What should you pay attention to when you start interiming and how do you market yourself? “The variety and freedom are enticing, but you have to be able to stand the uncertainty of entrepreneurship,” says Nelieke Wismans, partner at Herman Rutgers Interim Search.
There are quite a few people who at some point think: I would like to interim. For example, people who have been with the same employer for a while and crave a little more variety in their work. ‘They hear from interim managers how great it is to go from one client to the next without having to worry about internal politics, because as an interim manager you are a little more distant. That can be a driving force. Or the idea of having a little more flexibility and freedom. It may not be entirely realistic, but the free enterprise of being an interim can be very enticing. We see that the good job market is now also attracting new interim workers who are now daring to do it.
‘Switching gears faster than in permanent employment’
Is it for everyone, character-wise?
‘No, you have to have some specific qualities and competencies to succeed as an interim. It is important that you can stand uncertainty. You really have to factor in that you may not have assignments for a few months and consider carefully: can you afford it, financially and mentally?
‘Second, as an interim, you are hired for something you can do and you have to show that quickly. Whereas in a permanent job, so to speak, you have the first hundred days to settle in, have introductory interviews and settle in quietly, as an interim, you are expected to pop and add value on day two.
“We always say: as an interim, you’re hired at 130 percent of your profile; when you get into a permanent job, you’re usually at 80 percent of your profile, because you still need to be able to develop. You have to realize that. You will learn to deliver much faster and look for the quick wins. You are charged sharply for the job you were hired for. You are expected to do that, you are paid a lot for that, and in fact, they expect you to do even more than that, because then you are a good interim. So the demands are high, especially in heavy strategic assignments. ‘As an interim, it is also important that you quickly see how the fences are running, who the informal leaders are and therefore where you need to be. You sometimes have to shift gears a little faster than if you were a permanent employee.’
So you have to be quite firm on your feet. An additional advantage of interiming is that you don’t have to worry as much about internal politics.
‘That is also what appeals to many people: you are hired for a particular job and everything that surrounds it is allowed to be forgotten for a while. Of course, that job can vary considerably depending on the type of interim assignment. The freelancer filling in for a maternity leave is more or less babysitting. This is very different from when you are a change interim manager tasked with reorganizing a department. There are also interim managers who are hired to do a particular project: roll out a new Web site or campaign. A fourth type is the interim person who temporarily moves into a senior position, a temporary spokesperson, for example.
“When does the store open?
So what is a good time to take the plunge and swap your permanent employment for being an interim?
‘You have to think about that carefully: do you quit your job at some point and decide: the store is open? Or do you wait until the interim job presents itself before quitting?
‘If you’re really serious about interiming, you have to make the switch. You can prepare some things in advance: your registration with the Chamber of Commerce, formulating your proposition. People who indicate that they prefer to wait from their permanent job for the first assignment, I advise: think carefully about whether entrepreneurship suits you, because you have to be able to stand that uncertainty.
How do you position yourself as an intern?
‘Very important is that you check for yourself: what is my added value, my usp, what distinguishes me as an interim professional, as a human being. Be as sharp as possible in formulating your proposition, because then you will also be recognizable to your network. Don’t position yourself as an all-rounder, even if you have so much and a wide range of experience: clients are not interested in a thousand-things cloth. Often a person really excels at one thing, and that is usually what he or she enjoys doing most.
‘Also important: assume your own strengths, although in addition you can very well emphasize capacities that are in high demand at the particular moment. Make sure you are up-to-date in your profession.’
How do you make sure you have a good LinkedIn profile?
‘Describe the areas of expertise you consider important so your LinkedIn profile will be found well in Google. People sometimes come up with fantastic terms for themselves and very cool new job titles that no one else has; very creative, but of course no recruiter is looking for those words. Also be sure to properly name experience gained in previous positions. That you did a thousand things in addition to that is nice but irrelevant. The same goes for your resume. Less is more and emphasize what you’re good at.
More tips for improving your LinkedIn profile can be found in
this blog
by Nelieke.
‘Even as an interim, you need to do career planning’
Which assignments are best to focus on? How do you build a good portfolio?
‘It is important to think about the type of assignments you want to do and with what type of organization. What competencies do you want to develop and where do you want to be in a few years? I see quite a lot of interim professionals who have rolled from one assignment to another or stuck in one sector: from one bank to another bank and each time with the same type of assignment, because, for example, they are so good at rolling out campaigns. Fantastic, but then in five years, when you think: I’d still like to get a permanent job sometime, take the next step, it becomes quite difficult. Because your peers, applying for the same permanent position, did work on their development.
‘As an interim, you can work on your development by thinking carefully about what should be in your next assignment. Choose consciously what assignment you take on; how will this job take you forward, what can you learn from it yourself? Keeping up to date and constantly developing yourself professionally by taking training courses is also very important.’
You’re as good as your last one or two assignments, I do hear people say about interim workers. How do you look at this at Herman Rutgers Interim Search?
‘We look beyond the resume; we also look at the potential that is in people. We don’t say: you only have experience in internal communications, so we only introduce you to that type of assignment. I personally get great satisfaction from proposing people for assignments where they themselves can learn something.
An example of a special “match” is that between Albert Heijn and Angela Ursem. She talks about it in this
interview
.
Are there many interim workers who choose permanent employment again at some point anyway?
‘There are interim workers who don’t want permanent employment ever again, and interim workers who choose to do so for a certain period of time and then return to permanent employment. I think it can be quite good for many people to work on an interim basis for a period of time: your learning curve is very steep and you can develop other competencies. Certain interim workers do want to return to permanent employment after a period of time, to also be able to start harvesting and have a little more connection with an organization. It can also be good to regain some seat meat, after the hit-and-run rhythm of interim existence. Interimmers may work harder than permanent employees. They work at the top of their game and are always “on.”‘
