Job Hunt Lessons from Coach Williams

As a graduate of UNC, it is impossible not to be a basketball fan. The Blue Heaven is a breeding ground for the sport and the enthusiasm is infectious. It is hard not to get swept up in the game when you are hugging a complete stranger on Franklin Street after the National Championship game.

And yet, this season, we are fighting tooth and nail to stay out of the bottom of the ACC rankings. My boys have been riddled with injury and are fighting to prove their worth after losing such amazing players as Tyler Hansbrough, Ty Lawson, Wayne Ellington and Danny Green to graduation and the NBA. This year, when game time rolls around, I prepare myself for some more heartbreak and then cheer on those small victories, like a good lay-up or a rebound.

The recent snow storm gave me an opportunity to finish up that giant stack of books that had been lying on my floor for the last few months, including Hard Work by Roy Williams. Now, you don’t have to be a Tar Heel basketball fan to read the book. In fact, if you are not, I daresay you might find you have a little soft spot in your heart for ol’ Roy. If you are in the midst of a job hunt, Hard Work has a few good take-aways you may find useful.

1. Roy makes it a point not to look at the scoreboard during the first half of the game. This gives him plenty of time to pay attention to his team, and to the other team, to see what they are doing. This means at halftime, Roy can talk to his team about how to improve their game (I guess this is why Carolina is generally a second-half team). This also applies to your job search. Instead of getting bogged down in the rejections, focus on what you are doing right and work on the things you are doing wrong and how to improve them.
2. Roy Williams played on the junior varsity basketball team and then attended varsity games while he was a student at UNC. He watched Coach Dean Smith coach and took statistics, for his own amusement. His constant presence did not go unnoticed. When Coach Smith was looking for an assistant coach, Roy left his job as a high school basketball coach and moved his young family across the state, for a pay cut, to work with a coach he loved, for a team he loved. This is similar to taking an internship, either unpaid or for less money than you might think you deserve, or that entry-level job that you think might be below your skill set, but at a company you love. You will have to pay your dues, you will work hard and sometimes it will be thankless, but someday, somehow, it all works out.
3. The boys in blue often yell “Hard Work!” as they leave a huddle because in the end, hard work is what pays off. When you are job hunting, this is especially true. You’ve got to keep plugging away, making connections, changing up your resume to make sure it meets the needs of the position you’re applying for, and writing compelling cover letters.

If you have some time on your hands, I highly recommend you read Hard Work. If you don’t have the time, think about looking in unlikely places for some help in your hunt. I myself read a lot, from biographies to career books to the back stories of independent retailers in America. You can read blogs and web pages for start-up lessons and stories and you can ask the people that you are networking with to talk about the things that got them where they are today. I picked up this book because I wanted to know a little bit more about Coach Williams and Carolina basketball, and I ended up being able to apply some of the things I learned to my own job hunt.