Jobs Galore

If you’re a job seeker, the problem with the job market seems to be less about a shortage of opportunities and more about an endless array of jobs that, for some reason, you just can’t obtain.

As a job seeker, you can spend months applying to these jobs. It gets exhausting, disheartening, and can even feel dehumanizing.

An important thing to remember is that you can’t apply to everything. Pursuing every job that may be a remote possibility is tempting… but often counter-productive.

It’s a hard reality to accept because job seekers can find themselves in really tough situations, where they really need a job, right away. The thing is, tiring yourself out won’t help you. So if you’re thinking this whole job search thing is spreading you too thin, it probably is.

First piece of advise: Take a step back and Take a day off. For those of you who know too well that looking for a full-time job is a full-time job, you may need to get your mind off the job search and get re-fueled. Starting over from square one sounds exhausting, but doing so after some good rest that involves no thinking about jobs whatsoever, that can pave the way for innovative tactics and energetic vitality.

After a short break, spend more time targeting your job search. Have you been applying to jobs that, if you’re really honest with yourself, don’t actually sound like a good fit? Even though you may be desperate, skip it. It detracts your time and energy from perfecting your other cover letters and resumes, which should be painstakingly tailor-fit to the position. This takes time and energy, and you don’t have limitless stores of it.

Change things up a bit and start networking. For example: We love LinkedIn. Can’t get enough of it. If you connect with most of your professional and personal contacts, you can easily find out which people you already know that are somehow connected with the CEO or hiring manager of the company you’re applying to. Another idea: going door-to-door isn’t such a bad option (especially in the summer!). Go for a drive or for a walk in the park. On your way home, keep an eye out for companies you could see yourself working with. Go on in, resume in hand, and inquire about any openings they may have. It shows dedication, confidence, and a true desire to work with their specific company.

Our website has a great article about re-working your strategy, called 5 Steps to Job Search Magic. Although there are never easy answers, and no one can guarantee results in such a dynamic thing as the job search, there are tactics you can use to increase the chances of your success. Check it out, and let us know how it goes!

Keep Up the Good Work by Keeping the Good Workers

It’s Ask a Professional time again! This month, our Communications Specialist, Chelsea, tackles the issue of maintaining employee loyalty.

Q:  With the job market slowly opening up, what steps can we take to increase employee retention?

A:  Your employees need certain things from you from day one in order to do their jobs well. By paving the way for your employees’ success, you provide a sense of stability and cultivate loyalty. However, we’ve found that most employees receive insufficient training and/or unclear direction about what is expected of them at the outset. To prove your own fidelity to your employees, the first steps after hiring should be the following:

• Introducing each person (or most) in the company. The new hire needs to know whom to turn to with related questions.
• Thorough, time-consuming training–even for quick learners and experienced personnel. Skimp on this, and it will prove costly down the line.
• Asking what else they need to succeed, and following up multiple times a year. This doesn’t have to be a superfluous exercise in hand-holding. Help them establish, and meet, certain goals.

Employee motivation is another essential component of retention initiatives. Cash incentives and numbers-based analyses of success are only effective with certain people. Many are more motivated by continual verbal feedback. Get to know what ‘speaks’ to a given employee. And keep the communication open. Listening well makes employees feel they are an important part of your business, and encourages a similar response.

For more on this topic, check out Harvard Business Review‘s compelling story about managers going above and beyond for their employees. And here is another article on ensuring employee success. We’ll elaborate on these stories at a later date: Stay Tuned!

Happy Administrative Professionals Day!

It wouldn’t take much to argue that a receptionist has one of the most important jobs in a corporation.

He or she can be the first and lasting image portrayed to potential clients. His congenial attitude may be the primary thing that keeps customers coming back time after time. Her constant eagerness to assist in any possible way can be a major factor in making your business stand out from the rest. And it is common knowledge among executives that administrative professionals of varying capacities step in to save the day week after week, year after year.

We could launch into an article about the vital hiring requirements for such a position, but today, we simply want to acknowledge the hard work of all administrative professionals. You’ve grown our companies, managed countless customer quandaries, and taken on more work than we can know.

THANK YOU.

This week is Administrative Professionals Week, and Wednesday, April 27th is the official Day.

Quality of Work vs. Quality of Employer

McDonald’s is making a unique hiring move today, after they announced their intention to hire 50,000 people nationwide – in just one day. Many people have such a negative association with jobs at McDonald’s that the company is said to make this move to combat the connotations of the McJob. For us, this raised a question about whether or not it is worthwhile to work at a less-than-stellar job for a good employer.

The funny thing is, I’ve never heard any McDonald’s associate lament that they have the worst job in the world. Perhaps the people in burger-flipping positions consider the job purely a means to an end, but it seems that the stereotype of sweat-shop style misery is a little over the top. The horror stories exist, but they can’t be the only stories. Steve Buttrick, for example, worked a McJob, and insists he learned invaluable lessons from his humble beginnings at McDonald’s. He is now the proud (may I add very successful) owner of CertaPro painters. Many other burger-flippers move along to lucrative careers in various management positions.

The relevant question here is: Is it better to take a sub-par job at a company that is known for offering upward mobility as well as solid training for future employment skills? Or should you keep looking for that perfect job, even if it might mean working for a company that may not have the best reputation for taking care of their employees? You can probably guess our answer. Although we wouldn’t suggest simply settling, this job market compels us to reconsider the advantages of that first mentioned situation. Advancement and cultivation can be hard to come by. Look at the big picture: spending a few years at a decent company is never a waste. Consider what you can gain and what you can offer. What you make of a position is a great testament to your talent as an employee.

For additional information on career management, visit our Facebook page for tips and the latest news.

Expecting the Unexpected

41 years ago today, an oxygen tank burst on the Apollo 13, rendering the mission-to-the-moon impossible and seriously jeopardizing the safety of the three men on board. In addition to raising concern for the lives of these men, it must have been a sobering blow to the elation and confidence kindled by the recent success of the space program. (The first men on the moon landed less than a year earlier.) But preceding this crisis was another unforeseen challenge: one member of the mere 3-man crew was dismissed because of an illness scare a week before launch. Consequently, just three days before liftoff, NASA called on one of their backup personnel to officially join the crew. Test pilot Jack Swigert suddenly found himself the last-minute substitute on a mission to the moon.

To those who can find themselves in a pinch at the worst of times (attention: employers), I’m not here to brush it off with a nonchalant “Everything somehow works itself out,” but rather “Be prepared in your workforce.” NASA certainly had additional backup crew, but if Swigert had refused the last-minute appointment or (understandably) buckled under the pressure of risking his life, it could have proven a costly letdown for the company.

Although Swigert wasn’t NASA’s first choice for the job, surely the company made a strategic decision to hire this dedicated person in the first place. The employer knew they need to prepare for the worst. Being short-staffed, even for a few days, can be crippling to the operations and even finances of a corporation. As a company, have you hired employees who will step up to the challenge when the work environment isn’t what they signed up for? Are you taking all the steps you can to care for your workers, so that you’ve truly deserved their commitment during upheaval?

For the employee side of this story, I’m not going to dramatically speculate about Swigert’s surprise and possible panic when 72 hours before lift-off, he learned he would be manning a spacecraft. But we do know one thing: he didn’t back down. When a provisional plan became his life-risking reality, Swigert stepped up to honor the commitment he’d made to his employer.

It is perpetually surprising how many people are offered lucrative positions through our company and walk away from it simply because they weren’t sure they were ready for it. But isn’t that the feeling we all get before the next big thing? Maybe it’s true and we really aren’t ready for it. Yet, if we remember how many times we’ve been in similar situations, we realize we were prepared in ways we couldn’t see at the time. That recognition is one of the most helpful skills for a job seeker.

Among the many things we’ve learned from the heartfelt space fever of the ’60s and ’70s, one aspect is the importance of timing when pursuing your ambitions. But for now, it seems humanity is taking a hiatus from sending actual people to explore the moon. (So many advancements in technology have been made that I wonder if children even dream of walking on the moon anymore.) But this shift compels us to remember how quickly the best opportunities in life can fade from our grasp. So, to those who are hesitant to take the next big step in employment (or in anything else, for that matter!) we say, carpe diem. You never know when you’ll end up on the moon.

A Little Too Good?

For this month’s Ask a Professional section in the Glen Ellyn/Wheaton News, we were asked: How do I handle being considered ‘overqualified’ for a position? Here are our suggestions on this difficult but widespread predicament:

If you find yourself overqualified in the same field as the job you’re applying for, it is helpful to understand the employer’s possible predicament. Their primary concern is that you would be unsatisfied with the job, and might leave once a better opportunity arises. It can spell trouble for an employer who may soon be faced with the expense and trouble of hiring all over again. Simply telling yourself and the interviewer it won’t be an issue isn’t helpful; neither is undermining your experience, which suggests to the interviewer that you haven’t made everything you could out of your previous work. I suggest a more direct approach.

Different ranks of jobs require very different relational skills, patience levels, and workplace mannerisms. With that in mind, before you interview, consider why the employer should hire you instead of someone who matches the level of experience called for. In the interview, describe what aspects of yourself, your background, and your interests align with their company.

The main question you want to answer is, “Can I – and do I want to – do this job well?” Explain why you are applying for this position even though you’ve worked at higher levels previously. Perhaps you’re eager to work for their company in any capacity. Maybe you would be able to use your skills in a new way, or think this position would lend stability.

Especially given the past few years’ job market and all the switches employees have had to make, employers understand that changes in career are happening across the board. With increased awareness of how much stress can affect health, it is becoming more and more acceptable to seek out other opportunities simply to balance your life’s demands or to revert back to a job level that entails less stress. Just be prepared to explain why you won’t jump at the next opportunity elsewhere.

Before launching into the interview process, we strongly advise that you set one issue straight: Are you truly overqualified, or do you simply have higher-level experience in a different sector? In the latter case, the interviewer will want to know not only if you would be satisfied with the lower-level position, but if you would be a competent employee in that role. Just because you were a powerhouse, go-getter executive at a national accounting firm, for example, doesn’t mean you will be a reliable branch manager of a community bank.

Especially if you are up against candidates who have the exact experience the company is looking for, you’ll want to focus on the benefits of your diverse qualifications, not your advanced expertise. Brainstorm about what general disposition the job requires. When have you encountered similar dynamics in your previous work? What about the types of people you’ve dealt with: are there aspects similar to people you would work with or for in this new position? Perhaps much earlier experience that relates to this job better portrays your abilities and interests. Whatever the case, think hard about these questions and keep track of your ideas before jumping into the application process.

For more information on landing the job, see the Candidate articles on our website.

Looking for That Perfect Person

Every month, we answer employment-related questions for the publication Glen Ellyn/Wheaton News. Their ‘Ask a Professional’ section is devoted to connecting everyday questions with people who are in the know.

For March, our Recruiting Manager (bio here) responded to the question, “How can I get only the best candidates for my company’s open position?” Take it away, Dominic.

Creating a detailed job description is one of the most important steps to complete when preparing to hire someone for your organization. Primarily, the job description acts as a road map in recruiting for the position, setting expectations for the individual once hired, and in the review of the individual’s performance on an ongoing basis. Job descriptions can always be updated, so feel free to be as specific as possible without having to worry if you’ve covered all your bases.

The job description should include information such as minimum requirements, preferred skills, pay rate, schedule, who the individual reports to, and the expectations/goals. In the recruiting process, these clearly stated details should prove helpful in attracting only qualified candidates, and reduce the number of resumes you’ll have to review. You can always broaden your search if you require additional candidates or if the “perfect candidate” is difficult to come by.

Once you’ve completed the process of hiring an individual, you’ll likely have a much more detailed idea as to what you will require of that person. Take a moment to update the job description to avoid any confusion in the future as to exactly what will be expected of them.