The Remote Show
The Remote Show
Jun 5, 2020
Remote Show Live with Kate Smith, Founder of The Remote Nomad!
Play • 1 hr 9 min

 Kate is a career coach and founder of The Remote Nomad. She has been profiled in a number of large publications for her expertise in all things remote work, and she helps clients around the world find remote jobs and excel in their careers.

In light of the current environment, we wanted to create a more interactive show where we talked about finding a remote job and answered questions from our listeners directly.

You'll notice that the audio sounds a bit different. Like many out there, we've had to adapt and were unable to use the studio setting for our recording  session. Hopefully this session was helpful for listeners out there! I know I learned a lot from Kate and we hope you did too. 

Please check out the Remote Nomad  from more information on Kate and to purchase one of her courses. She also has a free ebook for our listeners, find that here. 

More to come in this format! We'd love to hear your thoughts on how we can improve the show and be as helpful as possible. Send us an email at podcast@weworkremotely.com -- we'd love to hear from you!

Transcript:

Matt Hollingsworth (00:00:07):

Hello, everyone. My name is Matt Hollingsworth and welcome to another episode of The Remote Show where we discuss everything to do with remote work with the people who know it best. Thanks so much for listening. The Remote Show is brought to you by We Work Remotely, the largest community of remote workers in the world. With over 220,000 unique users per month, We Work Remotely is the most effective way to hire.

Matt Hollingsworth (00:00:25):

Welcome, everybody. We're going to get started here in a few seconds. I'm just going to allow people to get into the room here. So just as a quick introduction, again, we're going to give this a few seconds here for people to come on board. Participants are already climbing, which is awesome to see. Hopefully, that number keeps going up. So I'm going to kick this off. So this is technically part of The Remote Show Podcast. So welcome everybody to Remote Show Live. This is the first time we've ever actually done this. Hopefully, this is valuable. Again, we're new to this structure so we're figuring this out as we go. There's some chats in there as well. That's awesome.

Matt Hollingsworth (00:01:14):

I'm going to do a quick introduction to my guest today, Kate Smith. Some of you have probably seen Kate before or know of Kate already. She is a remote coach. She's the founder of The Remote Nomad. She's been on a number of high profile, different publications. She's been on CNN and Glassdoor. Kate, you can fill me in if I've missed any of those. But she's very prominent, a very knowledgeable person in the remote workspace so really happy to have her on. Kate, welcome to the podcast.

Kate Smith (00:01:47):

Thank you for having me. I'm excited to be here today and just share a bunch of knowledge and information from what I know and from my experience and what's been working with my clients with everybody today.

Matt Hollingsworth (00:01:58):

Yeah. We're super excited about this and we're happy to have you on. I just wanted to start by talking a little bit about the context that we're doing this. I think, it's important for us all to recognize that this is a pretty unique time for everybody. I know that in a lot of circumstances, this is a very uncertain time, I know people have maybe lost their jobs or looking for work in a different space. I think we have all been there before in that level of uncertainty. I just wanted to start by saying that and I think we are all in this together. This is the reason why we're doing this, is to help people that are looking for work. That is the reason we're doing this. Again, we're happy that you all are here to share that with us.

Matt Hollingsworth (00:02:50):

Kate, I think, well, actually, before we get into the questions here. Because we don't necessarily know the stages of everybody's remote work experience where people are at generally speaking with their remote work, their journey and if they are, for example, if they just lost their job, for example, or looking from a standing start how to get a remote job. If they're already remote workers and potentially looking for a career change in a space that's still remote and just a career change in general, the latterly up, whatever stage of their own works, that journey they're in. We would like to know that just because it will give us a sense of how to be the most helpful we can possibly be here. This is the goal.

Matt Hollingsworth (00:03:35):

Obviously, this is a free webinar that we're doing to help people find work and we want to be as helpful as we possibly can. So if you could put that in the ... Actually what I'm going to do here ... This is so cool, the chat. I'm going to put that in the polling here a couple of questions, and hopefully we can get a sense of where people are out with it and be as helpful as we can. I'm going to launch this poll. Again, this is the first time I've ever done this, so bear with me if this doesn't go well here. So I'm going to just launch this.

Kate Smith (00:04:04):

So if you guys can just let us know if you have lost your job due to COVID, if you're looking for remote work, just kind of what your situation is, so that we can have a better idea and make sure that we tailor the discussion today to where you guys are at.

Matt Hollingsworth (00:04:22):

All right. I've just put that poll out. It looks like the vast majority of you are looking for remote work. Now, that makes sense. I'll just change up the question here, because I think that's a pretty obvious one. So if anybody's interested, everybody ... Pretty much everybody here is looking for remote work. I don't know what everybody else is doing here. If you're not looking for a remote job, if you're just looking to ...

Kate Smith (00:04:45):

Kill some time during quarantine.

Matt Hollingsworth (00:04:48):

... kill some time in which we're also ... Hopefully, we can help with that as well. So I'm going to end this one and I'm actually going to put up this next one here as well. Okay, when we're going to ... So we appreciate putting in the chat there what your experiences. We'll kind of scroll through, hopefully, we can kind of pick these things up as we go. But anything you want to put in there is helpful. I'm going to put out a different poll here as well. Okay. The next poll here. Go ahead, Kate.

Kate Smith (00:05:18):

Could you do one and see if anybody has recently lost their job. I think I'd be curious to see if anyone's been impacted in that capacity.

Matt Hollingsworth (00:05:26):

Okay, great. The poll is out there now. The first poll that I [inaudible 00:05:31]. This next poll has, "Have you worked remotely before?" In the chat, if you could just say if you're looking for or if you just lost your job, that will be helpful. All right. It looks like here, "Have you worked remotely before?" The answer is 65% of you have worked remotely before and 36% haven't. So that's a pretty ... That's kind of what I was expecting. To a large extent, I think that's a good place to start.

Matt Hollingsworth (00:06:08):

Well, why don't we start this off with actually with just the, "You haven't worked remotely before." And this is going to be, the way that we're going to do this folks is we're just going to, I'm going to ask questions to Kate and then I might be able to add some value to part of the question or I might able to chime in as well. But my job here is to really pick the brain of Kate, hopefully, add something a little bit valuable myself.

Matt Hollingsworth (00:06:30):

So Kate, in the context of somebody who potentially has just lost their job and they haven't worked remotely before, maybe they have worked in the tech space, maybe they haven't. I'm sure it's a pretty intimidating thing to go into this. Not even knowing where to start. What would be step one for somebody out there that is feeling that they really don't know where to start with this, they maybe are looking for a career change and they just are feeling overwhelmed. What's step one, do you think?

Kate Smith (00:07:02):

I just wanted to share with everybody that I've been there. So my personal journey of working remotely, I've been working remotely now for over five years now, I had a corporate job in advertising. It was my dream job at the time. You know, as time went on, a couple years in corporate, I realized, this isn't for me, I like to travel too much. Two weeks vacation is not going to cut it. I didn't like staying at a cubicle all day. I started saving up to quit my job and I actually ended up getting laid off. So for those of you that have been laid off, that is actually what kick started my journey.

Kate Smith (00:07:35):

I remember at the time, I was working with a life coach and she's like, "How are you feeling? You know, you've just been laid off." I'm like, "I'm so excited. There's so much ... I can do what I want to do now." At that time, I didn't even know remote work was a thing and ironically enough, I was working remotely right after university for a few months. I had this job that I was doing at university, doing it from a distance. But anyways, what I just want to share with you guys is that you can look at this in two ways, like "Can I ..." Is it fine if I swear sometimes when I get into things? Slips out of it?

Matt Hollingsworth (00:08:07):

Sure. I think we're okay.

Kate Smith (00:08:08):

Okay. You can look at it two ways, you can kind of look at it as this, "Woe is me," and fall into this victim mode and just kind of feel defeated for the whole thing. Or you can see it as an opportunity and possibility and potential. For me, I mean, obviously, I learned the hard way how to land a remote job and I did land a remote job and I had that job for a few years, working remotely, traveling the world before I started my own business. But I just want to let you guys know for those of you that have been laid off that, yes, it sucks. Yes, times may be tough, but you get to choose what you create and how you come out of this.

Kate Smith (00:08:48):

I know it's tough because when I went remote, I put all of my savings down to join a program and book a one way ticket to Prague. I think it was like $5,000 at the time, five or $6,000. Even at that time, I was hoping to land a remote job. Didn't really know what I was doing. I even brought on my carry-on, [inaudible 00:09:11] on my carry-on to the Prague, I brought a bag of food because I really ... Money was tight. I was like, "Okay, I got one month to figure this out. Get a remote job." I'm not really sure how I'm going to feed myself so just in case, I'm going to bring some food. And it worked out.

Kate Smith (00:09:26):

But I just want to let you guys know that with the right process, with the right strategy and knowing where to look and how to find these opportunities, it's there. It may be challenging, it may be tough, it really comes down to what are you willing to do to make it a reality. For me, I was willing to do pretty much anything within reason. And that led to my journey. So if anything, I just want to convey to everybody that just because this situation sucks right now, doesn't mean the opportunities aren't there. Even when we look at the space in the industry, a lot of people are wondering, "Are there remote jobs out there? Are people even hiring."

Kate Smith (00:10:07):

A big thing that I predict that we'll see in the next year or two is that a lot of companies have now been forced to operate remotely and they're going to start to realize, "Shit. This is a more efficient, effective, better model to business. It saves us a shit ton of money. We don't have to pay for all this overhead." And a lot of companies now that aren't even remote are going to start shifting to that model, which is a beautiful blessing in this whole scenario. The founder of Twitter even mentioned recently that he's going to shift his whole company to a remote model. That's just the start. There are so many companies that are going to make that transition. So there's just so much opportunity and possibility here for everybody. I just want to leave you with that.

Matt Hollingsworth (00:10:53):

Yeah. Totally. It's a great message. I think it's also important to know. I'm going to kind of answer my own question and I apologize, I do that sometimes with these kinds of things. I think it's also important for people to know, too, if you're looking to go remote and you're looking to ... If you're feeling like you're at a standing start, essentially, and you're having to take the first step through becoming a remote worker, oftentimes, you actually ... Whatever field you're in, whatever skills you have, that might be already a part of a remote job. People don't associate necessarily ... If you're in the financial sector, for example, if you're in accounting or if you're even in the medical field, if you're, whatever, all that kind of stuff is actually now and I think will continue to be, to your point, will continue to be the case where you'll be able to ...

Matt Hollingsworth (00:11:43):

There are remote jobs related ... Maybe not exactly what you're doing, but it's related to the skills you have. So it's going to be easy for you to then transition to find that remote job. I do want to mention that, too, as an important thing to note. It doesn't necessarily mean you have to start from scratch. That might be the way you want to do it. For those folks, we'll get into that as well but you don't necessary ... It doesn't need to be the case and there might be an option that's more relevant to whatever you're doing now.

Kate Smith (00:12:08):

Yeah. Just to add on to that, a lot of people have this assumption that what they do can't be remote. Like you said, Matthew, it's the complete ... It's just not true. For example, I used to be a project manager and oftentimes people think, "Well, I can't work remotely as a project manager, I have to meet with clients." Well, there's [inaudible 00:12:28] assume, remote companies have these ways to navigate that. There are over 50 different spaces and industries that operate remotely. They just do their business in a different way, you can do the same job, it's just done in a slightly different way. And sort of what you were saying and leading into what you're saying as well is that you can often take the transferable skills that you have and find a remote role. Even if it's not the exact role, you can pull on those transferable skills to fit into that ideal remote role.

Matt Hollingsworth (00:13:02):

Yeah, yeah. For sure. Also like I said, I think, so for somebody that is looking to start from scratch essentially, it's time for a complete career change. Maybe the wave of job losses we've been seeing has led them to rethink their careers. I mean, kudos to you if you're in that position, I think it's a brave thing to do. It takes a lot of courage to go out and try something new and get into a field that you're normally experienced in. So question to you would be, Kate, how do you start to think about the things you might be good at? How is it just based off of interest, generally speaking, like is the kind of throwing darts at a dartboard, how would you go about starting to look for things that might be interesting for you in a remote context?

Kate Smith (00:13:53):

I think it's first identifying what are my skills and what transferable skills do I have? The way I explain remote work to a lot of people, and it's a bit tricky, is because everyone thinks, "What kind of job can I get as a remote worker?" That would be like me asking people, "What kind of job can I get in the corporate nine to five environment?" It's like holy shit, there's a lot. And it's the same with the remote working world. Those opportunities are there. You know, Matthew, you guys have We Work Remotely. There's a lot of sites out there that post remote only job depending on the industry and role. So what I would do is look at, "Okay, what are those transferable skills? What are my current skills? What kind of role do I want to apply that to?"

Kate Smith (00:14:40):

Maybe not so relative to what you're saying right now, but when I started my journey and I had no idea what I was doing, I started doing a bunch of random stuff to explore what I wanted to do. You know, I was researching, "Okay. Should I become a nutritionist? What does that look like?" I stumbled across the program Remote Year and that's when I was introduced to remote work and I thought, "Okay, I can just do what I'm doing but do that remote." I think it's starting at looking at your transferable skills, looking at currently what you're doing and there is a chance that you can just do the same job remotely.

Kate Smith (00:15:17):

I think a big thing as well that a lot of people underestimate a lot is building your network, tapping into your current network, building that network, building that network. So if you look at it, I saw in the chat here, someone was saying, "You know, for every job that's posted, there's so many candidates. So how am I to stand out?" The reality is, is you've been working your network and growing and nurturing your network over time, you're going to have that ability to find and uncover opportunities and stand out among everyone else.

Kate Smith (00:15:49):

Referrals are a great way to stand out among ... Referrals have a higher hiring rate than other people. Their whole journey is faster. I think they get their journey to getting hired is like four to five times faster than most people. So another big thing is start building that network, LinkedIn. There's so many ways to connect with people in the virtual world. So start tapping into that growing and nurturing your existing network.

Matt Hollingsworth (00:16:17):

The networking piece is really important. For myself, I always assumed or I thought to myself, "You're not really a networking person." I think for people that have that as their starting point, it's really difficult to see themselves in a position of, "Okay, I'm just going to reach out to this person, I'm going to ask them a question. I'm going to maybe see what they do and see if it's interesting to me." It's a good segue, actually, to talk about networking. For somebody that isn't really their thing, doesn't come naturally to them, what's a way to approach networking and maybe reaching out to people that doesn't come across as spammy or annoying. Is there ways or process you have or thoughts you have to that?

Kate Smith (00:16:57):

I think biggest thing when it comes to networking is your mindset and how you perceive it. A lot of people will think of networking as, "I want a job and I'm going to try to connect with this person to get a job." That's not what networking is and that's not what it should be for. Networking is a long term strategy and the way that I approach it is I want to simply meet, I'm curious to meet similar like-minded people. And that's it. Have a conversation, be a value to them. Don't just be like a leech or a suck. People don't like that, to be spammy.

Kate Smith (00:17:33):

But just start a conversation. Just how you would connect with people like, "Hey, you seem really interesting." "Wow, I saw that you're doing that. That's really cool." Or you know, "I've been following your content on LinkedIn. I love that you said this." Even just as much as insightful comments on ... Follow someone on LinkedIn, leave insightful comments on their posts like, "I read your recent article on LinkedIn. I really liked this and that." They're just like, "Hey, I care." I also just want to mention here, too, that LinkedIn is a huge networking opportunity. I think people underestimate the opportunity.

Kate Smith (00:18:08):

I have a client that I'm working with recently and he started doing that approach, leaving insightful comments, following people, connecting with people. And he had the CEO of Wired respond to him, and he's like, "Holy shit, how did that even happen?" And it's because you have Instagram, Facebook. We have a lot of saturated places online but LinkedIn isn't and it's a huge opportunity. It's set up for professional networking so there's a huge opportunity to connect with people. But again, I think the biggest thing to consider is simply look at it as connecting with interesting like-minded people, get curious about people, "Hey, what you're doing seems really cool," and ask them questions. And don't approach it with this mindset and mentality of like, "I want a job. How can I use you to get this job?"

Matt Hollingsworth (00:18:55):

Yeah. Totally. I would also like to mention too, LinkedIn is a great obviously resource. I think Twitter is another one as well where it's super important. Again, for people that don't see themselves in that niche of, "I'm going to use social media to my benefit. I'm going to grow my network." One thing that I've found to be helpful and I've seen successful in the past is just, like you said, leaving insightful comments, asking questions to people, follow people that you think are interesting. Because oftentimes, that in itself is enough to justify following them in the first place.

Matt Hollingsworth (00:19:27):

Then also just comment on their tweets, try to engage with them in some way. That might not be the direct reason why you get a job but at least ... Because it's such an exponential thing, people will see your name, maybe a friend of theirs or whatever will see your name because you were on Twitter and you interacted with them in some way. As well as LinkedIn, I think Twitter is really an important thing to keep in mind.

Kate Smith (00:19:55):

Another thing just to add to that as well that a lot of people need to realize is that it's the 21st century. Everything is online. And if you want to stand out among the competition and give yourself an edge, so to say, building that personal brand is really important. It can be as simple as, as you read articles in your industry and space, to share it on LinkedIn and write your thoughts or comments, "I just read this article, here's a few takeaways I had. I think it's really interesting." As you continue to post, people are going to start noticing and seeing your name. It's like that omnipresence.

Kate Smith (00:20:30):

Another little trick, too, is Google yourself. So many people don't Google themselves. It's like when you're applying to these jobs, the recruiters will Google you. It's just a natural thing. You're Googling the company, you're learning about them, they're going to do the same to you. So I encourage you all, just as you're going on these social platforms and as these recruiters are going to be creeping you online, clean up your social profiles. If you're on Twitter, if you're on LinkedIn, make sure it's professional and clean and something that you would want an employer to see. Google yourself. If you have Facebook, if it's very personal, just tighten up those security settings and just recognize that as things are online, networking goes online, it's part of building this personal brand, so to say, to give yourself an edge.

Matt Hollingsworth (00:21:21):

Yeah, yeah. Totally. So I'm actually going to just take a step back quickly and just talk about this. I forgot to mention this at the start. So apologies, it's my fault. We're going to do this conversation back and forth for a little bit longer here in probably about 20 or so minutes more, and hopefully this is helpful. Please do keep commenting in the chat to let us know if we're on the right track or not. I would like to mention though, too, we're going to do a Q&A session afterwards. At the end, at about 25 minutes or so, we're going to open up to a Q&A.

Matt Hollingsworth (00:21:50):

If you do want to, leave us a question and that we'll get to and we're going to scan through them when that time comes. Please do leave that in the Q&A section right now or until the end of the thing here so we can get to that question when we can. Just want to mention that quickly. A few things, actually that I've seen here in the chat so far and I think we were going to touch on this piece of it anyways, is just like ... You maybe have some skills, maybe you do meet the qualifications of a job posting that you see online, something's interesting to you. You go on and you apply and all of a sudden you're within one of 500 people that have applied for that position.

Matt Hollingsworth (00:22:30):

Which is a pretty common thing, I think, you know, especially with the junior to mid-level positions, oftentimes, companies that you want to work for will get a lot of people that also want to work for them. Is it the cover letter, is it the resume, is it the structure of it, is there easy nos that you can avoid being that person that people just disregard completely because you didn't do something, didn't do X, Y, or Z? So let's just focus a little bit more on the resume cover letter piece. Kate, if you have any thoughts on that.

Kate Smith (00:22:59):

I feel this is a loaded question and there's so much I could say on this. But if we're going to talk specific to cover letters and resumes, you could be the most talented person, most skilled person in the world. If you don't know how to showcase your skills or connect with the right opportunities in the right way, it doesn't matter. So there is a bit of a skill and an art to understanding how to find opportunities and how to present yourself a value to a company. What I'll just share, which will hopefully be a value of everybody today, and you can take this option today to improve your resume to help you stand out, there are probably ...

Kate Smith (00:23:38):

I'll give you three things, three main things that people usually fail or fall short on their resume. Number one is a lot of people will just focus on their job duties. Like, "I did this, I answered phones, I filed whatever it may be." Instead, you want to make sure you're focusing on your stats, impacts, and achievements. For example, by implementing a new system or process that you implemented, you made whatever process 30% more efficient, something like that. So focusing on those stats, achievements, and impacts, and a lot of people don't do that.

Kate Smith (00:24:14):

The second thing to recognize is that when you're applying to remote jobs, I would say 90 to 95% of those companies are using an applicant tracking system. So an ATS system, I'm not sure if you guys are familiar with that. What it means is that your resume is going to go through a machine before it even gets to a person. It is super important that you tailor your resume based on the job description. An easy way to do this is go through the job description, pull the keywords from that job description and make sure that you put that into your resume and that it's tailored. Be a little cautious if you have an overly graphic designed resume, because sometimes that doesn't go so friendly through the ATS system.

Kate Smith (00:24:56):

What was the third thing? Making sure you tailor your resume with those keywords, making sure that you focus on those stats and achievements. I can't quite remember what the third one was. But a lot of people, what they'll do is they're going to focus on quantity over quality. They're just trying to pump out these resumes. Be very careful where if there's a job description and it says, "We want you to, in addition, create a five minute video about yourself." Don't skip out on that. If you skip out on that, you're going to be an automatic no.

Kate Smith (00:25:29):

Honestly, just give it your all. Give every application 100%. So many people will just try to pump out the resumes and do quantity over quality, but quality will far outweigh quantity every time. Remember, if you're tapping into that personal network as well, that's giving you an additional edge when you're applying to these jobs. Does that help answer your question? Is there anything else that I missed or that you want to add in terms of that?

Matt Hollingsworth (00:25:52):

Yeah. I think that's a good, those are really good points. I think the really important piece that I've seen, because I've seen a few, we've seen few resumes come through and it is clear which ones have spent the time to really understand the job that they're applying for. Which you would be surprised or maybe you wouldn't be surprised to know that a lot of the jobs that, or lot of the job applications we see, clearly, you don't know the company, you don't know what the role is or maybe you saw it and you thought that it was ... We said it's the spray approach of just like hoping something sticks.

Kate Smith (00:26:30):

Okay. Another story, just on that note. A lot of people in their cover letter, they'll write something like, "I see that you operate remotely and I'm super excited. I want to work remotely because I want to travel and have that flexibility." Do not ever, I tell my clients, "Don't ever, ever say you want to work for a remote company because they're remote. Don't even mention it." It's a thing that you know but you don't talk about. To remote employers, that says, "You don't care about us, you just want to work remote." Then similar to what you were saying, Matt, just because there's 1,000 applicants applying to a job doesn't mean they're 1,000 good qualified applicants. A lot of those could just be shit resumes. So keep that in mind as well and don't let that hold you back from applying.

Matt Hollingsworth (00:27:15):

Yeah. And it doesn't need to be ... The other side of this, too, which is I spend way too much in one specific one, because you think that this is the job for you, this is the company for you. I think it's really easy to go down that rabbit hole, too. And then now often when you don't ... And this will lead into this next question here, but when you don't receive a positive response or any response really from the company, that can be really dejecting because you've spent so much time on this one resume and this application and all sudden that's a no go.

Matt Hollingsworth (00:27:45):

So there's a happy medium there and I think it's a really hard thing to really pinpoint. But just acknowledge that spend the time to know the company, know the rule, show that you care and then apply and then move on. Don't put all of your eggs in one basket emotionally, because that's quite easy to do. Then I've had that experience as well. Just try to focus on ... As well, try to focus on the companies that you want to apply for. I think, this potentially is something that not everybody has the luxury to do in some cases.

Matt Hollingsworth (00:28:17):

So if you're looking for a job and you're maybe not as qualified or this is new for you, then maybe you do have to take that all out approach. Let's face it, we all need jobs and that can be the reality for some folks, but I think it shows that you know, if you read a resume and a cover letter that is specific to the company, you can show within your cover letter that you care about the company, that goes a long way. That might not get you the job, but between five candidates, if you're equally qualified as the other people, that will get you a job over those other folks that didn't do that.

Kate Smith (00:28:50):

Yeah. And just to add to that, sometimes your passion about a company and what they're doing can go a lot further than your specific skills. Because you can't teach someone to be passionate and excited about a company, but you can teach them skills. So keep that in mind, too.

Matt Hollingsworth (00:29:05):

Yeah, yeah. Totally. So this is my next question, if you have a job that you really, really want and it's something that you think you'd be really good for, how do you go about applying for that job in a way that that shows initiative, that goes the extra mile, that makes sure that you are the head of the fact in terms of being visible but isn't annoying. Because everybody's had that, I think ... Well, maybe not everybody, but I've seen that happen before where it goes too overboard and you're just wanting to get ahead of the person or get in front of people. It just comes off as spammy a little bit. Is there anything that you have thought about it just to show that you care and then maybe that's it. Do you see what I mean? What I mean is there anything there that you would suggest?

Kate Smith (00:29:49):

I mean, one way that can help ... Well, first of all, follow up with companies after you apply, about a week after, I would say. But make sure the job posting has been closed down. If it says explicitly don't follow up, then don't. Otherwise, it's okay, just send a quick follow up. A good way for a company to get a sense and feeling about who you are without having any pressure to it is setting up informational interviews, which is simply connecting with people at different companies saying like, "Hey, your company sounds really cool. I'd love to learn more about what it's like to work there. Do you mind ..." In that conversation, you can get insights and they would learn more about you and they can give you specific feedback like what do people ... What does your company look for in candidates? What could I do to present myself as stronger?

Kate Smith (00:30:40):

And when somebody is giving you that feedback and advice, they're going to have a vested interest in seeing you succeed. It's just a psychological thing. They're like, "Okay, I gave you advice on how to succeed, now I want you to succeed." So that's something to keep in mind, too. Just keep in mind, this whole journey and process is a lot of learning. Don't just keep doing the same thing over and over when you're applying to jobs and expect. You know, just say you're applying to all these jobs all this all the time and you're not getting any results, try out different things.

Kate Smith (00:31:12):

Maybe you find, "Okay, these type of jobs, I'm not hearing back. These type of jobs, when I follow up, I'm hearing back from them." So try out different strategies and approaches and really look at it with some curiosity and learning. Don't just keep doing the same thing forever. Always try out different things, "Okay, maybe I do this to stand out or that to stand out." Maybe not super relative to remote work, but I remember when I was applying for my internship to study at university, I was meeting with the CEO of the company, and I had to drive four hours from university to the company, met with him and I just casually mentioned it, because he had talked about, you know, small talk.

Kate Smith (00:31:50):

I was like, "You know, it's middle of exams. I just had to drive down or whatever." He's like, "You drove four hours to have this 30-minute conversation, only to drive back in the middle of exams?" And I was like, "Well, yeah." And I didn't think anything of it. I was like, "I want the job. Of course, I would." So there's going to be even opportunities like that that may come up where you can just show that you care. Like don't reschedule an interview, do whatever you can to be on that call and make sure you have good internet, make sure your background's quiet, show that you care. I think showing that you care can go so far.

Matt Hollingsworth (00:32:23):

Yeah. Totally. There's some interesting case studies or things that I've heard. Actually, this is sort of how I got my job in first place, as well. So I'll share a little bit about that. One thing that I found to be really effective and even if you don't get the job, I think people that are hiring really appreciate this way of going about it. In some cases, I've seen ...

Matt Hollingsworth (00:32:48):

Let's say, for example, if you're a designer or if you are a programmer or you're something that you can build something online, what I've seen people do is they'll reach out to a company and say, "Hey, there's this part of your site online that I think I thought could do some redesign. I'm a designer, this is my background. I know that you're busy and this is just something that I wanted to do in my spare time. Here you go. I've redesigned your ..." in sketch or whatever, "I've redesigned this part of your website or this part of your business. Let me know what you think. This is yours. That's totally fine if you don't even use it, but I thought you might appreciate it."

Matt Hollingsworth (00:33:27):

That combination of, I know for myself, would go ... Even if I don't hire the person, even if there's no job opening available, that kind of initiative goes a long way. A second part of that segment, which is like, "What skills do you want to get to be able to do that kind of thing?" If you're starting from scratch, obviously, that's a different question you need to ask yourself, but if you have a skill and you want to showcase that, there are ways to showcase it. That's a really interesting way of going about it. They're like, "Hey, this is what I wanted to do for you, let me know what you think."

Matt Hollingsworth (00:34:04):

My story that I wanted to share with myself was, when I first got ... There was no actual opening for the company that I started working for and that I actually ended up with where I am now. But the owner of the company, I went and had coffee with him just out of the blue, just kind of a random connection, and I didn't know anything about th…

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