4 Reasons Your Job Search Isn’t Yielding Results - Part 1 of 4

Are you tired of your job search? Tired of hearing from hiring managers “you don’t have enough experience” – or not hearing from hiring managers at all? I understand your frustration and want to help, so I've created a 4 part series that will share the "Top 4 Reasons Your Job Search Isn't Yielding Results" and release one tip per week - starting this week!

Reason #1: E-mailing Your Resume – Only: Did you know that on average, a hiring manager’s e-mail inbox may receive over 200 resumes for each posted job position?

I am not saying that you shouldn’t e-mail your resume. What I AM saying is that e-mailing your resume isn’t enough. E-mailing your resume is easy to do, so easy that thousands of candidates are doing exactly the same thing.

Try This Approach Instead: Go ahead and apply to that position posted online, just make sure to send your resume via fax, hand delivery, and good ole’ fashioned snail mail when you can.

Thank you for taking time to read this article. Stay Tuned Next Week For Tip #2! Feel free to share your comments and tips below!

You Are What You Say You Are

There is a quote by the famous T. Harv Eker that states "You will live into your story.” Basically, whatever you tell yourself, you will become. This can be both good and bad. Good, in the fact this can propel you to become better as a person and as a professional. Bad, in the fact you can undermine and sabotage your success without anyone playing an active role.

Your mind determines the story and your success at your job search. Tell yourself everyday WHY you are great. Review old documents that complement your ability to write on certain subjects. Take time to pat yourself on the back for those complements and commit these accomplishments to memory. Don’t be shy. Put these on your resume as well. These high grads on various class projects are EXACTLY what hiring managers are looking for. Especially if you haven’t had any prior experience in the job you are applying for!!!

Now that you are visualizing yourself as the wonderful person that you truly are, try these approaches to make yourself stand out:

Use Post-It Notes: Send your resume via mail with a Post-It Note attached with a approving phrase like “Good Candidate” or “Quick Study”

Send Candy: Send your resume via mail with a small bag of peppermints attached to your cover letter. The top of the cover letter can state “Life is sweeter with (insert your name) as your insert job title”.

Network: There are 6 degrees of separation between who you need to know and who needs to know you. Join your local professional association as a member and start meeting people in your profession. Ask questions and let them know what you are looking for and how you can help an employer. Keep doing this. You will get results.


You can make your life and your career the story that you want. Just take the first step to living your story – You are what you say you are!!!

Whine or Cheese

Can you believe it? In less than 4 months, this year will end and a new one will begin!


Don't wait until next year to make new year's resolutions. If you are unhappy with the way this year has been progressing in regard to your job search, then now is the time to swing your career into gear. No excuses and no regrets should be your sentiments by the time you reach January 2010 (Did I mention it will be here in less than 4 months?).


Every experience you have had this year, be it bad or good, has taught you a lesson. If you do not learn from it, you will fall into one of the two categories – Whine or Cheese.

Whine
You remember the one; it is the person in your office that blames everyone for the current problem or situation at hand. They whine about the gossip in the office, they whine about the time everyone comes in to work, and they whine about the amount of money so and so makes. Sound familiar? Well, hopefully not too familiar.....

If this sounds like you, or upon further reflection you realize is sounds more like you than you care to admit then make a vow to change right now. Stop saying “it’s not fair” and stop listening to people that say “it’s not fair”. Start putting your energies into rectifying the situation at hand. You will find if you put all of your effort into correcting the situation and avoiding those that whine about situations then you will begin to see it improve.

Cheese
Nathan from the book Who Moved My Cheese stated, “Have you noticed we don’t want to change when things change?” The book is a story about change and how 4 characters in a book handle the change of the “cheese” or goal always moving around. A small book, one could read it in 20 min while standing in the bookstore.

The important truth that pervades this book is that we must anticipate and accept change. It will come whether you like it or not. Your career will change. Your job and the daily duties in it will change. Every job applied to in your job search requires a resume that has been changed to reflect the job you are applying to. You will change your mannerisms in each interview. Each interaction with your current manger will change based on what is going on that day. Accept and embrace this fact. Truly successful people understand that change brings challenges, but it also brings learning and opportunity.


Today, you stand at the edge of opportunity and challenge. Make a choice - whine or cheese anyone?

How To Use Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and Social Media To Help You Find A Job

Almost a year ago I joined Twitter.com with one question in mind – Can Twitter help our Kaplan University students find a job?

As I learned more about Twitter.com, the next question became – Are lawyers and legal professionals on Twitter?

As time wore on, the next question became – Are hiring managers on Twitter? What about LinkedIn?

After almost a year of being on Twitter.com (and reading MANY books on the topic) and exploring other “Social Media” sites such as LinkedIn and Facebook, I can happily answer YES to all 3 questions.

When I First Started Using Twitter…..
With unemployment approaching staggering highs, I wanted to find a way to share job search tips that people could use quickly and easily and find legal professionals and hiring managers for our Kaplan University students. For a short time, I felt as if I were "Tweeting" in the dark (posts to Twitter.com are called "Tweets"), looking for lawyers that shared an interest in social media sites for the purpose of networking and sharing their insights into the legal field seemed daunting. How do I find them? How does this Twitter thing work? How can we converse with only 140 characters (the key to sharing ideas using Twitter)? But, I kept going in dogged determination always asking "Do Lawyers Tweet?"

Determination Pays Off With Twitter….
My determination paid off! Lawyers, legal professionals, and hiring managers DO “Tweet” and they are networking, talking, and sharing. These "tweets" are vibrant, informative, and interesting as people share insight into their worlds (and available jobs). To make your profile stand out
-Make Sure You Project a Professional Image
-Post Relevant Information Related To Your Field To Establish Your Reputation
You can also locate people with like interests on Twitter by using the “search” feature, hashtags feature (the “#” symbol), and looking at other people’s profiles to see which people they are “following”.

LinkedIn….
After experiencing success with Twitter, I decided to try to locate job opportunities and network on LinkedIn by conducting a “LinkedIn Experiment” over several months. The key “take-aways” include:
-Join Groups
-Utilize the Job Boards
-Create a Marketable Profile/Brand Yourself
-Utilize the Recommendation Feature

For More Details On Using Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and Social Media:
What to learn how to use social media? Want to learn more about how to find a job using Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and Social Media? CLICK HERE or copy and paste this link – http://khe.acrobat.com/p11992736/ in your web browser. It will open a live webinar presentation that I conducted with our Kaplan University students that provides step by step instructions on how to use these sites and tie everything together with an action plan at the end of the presentation.

Note: I am also happy to announce that this article has also been published in Kaplan University's newsletter for our students.

You Know More Than You Think

If You Have No Experience....

For those of you without experience, one may think that you have nothing to offer hiring managers. However, the opposite is true!!!

Where & How To Locate Your Past Experience....

Think of the industries you have worked in the past. Experience you gain working in your industry gives you in-depth experience and a shorter learning curve compared to someone without prior knowledge or experience in that field. Use the knowledge you have to apply for an opportunity in the industry that can use your expertise. The following are examples of where to start your job search. These are examples are not set in stone. You have intangible skills that can cross over into any other industry.

Position:
Medical Assistant


What Do You Know?
Medical terminology and the how to translate (in laymen terms) how a medical procedure, error, or illness effects a client and the potential opportunities to build a case

Where to apply:
Hospitals
Law Firms with a Malpractice specialty
Law Firms with a Personal-Injury specialty
Public interest groups


Next Position:
Nursing Home Assistant


What Do You Know?
Proper elder care and nursing home procedure

Where to apply:
Larger nursing home companies
Assisted living retirement communities
Law Firms with an elder care specialty


Next Position:
Phone company employee

What Do You Know?
Proper telecommunications procedure and violations of regulatory compliance

Where to apply:
Local phone companies
Public interest organizations

Position:
Tax Preparer


What Do You Know?
Government procedure for taxation and penalties for improper tax filings, in addition, to shades of interpretation for filing purposes

Where to apply:
Law Firms with taxation specialty
Public interest organizations

See! The "What Do You Know" section lists your knowledge in terminology that anyone could understand without a lot of jargon. This is one of the keys to finding a job if you have no experience in a field! When something is simplified in a way that anyone can understand your impact, it increases the chance of you finding a job!

Thanks for taking the time to read this article! Feel free to share your comments below.

Grabbing The Attention of Hiring Managers - The Testimonial

Switch roles with the hiring manager for one moment. Wading through hundreds of resumes with job experiences all looking the same

• Company name


• Job duties: maintained calendar, Answered phones, etc.


• Objectives not centered on the company -- To find a (insert job title) job that will challenge me and allow me to use my skills effectively.


• Resumes that are difficult to follow due to all experience with each respective company written in paragraph form and resembling a novel instead of a resume.

In addition: These resumes add to the hiring manager’s concerns and questions of competence and credibility.

How Can You Grab The Attention Of The Hiring Manager?

How can you as a job seeker grab the attention of the hiring manager and ease some of their concerns about your credibility? At this stage, the answer does not lie in references provided with your resume. The answer lies in a unique approach that companies have utilized for years – testimonials.

Testimonials:

Testimonials help add credibility by providing evidence that your product (that means you) works. Start thinking of yourself as a business and the work produced as the product. The satisfied “customers” are your managers, co-workers, professors, and classmates. How have you helped improve your “customers” lives? Did you take initiative on a project and help complete it ahead of deadline? Have you been complemented on your contribution on a group project for class? Have found yourself in the situation of training new hires and the person learned the new material faster with you in comparison to being trained by someone else?

Contact previous employers, classmates, and professors. Ask if they would e-mail a statement to you praising you for your accomplishments in areas such as work ethic, reliability, multitasking, document preparation, interpersonal skills, working well under pressure, strong communication skills and customer service. Ask them to keep it specific but vague. Avoid use of industry jargon (unless is it the industry you will be working in).

Example:

Here is an example highlighting strong work ethic from a restaurant manager:

“I will never forget the time Jane worked several hours after the restaurant closed to make sure we had everything we needed to open early the next day.” “It was short notice and she had important plans that evening, but she canceled them to make sure we had everything we needed”
--John H. Manger, Steak Restaurant – Chicago, IL

The more people that you can show are satisfied in areas hiring managers find valuable, the less reluctant hiring managers will be to consider giving your product/you a try!!

Thanks for taking time to read this article. Please post your comments below.

Unleash the potential in yourself…..

Are You Looking To Be Freed?
How many of you have seen an animal chomping at the bit to be free? If you have visited a zoo, you can always tell the ones that know intuitively that this is not the correct habitat or place for them to be. When one thinks about it, the life of an animal in the zoo is not so bad. They receive food and shelter and all they have to do is look “cute and healthy” when people come to their part of the exhibit. So why are there still animals keenly aware that this place is not where they are supposed to be? They have the innate sense that there is more to life outside of the cage that they are in?

Are You "Chomping At The Bit"?
Where are you in your job search? Are you “chomping at the bit” to be free? Even though you are paid to look “cute, healthy, and busy” with your assigned duties do you have a sense that you still do not belong in that place. Your intuition may be right!!!

If you are “chomping at the bit” to be “free”, take a step back and find out why you feel the way that you feel. For those individuals that are currently working and want to stay with your current employer, find a way to incorporate new tasks that you enjoy. Develop a reputation for success in that area. Tell others about your accomplishments. Market yourself as the best person for the tasks that you love to perform. Soon, people will notice and soon, you will find yourself doing less of the job tasks that you didn’t care for and more of the job duties that you enjoy!!

If you are “chomping at the bit” to be free of your current employer, remember it will take work!!! Not working as a (insert job title here), but would like to become one? Start learning what hiring managers are looking for by speaking with them directly or reading about what their concerns are.

Suggested Steps...
For example, if you are looking to work as a paralegal, then a suggested first step would be to log on to www.law.com or pick 5 companies that you would like to work for and schedule an informational interview with the head of the legal department. If you are a student or recent graduate use that to your advantage by asking as many questions about the field and what hiring managers are looking for (if you are not, that’s fine too). Remember keep it short (about 20 min or so) unless the person that you are interviewing would like to take longer. Keep in touch with the person you interviewed by calling periodically and/or asking for their feedback on subjects that are featured on www.law.com (or an industry specific website) or any industry knowledge you come across.

Soon, others will see your potential and help you in your path and journey to unleash it!!!

Good luck and unleash your potential!!!!

Thank you for taking the time to read this blog. Feel free to share your experiences and your comments below.