A Perfect Fit
A Perfect Fit
The story of Goldilocks, as you and I know it, is about a little girl who enters the house of three bears: Poppa Bear, Momma Bear, and Baby…
The story of Goldilocks, as you and I know it, is about a little girl who enters the house of three bears: Poppa Bear, Momma Bear, and Baby Bear.
She samples three porridges, finds one too hot, one too cold, and the last one just right. She sits in three chairs. The first two don’t fit her but the third is perfect. Things are going well, but suddenly everything goes to hell. More on that later.
History has forgotten the unpleasant ending, and we use the term “Goldilocks” when we’re imagining something that’s a perfect fit for us: Just the right dress, just the right mate, just the job.
Employers are looking for just the right fit in the person they hire for their role.
They wrote many versions of the job description before publishing the one you read.
Every employer sincerely hopes, like Goldilocks, to find exactly the right candidate. They truly believe that there is somebody out there who is a perfect fit.
If they wrote “data-driven self-starter with long-term vision but who can also roll up their sleeves and execute”… they are really hoping against hope to find somebody who is all of those things!
How? The hiring manager gives the description to a recruiter. They will try out a thousand candidates against it, like so many bowls of porridge.
But recruiters (I love you, each and every one!) cannot be experts in what makes a perfect fit for every job in the company they work for.
So when they come to LinkedIn to look at your profile, expect that they’re going to be comparing it to the JD in a fairly literal way.
Which bowl of porridge are you going to be?
Example: If you’re applying for product jobs, you’ll notice terms like “data-driven”, “customer focus”, “partnering with engineering” and so on.
Does your profile/resume say those things? I mean, does it literally say something like “I am a data-driven customer-focused product manager who leads cross-functional teams by partnering with engineering and design.” No? Your porridge is too cold!
Do the bullet points or stories underneath each of the roles on your resume/profile talk about your experience using the same words and phrases that appear in the job postings? No? Your porridge is too hot!
Does every position on your resume seem relevant to the job? Are all of the skills you’ve listed relevant? If your resume has an objective that says what you’re looking for, does it specifically say you are looking for this job title?
Yes? That’s just right!
(By the way, in the original version of the story, Goldilocks was an old woman who was cast out of her home for being a disgrace, and was — according to Wikipedia — “impudent, bad, foul-mouthed, ugly, dirty, and a vagrant.” Our charming, meek bear family were in other versions replaced with three male bachelor bears, a hobgoblin, or a fox. After feeling the bears’ home, one version has Goldilocks almost eaten by the bears. In another she escapes, but is then impaled by the steeple of St Paul’s Cathedral.)