Resume Help Blog

If you found a wallet, full of money and credit cards, with a driver’s license that said: “Warren Buffett, Omaha, Nebraska,” do you think you might be able to meet the CEO of Berkshire Hathaway?

All you’d have to do is call Mr. Buffett and say, “I found your wallet. Can I deliver it in person?”

You would enjoy making that call, having that conversation, and meeting Mr. Buffett.

Well, you can do the same thing with employers — meet them by offering to return “lost” money.

Here’s how: Research a company until you can call a hiring manager and say something like this: “Mr. Smith, I found some lost money that belongs to you. You see, I called your office twice posing as a potential client, and your staff didn’t ask me a simple question that my last employer used to increase revenues 35%. Can I meet you for 15 minutes this week and give you that information?”

You would enjoy making that call, having that conversation, and meeting Mr. Smith. Bring your resume, along with more tips that could help him run his business, and a job interview would be the likely result.

Feeling diffident? Mail a letter with the “found money” information, say you’ll call to discuss, and then call at the appointed time.

Heck, if you really want to stand out and be a Guerrilla, fold up your letter and mail it in a wallet to the employer (buy them at any flea market or dollar store). The headline of your letter can read, “Is this money yours?” No resume needed.

The point is this: When you call to offer someone money, they may be suspicious. When you call to offer to return money they’ve lost, they will hang on your every word.

All you need do is research an employer’s business, industry, clients, and competitors until you find one or two ideas that can make or save a significant amount of money.

Best part: You don’t need to create the money-making/saving ideas, just as you don’t need to create gold nuggets; you need only dig them up. Nobody cares where you found the gold (except the I.R.S.).

If you can’t do this — if you can’t think of ways for someone in your field of work to make or save money — it means you have no idea why an employer should put you on the payroll. Instead of thinking of ways to earn a job, you are waiting for someone to give you one.