Simplify Your Job Search - Careers Articles

Do you feel like your job search is full of activity but you aren't getting anywhere? There's a lot of job search advice out there -- and if you keep doing what you read and hear, you might have a very convoluted strategy right now. Here are three do's and three don'ts to simplify your job search:

DO make a significant or difficult call, or send a significant e-mail, every day.

This is part of "networking." Putting off these types of communications only add to the list of "I really need to do this" clutter in your brain. Get through that list and free yourself so you can focus on other things you need to do.

DO go to face-to-face network events.

I know it takes time to get ready and drive there and back, and it takes energy to get in front of people and represent yourself well. It's not as easy as sitting at home on the computer with the TV on. But this is an activity that pays back in many ways. Meeting other people, learning from them, helping them move forward and getting your name/brand out there are all very beneficial.

DO practice your 30-second elevator pitch on everyone you can, every day.

As you practice you'll accomplish a few things: You'll get to a point where you deliver it more naturally. You'll polish the pitch and add a word here or take out a word there to make it stronger. You'll remind yourself of your self worth regularly as you say what you can do (and not focus on the negative in the job search). Best of all, you'll spread your brand to people who want to help you and let them understand how they can help.

DON'T spend more than 10 minutes a day on job boards, or sending out resumes.

Really, you should have set up job alerts on the job boards you are on so new opportunities come to your e-mail. Don't get stuck in the trap I was in, thinking "if I'm there when a new job is posted then I could be the first to apply," or "maybe there are jobs I didn't see the first time." You can spend hours doing this and wasting your time. Use job boards as a tool, not a crutch.

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DON'T sift through all of your e-mails and worry about getting to everything.

Some things take priority over getting back to someone, especially when it's not important or urgent. I hate e-mails cluttering my inbox too; but don't spend hours pushing your job search aside while you send off a "thanks, me too" e-mail.

DON'T organize all of your contacts, to-do's and notes all day long.

I remember I had a job where I was bored out of my mind. I spent time organizing and reorganizing my file cabinet. I'm a strong advocate of having an organized and well-managed job search, and yes, there are huge amounts of data to sift through; but don't hide behind "I'm organizing my job search" when you should be doing a job search!

The don'ts focus on minimizing time spent on stuff that has low return, while the do's focus on making sure you are doing important things to move your job search forward. What don'ts or do's are on your list? Leave a comment...

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Posted via email from AndyWergedal

How To Write A Great Accomplishment Statement

If you are regular reader, you may notice that another recent post showed someone similarly posed.  That post was about signaling strength during job interviews.  So it pictured a young boy flexing his muscles.

Today’s photo shows someone who has just accomplished something great.  In her case, the completion of her 365 day self portrait project that she shared on flickr.

I used this picture because writing a great accomplishment statement is just the beginning of the conversation about you.  It is the result of a story you should be telling in your marketing documents.  Stories that illustrate your impact in the world.

So there’s a bigger story.  And there’s an element of passion.  An energy about your great works in prior companies.  And the better you do this, the better a hiring manager can envision you doing similar things for their department or company.

And the accomplishment statements you write are your way to engage the reader.  So that you will be granted an interview.  An audience to tell your stories and share your energy.

So they have to be good.  Well written.  They also have to be relevant and measurable.

Also remember not to mix them up with your responsibilities.  I shared this and other tips as part of the tutorial introducing my favorite resume and CV template.

So to help you think about how to write a great accomplishment statement, I thought I would illustrate an example for you.  And then walk you through each part.  Here it is:

So now to take you through it step by step:

1.  Action: There’s a great list of action verbs at Quint Careers. You can use a few of those or think up your own.  But make sure that your leading words suggest movement, ownership and leadership.

2.  Relevant Topic: What does your target company care about?  What do you know about the role this person will play?  With a solid knowledge of your likely audience, you can focus on the right topics.

3.  Impact: You need a word here that clearly states what happened.  In this case, something got reduced. And that is a good thing.  Make sure the positive impact you had is clearly stated.

4. Key Metric: What was impacted?  Make sure that metric is also relevant and measurable in the way your industry defines it.  In an economy where budgets are heavily scrutinized, your ability to measure and report will be important.  No matter what your role is in the company.

5.  Benefit: Accomplishment statements need numbers.  Something tangible like a % increase/decrease, $ revenue up or $ cost down.  And you can strengthen the benefit by adding a second short sentence to answer the “so what” question.  In this case, you could add: “BENEFIT: Delivered new revenues 6 months sooner than expected.”  That’s a nice surprise. 

So what if you charted out your key accomplishments like this?  Sound like a lot of work?  I’ll bet if you do it for a few, you’ll get the idea.  And have this structure in your mind as you write or re-write the rest.

What are your favorite action words?

Or better yet.

Share (via a comment below) your best accomplishment statement and I’ll give it a review.

Want to really take your materials up a notch?  Consider a professional resume writer. You can find writers I’ve approved and listed here on the site. Or find one on my Twitter list.

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Posted via email from AndyWergedal

Am I really a Project Manager? | JibberJobber Blog

When I started my job search I was looking for opportunities with a few titles, including:

• Project Manager
• Business Analyst

I don’t have  a PMP but I had enough hours that I could have taken the test… just didn’t want to put the time into it, even though most of the job postings talked about getting the certification.

A funny thing happened in my job search, though… when doing searches on a particular job board for “project manager” I came across, just by chance, a title that was totally new to me: PRODUCT manager.

As I dug deeper I found that a product manager more appropriately described my experience, and what I loved to do.  I defined a product manager as the “mini CEO”… that is, the person who had P&L responsbility for a particular product, or product line.  This was the person who had somewhat complete control over the product and had to have their fingers in many pots (development, project management, strategic planning, competitive analysis, customer and delivery aspects, etc.).

This was what I really wanted, but I hadn’t known it beforehand.

I enjoy project management and have a lot of respect for project managers.  I can say the same thing about business analysis.

But I was more of a product manager than anything else (haven’t you seen that in my own business ventures?).

Thank goodness I learned that, eventually, from a job board (of all places!).

How about you? Have you been focused on a handful of job titles to the point where you are not thinking about what you really should be looking at? (of course, if you haven’t thought of it yet, the answer is probably NO, unless you feel like the titles you are looking at are incomplete or, for some reason, off).

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Posted via email from AndyWergedal

Social Media Strategy: Why Coworkers Don’t Make Good Facebook Friends | Brand-Yourself.com Blog

Work life and Facebook – it seems like a never-ending discussion topic nowadays.  There are many things to consider in regards to your personal and career brand. Yet so many people are either unaware of them or do not fully understand the ramifications of the content they might share online. For millions of people, this includes sharing their page and their personal lives with their coworkers. Many people feel that coworkers are just “buddies from work” and all is well as long as the bosses aren’t their Facebook friends.  If this describes your thoughts about coworkers as Facebook friends, you may be in for a rude awakening.

As a general rule of thumb, I advise people to not invite or accept coworkers as Facebook friends unless their posts, pictures, and videos are not deeply personal and are always clean, upbeat, and in good taste. Some people do choose to invite coworkers, managers, and other professionals because they are intentionally using Facebook to leverage their career brand. This is a great way to use Facebook and I highly encourage it.

However, my general rule applies to those who use Facebook moreso for personal use – which seems to be the majority of people. It is for those who typically friend their coworkers without much thought. I recognize that your best friend and someone you trust with your life might be your coworker and Facebook friend. I am not necessarily talking about those people but moreso any coworker who does not fall in that “best friend” category. People who friend coworkers should be aware of the serious issues that could arise.

Does Your Facebook Content Look Like This?

*“I hate Mondays!”, “Why am I at work when I would rather be somewhere else?”, “What a long day… wish it was over”, “Not looking forward to going back to the grind tomorrow”, “Can’t wait to the head to the bar to get my drunk on!” “Sometimes I just want to beat the crap out of people”, “I swear my life sucks”, “Why is everyone a backstabber?” (or anything even remotely similar).

*Drama related content – telling the world about your arguments with others or sharing details about all the different problems you might have.

*Arguing or using profane language.

*Videos, photos and articles that are in bad taste (profane or sexually explicit content).

*“Liking” pages that are in bad taste (ex: “yourname likes I hate my job!”)

Consider the Ramifications:

*Many employees talk and gossip on a regular basis.  They can’t help themselves.  Who are they sharing your content with? Your boss?  Another coworker who might share it with your boss? Maybe. How do you know they aren’t?

*A coworker might not intentionally share what you post but it gets out anyway due to frustration. Typical scenario: Boss asks your coworker to stay late to work on a project and to ask for your help.  Coworker inadvertently says, “She won’t help, she’s been posting all over Facebook how she can’t wait to get out of here”. The boss makes a mental note of it and considers that and other things he might have heard when evaluating your potential for advancement in the company. Potential leaders in a company should not be posting statements like that on Facebook! It gives the impression that they don’t really like their job.

*A coworker Facebook friend gets promoted and now is your boss or is a manager elsewhere in the company – a person who might now have a say about your future potential with the company.  The facts are, you can be a model employee at work but people typically cannot separate what they learn about on you on Facebook from your great work on the job. Careless postings on Facebook can shatter your strong career brand no matter how great your performance is at work.

*You take a sick day. You go out to lunch and then check in at the restaurant on Foursquare, which subsequently posts on your Facebook page. Or maybe you just mention your lunch in an unrelated Facebook conversation that evening.  Either way, your integrity is now in question. Situations like this can also cause you to be fired!

*You are at work “doing your job”.  But throughout the day, your Facebook page is somehow publishing a stream of updates from Farmville, Mafia Wars, Frontierville and results from a few random quizzes. Your coworker Facebook friend notices this and talks about it at the water cooler. It eventually gets back to your boss.  These kinds of things really do happen and this is another example of a situation that can cause you to be terminated from employment.

It’s Time for Damage Control

I can’t stress enough how important it is to be cautious about adding coworkers to your Facebook page.  Consider how much easier and less stressful it would be to separate your personal life from your professional life!

If you have not been careful about the quality of your content and you have coworkers as Facebook friends, you should start doing a bit of damage repair.

It is not necessary to go in and “unfriend” your coworkers as they have already read your content. Your best course of action is to completely change your online image and work hard at reversing the damage for at least a month or two. Leverage yourself and post only high-level content that will change the perception that others (specifically, your coworkers!) have of you.

I do recommend deleting controversial content that already exists on your page. But spend the majority of your time concentrating on building a strong, positive image of you. Your coworkers will notice the change and their image of you will start to change. After a month or two, I would remove all your coworkers from your page and simply explain that you want to keep your personal and professional life separate. Trust me, having your coworkers trust and respect you is far more important than having them as Facebook friends!

Jessica Simko is a seasoned senior level Human Resources professional with over 15 years of experience in all facets of Human Resources Management. She is a Career Coach and Consultant specializing in helping all levels of career professionals create, build, and maintain a strong career brand in the corporate work culture. She strives to help people connect their passions with their jobs and then to leverage their brand to maximize their potential throughout their careers. She offers a wide variety of career branding articles and tips at Career Branding Guide where she also offers coaching and consulting services based on the Career Branding Guide model. Feel free to connect with her on:

Twitter
Linked In

via blog.brand-yourself.com

Posted via email from AndyWergedal

3 Unique Ways for Executives to Build Their Network » Blog | Great Resumes Fast

At the executive level, you are always burdened with the task of trying to get more people to know you so that one day they might be able to help you. In other words, you’re faced with the job of having to build your executive network. Nothing wrong with this in theory, but sometimes the job can get a bit tedious, especially when you feel that you’ve used up all of your options.

Well now’s the time to get some fresh ideas to help you continue to build that network. So let’s look at some unique ways of getting this done.

Create Your Own Networking Group
Often times, we think that the only real way to grow our network is to join an existing networking group. But we forget that we could also build our own.

One great benefit of starting your own group is that you get to have control over when it gets together and what activities you will take part in. Also, it can center more specifically around your interests, thus guaranteeing you will feel passionate about it.

If you want to start your own group, you could create a strictly-online environment to include people from out of town, only work with your offline contacts, or mix it up a bit. By taking this route, you give yourself the opportunity to not only create more networking opportunities for yourself, but many others.

Bond with Online Contacts Offline
Sometimes people don’t realize that they’re online networking contacts are real people, especially if they meet them online. But they are very real and able to make a significant difference in your career if you let them. A good way to make the best use of your online contacts is to make them a part of your offline networking circle. This way, you have a face to place with the name and they do as well.

So how can you get this done if you are living in different cities? You could consider having a nice lunch meeting if you take a trip out to their city. If this is not likely to happen, you could even find out what activities they take part in outside of work to see where you have common ground. If you both love to ski, for instance, maybe you could schedule yearly ski trips on the same weekend and at the same resort to make sure you connect.

Create Exciting Business Cards
One way to get noticed is to create exciting business cards – some that tell a little bit more of your story with a unique flair. This means, instead of creating the standard business card with bland text on a white background, consider trying different colors that reflect your personality and brand. You could also include your picture on the card so people won’t forget your face after they meet you. And consider having yours cut into a unique shape – one that prompts people to ask questions yet still is able to fit neatly into a wallet or business card rolodex.

When building your executive network, don’t simply rely on the “tried and true” to get the best results. If you step out of your box and try unique options, you could see your network grow faster than ever.

via greatresumesfast.com

Posted via email from AndyWergedal

Cover Letters: To Send or Not to Send, This is the Question | Career Rocketeer - Career Search and Personal Branding Blog

I have discussed this topic in the past, and I see that it is still one of the most frequently asked and hotly debated questions on Linked-In. So I think it is worth revisiting, exploring both sides of the questions. Then you can be the final judge of what to do in your job search.

CONSENSUS:
The only thing that people on all sides of the great cover letter debate agree upon is when a recruiter, employer or job posting requests that you include a cover letter along with your resume that you do so; and you must follow their directions to a tee including sending a detailed salary history if requested.

PRO:
What I observed in evaluating the importance of a cover letter is, just like in politics, the pro and con opinions seem to follow defined lines. In participating in and following up with fellow contributors on these discussions I found that recruiters generally share a point of view that a cover letter is helpful to them and I recommend that you send one to them.

As a recruiter I rarely read cover letters. When I did it was only after reading the resume first, unless I asked for one for a particular assignment, and I will say I rejected more people based on their cover letter than I was swayed to change my original opinion. However I do know many recruiters, especially in high level search and certain industries who feel a cover letter is a required part of the resume submittal process.

So my opinion is that a cover letter should be sent to a recruiter since you need to sell them on accepting you as a candidate and working with you on the current assignment as well as on future assignments. Just make sure your cover letter is on-target, polished and professional.

I also found that corporate people who screen resumes in smaller companies and for companies that don’t hire on a regular basis, or in high volume rely more on cover letters to differentiate between candidates. I think this is because they have not developed the skills to judge candidates on the basis of their resume and social media.

So I would recommend you send one to them as well, but if you do not it is not a major faux pas.

CON:
Many of you will be dealing with recruiters on the corporate side who are working on high volume searches where they receive up to 300 resumes per job, and they generally work on multiple internal assignments with different departments and decision makers. These people do not have the time or inclination to read or receive a cover letter. To them it is another piece of useless clutter on their desk or inbox.

For them I suggest it is best to use the time and effort you put into a cover letter into tweaking and customizing your resume for the specific job you are applying for. The odds of reading your cover letter and sending it up the line are slim. But on the downside the people who do take the time to read your cover letter will scrutinize it so you better be carful how it is written. I have also found most of these recruiters/screeners dislike being sold, have a low tolerance for repetitiveness, and are prone to look for and question discrepancies in your resume and cover letter. So if you have a choice you can get away without a cover letter and it will not have a negative impact on your candidacy.

Now my personal opinion is if a cover letter is not specifically required it can do more harm than good. Most people I know are average to poor resume writers who learn through trial and error; and they are even worse at writing a cover letter. So if resume and cover letter writing is not your forte I suggest you not write one. If you feel a need to do so remember your cover letter will be judged on spelling, grammar, content, style and how well it sells you against other candidates. I think if your resume is a powerful document you should rely on it and save your sales pitch for a personal interview.

CONCLUSION:
I believe the best approach in most cases is the middle ground, which is to send a simple letter of introduction along with your resume. Do not try and sell yourself. Just explain what job you are applying for, that the resume will show why you are a good fit, and offer include contact information and availability for an interview.

Again I would appreciate if you all weigh in on this discussion and leave a comment here or send one to me directly.

---

Author:

Perry Newman, CPC CSMS is a nationally recognized executive resume writer, career coach, AIPC certified recruiter and SMMU certified social media strategist known for his ability to help his clients get results. You can view his sample resumes at http://www.perrynewman.com/, and email him your resume at perry@perrynewman.com for FREE resume critique.

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Posted via email from AndyWergedal

Take a break from your job search « Courting Your Career

Taking a break from your job search gives you a chance to evaluate the effectiveness of your current strategy and catch your breath.

Are things going well? Are you having limited success? Is there anything you would like to do differently?

Before reinventing the wheel trying to guess what went wrong, take some time to reflect on any feedback you’ve received from recruiters. Usually, you’ll be lucky to get a rejection letter from most companies, so don’t expect many employers to be forthcoming with constructive criticism on your interview. It’s nothing personal; they just get swamped with tons of job candidates and don’t have time to communicate with everyone.

When following up on rejections, don’t ask for feedback about why you weren’t selected for “that” position. Most recruiters will shy away from getting into specifics either because of company policies or a subconscious fear of a possible confrontation. Instead, ask them if they would be willing to share any “general” feedback that would help improve your candidacy. It’s unlikely they’ll give you anything of substance, but it’s definitely worth a shot. The worst they can say is no.

If you possess the required qualifications but haven’t been selected for an interview, go back and take a look at your resume and correspondence. Check for any typos, make sure your resume accurately reflects your experience, and have one of your friends read it to determine whether your email or letter of interest is well written and concise.

Applying for openings, preparing for interviews, and dealing with rejection can be overwhelming. That’s why it’s critically important to do something fun and enjoyable at least once a week while you’re job searching. Keep your spirits up by renting a funny movie, hanging out with friends, or treating yourself to your favorite meal.

Although it might seem counterproductive, taking periodic breaks from your job search will give you a chance to gain valuable insight into what seems to be working well and what isn’t. It also will give you a chance to recharge your batteries–a must if you’re going to be successful in landing an offer.

via courtingyourcareer.wordpress.com

Posted via email from AndyWergedal