Deciding to Make Change

The job search process is hardly definitive. Some professionals are forced into a career change against their will and must restabilize their employment situation within the course of a few weeks, while others parooze the Internet for job search options only to “see what’s out there”.

Among the first questions you’ll need to ask yourself is how you intend to advance your career.

• Considering your past accomplishments, what path does it make sense for you to next follow?
• Beyond the perceived balance of your career on paper, ask yourself why you want to bring about change.

Being able to effectively search for a job revolves around advertising your strong points. Think about which skills you feel most confident in. Armed with this knowledge, tie those skills back to attributes which might appeal to an employer.

• In the case that you’re deciding to switch industries, be sure to elaborate how previous skills or past employment experiences correlate to qualification in a new environment.

We would also like to issue a forewarning relating to social media...

• As soon as the job search process is begun, your past and present feeds should be constantly moderated.
• An offensive or otherwise indecent post may throw off the course of your entire application (and yes, employers do actually mine your social media pages).

Researching Jobs & Employers

Upon having introspected on your current career position, if you still feel confident in wanting to find a new job, the primary course of action will start with some research. Specifically, think about which kinds of jobs are available, for how much pay, and how location ties into these two factors.

Indeed Salary Trends:

This tool allows you to visualize salary trends for specific jobs.

• Its use case is most suited for applicants looking to reinvent their professional identity, as in an inter-industry shift.
• Simply enter a job title you’re interested in and analyze the average salary at popular companies.

Glassdoor:

While tools such as the aforementioned are helpful in casting a ‘wide web’ of options, sometimes it’s necessary to hone in on a particular company.

• For that kind of searching, our recommendation falls with glassdoor, a site specializing in user-written and in-depth company reviews.

Alternatively, you can exploit other techniques to find out more information about a company. Visiting a company’s social media pages can help paint an understanding of day-to-day life.

Or perhaps you know someone from a company of interest and can reach out to them specifically. Here are a few general questions to be thinking of when starting conversation.

Is the position fufilling?
What are your day-to-day responsibilities?
Do you find the work enviornment conductive to success?
What is the referral process like?

Alumni Career Services Center

Years after graduation, applicants often overlook the value in reaching out to career service centers. Most universities offer programs wherein alumni can connect with local companies searching for experienced graduates or college students.

One of the advantages with investing your time in these services is that the contact between client and employer is often one-to-one.

• Whereas with traditional processes, any submitted material must first undergo the scrutiny of an Applicant Tracking System, the level of credibility pre-established by your status as an alumni allows you to skip that step.

Many alumni service centers are catching up with the progression of technology and matching traditional, online job-board infrastructure.

• While at first glance seemingly quite similar to a more popular job-board alternative, alumni service centers offer undeniable silver lining: curation and direct contact.

Industry Associations

A new chapter on former labor unions, industry associations put together events to coordinate educational and networking opportunities.

Whether you’re a carpenter, or graphic designer, the chances are, leaders of your industry have put together resources to aid in the job search process.

Whether you’re a carpenter, or graphic designer, the chances are, leaders of your industry have put together resources to aid in the job search process.

• Some industry associations even feature their own newsletters, which can be helpful in boosting your knowledge in a particular discipline or with catching you up on new opportunities.
• Even regardless of whether you’re in the process of job searching, you should certainly investigate this resource.

Company Career Pages

Oftentimes, companies of interest will link to some form of ‘career page’, with specific offerings on positions available per location, as well as detailed overviews of the ‘life of an employee’.

• Visiting a career page first-hand is possibly the most direct way of boosting your knowledge of a particular company.

Aside from information mining, these pages additionally feature talent networks you can join in on.

• Essentially, a talent network can be thought of as a list of contacts, to which a company will send future job openings or networking/recruiting events.

In some cases, recruiters will use these lists as a way of directly contacting potential employees. In spite of the risk of spam, there isn’t much of a drawback associated with signing up and letting contact information flood your way.

Networking Events

As the popular saying goes,

"When it comes to finding a job, it’s not what
you know that matters… it’s
who you know.”

Especially in the midst of a trend showing ever-growing reliance on referrals and other personal recommendations, networking remains to be a powerful skill.

Networking events are opportunities hosted to meet people in a respective industry and who can connect you with potential job opportunities.

• Some contacts may even push further by offering valuable advice or acting as mentors.

Oftentimes, companies of interest will link to some form of ‘career page’, with specific offerings on positions available per location, as well as detailed overviews of the ‘life of an employee’.

• Visiting a career page first-hand is possibly the most direct way of boosting your knowledge of a particular company.

Attending such events, or networking online, provides an excellent opportunity to extend your “web” of contacts.

• Even a few minor connections may in the future connect you with powerful opportunities.

Job Boards

While online job boards may have lately garnered a bit of a spam-oriented and negative stigma, they are still fantastic in connecting you with opportunities all over the world.

• Whereas with other, more personalized alternatives, you may be required to move to pursue positions of interest, job boards are convenient through the fact that virtually any city in the US or elsewhere is involved in some capacity.

Another advantage associated with job boards has to do with the non-obligation factor.

• Posting 10 or 15 requests for interviews may have traditionally taken a long time, but with job boards, that transition is made instantaneous.

Of course, the token is dual-sided, and with more applications sent out, less are pushed forward to the interview phase. Even so, online job boards are certainly worth a look-over.

Career Coach

Admittedly an expensive alternative to online job boards or other resources, career coaches run between $50 and $250 an hour. Granted, the advice is highly-personalized and to-the-point, but certainly with a cost involved.

The key takeaway with Career Coaches is their potential to shorten your job search and get better results.

• Theoretically, you will have saved money by retaining a position fast enough
• And perhaps with the most trusted of coaches, this theory holds; however, for a majority of cases, career coaching can turn out to be a scam.

There is no regulation mandating specific career coach practices.

• Therefore, regardless of the perceived trustworthiness of a coach, there is no guarantee as to what you can expect.
• Especially in cases where career coaching is operated virtually, be sure to exercise caution.

Job Hunting Books

There are thousands upon thousands of expert-written and highly-detailed job hunting books. Albeit a time-consuming process, sitting down to truly analyze the job search process can reap benefits for your career.

For the few hundred dollars you may have otherwise spent with a career coach, you can pick up several books and read through a small library.

• If you’re someone who’s just beginning their first job-search, or near to it, a book will potentially save you hundreds of dollars in the future.

Whichever resources you end up selecting, the core idea to remember is that you’ll get back whatever you put in.

Before jumping to end conclusions, introspect on why you want to search for a new job and what you hope to get out of doing so. Then, armed with this information, explore which option is most appropriate to your particular case.