On Friday, the Caweb students went to Parisoma, a working space in San Francisco similar to WeWork where tech and design entrepreneurs and freelancers gather to work together and share their ideas. There, we attended a class by a recruiter for the digital market, Aurelia Laff.
The Newbie’s Guide to the Silicon Valley
A vastly-experienced recruiter and human resources specialist, Aurelia has founded her own staffing agency, Unlocked Talents. She provides managers in the digital entertainment industry with skilled professionals while offering candidates advice and expertise. She kindly took two hours of her time to share tips and advice regarding recruitment in the Silicon Valley with us.
CAWEB students are placed in companies during their second year of studies while they keep attending classes, so Aurelia invited us to compare what we know of French companies to what we saw of the companies we visited in the USA to better understand what working in the Silicon Valley is like.
French Companies and US Companies: Miles and Minds Apart?
Her job is an indicator of the tendency, but Aurelia confirmed it first-hand: while places in good companies are few and highly sought after in France, the Silicon Valley works on an employee-driven job market, where companies would rather create a position for a skilled worker than fit someone into a void position. A strong difference that implies many consequences.
How do you compete with your sole skills when you are in a region of the world which drives the most brilliant minds of the digital industry? Aurelia advised us to focus on two competences that are too often overlooked in France: communication and networking.
Clarity and Brevity for a Memorable Impression
A good way to get a job is to make sure your future employer remembers your name. During the workshop, we took some time to think of which particular skills and individual experiences each of us should highlight when introducing his or herself. What challenge did I tackle in a clever way only I could have thought of? What unique skill can I boast about? These were the questions we had to ask ourselves, in order to then shape the answers in appealing resumes and outstanding elevator pitches.
As a guideline for optimized communication efficiency, she presented us with the well-known acronym S.M.A.R.T., which, in her presentation, stood for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Results Oriented and Time balanced. These vary slightly across sources, but the bottom line is the same: if you can achieve a “smart” personal branding, you stand a better chance of soon being in a position to apply the same acronym to business projects.
Presse “Network” to level up !
Whether you want to take your career to the next level and the next company, or you are bursting with ideas for a new project and need hands to trigger it, your network is the key. Creating and maintaining professional relationships both in and out one’s realm of expertise is essential to evolve in a market where shifting from one company to the other is not rare. From handshakes, business cards and LinkedIn relations to chats in a coffee-shop, Aurelia shared some tips for effective networking, and encouraged us to extend and sustain our contact list.
It was great for us CAWEB students to have this opportunity to think on our own personal branding.The elevator pitch may seem a simple thing, but having it at the ready is the key. To have had the chance to put it together and test it with Aurelia was just the thing we needed to perk up our networking skills !