Build Your Work Inventory Around Your Recruiter's Business Problem

This article focuses on how to build your work inventory to aid your cover letter writing.

This strategy can make your cover letter very powerful, and promise you a guaranteed result immediately.

If you have not read the article "Use the Business Problem Concept to Win in Job Hunting", please go and study it first.

http://www.itotalsearch.com/Business-Problem-Concept.html

Firstly, you have to prepare yourself psychologically.

Write your cover letter based on a central theme: How do you relate yourself to your recruiters' business problem? How can you convince them that you are the best one to solve their business problems?

Refer also to the article "Use this Secret in Cover Letter Writing."

http://www.itotalsearch.com/advertising-technique-cover-letter.html

Prepare a work inventory table of your present and previous jobs. Ask yourself the following questions:

1. What did you do in your previous three jobs? What are you doing currently?
2. What achievement do you have?
3. How are they related to the business problem you have in mind?
4. What is your unique selling point with regard to their business problem? You can build it around these points:

• Experience you gained
• Personal connection/network you developed (for sales and management)
• Specific market information you have on-hand
• Unique targeted skills you acquired

List a table of your present and previous three jobs. List at least 6 to 8 items according to the above 4 points and pick 3 for your cover letter. The rest are to be used in your resume.

For example, you are an accounts staff and you are applying for a job in a US company which plans to open an office in Europe. You study their requirements and you realize that the company is new to Europe. You have previously worked in Europe but NOT as an account staff back then. You figure out that their business problem might involve the need to handle the complex office startup matters in a country with a native language not English. So the business problem might not be totally related to accounting but the need to build a business operation from scratch . This must be a headache for them.
Then, build your work inventory. One of your experiences is that you have worked in Europe before and you have helped with many administrative issues for your previous employer. And you have a network of people in Europe who can help if you get the job.

You have also worked in a startup environment before and you know how to start up a new office.

Create your unique selling point by combining the two.

You can begin your cover letter with the question:

Are you looking for a trustworthy person to handle the administrative matters of a startup office with the ability to work in a foreign country independently?

Then, elaborate your experience with the work inventory you have just worked out.

So you see. You are not merely drawing on your expertise in accounting. You are now building your cover letter around their business problem.

Believe me, this technique can help you beat many other applicants who are not aware of this concept

You might ask: if I have not worked in Europe, what should I write? If I have not been exposed to a startup environment before, what should I say?

Remember: their business problem is how to set up a new office overseas without hassle, right?

So ask yourself:

• Can you master their targeted country's language?
• Have you ever handled the full set of accounting documents for a new division in your present and previous companies?
• Are you in frequent contact of your overseas customers in which some of them are in Europe?
• Have you ever started a new operation in your own country?
• Or have you simply been assigned to take care of a new operation of your company?

All of these can be used as your relevant experience to their business problem.

You can work on this work inventory exercise and build up your unique selling points. Remember: your aim is to catch your employers' attention with your cover letter. Even though your previous work history is not completely relevant to their requirements, you can still make a pitch by using this technique. It is your selling points, not what you have actually done, that make them continue to read your cover letter.



From the Desk of
Damen Choy
http://www.itotalsearch.com

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