Designer hireworthiness, a perspective
Among the five elements of life (you, health & fitness, relationships, career and finance), career gets enormous attention, time and energy in an adult life.
If you observe closely, you'll see that in a 24 hour cycle of our day, one-third (or more) is spent on our work. The other one-third is spent on rest aka sleep. Everything else (kids, family, hobbies, health, fitness and more) in life is fit into the remaining one-third of the day. Typically this pattern continues for almost 50% of a normal human life (age 21- age 65) assuming 80 years is a typical life expectancy.
Despite all of us spending enormous time and energy on work in our adult lives, only 2% of the world's population have careers and the other 98% have only jobs. A career is lot more than just earning a pay check. If done well, a good career can boost your well-being exponentially and can add to other aspects of life (finance, relationships, health, your self esteem etc) as well.
90% of the time a career starts with your hireworthiness.
Hireworthiness allow professionals (including students) to enter career pathways that offer gainful employment and opportunities for advancement. Making a wrong choice or a bad choice while starting a career pathway can deflect careers and may even waste a lot of time travelling wrong pathways.
Three things every hireworthy designer must understand.
- Hireworthiness of a designer is what allows a hiring manager to pick certain candidates as potential considerations to go through the process of hiring. In a nutshell your hireworthiness allows you to go through the funnel of selection.
- Hireworthiness is determined by your past professional experience, demonstrable skills & assets, your adaptability and your character skills. Artefacts like profile, cover letter, portfolio and social clout plays a major role in determining your hireworthiness.
- The journey from a hireworthy candidate to a worthy hire is what we call as employment or a contract. The journey includes the interview process, background checks, referrals and your personal brand value.
Your hireworthiness is not just about core skills, it also includes other auxillary skills like critical thinking, creativity, problem solving, communication, collaboration, facilitation, productivity, managing ambiguity, emotional intelligence and more.
If you are getting constant rejections from your job applications, check your hireworthiness deeply. This will allow you look at your candidature more objectively and make progress in the right direction.
🥂 to hireworthiness!