The global pandemic has thrown things into disarray. There have been layoffs across the world. Few companies even rescinded  some job offers for the class of 2020. It is more difficult than ever. But don’t worry, we have tons of actionable tips and guidance in this article, meant just for you. 

Below are just some examples of these situations, that showed up on my LinkedIn feed and InMails.

These are challenging times and the rules of the game of life and doing business have indeed changed. The old rules just don't apply anymore. You need to learn to play by the new rules. The rules of hiring and recruiting have changed as well. Getting a job has become tougher than usual and one needs to really stand out among  the plethora of applications. 

These are just some of the factors, there could be many more at play. Let’s divide these into two categories - what’s in your control and what’s out of your control. You can’t do much about the situations and issues that are out of our control, so it would be unwise to focus or dread on those factors. However, you can always exercise control over how you act and react to these challenging circumstances. You need to carefully calibrate the steps you take towards securing that job you want, especially now. 

Here are the three  factors that are within your control: 

Manufacturing, Hospitality Services, and Travel Industries apart from many others, have slowed down and taken a bad hit. Everyone is talking about social distancing, administering new protocols and moving away from paper and physical presence. Digital transformation has become the focus for Governments, Educational Institutions, Healthcare, Enterprises, and many other businesses. 

The best companies or industries to look for jobs in, are the ones that are enabling this digital transformation. The SaaS industry is leading the digital transformation of the world. Within SaaS - Education, Digital Adoption, Customer Onboarding, Healthcare, Cloud Infrastructure, Collaboration Tools, Productivity, and Remote Work are the leading verticals. Some companies that I personally know are still hiring are: InterviewMocha, ChargeBee, Whatfix, Khatabook, Freshworks, Care.fit, and Unacademy among others. 

These are just some of the options out there. I’m sure many more SaaS companies are hiring. Here are some resources to find companies that are hiring across the world and in India:https://careervscovid19.com/insights,https://www.levels.fyi/still-hiring/, https://candor.co/hiring-freezes/, https://www.linkedin.com/feed/news/the-firms-hiring-in-india-4529499/, https://startuptalky.com/companies-hiring-people-amid-coronavirus/, https://remote.com/remote-jobs.

As you might have observed, most openings require skills in Sales, Customer Success, Web Development, Data Analytics, and few more in Product Management. If you have the necessary skills for the job, that’s great! This is your opportunity to seize. If not, then you need to learn the skills you need to be hired for the role you’re interested in. Think about it. If these are the roles the companies are hiring for, during a global crisis of this scale, then in some sense these jobs are basically recession-proof. It’s important to build skills and work at roles that are recession-proof. 

Other important skills that are recession-proof and worth learning are - Business Writing, Community building, Prototyping using tools like Figma, and Designing using Canva. 

Here is a collection of articles on how to write like an Amazon employee: https://medium.com/search?q=write%20like%20an%20amazonian. Amazon employees are known for their business writing skills. They do not use PowerPoint decks. 

If you haven’t read it already, I wrote a book about Selling SaaS - SeSaMint - A Guide to Selling SaaS. This is a good starter on the basics of software sales and why one should consider building a career in sales. 

Not even a hiring agency or a hiring manager. You should market yourself and convincingly sell your story. When someone listens to your story they should want to set up an interview with you. 

Your biggest challenge with getting hired during this pandemic is to stand out and get an interview call. Many people have reached out to me via LinkedIn seeking help for job search and interview prep.

The most commonly heard reason for getting rejected is - ‘You do not have prior experience or you are under-experienced’. If the job description states 5 years prior experience as the criteria and you have only 2-3 years experience don’t stop yourself from applying as you do not meet the criteria. Or if you’re someone who is transitioning to SaaS sales from traditional sales, don’t stop yourself from applying to a sales role that requires 1 year prior SaaS selling experience. Why should you apply to these jobs anyway?

Let’s look at the rejection reason - ‘You do not have prior experience or you are under experienced’. Why do companies require experience? Why is  HR saying this? 

I can speak from the context of hiring for a sales role. During a pandemic like this most  companies are optimizing for revenues. There is an onboarding process for a salesperson. Usually, the onboarding has two parts - product education and the company’s internal sales playbook education. Typically a new salesperson takes 3 months to reach their 100% monthly quota. That is acceptable during the normal times, but during a pandemic when companies are chasing revenues, 3 months is a long time. Companies are looking to reduce those 3 months to 1 month or 1 week. This is why having experience plays a critical role. An experienced person can jump right in, and start selling from the second week. But a person with no prior experience might take 2-3 months to start selling and bring in the revenue. 

For this precise reason, Companies and HRs stick to the specified job description criteria while filtering resumés and reject yours. So what should you do? How can you convince the HR that you have similar skills to that of a candidate with prior experience? 

The key ingredients to stand out and get an interview call (in the context of sales roles) are:

Use a resumé format that focuses on the impact of your work. The University of Berkeley has put out a great resource on resumé writing - Resumé overview. During this pandemic, go beyond your resumé. Just like how you know you need a hook to grab someone's attention, you should also be creative in your outreach for a job. You could even make a video about yourself using a free tool such as Wistia. 

In your outreach, include a presentation about the company. This presentation should work as a sales-pitch of the company that you have created on their behalf. Here is an example of the Almabase pitch submitted by a college graduate: Pratheek’s presentation for a job at Almabase. This shows that you have already built knowledge about the company and its product. This will reduce their worry about the time it will take to onboard you. It is a signal that you are ready to sell from the second week itself.

You must look at non-traditional ways of conducting a job search. Going to job portals and applying with standard resumés is a waste of time. Instead, look at websites such as Angel.co and LinkedIn. Ask for references from friends who are in sales. Reach out to your alumni network. Writing directly to sales leaders or the CEO of the company with a unique value proposition that can help them is an obvious but most underutilized way to land an entry-level position. Make them take notice with the way you communicate why you would make a good hire, and what you can do for the companies/teams that can hire you. Focus on the quantity and the quality of the outreach. These people will most definitely be busy with their own lives, they might not respond but don't give up! Keep following up with them. 

Here is my gift for you. I’m offering a 50% discount on my book. Here is the link to grab the discounted copy - SeSaMint Guide to Selling SaaS - First Job.

Go get that job!