A waste of time?

In 2002, I was on the job search a few months after leaving my job at Amazon.com.

I had just started looking for a programming-related job in e-commerce when I heard about a large upcoming tech job fair in the area. I was a bit skeptical about going but I put it on my calendar.

I later had to commute for over 90 minutes just to get to the fair.

Once registered and inside, I was handed a large bag of industry magazines and a map of the convention space, which I used to see if there were any interesting companies to apply to.

Armed with my resume, I spent the next 30-40 minutes walking around. I specifically remember giving out less than 10 copies of my resume in all and only having real conversations with two companies’ HR rep.s.

I then had a return commute of over 90 minutes to get home, meaning that I spent much more time on the bus that day that actually progressing my job search at the fair.

I felt like the fair had been a waste of time, but the truth was that I had wasted my time at the fair.

If I had known what I could accomplish at the fair, I would have had a more fruitful event.

Here’s why.

25 Reasons to Go To Job Fairs, Regardless of Age

1) Get out of the house

It’s become too easy to just job search from your computer and it’s easy to forget that there really are many effective ways to progress in your job search outside.

2) Kickstart a dormant job search

Sometimes habit and routine are not the best thing. Going to a job fair should be a welcome change of pace.

3) Meet company representatives who are normally hard to reach

Some companies will send people who actually do have an impact on hiring decisions, access to whom would normally be blocked at their corporate reception desk.

4) Meet company representatives in a less-formal setting

There’s a big difference between the atmosphere of a job fair and sitting across someone in an office. Company rep.s come with that in mind, and you need to take advantage.

5) Practice your elevator pitch

Just like the 30 seconds you might have to impress someone in an elevator ride, your chance to talk with a company rep. might be very short if there are a lot of people in line behind you at the fair, so you need to impress quickly.

6) Build your self-confidence with company representatives

By meeting with company rep.s in the informal setting of the job fair, even for only a minute or two, you’ll break the ice and become more comfortable sitting across them in an office.

7) Make a better first impression

As you become more comfortable and your self-confidence grows, you’ll make a better first impression as the fair goes on.

Research companies

Learn which companies you might want to work at, which open positions are relevant, etc., anything that can help you adapt your resume to align better with company needs.

9) Submit resumes and apply

If you think your resume will impress, submit it.

10) Get resume feedback

If you don’t think your resume will impress, perhaps because it hasn’t impressed others at the fair, ask for feedback from company rep.s. If you’re lucky, the fair may also have local resume writers to help you.

11) Get contact information from company representatives

This could be to send them an improved version of your resume – based on feedback/better understanding of company needs – instead of the ones you brought to the fair, to schedule a job interview, or perhaps even to help a friend’s job search with a referral.

12) Get free stuff from company representatives

In hopes of attracting the best job seekers, Google is famous for giving out free stuff or schwag at their recruiting booths: pads, pins, pens, magnets, yoyos, you name it. And people love taking it home too, and not just as a sign that the going to the fair was worth it.

13) Learn how industry players present themselves

Critical for students and first-time job seekers. This might be your first introduction to certain terms, expressions, techniques and more.

In the case of university job fairs, company recruiters want exposure to a new generation of potential candidates who many have never heard of them before.

14) Learn how your industry has changed

Critical for people who have been out of the job market for 5 years or more. Which companies have fallen out of favor? Which companies are hot? Who’s getting hired there?

15) Learn about the demand for your current skillset

By browsing the open positions and talking to recruiters, judge where your current skillset would most be appreciated and if there are there skills in high demand that you don’t have but could learn quickly enough to apply.

16) Learn about other industries where your current skillset is in demand

If you’re considering a career change or just if you’re open to one, recruiters and other company rep.s at the fair can make suggestions for positions they’re trying to fill.

17) Learn about new kinds of opportunities you would have never imagined otherwise

Regardless of whether company rep.s make suggestions, keep your eyes and ears open for anything new and interesting, especially if there’s demand for it i.e. more than one company has a related opening.

18) Learn about latest job market trends

Besides which skills are currently in demand (and which aren’t), which techniques are working? Which techniques no longer work?

Ask company rep.s what kinds of candidates are impressing them most, ask them how the market has changed in the past year and how they think it will change in the coming year.

19) Compare companies and go deeper

Company representatives are supposed represent everything the company is about. The first impression they make on you should have an impact on you deciding whether to spend your precious time chasing them for a job. After meeting the different companies at the fair, choose to go back for a second impression at the companies that deserve more of your time.

20) Network and make contacts

One of the most under-used job fair tactics is to talk to other job seekers at the fair! Share tips and feedback, and look for ways to help each other out.

21) Meet your competition

Depending on what kind of fair you attend and the kind of position you’re aiming for, the people in line with you may actually be the ones applying for the same openings. No need to be sneaky or manipulative, but if you have a great idea to stand out and impress a certain employer, you might want to keep it to yourself. That doesn’t mean you can’t learn from them, though.

22) Prepare questions and get answers

Take advantage of the quantity and different kinds of people at the event. Prepare some questions in advance that could affect the direction of your job search, then go out and ask people. Take a survey if that will help. Be bold.

23) Take in seminars and classes

In recent years, more and more fairs have begun offering free talks by job search experts and coaches, giving advice on how to get results now.

24) Save time in one location

While not all job fairs are created equal in what they offer job seekers, they do all offer job seekers many of the above possibilities in one single location, saving you a lot of time and effort.

25) Get inspired

If you try to do even half the things on this list at your next job fair, I guarantee that you’ll get new ideas that will help move you forward to your next job, making it all worth it.
http://jobmob.co.il/blog/job-fairs-reasons-to-go/

Social media can help you find a job and connect with people who can assist you with growing your career. However, it works both ways. Social media  can backfire and jeopardize a job offer or even your current job. It’s important to be careful and consider what you shouldn’t do, as well as what you should do, when using social media to job search.

“Recruiters may say they don’t look at Facebook, but they do,” says Connie Thanasoulis-Cerrachio, a career expert at Vault.com. “If you have digital dirt out there, it’s a bad judgment call on your part. Even if you think you’ve taken all the measures to make sure your profile and photos are private, this is the Internet and nothing is ever 100 percent private.”

-DON’T forget Privacy Settings. Keep the line drawn with personal and professional accounts. Make sure all personal accounts are private.

-DO Google Yourself. If an employer were to search you name right now, are you confident that only positive things/images will come up? Do a search from time to time and clean up your social media image.

-DO change your profile picture – A picture is worth a thousand words. Do you want an employer’s  first poinion based off last year’s Halloween photo of you dressed up, holding a red party cup? Thought not.

-DO utilize Social Media available to you. Join Twitter and LinkedIn. Follow companies you are interested in. Interact with employees.

-DO align profile experience with the position you are applying for. Make sure that your education, interests and overall profile support the attributes of the job you are applying for. If you have relevant experience, make sure that your profile shows it. Employers want to know that you will succeed in their position and your profile can be a useful tool in communicating that.

The cover letter is your first, and sometimes only, opportunity to engage with a perspective employer. It gives you the opportunity to describe yourself and mention things that may not be in your resume. Below are some helpful hints:

-DO address it properly. Look for hints about who may read it. Did the job description give an email address? Most company emails use the person’s first or last name. Go to their website. Utilize resources such as LinkedIn to find the HR Representative within the company. DO NOT send a resume stating “To whom it may concern” or “Dear Hiring Manager”. This makes your cover letter impersonal and look like bulk mail.

-DO address the position and state the qualities that you think the company may be looking for in this position. Example: “I am presenting my resume for the Software Engineer position within XYZ Company. As you can see, I possess the skills and experience you are seeking in this position. In my career (summarize experience/list projects..)”

-DON’T turn your cover letter into a mini resume. Keep your cover letter simple and to the point. The point is to “bait” the employer to take a look at your resume.

-DO spell check before sending. Typos are unforgivable.

-DON’T forget to follow up. Nobody gets a job by sitting at home waiting for the phone to ring. Take the initiative and follow up. Instead of ending the letter with “I look forward to hearing from you,” close with “I will call you next week to discuss a time for us to meet.” Once you’ve included this call to action, however, make sure you follow your own promise.

Employers often use resume databases, such as Monster.com or Careerbuilder.com, to search for the right candidates for their open positions. They search is very similar to an internet search; they enter a few keywords, or buzz words, to come up with the type of resume they would like to see. Are you using the correct buzz words to get your resume in their search?

Look in the employer’s job description.  What better way to show you can do exactly what they are looking for, and then to make sure it is stated in your resume. If the employer is looking for someone who can “analyze financial data reports”, then make sure you added just that (assuming you actually know how to!). But beware – you do not want to copy every buzz word they use, it will look like you just copied and pasted!

Show and tell! Don’t list your achievements or highlights without providing info to back up your claim. For example, instead of just saying “excellent communication skills”, show examples of how it has paid off for your former employer.  Are you “results orientated”? List the results that you actions have produced.

Do not shy away from appropriate industry jargon or acronyms.  Knowing the lingo shows you are familiar with the industry. These are often words that employers use to search resumes.

Be Specific! Have you worked with certain software? State it, rather than put “familiar with various software”. Do you have a skill or certification that puts you ahead of the crowd? Flaunt it!

Avoid using verbs when talking about your skills in qualifications. Just because you added “dynamic’ and “experienced” in your qualifications does not make an employer believe you do it well. We assume that you can do it because you listed it.

Spell out your educational experience. Make it easier for employers to notice your education, write out ‘Bachelors’, rather than ‘B.S.’.

Be original.  LinkedIn released a list of the most overused words and phrases in their member’s profiles in 2011 (http://press.linkedin.com/node/1051). Stand out from the crowd and stay away from them!

1. Creative
2. Organizational
3. Effective
4. Extensive experience
5. Track record
6. Motivated
7.  Innovative
8. Problem solving
9. Communication skills
10. Dynamic

Different Resumes Types:

• Chronological: Positions listed in reverse chronological order, with the most recent first. Best suited for people with solid work history or seeking positions within a similar field.
• Functional: Focuses on skills and experience, rather than your chronological history by grouping skills by function, rather than position. Good for entry level or career changes. Tends to be the least favorite with HR and Recruiters (hard to read, have to guess how long each position was).
• Nontraditional: May hold graphics, photos, graphs and other visuals. Good for Graphic Designers and other fields of the Creative Arts.

Pros:

• Chronological: Easiest to create. Preferred format by HR and Recruiters. Most Internet job boards require this type of resume.
• Functional:  Able to focus on what you are capable of doing, even if your employment history cannot reflect it. Ability to add experience not usually utilized on resume, such as volunteer work, classroom experience and social organizations.
• Nontraditional: Ability to show creativity and skills without meeting face to face.

Cons:

• Chronological: Shows employment gaps easily. Can be long. Not the best format if seeking a career change.
• Functional: Usually not well received within HR. Hard to use when applying over the Internet.
• Nontraditional: Most companies prefer a traditional, typed resume. Hard to use when applying over Internet and uploading to databases.

Do you ever wonder if your resume is keeping you from getting seen? If so, we offer an Improve My Resume service by our expert recruiters. They will review and edit your resume in a way that only a recruiter can. Contact us today to learn more.

3 Million American Jobs have been lost to China in the last decade. 2 Million in manufacturing alone. The items we purchase/import support up to 20 million jobs. In China. Think about that. But the tide seems to be turning as more US companies rethink offshoring.

One may think this recent reshoring initiative is the result of US government policies, however, that isn’t the case. It’s actually the result of China’s policies. China has rising land prices, growing transportation prices, and the rising strength of the Chinese currency are all playing a role.

The cost benefit to US firms is slowly starting to erode. Watch the following video from MSNBC that dives deep into this recent phenomenon.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

A new survey of Dutch companies from the consultancy IT Sourcing Europe reveals a small rise in the number of companies “dissatisfied with their current ITO engagements” and opting “to back-source their operations in-house or to a nearshore/onshore ITO partner.”

Translation: the sizable challenges companies face in their offshore contracts — identified by survey respondents as poor communication, poor output and project delays — are taking their toll. A staggering 36% of respondents are devoting resources to improving communications with their offshore teams; 17% are increasing managerial attention to the problem. And 26% of companies are considering switching their offshore service providers, which means more time spent pricing, hiring and training.

The bottom line is costs, costs, costs. Even in the IT industry, the traditional heart of offshoring, cost overruns and poor performance can send a contract sideways.

No Offshore Jobs believes in comparing apples to apples: let’s look at the real cost of offshoring, and find a team of American workers to do the job at a better price, at a higher quality. No headaches or surprises.

Fox News recently profiled Arise Virtual Solutions, which employs tens of thousands of Americans to provide customer service to an array of industries.

But how can a call center afford to operate in the U.S. with so much competition from overseas?

The answer is simple: homesourcing. Arise’s employees work from home, and because of the particular nature of their work, they also set their own schedules. As the report points out, the gig is ideal for “college students and retirees with technical skills and flexible schedules, as well as workers facing unemployment or reduced hours.”

The company has created 18,000 jobs, and plans to double that by year’s end. That’s a significant number of Americans rejoining the workforce, and while a customer service job is temporary for many, it’s a big step toward recovery. In this industry, those thousands of jobs could very easily have been an ocean away.

But CEO Angela Selden won’t be swayed by the offshoring propaganda. She outlines the benefits on the corporate side of turning to homesourcing instead of offshoring:

“[Customers] want to know that you are in the United States because they want to know that their business, or whatever they’re paying for — membership or whatever it is — is staying here.” [...]

Arise’s CEO said customer service agents familiar with the local culture, customs and dialect tend to be more accurate than someone speaking broken English on the other side of the world.

“Even though the rate per minute might be less expensive offshore, it’s actually less expensive to have somebody in market answering those calls,” Selden said. “They can answer them in a much more efficient and effective manner.”

No Offshore Jobs stresses the same point. Even when a contract could be marginally cheaper overseas — and that is often not the case — the complications of an offshore operation cause delays, cost overruns and logistical headaches.

Read more about the offshoring myth, and learn how your company can use rural sourcing and homesourcing to your advantage, at No Offshore Jobs.

Three articles in the past week have pointed out one serious risk in moving IT operations offshore: data insecurity.

Writing in his ZDNet blog, analyst Joe McKendrick notes that the rush toward cloud computing runs the same risks that companies encounter when offshoring IT functions. What’s more, most companies don’t build in safeguards:

[A recent] survey confirms that much sensitive data is handled across many parts of organizations… without safeguards such as data encryption, masking and de-identification. [...] Most respondents state that they have no strategy for protecting data deployed in clouds. Three out of four say they are not aware of their companies having a strategy for cloud security, suggesting that there has been no discussion of the implications of moving data and applications beyond their original domains.

Kim Peretti, a director at PWC, warns of WikiLeaks-style data breaches at the hands of “less commonly considered third parties with access to sensitive data includ[ing] law firms and third-party outsource or offshore providers,” where security is “not likely to be state of the art.” As Peretti writes in SC Magazine, “the increasing international operations of many leading firms only increase the risk associated with sensitive data protection.”

Outsourcing bigwigs also reacted jumpily to this month’s instability in Egypt, which many had considered a prime target for offshoring labor. As CIO recently wrote:

“The rolling wave of social and political pressures that has now hit Egypt will take them off the list of rational choice for an offshore location [...],” says Ben Trowbridge, CEO of outsourcing consultancy Alsbridge.

Most offshore outsourcing hot spots carry some degree of geopolitical or location-specific risk, such as the 2008 terror attacks in India and the current narco-violence in Mexico.

Yet many offshoring customers do a poor job of monitoring IT service supply risks on an ongoing basis, says [Atul] Vashistha [CEO of offshoring consultancy NeoAdvisory]. “We recommend ongoing monitoring of country, city and supplier risks.”

Does your small business have the expertise to continually monitor of political situations overseas? Do you have the means to secure data in a crisis, or move operations to another country in case of a revolution or terrorist incident?

Persistent questions about security — both virtual and physical — add layers of uncertainty and cost to an offshore contract. And they’re contingencies that the cheerleaders of offshoring don’t mention when they promise spectacular savings.

Explore the numbers behind offshoring and make the rational, long-term choice for your business.

In a speech to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce this morning, President Obama urged business leaders to contribute to the nation’s rebounding economy by creating jobs here in the United States.

…the key to our success has never been just developing new ideas; it’s also been making new products. So Intel pioneers the microchip, then puts thousands to work building them in Silicon Valley. Henry Ford perfects the assembly line, and then puts a generation to work in the factories of Detroit. That’s how we built the largest middle class in the world. Those folks working in those plants, they go out and they buy a Ford. They buy a personal computer. And the economy grows for everyone. And that’s how we’ll create the base of knowledge and skills that propel the next inventions and the next ideas. [...]

So if I’ve got one message, my message is now is the time to invest in America. Now is the time to invest in America. Today, American companies have nearly $2 trillion sitting on their balance sheets. And I know that many of you have told me that you’re waiting for demand to rise before you get off the sidelines and expand, and that with millions of Americans out of work, demand has risen more slowly than any of us would like.

We’re in this together, but many of your own economists and salespeople are now forecasting a healthy increase in demand. So I just want to encourage you to get in the game. As part of the bipartisan tax deal we negotiated, with the support of the Chamber, businesses can immediately expense 100 percent of their capital investments. And as all of you know, it’s investments made now that will pay off as the economy rebounds. And as you hire, you know that more Americans working will mean more sales for your companies. It will mean more demand for your products and services. It will mean higher profits for your companies. We can create a virtuous circle.

Click here to read the full text of the President’s remarks at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.