GadBall Blog | GadBlog

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, just over 4 million Americans lost their jobs in 2009 alone. For those millions of people, a new reality has emerged that may include stress, financial difficulties, and uncertainty about the future. Many sociologists have written about the long-term psychological effects of prolonged unemployment. One problem that’s often mentioned is the loss of identity experienced by people who are out of work.

Think about it: When you meet someone socially, one of the first five things you will probably ask them is, “So, what do you do?” or “Where do you work?” For someone who has lost his job, this question suddenly becomes difficult to answer. It’s a lot easier to say, “I’m an analyst at XYZ Bank” than to say, “I used to work as a financial analyst, but I got laid off last year.”

Because it can be difficult to retain your identity through a period of unemployment, it’s particularly important to surround yourself with people who know you as more than just an employee. Whether it be your immediate family, spouse, former coworkers, or closest friends, spending time with people who fundamentally understand, like, and respect you—regardless of where you work at the moment—is critical.

Not only does time spent with family and friends help you to retain a positive sense of yourself, but it can also provide you with ideas for promoting yourself during your job search. Talents that may seem common to you often stand out to your friends. For instance, a friend may say to you, “You’re so good at organizing events and connecting people, you should be running a nonprofit somewhere!” Or, “You’re fantastic at explaining things—have you ever considered becoming a teacher?” The strengths that friends identify in you can be helpful as you market yourself through cover letters and resumes.

As quickly as possible in your job search, it’s important to develop an answer to the question, “What do you do?” For the person mentioned above, an appropriate answer might be, “I’m looking for a financial analysis opportunity with a large bank.” Objective statements are no longer fashionable to use on resumes, but it’s great to have one ready whenever someone asks about your career! Succinctly summarizing the goal of your job search not only helps new acquaintances understand your situation but also allows your family and friends to think clearly about who might be able to help you from their network.

People who know and love you provide invaluable support during a time of unemployment. Heed what they have to say about your strengths, and focus their efforts to help by having a clear goal for your job search.

When it comes to business, people want to feel safe and have reliable employees beside. That’s why they often recruit people through recommendations and it is your friends who can help you in your job search and spread the word about your talents and strengths. It’s not a rapid process but we’ll show you how to make it more effective.

1. Making your relationships work for you.
If we take a look into our address books, it turns out that each of us has a lot of friends and acquaintances who we haven’t reached out for quite a long time. Some of them are from school, some are from college, a hobby-group, a sport club, previous work, a volunteer organization etc. All of them do something, work somewhere and have a lot of friends. So it makes good sense to talk to them about your job search.

2. Establishing new connections.
It’s not so easy to make new contacts and build new relationships but it’s an essential component of any successful job search. Work out a system of expanding your connections – meeting new people both on your own and through third persons. There’s always a good possibility to join a professional association, attend business and cultural events where you can easily find connections that can lead to jobs or other work-related opportunities.

Read More »

Taking into account requests from our readers, we started a series of articles titled ‘Resume Makeover Series.’ The objective is to take you through the complete process of writing a resume, with best practices for each stage.

In our last article we advised that you should start your resume with a Power Statement. In this piece we round-off that discussion and talk about the resume Summary Section, which includes your Power Statement plus a few more bullet points about your most relevant skills/characteristics.

We recommend starting your resume with a Summary Statement, which is like your personal advertisement. It should give the reader a concise overview of your experience, skills and achievements. When writing your summary statement make sure that you focus on the job you are applying to, its main requirements and your unique selling points. Typically, the Summary Section is about 3-5 bullet points.

Read More »

Most of those who are in transition today are looking for a new job the same way they did the last time they were in the job market. And that’s a terrible mistake. In fact, it’s almost certain to lead to career cardiac arrest or what most of us call unemployment.

Why is that? Because today’s (and tomorrow’s) workplace is profoundly different from any that has ever existed in the United States. Just as the Great Depression changed the behavior of a whole generation of Americans, this Great Recession is changing the behavior of this generation of employers.

What we’re now seeing in corporate America is not a reduction in force; it’s a reduction in structure. There are fewer jobs, and those positions that have disappeared will never come back. But that’s not all. Even as they are downsizing their organization charts, America’s employers are also upgrading their staff. They’re trading out “C” level performers for “A” level talent.

Those two facts of work change everything. They mean that the days of the “come as you are” job market are over. You can no longer find a job the old fashioned way. And you never will be able to again.

We’re all familiar with the traditional approach to job search. It was a simple 4-step process:
• Step 1. You wrote up your resume.
• Step 2. You sent your resume out to a bunch of employers.
• Step 3. You did a little networking around the edges.
• Step 4. You landed a new job that was usually equal to and often better than the one you had before.

For 60 years or more, those four steps were the way Americans managed their careers and secured their hold on the American Dream. And they are now as obsolete as buggy whips and carbon paper.

The come as you are job market has morphed into the “only the best need apply” job market. Companies will no longer hire qualified people for their openings. This Great Recession has convinced them that they cannot survive and prosper in a global marketplace with that kind of employment strategy. Instead, if they want to be around to enjoy the recovery, they’re going to have to hire the best qualified talent there is.

What’s that mean for you and me? We have to change the four steps in our job search methodology. Here’s what we have to do now:

Step 1. Resuscitate your career. If you’re out of work, your career is sick. As with a physical illness, that doesn’t necessarily mean you’ve done anything wrong. It does, however, require that you get yourself well. You must upgrade your skill set, expand and enrich your network of professional contacts, add powerful new ancillary capabilities and do all of the other things that establishes a fit career. And you must do that before you start looking for a job.

Step 2. You must focus only on jobs where you are best qualified and then tailor your resume for each of those specific openings. They days of shotgun applications and generic resumes are also over.

Step 3. You must practice networking as the word indicates you should. It’s netWORK, not net-get-around-to-it-whenever-it’s-convenient. And you must network online as well as off.

Step 4. You must pick an employment opportunity that provides two forms of compensation. The near term paycheck you need to meet your financial obligations and the ongoing flexibility, time and support you need to invest in the continuous improvement of your career. Why do you need both? Because in the 21st Century world of work, you’ll likely be repeating these four new steps in the next three-to-five years.

Thanks for reading,
Peter Weddle
Visit me on CareerFitness.com

Article courtesy of the Recruiting Blogswap, a content exchange service sponsored by CollegeRecruiter.com, a leading site for college students looking for internships and recent graduates searching for entry level jobs and other career opportunities.

In today’s ever changing business world, we are constantly striving to stay on top of industry trends and best practices to operate more efficiently. The area of human resources has not gone untouched by change, and we need to address changes specific to the recruitment process. A company is only as strong as the weakest link, so it is imperative that an organization place emphasis on finding the right candidate. Finding the ideal candidate starts with reviewing resumes. Whether you are working with a staffing agency or conducting your own search, it is important to keep the following tips in mind when reviewing resumes.

First, the process of reviewing resumes does not begin with a resume. More specifically, the process of reviewing resumes starts with a solid job description. One must thoroughly understand the scope of the position before he or she can begin searching for qualified candidates. It is sometimes helpful to create a list of the most important qualifications you seek in an ideal candidate. This is sometimes referred to as a “candidate profile” and should include selection criteria such as desired educational level, relevant experience, and required skill sets.

The job description and candidate profile are not only important for reviewing resumes, they are also essential in the ad writing process. You will need both accurate and detailed information to develop an effective ad that will attract the ideal candidate. In preparation for the resume review, one will want to spend an adequate amount of time writing the ad and posting on the appropriate websites. Spending time in preparation will enable you to save time in the process of reviewing resumes. More specifically, effective ads and placement will narrow down the selection process more accurately.

Once the preparation process is complete and your inbox starts to fill with resumes, you are ready to start reviewing resumes. In reviewing resumes, it is important to be able to devote a block of time so the qualifications and credentials of candidates can be compared to one another. In the initial review of resumes, it is important to note that as technology has advanced so too has the submission of resumes. Due to the change in submission of resumes from snail mail to email, individuals reviewing resumes have modified the traditional screening process. For example, no longer does the quality of stationary and appearance of envelope play a role in the review of resumes. Although there have been some changes to the traditional screening process, other techniques have gone unchanged. For example, proper spelling and grammar still weigh heavily in the review of resumes.

To start the actual review of resumes, you will want to skim each resume to obtain an overall impression of the candidate’s resume. The resume should have an overall flawless presentation with easy to read formatting and organization, correct use of grammar, and proper spelling. If the candidate’s resume passes the initial inspection, you will want to review it further to assess whether or not the candidate meets your top credentials outlined in your candidate profile. More specifically, you will want to look for relevant educational and work experiences. While reviewing relevant educational and work experiences, you will want to keep a focus on the most recent educational and work experiences. Although it is important to look at recent experiences, you will also want to consider the stability in work history when identifying potential candidates.

If a candidate fulfills your top credentials, you will want to review it more thoroughly concentrating on such things as the applicant’s specific skill sets, achievements, and extracurricular activities. In this step of the resume review process, you are also looking for red flags (i.e. employment gaps, multiple shifts in career paths, and evidence of decreasing job responsibilities). Once you have reviewed all resumes in the search of red flags, you will want to identify the most qualified applicants. The most qualified candidates thus far should be contacted for an initial phone screen.

After the initial phone screens, you will be well on your way to successfully finding the right candidate. Just remember that finding the right candidate starts with reviewing resumes.

Author Byline: A company is only as strong as the weakest link, so it is imperative that an organization place emphasis on finding the right candidate. Author Website: http://www.lakeshorestaffing.com/employers/resources/tips_for_reviewing_resumes/

Article courtesy of the Recruiting Blogswap, a content exchange service sponsored by CollegeRecruiter.com, a leading site for college students looking for internships and recent graduates searching for entry level jobs and other career opportunities.

It is amazing that with all of the advice available on writing a great cover letter, mistakes continue to be made. This isn’t to say that you have to be perfect 100% of the time, but you do need to strive for perfection.

So how to you kill a great cover letter?

Grammar and Spelling: Not only is this the fastest way to ruin a cover letter, it is also the most preventable. Proofreading your cover letter will ensure that you won’t be rejected for preventable mistakes. It only take a few minutes and it can make all the difference in landing an interview.

Informal Language: Your cover letter is a formal piece of correspondence and not the place for informal language. Avoid slang and conversational language and ensure that the tone of your letter stays professional.

Generic Text: Another major mistake made by job hunters. For many people, the job hunt is a numbers game. It is easy to blast out resumes to every job posting that you come across, with a generic cover letter attached. However, if you don’t give the recruiter the sense that you are interested in their company, success will be hard to come by. Tailor your cover letter to the specific company and you will have more “luck”.

Lying: This is self explanatory. If you are caught lying, you won’t even make it to the interview. Even worse, if your lie is caught after you are hired, it is grounds for immediate dismissal.

Unsigned Letter: A simple mistake but one that is easy to make. If you forget to sign your cover letter, it will give the wrong impression to the interviewer. Double check that each letter you send our has your signature.

Missing Contact Information: If you don’t let them know how to contact you, how do you expect to land an interview?

No Objective: Your cover letter is the start of your personal sales pitch. If the employer doesn’t know what you are selling, or even what job you are applying to, then it is easy to discount you as an applicant. Make sure that you state up front who you are, what you have to offer, and what job you are applying to.

Too Long: You don’t want to overwhelm the reader at first sight. Keep your cover letter brief. It should be no more than one page and should contain no more than five paragraphs.

Keep these pitfalls in mind and you are on your way to a perfect cover letter.

Trevor Wilson is an author and consultant who works with new graduates preparing to enter the work force for the first time. His site, Gradversity.com, provides daily advice on job hunting, networking, and resume/cover letter writing tailored to the Entry Level Job seeker. His first book, Overcoming Gradversity: How to Break Into the Entry Level Job Market, was published in 2008 and is available now.

Article courtesy of the Recruiting Blogswap, a content exchange service sponsored by CollegeRecruiter.com, a leading site for college students looking for internships and recent graduates searching for entry level jobs and other career opportunities.

Despite the down economy, there are plenty of jobs and internships to be had for anyone willing to work smartly and diligently to meet more hiring authorities.

You can do it the old-fashioned way — networking in person and by phone — or using new social media, like Facebook.

Here are two recent success stories from job seekers who did both, with lessons you can use today …

1) Work the Phone and the Room

“I started my job search in late August 2008 and had a new job on October 13. In addition, I had two other offers and each was $25,000 more than my previous position. I eventually ended up with a $40,000 pay raise. I count my lucky stars every day,” says Christopher Kelly, who now works at Burlington, Mass.-based nSight.

How did Kelly do it? Two ways …

First, he picked up the phone. “I called my top-tier employers before sending any resume. In fact, every interview I received was the result of a proactive phone call.”

Kelly researched employers using sites like MarksGuide.com and LinkedIn.com.

How many calls did Kelly make? “I’m not sure, but my September phone bill was for 3500 minutes,” adding that he used downtime while driving to make as many calls as possible.

Can you make 3500 minutes of phone calls today? No.

This week? Not likely.

But can you spend 35 minutes a day on the phone for 30 days? That’s 3500 minutes.

And that’s very doable. So, are you willing to make 35 minutes of phone calls today, to build relationships with people who can help you get hired? The answer should be yes.

Second, Kelly went to networking events. “The job I landed was the result of attending a mixer sponsored by a local industry association. I met someone who was looking for the exact background I have. I called him 9:00 a.m. the next day and set up an interview. I had an offer sheet 14 days later,” he says.

How did Kelly connect with this person? “I talked to as many people as possible. One person I spoke to told me he had just met someone looking for someone like me, and that man pointed me to my current employer,” he says.

To sum up, Kelly worked very hard — but for less than two months — to build relationships, by phone and in person, until meeting the manager who hired him.

2) Use Social Media Smartly

When Jamie Favreau, from Warren, Mich., updated her Facebook profile in mid-December 2008, she didn’t know how quickly it would lead to a new position.

“I changed my status on Facebook to ‘Looking to volunteer for a new non-profit,’” she says. That evening, a friend who saw her new status brought Favreau’s name up to a hiring manager, who later called to interview her.

Within three weeks, Favreau was working as an intern for The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, doing media relations, social media, and public relations.

Favreau’s job search was simple, and can be boiled down to three key actions …

First, she built her network before she needed it.

The woman who discovered her status change had to first be in her circle of friends on Facebook. So Favreau was smart to build a network of connections on Facebook, in addition to her network on LinkedIn and Twitter.

How’s your network? Could it be bigger and better?

If so, try adding one person per day for one month. That’s 30 new connections — 60 more eyeballs to spot employment opportunities for you.

Second, Favreau used the right keywords, putting the phrase “social media” in the Info section of her Facebook profile.

Keywords are simply the words people search for online. If the phrases describing your ideal job aren’t in your online profiles, employers are less likely to find you.

Tip: Make a master list of keywords found in job postings that appeal to you. Then, include all relevant keywords in your profile on Facebook, ZoomInfo.com, and other sites.

Third, Favreau started working before she was hired.

After researching the needs of her prospective employer, Favreau did something smart. “I created a social network plan and I brought that to the interview.”

What did the hiring mangers think of her bringing a sample of work she hadn’t yet been hired to produce? “Their reaction was, ‘Oh, you know what you’re doing,’ and it was well-received,” says Favreau, who got the internship shortly thereafter.

Both of these successful job searches required thinking, research and diligent effort, something anyone can emulate.

Why not you, starting today?

Kevin Donlin is Creator of TheSimpleJobSearch.com. Since 1996, he has provided job-search help to more than 20,000 people. Author of 3 books, Kevin has been interviewed by The New York Times, Fox News, CBS Radio and others. His latest product, The Simple Job Search System, is available at http://www.collegerecruiter.com/guaranteed-resumes.php

Article courtesy of the Recruiting Blogswap, a content exchange service sponsored by CollegeRecruiter.com, a leading site for college students looking for internships and recent graduates searching for entry level jobs and other career opportunities.

It’s very hard to write your own resume because a resume is a macro view of your life, but you live your life at the micro level, obsessing about daily details that have no bearing on your resume. For that reason, a lot of people hire someone to help them. After all, spending money on a resume writer is one of the few expenditures that will have good return right away. But if you’re writing your resume on your own, the first thing you’ll have to do is make some mental shifts. You need to rethink the goals of a resume, and rethink the rules of a resume in order to approach the project like the best of the resume professionals. That means not making the most common resume mistakes, and not breaking a few key rules.

Steps

1. Don’t focus on your responsibilities, focus on what you achieved. A resume is not your life story. No one cares. If your life story were so interesting, you’d have a book deal. The only things that should be on your resume are achievements. Anyone can do their job, but only a small percentage of the population can do their job well, wherever they go.
   • The best way to show that you did your job well is from achievements. The best achievement is a promotion because it’s an objective way to show that you impressed the people you work for. The next best way to show objective measures is to present quantified achievements. Most people do not think in terms of quantified achievements when they are in the job, but on the resume, that’s the only part of the job that matters. No one can see that you were a “good team player” on your resume unless you can say “established a team to solve problem x and increased sales x%” or “joined under-performing team and helped that team beat production delivery dates by three weeks.”
   • Steer clear of expressions like “Duties included,” “Responsibilities included,” or “Responsible for.” That’s job-description language, and not what employers are looking for.[1] Use action verbs instead, but minimize the use of “I” and articles (the, an, a).[2]Write a self evaluation and for each achievement, ask yourself: “What does this accomplishment say about me, and what I can do for this employer I want to work for?”
2. Don’t make your resume a moral statement; it’s a marketing document. The best marketing documents show the product in the very best light, which means using whatever most outrageous tactics possible to make you look good. As long as you are not lying, you will be fine. Here’s an example: You join a software company that just launched a product and the product had so many problems that they had to hire someone to handle the calls. You start doing the tech support, and you work tons of overtime because the calls are so backed up. You clean up the phone queue and then you start taking long lunches because there’s not a lot to do, and then you start job hunting because the job is boring.Here’s how you summarize this job on your resume: Assumed management responsibility for tech support and decreased call volume 20%. How do you know 20%? Who knows? It was probably more. But you can’t quantify exactly, so err on the safe side. But if you just say “Did tech support for a software company” no one knows you did a good job.
3. Keep it all on one page. The idea of a resume is to get someone to call you. Talk with you on the phone. Offer you an interview. So a resume is like a first date. You only show your best stuff and you don’t show it all. Some people dump everything they can think of onto their resume, but a resume is not the only chance you’ll have to sell yourself. In fact, the interview is where the hard-core selling takes place. So you only put your very best achievements on the resume. Sure, there will be other questions people will want answers to, but that will make them call you. And that’s good, right?
   • For those of you who can’t bear to take off the twenty extra lines on your resume because you think the interviewer has to see every single thing about you right away, consider that a hiring manager has to sift through a pile of resumes to figure out which person to interview; each resume gets about a ten-second look. If you think you need a longer resume, give someone one page of your resume and have them look at it for ten seconds. Ask them what they remember; it won’t be much. They are not going to remember any more information in ten seconds if you give them two pages to look at; ten seconds is ten seconds.
   • If you have a long job history behind you, beware of age discrimination. Employers might think you’re too expensive if you have loads of experience. If you’re at the senior level, list about 15 years of job history (no more) and don’t provide the date of your college graduation if it was more than about 10 years ago.[3]
4. Ditch the line about references on request. It’s implied. Of course, if someone wants a reference, you will give one. No one presumes that you will not. So when you write that you will provide a reference you seem to not understand how the game is played.
   • Don’t list references on your resume at all; if they are requested along with your resume, list them on a separate sheet.[4]
   • Bonus tip: If you have an excellent reference, like a CEO of a Fortune 500 company who vacations with your Mom, have the reference call before you even go to the interview. Sets the tone for the employer to think you are amazing.
5. Tread lightly on the personal interests line. Your personal interests are not there to make you look interesting. They are there to get you an interview. Every line on your resume is there to get you an interview. So only list personal interests that reveal a quality that will help you meet the employer’s needs. If you are in sports marketing, then by all means, list that you kayak. If you were an Olympic athlete, put it down because it shows focus and achievement. If you are a mediocre hobbyist, leave it off. Personal interests that don’t make you stand out as an achiever do not help you. And personal interests that are weird make you look weird and you don’t know if your interviewer likes weird or not, so leave weird off the resume.
6. Don’t be a designer unless you are. If you have more than three fonts on your resume and you’re not a designer, you’ve botched the layout. If design was easy, no one would get paid for it. Recognize your strengths and keep design elements to the bare minimum. And leave Photoshop out of it: Just because you know how to use the shading tools doesn’t mean you know how to use them well. Stay away from overused templates (like those in Microsoft Word) because you won’t stand out, and it makes you look completely generic.[5]

Video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rg8A1WbCRXs

Tips

• Tailor your resume to each position. One-size-fits-all resumes should be avoided, unless you’re casting a very wide net (versus applying for a specific company or position).
• If you are only putting achievements on your resume, you are going to be hard-pressed to fill a whole page. That’s okay. Anything on your resume that is not an achievement is wasting space, anyway, because you don’t know what a hiring manager will look at first—and if you have ten good achievements and three mediocre lines about your life story, the hiring manager may only read those three lines—so remove them.
• It’s very hard to see your achievements from the trenches; you might think you did not have achievements because your boss doesn’t ask you to do achievements, your boss asks you to do tasks and projects. But you need to recognize that you do not see achievements and ask for help to see them. A resume coach, or even a friend, can help you to see them more clearly.
• List items in order of importance or relevance to the reader. Many people write the dates first, and while dates are important, they’re not the most important.[6]
  • Job history: Title/position, name of employer, city/state of employer, dates of employment.
    • If the company you work for is unknown, or the nature of the company isn’t obvious from the name, describe the business, note its revenues and maybe how old it is; otherwise, a recruiter or hiring manager will have to look up the company description, which takes up more of their time.[7]
  • Education: Name of degree (spelled out: Bachelor of _____) in name of major, name of university, city/state of university, graduation year, followed by peripheral information, such as minor and GPA.
• Accompany your resume with a short and succinct cover letter/email.

Warnings

• List your most recent job first. Chronological order is only a good idea if you are looking to get hired to go back in time. Otherwise you look like you’re bucking resume writing convention in order to hide something, which you probably are, but you have to do it with a better sleight of hand than that.

• Spell check your resume. Then check the spelling yourself. Then have someone else proofread it. Resumes with typographical errors often automatically get moved to the bottom of the pile. If you can’t be trusted to pay attention to such an important detail in your job search, what does it say about your potential job performance?

Related wikiHows

• How to Write a Self Evaluation
• How to Write a Cover Letter
• How to Make a Resume
• How to Ask for a Reference from an Employer
• How to Get a Job

Sources and Citations

• blog.penelopetrunk.com: How to edit your resume like a professional resume writer – Original source, shared with permission.
• blog.penelopetrunk.com: 6 most violated resume writing rules – Original source, shared with permission.

1. ↑ http://www.quintcareers.com/resume_mistakes.html
2. ↑ http://career-advice.monster.com/resume-writing-basics/Common-Resume-Blunders/home.aspx
3. ↑ http://www.quintcareers.com/older_worker_strategies.html
4. ↑ http://www.quintcareers.com/resume_mistakes.html
5. ↑ http://www.quintcareers.com/resume_mistakes.html
6. ↑ http://www.quintcareers.com/resume_mistakes.html
7. ↑ http://www.forbes.com/2001/11/01/1101resume.html

Article provided by wikiHow, a collaborative writing project to build the world’s largest, highest quality how-to manual. Please edit this article and find author credits at the original wikiHow article on How to Avoid Common Resume Mistakes. All content on wikiHow can be shared under a Creative Commons license.

Another candidate with inappropriate material on his MySpace… who is now no longer a candidate.

It’s REALLY important to sanitize your social network pages (anything on MySpace, FaceBook, YouTube, Twitter, etc.) while you are looking for a job in medical sales, pharmaceutical sales, clinical diagnostics sales, laboratory sales, pathology sales, imaging sales, medical device sales, cellular products sales, molecular products sales, or biotech sales, which is why I have addressed this in previous posts.

Why? According to a Vault.com survey, which I found in Net Etiquette for Job Seekers, 44% of employers surveyed looked up potential employees on social networking sites and 82% of those employers would think twice about hiring candidates with something perceived as negative in their on-line profiles. And FYI: 39% of employers have searched the on-line profiles of current employees, so don’t think you’re good to go after you’ve got the job. It may seem unfair and an invasion of your personal social life, but it becomes fair game once you’ve put it out there in public.

Additional great advice in this article–not only make sure your sites are “PG,” but also make sure they are complete, since they are serving as another resume. For instance, identify yourself as a healthcare salesperson (or even better, as a laboratory sales rep) rather than just say you’re “in sales.”

If that many employers are using social networks to gather information, I would imagine that any recruiter worth his or her salt uses them, too. (I know I do.) Social networking sites are one of the gold mines for finding candidates.

Social networks can be general or focused on a particular group, and it’s worth it to companies and candidates to find out how to effectively use them. The New Way to Network for a Job offers an overview that shows you how important they have already become and solid advice for how to use them to your advantage.

By the way, no one will tell you that this is what killed your chances…managers will just assume that you have bad judgment and want nothing to do with you.

Article courtesy of the Recruiting Blogswap, a content exchange service sponsored by CollegeRecruiter.com, a leading site for college students looking for internships and recent graduates searching for entry level jobs and other career opportunities.

Article by the Medical Recruiter
Website: http://www.phcconsulting.com/WordPress/2008/06/24/myspace-killed-the-candidatecritical-job-interview-tip/

We’re in some tough economic times right now, and that can make it that much harder to find a job. Although laboratory sales, medical device sales, imaging sales, pathology sales, molecular products sales, cellular products sales, and biotechnology products sales are much less susceptible to economic downturns than pharmaceutical sales, any person searching for a position in healthcare sales can have a hard time.

To help you out, Fortune magazine has 7 tips for job hunting in a tougher market. They include:

1. Request more face-to-face meetings. Get your face in front of recruiters and your network instead of relying on e-mails and phone calls. It will make more of an impression.

2. Step up your job-search activity. This makes sense. In many ways, a job search (like sales calls) is a numbers game. Increase your odds by increasing your activity.

3. Try to be as flexible as you can. Consider contract work, part-time work, or starting at a lesser salary than you were hoping for. It gets your foot in the door for other opportunities later. Besides, less money is better than no money, right?

4. Consider relocating. Top jobs aren’t always where you are. I love the idea of relocating and expanding your horizons…trying something new.

5. Scour the hidden job market. Many jobs aren’t advertised. Be proactive. Use your network. Or contact employers directly. They might appreciate your initiative.

6. Spend very little of your time on Internet job boards and help-wanted ads. Look, but don’t focus. Everyone’s looking here.

7. Take advantage of social networking sites. Personally, I love LinkedIn. But also, use MySpace or Facebook as part of your networking tactics. Just be careful to keep it professional.

One tip they missed: In tougher job markets, a medical sales recruiter is a gold mine of job opportunities and information.

Here are some more great tips to heat up your job search. One last great idea:

You never know when or where you may meet a prospective employer. Memory sticks, flash-drives, or email versions of your resume on your Blackberry, Treo or iPhone are must-haves in today’s volatile employment market.

Good luck.

Article by Peggy McKee, Owner/Recruiter
Website: http://www.phcconsulting.com/

Article courtesy of the Recruiting Blogswap, a content exchange service sponsored by CollegeRecruiter.com, a leading site for college students looking for internships and recent graduates searching for entry level jobs and other career opportunities.