Author Archives: bryandilts

The first 2 steps to make sure you are not forgotten by a hiring manager

Posted on June 3, 2013 | Leave a comment

I have called a hiring manager 5 times in a day to find out if he wants to hire my candidate NOW.  If you do the same, you will never get that job.  That’s one advantage of working with a recruiter who knows how far he can push a client. For me it is aggressive, for you to do it is offensive.

Waiting by your phone and hoping someone will call you might work.  It works if no one forgot you.  It works if all the paperwork is in order.  It works if no emergencies or urgencies distract the hiring manager.  It works if there is NOT an aggressive recruiter like me who is pushing a different candidate. So what can you do?

You need to be somewhere between easy to forget and offensively overbearing.

Take these two steps first:

  1. Make a list of everyone you contact.
  2. Track when you last talked to them or sent an email.  That way you will know when it has been too long or not long enough since you reminded them that they need to give you a job.

Tomorrow I will write about how often to make contact.

Something to do today

Make that list of everyone you have a potential job with. Write down when and how you made the last contact with them.

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How to wait and be noticed

Get the credentials of an expert -3 ways

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Posted in Followup, Recruiters

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7 tools inside the box. What’s wrong with thinking inside the box?

Posted on May 31, 2013 | Leave a comment

I’ll be more enthusiastic about encouraging thinking outside the box when there’s evidence of any thinking going on inside it. (Terry Pratchett)

7 tools inside the box 

I got an email that said, “I finally got a job networking.”

The job came from handing out lots of business cards.  Often you get lucky working inside the box.  The box is where the proven tools are stored.  It is where most jobs are found.  Sure, think outside the box.  It might work.  First, use all the tools in the box.

This is the box

  1. Look for a job while still employed, if you can.
  2. Concentrate most on the jobs and companies you want most.
  3. Use an accomplishment filled resume – it proves you can do the job.
  4. Get the credentials of an expert.
  5. Constantly network – let people know you are looking, follow up.
  6. Watch the job ads – internet and newspaper.
  7. Use recruiters and constantly follow up with them.

Are you using all the tools inside the box?

Something to do today

Concentrate on a different tool every day or every week of your job search.  It helps keep the hunt from getting boring.

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How to wait for the next interview

Be a squeaky wheel

Get the credentials of an expert

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Posted in Finding jobs, Focus, Networking, Perseverance, Recruiters, Resumes

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How to get proper credit and light a fire under your boss

Posted on May 30, 2013 | Leave a comment

Telling everyone you meet how wonderful you are will get you mocked. No one likes an empty headed braggart. It will not get you a promotion, raise, or a new job.

“He is a legend in his own mind.” Is an old saying you don’t want applied to yourself.

Refusing to take credit for what you or your team has done will doom you to be the last person hired and the first person laid off. Refusing to take credit is not humility, it is job suicide.

Humility really is sharing credit where it is due, and taking credit where you earned it.  Humility is not job suicide.

Tell the people who matter how good you are at the appropriate time.  Here are the most common appropriate times:

  1. In a project status meeting
  2. In a weekly, month, and quarterly written report to your managers
  3. In a resume

Surprise!

Your resume is appropriate even in your current job.  Many companies keep resumes updated for top people.  They use them to prove to clients the quality of the individuals working there.  They also use internal resumes when new promotions, transfers and raises are being discussed.

Write a great resume.  Hand it to your current boss.  Tell him you gave it to him because you want a raise, transfer or promotion.  Do it a month before salary reviews.  Of course, you can also use it to leave your company.

Something to do today

Give your boss a knock-em-dead, accomplishment filled resume each year.  It is very likely that he needs to be reminded just how good you are.

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What’s wrong with the box?

How to wait for the next interview

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Posted in Accomplishments, Attitude, Raises

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Rules of war for gutsy job seekers

Posted on May 28, 2013 | Leave a comment

Here are your rules if you have the guts to declare war on your job search.  They are not for cowards.  This is how a real proactive job search can be done.

Check it out here.  It is on LinkedIn.  If you aren’t on LinkedIn yet, then link to me bryan @ dilts.us

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Posted in Finding jobs, Perseverance, Time management

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Tracking elk and finding hidden unadvertised jobs

Posted on May 23, 2013 | Leave a comment

It is impossible for an orange tiger with black stripes to hide in green grass, yet it does.  You can’t fill a job unless you let people know about it, yet it happens all the time.

I walked 50 miles in a wilderness area.  I found lots of elk, fox, coyote, deer and bear.  I didn’t see any of them.  Not one.  But, I found them.  I heard them and saw their tracks and scat.  They were there.  If I wanted to go hunting, I would know right where to go to find them.

There are also jobs you can’t see. At times it is as obvious as tracks in the mud even if there are no job ads.  There is an announcement of a new division moving to your area.  A newspaper mentions the company is expanding.  You may see a new building being built. These things should alert you that a company needs to hire people.

More subtle indicators are that you hear of someone being fired, or that they are looking for a new job.  In all likelihood, someone will replace them.  That is a job opening.

Every city has at least one business newspaper.  Little old Harrisburg, PA has 3 or 4.  In that business news they highlight the expansion plans of businesses.  There is a section about appointments and promotions.  When someone is promoted, they had to come out of another job.  Call them up and congratulate them.  Ask them how they got the promotion and wait for them to tell you what job they left behind.

75% of all jobs are filled without ever placing an ad or posting an internal job notice.  Keep your eyes open for where an opening will be.  If you get the job before the ad appears, there is no competition.

Something to do today

Go to your biggest local library and to the local college or university library.  Ask to see all the business daily, weekly and monthly newspapers and magazines for your area.  See if you can find job tracks in them.

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Humility and job suicide, there is a difference

What’s wrong with the box?

How to wait for the next interview

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Posted in Finding jobs, Networking

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What the smartest guy in the room does

Posted on May 22, 2013 | Leave a comment

A stupid person can make only certain, limited types of errors; the mistakes open to a clever fellow are far broader. But to the one who knows how smart he is compared to everyone else, the possibilities for true idiocy are boundless.  (Steven Brust)

The smartest guy in the room

Frank was a legend. Phil was a legend in his own mind.

Phil gave off an odor of conceit.  He would condescend to help others.  He had very important things to do. He promoted himself all the time. We got tired of hearing him talk about another project he finished.  That boy could talk, as long as the subject was himself.

Frank entered a room of 20 people and the collective IQ doubled.  He listened.  Frank tended to migrate towards the leaders and managers.  They also migrated towards him.  He talked and mingled happily with the rest of us.  He was friendly and helpful.  Frank used persuasion and experience to sway others.  He also told his bosses in private, on paper and in emails of what he had suggested, whom he helped and what he accomplished.  In other words he reported back on everything to his leaders.  He got credit where it counted.

Frank even got credit for helping me, a peon.  He kept track.  He let his boss know how many hours he spent helping others.  He kept track of the projects he assisted.  He reported it.

Phil bragged, strutted and annoyed.  Frank helped, improved, reported and got credit.

Are you Phil or Frank?  Or are you just afraid to let people know how much you do?  A lot of people know a Phil.  They don’t want to be a self centered, conceited, bragging laughing stock.  So they hide what they do.  They don’t become a Frank.  Frank was well respected by all.  He helped and accomplished, and got credit for it where it counts.

Report back to your boss.  Keep a job journal.  Know and show what you do.

Something to do today

Give your manager a report each week of all the things you get done.  He may not really know how useful you are.

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Top articles from the archives while I take some Scouts into the woods

Humility and job suicide, there is a difference

What’s wrong with the box?

How to wait for the next interview

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Posted in Attitude, Networking, talent

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Don’t say these things when you ask for a raise

Posted on May 21, 2013 | Leave a comment

Asking for a raise can get you more money, or damage your career.  At times it can get you fired.  Here are 9 things not to day when asking for a raise.

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Posted in Negotiating, Promotions, Quitting or Fired, Raises

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World (or job search) destruction by accident

Posted on May 8, 2013 | Leave a comment

The most likely way for the world to be destroyed, most experts agree, is by accident.  That’s where we come in, we’re computer professionals.  We cause accidents. (Nathaniel Borenstein)

Call or email?

I have seen a job lost by a single email.  Instead of picking up the phone, the candidate decided to ask a bunch of delicate questions by email.  With email, they can’t see your smile or hear your voice.  An email can’t respond to the question in the reader’s voice.  An email isn’t a real personal contact.  It is just a contact.

Never leave an important contact to an email if you don’t have to.  Instead of sending a long email, pick up the phone and call.  You can document the conversation in an email afterwards, but make the initial contact more personal.  Pick up the phone.

Sure, you can ask, “Have you made a decision yet?” by email.  But, if the reader is frustrated with his staff when he gets it, he thinks, “One more person on my back.”  If you get him on the phone and hear his frustration you can say, “You sound in a hurry, how can I help you in this process?  What else do you need me to do?” You can become the one sane voice he has heard today.

Email is great, but personal contact is better.  One trainer in our industry suggests that I make every third contact by phone.  That way I remain in closer contact with the situation.  I hear the voice, the attitude, the person. You and my clients in turn hear my voice.  I continue being a real person in your mind.

Be honest.  A one page email often takes longer than a phone call.  It just isn’t as scarey.  You spend 20 minutes writing, editing and worrying.  Then you send it.  A five minute phone call is faster.

For a lot of chores a computer is incredibly fast.  It really can help.  For keeping in contact with people who have to remember who you are, occasionally pick up the phone.

Something to do today

If you have a list of people you are waiting to hear from about jobs, start making at least every third contact a phone call.

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The smartest guy in the room

Humility and job suicide, there is a difference

What’s wrong with the box?

How to wait for the next interview

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Posted in Followup

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How to get to sleep at night

Posted on May 2, 2013 | Leave a comment

Tense because of work and your job search?  The comments on this article list a lot of real ways people get to sleep.

My most effective way to get to sleep is to count to 2.  In my head I lie down and count 1-2-1-2-1-2-1-2….. until I fall asleep.  If I count any higher it takes enough mental energy that it keeps me awake.  Counting clears my mind and lets me rest.

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Posted in Attitude, Uncategorized

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Why would your boss think you are as bad as a cheating husband?

Posted on April 30, 2013 | Leave a comment

This may be counter-intuitive, but when you try to leave your job, your boss looks at YOU as the cheating husband.  Your boss sees YOU as the betrayer no matter how many times he has failed to follow up on his promises. He may have not given you any raises in 4 years, but he sees you as the person who is making his life miserable.

Your boss sees himself as the righteous WIFE in this story when you quit.  If you agree to stay due to his pleadings, pay raises, promotions, and cajoling, he absolutely loses his trust in you.  Here is how he feels.

Your boss thinks he is the wife in this example

Your husband asked for a divorce last week. He quit. He has been dating another woman who is so much nicer than you. He is cheating. He told you about her looks, personality, family, and friendship. He was preparing to move out until last night. You begged him to stay for the kids’ sake. You agreed to change the way you treat him. You will start exercising, get a facelift and breast implants. He finally agreed to dump that floozy. It is so nice to have him in your arms again. He’s yours. (Remember, you are the husband, he is the wife who is getting surgery to get you to stay.)

It’s two weeks later. He needs to “work late” for the second time this week. Can you keep yourself from calling his office?

He’s gone on 3 overnight business trips this month. Are you going to check the credit card statements when they come?

You called at 3 pm and the receptionist said he is out of the office. You really want to get an ankle bracelet to track him, don’t you?

Your boss

When you tell your boss you are quitting, and he sweet talks you into staying, he has already lost faith in you. The next time you have a dental appointment he is going to wonder. When a big opportunity comes up he’ll remember that you took an extra half hour at lunch one day last week. He’ll give the big project to someone else who he is sure will stay in the company and finish it.

Once you give notice you are quitting, leave. Come back in 6 months if you were wrong. Then your boss will know that your commitment to your new employer was firm, but things didn’t work out. When you accept his pleas to stay, he knows you just screwed the other company. He’ll be wondering when you will screw him.

That’s real life.

Something to do today

Prepare a resignation letter that only says: Thank you for the chance to work here. My last day of work will be xx/xx/xx.

Now practice this phrase 20 times: “Let’s not talk about why I am leaving, let’s talk about how I can make the transition easier on you.”

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World destruction by accident

The smartest guy in the room

Humility and job suicide, there is a difference

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Posted in Counteroffers, Quitting or Fired

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