When it takes you six hours to write a cover letter, what the hell happened? I can find a handful of explanations and let you decide i) I have a hard case to sell; ii) I am too full of myself and spending too much time praising my beloved skills and experience; iii) I don’t know the company well and need to spend hours educating myself first; iv) I am watching NCIS and House in parallel, v) I am a perfectionist.
For the ones that know me best, I can bet you started with number v). Bernardo is clearly betting on number iv) though wondering why not my favourite Law & Order SVU.
It is nice of you to think that but, even though it is true that those are pieces of me to blame, number i), ii) and iii) also apply. First, I do have a hard case to sell. As impressive at it may seem to have worked in Morgan Stanley, how do I guarantee that it is not because the market is down that I am not going back there. As impressive as it may seem to have worked on the ground in Mozambique, what does it add to them if they want someone that would like to help more countries other than my all time favourite Mozambique? Second, HBS has taught me that the only way of dealing with number i) is clearly being full of myself and try to make a point as much as possible that it would be clearly be in the world’s worse interest not to hire me. And finally, truth is I am still learning about the sector. And that combined with all the others means I spend 3 hours reading activity reports, mission statements and news articles.
Now you know why I have not called, skyped or emailed lately…
I heard what is likely to become one of my top 3 favourite quotes on a podcast on Friday. "Time is the only real democratic asset. We are all awarded the same time, it is what we do with it that distinguishes us". Now, I recognise that most of us need to work with survive and that is not democratic throughout. But on an equal opportunity basis, this is an interesting way of putting it. For many years I did not understand why MS thought my resume was so interesting. In fact, they chased me during the entire recruitment process, even though I had no idea of moving to London or Finance. I wanted to be a consultant and stay in Lisbon forever. But traditional consultants in Portugal saw nothing in me, and MS did not let me go. When I started screening resumes and hiring people a couple of years later is when I understood why I was different. TIME. I was truly different about what I did with my time. Not necessarily the basics - choice of degree or anything. But really ...
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You can do it!