. Because doing the now with excellence is the stepping stone that will help you win in the next. So how do you do this? How do you fully accept your role? You start by having an attitude of gratitude toward the work right in front of you. No matter how little or mundane the task is, you have to do it with excellence.