If You Strike Out
by: Richard Bolles (What Color is Your Parachute)
If all the resume postings and the job listings you search pay off for you, and you
get the job you most desire, great! But, if it doesn't, please don't take it
personally.
If your job hunt on the Internet is fruitless, that's because the job listing and
resume sites are nothing more than the old Neanderthal job-hunting system our
country loves and knows so well, albeit in a new dress. That system didn't work very
well before the Internet, and it doesn't work very well now.
You are not alone in your digital dismay. Hear about the disappointing Web
experiences of some actual job hunters.
Job hunter #1. I have not had any positive reaction to any of my listings of my
resume online. The one exception was a headhunter who asked for my resume. You will
get a lot of offers from strange companies or people looking for things that I would
describe as pyramid schemes.
Job hunter #2. It was a waste of my time ... not a single reply!
Job hunter #3. I haven't gotten any responses online. My impression is that if
you're not in the computer field, you can pretty much forget finding work online.
Job hunter #4. I found the Internet to be very limited, even for computer employment
(which is what I do). Even the entry-level newsgroup is full of jobs requiring
previous experience. Most of the employer listings seem to be looking for another
Albert Einstein with just as many years of experience.
Job hunter #5. I didn't actually get my job from the Net, though I made a pass at
it. But in the end, I probably reverted to old habits rather than pursuing the job
search on the Net the way I said I would. At the same time, the Net definitely
played a part in my job hunt, as I pursued many of my contacts via e-mail - much
better than making cold telephone calls, once I'd gotten an e-mail address for a
contact in a company (for some reason, a much easier thing than getting direct phone
numbers). If I had it to do over again, I would probably do more to take advantage
of the Net...
Job hunter #6. I found seeking work online was worthwhile, but I'm in computer
programming. After watching the listings for a few weeks, I saw a posting in
mid-December which I answered with an e-mailed cover letter and resume. I heard back
within a few hours, indicating they would be in touch when they scheduled
interviews. While waiting to hear back, I saw another posting for which I considered
myself qualified (Note: Only two listings fitted me at all in four weeks). I
answered this one, but never heard back. However, the first one did call me back
four weeks later, to set up an appointment, and they offered me the job two weeks
after that. I started three weeks after that. But notice how long this process took.
While you connect quickly on the Internet, the employment process still moves at a
snail's pace out there. You'll need patience. Big-time patience.
Job hunter #7. I feel that online job lists should be viewed with the same healthy
skepticism that we offer to want ads. That is, there are many scams, there are
comparatively few jobs outside high tech, the government, and academe, and the
qualifications sought are either high or highly specialized. Thus, one should not
spend any greater time online than he or she would spend looking at the want ads.
There is more hype than substance for the so-called average job seeker.
In sum, I agree with Margaret F. Dikel (formerly Margaret Riley - see below for the
website), everybody's favorite expert on electronic job-hunting, whose words I
quoted elsewhere in this guide: "The Internet is merely an added dimension to the
traditional job search, and it is not necessarily an easy dimension to add."
But if you're determined to try it, my advice is: budget only a certain amount of
your total job-hunting time to the Internet part of your job search (I'd say 15
percent of your time, max). Keep tabs on yourself, and if after two weeks you
discover that the Internet is all you are doing with your life, disconnect, give
your modem to a friend, and go back to job hunting the way people job hunted before
the computer was ever discovered.
But in either case, follow the creative method of job hunting, puh-leaze.
It has eight simple rules:
1.. Know your best and most fulfilling transferable skills.
2.. Know what kind of work you want to do and what field you would most enjoy
working in.
3.. Talk to people who are doing the work you want to do. Find out how they like
the work, how they found their job.
4.. Do some research, then, in your chosen geographical area on those
organizations which interest you, to find what they do and what kinds of
problems/challenges they or their industry are wrestling with.
5.. Then identify and seek out the person who actually has the power to hire you
for the job you want; use your personal contacts - everyone you know - to get in
to see him or her.
6.. Show this person with the power to hire you how you can help the company solve
its problems/needs/challenges and how you would stand out as one employee in a
hundred.
7.. Don't take rejection personally. Remember, there are two kinds of employers
out there: those who will be bothered by your handicaps - age, background,
inexperience, etc. - and those who won't be and will hire you, so long as you can
do the job.
8.. If you get rejected by the first kind of employer, keep persevering until you
find the second.
In all of this, cut no corners and take no shortcuts.
Richard Nelson Bolles, known the world over as the author of the best-selling
job-hunting book in history, "What Color Is Your Parachute?" is acknowledged as
"America's top career expert".
If you need further help with the job hunt in general, rather than just with online
job hunting, go read the current edition of "What Color Is Your Parachute?".
Visit the websites of Richard Bolles - Job Hunter Bible:
http://www.jobhuntersbible.com/intro/intromez.php
and the Riley Guide: http://www.rileyguide.com/
Smarter Networking!
Pick up a lifetime of professional networking savvy in thirty minutes. Turn your
speakers up and watch the Knock 'em Dead Networking Workshop.
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