Essay Guideline

Looking for a job on the Internet can be daunting. Where do you start? What Web sites are best for your industry?

If you’re suffering from “job search overwhelm,” take heart. Remember the adage about how to eat an elephant one bite at a time.

Your quest for employment is the same.

It’s less overwhelming if you slice the online job market into bite-sized pieces instead of trying to visit 1,000 Web sites in a single day.

Here are 4 ways to divide the online employment market into smaller niches — and get hired faster.

1) Search For Local Job Sites

Like politics, most job searches are local. You’ll likely get hired by an employer within 20-30 miles of where you are now. So it pays to find Web sites that list local job openings.

Tip: look for job listings at the Web site of your local newspaper or TV station. You’ll almost always find something. Examples: startribune.com, kstp.com, detnews.com, nytimes.com. You’ll often find links to other regional job sites this way, too.

A second tactic is to type your state or city name and the word “jobs.com” into your Web browser and see what turns up. Examples: Minnesotajobs.com, Chicagojobs.com, Phillyjobs.com.

2) Search For Jobs By Industry

No matter what line of work you’re in, there’s probably a Web site with employment postings for that industry. So doing a Google search for “job title + jobs” should produce leads.

Another good Web resource is SearchSimpleton.com. It has links to more than 1,000 industry-specific Web directories, from Accounting and Finance to Travel, Hospitality and Restaurant job sites. It’s a good place to narrow your search to a specific industry or job function.

3) Search For Unadvertised Openings

Here’s a neat trick. You can get hired by companies before they even know they need you, according to Rich Milgram, founder and CEO of the 4Jobs.com Career Network.

All you have to do is think beyond your title.

“Most people take their job searches too literally. If they don’t find an exact match for the position Software Development Manager, for example, they give up. This is a mistake. Instead, look for companies hiring lots of software engineers and go pitch yourself as a manager to that company. That’s because employers tend to fill lower-level jobs first over the Internet, so you’ll be there ahead of their need for a new team manager,” says Milgram.

How do you pitch yourself to employers before they’ve listed a job opening?

Research the company, make contact with people who work there, then send a networking letter. According to Milgram, your letter should say something like: “I’ve been in your shoes before, here’s what you’re going to experience as you hire new people, and I’d be happy to talk to you about it.”

“The successful job search is not about you, but about the growth and the future of the company you want to work for,” adds Milgram.

The sooner you realize that, the sooner you’ll get hired.

4) Contact Old Classmates

You already know that networking can uncover the best job leads. It’s essential that you tell everyone you know about your job search. But don’t stop with those people.

Talk to everyone you used to know — folks you haven’t been in touch with for years.

And the easiest way is to contact people you went to high school or college with. Even if you haven’t talked to them in 20 years, you have something in common and they ought to be glad to hear from you (unless you stole their lunch money or did something equally inapt).

Two Web sites to help make contact with old school friends are Classmates.com and Linkedin.com. Also, most college Web sites will help you get in touch with fellow alumni — try yours and see.

Now, go out and make your own luck!

Kevin Donlin is President of Guaranteed Resumes. Since 1996, he and his team have provided resumes, cover letters and online job-search assistance to clients in all 50 states and 23 countries. Kevin has been interviewed by USA Today, CBS MarketWatch, The Wall Street Journal’s National Business Employment Weekly, CBS Radio, and many others.

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It’s perceived to be one of the most difficult transitions in life: rejoining the workforce after an extended layoff. Maybe you were raising your children, maybe you were caring for a relative, or maybe you were downsized and had trouble finding a job. In any case, it’s a daunting proposition to pull out the business suit, polish up the resume and start looking for a job.

To be sure, it’s not an easy task, but if you prepare appropriately, and attack the search smartly, it’s not as intimidating as you may think.

With the right Mindset, the proper downtime Approach, and some specific Strategies, you can get back out there and land work.

The Mindset

You have a gap in your resume.

So what!

There is this obsession that having a gap in your resume is a horrible sin. It’s not. The fact is, it’s incredibly common these days. Layoffs unfortunately are an everyday occurrence. Work/life balance awareness has increased to the point where more people are taking time off for personal reasons.

Twenty years ago, the typical job situation had the male breadwinner getting a job out of college and spending the rest of his career working for one company until his gold-watch retirement party at age 55.

Those days are long gone.

There’s no need for you to be shy about the fact that there’s a gap in your resume. You are part of a large and growing population of job seekers that have taken time off for a variety of reasons. There’s no need to fret.

The Approach

The biggest issue that employers have with employees returning to the workforce is their perceived lack of being “out of the game.” Technology, industry trends, and job skills can all change rapidly over the course of a couple of years.

As such, you want to make sure that you can show your aptitude in some of these areas. Take computer classes, get involved with trade organizations, and stay abreast of industry happenings by reading trade publications during your time off. It does take some time, but not nearly as much as working full time.

Then when it comes time to interview you’ll be able to say something like, “I knew it would be important for me to stay current on my computer skills, so I took classes in the most recent version of Microsoft Office while I was taking care of a relative.”

The Strategy

Packaging your “gap” in a resume or on an interview takes careful consideration. Don’t try tricks like changing dates or writing about how you honed your managerial skills negotiating with three children under the age of 10. Recruiting Directors know what you do as a mom or as a caregiver. What they want to know is that you’re in the game and ready to contribute.

Of course it would always be ideal to be able to tell your story in person, but often you don’t have the luxury of meeting someone face to face. As such, the cover letter becomes a great tool to let a potential employer know about your resume gap and why it’s not a big deal.

Mention why you’re reentering the workforce now

“I had always wanted to return to the workplace, and now that my children are in school full-time, it’s the perfect opportunity.”

Talk about how you stayed in the game

“I wanted to stay involved in nonprofit as much as I could after our company closed our office, so I’ve volunteered at the American Cancer Society and took an online class in development.”

Ultimately it’s not going to be easy to get back out there. But with the right game plan, it doesn’t have to be as difficult as you think.

Good luck!

Brad Karsh is president of JobBound, a company dedicated to helping job seekers make the transition to work. Author of “Confessions of a Recruiting Director: The Insider’s Guide to Landing Your Fist Job” (Prentice Hall Press, April 2006), Brad is considered the nation’s leading expert on job searching. He’s been featured on CNN’s Paula Zahn Now, CNBC, CNNfn, and quoted in The Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Fortune, and many others. For even more job search advice, check out http://www.jobbound.com

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The Workplace is changing and unless you are prepared to change your perceptions about the nature of work and about yourself at work, you will feel lost, dispirited and unable to ride the wave of workplace change successfully.

While we can point to endless examples of rapid change from the Internet, globalization, outsourcing, mergers and mass retailing, what I think we need to pay attention to is how to prepare ourselves and our children to interact, respond to and add value within the new realities of work.

Preparing yourself for a new job or a first job requires introspection, self-appraisal, research, preparation, dedication and discipline. Success in the new marketplace requires you to give thought to what makes you Who You Are? What is your Behavioral Style? What do you value? What is your vision of what is possible for you? What are your internal obstacles? How comfortable are you interpersonally? How do you present visually, verbally and non-verbally? Once you get a clear picture of these specific issues, and only then, should you begin to assess your skills, abilities, experiences, education and other more standard components that are engaged in a job search.

For a number of years I was a senior Outplacement Counselor at a “boutique” outplacement firm in New York City. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the term outplacement,it is a coaching and advisory service provided to individuals (by their employers) who have been severed from their jobs for any number of reasons: fired, downsized, mergers, relocation, outsourcing, and voluntary severance.

My job was to help them work through their next career step, be it to another job, transitioning into a new industry or into the non-profit arena, into entrepreneurship, or even retirement.

We began our work from the “inside out”.

What that means is that we started our work together by discovering what “made them tick”. Using a variety of well crafted assessments, we explored what were their preferences in terms of how they operated in the world. Were they outgoing, forceful, introverted, perfectionistic, spontaneous or deliberate as well as a host of other aspects. What was important to them in their lives? Was it community involvement, the arts, financial arenas, theoretical and knowledge acquisition or something else?

Why is this inside-out approach so important? Because a successful career path demands that you bring your full self to any endeavor and you can’t achieve that if you haven’t gotten a clear picture of who you are, both strengths and opportunities for development.

Today “lack of time” is the new poverty. We spend increasing amounts of time at work, even when we are away from the place of work, on weekends, vacations, traveling we are often plugged in with little opportunity for down time and rejuvenation. With that as our reality, if you don’t enjoy what you are doing every day and if you feel that your job is always in threat of being lost, you’ll ask yourself, “What’s the point?”.

The new awareness that is bubbling up is that it is more risky NOT to know what you really love and then do it than to take or stay in a job because it sounds right, pays X amount of money or because that’s what you’ve always done.

All jobs are one step away from ending.

And, if that is the new reality, doesn’t it make sense to pursue what you really care about, to invest your energy because you love what you are doing and choose work that makes you feel alive?

Now, if you think this line of thinking makes sense, you may be thinking, “Ok, so how do I go about this?” Most people are clueless about how to conduct a really effective, well-conceived job search. Most of my clients, including people with Senior VP titles, have said, “God, I wish someone had taught me these tools 20 years ago. My life and career path may well have been very different.”

So, here’s what it takes to Re-Purpose Your Career:

1)A Process of Self Analysis:

The use of evaluations and assessment as well as discussion with others will help you attain a clear and honest picture of who you are - warts and all. This is the crucial first step.

2) Discover What You Value:

Take an in-depth look at your values, attitudes and interests and what they indicate about discovering work that you will love and be committed to.

3) Assessing Your Success Quotient:

In other words, you may be able to do many things and know about lots of things, but there are certain things that you love to do and particular ways of using yourself that you really enjoy. There are specific clusters of these skills, abilities and attributes that have always contributed to whatever success or triumph over adversity that you have had throughout your life, not just at work or at school, but recreationally, socially or within your life experience.

Identifying these success clusters points the way to what kind of work you should pursue and in what kind of business culture.

4) Setting Your Intention:

Once you have achieved the above analysis you must commit yourself to pursuing work and job opportunities that capitalize on your strengths; on what you love, and on how you enjoy operating in the world.

It is very easy to get frightened that you will never find such a combination, or that you don’t have what it takes to attract job opportunities like the ones you imagine, and other self-limiting beliefs. Your beliefs about what is possible determine your outcomes. If you believe you can’t, you can’t. If you truly believe you can and then sharply focus your intention and efforts without demand for instant gratification, you will achieve what you desire.

One comes to be of just such stuff as that on which the mind is set.”(Upanishads)

5)Nuts and Bolts Application:

a) Now it is time to develop your RESUME. A resume won’t get you a job but it can really open the doors. How your resume is constructed will either attract or push away opportunities. A resume should be more than a laundry list of past job or related experiences,it should provide the reader with a sense of who you are and what you can accomplish.

b) Write a BIO: A one page document that is written almost like a press release that you can distribute to people you know who may be able to be helpful to you.

c) PRACTICE INTERVIEW SKILLS: Create possible questions, develop honest yet savvy answers, have trial runs with someone, videotape yourself and see how you present - it’s often quite the eye- opener!

d) NETWORK: This is a skill that will be invaluable for the rest of your life. Talk to everyone you know about what you want to do. Speak with people who are doing what you think you are interested in and get a real sense of what it is like to do that work, what organizations that are involved in that kind of work are like, what is new in that field, what are the opportunities, what are the challenges.

Send thank you notes to people who met with you or have been helpful to you -keep them in the loop. The more you know the more powerful a job candidate you will be.

e) GET ORGANIZED: Keep careful notes of all meetings, phone calls and interviews. Write down who you spoke to or met, what was said, what did you learn, what could you have done better, when to follow up and more. Finding Your Job is like a military foray - it’s all in the preparation, debriefing, follow-up and follow through.

There are many books in the library and bookstores that you can use to help you find the work that you love. For some people, reading books and other publications that provide good information is enough to get them on their way.

For many others, somehow the great ideas on paper don’t translate into effective and comprehensive action. For those, that’s what a Career Coach is for. A Career Coach knows what assessments will be valuable for you, what questions to ask, how to structure your resume, help you network and find the resources that will be most beneficial.

Whether by yourself or with the help of a professional, be prepared to dig deep, work hard and be disciplined in your search and, if you do, you will succeed.

Leslie Malin, MSW, President of Management by Design is a co-author of “The Essential Coaching Book: Secrets to a Winning Life,” and is the author of two forthcoming books: “Meeting Yourself on the Way to Work: Finding Meaning from 9 to 5″ and “HireSmart: A Practical Guide for Business Owners & Their Managers”.

As an entrepreneur, coach, consultant and therapist she guides independent professionals, solopreneurs and small business owners who want to create their success by choice, not by chance.

Her expertise in working with people in career transition or seeking their first job provides mastery of the job-search process.

Undue the “default thinking” in your life, get your FREE Copy of “As a Man Thinketh”, by James Allen by emailing Leslie at results@lesliemalin.com with your contact information (Full name and email)and be signed up for her ezine, “On the Way”. Browse her website at http://www.lesliemalincoach.com.

Leslie is available for public speaking engagements, executive retreats and motivational seminars. Contact her at: results@lesliemalin.com

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