The Do's and Don'ts of "Reaching out to People"

Next Step Navigator is a career newsletter mixing real talk with real advice to help you tackle the job hunt and carve out your own unique path. It’s like grabbing a coffee with a mentor who shares stories and strategies to boost your confidence and guide you towards making strategic, meaningful career moves.

On any given afternoon browse of LinkedIn or CareerTok, I will see opposing advice on the same topic.

Example:

1. Don’t reach out to the hiring manager after you apply for the job!  They get so many messages and won’t appreciate or read yours.

2. Do reach out to the hiring manager after you apply!  It’s the only way to get noticed!

The tricky thing is that both of these pieces of advice could be true.  What’s missing is context.

The best or most strategic way to connect with people (that will put you in a better position to be hired) is influenced by:

• the industry

• the size of the organization

• the structure of the organization

• whether or not they are unionized

• their recruiting process

• expected standards of job application materials

• the overall level of formality by which they conduct business.

Online career advice is snappy, short, confident and to the point. It makes the suggested actions sound easy, possible and true.  But you don’t want to follow advice that makes you stand out for the wrong reasons.

Let’s add a bit of nuance to a crowded field of quips and sound bites.

If you’re trying to leverage networking to better your chances of landing a job (which you should be doing!) research is required to figure out the best way to engage with folks who have influence over recruitment.

Here are some different contexts that might apply to you as a job seeker:

1. You are applying for a job at a large unionized organization (think public sector, healthcare, higher education, etc.)

2. You are applying to a small non profit

3. You are applying to a role in tech

4. You are applying to a posting on LinkedIn with a recruiter listed

5. You are trying to become a teacher (in a public school)

6. You are applying for a role in a startup

7. You are a career changer switching industries

8. You are applying to a role through a referral or warm connection

9. You are applying to a role in a very competitive industry (think Big 4 consulting)

10. You are an early career professional (maybe looking for your first post-graduation job!)

All of these scenarios require different strategies, different types of communication and different levels of engagement.  

Let’s explore a few specific examples.

Scenario #1

The context: You are applying to a role in a large, unionized organization.  The recruitment communication is exclusively through HR and you’re not in direct contact with the hiring manager or department director.  You are invited to a panel interview where you meet an HR person, the hiring manager and a staff member on the team.  

You really want to stand out, be memorable and make extra sure that people know you’re really excited about the job.  You decide to search through the company contact directory and email the director of the department (whom you’ve never met and is not hiring for the position) introducing yourself, sharing your expertise and excitement about the role.  

You receive a terse reply asking you to keep your communication through HR.  You’re not offered the role.

What was missing?

Nuance: Large unionized organizations tend to have very strict procedures to follow around hiring and straying from the expected communication channels can leave a poor impression of your professionalism, demonstrate a lack of understanding of the structure of the work environment and the expected communication norms.

Research is required!

If this is a new environment for you, reach out on LinkedIn to request informational interviews with folks in roles at similar levels to the one you’re applying for.  Ask about communication norms, their recruitment experience and the work culture.  Ask about their experience working in a unionized environment.  Ask their advice on how to make a good impression and stand out during the interview process.

Scenario #2:

The context: You’re applying for a role in a tech company where the recruiter is listed on the job posting.  You are really interested and well-qualified for the job and submitted a strong (tailored) application.  You recently read a post that warned against reaching out to people on LinkedIn, so you decide not to message the recruiter.  They receive hundreds of messages and you don’t want to “bother” them.

What was missing?

Nuance: If the recruiter is listed directly on the job posting on LinkedIn, take advantage of this by sending them a message!  BUT the message needs to be strategic and specific.

Don’t send something vague and general like “Hi, I’m really interested in this job!”

Do send something more like:

“Hi [name], I applied for the role of [role title].  I’m [3 ways you’re qualified for the job] and would love to talk more about this opportunity.”

Making sure your message has value, so it helps (and doesn’t hinder) your chances of landing an interview!

On the flip side, if the recruiter or hiring manager isn’t listed, you can try to search for them on LinkedIn.  Just remember that you can’t guarantee it’s the correct person and they may or may not be open to being contacted by candidates before the interview.  Do research on the norms in your industry, follow relevant industry leaders/hiring managers/recruiters on LinkedIn and request coffee chats with people who’ve been hired into similar roles to discover strategies to stand out.

Scenario #3

The context: A former colleague works at a company that you’re really interested in and they send you a posting for an amazing job.  You never would have found the posting otherwise, as it didn’t appear on the large aggregate job boards (i.e. LinkedIn or Indeed).  

The company is small and they are accepting applications as pdfs directly to the email address of the hiring manager.  You craft a cover letter and resume and send it in.  Several weeks go by and you don’t receive an interview request. 

What’s missing?

Nuance: Something like 70-80% of jobs are part of the ‘hidden job market’ and are filled by referral (i.e. through connections).  That’s why I always tell people not to rely on their resume to do the heavy lifting in a job search.  

If you know someone in your target organization, mention their name in your application email or via LinkedIn!  Hiring is expensive and risky for organizations and they value good referrals, trusting that their current employees will recommend folks who have the skills, values and personality to be a great addition to their organization.  

Take advantage of your connections.  It’s not icky, awkward or unprofessional.  Everyone has been helped by someone in their career, so take advantage when someone gives you a leg up.

So what’s the moral of our story?  When you hear quippy or conflicting career advice stop and think - how does this apply to my situation, in my industry?  Context, nuance and research! 

How could I find the information needed to interpret this advice?  Put on your critical thinking cap and don’t take things as gospel because someone has a lot of followers, sounds convincing or seems successful themselves.

Let’s chat - what quippy career advice have you encountered that needs to be filtered through a specific contextual lens?  Have you ever followed advice that backfired?  What contextual questions are you navigating right now?

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