Raise Your Profile

Headhunters use researchers to track down likely candidates. And they carry out their research by phoning people and asking them about people who might fit a specific role.

Chapter 8 already covered networking, which is one critical way of raising your profile. But there are some other methods you can employ too:

• Present at seminars and conferences. Even if it’s only an internal seminar, you can get your face spotted by more people.

• Do well by your customers. Anyone can be a source of information for a headhunter’s researcher. So always take the time to be polite to all the people you deal with.

• Don’t be embarrassed handing out your business cards. Why should you be embarrassed? What have you got to lose? And it will help a headhunter to track you down more quickly.

• Send them your CV. Contrary to popular opinion, you don’t have to sit and wait to be spotted. Ring the switchboard of a headhunting company and ask for a named individual you can send your CV to. Most of the time, they will be happy to take a look at your CV, but politely tell you that they ‘don’t have an opportunity at this time’. But you can be guaranteed that they will keep you on their database for future opportunities.