David E. Perry's Blog, page 6

Network Backwards

One client, Jeff R. from Prior Lake, Minnesota, hit pay dirt in February by networking among contacts most people would never consider calling. He contacted potential employers from his LAST job search – companies he had interviewed with but not accepted job offers from.

 

"I emailed a manager I had interviewed with two years ago, before my latest job. He had moved to a different part of the company, but he referred me to the right decision maker. That new person interviewed me and offered me a job," says Jeff.

 

Action Step: Don't forget to look both ways when you network -- forward and back, all the way back to your college career office and internships, no matter how long ago you graduated.

 

And … don’t stop with your last job search. Ask your spouse/significant other, friends, family, neighbors if they have contacts from their last job search you could talk to. You’re sure to find something. But you have to ask!

Compliments of David Perry and Kevin Donlin

Grab your Free Guerrilla Job Search Audio here.

For more creative job search tactics, go to the Guerrilla Marketing for job hunters blog and download the free audio CD.

Career Watch: Finding a job in a third the time - Computerworld

Career Watch: Finding a job in a third the time

via www.computerworld.com

Good interview on the latest trends and tips.

How to Crack the Hidden Job Market

A rapid transformation in hiring practices has gone unnoticed by those looking for work  and the secret to finding a suitable job today lies in mastering the digital search environment used by employers

Every year, 50-million jobs are filled in the United States  --  almost all without a job posting.  This is happening because employers can’t deal with the avalanche of resumes they get.  Today, employers are relying on a brand new digital suite of tools and tactics to find the handful of “most qualified” recruits that they want to interview.

Let me tell you about the “hidden” job market and how you can use it to get hired. 

First, let’s dispense with a common misconception -- the hidden job market isn’t really hidden at all. It’s just not in plain sight. It’s referred to as the “hidden” job market because of how positions are created and filled. In most cases, jobs are created in one of three ways:

A company is growing and creates a new job;
An employee quits, vacating an existing job; or
An employee is fired from an existing job.

When a company is growing, the owner, president, or other hiring authority may know they need new employees, but haven’t initiated the process. They may not have the time, the budget, or the willingness to go through the hassle of advertising and interviewing. So, while the need is real, the job itself remains hidden inside the head of the hiring manager.

When someone quits or is fired, managers will first decide if they can eliminate the job, or combine it with another position. If they decide a new person is needed, they will first look inside their organization for someone to fill the role. If that doesn’t work, they’ll likely ask employee for referrals. And if that doesn’t work, they may opt to run an ad through HR, or hire a headhunter.

Companies often contact a headhunter when secrecy is required, because good recruiters can conduct a search without anyone ever knowing. This is especially important if an employee is going to be replaced without their knowledge – loose lips not only sink ships, they can also damage company morale.

In all of these cases, jobs remain hidden to the outside world for weeks if not months. Hence the term “hidden” job market.

The only way for you to access the hidden job market successfully is to reach out to hiring managers directly before they opt to go the advertising or HR route. The hidden job market is your private laboratory to test the best methods for finding your dream job.

Now let’s look at one of the Top 10 Strategies Guerrilla Marketing for Job Hunters uses to access the hidden job market …

 

Strategy: Do Targeted Research

One quick way to discover new opportunities is by doing structured search engine queries. And it’s fairly easy to do. Here’s how to do targeted research, in two easy steps:

Step #1 Develop a list of companies you want to work for.

Here’s how you build that list. Before you start, you have to answer two questions: What job do you want? and Where do you want to do it?

Let’s say you want an advertising job in New York City. We’ll visit Google.com and use the Advanced Search option. The search string shown below instructs Google to search for a directory of advertising firms in New York or an industry conference on advertising held in New York. This will bring back leads for prospective employers.

Your search query should look like that in the picture above.

My search returned many hits, including one for AD:TECH, billed as “The Event for Interactive Marketing”. It’s a conference held in New York for the advertising industry. There where also hits for directories of advertising companies in New York, complete with web site addresses, phone numbers, and profiles of the owners. Pay dirt!

If you spend a few minutes experimenting with different combinations of search terms, you should turn up a nice list of potential employers who can hire you – your own private “hidden” job market.

Now, it’s on to …

Step #2 Find People Who Can Hire You:

Once you have a target list of companies, you need to find out who the people are in those companies that can actually hire you. A good headhunter would pick up the telephone, call and ask. You might not be so inclined, so here’s another way to get the names of hiring authorities …

Visit each company’s web site and look for names of people who can say yes. Who are you looking for? Executives, not human resource people – the latter group can only say NO … unless you’re another human resources professional. If you’re lucky, every corporate web site will identify its senior executives, including names, titles, phone numbers, career summaries and sometimes email and photos!  Web information should be up-to-date, but I would still call the receptionist to confirm it.

Let’s go back to our advertising example. Let’s say I’m looking for a sales job in an ad agency in New York City. Who would have the power to hire a sales rep? I would scour company web sites for the name(s) of a VP of Sales, VP of Sales & Marketing or a General Manager.

If you’re having trouble finding names on a web site, go back to Google’s advanced search box and type in the company name in the first box and “Vice President Sales Marketing Director” in the third box. (By the way, you don’t need to put the words in brackets and don’t include commas or punctuation.)

That search string will bring you:

♦   All the people who are, or have ever been, VPs or President or Directors of Sales and/or Marketing for that company.

♦   The resumes of a whole pile of people from that company whom you may be able to call and solicit for information.

Once you have the name of the person one rung up the ladder from the job you want, you need to process their name through Google again. This time, put their first and last name in the first box and the company name in the third box.

This will produce a list of press releases, and news articles in which they are mentioned, as well as conferences they’ve attended. Read an article or two and clip something memorable to use in your NarrowCast letter, in which you demonstrate your knowledge of the person, the company, and how you can help both. (You can view an example NarrowCast letter at this link).

When you send your letter, you can to write. “I read your article in … [name the publication] about … [name the subject] which prompted me to write.” Very powerful, and a great way to get interviews.

Article by David E. Perry Managing Partner of Perry-Martel International Inc., co-author Guerrilla Marketing for Job Hunters with Kevin Donlin, President Guaranteed Resumes, author, Resume and Cover Letter Secrets Revealed, Guaranteed Sales Resumes, and 51 Ways to Find a Job Fast -- Guaranteed.  David and Kevin are co-authors of Guerrilla Resumes for Job Hunters

We're # 2 so we try harder!!!

Guerrilla Marketing for Job Hunters 3.0 is #2 again on Amazon!!!

Thanks.

Brandman to the Rescue

" In late 2008 I was in a challenging spot, professionally.  But a combination of guerrilla tactics, personal branding and fortuitous timing got me back in the game.   Several events conspired to create Brand Man, my fictional alter ego.  The first was the economic crisis of 2008-2009 and the subsequent implosion of the job market.  I knew there would be lots of qualified candidates applying for the same positions I was targeting.  Plus, I was at a disadvantage because I had been doing contract and freelance work for the previous year and a half." 

Read the full story at www.gm4jh.com/g3downloadpage/tom-mcalister

 

The 5 world events that changed job-hunting forever

Here are the 5 events which will impact your job hunting the most over the next 10 years.

The advent of the Internet
The most obvious event that has changed job-hunting is the advent of the Internet.  In the old days people would wait for the Sunday paper and check the classified section to see who was hiring or they’d simply ask their friends and neighbors if they knew of any job openings.  Now, thanks to instant communications and round-the-clock access you can research companies and job-hunt anytime at more than 42,000 job boards and 500,000 corporate web sites.  You can network with total strangers, thousands of miles from home, in your pajamas.

 

Enron, the dotcom bubble, and ethics
The dotcom bubble burst when investors suddenly realized companies needed to make a profit to stay in business.  In a virtual one-two-punch the scandals at Enron accelerated the changing relationship between employers and employees.  Basic business principles have gone wrong, ethics have been forgotten and profit became the new god.  Employees today do not see their top executives as being people of high integrity.  A post-Enron survey found that 58 per cent of workers thought that top executives were only looking out for themselves.  Business violated the old social contract: ‘Be loyal and we will take care of you’.  Employees feel they are responsible for their own welfare—companies don’t care.   Today’s businesses are increasingly “knowledge-based” and need the active involvement of their employees at a time when there has been huge forced turnover in staff.  Consequently, loyalty is low and involvement uncertain – many people now think like “free-agents.  Clearly this is not your daddy’s company anymore.

9/11
The horrific events of September 11th 2001 have changed the face of America.  America has always been seen as a destination for immigrants eager to build a better life, safe from the ravages of war which have plagued Europe, Asia, Africa and the Middle East.   Because of the events of 9/11, immigration has been tightened.   Immigrants bring with them a diverse set of talents, abilities and skills that America will rely on more in the next decade as skill requirements of new jobs rise and our population ages.  For more than 200 years immigration has fueled growth in America and shored up skilled worker shortages.  We suggest the events of 9/11 altered the mix of people America allows into the country and therefore unwittingly slowed the natural growth of the economy.  Some have speculated that this will increase the offshoring of jobs from within all of the G8 nations. 

Retiring Baby-boomers
Just as America is emerging from recession, a major event is poised to erase all the productivity gains of the last few years and cripple growth across every sector of the economy – baby-boomers are retiring in unprecedented numbers.  With 76 million baby boomers heading toward retirement...and only 46 million Generation X players waiting in the wings, America is facing a mammoth talent crunch.   In the very near future, there will be 15% fewer Americans in the 35 to 45-year-old range than there are now. At the same time, the U.S. economy is likely to grow at a rate of 3% to 4% per year.   Who will do the work?

Tiananmen Square
The western world’s reaction to Tiananmen Square has helped to put China on the road to democracy and with it, the opening of the single largest market in the world. Most of China’s one billion people live in conditions not unlike those in the early 1900’s in America.  Shortly there will be a growing demand for everything modern. China will strain the world’s resources in agriculture, manufacturing, energy, transportation, natural resources, education and medicine.   You can benefit by working for those companies who will assist China in designing and expanding their infrastructure.

Compliments of David E Perry and Kevin Donlin. For more creative job search tactics, go to the Guerrilla Marketing for job hunters blog and download the free audio CD.

Search In Niches

Everyone advises you to post your resume on leading sites like Monster.com and HotJobs.com. And there's nothing wrong with that -- my clients have been hired using both.

 

But don't forget the growing number of job postings found on niche Web sites that cater to specific industries, associations and other affinity groups.

 

This tactic worked for one of my clients Carla S., from Marshall, Minnesota.

 

"I interviewed for and got offered a great job this week after applying to openings on sites from my industry, like www.jobsinlogistics.com and www.careersinfood.com ," says Carla.

 

Action Step: Follow Carla's lead and focus your search on sites that appeal to a narrow audience. As a result, you'll likely find less competition for jobs that are closely matched to your qualifications.

 

Find niche job boards at sites like www.nicheboards.com and by doing searches for keywords ("YOUR INDUSTRY + jobs") at search engines like www.google.com, www.yahoo.com, www.teoma.com and www.kartoo.com.

 

Compliments of David Perry and Kevin Donlin

Grab your Free Guerrilla Job Search Audio here.

For more creative job search tactics, go to the Guerrilla Marketing for job hunters blog and download the free audio CD.

The new global America for job hunters

“It’s not the strongest of the species, nor the most intelligent, that survive; it’s the one most responsive to change.” - Charles Darwin

Under siege from layoffs, outsourcing, off-shoring, rightsizing, downsizing and bankruptcies, America is in the midst of a profound business transformation.  It’s the result of developments in information and communications technologies, changing human values and the rise of the global knowledge-based economy. The sheer complexity and technical sophistication of business has transformed the job market - not just here in America, but around the world. Business is becoming knowledge-based as well as technology intensive. 

 

Knowledge workers are now the backbone of America. They are employed in all sectors of the economy, most prominently in the information technology and communications sectors, but also to a growing extent in healthcare, manufacturing, education, finance, natural resources, defense and government—in any field that requires innovation to sustain competitiveness. Competitive advantage is rooted in the new ideas of these skilled workers.

Of the 120 million skilled workers in America today, 24-40 million change jobs every year.  Many people needlessly drift in and out of dead-end jobs because they don’t know which industries have a future in this new America, or how to present their value in the right terms to the people who can hire them. 

Already reeling from outsourcing and the struggling economy, competition for the remaining U.S. jobs is tougher than ever, the rules for getting them have changed, and global competition will ensure the rules will change again tomorrow. 

To succeed in the new world of work, you must have a plan.  The plan must be clear and detailed in every way.  It must be:

 Clever;
Results driven;
 Marketing oriented;         
 Inexpensive to execute;
 Realistic; and
 Achievable

No government agency, educational institution or think tank has a genuine crystal ball to make a call on the future; there are simply too many unknown factors when it comes to industry and job creation. One thing is certain, whether you are employed but unhappy, or unemployed and in need of a new opportunity; you as a job-hunter are at a strategic fork in the road. 

Are you ready to take control of your  life?   Are you  ready to become a Guerrilla Job Hunter?

Compliments of David E Perry and Kevin Donlin. For more creative job search tactics, go to the Guerrilla Marketing for job hunters blog and download the free audio CD.

Zoom Zoom ZoomInfo - here's why I insist my job huntering friends need a ZoomInfo profile

Sometimes FREE is good - especially if you're job hunting - but in ZoomInfo's case it's absolutely essential. 

People that know me well and understand how the recruiting and search business function know why I'm a HUGE fan of ZoomInfo.  It works.  It makes my life simpler by doing the upfront grunt research work involved in every search project faster and in a lot of cases more meaningful. 

ZoomInfo makes gathering a long list of potential candidates blindingly fast.  Now our database is 2.2 M strong [which rivals the largest search firms] but ZoomInfo's is 42M.  Cross referencing our info with theirs helps us start every search on a solid foundation. 

Why should you care as a candidate?  If you're not found in the research phase of a search you'll very likely never be called.  The search project will be completed before you even know it's happening. It doesn't take the "art" out of the recruiting process but it sure adds a depth of rigure to the science of sourcing.

So listen to Peter Clayton's pod cast and you'll understand why need to be in ZoomInfo if you value your career.  Did i mention it's FREE?  Who cares!  Some day ZoomInfo may wake up and start charging for this.  In the meantime click quiockly over  to ZoomInfo.com

Compliments of David E Perry and Kevin Donlin. For more creative job search tactics, go to the Guerrilla Marketing for job hunters blog and download the free audio CD.

Leveraging your "unique selling proposition"

I was absolutely flabbergasted by the creativity of some of the recruiters and career counselors who answered our call for "War Stories".  Tales of success from job hunters stepped beyond the ordinary to reach their goals.  Here's one of those stories compliments of Ross Macpherson who's President of  Career Quest in Toronto, Ontario, www.yourcareerquest.com.  BTW, Ross is a first class career coach and innovator.  Now, in Ross's own words.

I worked with one client who specialized in retail merchandising (POP, planagrams, etc).  After developing her resume, we discussed putting together a targeted job search campaign to go after some of the bigger players in retail.  While working out her "unique selling proposition" 

 

she made the claim that she could walk into any retail environment and recommend how they could make more money through better merchandising.   I asked, "Can you really back that up?" and suddenly her plan was born.  My client targeted 5 major   retail outlets, went to a number of their locations, and made detailed  notes on what she saw and how she would improve it.  The first company  she contacted was a major outlet with offices located in the building  over the store.  She walked into the offices, asked to speak to the  person in charge of marketing, was told he was in a meeting until  11:00am, so she scribbled a quick note on a piece of paper that read  "I've just spent 30 minutes in your store.  I found  3 merchandising inconsistencies and identified 7 ways that should  increase your sales by about 12-15%.  My name is ____________ and I  will be waiting in the coffee shop downstairs." "Please hand   this to him at the end of his meeting. It's very important" and she   walked out.  Shortly after 11:00, the VP of Marketing came   downstairs, met her in the coffee shop, and spent the next hour   walking through every corner of the store discussing her findings.  Although no such position existed, the VP hired her as their new  Director of Merchandising. 

I hope that War Story sparks a few creative ideas for your job hunt Guerrilla.  You can find more on the official blog site for Guerrilla Marketing at www.gm4jh.com

David

Compliments of David E Perry and Kevin Donlin. For more creative job search tactics, go to the Guerrilla Marketing for job hunters blog and download the free audio CD.