“When one door closes, a new door will open up but, how long is the hallway?” she said. This made me laugh. Both of us on the hunt for a job but she expressed what I’ve been feeling this week; a mix of anxiety and optimism, with my first rejection letter landing in my inbox. Bummer.
Searching for a job is not fun. Once I made the decision to stop being self-employed, focusing my energies on a job search and not a new project for my business, I suddenly felt alone. An ominous silence has taken over my world.
The phone doesn’t ring and my email inbox is getting zero action, though my sent box has lots of activity. I think I’ve sent out about 60 resumes this week. I am going for quality and not quantity but, the job market sector for my type of skills-set seems to be hot right now. Which has made me feel like I am behind and need to catch up but quick or be left out of the game entirely.
But what to do about it?
As is my nature, when presented with a problem, I turned to research. If the job market is an industry, and it is, then my skills are the product or commodity that I have for sale. Just as I have always done in my advertising sales and marketing career, I want to find decision makers and align my offerings with their business drivers and priorities. The closer we are to each other, then the closer I am to a job.
But it’s tricky. How do you stand out and get heard through all of the job seeker collateral that hiring managers receive on a daily basis? Resumes, cover letters, follow up emails or trying to find somebody, anybody, to talk too is very difficult. People are busy and hiring managers really don’t want to hear from you; job applicant software on websites feeling like a one-sided conversation or more accurately, no conversation at all, with a 3-second assessment and your well-crafted resume chucked to the delete bin.
However, there is hope.
In all of my research I found that LinkedIn is an excellent source for job seekers. Not only can you define your search using categories but, if you upgrade to a Premium package, you can take advantage of a few extra features that ensure (so LinkedIn promises) that you can speak directly to hiring managers or decision makers.
I am going to give it a shot and see what happens? I will let you know how it goes but for now, here is a great blog post that offered a few tricks and techniques to try for using LinkedIn in your own job search: Ten Ways to Use LinkedIn to Find a Job
Direct Link to Blog:
http://blog.guykawasaki.com/2009/02/10-ways-to-use.html#axzz1GDZCyqus
Also helpful was Alison Doyle’s article at About.com
Alison’s Link:
http://jobsearch.about.com/b/2010/02/16/how-to-use-linkedin-to-find-a-job.htm
To your success!
Trish King
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