Category Archives: Networking

Hallowe’en and your job search, really.

Posted on January 20, 2014 | Leave a comment

I know it is not Hallowe’en.  Humor me.

Tips for job seekers and Halloween trick or treaters are just about the same.  Think about how each of these directly applies to looking for a job.

  1. If you are scared, get your dad (a coach) to help on a few doors.
  2. Dress for success.  Look the part from your hair to your shoes, bag and greeting.
  3. The neighborhood you call on defines the size of the treats you get.
  4. Not everyone is giving out one pound candy bars, but they are all worth visiting.
  5. The more houses you call on, the more likely you will get a one pound candy bar.
  6. Go BACK to the biggest house with the best candy later.
  7. The most successful trick or treaters plan their routes and run from door to door.
  8. If you don’t knock, they won’t answer.
  9. If the porch light is out, you won’t get any candy, but you may get advice.
  10. Some of the scariest houses give the best treats.
  11. You get more treats if you start early and work late.
  12. Asking for candy in the traditional way works, ingenuity may get you more.
  13. Helping a little kid can double your take.
  14. Always say thank you.
  15. Sometimes they just ran out of treats, sorry.
  16. Going with friends (groups and social media) can make a scary neighborhood safer.
  17. It is a night of cold calling, even if you know the people.
  18. Trade candy (leads) afterwards to get what you really want.
  19. If you go to a party instead, and complain, you won’t get a big bag of candy.
  20. Don’t blow out the candle in the pumpkin.
  21. Do it again next year, only better, now that you have experience.

Wow!  I could write 21 articles based on those points.  Let me make a few quick points instead.

  1. Planning and preparation.  If you want the best chance of quick success, take 15 minutes each day and an additional 4 hours each week to review results, make lists, THINK, and plan for the coming week.  And make sure you have resumes that are attractive and get people to call you.
  2. Work hard and fast.  Actually do what you plan.  Make calls and contacts daily.  It is amazing how often luck follows hard work.
  3. Go back again.  You should be talking to your best prospects at least monthly.  If you spend 15 minutes thinking and looking for a reason to call, you can usually come up with a helpful reason to call almost anyone.
  4. Work together.  Share leads.  Offer to critique other’s resumes.  Suggest websites, books, and other job search ideas.  A lot of people find the perfect job in the castoffs and contacts from someone else’s search. Go to someone else’s house and both of you make calls at the same time.
  5. Be polite. Just because they say “No” doesn’t mean they hate you.  Say thank you and contact them again if it is a company you really want to join.  Never burn bridges or “blow out the candle” with anyone.

Have a great Halloween, and an even better job search.  Good luck finding that one pound candy bar!

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Posted in Finding jobs, Followup, Interviews, Job Boards, Networking, Perseverance, References, Resumes, Time management

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5 things I do to stop procrastinating

Posted on November 11, 2013 | Leave a comment

Plans are only good intentions unless they immediately degenerate into hard work. (Peter Drucker)

An old friend laughed when she read my article on procrastinating.  She knows I am a king at procrastinating.  She mentioned how I paid my kids to help me stop procrastinating.  The first one to call me after 3 p.m., and ask if I had met my goal for telephone calls that day, got paid.  It was cheaper than having a boss take 50% of my commissions.

I am an expert at procrastination.  The only way I have been able to beat that problem is to think about it….then set up motivators.  You need to do the same thing with your job hunting duties.

There are certain things that help me stop procrastinating:

  1. Guilt
  2. Rewards
  3. Getting checked up on
  4. Momentum
  5. Brain games

Guilt

If I make a plan that I know will succeed, and don’t follow it, I feel guilty.  Simple.  I pray for help, come up with a plan to reach my goal, and am goaded by guilt.  (Why don’t you write down a plan for finding a job. You’ll feel guilty for ignoring it.)

Rewards

One month I earned a membership at the Climbnasium by making a placement.  I basically don’t buy much of anything unless it is a reward for reaching a goal.  At the end of this month, I get a “prize” if I call 30 new people every work day.  I’ve used trips, shoes, clothes, a car, computer accessories, a camera, lunch, and leaving before 5 p.m. as rewards. (You can set up a reward for sending out 10 resumes, or making 5 calls.)

Getting checked up on

I mentioned paying my kids to call me and check up.  I’ve had my wife call at noon when I was having a lot of problems procrastinating.  I have kept daily charts of how many new people I call, how long I am on the phone, and other important daily accomplishments. Having a helper or just having to check up on myself every day is a big help. (Try making a chart for how many ads you respond to, or how many networking lunches you have in a week.)

Momentum

Funny thing about starting, it’s easier to keep going after you get some momentum.  The first 3 calls I make every day are to people I already know who are actively looking for jobs.  That gets the phone to my ear.  After those 3 calls, it is much easier to make the other calls to people I have never talked to before. (To start your day you can send out two resumes thru Monster first, then send out two resumes to companies with no openings, then call the two companies you sent resumes to yesterday.  Get momentum going.)

Brain games

The most effective thing I have done to get me to make calls is a simple brain game.  I have 50 dollar coins – 40 are gold colored, 10 are silver.  Every time I call a new person I noisily drop a coin into a cup.  Silver coins are for sales calls, gold are for recruiting.  It reminds me that every call means money.  It works for me.  At the end of the day, if I only have 20 or 25 calls, I can see how close I am to my goal of 30. It is a brain game that really motivates me. (What is a brain game you can use for job hunting?)

 

Procrastinating the most important parts of your job search can be a major problem.  Figure out what you can do to get working on the important things every day.

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Tomorrow:     Mental hygiene

Cover letter anesthesia

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Posted in Finding jobs, Focus, Followup, Networking, Perseverance, Time management

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Why people you barely know are better to network with

Posted on October 18, 2013 | Leave a comment

Your closest friends are less useful in a job search than people you barely know.

Anti-intuitive, but true.  Here’s why.

The people you know well are few in number, and may all work in only 2 or 3 different companies.  They all know about the same job openings.

There are a lot more people you barely know.  They are spread through a much more diverse set of companies and geographical areas.  There is a much better chance that the people you barely know will tell you about a job or company you didn’t know exists.

Some studies have been done on job hunting through strong and weak networks.  It turns out that people really do get better job leads from weak connections.

Moral of the story: Tell everyone you know, meet, and recognize about your job search.  You may just get a lead to an unbeatable job by talking to those folks you barely know.

Something To Do Today

Have you been spreading your job net as wide as you can?  Talk to people you barely know from an association, your church, a club, or your kid’s soccer league.  Tell them about your job search.  It may just work.

And, do talk to your close friends about your job search.

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Later:                                  How many times…

A Korean attitude

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Posted in Finding jobs, Networking

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When recruiters become slaveowners

Posted on October 10, 2013 | Leave a comment

Your resume may have been thrown away because the wrong person submitted it.  You may have become a victim of recruiter ownership. (No, it is not slavery, it just feels like it.)

Paul recounted to me that he was presented by a recruiter to a company for a job.  The recruiter said, “I have great contacts there!”  Nothing happened. So Paul networked his way in and set up his own interview without the recruiter.  When the hiring manager found out that a recruiter had previously presented Paul, Paul was told that it would be impossible to hire him.  The manager would have to pay a fee to the recruiter even though the recruiter did not cause the interview to happen.  The manager didn’t want to pay the fee.

Did the recruiter lie?  I don’t know.  There may have been 4 other managers that would pay a fee that turned down Paul’s resume when the recruiter presented him. The problem is that the recruiter didn’t get Paul an interview.

Did the manager lie?  I don’t know that either. If the manager has no recruiting budget, Paul is out of luck.  If the manager has a recruiting budget and someone else who is free is almost as good, Paul is out of luck.  The manager may be hiring someone who is better and paying a fee, but is still using the recruiting fee as an easy excuse to get rid of Paul.

In the end, Paul doesn’t get the job.

Whenever I hear anyone arguing for slavery, I feel a strong impulse to see it tried on him personally. (Abraham Lincoln)

Recruiters have to get paid by the company when they find someone a job. They can prove they submitted your resume and a company accepted it.  In many cases that is all they can prove. So the contracts often say that is all they have to prove to get paid.  A company always has an incentive to hire someone NOT submitted by a recruiter–the recruiter’s fee.     But they will hire the best person despite the fee for critical positions.

Just as it can be a mistake to have a recruiter submit you, you can make a big mistake by submitting your resume yourself. If you submit yourself first, the recruiter can’t get paid.  Even if he can get you an interview because he knows the hiring manager, he won’t even try. You submitted through the website and got turned down by an HR receptionist, so the recruiter will not resubmit you. Your unpaid resume could knock one of his paying resumes out of submission.  He won’t submit you because he doesn’t “own” you.

So why use a recruiter?  Because the recruiter may know about a job opening you don’t know exists. Because in many cases he really can get you past the HR department.  He may be able to get you an interview that you can’t get without him.

So, what do you do? Hand your resume to the hiring manager personally if you can.  Use a recruiter if the recruiter will be more effective.  Submit yourself if you found the job yourself and a recruiter will be no more effective than you will.

Then wait patiently.  It may feel like you are being sold into slavery if you are told you are not being hired because the recruiter “owns” you.  But that is a risk you and the company take because in many cases the recruiter can get you a job you can’t get on your own.

Something To Do Today

If a recruiter tells you about a job you didn’t know exists, you need to be fair and let him submit you.

If you know about a job you have to decide whether you can network your way to the hiring manager (best), if a recruiter can get you an edge in hiring (next best), or if you should submit yourself to the HR department (still okay).

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Later:              Non-competes

Coyote traps – when to gnaw off your arm

Glass ceilings

The hours game

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Posted in Networking, Recruiters, Resumes

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How people really find jobs in 2013

Posted on September 27, 2013 | Leave a comment

People are NOT finding most jobs at Monster, Career Builder and other job boards.

A survey was done in 2013 of companies with over 5000 employees.  These are companies that keep great records of where they find people.  These companies employ every possible method of finding new employees.  The details are at

http://www.careerxroads.com/news/SourcesOfHire2013.pdf

The biggest job filler was internal candidates already working there – 42% .

There were an average of 74 applications per hire. Frightening, isn’t it?

Outside hires

From here on out, I’m going to talk only about percentages of the external candidates hired.  The ones who came from outside the company.

Referrals were the biggest source of external candidates at 25% of all jobs filled.  Of those referrals, 95% were referrals from people who worked at the company. You are 3-4 times more likely to get hired if you can get someone inside the company to refer you.

The company website got credit for 23% of candidates.  This is a suspect source according to the study authors, who suspect other things drove people to the website, but I’ll accept that number for the sake of argument.

Online job boards filled 18% of jobs.  The most significant job boards were Indeed and SimplyHired.  They found more people jobs than Monster and CareerBuilder.

It is simple mathematics, job boards are useful, but they are not the main way people find new jobs. Just going to company websites and submitting resumes blindly appears to be more effective than the big job boards.

Social media only got credited with 3% of hires, but it influences, drives, or combines with referrals, company career sites, job boards, direct calls into competitors, college recruting, temp-to-hire, and career fairs.

Recruiters like me only accounted for 3% of hires. They use recruiters only for the jobs that are begging for people.  They don’t want to pay my fee unless they just can’t find the right person easily.

Print is dead. Print ads only filled 2%.

What it all really means?

The real key, however, is networking.  It may not be easy, but it is still the main way jobs are filled.  Even in giant corporations. You are 3-4 times as likely to get hired if you network your way into a company.

Something To Do Today

Bite the bullet.  Do something in your job search other than rely on internet job boards.

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Tomorrow:     Slings and arrows of outrageous fortune

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Posted in Finding jobs, Job Boards, Networking

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How 2100 hirers say you should use social media

Posted on July 5, 2013 | Leave a comment

More and more companies are using social media to find and vet job candidates, and more and more often, social media is giving these companies reasons to not hire a candidate.

A survey conducted by Harris Interactive on behalf of CareerBuilder found that two in five companies…Click here to read more about the survey of 2100 hirers.

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Posted in Finding jobs, Job Boards, Networking, References, Resumes

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How to find out if you really want to join a company

Posted on June 21, 2013 | Leave a comment

Much of the history of the Western world over the past three decades has involved replacing what worked with what sounded good. (Thomas Sowell)

We have a local Fortune 1000 company that has a reputation that makes top local people avoid the company.  That company spends a lot of money on relocating people from out of town.  However, some people love working there.  So how do you decide? Is it a good company for YOU to go to work for?

How to research a company

First off, Google the company and find out all you can about it.  Check out the company website too.  Find the easily accessible information first.

Now start asking people you know.  You can occasionally ask coworkers, but don’t interrogate them weekly about a new company.  Find other people who work there as well as those who used to work there.  If you only ask people who left, you may get a very skewed picture of the company.  The people who left the company, left for a reason.  The people who stayed there, stayed for a reason.  Find out the reasons for both.

If you start hearing a lot of people say they stay for the job security then believe them.  Don’t assume the place reeks for job advancement unless the people you respect who left say the same thing. In other words, believe why people say the stay.  Believe what people say about why they left if you really respect their work and teamwork.

Whether you are using a recruiter for this particular job or not, ask a few recruiters what they think.  You would be surprised what recruiters find out about companies.  We talk to a lot of people who want to quit from, or move to, any given company.  We naturally sift through gossip and sour grapes to find the truth.

Find out what you need to know about a company before the second interview starts.  Be prepared to give a quick “yes”.  If you have your doubts about the company, be prepared with tough questions.  Find out whether you really want to go there or not.  Be ready to “just say no.”

Something to do today

Start talking with people about companies long before you even start to look for a job.  Asking questions is called business intelligence.  Be intelligent.

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Coming up

The jobs on my resume

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Posted in Interviews, Networking, Recruiters

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Quick job change decision: personal support network preparation

Posted on June 18, 2013 | Leave a comment

After an exhaustive search you announce, “We are moving to Aspen, Colorado! We’ll be 10 minutes from the ski slopes.  I found a great job.” You and your spouse have talked for 10 years about moving to Colorado for the great skiing.  You vacation there every January for 3 weeks.

“You’ll have to move without me. I am not going anywhere,” is the chilly response from your spouse.  The kids are even more negative.  What happened?  You forgot to prepare your support network.

I am amazed at how often people search for new jobs based on blue sky conversations.  When a job is found it takes weeks to get agreement to move, or the job has to be turned down.

If you are going to even dabble with the idea of changing jobs or relocating, talk to your family.  Also talk with a few close friends and anyone in your direct support network.  You may be surprised to find that when you set people down for a serious discussion, that all kinds of problems crop up.  You may also get the reply, “It’s about time.  Why did you wait so long?”

If you are afraid to mention your job search until you have an offer in hand, you are going to create confusion and possibly despair.  Talk it out.  Set criteria that work for you and everyone who depends on you and who you depend upon.  Prepare the people in your support network for your potential move.  Then you will be able to make an instant decision on whether or not to take a job offer.

Something to do today

Time to talk with your spouse, kids, pastor, next door neighbor and softball buddies.  Get their input.

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Coming up

How to make a quick decision

Personal brainwork

Job research

Company research

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Posted in Networking, Quitting or Fired

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3 ways to get the credentials of an expert

Posted on June 5, 2013 | Leave a comment

My definition of an expert in any field is a person who knows enough about what’s really going on to be scared. (P.J. Plauger)

I spent months getting my CPC (Certified Personnel Consultant).  It does occasionally help me get some work.  It makes me different.  I have become a little more elite than other recruiters.  A lot of people don’t care, but enough care to make it worth the effort.

You can become an elite candidate the same 3 ways I have.

 

Get a letter of recommendation

An expert gives you his credentials when you have a letter from that expert saying how good you are.  A letter from a non-expert also sets you apart. Someone believes in you.

Take some classes and get a certification

You can get a certifications in almost every field.  Some, like a PhD, are more difficult than others.  Passing a www.BrainBench.com  test is an instant certification in 600 specialties.  Microsoft and Sun have a bunch of certifications for computers.

You need to ask experts in your field for help. What certification can you pass the quickest?  Which will have the biggest impact? Any certification will help.

Write an article for a trade journal

Trade journals and trade web sites are hungry for articles.  Doing an interview article for a trade journal is a great way to introduce yourself to top executives in your field.  “How To” articles show your expertise. You can attach the first page of your articles to the back of your resume.

Being known as an expert will make your job search easier.  It will also get you more money.  Don’t wait until you are out of work to become an expert.  Start working on it now.

Something to do today

Ask around and find out who are the experts in your field.  Find out how they became experts.  You can even call them and ask for advice on how to become an expert.  They will feel flattered.

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Why do I make less (or more) money at this job?

Daydreams, plans and the future

Inventing your next job

Religion, politics, sexuality and job hunting

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Posted in Accomplishments, Networking, Promotions, Resumes, Training

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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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