Land Your Dream Job This Year
This is exactly how you are going to land your dream job this year. Not just a nice promotion, but your actual dream job. The one you dreamed about when you were a kid. Big salary, lots of fun, very rewarding. Landing your dream job might feel impossible, but it’s not. There are five simple steps to follow to land your dream job.
Defining Your Dream Job and Vision
Step one of this five-step process is either the easiest or the hardest part of the process, depending where you’re at. Step one is defining your dream job. Having a clear vision of your dream job is so important because we can’t get somewhere if we don’t know where we’re going. Here’s a quick sheet linked to in the description. So if you want to create your own or just use this one, you can grab it from there.
Detailing Your Target Industry and Job Title
These first two rows are completely optional, but if the job title that would be considered a dream job is known, it can be written in there. If there is a dream company or a dream industry to be a part of, that can be added as well. But if there isn’t one in mind, just describe whatever is generally coming to mind, or a couple of different options is fine as well.
The next pieces are what are most important. Looking at in-person, remote, or hybrid, what type of work arrangement is the dream scenario.
Identifying Your Preferred Salary and Work Culture
In terms of salary, don’t be shy. What is the target salary for this dream job? The most important part is probably the function setting. What are the things that can be pictured doing in this job? Is it accounting? Is it homicide investigations? Scorekeeping for an NBA team? And then finally, co-workers. Who are you working with? How do they treat you? What kind of an environment are you in? Is this a collaborative team?
Do they let you do your own thing? What are the interactions like? What is the boss like? And then the last piece is just how do you feel? How do you feel when you’re doing this job? How do you feel when you’re telling people that this is your job? Are you proud of yourself? Do you feel like you have to be a little humble because it’s so great?
Take some time, think through this list. Be very clear about what your dream job actually is. And if you need to come back to this as part of your journey, that’s totally fine as well.
Building the Road Map to Your Dream Job
Once the dream job has been defined, part two of this five-part process is pretty easy and very fun. The road map to the dream job gets built here. It takes 5 to 10 minutes at most. First, go to whatever your favorite job board is. Indeed, LinkedIn, Glassdoor. Type in the dream job title. This can be done a few times to look through various jobs. Then just scroll through and look at plenty of jobs and find a few that stand out.
Researching Requirements on Favorite Job Boards
Peruse the job postings to find something that really stands out. Then take a very close look at that specific job and read the requirements. What are they looking for in a person that they’re going to hire for this role? That is the basis for the dream job road map. As you’re reading through the job description, look at three things specifically. What are the tasks that they’re asking this person to do.
Specifically, what are the requirements in terms of education, training, and credentials. And finally, any industry expertise, software, technology, or equipment that this person needs to be able to use to do this job well.
Organizing Task and Requirement Lists for Review
Next, open up the same spreadsheet used to define the dream job. There is another tab for a JD review. On this tab, fill out the table with the tasks found in the job description, along with the requirements in terms of education, expertise, and any software, technology, or equipment. Make a big list of things that they need done and put them in this table. Next, highlight any of the skills already possessed in green.
That indicates meeting those requirements already. For those requirements, that’s one step closer to the dream job. For the requirements not yet met, this is a huge step because the to-do list has now been uncovered. The things needed to accomplish in order to be qualified for the dream job. Most people never know what stands between them and their dream job. Now those things are known, and the next step covers how to conquer them.
Bridging the Skills Gap with Targeted Education
Steps three and four of this five-step process to landing a dream job involve attacking the deficits in skills and requirements. There are two ways to do this. The first way is what can be called the learning phase. Take a look back at the sheet of dream job requirements and identify in bold which of those are things that may require going back to school, taking some sort of formal training, or just skills that would benefit from further learning.
Utilizing Free Online Courses and Training Platforms
There are a lot of places where this kind of training can be found online for free. edX.org is a great resource. They have over 5,000 free courses on their website from organizations like Harvard, Berkeley, IBM, and Google. These are courses that can be completed and then added straight to a resume.
The second place recommended for low-cost training is LinkedIn Learning. This comes for free with a LinkedIn Premium membership, and most local libraries also give free access to LinkedIn Learning. LinkedIn Learning has so many courses on high value topics. It can get very specific or be very broad, and it is an amazing place to take certifications and individual classes. T
he programs completed will go straight into a LinkedIn profile, making the profile look even more qualified, and they can be added to a resume as well.
Pursuing Advanced Certifications and Professional Designations
For those who choose to pursue more advanced education like a master’s degree, a Lean Six Sigma black belt, or a PMP designation, these are a bit more of a commitment in terms of financial investment and time investment, but they do have massive payoffs down the road. And as soon as these programs are started, they can be added to a resume, listed as in progress.
This will already start to provide a huge benefit when people read that something like a big degree is even being worked on. Learning is a huge part of this process. Take stock of what needs to be learned and know that this step is going to give a lot of momentum. Don’t be shy to sign up for that first class to take the step toward a dream job.
Gaining Practical Experience in the Perform Phase
The most important part of this process is step four, the perform phase of landing a dream job. In this phase, impressive experience is gained doing the work that would be required in the dream job. Back at the dream job road map, identify any skills that don’t yet have experience behind them. The goal is now to set out to get experience doing those things.
Finding Career Growth Opportunities at Your Current Job
Probably the best and most credible way to gain experience doing this work is at a current job. If it makes sense in that setting, it can be incredibly valuable. Here is a story from a personal career where this tactic was used to help prepare for a dream job. When wanting to prepare for a management role, this was said to a boss: “Boss, I recently developed quite an interest in leading teams. I’ve been reading up on this in my own time and studying management through podcasts and courses online.
I would love to have the chance to manage someone here at our organization. I was hoping we could shift around the structure of the team a little bit so I could oversee some of our interns this summer.” The boss said yes. And that’s how a first management experience was gained. In circumstances where there is a good boss and the fit of the ask makes sense, this is a great way to add experience.
Negotiating for New Responsibilities to Build Experience
Here are some other options to gain experience if it can’t be done at a current job. Another option is to start a business. It doesn’t have to be a thriving empire. It can just be some light consulting for friends or volunteer organizations, anyone who’s running a small business who would be happy to accept help at little to no charge. The only goal is to gain some credible experience doing the work that is desired.
It does not have to be a highly profitable endeavor. Just get some experience. An example of this: a friend who wanted to become a brand manager for a big apparel company like Adidas or New Balance started with no experience.
Starting a Business to Build Credible Industry Experience
She offered to help set up some of the brand strategy for a resume writing business, and that then became a foundation which she used to discuss in interviews and on her resume. Eventually that did lead to her getting a job in the industry she wanted to work in.
Utilizing Volunteer Work to Develop Substantial Career Skills
The third option is volunteering time. A client worked her way up to be the COO of a fairly substantial organization, and she had started out by reorganizing the lunch program at her kids’ school to gain her first experience after re-entering the job market.
Employers care so much more about what was done more so than whether or not there was pay involved. So volunteer experience to gain these skills is super valuable as well.
Building Your Professional Network on LinkedIn
The last piece, item five out of five of this five-phase plan for landing a dream job, is to build a network on LinkedIn. Type the dream job into the search bar and hit enter. When someone worth connecting with is found, go to their profile and open it. Yes, they’ll see that you were there, but the goal is for them to know you exist. Click connect and then send a message like this: “I hope this isn’t too out of the blue.
I am an aspiring blank and you are currently somewhat of a career idol for me. I’ve always wanted to get into blank and I’m working on making a change in that direction. If you have a little time, I’d love to connect to learn more about what you do and how you got started.”
Reaching Out to Career Idols with Personalized Messages
No pressure at all. Just thought I’d ask. If this is done a few times, people will eventually start to say yes. At which point, conversations with these folks can happen, and questions like these can be asked. How did your early career experience impact or shape your career? Do you recall an achievement that you were most proud of? One that confirmed you were where you belong.
As your career progressed, how did you approach the increased responsibilities? What was one piece of advice that influenced your approach to leadership?
Asking Insightful Questions to Gain Career Advice
Asking questions like these is not only going to help understand their journey and get some good advice, it’s also going to make them like you. If a connection is made with someone in a target industry like this every couple of months, it’s a very nice low pressure way to start building high value connections for when it’s time to start applying to those dream jobs.
If you work hard and follow all of these steps, you should be feeling ready and connected and capable to apply for your dream job within the year.
