Wednesday, October 6, 2010

More new ways to job search

If you are looking for a job, you are more and more aware that the newspapers, especially on line, are now affiliating themselves with some of the larger on-line job websites, such as Jobs.com and Monster.com rather than listing jobs in the classified section. Businesses are being inundated with resumes and their own personnel departments are unable to handle the volume of screening efficiently.

It used to be, that if you went to a recruiter to assist you in locating a position, anyone in mid-management or above could count on the company picking up the fee from the agency. With 1 out of 4 people now unemployed, it is becoming more and more difficult to have the company pick up the entire cost.  If you are lucky, you can get them to split the cost with you and then have a written agreement, that after you are employed with them for a year, they will reimburse the half that you paid upon your year review date.

One thing that you can do is begin using the white business pages of your telephone book. I suggest this rather than using the yellow pages, because not all companies take out a yellow page ad. Locate companies that either you know or think could use your skills.  Make a list of these companies, along with their address and phone numbers. Now go to the internet and see if they have a website. If they do, search under careers or jobs to see what openings they have listed.  Even if a position is not listed, but it is a company that would hire for your job description, send them a resume.

If you are thinking of moving away from the city where you now reside, go to the Internet and do a search on the cities you are thinking of moving to. Profiles of the cities are listed and the largest employers in the city are included. You can also go to their Chamber of Commerce listings and look under the membership column for even more companies. You can also go to the whitepages.com website, do a business listing search using a category name.

Granted, doing searches like this will take time, but it is well worth the effort. You can become better acquainted with different areas of the country that may or actually may not be a better location for you to consider moving to. The grass is not always greener on the other side of the fence once you begin doing the research.

I used to tell people, when I was doing personnel placement as a profession, that looking for a job is like having one. You have to put in the effort of looking for work, putting out the resumes, be creative in your job search.  It is an 8 hr job 5 days a week to find a position.  It was then back in the 1980’s and it is even more so nowadays.

In today’s job market, it is the blue-collar workers and the white-collar management sector as well. Even CEO’s, or as I like to call them “the gray flannel suits” are also out there looking. No one has been immune to this depression and many people are going to be unemployed for a long time. There is a lot of competition out there and you are going to have to do everything you can think of to make yourself stand out from the crowd.

One thing you will need to remember while you are out there on your search, is that not only the value of houses has decreased a good $20,000-$40,000 but so have the wages that are being offered to those looking for a job. Yes, you many have been making $125,000 at the job that you held for 10 years before you were laid off, but do not expect to come back into the workforce with a new company for that figure.
Check out payscale.com or homefair.com, both of them have excellent salary calculators and relocation cost of living calculators for you to use.   Be prepared to be shocked! I know I was!

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