Even when losing, all T-Pain does is win (and he drops some business gems so you can too)

My friend sent me this article about the current best hook man in the music game, T-Pain, cancelling an upcoming tour. And there are all kinds of business gems to take from this, but first a quick clarification…

In music, the hook is basically the background singing you might hear on a song during the chorus. So that’s not to be confused with the hook when you’re writing your resume (the summary or the cover letter).

Now back to what prompted this note…

T-Pain cancelled his upcoming tour and decided to release a personal video announcing his change in plans and also giving a glimpse into the behind the scenes of the business side of music.

You can find the full 3:51 video on his instagram page but here are some of the things worth noting:

Authenticity matters

T-Pain opted to be transparent about low ticket sales driving his decision to cancel the tour. And he did so against the advice of some of the people in his circle (They wanted him to lie, which is a non-starter in resume writing, because if people find out, you’re done.). His willingness to be vulnerable for his fans made him more relatable and gave him a credibility boost for whatever he decides to do in the future. And if social media comments are any indicator, fans will be anxiously awaiting for his next project.

You can’t rely totally on your prior success to generate future success

Another nugget T-Pain shared was about how his team just came off a successful tour and phone it in a little bit on this tour. The thing is, in a world where you’re competing with so many alternatives for attention, you have to make sure you’re staying top of mind and doing it in the right way.

The market (including your current and/or future employer) doesn’t care about your sunk cost

“You can’t hold on to a mistake just cause you spent a long time making it. And that’s just the damn truth.”

That’s probably my favorite line of the video. If you have a business background, you may recognize this as a basic principle of finance but so many people don’t apply the textbook theory to real life.

You could spend days putting together your resume but all that matters at the end is the result. And if what you’re doing isn’t working, you need to let it go and try something else.

Easier said than done (I’ve learned this the hard way), but the faster you get used to making adjustments and not getting overly attached to the effort you put in, the faster you’ll see recruiters lining up to interview you.

I’ll leave you to apply the learnings from this note and if you want more resume writing goodness, you can get that here:

https://ericpbutts.com/breakthrough-resume-writing/