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The Transition Process

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  1. A TYPICAL TRANSITION
  2. KEY CHALLENGES AND PITFALLS
  3. A GOOD TRANSITION: BEST PRACTICES
    • Psychology
    • Strategy
    • Organisation
    • Tactics
  4. MEASURING A GOOD TRANSITION

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Typical Transition Process

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* R&A-specific tool

PHASE I

PREPARATION

PHASE II

OUTREACH: CALL / MEET / WAIT

PHASE III

INTERVIEWS & OFFERS

ACTIVE

REACTIVE

  • Offer Negotiations
  • evaluation criteria/filters
  • comparisons/benchmarking
  • short term –v- long term
  • Interviews
  • Candidacy Management
  • Course correction
  • preparation
  • follow-ups
  • up-front positioning
  • slow down/speed up tactics
  • “top of mind” tactics
  • problem-solving differentiation
  • Post-offer career

management plan

  • Calls to/Meetings with
  • Headhunters
  • university alumni/ae
  • employer alumni/ae
  • professional peers/network
  • clients/customers
  • ex-clients/ex-customers
  • previous employers
  • friends/family
  • professional organizations
  • community organisations
  • volunteer/charity work
  • meetings
  • mailings
  • Course correction
  • review progress
  • add/delete targets
  • yield per channel
  • Positioning
  • what job can I /should I do?
  • goals: today/5 years/10 years
  • what is my story?
  • why am I leaving my current employer? Now?
  • what is my value proposition?
  • how am I different from all the others?
  • how to handle questions on comp
  • Intelligence on
  • Tool Preparation
  • Targeting
  • resume/CV
  • experience list
  • Self-assessment *
  • outreach script(s)
  • search plan
  • interview tactics/refresher
  • Channel Strategy
  • networking
  • headhunters
  • job postings
  • Segmentation + messaging

Introducers

Employers

Introducers

Employers

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Key Challenges

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  • Duration
  • Effort
  • Indeterminacy
  • Solitariness
  • Subjectivity
  • Trade-offs

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Key Pitfalls

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  • Emotional baggage
  • Unrealistic expectations
  • Inadequate preparation
  • Narrow focus

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Best Practices

  • Psychology
    • Set a wide horizon.
    • Drop Pareto’s 80/20.
    • Cut the umbilical cord to your current or former employer.
    • Establish a new work vs. home balance.
    • Prepare for a non-linear, iterative path.
    • Set short- and long-term goals concurrently.

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Best Practices (Continued)

  • Strategy
    • Identify your 2-3 salient differentiators
    • Pursue a multi-sector, multi-channel approach.
    • Co-opt a cabinet of advisers.
    • Increase the odds with quantity: more is better.
    • Prepare bespoke answers to 2 questions: Why should they hire me? Why do I want to join them?
    • Set compensation goals, needs, and thresholds.
    • Keep a dynamic, non-binary perspective.

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Best Practices (Continued)

  • Organization:
    • Structure the transition as a development and roll-out of a new product or practice.
    • Make a plan. List your resources and tools. Set goals, milestones, and periodic reviews.
    • Research the target employers.
    • Research conventions on compensation, benefits, relocation, contracts, severance policies, NDAs, “non-competes”, and equity compensation.
    • “Push the process” and expect surprises

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Best Practices (Continued)

  • Tactics
    • Practice talking about yourself: Who am I? Why leave my current or former employer? What do I want earn? Why?
    • Distil all communications to succinct, concrete specificity.
    • Segment your networks, channels, and employers and customize your message.
    • Figure out what employers want, and why?
    • “Connect the dots” for employers.
    • Ask great (probing, incisive) questions.
    • Offer help more than you ask for.

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Measures of a Good Transition

  • Input/output
  • A “police line-up” to select the right job
  • Increased self-knowledge
  • Positioning for the job after the next job
  • 25 new contacts for life
  • A good feeling

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