The Games Game

The Need for Persuasion (August 2005)

Hi Tom,

This is in response to your answer recently given to Vince DeLeonardo regarding specializing to get a job.

One thing you might have added is that perhaps he is not doing enough to *sell* himself to these companies. I've heard a lot from games companies (and non-games software companies) about how "the sell," if you will, is one of the most important parts of an interview process.

In particular, someone like Vince seems to be getting the wrong message across to the interviewers. The tech guy sees art as his strength and the art person sees tech as his strong point. That sounds like a classic case of failing to profile your audience and talk in their terms.

If Vince is, as it seems, simply handing his resume + portfolio to people and asking them what they think, he has to realize that a critical, unguided eye will indeed often see *all the wrong things* and *none of the right ones*.

And I have to say that in an industry where teamwork and communication is so important, I don't entirely blame interviewers for *not* giving candidates the benefit of the doubt and *requiring* them to sell themselves. It's all a part of the game.

Dear Darren,

For the benefit of the readers, you're writing in regards to my May 2005 column, "Time to Specialize, Jack". And you raise a valid point. That salesmanship is an important skill for job applicants.

We have to sell ourselves when applying for a job. We have to sell our ideas while working in the job. We can't get a job and keep a job with zero salesmanship skills.

Yet for all their importance, our schools rarely teach us those skills. We're expected to figure them out on our own.

Not that we'd jump to take courses in salesmanship or negotiation, if offered them in high school or college - we can't know at that tender age what we need to make it in the real world.