313: When Being Qualified Isn't Enough with Gina Riley

Why do some highly qualified candidates land the job while others get passed over? 

The answer often lies in how well they tell their career story.

In this episode of The Mid-Career GPS Podcast, Career Transition Coach and Forbes Coaches Council member Gina Riley, joins me to share insider strategies from her experience at Intel and as an executive search consultant. She explains how mid-career professionals can stand out in today’s competitive job market by documenting accomplishments, creating compelling stories, and positioning themselves as the solution to an employer’s biggest challenges.

You’ll discover:

• How to build your Career Data Vault so you can confidently communicate your value.
• Why recruiters read resumes in an “F” pattern and what that means for how you present your experience.
• The crucial difference between mentorship and sponsorship—and why you need both.
• Ways to quantify achievements in support roles to prove business impact.
• How to align your interview stories with the problems hiring managers are trying to solve.
• Why developing a personal board of directors helps guide smart career decisions.

Whether you’re frustrated with your job search or looking to move up in your career, this conversation will help you craft stories that resonate with hiring managers and position you as a must-hire candidate.

Connect with Gina on LinkedIn | Get Gina's New Book on Amazon.

Chapters

• 0:00 Meeting Career Coach Gina Riley
• 10:30 Sponsorship vs Mentorship in Career Growth
• 15:20 Building Your Career Data Vault
• 22:15 Making Your Resume Recruiter-Friendly
• 27:35 Quantifying Soft Skills and Support Roles
• 33:00 Being the Rare Candidate in Interviews

Transcript

John Neral: 0:00

Last week, you heard from one of my former clients, Chris Bond, who shared his experiences about finding a job in this challenging job market. Today, you're going to hear from someone on the hiring side about what's working and what's not in this job market. In a few moments, you will meet Career Transition Coach and Forbes Coaches Council member, gina Riley. Gina is here to share how you can get noticed by more recruiters and hiring managers, why you should stop thinking your work will speak for itself and why you should position yourself as the rare candidate. Let's get started. Hello, my friends, this is the Mid-Career GPS podcast and I'm your host, john Nerrell. I help mid-career professionals like you find a career they love, or love the one they have, using my proven four-step formula. There are things we can do right or wrong in any job search, and if you are frustrated that you're not getting the I've got a free guide and video training called Why Your Mid-Career Job Search Isn't Working and What to Do About It. you want, my question to you is this what do you want to do differently? Here's where I can help. In this guide and training, you will learn some of the biggest mistakes I see mid-career professionals making in this job market and how to stop doing them. Now. To get this free guide and training, you can check the show notes https://johnneral. com/resources or visit to website to get it.

John Neral: 1:47

Today, Gina Riley is transforming how people approach job search and career transitions. With nearly a decade of experience in corporate HR at Intel and as an executive search consultant for Talents Group, she has led searches for CEOs, coos and CFOs across various industries, trained hundreds in talent selection and gained unique insight in how to stand out in competitive leadership searches. She developed the Career Velocity Framework, an action-oriented system helping executives navigate successful transitions. A two-time Disrupt HR speaker and recognized thought leader, gina holds a master's degree and is a certified UMAP coach and expert in behavioral interview skills. Her expertise spans networking strategy, leadership development and executive presence networking strategy, leadership development and Today, September 9th, Gina released her first book. executive presence. And you know what's really wonderful. Her first book is called Qualified Isn't Enough. Develop your Story, land the Interview, win the Job. In it, Gina shares her comprehensive understanding of both sides of executive hiring, so let's get into it. It is my pleasure to introduce you to Gina Riley. Gina, welcome to the podcast. It is great to have you here today.

Gina Riley: 3:19

I am beyond excited to talk with you, John.

John Neral: 3:22

I am too. We've had a couple of conversations leading up to today's interview and I'm so excited to dig into this idea about how mid-career professionals can tell their story better and more effectively. But before we get there, I actually want to get into your story a little bit. What was your mid-career moment?

Gina Riley: 3:44

Ah, I had a very specific mid-career moment. It was slightly early-ish, but you know who's counting years. I was working at Intel and I had risen up through staffing and recruiting, and what I really wanted to do was ultimately land in training and development. I wanted to develop training programs and be in front of the room and train people. Training and development I wanted to develop training programs and be in front of the room and train people, but part of the gateway to get there, in my mind's eye, was to grow my expertise in HR.

Gina Riley: 4:09

So I wanted to be an HR business partner, and at that time Intel was requiring a master's degree and I did not have it.

Gina Riley: 4:17

And so, as I sought out mentorship and talked to people that I admired in the various roles that I wanted to be in, all of them said this is the requirement we can't sponsor you until you have this credential. And so it took me a couple of years and, hitting my head against the wall, thinking the magic would happen, I would get plucked up into the job I wanted. It didn't happen, john. So ultimately, for this situation, I went back and I got my master's degree. It was in whole systems design and it specifically set me up to be a consultant and sit at the right elbow of one of our up and coming VPs. I got assigned to this cool group it was the server group and had this kind of hotshot team of people growing a business inside of Intel and had this kind of hotshot team of people growing a business inside of Intel and what it took for me was to listen to good advice and then have sponsorship to then get the job.

Gina Riley: 5:23

Tell us a little more what you mean by sponsorship. Yes, sponsorship are people who speak your name when you're not in the room. It's different than a mentor. So I had mentors who offered me advice and support as I navigated my early career at Intel. However, it took a couple of those people that were also sponsors, who gave me their sage advice, who nominated me, put me up in front of decision makers who are making those final hiring decisions on how they were moving the chess pieces within the staffing board, and that you need to have people who maybe aren't even mentors but they're willing to talk about you when you're not there.

John Neral: 6:09

So obviously a company like Intel. We're talking very large company and for listeners who may not be familiar with the idea of a sponsor or are maybe confusing the role between a mentor and a sponsor, gina, if someone's working for, say, a smaller or medium-sized company, is sponsorship opportunities still available to them?

Gina Riley: 6:34

Yes, I have a really cool example, john. I interviewed a woman named Angela Shaw. Angela Shaw is an HR leader, and it's for a series that I wrote called how your Next Executive Role Finds you, but this applies to all people, not just executives. Her career transition strategies played out in such a way where she really wasn't using job boards to apply for jobs. She was a volunteer leader and she sought out volunteer leadership opportunities within her professional community In this case, it was SHRM in Texas and so she would volunteer for different kinds of roles, ultimately leading the organization. But the strategy was spending her volunteer time showcasing her knowledge and expertise and leadership skills so that when other leadership roles in HR came up in other companies, in the surrounds people were speaking her name when she was not in the room and people would then call her hey, angela, I think I've got an opportunity you should entertain. That is a sponsor entertain.

John Neral: 7:48

That is a sponsor. I love that and it really drives home this message, especially right now in this job market where, when we talk about mid-career professionals, that you know, yeah, job boards could potentially find you something, but we know it's tedious and laborious and really stressful, but it's that idea about getting yourself out there and building your brand and building your network and everything. I love how you just you drive that point home. So your book Qualified Isn't Enough that I did talk about in the introduction has so many. What I found going through it was it's so many practical and tactical tips to help people navigate what that next move is going to be. But, gina, I want to spend a couple moments with you talking about this idea of what you term as a career data vault.

Gina Riley: 8:40

All right Right to chapter four. I love it, chapter four Exactly so.

John Neral: 8:45

Give us what that I love it. Chapter four exactly so. Give us what that quick definition is of a career data vault.

Gina Riley: 8:49

You got it. I actually just published an article in Forbes Coaches Council on this exact topic. So the career data vault and it's so great for the mid-career professional, john, because they haven't gotten so far along in their career that they can't go back and construct the memories. So the career Data Vault is a repository of all of your career wins, going all the way back to the beginning up to today. And where do you find the data to inform it? You go back to all those performance reviews that are in writing. And if you don't have those and so many of these people, john, that are being laid off from the Intels and the Nikes and the Googles and the Metas, some of them only have one or two years' worth of stuff. They haven't saved it or they got locked out of their accounts. They don't have access and they don't have the memories of the details, and those details may come in handy for interview stories.

Gina Riley: 9:41

That's chapter seven. So if you don't have your repository where you can tickle your brain and your memory, you may have less powerful stories to share, and it erodes confidence when we can't remember them. We're like God I think I did something really great, but I don't remember what it was. So I actually have people in their 50s that I'm working with now who are going back and calling the colleagues back at their former company and say can you help refresh me on the value I added on that project? Because I don't remember. So go back to the beginning and that chapter exercise tells you to the micro what it is that you're pulling out Quantifiable results. What were the obstacles and situations? Kind of go back to that SOAR idea. You know what was the situation obstacles, actions and results. Results we got to have those results for interview stories, for resume bullet points, for LinkedIn profiles.

John Neral: 10:41

Nice. So here's where I think our listeners are going to want to really hone in and pay attention here, because oftentimes what I find and I'd love to get your take on this as well, especially around this work is that we know our story right, we think we know our story, but then when we go to tell it it's very easy for us to leave out some information because we just figure they're gonna figure that all out.

John Neral: 11:13

And so the micro exercise that you have in your book that walks through this protocol that you have for building that career data vault I wanna share with you this quote that I pulled out from your book because I'd love for you to talk about it on the other side, specifically for what this would mean, especially in the interview process for a mid-career professional, let's say, who is either working directly with a recruiter or perhaps with a hiring manager. Okay, so this comes from your chapter four, building your Career Data Vault. You write, quote Don't make me search hard or guess the extent of your responsibilities and results. Many companies aren't widely recognized. Describe your company's industry, clientele, revenue and size up front Spoon. Feed me this information. If I need Google for basic information, I might move on to the next candidate.

Gina Riley: 12:15

Yes, and that comes from one of my talents group teammates, lynette Carney. I can hear her voice saying those words that got wrapped into the book. Recruiters are moving fast. We know that studies show that it's 7 to 11 seconds for the first skim. Does it mean your resume only gets 7 seconds? No, what it does mean we need to look at that ladder study from years ago.

Gina Riley: 12:44

Recruiters are reading your resume in the shape of an F, as in Frank. They go across the top your name, where are you? What is your headline, may skim the summary. Then sometimes people bunch up their skills there next. I personally do not read those. I go right to company title and then what was the size and scope of the company in relation then to the role you had in the size and scope of your span of control? If you will, that tells me I'm on the right resume to keep going or not. And the missed opportunity are those quick hit details, quantifiable details. You know I work for this. You know multi-site global conglomerate. And then where I sit in the ecosystem is here and this is my budget or my team size or whatever that is. If I have to go to Google, but I have 800 more resumes. I need to skim. I might put you in the B bucket. Maybe I'll come back, maybe I won't.

John Neral: 13:46

Yeah, I think that's so important for people to hear, because and I love the idea of looking at the resume in that shape of an F I had never heard it that way before, which I really appreciate. But, especially when working with recruiters, I tell my clients all the time it is your job to make their recruiting job as easy as possible. Don't make them fish for information. Attach your resume back with the job posting to every email you send so they don't have to go and find it and look for it. Right, like, be a really good friend to them because they'll help you out if it's the right fit in that regard.

Gina Riley: 14:26

I love that, yeah.

John Neral: 14:30

So here's what I'm really curious about, though when we have a mid-career professional who is maybe they don't have the data points, they don't have the metrics because the work that they've done has maybe been more around culture or soft skills or those leadership skills that may not be as easily quantifiable and they come up and they go well, what's your tangible results? And they sit there and go. Everything I did was part of a larger team and I don't really have data points, but here's what I did and here's how my job description played out, and they get lost. They get lost in this job search process and they are not seen by the people who need to be seeing and advocating for them in terms of their, their hiring or their candidacy.

John Neral: 15:23

What do you tell people in those situations?

Gina Riley: 15:25

Oh, my goodness, I was just quickly trying to find an article I wrote also for Forbes Coaches Council.

Gina Riley: 15:30

I wrote an article on the six different things that consultants may want to use in order to help quantify their impact. Because if you think of support roles as consulting roles, even if you're an early career person in HR, IT, finance, think of all the support roles that may not have some kind of quantifi, even if you can't take credit for the whole enchilada, right. So if what you did supported a function, a group, a business that ultimately sold gazillions of widgets back into what it was, that you did, that helped support and enabled great work to get done. So, like I said, I was trying to like quickly find it because I've got the six things listed, but what you want to do is think of it this way by what degree up or down, increase or decrease of something did you impact? Did you help decrease? You know the call center calls coming in because you did something that enabled you know the whole system to work better. It sounds like something you can't quantify, but decreasing the number of calls coming into a call center saves time and money.

John Neral: 17:02

Absolutely.

Gina Riley: 17:03

It also impacts NPS scores net promoter scores, meaning satisfaction from customers. So we need to get creative and think about it. But we all have some kind of impact, even if it isn't. I owned the $2 million revenue that got sold to blah, blah, blah.

John Neral: 17:22

Right, absolutely, and I think for people who are in those types of roles, the challenge then for them becomes knowing what they have ownership of, or what they owned in that regard that they can talk about here's where my impact was, or here what was quantifiable about it and to be very careful in the words they use when they tell their story, that those words are indicative of confidence and competence, as opposed to this may sound like I'm just making this up to make myself look a little bit better.

Gina Riley: 18:00

Absolutely, absolutely. These are all another trick that you may want to employ if you're a mid-career professional struggling to find those quantifiables. One is go talk to the people that you worked for. The people that you worked for are the ones that gave you your review and were the ones that went to bat during promotional season promotion season where you got your raises, maybe a promotion. They're the ones that know what your value add was, because that's what they're measured against as well. So they can say here's where you had impact to me in my life as a manager. Translate that to like what it means for you, more at that micro level. So that's one trick you know.

Gina Riley: 18:42

Another trick is to talk to people that you serve. So, if you're in HR or if you're in IT or whatever it is that you're doing in the organization, but you go out to the people that the work impacts and say, when I do what I do best, what do you do better? What's better in your life? Because of what I provide. And you know, gosh, if we don't get some good answers then we probably should question what it is that we're doing.

John Neral: 19:15

Well, that's why we have those conversations right. They're especially helpful in terms of getting the information we need, especially when we think about what's that story we want to tell in an interview.

Gina Riley: 19:28

Absolutely. And you know, john, another kind of just anecdotal this is just me but when I moved from staffing and recruiting into another role, before I became an HR business partner, I ran the intern program for the Oregon site. We had the largest site in the world, I believe. At the time I hired 500 interns in one year myself. I made that many offers and I managed the programming of it, which was a lot of fun, but it was super high stress and it was really high volume and I was very driven to be an achiever in that role, and so what I was working to accomplish were the conversions.

Gina Riley: 20:04

Intel had to hire a lot of recent college graduates and that costs money to go and recruit and make those offers and try to secure people in a highly competitive market, and so everything I did was built around how am I going to make sure the best students are coming in at the GP and minimum requirements that we're going to require for the college graduates that we hire and then work in those hiring managers to make offers at the right time and sell those students. So 72% conversion that year, that's massive. Think how much money I may have saved us Intel from having to go and recruit new people and convince them to come work. So you can find juice in many things that you do.

John Neral: 20:55

So absolutely.

John Neral: 20:56

And, Gina, what I want to do right now, for a few minutes, is I'd love for you to put that hiring manager hat on that you have worn at different times in your career, because I want the listeners today to get a sense of what it's like to be on the other side of the table.

John Neral: 21:15

So you, being the person who's responsible for hiring talent, you have those hiring decisions that you're going to be making and a candidate comes in at that final round or next to final round of the interview. You've looked at their resume. They are qualified, competent, it looks like they're going to be a potential fit. It's just a matter of between them and whoever else you have in that very small, small window at this final round of an interview. You go through the questions, you go through the questions, you go through the interview and, as you're listening to the candidate respond, we know more than ever storytelling is so vital in an interview. As a hiring manager, what makes a story compelling enough that keeps you interested in who they are and what they do in the job interview.

Gina Riley: 22:14

I have one word to start with Relevancy. Relevancy If you're telling the wrong stories that don't apply to the hairiest problems that team is trying to solve, that don't apply to the hairiest problems that team is trying to solve. What is keeping that hiring manager up at night and if they hire you, they pay you a good salary to be the solution to their business problems then you better be speaking their language. You need to have done their so.

Gina Riley: 22:41

In chapter seven I talk about being the rare candidate, which is research. Align your stories, read the room and evaluate the opportunity. If you do awesome research on all the people that you interview with the company, their challenges, what's in the news, what are they trying to accomplish Then you align your interview stories. I like the sore method that can be debated at some other time and then working to build up the stories that then tie to what these people are trying to accomplish, and that's the reading the room part, body language, how they're responding to you, checking in and making sure the interview is a conversation and not a one-way drill sergeant session. You're there to make an evaluation as well, so the stories must align and be relevant.

John Neral: 23:37

That's so good and I hope people will hit the back button a couple of times just to go back and hear that answer, because the idea about listening intuitively and diagnostically, as you say, reading the room but to have that kind of relevance in terms of the stories you're choosing, is so vital. But what I also envision here is that when a job candidate does that, how much do you believe it takes the neediness or the desperation out of their tone when they're telling their story, when they're in that final round of an interview.

Gina Riley: 24:23

Yes, when you show up really understanding what those business challenges are, with aligned stories and your UVP, that's chapters one through five, developing that, now you're freed up to be curious. Now you're freed up to ask smart, effective questions that enable you to have a juicier deeper conversation, questions that enable you to have a juicier deeper conversation. The candidates that do less well I don't know if that's good grammar the people that end up not getting the offers are passive. They're waiting for the questions to come their way. Then they respond and they're thinking about all of the frameworks of SOAR and STAR and CAR and they're just hitting the robotic button. You can't do that for senior level roles, especially as you're growing up and trying to get promotions in your career. You need to have intuition. You need to navigate the challenges and show that you understand challenges backwards and forwards. You can't do that if your mind is locked up, worrying about what you're going to say. Instead, you already need to know what you're going to say. You know your stories. Now you're curious.

John Neral: 25:34

Yeah, well said Absolutely. And a shout out to my editor, who often listens to this podcast. I'm going to just say Leswell is okay. He'll tell me otherwise, so shout out to him, i'm't. I'm going to just say Leswell is okay.

Gina Riley: 25:49

He'll tell me. Otherwise I'm not perfect, John.

John Neral: 25:58

I'm not either, but in the moment I think Leswell absolutely works, because it's. It's that point that you just made, though right, that it's about listening so intently and and being so present in the moment that you are having a conversation, that it's a conversation rooted in whether or not you believe you can actually help them solve their problems. That, to your point earlier, that hiring manager can actually get to sleep at night.

Gina Riley: 26:25

Absolutely. You know it's the same for even being a podcast guest. Right now. I'm on your turf right. I have a lot to say. I could talk for hours on this topic, but I have to read the room. Which stories do you want to tell for your audience to help solve their problems? We all show up in service of when we're the guest, so to speak, and when you're the job seeker, you're not on the inside yet you got to earn it.

John Neral: 26:55

So for that job seeker who's getting close they're getting the final round interviews, they feel like they're doing all of the right things, but they're not getting the job offer what strategies do you recommend to help them show up either more impactfully or show up for their interview a little bit differently that they can then evaluate whether or not what they're doing is actually leading to getting to that job offer?

Gina Riley: 27:24

It's another question I really love, because if you're getting into that number two or three spot repeatedly which in this job market would be phenomenal, to have all the shots in the ring, so to speak but you're not getting the offer, it could be a number of things that have nothing to do with you. So let's start with that. One is they went with an internal candidate. Internal candidates are really tough to beat and sometimes you don't even know you're up against that. So when my clients went beat out an internal candidate, I find out later I almost cry because it's such a big deal. Okay, or they change the scope, or you know what they wanted for their target and you weren't quite it, and that's okay. I mean that's you know, that's their decision, or it could be something that you're doing repeatedly that's just not landing. One is maybe the stories aren't as sharp as you think they are, maybe you are rambling and talking a little too much, or maybe it's executive presence. So executive presence is something that I've spoken at conferences about, I've written about it.

Gina Riley: 28:26

There's 17 different elements of executive presence, with three major categories. One is how we appear, so appearance, communication and gravitas the first hurdle that we need to get over when we walk into the virtual or real room is our appearance. People are biased and they make a three-second determination about what they think about you because we humans want to categorize and feel safe in the world. So you've got to read the room, wear the right things, show up in a certain way, right. Once you get past that, it's communication and gravitas. Gravitas is the most important, so it's how we speak, how we behave. So, within the micro of all these moving parts, you've got to read the room. You got to show that you can make decisions. You've got to be a great listener, you need to be decisive, so there could be something in the way that you're communicating that devalues your impact.

John Neral: 29:31

Yeah, and we know how difficult it is for candidates to get feedback during an interview. So to have that type of reflection or introspection around what could I be doing a little bit differently, or how could I tell this story differently, or maybe it needs to be a different story. I think that's the part where, after the interview, job seekers and candidates can do some really deep work around where they might choose to pivot their strategy.

Gina Riley: 29:59

Absolutely. If you don't mind, I have a great example for the mid-career professional.

John Neral: 30:03

Please do yeah, absolutely. And.

Gina Riley: 30:06

I'll say I work with a lot of humble people, men and women. Women particularly have a challenging time owning what they lead and direct because they're collaborative and fearful of not coming across as humble. I have worked with people from a variety of cultures also that just come with the humility. I was working with a mid-career professional one of the major big high-tech companies globally and she was in charge of 20 product developers in technology. This is a really highly educated, great leader.

Gina Riley: 30:40

She started to tell me her interview stories and what she would do is she would tell me the situation and she would tell me some of the obstacles and then she would beeline it to the actions and results, or not even the actions.

Gina Riley: 30:53

She would go right to the results and because I already knew her UVP we had worked through her storytelling and I knew that she was probably navigating cross-functional teams and influencing certain decisions before she even got in the room for a pitch and then took, as a good leader, took product developers in with her in front of 12 VPs to get funding for the projects skipped over all the cross-functional influencing, skipped over how she elevated her people and brought them in the room room and skipped over what she had to do to get the funding for those projects that ended up making that company gobs of money.

Gina Riley: 31:35

And so when I dialed it back and said, how hard was it to do that job? Didn't you do this, Didn't you do this, and so on, she sat back and took a big breath and went oh my gosh, you're right, I skipped over all the things that make me a good leader. If you gloss over the juice, no one's going to guess it. No one would have guessed what she did. Right, I just happened to know it because I had teased it all out and I knew who she was.

John Neral: 32:05

Well, that's why our work is so important, right? That's why what we get to do as career coaches and consultants and trainers and speakers and authors, that's where we get to help draw those things out for people. So I love that story. Thank you for sharing that. Well, Gina, we are almost at time. It is amazing how time just flew by and everything you shared so much, and I know you have so much more to say. So I wanna give you the mic for a couple of moments and as we wrap this interview up, I always ask my guests to share what advice they would give the listeners to help them build their mid-career GPS that thing that's gonna take them from where they are to where they wanna be. So if there was something you haven't shared yet today to help someone build that next step in their career trajectory, what would you tell them?

Gina Riley: 32:55

Okay, I've got concentric circles that overlap, as per usual. One develop your unique value proposition and keep it with you for your career. It may change. Some of your strengths and values may change over time what you lean into, the career pride points are going to change. But you need to understand your career thread, what the themes and patterns of your career are, so that every time you network and every time you interview you can answer tell me about yourself, which is not an elevator pitch, it's a three to five minutes highlights reel that help people understand where you fit in the ecosystem.

Gina Riley: 33:33

If you're not clear, no one else will be clear and you won't be able to make asks and get referrals. That's one. Two build a healthy network and maintain it throughout your career. That would be the other thing. And then the third thing I would say is make sure that you build up what I call a PBOD personal board of directors or advisory team of mentors of a variety of skill sets and backgrounds so that you get information from different kinds of people. Maybe someone on that team has finance background, another's HR background. One is a program manager. I don't know People you admire that you trust that can give you advice throughout your career to help you navigate and use your GPS appropriately.

John Neral: 34:21

Yeah, so good, so good. Thank you so very much. Well, today is September 9th and as we go to wrap up here, I want you to share all of the great things where people can connect and follow you, and perhaps maybe share a little bit why September 9th, once again, is such a big day for you.

Gina Riley: 34:46

Oh, my goodness, I am a new published author. September 9th is when Qualified Isn't Enough Hits the newsstand, so to speak, and I could not be more excited to help people develop their story so that they can tell better stories. Land interviews win the job, so I'm excited to bird this into the world. People can find me at GinaRileyConsulting. com and I'm on LinkedIn, probably as you, John. Every day I'm there, I post, and I have almost 24 articles on the Forbes Coaches Council on that website as well, to help job seekers. That's what I do. I spend all my time building content to help job seekers navigate to their next best thing.

John Neral: 35:27

Wonderful, gina. I am so glad we connected. Gina Riley, thank you for being such an amazing guest on the Mid-Career GPS podcast. Thank you. All right, my friends, here's my one takeaway.

John Neral: 35:39

I've got a lot of takeaways from my conversation with Gina today, but here's one. Where are you relevant? What's your relevance when you're thinking about the stories you want to tell, when you're networking or interviewing, you're sitting at your job and talking to your supervisor and considering an opportunity for a promotion, or you just want more visibility on a particular project? Where are you being relevant? What is your relevance actually doing to make the case that you are the best fit and the best person to take on this responsibility or this role or get this promotion? Gina talked so much about how having a relevant story and reading the room is integral to your career success.

John Neral: 36:25

So if you want to put something else into your GPS toolkit right now, what I want to offer you today is lean into Gina's comments about relevance and do some work around. Where are you the most relevant in your career, your industry and your organization right now? So until next time, my friends, remember this you will build your mid-career GPS one mile or one step at a time, and how you show up matters. Make it a great rest of your day. Thank you for listening to the Mid-Career GPS Podcast. Make sure to follow on your favorite listening platform and, if you have a moment, I'd love to hear your comments on Apple Podcasts. Visit johnnerrellcom for more information about how I can help you build your mid-career GPS or how I can help you and your organization with your next workshop or public speaking event. Don't forget to connect with me on LinkedIn and follow me on social at John Nerrell Coaching. I look forward to being back with you next week. Until then, take care and remember how we show up matters. Thank you.