People are anxious to find a new job immediately but if you jump into networking and recruiter calls without doing the research to define your niche, you will struggle because:
Your LinkedIn will be generic and won’t engage people
You will burn your network connecting too early without clarity
You will waste cycles interviewing for roles you don’t want / aren’t a fit for
You will struggle to convert interviews when you aren’t clear in your strengths and can’t speak with conviction
“Getting out there and interviewing a lot won’t help you find clarity. It may actually hurt you.” Whispered Founder
Why niching down is critical
“Every ounce of your intuition will tell you to position yourself broadly - to cast a wide net. ButThe wide net doesn’t catch good job possibilities because … humans can be expansive, but not reductive…. Your network can expand from your narrow niche and think of you for a range of jobs. But paradoxically the inverse is NOT true. They can’t take a wide (focus) and reduce it to a specific role. If your statement is broad, most times they can’t even remember it or you.” Phyl Terry
Throughout our careers, we have observed this phenomenon thousands of times. It is why when people say “if you hear of any interesting roles” we know we will struggle to help them… even though we want to.
You will be shocked how powerful niching down can be. Here are a few examples of how powerful combining your background, super powers and understanding of the job market:
Executive #1: This person had led SDR teams for 7 years before moving over to RevOps for the past 3 years. They were struggling whether to go back to SDR roles or work to build a career in RevOps. But we talked them through how given the rise of AI, more and more companies were automating the SDR function meaning the combined skill set positioned as a Growth Engineer would be much more powerful for them
Executive #2: This person had been COO of a company and was struggling to find their next COO role. We learned about the deep customer operations systems and processes they had built and guided them to consider a role in Customer Success Operations. They were hired to lead the CSOPs function at a public company.
How to define your niche
Below is a quick guide on how to define your niche. We work closely with premium members to coach them on this process but you can definitely do it alone too:
Do the background work: Start by making a list of
What you love AND hate doing
Your must haves AND must nots
Your strength AND weaknesses
Get clarity on the role / company: Use our template to build your focus statement.
Work to niche down even further:
Think from the perspective of the CEO/hiring manager. What impact are you uniquely qualified to drive?
Are there emerging roles and technologies that you can position yourself to be an expert in?
“The smart (executives) watch the industry in their spare time. They study the categories and build thesis in their own mind.” Andy Price, Artisanal Talent (see podcast starting at 49:50)
Understand how the market sees you and pressure-test your focus statement: Connect with 5-7 people in your network to review your focus statement
These people should be former colleagues or connected friends
Reach out to them sharing that
You are talking to a few people you respect before starting your career search (this makes you less threatening)
You want to make sure you target the right roles for your background
You’d love to get their perspective about where you are focusing
Call agenda
Give quick context on call of where you are in search
“If you were in my shoes how would you approach this job search”
Share your draft focus/niche
What do you think of my focus?
Is there anyone else I should talk to?
Thank them - this will be someone you can go back to once you start your search and someone you can keep updated on your search
Once you know your niche
Once you have defined and tested your focus, then you are ready to update your LinkedIn profile to reflect this. Rather than listing your experiences, remember that people will give you <15 seconds to review your LinkedIn so you want to:
Communicate a consistent single message about where you are focused
Write a clear “About” section that speaks to your niche
Align all your experiences to support this story
Remove superfluous advisory roles that don’t support your story
Use our article on Optimizing your LinkedIn to make your entire LinkedIn profile align with your focus.
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