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Searching for Jobs Online?
Embedded Geek asks: "My wife, a VB/C/C++/SQL coder, was recently laid off from our mutual employer and is on the job hunt. I am also sending around feelers. We've posted both our resumes at our own site (here and here) and at Monster.Com. So far, we have gotten disappotinting results - several headhunters generating a lot of smoke but no heat. Some people have suggested dice.com and other techie oriented sites, but I wonder if we're going about this the wrong way. Are we better off using the Internet to directly find and reach companies (I really dislike headhunters)? Should we find a site affiliated with a major newspaper's want ads? Has anyone out there found other strategies to using the Internet in a job search?"
This related submission from kalanar asks a similar question, but questions whether exclusive online searches are the answer: "With the current economy state, and the increase in unemployment in the US, I'm curious if anyone has had luck with onlinejobsearchengines. I have applied to many job listing (80+) and have not received much of a reply. I'm curious if employers are worried about the relocation factor or if employers are more anxious to hire people that have applied in other ways. (Fax/Inperson)"
So if you are recently employed, especially in the US, what strategies did you use to land your current job?
Go thru your Rolodex and hit the phones. Past bosses and colleagues, regardless of how long ago they were, are prime sources for leads.
Don't forget your family and the people they know. Chat people up. Talk talk talk. The best jobs aren't going to be found in the want ads.
Last person I helped land a job was because I saw her reading Webmaster In a Nutshell on a commuter train, and I asked if she was lookin'. She was, and she was good, so we hired her.
Find a headhunter you like, if that's possible. If you're great, they'll do the work for you, and get you in the doors. Just make sure that the job is the right fit.
I'm not saying to ignore postings, whether online or in print, but they're nothing compared to talking to other humans.
Other suggestions?
"Prepare for the worst - hope for the best."
In the UK (and Europe) you want to look at Jobserve. Lots of/All agencies advertise their jobs there, and after the first contact things are done through them (such as suggesting other positions).
It's where I found my current job, and where most people I know who have used the net to find work found theirs.
I suppose the best thing to do would be as many as possible out of those options. Search the net, mail resumes, look up in the paper, and let headhunters know you're available. Be a bit careful of them, though. I used one to get my current job and they tend to ignore me for months at a time, plus they can't write performance reviews or letters of recomendation after the contract expires. They never see you work, after all.
Also, make sure you follow up on resumes you've sent. Just because you send them one doesn't mean they'll look at it. Often this can be as easy as an email to the HR staff. In addition, I've found that a lot of times when dealing with online listings its better to send the resume and then call the contact right away (or even before) to get more details on the job, if they're still hiring, and mayeb even to send them a nice printed copy of your resume. Don't be a pest, but don't let them forget about you either.
All in all, if you need work, look everywhere. Chances are you don't have much else to do anyway. That, and follow up on everything you send and you should find your way to employment soon.
"A coward dies a thousand deaths, the brave but one."
I got my job through a friend who left it. I really don't think that any method compares to the person-to-person hookup, when the two people actually know each other.
I know a lot of people who've used online job search engines, and very few of them have gotten good results. It's a very obvious place to start these days, and I don't think that an email application impresses anyone these days. Also it seems that a lot of online openings are stale--just left over from a position that might already be filled, or might never be filled.
But good luck in your search!
It took from May 15th to the last week of June (about) to land a position. In that time, I got about 1/2 dozen calls, two interviews, and two offers, both sent my way by headhunters. None of my personal applications panned out. So, my "saturation" technique didn't result in what I'd consider excessive interest -- you just never know who uses what job engine or site.
I ended up accepting a position near Dallas, TX, and moved from Chicago, IL. Employer payed a flat rate toward moving expenses and left me to deal with the logistics (the allowance was generous, but the headache of dealing with all the logistics was a pain -- apparently outsourcing that kind of stuff is expensive).
Now, my case might be atypical, because in addition to all the other problems related to the downturn in the economy, I required visa sponsorship. Still, I found and got a job I liked using only on-line resources.
You could've hired me.
Here's one idea: submit your resumes to Slashdot.
It's gruesome right now - if you're in the wrong city you should be prepared for a *long* search because it's REVENGE OF THE INCOMPETENT HR MANAGER time. Don't have 10 years of Java experience? Then don't bother sending your resume... or pointing out that the language is less than 10 years old so anyone who claims this much experience is lying. Don't have 5+ years experience in both COBOL and the lastest EJB/J2EE technologies, then don't bother responding because the company insists on merging two (or more!) positions while cutting the salary by a third.
That said, networking is usually best but it's worthless when everyone you know is unemployed in a mass corporate panic. You probably aren't looking for the same jobs, of course, but the usual information net is severely pruned since there's no water cooler gossip, etc.
Second best is online sites, but you have to be very careful about sleazy body shops that will float your resume to everyone on the planet. They will *not* help you, and in fact will harm you since many companies will refuse to hire anyone with resumes from multiple sources to avoid any threat of confusion over "finder's fees" and the like.
What I've found practical are only replying to 1) recruiters and companies I've worked with in the past, 2) or recruiters who give local addresses and meaningful contact information, and 3) ads that have provide some details. I never put my resume up on a web site (and not just because it's a phone book after almost 20 years), and I never send it to someone who uses a generic drop box email address.
I've passed on some great ads... but I really can't take a one-line ad from a recruiter a thousand miles away from the job seriously. Yes, this can legitimately happen, but in those cases the recruiter has always willing to explain the circumstances in response to quick note. It's the ones who quietly ignore me and my hard-learned concerns that make me worry.
For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong. -- H L Mencken
Don't just post your resume somewhere and figure they'll come to you. Go directly to them. Find companies that you are specifically interested in working for and send them your resume etc. either paper with an old-fashioned cover letter, or by email. Most companies have "employment" sections of their websites, even if they're not currently hiring; submit through that or by contact info from the good ol' phone book.
Showing a specific interest in a company really does go a long way.
When I went to college in fall of 2000, I decided to get a part-time job. I had worked for the previous year doing contract programming at a large chip company, and I had started my own small online (and profitable) business. However, I had just moved to a different city, and I didn't really know anyone who could get me a tech job.
I decided that an online search just might do the trick. Monster.com yielded nothing interesting, nor did HotJobs. As I was walking home from class one day I saw a billboard ad for FlipDog, and decided to try it.
After a quick and easy search focused down very specifically by city and job category, I found about four relevant jobs within three miles of my home. After a bit of resume touch-up, I e-mailed my resume to the interesting-looking employers. I received two e-mails back, one with an interview offer. I called the company and scheduled it for the next day.
In short, I had a job three days after my search on FlipDog.
As an aside to the story, FlipDog has some very cool technology developed at WhizBang! Labs. WhizBang! was headquartered in the same city that I attended school, and I got to go to a lecture about them. They have their web spiders crawl the web looking for job listings on companies' own sites. Then they use machine learning software to recognize and extract information (job title, location, description, etc.) from the free-form web page. That gets dumped into a database that FlipDog uses to help you find a job. Instead of making employers post available jobs on a special job site, FlipDog goes to the employers' own web sites and extracts job postings. Very cool. Check it out. (No, I'm not affiliated with them, except that they helped me find a job.)
There are 10 kinds of people in the world: those who understand binary, and those who don't.
(posted anonymously to cover my ass)
Sorry if this gets offtopic.
I'm at a professional college specializing in IT that boasts about their excellent record in job placement, and you'd expect that they'd have all the secret contacts and are getting flooded by prospective software firms and are plucking students out of the classroom left right and center, correct?
Wrong. The first two things they tell you are (a) hit the pavement and introduce yourself to as many people as possible, because someone's got to take you at SOME point, and (b) network through your friends and family. What these guys call a placement rate is really the students going out there and placing themselves. It's bogus, and what's worse is, they're one of the must succesful schools around for this sort of thing.
The only work I was able to get through them was as an instructor at this same damn professional college. I shit you not.
Another thing they tell you is not to bother trying to find work online. The average hiring rate doesn't make it worth the effort.
I know this will sound silly, but it works for some reason. If you are sending a resume to one of those "resumes@foo.com" or "jobs@bar.com", most likely you will see it filed away and never see a human response. A trick I learned (by accident) is to send an email to one of these addresses talking about your "attached" resume ("As you can see by my skills x and y in my resume blah blah..."), but *don't* actually attach it. 90% of the time you will get an email back from a *person* (i.e. not an autoresponder) asking if you could try and send it again. Now you have an actual email address of somone in H.R. that you can use to send polite emails concering the status of your application, etc.
I know many people will scoff at this idea saying "No self respecting tech company will hire you if you show you're too stupid to be able to attach a resume!" But this isn;t the case. Most of the people who work in HR are the types who find it perfectly resonable to make a mistake and forget to press the "attach" button, or else they are the types that believe whole-heartedly that attachements can get "lost in the mail" even if it's email.
Once you have an actual person (sometimes including a phone number!) you have the chance to add a little "human touch". As long as you are polite and don't make yourself look bad, this extra little boost can be what seperates you from the rest of teh stack of resumes.
"Your superior intellect is no match for our puny weapons!"
A brief history
"Laid off" from Ihigh.com
Graduated in may from UK
Spent the summer both online and off in the job hunt
My Current Employer found me in late September through Monster, I'm now their Jr. Webmonkey and Rookie Solaris Admin who breaks^?^?^?^?^?^? stress-tests machines.
When all is said and done, in this market, be prepared to wait. If you have the time and cash, get training, be ready when things hit the upswing
Read my plan to save the Bengals
Also:
this means it's more likely your resume will actually be *looked at*
it saves them the time to read through the resume
same as above.
not all the people who filter job applications are good with computers, no matter what the industry.
I am fluent in the Phonetic Alphabet, and put it on my resume. I had a lot of companies and recruiters call me to ask what it was.
I received one from a company I had emailed my resume to. they offered me a job after I sent them an email detailing what virus they were infected with and how to remove it and prevent it in the future. I didn't accept their job offer, but I think they'll remember me if I contact them in the future.
...or something like that: www.asktheheadhunter.com
nick (the guy who made that site) says that putting your resume on sites like monster is as good as flushing them down the toilet. like someone said (approx.) in another post, you find jobs through people. go out and get to know some.
In this economy, any resume submitted through a headhunter goes directly to the trash, unread.
Think about it. If you are an employer and are getting thousands of applicants for every position you have open, why would you want to pay a headhunter's fee?
fall of 2000
What more need be said?
Oh, and I feel sorry for anyone working at a company with such a laughable stereotyped dotcom name as "WhizBang! Labs". When it goes under (not "if") those people will be utterly unemployable.
The major myth about down markets is that there are no jobs out there. Everyone's getting laid off and no one's getting hired, right? Actually, there are MANY jobs out there, but it's usually the privately held companies that are in need of people more than the publicly held companies.
Just think about it. When the market is up, everyone wants a job at a publicly traded company so they can get in on the stock options. But in the down economy, those same publicly traded companies are trying to save their stock prices by cutting costs, which includes cutting personnel.
So, we know the jobs are out there, but how can we get them?
1) Don't ever rely on your own personal website. No one looks at it except your friends.
2) Online job sites are really only used by headhunters. Only once in a blue moon is there an individual company that posts a job offer there. So, if you want to use a headhunter, use an online job site. But, be forewarned: in a down economy, companies are not going to want to pay the extra headhunter's fees when they already have applications being sent directly to them.
3) Ads in the newspaper are better than online job searches. It's amazing, its preposterous, but still the large majority of HR people will use the local newspaper to find applicants, rather than going online. The thinking is that they're more likely to find someone local to their company, plus most HR people just aren't as interested in computers as we are.
4) To really, really get a job in the down economy, your best bet is your friends, your family, your schoolmates, your past coworkers - your network. Networking is going to be your lifesaver in finding a job nowadays. Most companies who are hiring now are looking for trusted people. They can't afford to take on unkowns who may leave in 3-4 months, wasting their time and money. So, they'll turn to their employees, their friends and their families to find people. And because of that, your best bet for finding a job is seeking out everyone you know on earth and checking in to see if they know anything about any openings. It's the one true way to really get yourself noticed and in the position you need. So, brush up the resume, but really brush up the people skills and work on your contacts. Good luck!
+1 Insightful, -1 Troll. What can I say, I'm an Insightful Troll.
If you are looking for a contract work in UK. Then make sure you always quote your rate in higher range. Agencies are stupid, if due to frustration you quote low rates agencies will assume that you are not good. So remember always ask for more money and you are most likely to get an interview...
Companies want cheap, docile foriegners who are used to being steppped on.
Congress sold us out, so you might as well join them instead of beat them.
Table-ized A.I.