• 2-minute read •
Pop quiz: What do Mr. Miyagi, Yoda and Professor Dumbledore have in common? Aside from being pretty badass film icons, they’re each incredibly gifted mentors.
True, the chances of meeting someone who can transform you into a karate master or Jedi Knight are slim. But you can find a mentor to help show you the way forward.
“A mentor can help you establish your career direction and set long-term goals,” says Beth Zefo, co-author of Grad to Great: Discover the Secrets to Success in Your First Career.
And the great thing about being in a college environment is having access and exposure to so many people who are more than qualified to help guide you through the job search process, and later, the working world.
Showing posts with label Find. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Find. Show all posts
5 Ways To Tap Into Career Intuition
• 2-minute read •
Do you believe in intuition? Do you realize you can tap into your own future and "see" your next successful career step?
Perhaps you're smart, successful, practical, realistic and don't believe in what you can't see. But then why are you in this mess? Why are you rethinking your life? Why are you afraid?
You carry the solution to all of your problems right inside of you. It's called intuition. And usually, whatever problem you think you have in front of you - is actually your solution.
Do you believe in intuition? Do you realize you can tap into your own future and "see" your next successful career step?
Perhaps you're smart, successful, practical, realistic and don't believe in what you can't see. But then why are you in this mess? Why are you rethinking your life? Why are you afraid?
You carry the solution to all of your problems right inside of you. It's called intuition. And usually, whatever problem you think you have in front of you - is actually your solution.
Finding a good job is merely a numbers game!
Getting a good job has more to do with numbers than a great resume or the best experience.
This doesn’t mean you can just throw anything together and get good results, although you may still get some results. What I’m saying is a reasonably good resume and cover letter, and proper follow up will do more for you than trying to get that magic resume to win the Blue Ribbon at the World’s Fair.
Looking for a job is like a salesperson selling a product. A salesperson is competing with other professional salespeople and each of their products is as good as his/hers or even better. However, a good salesperson can outdo the competition by following some simple rules, and the main thing, is to have a great attitude with determination and persistence.
You can have a mediocre resume and cover letter but with determination and persistence outdo others that are better qualified than you and have better looking resumes and cover letters.
Frank Bettger, a salesman in the ’30’s wrote a book “How I went from Failure to Success in Selling” told a story when he was to give a speech on salesmanship. He never gave a speech before and he was terrified. He got up on the podium and said three times “See the People.” “See the People.” “See the People.” Then he walked off. Later in the book he said that was the best advice he could give anybody and he shortened the “See the People.” To STP.
There you have it in a nut shell, “See the People.” Or STP.
The cover letter and resume are not substitutes from getting in front of the hiring authority. In fact, the cover letter and resume are vehicles to use to get you in front of the employer. The cover letter and resume are your advertisement. They are the enticement and inducement for an employer to contact you for a job interview. You send these out so you have an opportunity to have an employer know something about you and want to know more.
In every company, you are dealing with people who are responsible for hiring and you need to see them. You may say, “Great” but how do you get to see them? My answer is anyway you can. Find a way. Write letters, telephone or email them, visit them at their place of work. You need to get in front of them.
Here is a step by step approach on how to do this.
The most important thing for you to remember is you are dealing with people. People vary in personality and character. A book called “Please Understand Me” is about Character and Temperament Types by David Keirsey and Marilyn Bates. They say there are 16 Character Types. In reality, there may be even be a hundred types, the point is this; people are different. What appeals to one person may turn another person off.
You may, in your mind, have a resume that is outstanding but the person who looks at it, isn’t impressed.
There is no perfect resume, cover letter, interview tricks, perfect job, etc.
Let’s pretend a moment that you get a resume book shows 100 outstanding resumes and each of these resumes were sent to one employer for the same position. Well, how good is this outstanding resume now? Each outstanding or perfect resume is now competing with 99 other outstanding resumes. Now, do you see my point?
One can’t know what will impress the employer’s hiring authority. They may select your resume because they see a school you went to that they also attended. Perhaps it’s a company both of you worked for once but at different times. It may simply be the appearance of your resume.
There are books that say employment recruiters are not persuaded by unusual or other slick tactics. One should stay with the tried and true conservative approach. This is just generalizing. After reviewing 75 white colored resumes in a row, one may just jump on an odd looking resume or a different colored one just to break up the monotony.
The same employment selector can reject your colored resume on Monday but accept it on Wednesday. The reason, people feel differently every day. One Monday, they may have a headache, worried about some problem at home and on Wednesday be completely relaxed and in good humor.
So how do you play the numbers game and come out on top.
The first caveat is there is no guarantee. The following may work most of the time, but may not work at any given time.
Someone once said “Timing is everything.” A cover letter/resume received on Tuesday and rejected could have been accepted if read on Friday. Life is just that way. Just as you can make a good decision doesn’t guarantee a good outcome. But, this doesn’t negate that you make a good decision based on the available facts, but the outcome is outside your control. However prudent decision-making improves your odds of a good outcome.
The same can be said with applying good skills to the job search process. It won’t guarantee you a job but it will improve your odds immensely.
Here are the best things you can do for yourself for the job search.
Be organized. Keep good records. This will do more for you than anything else. If you find a help wanted ad that you think you’d like to apply for, clip the ad, attach it to letter size paper, or keep a note book and date the ad and what periodical it came from. Usually it’s your local newspaper. You can file it alphabetically, by job category, location or whatever, but keep a cross reference of it.
Keep a log of every piece of mail you send out. You want to include Employer name, address, phone number, date, a column for resume, cover letter, and a column for other or miscellaneous. For example, If you mail a cover letter and a resume, you would check two columns, for resume and cover letter, and you would fill in the employer information. You also want to include a column for follow-up and results.
The idea here, is to keep as accurate and as much information as necessary to track what you are doing.
You will probably have more than one type of resume and cover letter made up, so you also need to indicate which resume and cover letter you sent. You can put a number or letter on it, anything, so you will know later what you sent.
Note: You should make up at least five different types of resumes. Each resume should be done a little differently and highlighting different points. You don’t want one resume to try to do all things. The same goes for cover letters. You can make a template and then modify off the template.
There are many tactics and strategies on how to look for a job but none would be of greater value than your attitude. Your attitude is going to be the single biggest factor in what happens to you in the job search. Looking for a job is difficult work. Using our salesperson metaphor, a salesperson has to endure mostly rejection. It will not be unusual for you to get 95% or greater rejection rate. Don’t despair. This is typical. You will hear “NO” many more times than “yes”. Get used to it.
There are books out there that will tell you that networking is the best way to get a job. Others will say trash your resume. Other books will site that only 5 to 7% of jobs come from the help wanted section. They will also tell you that most jobs are not advertised. All of these books are correct up to a point.
People get jobs in all kinds of ways. The so called ideal way to find a job is to use as many tactics and approaches possible. This will enhance your chances of getting a response. Of course the ideal way is the one that eventually got the job for you but it will more than likely be a different ideal way than someone else’s ideal way.
Some books will tell you that sending out “confetti” letters, these are letters sent out in numbers saying the same thing and just using numbers is not very effective. They say that you may only get a response rate of 1% or 2 %. But if you sent out 500 letters, 1% is 5 responses and that’s 5 more response that you may otherwise not have had.
One of the best selling books on the job search says that sending out resumes at random is one of the worst ways to do the job hunt because the success rate is only 7%. It also says that private employment agencies is not good because they only have a 5-24% success rate and answering newspapers have only a 5-24% success rate. But if you add all of these up and utilize every one of them, which is what I am recommending, the totals are 17% to 55%. I’ll take this percentage anytime.
Taking the low end, if you made one hundred contacts through mail outs, answering newspaper want ads and going through employment agencies, you will get 17 responses per every 100. Out of that 17, you will probably get 5 invitations to an interview and out of this possibly 2 job offers. Not bad. Increase these numbers and see what you will get.
The more things you have working for you the better are the chances of you getting the job. Employment agencies may be a long shot but you have one or more people working on your behalf to get that job.
Let’s suppose an employer puts a help wanted ad in the newspaper for a clerical position. Let’s say the city that the employer does its business in is a city of 250,000. Even when the economic conditions are good, an employer of 200 employees or more is more than likely to receive about a hundred or more resumes.
Some will trickle in on Monday with the bulk of them showing up on Wednesday and Thursday of the first week and then a few more will trickle in even into the next week.
The person who is to review the resumes will just glance at the cover letter and resume perhaps for 20 seconds or so, perhaps even less. The object is not to include qualified candidates but to exclude them. The reason for this is that it is not cost effective or time feasible to spend too much time trying to figure out who the best candidate is out of 100 pieces of mail.
So, the reviewer will choose criteria that will reject the paperwork. They may choose to reject resumes without cover letters, to reject those that do not have eye appeal or some other appearance problem. If they find a resume that has misspelled words and poorly organized. Perhaps it’s too difficult to read. Maybe it doesn’t have an objective or an employment overview. The point is each employer has their own criteria to reject a cover letter or resume. They want to eliminate as many as they can so they can reduce the number down to 10 to 15. This will be manageable and easier for them to look the paperwork over more thoroughly.
Because of the selective process, the chances are good that the best candidate for the position was rejected.
People who are more likely to get the job are better skilled at the job search. Many quality workers aren’t good at looking for work and putting together their cover letters and resumes in an eye catching way.
You could be theoretically the best job candidate and have an excellent cover letter and resume and still be rejected in the selection process. The reason, the whole job search and job selection process is very human and fallible.
A professional salesperson knows how to work the numbers game. They use what is called the “Law of Large Numbers.” This law simply states that the more numbers you contact the better chances of you getting “so many sales” irrespective of your salesmanship, product or other situation.
Many sales training manuals will say something like this; contact 10 people get 3 interviews and make 1 sale. This number ratio will probably not prove out with only ten contacts but when you make hundreds of calls or send out sales approach letters, the numbers will show up over the long hall as reliable and consistent.
Do everything you can to put together a good cover letter and resume. Prepare yourself well for the job interview, but when it comes down to it, it’s all numbers. Don’t allow your ego to get involved and feel you are being rejected.
I am going to give you some suggestions, tactics and strategies and that will help those numbers, but after all is said and done, it’s only the numbers that count.
I have asked many people who have responded to a help wanted ad in the newspaper and asked them what their result was. The answer I get most often is they usually get a postcard telling them they were not selected.
I then ask them “How many resumes did you mail to the prospective employer.” They look at me incredulously and say, “Why, one, of course.” I then reply why you didn’t mail 5 or 10 to the employer. They usually reply, “Well, why?
I explain to them that there is nothing preventing them to send more than one resume to an employer. It’s sort of like buying more than one lottery ticket to play the lottery. Your chances are better the more often you participate. I tell them to send different cover letters and resumes on different types and colors of paper and mail them on different ways. What you want to do is give each mail out a different look. By doing this you increase your chances that your letter and resume will be selected. This may especially happen if there is more than one person reviewing the resumes.
Another thing you can do is send a letter and resume to the president, the director of human resources and the hiring person with cc and the appropriate names on each piece. What this does for you is get your name in front of three people and by cc the other names shows the individual that you mailed to that the other people to one to. This could make the HR person and the manager of the department look at your resume more closely because they see the president’s name is on it.
Chances are good the president won’t see the resume and the administration assistant will just route it down to the HR department, but now you have three contact names for you to follow up with on the telephone.
There are some books that tell you the best approach to the job market is through the telephone. What they propose is you cold call a prospective employer and give them a hundred word dialogue about who you are and your qualification. They usually give a variety of responses for you to say when the person you are talking to says no to you.
Here’s the problem with this approach. When a person answers the phone, they have their minds usually on something else. When you start talking you are trying to break into their thoughts and have them focus on what you are saying. You in the meantime are trying to say so much, so fast and in so little time that the receiver of your call probably doesn’t understand much of what you are saying. When the person responds with the typical “I’m sorry, we’re not hiring now.” You will have been instructed to say some cute or clever comeback to get the person to pay attention to you. This could work, but usually not.
It will to your advantage to send a warm up letter to the intended person, first, letting them know you will call them. When you call, you will identify yourself and say, “Mr. so and so, I mailed a letter to you a couple of days ago, did you receive it?”
The person, if gets much mail at all, will probably say something to the effect that they are not sure and to remind them of what the letter was about. This is your opportunity to create dialogue with them. Give them a short summary of the letter and ask if they recall the letter now. Chances are they saw your letter and routed it to Human Resources. It doesn’t matter. What you want to do is try to get the person talking and helping you.
People are more apt to talk when you ask them open ended questions. These are questions that require more than a yes or no answer.
Before we get into this further, let us go through the steps that one needs to go through to get to the point of talking with someone.
Years ago, in the ‘70’s and early ‘80’s a popular job search tool was the broadcast letter and resume. The word broadcast means casting your cover letter and resume in the broadest (widest) possible way. In other words, you will be mailing many letters to many companies. In the ‘80’s books started to appear to say the broadcast letter is not the way to go. They said most jobs are not advertised and the way for you to uncover the “Hidden Job Market” is through networking and the informational interview.
Now in the 21st century, networking and the informational interview are now considered passé and books are beginning to go back to the broadcast method.
There is no one exceptional way to go about the job search. Just like a salesperson uses multiple ways to uncover leads, so should you. The salesperson uses mail-outs (Approach letters to Prospects), networking, talking to friends and acquaintances, cold calling on the telephone and through referral (one person refers the salesperson to another).
In your job search, you should do the same thing. This is called a job search campaign.
People can’t hire you if they don’t know you exist. Your job is to acquaint them with you and your skills and qualification and make them a permanent contact of yours.
Typically, the average person who sends out a cover letter/resume to an employer just waits for a reply. If they get no reply they move on to the next help wanted ad or employer.
Let’s look at what happened. When you responded to that help wanted ad, you introduced yourself to someone. Someone now knows you exist. They may have excluded you in their selection process. That’s okay. Your next step is to follow up after the letter/resume was sent with a phone call.
Most job applicants do not do this. So, you are now in the minority of people doing something that most don’t do. The follow-up phone call gets your name in front of the hiring people one more time.
If they discarded your resume and say they don’t recall your letter/resume or they have already made the selection, you follow up with, “Mr./Ms, are there any other positions in your company that my skills and qualifications may be applied?
You will probably get an answer something like, the company is not hiring for any other positions at this time. Then you reply, I understand Mr./Ms. However, I’m sure you’ll agree that positions become available for various reasons in the future and I’d like for your company to get acquainted with my experience when the opportune time comes.
The typical response you are going to get is one of resistance. Your objective is to engage in polite but directed conversation and to see if the person you are talking with will give you some inside information.
If this person doesn’t seem very helpful and wants to brush you off, you should close your conversation with, “May I contact you from time to time to see if anything has changed.” They will usually say yes because they want to get rid of you, but they don’t know how persistent you are. You will follow up with another letter thanking them for the time and courtesy they gave you and that you appreciate they said you can contact them in the future. This is your open invitation to continue to make contact with this person.
What you are going to do is follow up with letter and phone calls at various times in the coming weeks and months. I call this the drip—drip—drip technique. What is the drip—drip—drip technique. Most everyone at one time or another had a water faucet that wasn’t fully shut off or needs a washer replaced. It won’t be long before you hear drip, 20-30 second later, drip, another 20-30 seconds later drip and so one until you finally get up to try to stop the dripping.
The drip eventually caused you to act and do something positive. By putting your name in front of a person every so often with well placed intervals, the person who receives your mail pieces will get to know you and eventually will try to do something for you. If you did this with friendliness, politeness and persistence you will have changed this person from a stranger to an advocate.
The broadcast letter is one tactic to use in your overall strategy. The broadcast letter is mailed out as an unsolicited letter indicating your interest in the company and that you are wanting for them to get acquainted with what you have to offer. You put in your letter a disclaimer that you know that a position is not likely to be available presently but with business always in a state of flux a position may become available at some future date.
A good way to mail out broadcast letters is to first of all identify the companies you are interested in working for and getting the names of the president, the Human Resource Manager and the Manager of the department you are interested in.
Since companies typically get mail in #10 standard business envelopes and that are type written, you can increase your chances of getting your mail read by hand writing the name and address on an off size envelope, perhaps one that looks like a greeting card. You also do not put on the envelope a return address. This will more than likely stand out from other pieces of mail and cause the recipient to be curious and want to look at your mailer.
The idea here is to mail out many pieces, hundreds if the city you live in will support many employers. You don’t have to send them out all at once because you will be making follow-up telephone calls. So, decide how many you can reasonably follow up on within 3-5 business days.
The letter can say something like:
Because businesses go through various economic cycles, and with the belief a company such as yours is always looking for good qualified and experienced help, I am writing to you because your company may be in need of someone with my skills and experience as they would apply to your current or future needs.
I have a diversified background in business, including 20 years experience in the transportation industry. I am experienced in Customer service, Freight Rates and Billing, Freight Rate Auditing, Commercial Collections and Supervision.
My education includes 2 years college in Traffic Management with continuing education in Management and Supervision at South Seattle Community College, 2002.
I have had successes in increasing efficiency, reducing cost, increasing revenue and problem solving.
Some of my accomplishments include:
l Analyzing transportation charges that Reduced errors 90% resulting in savings of $1,000,000.
l Designing a form reducing the workload 25% between Two departments.
l Recommending changes in carrier tariff rules and rates Increasing revenue 20%.
I have the ability to analyze and define problems and the resourcefulness to implement and follow through with solutions. For example, at Sears Inc., I was able to discover a procedural problem that resulted in recovering over $1,000,000 in back freight allowances for which I received an employee suggestion award.
If my qualifications can meet a need in your company, a personal exploratory meeting, without obligation, would be welcome.
I am aware that you may not have a suitable position at this time, but do to growth or other company changes; a position may become available in the future that I may be able to fill at the opportune time to our mutual advantage.
With this in mind, I would like very much to meet with you personally and talk to you about possible future employment and acquaint you with what I have to offer.
Since I know how busy you are, I will call you in a few days for an appointment to arrange a brief meeting at a convenient time for you.
This cover letter will be on your letter head but it will not be addressed to the recipient. You will make copies of this cover letter template along with a copy of your resume. Your Cover letter should be on white paper and your resume on a light gray paper to differentiate the two.
The whole point of this approach is to get your name out to as many employers as possible. The hard but rewarding work that produces results comes from your follow-up call.
Okay so far I’ve said there is nothing holding you back from sending out more than one cover letter, resume package in response to a newspaper help wanted ad. You are mailing out, unsolicited, hundreds of pieces of mail, spaced out so you can make the appropriate follow up call.
Now, here is another thing to do and keep in mind. Once you make a contact, never lose a contact. Keep this contact forever. Too often people will send out mailers or make a call and then forget about these people.
In today’s business and employment climate, during your career, you will probably have 7 to 10 job changes. The people you contact can be a part of your network. When you follow up with a phone call and talk with someone and ask them if you can contact them from time to time, you do so. It will be the best investment in your time and you will be surprised at how many of these original cold contacts become friends.
You don’t always have to call them. You can simply send them a little note keeping them informed as to your progress in the job search. If you get a job, then stay in contact with them and let them know what you’re doing.
With computers today, you can replicate letters very easy by having a core template and modifying it as necessary for each person you send a letter to.
When I say the job search is merely a numbers game, it is, but it doesn’t mean you get sloppy or careless. To reiterate, a good salesperson prepares as best as he or she can but then the rest is purely numbers or statistical. Keep the numbers flowing and you will reach your goal.
Now lets say a few words about the informational interview. This has now been around for 20 years or so. There are people in the work world who are turned off by this method because they think this is a veiled tactic to try to get a job even though they say it’s only for information. Don’t let this stop you from networking. People are people and they will respond to other who demonstrates respect and sincerity to them.
Many books will go to lengths telling you about your transferable skills and that you can transition yourself into a new career, direction or job by convincing a prospective employer that you have the skills to do the job.
Real Business World lesson number one, people don’t like to take risks, they resist change, they stay with the familiar, and they follow the path of least resistance and basically are lazy. Lazy in the sense they want to expend the least amount of work and energy to accomplish their goals.
Let’s do a hypothetical. An employment recruiter is looking at two resumes. Each person has 15 years of business experience. Each person shows they have had success and achievements. The job that is open is for the manager of the customer service department. One resumes shows that out the 15 years of experience 7 years were as manager of a customer service department. The other resume says that all 15 years was as a customer service representative but the cover letter says that all the skills are transferable and he or she says I can do the job just give me the chance.
I’m not saying the cover letter says these words, but that’s what the two resumes convey. One has the hard experience and the other doesn’t. Who are you going to hire?
There’s always a long shot that they will hire the customer service rep over the experienced manager, but not likely. It is very difficult to cross over from one area of experience and job function to another completely different one.
The people who hire are always trying to hedge their bets. They don’t want to make a hiring mistake. However, in reality, they may. The person who has 7 years managerial experience may have the years but is not very good at the job but the 7 years will still make the impression and cause the hiring authority to put a heavy weight on the most experience. Numbers count.
Here’s another reason why I say the job search is merely a numbers game. When it comes down to hiring someone, people almost always hire the person they like not the best qualified person. People will always be people no matter who they are or where they are. In other words, most of us want many of the same things. From a personal standpoint or because we are just plain being human we usually like people who like us or are like us.
Your whole endeavour is to get in front of an employer’s hiring authority. You can’t get the job until you are face to face with this person and then you try to sell or convince them you are the one they want and need.
The only exception to this may be that you met the president of some company at a local bar, hit it off, and said he wants to hire you. The next day he calls Human Resources and says hire this person. Nothing more is needed.
No matter which job search book you read, all they can do for you is give you some general principles to follow and the rest is up to numbers and chance.
There are going to be those who will argue or oppose what is being said here. But, nobody can guarantee you a job by reading their book and following what they say.
When you are competing with others, it’s a crap shoot.
On the other hand doing the follow-up and staying in contact with people who you’ve made contact with can over time be the best way to get job offers.
When a position becomes available, a company will try to fill the position from within first. Then they will see if someone, a current employee, knows someone. If they don’t find someone this way, they will look in their file of recent resumes and see if someone qualifies from this pool. When all of these don’t produce a person for the position, they will advertise.
So, if you have been staying in contact with these employers over the years, they may think and consider you.
When you do the follow up work with either a call or letter, try to find something interesting to share with them. If you have added any skills or education since the last time you contacted them, you can include this. If their company has been in news, that is good news, you can mention something about that. You will be the judge of what to say or include.
A professional salesperson keeps a customer contact file. He or she will rate each customer based on how much business they give him and other criteria such as what are the chances one of his customers can be upgraded from being a mediocre customer to a top customer. The system can be as simple as “A” “B” and “C.” “A’ being the top customers and “C” the lowest.
Based on the types of responses you get from your contacts, you can rate them as well. Then the “A” can get a follow-up more often than the “B’s” and “C’s.”
Looking for a job is called a campaign because it is a whole set of activities in a planned and strategic way over a period of time.
Depending on the circumstances, the time of year and the economic condition, you may be competing with hundreds of people for the same position. Somehow, you have to stand out from the crowd. No matter how good your cover letter and resume, the odds are against you.
As I stated before, if you have a hundred cover letter/resume combinations sent to the same company for the same position and they all had outstanding cover letters and resumes and everybody had pretty much equal experience, how does the hiring authority pick and choose. The answer of course is it depends on the individual and that can be as varied and fickle as the mood or whim of the moment.
The smartest thing anyone can do is to be constantly looking for new employment and keep networking and meeting new people. When you get that new job, you should be thinking about the next job. Over a period of time, you can and should be known by many people. Find as many ways as you can to get your name in front of people for whatever the reason.
Many people volunteer as a way of getting known. You can write a piece in the local newspaper or submit articles to magazines.
Even though you may not be getting paid for this, you are getting yourself known.
Joining clubs and associations are a good idea, better yet, join a job networking club. Taking classes in school can help. Anywhere there are people; there are people who can usually help or point you to someone who can help. The best bet is that most people like to help and are flattered that you ask them.
One of the biggest holdbacks for people is their inability to be assertive. If this is your case, the best thing you can do is take a class or read a book in assertiveness training or how to deal with being shy.
One of the biggest qualities employers look for in employees is their ability to express themselves. If you car a good communicator you have an advantage over your lesser counterpart.
Most jobs can be learned on the job. However, having basic computer skills, communication skills and being well groomed are definitely assets to have. Understanding how power and politics work can also be of an immense help to you.
Always remember the best qualified or skilled candidate is usually not the ones to move up the corporate ladder. This doesn’t negate the fact that good credentials don’t help or not useful. Graduates from the top college and university such as Harvard gives you a big advantage. People are impressed with big name colleges and universities, titles and awards.
There’s a movie called “Finding Forester” staring Sean Connery, who plays a recluse, one time best selling writer. He is mentoring a young black male in writing. He tells the young man that being published helps in getting the girls. He mentions that it can even be a bad book, the key is that you are published.
You can prove this to yourself anytime you want that a title or award impresses people. The next time you are in a social setting and you are talking to someone you have not met before, tell them you are a Ph.D. and watch their reaction. You can make a name of title for yourself.
In the ‘70’s, there was a TV series with James Garner, called the “Rockford” files. Rockford, who was a private detective, would make up a business card for whatever the occasion he needed. He would tell people that others would believe he was who he said he was because he had a business card printed. I know this works because I’ve done it myself.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not telling you to falsify any information, but wherever possible use titles and or names that makes an odd impression if you can rightfully use them.
A garbage man is no longer a garbage man but a sanitation engineer.
Okay, let’s summarize. Do put together as good a resume and cover letter as possible. Spend time on this. Appearance is importance. It’s appearances that will grab the attention of the evaluator. One cannot know what will impress people. One person can be turned on to your resume and another will not like it all. Experiment and make up a number of different styles of resumes. Show them to your friends, better yet see if you can get strangers or even employers to look at them and give you feedback.
This doesn’t mean you can just throw anything together and get good results, although you may still get some results. What I’m saying is a reasonably good resume and cover letter, and proper follow up will do more for you than trying to get that magic resume to win the Blue Ribbon at the World’s Fair.
Looking for a job is like a salesperson selling a product. A salesperson is competing with other professional salespeople and each of their products is as good as his/hers or even better. However, a good salesperson can outdo the competition by following some simple rules, and the main thing, is to have a great attitude with determination and persistence.
You can have a mediocre resume and cover letter but with determination and persistence outdo others that are better qualified than you and have better looking resumes and cover letters.
Frank Bettger, a salesman in the ’30’s wrote a book “How I went from Failure to Success in Selling” told a story when he was to give a speech on salesmanship. He never gave a speech before and he was terrified. He got up on the podium and said three times “See the People.” “See the People.” “See the People.” Then he walked off. Later in the book he said that was the best advice he could give anybody and he shortened the “See the People.” To STP.
There you have it in a nut shell, “See the People.” Or STP.
The cover letter and resume are not substitutes from getting in front of the hiring authority. In fact, the cover letter and resume are vehicles to use to get you in front of the employer. The cover letter and resume are your advertisement. They are the enticement and inducement for an employer to contact you for a job interview. You send these out so you have an opportunity to have an employer know something about you and want to know more.
In every company, you are dealing with people who are responsible for hiring and you need to see them. You may say, “Great” but how do you get to see them? My answer is anyway you can. Find a way. Write letters, telephone or email them, visit them at their place of work. You need to get in front of them.
Here is a step by step approach on how to do this.
The most important thing for you to remember is you are dealing with people. People vary in personality and character. A book called “Please Understand Me” is about Character and Temperament Types by David Keirsey and Marilyn Bates. They say there are 16 Character Types. In reality, there may be even be a hundred types, the point is this; people are different. What appeals to one person may turn another person off.
You may, in your mind, have a resume that is outstanding but the person who looks at it, isn’t impressed.
There is no perfect resume, cover letter, interview tricks, perfect job, etc.
Let’s pretend a moment that you get a resume book shows 100 outstanding resumes and each of these resumes were sent to one employer for the same position. Well, how good is this outstanding resume now? Each outstanding or perfect resume is now competing with 99 other outstanding resumes. Now, do you see my point?
One can’t know what will impress the employer’s hiring authority. They may select your resume because they see a school you went to that they also attended. Perhaps it’s a company both of you worked for once but at different times. It may simply be the appearance of your resume.
There are books that say employment recruiters are not persuaded by unusual or other slick tactics. One should stay with the tried and true conservative approach. This is just generalizing. After reviewing 75 white colored resumes in a row, one may just jump on an odd looking resume or a different colored one just to break up the monotony.
The same employment selector can reject your colored resume on Monday but accept it on Wednesday. The reason, people feel differently every day. One Monday, they may have a headache, worried about some problem at home and on Wednesday be completely relaxed and in good humor.
So how do you play the numbers game and come out on top.
The first caveat is there is no guarantee. The following may work most of the time, but may not work at any given time.
Someone once said “Timing is everything.” A cover letter/resume received on Tuesday and rejected could have been accepted if read on Friday. Life is just that way. Just as you can make a good decision doesn’t guarantee a good outcome. But, this doesn’t negate that you make a good decision based on the available facts, but the outcome is outside your control. However prudent decision-making improves your odds of a good outcome.
The same can be said with applying good skills to the job search process. It won’t guarantee you a job but it will improve your odds immensely.
Here are the best things you can do for yourself for the job search.
Be organized. Keep good records. This will do more for you than anything else. If you find a help wanted ad that you think you’d like to apply for, clip the ad, attach it to letter size paper, or keep a note book and date the ad and what periodical it came from. Usually it’s your local newspaper. You can file it alphabetically, by job category, location or whatever, but keep a cross reference of it.
Keep a log of every piece of mail you send out. You want to include Employer name, address, phone number, date, a column for resume, cover letter, and a column for other or miscellaneous. For example, If you mail a cover letter and a resume, you would check two columns, for resume and cover letter, and you would fill in the employer information. You also want to include a column for follow-up and results.
The idea here, is to keep as accurate and as much information as necessary to track what you are doing.
You will probably have more than one type of resume and cover letter made up, so you also need to indicate which resume and cover letter you sent. You can put a number or letter on it, anything, so you will know later what you sent.
Note: You should make up at least five different types of resumes. Each resume should be done a little differently and highlighting different points. You don’t want one resume to try to do all things. The same goes for cover letters. You can make a template and then modify off the template.
There are many tactics and strategies on how to look for a job but none would be of greater value than your attitude. Your attitude is going to be the single biggest factor in what happens to you in the job search. Looking for a job is difficult work. Using our salesperson metaphor, a salesperson has to endure mostly rejection. It will not be unusual for you to get 95% or greater rejection rate. Don’t despair. This is typical. You will hear “NO” many more times than “yes”. Get used to it.
There are books out there that will tell you that networking is the best way to get a job. Others will say trash your resume. Other books will site that only 5 to 7% of jobs come from the help wanted section. They will also tell you that most jobs are not advertised. All of these books are correct up to a point.
People get jobs in all kinds of ways. The so called ideal way to find a job is to use as many tactics and approaches possible. This will enhance your chances of getting a response. Of course the ideal way is the one that eventually got the job for you but it will more than likely be a different ideal way than someone else’s ideal way.
Some books will tell you that sending out “confetti” letters, these are letters sent out in numbers saying the same thing and just using numbers is not very effective. They say that you may only get a response rate of 1% or 2 %. But if you sent out 500 letters, 1% is 5 responses and that’s 5 more response that you may otherwise not have had.
One of the best selling books on the job search says that sending out resumes at random is one of the worst ways to do the job hunt because the success rate is only 7%. It also says that private employment agencies is not good because they only have a 5-24% success rate and answering newspapers have only a 5-24% success rate. But if you add all of these up and utilize every one of them, which is what I am recommending, the totals are 17% to 55%. I’ll take this percentage anytime.
Taking the low end, if you made one hundred contacts through mail outs, answering newspaper want ads and going through employment agencies, you will get 17 responses per every 100. Out of that 17, you will probably get 5 invitations to an interview and out of this possibly 2 job offers. Not bad. Increase these numbers and see what you will get.
The more things you have working for you the better are the chances of you getting the job. Employment agencies may be a long shot but you have one or more people working on your behalf to get that job.
Let’s suppose an employer puts a help wanted ad in the newspaper for a clerical position. Let’s say the city that the employer does its business in is a city of 250,000. Even when the economic conditions are good, an employer of 200 employees or more is more than likely to receive about a hundred or more resumes.
Some will trickle in on Monday with the bulk of them showing up on Wednesday and Thursday of the first week and then a few more will trickle in even into the next week.
The person who is to review the resumes will just glance at the cover letter and resume perhaps for 20 seconds or so, perhaps even less. The object is not to include qualified candidates but to exclude them. The reason for this is that it is not cost effective or time feasible to spend too much time trying to figure out who the best candidate is out of 100 pieces of mail.
So, the reviewer will choose criteria that will reject the paperwork. They may choose to reject resumes without cover letters, to reject those that do not have eye appeal or some other appearance problem. If they find a resume that has misspelled words and poorly organized. Perhaps it’s too difficult to read. Maybe it doesn’t have an objective or an employment overview. The point is each employer has their own criteria to reject a cover letter or resume. They want to eliminate as many as they can so they can reduce the number down to 10 to 15. This will be manageable and easier for them to look the paperwork over more thoroughly.
Because of the selective process, the chances are good that the best candidate for the position was rejected.
People who are more likely to get the job are better skilled at the job search. Many quality workers aren’t good at looking for work and putting together their cover letters and resumes in an eye catching way.
You could be theoretically the best job candidate and have an excellent cover letter and resume and still be rejected in the selection process. The reason, the whole job search and job selection process is very human and fallible.
A professional salesperson knows how to work the numbers game. They use what is called the “Law of Large Numbers.” This law simply states that the more numbers you contact the better chances of you getting “so many sales” irrespective of your salesmanship, product or other situation.
Many sales training manuals will say something like this; contact 10 people get 3 interviews and make 1 sale. This number ratio will probably not prove out with only ten contacts but when you make hundreds of calls or send out sales approach letters, the numbers will show up over the long hall as reliable and consistent.
Do everything you can to put together a good cover letter and resume. Prepare yourself well for the job interview, but when it comes down to it, it’s all numbers. Don’t allow your ego to get involved and feel you are being rejected.
I am going to give you some suggestions, tactics and strategies and that will help those numbers, but after all is said and done, it’s only the numbers that count.
I have asked many people who have responded to a help wanted ad in the newspaper and asked them what their result was. The answer I get most often is they usually get a postcard telling them they were not selected.
I then ask them “How many resumes did you mail to the prospective employer.” They look at me incredulously and say, “Why, one, of course.” I then reply why you didn’t mail 5 or 10 to the employer. They usually reply, “Well, why?
I explain to them that there is nothing preventing them to send more than one resume to an employer. It’s sort of like buying more than one lottery ticket to play the lottery. Your chances are better the more often you participate. I tell them to send different cover letters and resumes on different types and colors of paper and mail them on different ways. What you want to do is give each mail out a different look. By doing this you increase your chances that your letter and resume will be selected. This may especially happen if there is more than one person reviewing the resumes.
Another thing you can do is send a letter and resume to the president, the director of human resources and the hiring person with cc and the appropriate names on each piece. What this does for you is get your name in front of three people and by cc the other names shows the individual that you mailed to that the other people to one to. This could make the HR person and the manager of the department look at your resume more closely because they see the president’s name is on it.
Chances are good the president won’t see the resume and the administration assistant will just route it down to the HR department, but now you have three contact names for you to follow up with on the telephone.
There are some books that tell you the best approach to the job market is through the telephone. What they propose is you cold call a prospective employer and give them a hundred word dialogue about who you are and your qualification. They usually give a variety of responses for you to say when the person you are talking to says no to you.
Here’s the problem with this approach. When a person answers the phone, they have their minds usually on something else. When you start talking you are trying to break into their thoughts and have them focus on what you are saying. You in the meantime are trying to say so much, so fast and in so little time that the receiver of your call probably doesn’t understand much of what you are saying. When the person responds with the typical “I’m sorry, we’re not hiring now.” You will have been instructed to say some cute or clever comeback to get the person to pay attention to you. This could work, but usually not.
It will to your advantage to send a warm up letter to the intended person, first, letting them know you will call them. When you call, you will identify yourself and say, “Mr. so and so, I mailed a letter to you a couple of days ago, did you receive it?”
The person, if gets much mail at all, will probably say something to the effect that they are not sure and to remind them of what the letter was about. This is your opportunity to create dialogue with them. Give them a short summary of the letter and ask if they recall the letter now. Chances are they saw your letter and routed it to Human Resources. It doesn’t matter. What you want to do is try to get the person talking and helping you.
People are more apt to talk when you ask them open ended questions. These are questions that require more than a yes or no answer.
Before we get into this further, let us go through the steps that one needs to go through to get to the point of talking with someone.
Years ago, in the ‘70’s and early ‘80’s a popular job search tool was the broadcast letter and resume. The word broadcast means casting your cover letter and resume in the broadest (widest) possible way. In other words, you will be mailing many letters to many companies. In the ‘80’s books started to appear to say the broadcast letter is not the way to go. They said most jobs are not advertised and the way for you to uncover the “Hidden Job Market” is through networking and the informational interview.
Now in the 21st century, networking and the informational interview are now considered passé and books are beginning to go back to the broadcast method.
There is no one exceptional way to go about the job search. Just like a salesperson uses multiple ways to uncover leads, so should you. The salesperson uses mail-outs (Approach letters to Prospects), networking, talking to friends and acquaintances, cold calling on the telephone and through referral (one person refers the salesperson to another).
In your job search, you should do the same thing. This is called a job search campaign.
People can’t hire you if they don’t know you exist. Your job is to acquaint them with you and your skills and qualification and make them a permanent contact of yours.
Typically, the average person who sends out a cover letter/resume to an employer just waits for a reply. If they get no reply they move on to the next help wanted ad or employer.
Let’s look at what happened. When you responded to that help wanted ad, you introduced yourself to someone. Someone now knows you exist. They may have excluded you in their selection process. That’s okay. Your next step is to follow up after the letter/resume was sent with a phone call.
Most job applicants do not do this. So, you are now in the minority of people doing something that most don’t do. The follow-up phone call gets your name in front of the hiring people one more time.
If they discarded your resume and say they don’t recall your letter/resume or they have already made the selection, you follow up with, “Mr./Ms, are there any other positions in your company that my skills and qualifications may be applied?
You will probably get an answer something like, the company is not hiring for any other positions at this time. Then you reply, I understand Mr./Ms. However, I’m sure you’ll agree that positions become available for various reasons in the future and I’d like for your company to get acquainted with my experience when the opportune time comes.
The typical response you are going to get is one of resistance. Your objective is to engage in polite but directed conversation and to see if the person you are talking with will give you some inside information.
If this person doesn’t seem very helpful and wants to brush you off, you should close your conversation with, “May I contact you from time to time to see if anything has changed.” They will usually say yes because they want to get rid of you, but they don’t know how persistent you are. You will follow up with another letter thanking them for the time and courtesy they gave you and that you appreciate they said you can contact them in the future. This is your open invitation to continue to make contact with this person.
What you are going to do is follow up with letter and phone calls at various times in the coming weeks and months. I call this the drip—drip—drip technique. What is the drip—drip—drip technique. Most everyone at one time or another had a water faucet that wasn’t fully shut off or needs a washer replaced. It won’t be long before you hear drip, 20-30 second later, drip, another 20-30 seconds later drip and so one until you finally get up to try to stop the dripping.
The drip eventually caused you to act and do something positive. By putting your name in front of a person every so often with well placed intervals, the person who receives your mail pieces will get to know you and eventually will try to do something for you. If you did this with friendliness, politeness and persistence you will have changed this person from a stranger to an advocate.
The broadcast letter is one tactic to use in your overall strategy. The broadcast letter is mailed out as an unsolicited letter indicating your interest in the company and that you are wanting for them to get acquainted with what you have to offer. You put in your letter a disclaimer that you know that a position is not likely to be available presently but with business always in a state of flux a position may become available at some future date.
A good way to mail out broadcast letters is to first of all identify the companies you are interested in working for and getting the names of the president, the Human Resource Manager and the Manager of the department you are interested in.
Since companies typically get mail in #10 standard business envelopes and that are type written, you can increase your chances of getting your mail read by hand writing the name and address on an off size envelope, perhaps one that looks like a greeting card. You also do not put on the envelope a return address. This will more than likely stand out from other pieces of mail and cause the recipient to be curious and want to look at your mailer.
The idea here is to mail out many pieces, hundreds if the city you live in will support many employers. You don’t have to send them out all at once because you will be making follow-up telephone calls. So, decide how many you can reasonably follow up on within 3-5 business days.
The letter can say something like:
Because businesses go through various economic cycles, and with the belief a company such as yours is always looking for good qualified and experienced help, I am writing to you because your company may be in need of someone with my skills and experience as they would apply to your current or future needs.
I have a diversified background in business, including 20 years experience in the transportation industry. I am experienced in Customer service, Freight Rates and Billing, Freight Rate Auditing, Commercial Collections and Supervision.
My education includes 2 years college in Traffic Management with continuing education in Management and Supervision at South Seattle Community College, 2002.
I have had successes in increasing efficiency, reducing cost, increasing revenue and problem solving.
Some of my accomplishments include:
l Analyzing transportation charges that Reduced errors 90% resulting in savings of $1,000,000.
l Designing a form reducing the workload 25% between Two departments.
l Recommending changes in carrier tariff rules and rates Increasing revenue 20%.
I have the ability to analyze and define problems and the resourcefulness to implement and follow through with solutions. For example, at Sears Inc., I was able to discover a procedural problem that resulted in recovering over $1,000,000 in back freight allowances for which I received an employee suggestion award.
If my qualifications can meet a need in your company, a personal exploratory meeting, without obligation, would be welcome.
I am aware that you may not have a suitable position at this time, but do to growth or other company changes; a position may become available in the future that I may be able to fill at the opportune time to our mutual advantage.
With this in mind, I would like very much to meet with you personally and talk to you about possible future employment and acquaint you with what I have to offer.
Since I know how busy you are, I will call you in a few days for an appointment to arrange a brief meeting at a convenient time for you.
This cover letter will be on your letter head but it will not be addressed to the recipient. You will make copies of this cover letter template along with a copy of your resume. Your Cover letter should be on white paper and your resume on a light gray paper to differentiate the two.
The whole point of this approach is to get your name out to as many employers as possible. The hard but rewarding work that produces results comes from your follow-up call.
Okay so far I’ve said there is nothing holding you back from sending out more than one cover letter, resume package in response to a newspaper help wanted ad. You are mailing out, unsolicited, hundreds of pieces of mail, spaced out so you can make the appropriate follow up call.
Now, here is another thing to do and keep in mind. Once you make a contact, never lose a contact. Keep this contact forever. Too often people will send out mailers or make a call and then forget about these people.
In today’s business and employment climate, during your career, you will probably have 7 to 10 job changes. The people you contact can be a part of your network. When you follow up with a phone call and talk with someone and ask them if you can contact them from time to time, you do so. It will be the best investment in your time and you will be surprised at how many of these original cold contacts become friends.
You don’t always have to call them. You can simply send them a little note keeping them informed as to your progress in the job search. If you get a job, then stay in contact with them and let them know what you’re doing.
With computers today, you can replicate letters very easy by having a core template and modifying it as necessary for each person you send a letter to.
When I say the job search is merely a numbers game, it is, but it doesn’t mean you get sloppy or careless. To reiterate, a good salesperson prepares as best as he or she can but then the rest is purely numbers or statistical. Keep the numbers flowing and you will reach your goal.
Now lets say a few words about the informational interview. This has now been around for 20 years or so. There are people in the work world who are turned off by this method because they think this is a veiled tactic to try to get a job even though they say it’s only for information. Don’t let this stop you from networking. People are people and they will respond to other who demonstrates respect and sincerity to them.
Many books will go to lengths telling you about your transferable skills and that you can transition yourself into a new career, direction or job by convincing a prospective employer that you have the skills to do the job.
Real Business World lesson number one, people don’t like to take risks, they resist change, they stay with the familiar, and they follow the path of least resistance and basically are lazy. Lazy in the sense they want to expend the least amount of work and energy to accomplish their goals.
Let’s do a hypothetical. An employment recruiter is looking at two resumes. Each person has 15 years of business experience. Each person shows they have had success and achievements. The job that is open is for the manager of the customer service department. One resumes shows that out the 15 years of experience 7 years were as manager of a customer service department. The other resume says that all 15 years was as a customer service representative but the cover letter says that all the skills are transferable and he or she says I can do the job just give me the chance.
I’m not saying the cover letter says these words, but that’s what the two resumes convey. One has the hard experience and the other doesn’t. Who are you going to hire?
There’s always a long shot that they will hire the customer service rep over the experienced manager, but not likely. It is very difficult to cross over from one area of experience and job function to another completely different one.
The people who hire are always trying to hedge their bets. They don’t want to make a hiring mistake. However, in reality, they may. The person who has 7 years managerial experience may have the years but is not very good at the job but the 7 years will still make the impression and cause the hiring authority to put a heavy weight on the most experience. Numbers count.
Here’s another reason why I say the job search is merely a numbers game. When it comes down to hiring someone, people almost always hire the person they like not the best qualified person. People will always be people no matter who they are or where they are. In other words, most of us want many of the same things. From a personal standpoint or because we are just plain being human we usually like people who like us or are like us.
Your whole endeavour is to get in front of an employer’s hiring authority. You can’t get the job until you are face to face with this person and then you try to sell or convince them you are the one they want and need.
The only exception to this may be that you met the president of some company at a local bar, hit it off, and said he wants to hire you. The next day he calls Human Resources and says hire this person. Nothing more is needed.
No matter which job search book you read, all they can do for you is give you some general principles to follow and the rest is up to numbers and chance.
There are going to be those who will argue or oppose what is being said here. But, nobody can guarantee you a job by reading their book and following what they say.
When you are competing with others, it’s a crap shoot.
On the other hand doing the follow-up and staying in contact with people who you’ve made contact with can over time be the best way to get job offers.
When a position becomes available, a company will try to fill the position from within first. Then they will see if someone, a current employee, knows someone. If they don’t find someone this way, they will look in their file of recent resumes and see if someone qualifies from this pool. When all of these don’t produce a person for the position, they will advertise.
So, if you have been staying in contact with these employers over the years, they may think and consider you.
When you do the follow up work with either a call or letter, try to find something interesting to share with them. If you have added any skills or education since the last time you contacted them, you can include this. If their company has been in news, that is good news, you can mention something about that. You will be the judge of what to say or include.
A professional salesperson keeps a customer contact file. He or she will rate each customer based on how much business they give him and other criteria such as what are the chances one of his customers can be upgraded from being a mediocre customer to a top customer. The system can be as simple as “A” “B” and “C.” “A’ being the top customers and “C” the lowest.
Based on the types of responses you get from your contacts, you can rate them as well. Then the “A” can get a follow-up more often than the “B’s” and “C’s.”
Looking for a job is called a campaign because it is a whole set of activities in a planned and strategic way over a period of time.
Depending on the circumstances, the time of year and the economic condition, you may be competing with hundreds of people for the same position. Somehow, you have to stand out from the crowd. No matter how good your cover letter and resume, the odds are against you.
As I stated before, if you have a hundred cover letter/resume combinations sent to the same company for the same position and they all had outstanding cover letters and resumes and everybody had pretty much equal experience, how does the hiring authority pick and choose. The answer of course is it depends on the individual and that can be as varied and fickle as the mood or whim of the moment.
The smartest thing anyone can do is to be constantly looking for new employment and keep networking and meeting new people. When you get that new job, you should be thinking about the next job. Over a period of time, you can and should be known by many people. Find as many ways as you can to get your name in front of people for whatever the reason.
Many people volunteer as a way of getting known. You can write a piece in the local newspaper or submit articles to magazines.
Even though you may not be getting paid for this, you are getting yourself known.
Joining clubs and associations are a good idea, better yet, join a job networking club. Taking classes in school can help. Anywhere there are people; there are people who can usually help or point you to someone who can help. The best bet is that most people like to help and are flattered that you ask them.
One of the biggest holdbacks for people is their inability to be assertive. If this is your case, the best thing you can do is take a class or read a book in assertiveness training or how to deal with being shy.
One of the biggest qualities employers look for in employees is their ability to express themselves. If you car a good communicator you have an advantage over your lesser counterpart.
Most jobs can be learned on the job. However, having basic computer skills, communication skills and being well groomed are definitely assets to have. Understanding how power and politics work can also be of an immense help to you.
Always remember the best qualified or skilled candidate is usually not the ones to move up the corporate ladder. This doesn’t negate the fact that good credentials don’t help or not useful. Graduates from the top college and university such as Harvard gives you a big advantage. People are impressed with big name colleges and universities, titles and awards.
There’s a movie called “Finding Forester” staring Sean Connery, who plays a recluse, one time best selling writer. He is mentoring a young black male in writing. He tells the young man that being published helps in getting the girls. He mentions that it can even be a bad book, the key is that you are published.
You can prove this to yourself anytime you want that a title or award impresses people. The next time you are in a social setting and you are talking to someone you have not met before, tell them you are a Ph.D. and watch their reaction. You can make a name of title for yourself.
In the ‘70’s, there was a TV series with James Garner, called the “Rockford” files. Rockford, who was a private detective, would make up a business card for whatever the occasion he needed. He would tell people that others would believe he was who he said he was because he had a business card printed. I know this works because I’ve done it myself.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not telling you to falsify any information, but wherever possible use titles and or names that makes an odd impression if you can rightfully use them.
A garbage man is no longer a garbage man but a sanitation engineer.
Okay, let’s summarize. Do put together as good a resume and cover letter as possible. Spend time on this. Appearance is importance. It’s appearances that will grab the attention of the evaluator. One cannot know what will impress people. One person can be turned on to your resume and another will not like it all. Experiment and make up a number of different styles of resumes. Show them to your friends, better yet see if you can get strangers or even employers to look at them and give you feedback.
How to find your ideal job
Once you've identified what it is you want to be doing, the next step is finding out where to find that ideal job.
The most obvious place to start is your university careers office. They should have the names of companies who have good graduate schemes, and will be able to help you on your first steps in finding a job. Including helping you with your CV.
Otherwise - you can go straight to Graduate Recruitment Companies, who will help you find the right job for you, but bear in mind that they may try and push you into doing a role that isn't your ideal job.
They work for their clients - not for you! After all, it's their clients who pay them, not the poor ex-student looking for work. But they are always a good source of information and advice and if nothing else, they'll help you refine your interview technique.
Always ask your friends and family to help you. They may know someone who's looking for someone just like you for an exciting opportunity. Many ex-students take their first step into the real world through personal contacts and you know you can trust your family to have your interests at heart.
Never neglect the newspaper as a good source of finding a job. All the big companies, public services, schools and other institutions advertise in the paper regularly for graduates. And, of course, the Internet should be one of the first ports of call for you - there are dozens of excellent job search sites for jobs in the UK and in Europe.
A lot of it will be hit-and-miss. It's rare to find the ideal job at the first go. The key is widening your "net", making contacts with as many people as you can - get your name "out there".
Other Strategies for Finding a Job
Targeted mailings, cold calling, job fairs, and occasionally other strategies work for some job seekers. Yet, only 5 to 15 percent of job seekers find positions using these strategies, so be mindful of how much time and energy you put into each. Any direct mail marketing campaign, for example, is considered successful if it generates from a 1 to 3 percent response (each batch of 100 letters yielding 1 to 3 replies). To get significant results from this strategy, you need to limit your expectations; even if you mail to hundreds of organizations, your response rate may be even lower than the industry average. Your goal is to meet someone who will talk to you when there is no open position.
Targeted Mailings
To be effective in a targeted mailing, choose the person you hope to report to or think is the key decision maker. If you correspond with someone much above or below the job level you seek, your letter could be forwarded directly to human resources for filing in the future reference drawer -- and never be read. (Job seekers have a special term for this place: the black hole, where all errant resume mailings go to oblivion. One industrious job applicant I know engaged in the great folly of addressing 700 resumes "To Whom It May Concern." How many people do you think ever read his resume? Oh well, at least he made the Post Office happy; many of his envelopes were sent via Next Day Air delivery.)
Compose a cover or marketing letter that will distinguish you and showcase your best abilities to contribute. Make your comments interesting, relevant, and creative, for example, "Resumes can't talk, but I can. I'm eager to speak to you about . . ." Then, follow up each targeted mailing with a phone call. Wait about two to three days after your mailing to call to be sure the letter has arrived; it is embarrassing to call too early and appear to be a pest, or too late and learn the letter got passed on to the black hole. Also practice some of the techniques presented here.
Mail your letters in batches of no more than 20 letters at a time. Remember your goal is an in-person interview, and there is no need to mail more inquiries than you can effectively track for timely follow up.
Cold Calling
Most of your job search communication will be by phone. Here's where you get to be a phone fan like your teenager. Your goal is a face-to-face meeting or interview, and applying the phone strategy well will increase your number of interviews. Remember, you are competing for your contact's attention with many others who are selling -- real estate agents, stockbrokers, bankers, and other job seekers. Of course, telemarketing has a poor reputation, conjuring up images of frenzied callers interrupting dinners and barking about overzealous bargains. Nevertheless, in the pursuit of new work, effective telemarketing is a critical part of your marketing campaign.
To be effective, plan what you want to say, as you would any important telephone conversation.
- Develop a script and rehearse it, in front of a mirror, if possible.
- Craft a sequential list of meaningful questions, beginning with the most important. Ask questions that can actually be answered; people won't respond well to long, imposing, or confusing questions.
- Verify your research so you are knowledgeable and informed. Also, do your homework on the background of the person you're going to talk with, noting any special accomplishments to bring up, if that is appropriate, in the conversation.
- Relax and take some deep breaths. Even Olympic weight lifters do this before making a move!
- Mention your contact's name with your greeting.
- Check if it's a good time for the other to talk.
- Prepare answers for objections.
- Stay cheerful and focused on your objective.
- Take notes and listen carefully (confirm some facts if necessary).
- Ask specifically for what you want.
- Write down your follow-up steps -- and follow up on them.
- Meet your commitments, that is, don't assent to something you can't provide.
- Compose and send your thank-you note on the same day.
With cold calling, you do not always know the name of the right person to contact. You need to do your research and bypass the voice mail system by learning the names and numbers of assistants who can refer your call directly to a preferred contact. To find the correct name, try the company's main number first, and ask the operator for the name of the vice president of human resources or the manager of customer service. If the above information is unavailable, and sometimes it truly is, ask to be transferred directly to the specific department and learn the name of the department head. Verify the correct name spelling and address. If you're unsure about the gender of a name -- like Carol, perhaps -- or only have the first initial, make sure you learn the person's gender, too.
If you are working through a company phone directory, experiment using a catch phrase, such as, "I have some correspondence with Brent Nichols -- is he still your manager of customer service?" Try to get the name of your target's support person and use it if you can, too. Be clear and distinct when you give your name and number and alert her that you will be calling back. Your tone should be patient, courteous, and upbeat.
Finally, to increase your chances of talking to your target when you telephone, call during business off-hours: early in the morning, right before lunch, or late in the day. Your target is most likely to be at his desk then, not away at a meeting.
Practice your voice mail reply so that it is both brief and inclusive. Provide a time when you'll be available for a return call and leave your message citing your number slowly and distinctly. You've encountered fast talkers, not all of them selling used cars or leading an auction, so you can imagine how annoyed your contact will be if you leave a hasty voice mail that has to be played twice to hear the message correctly.
For incoming calls, be sure you have a quiet room set aside to talk, including a desk or table for your contact records, calendar, and resume (or accomplishment sheet), with paper and pencil handy. Alert family members who answer the phone to be prepared to note accurate information, and sound as polite as possible. Your four-year old is charming for family and friends, but might not be the best choice as an administrator to answer your phone call from a job recruiter, unless you're a day care leader. Make sure your voice mail recording is rational, too, and not overly cute or off the wall. (Let the kids' cell phones have the answering modes with rapper-recorded messages.) The following story is an illustration of this type of situation.
A freelance single mother of a ten-year-old girl asked me for advice on expanding her business. I returned her phone call one morning, only to hear the daughter's recorded voice singing a "hello" message before asking for return call information. I met with the freelancer to tell her that this was neither professional nor a business-friendly message and she should consider a separate phone line or a revised recording. She told me she was reluctant to do this, fearing she would damage her daughter's self-esteem if the message were changed, nor did she want to pay the extra cost for another line. One month after reluctantly changing her voice message, her business began growing again.
Job Fairs and Open Houses
Job fairs and open houses attract potential employees and help organizations fill a large number of open requisitions. Fairs are popular during periods of dynamic growth and even in downtimes draw those with can-do skills. Some job seekers see these as "cattle drives" to round up desperate people who will work cheaply, but others with a positive attitude like job fairs because the gatherings allow them to shop the companies they like.
Before the fair, you should practice your "reason for availability" or your 60-second infomercial/elevator speech, stay confident and positive, shake hands convincingly, and smile. Also, keep the following tips in mind.
- Research the companies attending -- and also consider organizations not previously on your radar list.
- Dress professionally (tie and jacket for men; skirt/dress slacks and blouse for women). Save the Speedos and sweats for at-home networking. And always wear comfortable shoes.
- While at the fair, ask good questions of the recruiters and show enthusiastic interest in the organization. Take company literature available for future study/research.
- Write down the name of the person you meet and jot down the context of your conversation on the back of his business card. You may find, however, that some companies hire recruiters just for the day and instruct them to withhold any personal identification.
- Bring an ample supply of resumes (25 to 30 copies). Some astute product marketers fold their resumes in thirds to have them stand out in a file; others enclose them in plastic sheaths to distinguish them.
- Distribute your business card.
- After the meeting, follow up with the recruiter or hiring manager by telephone. Wait three to five days for smaller events, five to ten days for events with more than 100 attendees.
- If the lines are long and the waits are tedious, introduce yourself to others in line and start one or two new relationships. People looking for work could have friends and contacts at companies that interest you, and you can often learn from them about the company's culture, salary range, and hiring needs.
Other Sources
There are numerous sources to help you find a job. Below are just a few for you to consider.
Job Hot Lines. Some large organizations, universities (and colleges), and government agencies have 24-hour job hot lines. They have recorded messages with current openings that include brief job descriptions, a few key requirements, salary ranges, and dates for submitting applications. Treat your responses as you would a published listing.
Computer Networks. Some institutions use a national computer network for their job listings and accept resumes online. Be sure to follow all of the directions to log on and to access the system exactly. There is always the danger that your paperwork will be cut off at the end of a couple of minutes or after 200 some odd words. Make sure your resume has key words that are used in the job description.
Interactive Voice Mail. Some firms are experimenting with a new interactive voice mail software. Here you are asked to submit your qualifications by touching your telephone keys (push 1 if you have an MBA, push 2 if you have a Ph.D.). It is used mostly as an elimination tool, so, again, follow directions precisely to avoid a mistake that could take you out of the running. Also, supplementing this with a follow-up mail response or direct phone contact with the hiring manager is a very good idea.
Faxing Your Resume. Never hesitate to fax your resume when asked or to use the medium to further distinguish yourself. One marketing executive created her own fax form, with her unique experience and skill set noted in the borders. She also took a risk when she faxed her resume and marketing cover letter to a key number of important directors of marketing. Some offices do not welcome unsolicited fax communication, even from a candidate where creativity is expected.
Characteristics To Help Find The Work Of Your Dreams
"Why am I not happy?" "Why is life a struggle?" "Why doesn't work, work?" We probe our soul with questions like these, but we will never hear the answers if we don't take time off in our hectic days to listen. Unless we slow down and take a deep breath, we cannot hear the subtle responses that come from within.
As we get older, the questions about the nature and quality of life come up. By then, though, we are so mired in the car payments and the mortgage and the daily routine, and we are so used to looking for answers outside ourselves, that we fail to recognize the simple truth: We need to find enough quiet space so that we can listen to the answers locked deep inside. We need to stop and let them surface.
Once we take that time, we can reflect on all we have done and all we hope to do, and decide if we are living the life we want or if, instead, it was programmed for us by others. Only then can we listen to our own voice, our own intuition, our own inner wisdom. Only than can we tap into our inherent skills, talents and inner creativity, which form the work for which we were individually designed. Then we will truly reap the rewards of joy and fulfillment as well as a paycheck.
Afterward, when we go back to our busy life, we find that we are whole beings again, not walking machines. If we have chosen to take a break from our careers, the work we choose when we return will be right and satisfying.
Regardless of how we use it, time goes by and then it's gone. The combined power of every ruler in the world could not change that by decree. So, in the end, the only thing that counts is how we used the time. Is what we're doing meaningful enough that if we were still doing it 10 or 15 years from now, we would be satisfied with that?
If you just keep going the way you are, ask yourself what you will miss and how it will affect you and the ones you love. If you are losing some of your spirit every year, what kind of husband, wife, father, mother or friend will you end up as after half a lifetime goes by? If you need to take time off to stop the downward momentum, isn't it worth it?
It takes time and perseverance to find the work and life of your dreams. Here are some characteristics to cultivate that will support you:
Vision -- great clarity about what you want. Describe your vision in detail and visualize yourself in your new condition. The more you do this, the more possible, even probable, it seems that you will get there.
Strong intention -- determination to get what you want. Pursue your goals when you are thinking, writing, talking, exploring, reading and being, as well as in your actions. Be resolute that you will achieve your objectives. Stay focused and don't let anything or anyone stand in your way.
Unwavering belief -- a belief so strong that it stands up against challenges. Other people, sometimes believing they are being helpful, try to persuade us to be realistic, meaning that we shouldn't aim too high. Successful people keep their goals high and their expectations inline. People may tell us we are being a dreamer. Successful people are practical dreamers. They have dreams, and they figure out how to make them come true.
Action approach -- know what you need to do and do it. If a person wants to drive a car, he gets behind the wheel. To dance, he moves his feet to the rhythm. To find a new job, career or better skills, he researches his options, decides on a plan and implements it. Everything requires movement. Moves toward your goals.
Focus -- stay on course. Don't stop on the way or get sidetracked by fear or the myriad other things that hold one back. Even the best get waylaid now and then, but those who are sure of the path they are on don't let themselves procrastinate for long. They just put themselves on fast forward and fly.
Faith -- truly believe you will get it. Know it is just a matter of time. If things don't move as fast as you would like, if something goes wrong, if you get unavoidably sidetracked, it doesn't have a permanent effect. When you fall off the horse, simply get right back on.
Assess Company Culture to Find the Best Fit
Landing a great job involves more than interviewing well, getting an offer and earning a paycheck. While it's the interviewer's responsibility to assess your skills and experience, it's up to you to determine whether a particular employer is aligned with your core values and beliefs.
Working at a company with values inconsistent with yours is stressful, unrewarding, even depressing at times. No matter how great the position and salary, if you're working in a caustic, understaffed and unethical culture, you'll feel unfulfilled.
The job interview is your best opportunity to assess the work environment and organizational norms. But how can you assess the culture while you're being interviewed?
Organizational culture is dictated by the values, behaviors, beliefs and norms that permeate the group. Culture is expressed through the words and behaviors of each employee. Company or department leadership sets the overall tone.
Recruiters and managers often say that a candidate “fits” or “doesn't fit” to explain why a candidate should be offered a job offer or not offered one. What interviewers are really saying is the candidate fits or doesn't fit into the company culture. Many companies, in an effort to perpetuate their corporate cultures, hire people they feel fit and reject candidates whom they think do not fit their culture.
You should be sure the culture works from your standpoint as well. Rarely will you find a work environment totally aligned with your values, but you should be able to find organizations where the culture and your values can coexist.
Be a Keen Observer
Here are some of the things to be cognizant of during your interview experience:
- How are you treated while interviewing?
- What phrases do the interviewers use frequently?
- Is there a theme or unspoken tone to the questions asked?
- How does the environment feel to you?
- How prepared are the interviewers? Are they on time?
- Were you given an interview schedule?
- Were you treated like a prisoner or a guest?
- Are your responses to questions treated with suspicion or professional curiosity?
- How considerate is the company recruiter?
Ask for Details
Of course, digging up facts about company culture doesn't have to be an altogether clandestine effort. You can simply ask questions about organizational culture. Here are a few to consider:
- What three words or phrases would you use to describe the company or department culture?
- How does the company (team) handle conflict or differing opinions?
- How does the company recognize employee accomplishments?
- Does the company have a code of ethics?
- Please describe the leadership or managerial style at your company.
- What qualities do the most successful employees in your company possess?
- What is the company's attitude toward professional and educational advancement?
Job interviews are business events where your talents are evaluated -- and they are also your opportunity to evaluate how the company's culture complements your values. Be sure to make the observations and ask the necessary questions to make a good assessment of whether the culture is the right fit for you.
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