The Resume Hack That Gets Results Every Time with Claire Davis, Founder of “Traction Resume”
Grit looks like THIS.
In this Spotlight Series episode of Secrets in Medical Device Sales, Lisa and Cindy sit down with Claire Davis, founder of Traction Resume, to talk about turning career setbacks into success stories. After surviving five layoffs, Claire shares how she built a proven system to help medical sales pros market themselves like top-performing products. This episode dives deep into resilience, reinvention, and the power of owning your story.
Real advice. Real talk. Real results.
Episode Chapter Markers
00:00 Introduction
01:54 Claire Davis' Background and Career Journey
03:04 Overcoming Layoffs and Career Challenges
04:44 The Triple S System for Job Searching
16:54 Extracting Unique Stories for Resumes
17:54 The Importance of Storytelling in Resumes
18:42 Identifying Patterns in Career Success
21:10 Becoming the Orange: Standing Out in Job Applications
27:32 The Art of Negotiation
33:08 Favorite Books and Quotes
Must-Hear Insights and Key Moments
The Recruiter’s Eye Advantage – How Claire’s decade in headhunting gave her an insider’s view of what hiring managers really look for and why most sales reps miss it.
From Laid Off to Lifted Up – The mindset shifts that helped Claire turn five layoffs into the foundation for her company, Traction Resume.
The Triple S System – Breaking down her signature formula Style, Story, and Statistics and how it helps medical device pros sell themselves like top-performing products.
Faith in the Freefall – Why Claire believes her setbacks weren’t punishment but divine redirection and how faith grounded her through uncertainty.
The Power of a Thank You Note – The old-school strategy Claire swears by that turns clients into lifelong champions and opens doors long after a layoff.
Owning the Awkward Truth – Why talking openly about layoffs builds connection and credibility, not shame, and how vulnerability actually sells.
Spotlight Your Superpower – How even the most seasoned pros overlook their biggest differentiator and the secret question Claire uses to uncover it.
Resilience Reframed – What getting back up (five times) taught Claire about confidence, courage, and creating a career that can’t be taken away.
Words of Wisdom: Standout Quotes from This Episode
“When you start marketing yourself like a product, everything changes.” - Claire Davis
“Five layoffs later, I learned you can’t wait for someone to call you and have to sell you.” - Claire Davis
“What makes you successful often feels ordinary to you but it’s extraordinary to everyone else.” - Claire Davis
“Don’t stay quiet about being laid off. Speak up. That’s how new doors open.” - Claire Davis
“Your story is your greatest sales tool, it's what no one else can copy.” - Claire Davis
“How it's really not what you say or do, it's how you make people feel.” - Claire Davis
“Every setback teaches you something if you’re brave enough to look for the lesson.” - Cynthia Ficara
“You really get to decide how you react, that's where your power is.” - Cynthia Ficara
“Bad things and good things will happen, but it’s what we do next that defines us.” - Cynthia Ficara
“If you stayed in those other jobs, so many people wouldn’t have benefited from what you’ve built.” - Cynthia Ficara
“There’s resilience in your story that every woman in this industry can learn from.” - Cynthia Ficara
“Sometimes God closes a door not to punish you, but to point you toward your purpose.” - Anneliese Rhodes
“I hate that you went through it, but I love what you created from it.” - Anneliese Rhodes
“Your story proves resilience isn’t built in comfort, it's built in comeback seasons.” - Anneliese Rhodes
“We forget that our clients can be our biggest cheerleaders. What a brilliant reminder.” - Anneliese Rhodes
“It’s not shame, it’s strength when you tell the truth about what you’ve survived.” - Anneliese Rhodes
About Claire
Claire Davis is an award-winning Medical Sales Resume Specialist and Career Consultant with 20+ years of experience helping professionals land six-figure roles. As CEO of Traction Resume, the world’s leading medical sales resume agency, she’s guided thousands to career success using her proven resume and networking systems.
A LinkedIn Top Voice featured in Forbes and The Wall Street Journal, Claire turns real-world setbacks into strategies that help others rise, rebuild, and thrive in medical sales.
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We'd Love to Hear Your Stories!
Even in life’s darkest moments, we have the power to create change. We’d love to hear from YOU — whether you’ve taken a leap of faith, overcome adversity, or found purpose through a challenge. Share your stories with us in the comments or send us a DM. Let’s keep the conversation going and continue lifting each other up.
A Team Dklutr production
Blog Transcript:
Note: We use AI transcription so there may be some inaccuracies
Anneliese Rhodes: Welcome everyone to another episode of Secrets and Medical Device Sales, and today we are bringing you another Spotlight series. We have not done this in a little while, Cindy, and I'm like, why? Because talking to this dynamic speaker that we have today and guest, I am like so mad that we have not had you on already.
I know. So today, I dunno what, what? Today we have Claire Davis. From Traction Resume. I have seen her on LinkedIn, you guys for years. She is fantastic. We're looking at her. She's beautiful, she's bubbly, she's bright, she's energetic. She's the type of woman that I would wanna call if a hundred percent. I need a new resume, but even some other stuff that we're gonna drop, little bombs and pearls on you guys today, so I'm so excited.
Cynthia Ficara: I am so glad to have you, Claire. And you know what? I think I'm going to let you introduce yourself. Can you just tell the audience who you are, how you got there? We are. We are very ready to hear all about your backstory.
From Layoffs to Leadership
Claire Davis: Oh my gosh. Well, I'm so grateful to be here, ladies. I love your show. I love how you spotlight people.
Yay. And you guys have fresh, fresh perspective on this show, so I'm a thank you. I'm a huge fan. It's a big deal for me to be here on your show. So thank you so much for having me. Um, and we'll probably let the audience know about our Secret Book Club that we just created backstage 15 minutes ago. We did, right?
We did. We did. So, so this will be the cliffhanger. Um, so I, if, if we haven't met, uh, all of you listening today, uh, my name is Claire Davis and I run Traction Resume and we specialize in helping medical sales professionals get the jobs that they so desire by positioning them like they would a product.
Which is oftentimes a very radical notion because if you've been in this job market for the last 15, 20 years, you've probably been thinking, okay, if I need a new job, I'll get my resume polished up. I'll apply online, and I will wait and someone will call me with a beautiful right fit, AI matched perfect job in a few days.
Right, right. And unfortunately, and you hear the crickets. That's me, by the way. That's me. Those crickets. That's me. Yeah. And you know what? Unfortunately that's just not how it works anymore. So we help people really harness the, the best chops that they have developed in being in sales in the first place to land those jobs that they really want,
Cynthia Ficara: you know?
Love that. It sounds so unique and so exciting, and can you tell us like how this came about? You know, because you really touched on something that is very important and that can really help people advance in their careers. So can you just expand on what got you to where you are today?
Claire Davis: Yeah, sure. So originally my career started out in recruiting, so I worked for my family's small headhunting firm.
We specialized in placing pharmaceutical sales reps all over the country. So you would think after having done that for 10 years and looking through quite literally. 16,000 medical sales resumes. Oh my God. That would have, yeah, just a couple. Everyone's doing that, right. So you would think that I would've had the job market dialed after I decided to go into medical sales myself.
So I ended up finding an awesome job at a diagnostic company that focused on, um, ovarian cancer when I was early, early in my career. And so things were going really great. I was learning with the team. Everything was buttoned up, and I was putting all of the career chops that I had learned and had coached my clients on as a recruiter in place for myself.
What I did not anticipate was that even when you are very, very prepared for this job market and you know it inside and out, you're still bound to the same roles as everybody else. And about 18 months went by and I got the Friday note to get on a call with my manager and hr. And of course, you know what's coming.
There was a company-wide layoff. So I was really bummed out. This is a really difficult time. And of course you drive home in your car and you're crying and you're just so upset that this could even happen. And then you pick yourself up by your bootstraps and a few weeks later you get back in the game and you decide, you know what?
Go out there again. And lo and behold, I found another great job. So I'm fast forwarding a little bit through a couple of bumps and lumps, but. I ended up going into this amazing next company and it was oncology and diagnostics in women's health. Okay, and wonderful time. Love my clients. I love being in the OR and talking with pathologists all of the above.
And about two years go by. And I get an email from HR and my manager, oh my gosh. And lo and behold, another layoff. And what I'm not telling, uh, in, in this story that you might know if you've read up on me before, uh, for those who are listening, is this was actually layoff number five. Wow. So at this point, I thought there is no way lightning can strike twice or three times, or four or five.
So after that, many times doing anything, the only silver lining is that things become a pattern and you start to look back and you say, okay, well between all of these career hops, what were some of the things that worked to get me back into the roles that I wanted to do? And what were some of the things that maybe the internet was telling me, but don't actually work a darn.
So things that don't work. Being really quiet about being laid off, not telling a soul that doesn't help you at all, or putting a resume out there and using the internet to make the job description, um, basically a form of your resume. And now today, ai, because you sound like everybody else.
Anneliese Rhodes: Yeah. Or
Claire Davis: refusing to network and just applying online and waiting, which I hate to see, but it still happens today.
So I decided to go back and look at all of this experience and what I found were that through all of those jumps, when I would market myself like a product and I would focus on three specific areas, it went from I don't know what to do in my job search to, I have a plan that works. And the plan was what I now call our Triple S system.
And this is what we use with every one of our clients. And it's when you really start to look back and you harness your style, your story, and your statistics with that trifecta together, I like that you have now put together a formidable sales plan to market yourself. And so that's what we do at Traction Resume and it's love, you know, luckily those five layoffs taught me something, which was great.
Anneliese Rhodes: I love this. I love your story. I mean, I hate the story for you, sorry. But I love it. You know, sometimes, like I'm very, we're we're, we both believe in God. You know, sometimes there's just signs, right? Yeah. Sometimes God is like, Hey, this is just not your path, and I feel like you were just getting those signs that this was, these were not your paths, but in.
In the, in the hard times you found something beautiful and amazing and now you've able, you've been able to build a company off of it. And you live a very, I'm assuming happy life. You enjoy what you do, you're helping hundreds of people, um, yeah. And you're touching hundreds of lives or thousands of lives now.
And I think that that is so amazing, Claire. So honestly, I'm, I'm sorry for all the layoffs, you know, I. Um, I can feel that for you a hundred percent. And I know a lot of our listeners out there have been through that and it's really tough and it's, it's, nobody wants to talk about it. And that's interesting that you say you should be talking about it because that's something that I personally would not wanna talk about.
I'd wanna brush over it and just wanna talk about all the positive things, right? All the accolades, all the accomplishments.
Selling Yourself Like a Product
So I'm just curious why, why tell about that part of your story.
Claire Davis: Yeah. Well, I think that for many of us, and, and certainly your listeners, up until 2020, it was still a bit of a rarity to know somebody who had been laid off or to be laid off yourself.
Mm-hmm. Which is why there was shame attached to a layoff and people would take it even though they knew. That it was a company decision based on the board, based on data, based on the market, based on whatever.
Anneliese Rhodes: Mm-hmm.
Claire Davis: It still felt like it hit home because you weren't enough. That's why I was so grateful to learn from the layoffs and it wasn't easy.
It certainly wasn't after the first or the second one. In fact, it was, it was really after the second one when I was sitting in my boyfriend. Now, husband's house. And, uh, we're sitting at the table and I'm applying a line and applying a line. And I remember I just applied to Ducks Unlimited.
Why? There's no way at that point. That's awesome. I love that. At that point, honestly, ladies, I'm like, I'll do anything, anything. I'll do anything. And my husband looked at me and he goes, you know. You were pretty good in sales, right? And I said yes. In fact, that's why this is so infuriating, because I had just crushed the new hire quota record and opened up a territory that was above and beyond my, um, my scope of role because I was an associate at this time anyway.
Mm-hmm. Uh, and he is like, well, what if you just sold yourself as like you would your product? He said that. Wow. And that's when I thought, oh my gosh, that's it. And it was different from then on. So then it was really a learning of, okay, well if I were to do that, what would it be? And I remember the very first thing that I took, and you guys, I still recommend this to my clients today.
So if you're not doing this, steal this idea that I'm gonna tell you about everybody. Listen, listen. I love this. Listen, listen up. I will keep to this day a pack of thank you notes in my car and a pen, and whenever you have an interview. Yeah, whenever somebody does something nice for you. I always, always drop a thank you note and should you find yourself in a layoff situation, and this can be whether or not you know it's coming or you don't know it's coming, but it happens to you, I would suggest.
Doing what nobody's doing anymore. In the age of AI and email, I would put together a physical thank you note, make yourself a business card, print your resume on a piece of paper and put it in a manila envelope, and you mail it to the physicians who were your best clients.
Anneliese Rhodes: And the
Claire Davis: message is not, Hey, I need a job.
The message is I want you to remember me when you see something great because I loved working for you. When you do that, oh my God. Champion for life. That is Oh, freaking
Cynthia Ficara: amazing. Okay. That is like, I'm
Anneliese Rhodes: writing that down.
Cynthia Ficara: I know you do that. Well, you're so right. You really point out what is so unique in medical device sales is, I mean, and they're truly your customers, but you work for another company.
It's such a great dynamic. I, I tell you, Claire, that is Yes. Really? Yes.
Anneliese Rhodes: Really freaking brilliant. That is brilliant. They are our biggest cheerleaders. If you did your job right, they're your biggest cheerleader. And that is something that we all, I think even, even I will overlook, we forget about that.
Right. And go, Lee, what a great fricking idea. And I bet they would love hearing from you. You know? Absolutely. And the thank you note.
Cynthia Ficara: Absolutely. And I mean, just, I mean, a lot of resilience was built out of your story. I was. I was very impressed about how five times is a lot. It's each time you're getting back up and learning from it and getting into a better place.
And Lisa, you, you were right. I mean, this is kind of the journey you were on, but you don't know it at the time. Mm-hmm. And I think that we have a choice. When bad things happen to us, we can decide. It's do we get up? Do we get down? It's all how you react because bad things and good things happen in our lives, and we just have to be in tune in looking at how are we gonna react to this?
Is this actually working for me because. It's easy now, right? We can look and say, oh, let's look back all those things that happened. Look what that got you. And that worked for you to, to bring you to Traction resume, to bring you to look at these great ideas you had that needed to be told. Maybe if you stayed in those other jobs, other people wouldn't benefit from your knowledge.
Claire Davis: So that's a great point you that, that was so beautifully said. Um, and you know, I think that I, I believe in God and I am a, a big proponent of we're all here for some purpose to serve and we don't necessarily know what that is. Mm-hmm. And what's really special about my role is that I get to interview people who are leagues smarter and more experienced in, in high levels of medical device.
And otherwise, every single day I got off with the president of a company right before we came on today. Great. And what's tremendous about that is that even people who are in high powered positions, and almost more often when people are in higher powered positions in this industry. They might know a little bit about what makes them so special.
They may know historically, you know, this is the way I go about business that really works. This is how I come in and I can be a turnaround artist. Or, this is the reason that I take this joint of teams and I make them unified again. But they usually only know about the half of the story because people who are very successful tend to miss.
What's so great about them, and the reason is because what makes you successful is oftentimes a combination of what you've learned but what you're ordinarily wired to do. So for you, it's second nature and you are just operating out of the way that you do things. And it's just how everybody should view business and kind of why doesn't everybody look at it like this, but to the rest of us.
We are taking notes because what you do is so unique to you, but because it seems so natural to you, you miss it as spectacular, and the rest of us are blown away. So I think the best part is that regardless of if you're new to the industry, if you are, you know, an executive in the industry, you're consulting in the industry, wherever you are, there's something unique about every single person.
And it almost always takes a third party to get that, get to the bottom of what that really is. And sounds like, have you guys ever done like personality tests and been surprised, like some of the things you found out? Yeah. Well, yes and no, but I was, yeah.
How Listening Unlocks the Real You
Anneliese Rhodes: Yeah. Oh my gosh. I have so many things running through my brain right now.
I know. First of all, you're reminding me of Brene Brown. I'm just gonna say it like, I'm like, oh my God, it's a jacket. No. Oh yes. By the way, shame and the vulnerability. And if nobody knows who Brene Brown is, go watch her. But like course, literally, um. Somebody sent that to me the other day and I was like, I've seen the video, but I'll watch it again because I'm trying to learn how to be more vulnerable, which is really hard for me and I can't even say the damn words, but she says the word.
Yeah, you said it pretty good that time. I can't even say it because I said it really quick. Can't word. I said it quick, but, but let me ask you, how do you get their stories? What is your secret sauce? Because I'm thinking to myself. I'll hire you, I'll have you write my resume for me, but how do you do it?
Like, and I don't want you to give away all your magical powers. Right, right. But you know, maybe, I mean, I don't know. Talk to us, tell us like what makes you so special, because you're amazing and I wanna know like how you do this, how you get people to tell you your stories,
Claire Davis: because that's hard. So. There are a lot of ways that you can make people comfortable enough to trust you with their story, but I think that it all starts with really giving people the space to do it.
So, ah, early on when I was first writing resumes for myself as a, as a business owner, I would allot up to three hours for someone to be interviewed. Because three, I really, yes, because what I found was, initially I didn't think I'd need that much time, but when you give someone a floor who've, who's really lived some life.
I mean like live some life. Look at the industry we're in. Yeah. Yeah. Every sale you make is made is literally tied to a human's livelihood in some fashion. You've got mergers and acquisitions happening all the time. So while I know the world was rocked by 2020 and all of the change up in those companies, uniquely medical sales.
All the different segments had been accustomed to a lot of chaos and tumultuous markets and change. So for that, we were a little bit prepared. But when you give someone the floor who's lived a lot of life, what I found, which was surprising to me, was that if I gave them enough time, they would start to tell me stories.
And typically, if you think about, okay, what am I gonna write on my resume? The first things that come to mind are what are my results that I can talk about that are very serious and they're in the star format and they are really, really gonna impress somebody, which is great. Which is
Cynthia Ficara: great. I love how you personalize these resumes.
I feel like they're talking
Claire Davis: to me. I know. Yeah. Well, you know, it's, it's, um, and that's me, by the way.
Anneliese Rhodes: Good. Yeah, you
Claire Davis: do want to have those things. So you guys are all on the right track. Like really, Lisa, you're on the right track, certainly Cindy. But what happens is. When we're looking at a resume that has just numbers and results on it.
Mm-hmm. We're comparing people apples to apples. So more or less you could remove the name from the top of those resumes. And now we're just looking at numbers, which I don't know about you guys, but as you know, I have had many, many career lumps and bumps and changes and wins, and it was like a veritable rollercoaster through my twenties and early thirties.
So the difference is when you capture somebody's story, the kind of things that you're getting are character, leadership, vision, how they perceive and look at business, and more importantly, how they're perceived by other people. And when you start to talk about those things, that's when someone's story comes to the surface.
And when you. Listen hard enough, you'll start to catch things that are patterns, and that's where the sweet spot is, Lisa, because people don't recognize their own patterns because again, right to them it's second nature. They just do the do because it's who they are. So then when you have this three hour interview session where they regale you with these stories, 'cause now they finally have someone willing to listen to them.
You repeat back the patterns that you saw. It's like watching people have an experience in front of your eyes because they didn't realize that they had a method to success. They had no idea. This is so
Anneliese Rhodes: freaking
Claire Davis: cool. This is like, this is a science experiment.
Cynthia Ficara: I love this. I know. I'm like, oh my gosh. I'm sitting here like, I, you, you, you know, I will tell you that clearly you are a good listener because, and, and you're very, very captivating to speak to.
Um, I never thought about identifying patterns ever, but when you said it, why am I thinking, why did I never think that before? Because. You know, you look at, if you look at sales, why would you wanna hire a high performer? Right? Because they have patterns that continue to produce. They apply what they had somewhere else and put it somewhere.
But instead of just saying, these were my results, it's like, how do you pull out what makes them them? Oh my God, that is exciting.
Anneliese Rhodes: Oh, it's brilliant. It's amazing. I'm like, you're like storytelling here again, Brene Brown.
Stand Out and Become the Orange
Claire Davis: Yes, that's exactly it. You're, you're exactly on it. And you know, it's, it's amazing to me how surprised we are when we are reminded that we have a way about us or way that we do things.
And I also think that's why the majority of us, probably a lot of e and fjs like me, but like we love to do personality tests. Because we really like it when someone like gets in there and tells us like, well, this is kind of behind the way that you think and like it's really important and this is why it's, you know, good for you and these are the things to look out for.
You know, when other than personality tests, we don't have a lot of opportunity to really dish and in a time where everything is so fast and everything is so digital and we are so disconnected, being able to have that. Time where you really do share. Let me tell you a story. Let me tell you about the time that I worked here and this craziness happened, and then I had to go over there and then I got scouted.
And they're so proud. 'cause they should be, I love it and it's magic. So the trick is to make sure that you're not an apples to apples candidate. Gotta get that story in there. But there is one other little thing, and this is where if you know, even if you do. A really good job of telling your story on your resume.
There's one other thing, and this is what I see most people miss, and so I'd love to share it on your show so that they can take this and become the orange, right? So apples to apples go become the orange or the pineapple or whatever you wanna become. Mm-hmm. Um, you've gotta tie it to relevance because if you're thinking about a company who's purchasing you as a product.
They're gonna invest sometimes over six figures a year to have you here. That's a big deal. And in almost every single other thing we buy, we expect that the person we're buying from to know what's important to us. Amazon better recommend to me the right kind of eye mask because they know that I love hyaluronic acid.
So don't come at me with any of that matcha stuff 'cause that makes me break out, right? So like we expect in the selling environment for us as the customer to be very, for them to be very finely in tune with what we want, what our challenges are, what our pain points are, what we need. We don't look at the career situation in the same way, and we should.
This is a huge, huge missed opportunity for most people on the market right now. And the great thing is once you see it, you will never forget it. So here's how you do it. When you are looking at being hired by somebody else, I want you to think of them like you would think about the doctor that you would sell a product to.
It's not enough to come in and tell that doctor how awesome you are, and you also swam on varsity in high school. That Dr. May or may not care. They might love you, they might not, but it still has nothing to do with their challenge and pain that you're trying to solve. So instead, do your market research on the companies you wanna work for, and the people who work there, and the people who are trying to hire, and the people who are already working there too.
And you're going to find through this process that you'll be able to not just become a great candidate, you'll become a great fit candidate because now you'll be able to take your story from interesting to relevant to them. When you do that, you become the obvious choice for these people because they finally see, oh my gosh, this person connected the dots for me.
I know they're coming from real estate segued into medical device, but they're really great at making relationships with people that they've never met before and by God, we're expanding in Savannah. Wow. That's how you do it. If you take anything away from this conversation with these incredible women, I would say make sure that your resume speaks to your unique value and story.
Yes, but equally and importantly to the challenges and what your customer or your hiring team is looking to solve too, so that you become the obvious choice.
Anneliese Rhodes: Wow. Oh my gosh. This is so great, dude. I'm like, this is unbelievable. I just, yeah. Thank you. Thank you. Brilliant. Cindy, you do some hiring here and there.
I mean, what are you thinking as like a hiring manager?
Cynthia Ficara: You know, it's, it's, it's so interesting 'cause my, my brain is like in wheels here and I think that, I loved when you said, you know how to be that orange because. Maybe I didn't think of it as an orange. Mm-hmm. But in speaking to people mm-hmm. There is that moment when somebody stands out and that you know that that's an easy like surface way of saying it, but the way you described don't be apples to apples.
Clearly, that was very easy to understand, but when you tie the relevance into. How you can plug and play into their world and help that company grow because you're going into sales, right? And think about in sales, what is one thing that we teach people in sales to your customers is you need to do the old art of W 'em.
What's in it for them? So why don't you sell your res yourself the same way to the company? What's in it for them And yeah. It is so simple and not something I ever actually extrapolated into saying before until just now. You pointing out how to be the orange is phenomenal. I, I, it's so great. I.
Anneliese Rhodes: So amazing.
Cynthia Ficara: You gonna have to tell us right now. How do people find you? So right now, somebody's listening, they're like, I know, I know. We'll do it again
Anneliese Rhodes: at
Cynthia Ficara: the very
Anneliese Rhodes: end because it's one other thing I wanna talk, talk about at the end I'm like, oh, this ISS so great. But tell us really quick if you need to say now.
Yeah,
Claire Davis: yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. So if anybody would like help with this, of course we love to do that. Um, attraction resume. I have an. Awesome team. This is what we do every single day, day in and day out. And what's, what I can guarantee you is that we have seen every kind of story you can imagine. We've helped handle a career gap or a challenge.
In every single kind of category that you can imagine. So, um, if anybody needs help, they can always find us@tractionresume.com, or you can find me where I pretty much live and hang out all day long on LinkedIn at, uh, Claire m Davis or Traction Resume. But we, we really, um. I challenge anybody listening to come over and try to surprise me with their career challenge.
'cause I bet you we've seen a thing or two. I love this. This is awesome.
The Power of Negotiating
Anneliese Rhodes: I was gonna ask you like five more questions, but like, I want, I don't want this to go on for hours, even though it could, um. We always give a secret away and on every episode, and Claire, you guys, as we were talking prior to recording this episode, she dropped a little secret bomb on us that Cindy and I were like, wait, what?
You also do this and I am raising my hand because I suck at this. Mm-hmm. Is. Negotiation. Mm-hmm. And I want you, if you don't mind, Claire, just talking a little bit about this other part of your business, so you're not just resumes. There is a whole, you know, this is a whole thing, right? And negotiation is part of applying for a job, part of getting a res, uh, a, a raise part of.
Life, right? Yeah. Nego. We, we negotiate every day and sometimes I really think I'm good at it, but I think I just push people. So I would love for you to tell us a little bit about your negotiation tactics and how you guys are also helping people out there, negotiating those raises, those jobs, those promotions, all the things.
Claire Davis: Sure. Well, first of all, Lisa, you, um, even pushing or feeling like you're pushing, you're doing more than most. So I would say keep going. And that's the thing is once you start, you refine as you go. Yeah. You know, um, you go to our book club on behavioral engineering and then we doing that way you'll have all these other we're that is daily tips.
I know we're ordering. So negotiation. Um, when I think about negotiation one, I feel like many woefully don't negotiate enough. Often enough, um, or it makes them feel kind of icky, uh, or they just feel like they don't wanna put the other person out, or that they are going to be retaliated against if they ask for more.
That is very, very rare to have that happen. So I just wanna put that out there. Retaliation for negotiating is very, very rare, and usually the worst thing that you can experience is somebody saying no, and that is not so bad. If you ask me compared to not, uh, asking at all, because most often people are far more willing to help us than we give them credit for, and they're far more willing to give us what we want, should we represent ourselves, and should we set up the table correctly.
So one of the things, for example, is when you're negotiating, the negotiation does not stop, or sorry, the negotiation does not start at the time that you ask. The negotiation starts before you're in that room to actually pose the question that you would like to see a pay raise more PTO. You wanna invest in executive coaching or you know that there may be a layoff in this tumultuous industry and you would like to negotiate an exit package proactively.
So that should someone have to take the fall, you raise your hand 'cause you believe in this, but you're also a realist and you'd like to help your manager out. Wow. So that's proactive. It's definitely proactive. It's more common than you think. It's, um, it's a newer thing that we've been introducing, but I will tell you that I have learned so much from one person in particular on negotiating.
And this is coming from someone who I have been helping people negotiate their salary comp benefits, location, travel, PTO, since. Let's just not date me and say back when I was recruiting. But, um, one of the smartest savviest negotiators that I have ever met is named Carrie Lynn Shaw, and she's a good friend of mine.
So if you guys do need the real deal executive, um, negotiating expertise, go follow her today. 'cause she's tremendous. She's changing the game. She's a huge advocate of especially women negotiating. Because a lot of times women tend not to ask. We tend not to wanna rock the boat or negotiate, and there are a lot of reasons for that.
I think there's more societal pressure reasons than particularly company reasons, but. There's a lot on the other side when you build up that bravery and you set the table correctly to really demonstrate your value before you ask. So negotiation for me is something that's, it's really a must. And when people tell you that at the, um, the crux of when you are getting your job offer, that they expect you to negotiate, believe them because they do.
They do expect you to negotiate, so ask for more than than you're comfortable with and you'll usually find something, uh, pretty nice on the other side.
Cynthia Ficara: That is excellent advice. You know, you just explained something that I think I just wanna reiterate because it's almost what you said. If you think about.
Going into negotiate and you're, you're afraid of what the answer's gonna be. Mm-hmm. The way you described it is you are selling yourself. So we are in sales and you're going to sell. If you think about it, the answer's no to start. All you are doing is selling an opportunity for them to say yes. It's no, it's no, because the answer's no 'cause you haven't asked.
So now it's already no. Are you able to just get the opportunity for 'em to say yes? Because if not, well it's no, and it was no. Anyway, so move on. Maybe that wasn't in their journey. Maybe that's not part of what is meant for them to do, but you don't know until you ask. That was absolutely, that was key.
That's great. It's you,
Claire Davis: you find, you find so many parallels between sales and marketing and careers. It's wild. And what's, um, what I will say, and, and I mostly work with medical sales professionals at all levels. Um, but I will say that we tend to have short memories when it comes to our career because we could be absolutely incredible in front of a customer.
Putting those decks together, justifying a product, launching all of those things great at business development. But when it comes to selling ourselves, we're a little sheepish. So I would say, remember that you, if you are in medical sales, are a highly trained, highly skilled business development professional.
And if you can take a minute to really consider what would I do if I were the product? You'll find yourself with a lot more answers.
Anneliese Rhodes: I love that.
Lessons in Resilience and Connection
All right. That's what we're ending on. 'cause that was amazing, even though there's a couple quick questions that we love to ask all of our, uh, spotlight series guests.
So Claire, even though we were talking about this prior to the episode, um. Do you have any favorite books or quotes that you live by that you can share with our listeners that they might be able to, you know, either pick up a, a pearl of wisdom or just learn something new? Inspired, yeah, become inspired.
Claire Davis: Sure. I mean, you can't mark it on social media without gathering a couple of quotes you say over and over again. Right, right. So I'd say one of my favorites is Maya Angelou, and I did a report on her and her incredible work, um, when I was in fifth grade. And what stuck with me was her quote about how it's really not what you say or do, it's how you make people feel.
That to me is really important and, uh, at traction, but also at home with my family. We try to live that way too. And um, and then the quote that got me through every single one of those layoffs was very short and sweet, and I had it scrolling on my computer, um, screensaver, if those are still a thing. And it was Keep going.
Because what I find is that typically when I'm working with somebody and, and even just when I'm, when I'm working with a friend, um, usually you're this close to making a breakthrough if you do, and a lot of times that's right when it gets darkest before that dawn. So just keep going. That's great. As far as a great book, uh, these ladies now know my, my passion for behavioral engineering and learning all about that nerdy, cool stuff.
And so if you have to, if you ever find yourself wanting to learn more about how people make decisions and how to be a better read on people so that you can have a more positive impact on others, I would recommend something called the Ellipsis Manual. Came out probably a decade ago, but it's by an incredible man named Chase Hughes, and it is not to be missed.
It is an incredible manual for how you can better understand social cues that other people are giving you, even when they're not saying any words. So let me know if you try it and send me a dm if you do on LinkedIn. I'd love to hear your experience with the book.
Anneliese Rhodes: I love that. And I mean, that's not what better book than that for sales.
Like really? I know. I mean, all we do all day is we're around people trying to sell. So I, I, I love this. Thank you, Claire. I know we talked about where to find you, but one more time just for all of our listeners.
Claire Davis: Absolutely, come find me@tractionresume.com, or I'm always on LinkedIn, uh, at Claire m Davis. Or you can visit our business page, of course at Traction Resume, but we'd love to hear from you.
Please don't be a stranger. I love meeting new people and especially people who listen to the Secrets and Medical Device sales show. So please send me a note, tell me what your favorite part was, and thank you so much, ladies, for having me. It's such an honor to be here.
Anneliese Rhodes: So much for coming on, Claire. I've learned so much today.
I know, I'm, I'm so much, I have a list of books. I'm all energized. I'm like, dude, this is amazing. Thank you
Claire Davis: very
Anneliese Rhodes: much. Thank my
Claire Davis: pleasure. Anytime I.
