Black: "This description of 'financial professional' doesn't tell me what she wants. It should read, 'I would like to continue being a financial professional . . .' People reach different levels of maturity at different times, and it's difficult to gauge her maturity from this."
Featherstone: "Her skill set is impressive, but where is it leading? I need a clue."
Bender: "I need to see more experience in one department."
Rubin: "Her brief jump into sales and then back out into an analytical job tells me she'd rather analyze various accounts than sell them."
2. Job-Hopping: A Plus or a Minus?
Koch: "Such short time horizons make me nervous. You'd get the person in and, poof! She'd be gone."
Black: "When I saw her professional skills, I thought, Oh, this is really nice. Then I read the work record, and it doesn't show any commitment or dedication."
Hansen: "I wonder how proficient this person got at any of these jobs. I'd be inclined to ask harder-than-average questions to find out if her emphasis was on what she was moving away from or on what she was moving toward with each move. One could interview her and find out she has an insatiable capacity for learning. That could be a real plus for a company that learns to keep opportunities in front of her to keep her satisfied and interested."
Rubin: "I've already gotten over the fact that there's tremendous job jumping in people's rÉsumÉs today. She's probably 35 years old and has reached an age at which stability is more important than improving skills on an annual basis. There are more positives that outweigh this negative."
3. Is Entrepreneurial Spirit a Problem?
Koch: "I like to see people strike out on their own. It shows they've got good self-confidence and an adventurous spirit."
Hansen: "I want to know more about her managerial side and about her skills beyond the financial ones."
Rubin: "She jumped to start her own consulting company. That's fine with me. But I want to know why she didn't stick with it."
Featherstone: "I want to know some specific deals she made and problems she solved. What were the results?"
4. Is Sales Experience Helpful?
Koch: "Selling teaches you how to get along with people and build consensus."
Hansen: "I'd want to know about customer profiles. What kind of businesses did she sell to and how high was their demand? Was it a team approach to sales? What kinds of applications did she sell?"
Rubin: "There are so many factors that can come into play. It would be very easy to increase sales of a brand-new product, but what can you do on a comparative basis, year to year?"
Black: "I want to know why she got into sales and why she got out. I would also ask her, what were some of the problems she solved for customers?"
5. How Important Is Education?
Koch: "The natural-sciences degree, coupled with her financial skills, indicates that she's a formal thinker."
Featherstone: "The fact that she's taken courses since graduating shows she has a keen sense of learning, which is great. After perusing a person's educational background, I look at how that's translated into experience and what types of choices he or she made."
Black: "It tells me how much a person is willing to invest in his or her own future. Hers is impressive and shows a healthy work ethic."
6. What Do Personal Interests Tell You?
Koch: "This is obviously a high-energy person. Five varsity letters, my God! She's probably very competitive and aggressive."
Hansen: "I suppose she has other, nonathletic interests as well, but she doesn't mention them. A wider range of interests is important."
Featherstone: "Most of these are individual sports. Does she like playing on teams or is it all just the 'I' factor?"
Black: "Her squash-captain title shows that she likes to be a leader but doesn't tell me if she's good at it. What kinds of conflict does she encounter?"
Would You Hire Her?
Hansen: "We push some of our products through the types of places to which she has sold. She might be able to go out in the field and tell us where the channel is working and where it isn't."
Koch: "I think this person would be a good assistant controller for someone who needs banking expertise to handle debt or work with a bank."
Black: "She could step in with very little training and lend us some very good ideas about what we could be doing with our software packages. That, combined with her financial skills, is very attractive."
Featherstone: "She'd probably be good in an information-systems type of job."
7. Is What You See What You Get?
Hansen: "I'd want to get a look at one of these report packages, see what she actually does, how she communicates with clients. Then I'd ask about why she made specific decisions in the package itself."
Black: "When asking her about her software experience, I'd ask how she set up a particular system. The most organized people with developed planning skills can rattle off the five steps they took to achieve their goal and why those steps were so efficient. I noticed in her banking experience she increased a loan portfolio. I would like to know what she did to achieve profitability. If a person can explain his or her plan clearly, it helps me tell if that person really did it or just assisted someone. She can obviously work with a budget and understand the importance of structure. That comes through in this rÉsumÉ."
Koch: "She may have sound financial-analysis skills, but how much daily-accounting experience does she have? If I were looking at her for a position in my company, I'd want her to beef up her accounting experience some more."
Bender: "She was promoted but then moved to another company to the same position. Why would someone leave a company right after being promoted? It doesn't look good."
The Candidate Replies
On the lack of a job objective: "If I said I wanted a job in accounting, an employer wouldn't think of taking advantage of my marketing skills. I want potential employers to see the opportunities my skills present for them. There's so much cross-training of professionals today that I didn't want to limit the possibilities prematurely."
On job-hopping: "I took another job only when it presented better opportunities to grow, learn, and make money. I'm still learning and growing at the company I work for now, so I'll keep working there and taking M.B.A. classes at night."
On why she quit her own company: "Cash flow. I would do it again with a partner."
On where she's headed: "Toward a position as an information-systems manager for a financial-services company, where I would be in charge of microcomputers, local-area networks, software applications, and custom applications."
