I wrote a post here a couple of months ago with some of my thoughts on how young, uneducated people can do well in the job market and make good money, and I got some great feedback and responses. You can find that post here: https://redd.it/5azat9
Since then, I have had continued correspondences about this with folks here in DMs, and of course further experiences with individuals IRL on these topics. One major roadblock that I keep hearing about is that people are struggling to get their résumé noticed, or to get offers even when they do get the interview. I have put together some thoughts on this based on what has worked for me and my friends that I thought might be of interest to people here. There is certainly a lot of content on this topic out there, so I’ll try to avoid the obviously cliché items. We’ll tackle this topic in 2 parts; how to get the interview, and how to impress in it.
How to Get the Interview
- Network
Okay, give me a pass on one cliché part, because this would be terrible advice if I didn’t lead with the fact that the best way to get a job, whether you’re qualified or not, is through your network. Some surveys show that as many as 85% of jobs today are filled based on personal connections: http://ift.tt/1SlooDQ
If you feel like you’re just dropping your résumé into black holes all the time to no avail, you probably are. The best thing that you can do in your job search is to try to meet people. If you want to work at a specific company, find folks at that company in similar roles on LinkedIn and reach out to them for advice on how to get started. Ask them about any openings that they have. People will comment and say that this is invasive; they’re probably jerks. I’ve had this happen to me several times and I never mind. Go to any events or conferences in your field that would allow you to network. Find a group of professionals in your area to get plugged in to. Working hard in this area will yield more results than anything else that you could do, especially if you’re not a wildly strong applicant. Hiring managers generally have no problem bringing in someone for an interview if the résumé hits their desk from a reference, whereas if you’re just stacking yourself up against all of the other applicants they’ve received line-for-line, you probably won’t stack up; I certainly don’t.
- Personalize your Résumé (ALL of it)
It’s continually shocking to me how few people do this, but you should go through your entire résumé to tailor it for each job that you apply for. You should be writing a custom intro/cover letter, calling out the skills and experiences relevant to the role you want and explaining why this exact job is in your career plan (even if it’s not). You should even be updating past job titles and their descriptions to line them up with what would best prepare you for the new role. Some people might call foul here, but I’m not saying you should blatantly lie about what you did; job titles are somewhat fluid. For example, I had a role as an IT Support Lead. When I’m applying for a support job, it’s perfect like that. When I’m applying for a job more in operations, I’ll often put “IT Support Operations Lead”, and then emphasize the aspects of the role that were most related to the job I’m after. Some of the responsibilities that I list may have been 1% of the job, while the responsibilities making up 50% of the job might be left out altogether if not applicable to the new role.
You want your résumé to tell a story where the happy ending is the new job you’re after. Good managers take the work of their team seriously, so this is usually very well received if you can communicate it that way. As a final note; there’s a lot of advice out there about including buzzwords from job descriptions in your résumé to ensure hits from automated parsers; this is smart, especially if you’re interviewing for a job at a big company with lots of applicants.
- Have a Great, Public-Facing Online Presence
I’ll be brief here, but in general, your personal social media should be private, and your LinkedIn/Monster/Etc profiles should be beautiful. Have a nice professional photo up, and online résumés consistent with what you submitted (again, you personalized your experience, you didn’t blatantly lie, so this should be fine.) 99% of this is for them to see your pretty, professional face and get a good feeling about you, so really; make it a good picture. All of the jobs that I’ve ever gotten have been a product of my network except for one, and it was a product of my LinkedIn page that a recruiter found. This also happened to be the most important job I’ve ever had as far as progressing quickly in my career.
If you feel like you’re doing all of these things and can’t get any traction in regards to applications that you’ve submitted, then I would find professionals who are in the field and ask them for advice. But honestly, as someone who really hates networking, people with a thriving professional network always seem to have opportunities knocking. Work on advancing your skills in that department.
How to Impress in the Interview
This is one of the hardest things that I’ve tried to address in either post. It’s disheartening to me when I know for a fact that someone is doing everything right, but never getting offers after their interviews. I’ve done some polling of folks that I respect, and combined it with my thoughts, and here is the best that I can do. To start, I’m not going to say things like “dress nice” and “give them a firm handshake”. Obviously you should do those things, but anyone who isn’t doesn’t have the motivation to read this post anyways. I’ll also say that I’ve only failed to obtain an offer after an interview once (for a job that I was way underqualified for), and I have never brought anything to an interview with me, such as print-outs of my résumé, a notepad, etc. These things might be more applicable in a different field, but I think advice like that is mostly outdated.
- Get Them Chatting
Here’s the general rule; if an interviewer likes you, they’re going to look for ways to ignore any lapses in your qualifications. If they don’t like you, they’re going to look for excuses to ignore your qualifications. So the game becomes making them like you. If you’re like me, and you’re not an especially sociable person that this comes naturally to, a great start is to make time pass quickly with you due to all the chatting that happened. If they expose a topic of interest of theirs, ask about it or open the door to that rabbit hole. Now obviously you don’t want it to seem like you’re forcing them off topic, so try to make sure they’re doing most of the talking, and that this isn’t just you blabbering away about nothing. Relax, smile, look people in the eye and don’t make it seem like the job is life-or-death to you. Just do everything you can to bring an aura of calm into the room that allows people to relax. This will go a long way in leaving a positive impression.
- Tell your Career Story
As we discussed in regards to writing your résumé, you should have a story of your career that leads to this job. Regardless of how menial your past experiences are, you need to string them together in a way that makes your desire for this role make sense. When they ask you why you’re interested in the role, tell that story. Have a thorough, prepared answer for why you want the job. If an applicant sort of shrugs that question away, or goes into why their current job sucks, most hiring managers will recoil. Talk about what led you here, and where you would like to go, and why this is the job to have for this phase of the plan.
- Ask Questions
You should look for opportunities to ask questions about the job throughout the interview. If you’re asked about your experience with a process or skill, answer, and then ask them how that comes into play on their team. This will demonstrate that you’re already taking ownership of the work and have an interest in how they operate. And yes; you need to have questions prepared for when they ask if you have any questions for them. Here are some of my go-tos:
- What does (x company) do as far as career planning? Do you find that there is a culture of upward mobility opportunity here?
- What are some of the projects or changes that your department has upcoming that you are excited about?
- What skills or attributes do you think the perfect applicant for this job would posess?
- Do you see any major red flags or gaps when it comes to my readiness for this role?
So that’s the gist. A lot of old-school folks recommend thank you cards to the interview panel; I don’t do this. I will reach out to the recruiter and ask them to pass a message on to the hiring manager a few days later if I’ve not heard back thanking them for their time, asking if they have any additional questions, and asking when I should expect to hear back.
I’d love to hear from professional recruiters and/or managers with any feedback, disagreements, or additions. Thanks for reading.
EDIT: Formatting.
Submitted January 23, 2017 at 08:41PM by PieceOfDatFancyFeast http://ift.tt/2j7KjnP
