Linsanity Everywhere!

Jeremy Lin, the former Harvard University basketball star turned instant phenom on the New York Knicks NBA team, has created quite a buzz in recent weeks. My interest in the NBA is minimal at best but I have been impressed with the instant marketing success this young man became almost overnight. As a sports fan, I realize that he could be a one hit wonder and fade into the woodwork quickly. That is not what is important to me right now.

My takeaway from this Linsanity madness is how a very unknown star from a school not usually known for its athletic successes turned into an overnight sensation and how this could be applied to candidates trying to add a little spark to their job search strategies. All too frequently, a candidate will contact me at my agency and tell me they have been out of work so long (time ranges from a month to a few years) that they are desperate and will work for minimum wage in an attempt to get back to their chosen field where they used to make much more ($40-100K+/-) and they practically beg for their resume to be sent out even if the job is a complete mismatch. As a career coach, people will ask to meet with me and lament that they have become complete failures since they sent out perhaps ten resumes in the last six months and no one called them for interviews.

Candidates need to sound less like the New York Mets organization (sorry Mets fans!) and more like Jeremey Lin and the Knicks! A good friend has been out of work for a few months and has sent out countless resumes and had some substantial interviews but not landed a job just yet. Whenever I ask how he is doing he responds that he is doing Great and never complains! Perception is 90% of the issue when job hunting. Before you all start telling me it is impossible to remain positive in such bleak times, I am here to tell you that it is essential to do so! If you cannot keep the energy level high (and I do understand how hard that is to do) then you need to get some help. Join a few networking groups, get out among people, find a career coach, talk with a clergy person, network with your friends and neighbors, do something to get the positive juices flowing through your body. I cannot promise instant success but I assure you it will go a long way toward getting you back on track!

Why Aren't You Getting Calls?

The following article is a presentation which I recently delivered to a job seekers support group at the National Council of Jewish Women's Center for Women in Livingston, NJ:

If you are frustrated because you send out dozens of resumes each week and rarely receive responses, let alone invitations for interviews, rest assured that you are not alone. In my roles, both as a recruiter and as a career coach, people contact me frequently, concerned because they feel like something is wrong with them or their resume. Before you throw in the towel, something you obviously cannot afford to do, let’s take a look at your efforts and see if we could make things a little bit better!

The first place to look is your resume.
~Do you list a phone number? Is it the number you most frequently use? Is there an answering system attached to it? Do you check this number at least 2-3 times daily for messages? Do you respond to all messages within 12-24 hours?If the answer to any of these questions is ‘No’ there is your initial problem. Potential employers may only call once. If you do not answer the phone live or respond within 24 hours, do not expect them to try again. If you do not have voice mail, set it up now!!! It is very annoying when a candidate relies on caller ID and calls back to a company and says they have no clue who called them or why they called them. There are plenty of others who will respond faster and get the interview intended for you.
~Have you listed an email address on your resume? Again, is it an address that you regularly check and respond to? Is it a professional looking address or something gimmicky like jerseyshoregirl1@aol.com? Having a novelty email address for your social activities is fine but you need something business like for employers to reply to such as jdoe@gmail.com. Yahoo, Hotmail, Gmail, and most cable providers allow you to set up no cost email addresses and I strongly recommend this.
~How many of you send out more than 75 resumes per month? 50-75?25-50?Less than 25? If you are not sending out at least 25per month, you should not claim that nobody is responding to your resume because nobody is seeing your resume! There are tons of sites to look for easy places to submit such as nj.com, indeed.com, simplyhired.com, tristatejobs.com just to name a handful to consider.
-When you look for places to submit your resume, what criteria do you use to select the jobs you apply for? Do you look only at jobs that fit 100% of your expectations based on your past work history even though it has been some time since you last worked in your chosen field? My suggestion is to apply for a mix of jobs with about 20% being the ones you consider perfect fits, 50% being jobs that you feel qualified to do about half the skills, and 20% for which you know a few of the needed skills plus about 10% just general, part-time employment with minimal special skills required. Avoid applying to full-time jobs that you have absolutely none of the required skills because if something more suitable comes up at the same site later on, the hiring manager might remember you as someone who randomly sent a resume for a job you were not qualified for. However, if your resources have hit rock bottom, you need to apply for any job just to get some positive cash flow. There is nothing wrong with taking a part-time job in a supermarket, drugstore or perhaps as a security guard or school lunch aide if you absolutely need to earn money but want to allow time to continue your job search.

If no one is responding to you, maybe you need to find other ways to search and target a new audience. How many of you are doing some form of networking beyond attending this group’s programs? Are you attending job seeker support groups through local houses of worship, Jewish Vocational Services, Catholic Charities, Professional Services Group of NJ? How many of you regularly visit your local public library and utilize their job search tools? I assume you are all using LinkedIN and have been adding at least 20-25 new contacts per week and have job search agents set up there. Are each of you calling 4-6 people per week who you simply know through one source or another and asking to meet with them to informally discuss your job needs, their current careers, and how they might refer you to someone they know? Do you attend job fairs and/or resource fairs at least once every 4-6 weeks. Does anyone pick up the newspaper and look for articles about new companies moving into the local area, write down the names mentioned, and contact them to see if you could meet to discuss future job opportunities they may have available?

It is terribly simple to get into a rut and say that nobody is responding to your resume but it is a true challenge to put yourself into high gear and find creative ways to identify job opportunities. Job hunting is a full time career and requires the same attention that a full time job deserves from you. Make a schedule consisting of weekly chores and responsibilities unrelated to job search then insert at least 6 hours per day six days a week for your search process and keep to that routine. It is okay, in fact better than okay, to rotate the order you approach your search each day and it is essential to give yourself one day off per week to clear your head.

Very honestly, this might look daunting to some of you. Rest assured, the results will start to become obvious if you stop making excuses and saying no one wants to hire and get out there and make things happen. Job searching is a job but is also a heck of a lot of fun and a great way to learn new things while finding fresh sources of income!!

Never Throw in the Towel!

Job seekers approach me quite often sharing their frustrations over submitting dozens, if not hundreds, of resumes and receiving less than a 5% response rate. I am not talking about getting interviews, I am referring to not even an acknowledgement of receipt. Most of us take a lack of response as a lack of interest or perhaps that the job was already filled with a different candidate. Common sense would tend to have us come to this conclusion but I am here to tell you that common sense and logic do not necessarily apply to job searches!

One might think this is simply a function of the abysmal economy and glut of unemployed professionals out there but I wish to take you back about 15 years. I had recently joined a recruiting firm and was working late one evening when the phone rang. On the other end was a director from one of the nation's telecommunications giants. Very excitedly, he told me our office had just sent him a perfect resume for a project he was managing and he needed to contact the candidate immediately. He had no idea which recruiter from our office was involved because the HR staff sent him the resume and said they just received it. Having never heard of the candidate, I did some research and discovered the recruiter had left our firm over a year back and the resume was submitted almost 18 months ago. Apparently, it got buried in the Human Resources office's database and just reappeared!!

Upon locating the candidate, I discovered he had taken a 2 year assignment in Europe a few months earlier since no one in the U.S. showed interest in his areas of expertise. The hiring manager at the telecommunications giant got very angry with me until I pointed out that his internal colleagues were the culprits, not our firm.

My long winded point is that a resume is never totally dead even though it appears that way. The corresponding advice is to follow up as best you can on submittals, keep making new ones if a company posts new jobs, and do your best to find new places to send your credentials. Sadly, it could take hundreds of attempts to get just a handful of interviews but please never throw in the towel because you absolutely must stay in the game to have a chance to get off the bench!

The Perfect Resume?

In 1979, I attended a workshop at Franklin and Marshall College on resume writing. It last about 20 minutes and we received a mimeographed (if anyone needs a lesson on what that is, contact me) list of what to include and a list of secretaries on campus who, for a small fee, would type it up professionally. With this information in hand, I hustled to my room, took out some lined paper and scribbled for maybe an hour. I then attempted to type it on my portable typewriter and then stopped by a trusted professor's office for some input. He corrected some grammar and advised me to find someone else to type it as my skills were not too sharp! For $10, I received a professionally type resume and 20 copies! That was the only tool used to get my first professional job. In 2011, we are able to post resumes to Facebook, LinkedIN, Twitter, Monster, etc. We are free to change our resume in a matter of seconds before each submission. Some of us can even carry it around in our cell phones! One important thing has not changed. No matter what method of distribution you use, make sure your resume is accurate, interesting to read, and related to the job you are applying for!

ETC.

• Job openings are starting to pop up here and there but companies still seem fixated on candidates with 2 to 4 years experience but want these folks to be experts in everything. The mind set of a lot of more seasoned candidates has helped bring this on so YOU need to demonstrate willingness and flexibility when job hunting!
• Resumes appear to be getting sloppier and less accurate. With time on your hands, no excuses will be accepted for this lack of attention to a very important detail.
• Pay rates are not rebounding as quick as job opportunities are at this point. be patient with employers. I do believe that if you take a job, you will eventually be rewarded. If not, as things loosen up in the next year or two, other employers will offer you the money you deserve.
• Help wanted signs are visible in many retail establishments. If your chosen field is still plodding along, consider taking a seasonal job to get the blood circulating.

Details

Yesterday, I had an interesting chat with a hiring manager I had never spoken with before at one of my longtime client companies. The department she manages deals with statistics and data so even the slightest error in a report could be devastating and cost a ton of revenue.

One error on a resume is enough for her to rule out a candidate without speaking to or meeting with them. This is understandable as perfection is the key to her division's success and she cannot take chances. After we spoke, I started reviewing resumes on her behalf and was disappointed with the results. One individual quite obviously misspelled thier name, another forgot to leave a space between their first and last name, and another one neglected to give an area code for their phone number.

Would you hire any of these people?

Tons of Candidates

Hiring managers love to quip that there are tons of candidates out there and they expect staffing firms to find a pile of perfectly matched resumes. Were that truly the case, I honestly doubt hiring managers would be asking us for assistance! There is a huge reason why good recruiters are keeping busy today. Employers want exact fits for their job openings and are unwilling to be the least bit flexible in many cases. The vast majority of unemployed folks have been that way for 18 to 36 months so they undoubtedly will not know all the latest software, methodologies, etc. but are capable of catching up with minimal ramp-up time. A tiny bit of patience will go a very long way toward plugging holes in corporate infrastructures while stimulating (there is that word again!) the economy by putting money into very grateful pockets!

Please note: I would love to hear the viewpoints of hiring managers about this topic and not everyone needs to agree with me. Debates are certainly entertaining!!!

Umbrella Needed!

Yesterday, a resume passed through the office (and to the shredder) that was one of the worst I have come across in the last 25 years! It started out by stating the candidate was a 'Rainmaker' who had 'increased by 27000000.' The front page never gave any indication of what the person actually is trained to do or when and where they did whatever it was they were talking about. I never made it to page two!

Truthfully, I doubt the candidate came up with this awful format on their own. I have seen similar (though not quite this dreadful) disaster in recent weeks and suspect someone is charging huge dollars to produce these resumes. Should you decide you need outside help, please read carefully the finished product before accepting ti and paying for it. Resumes in this style will negatively impact your job search and keep you from recharging your career.

Make Sure Your Shoes Fit!

No, I am not making a fashion statement with the title of this entry. The TV show What Not to Wear would fail if they tried to get me to conform to their guidelines! What I am talking about is not sending out your resume in response to a job posting if it does not fit. Countless times, I receive resumes for a specific job that make absolutely no sense. Why would some who has sold pharmaceutical products the past 20 year, for example, send their resume to a job requiring a machinist with 10 years of programming CNC machines? Sending resumes that do not fit are a waste of your time. The days of collecting resumes for future openings are long gone. Hiring managers and staffing firms are only concerned about what is on their desk at present. Please stopping wasting every one's time, including your own, by sending out resumes without looking to see if you are a viable candidate.