Launching In A New Direction

Axed, booted, bounced, canned, cut, de recruited, discharged, dismissed, fired, let go, ousted, outplaced, outsourced, redundant, released, riffed, sacked, terminated, or traded for a player to be named later. Call it what you will, I have met many people who have been "promoted to a position upstairs" only to find out that they are in a one story building. Few people go through life without experiencing being fired in some form.

It happened to Annabelle Gurwitch - She had the distinction of receiving this unpleasant news from cultural icon Woody Allen.

Annabelle took this painful life experience, channeled it and decided to do something to make the most of it. Although technically she was "fired" it appears that she was actually "launched" in a new direction.

For those in career transition, I am not suggesting you make a documentary out of your experience like Annabelle did (unless you think you can gross millions at the box office). Her painful experience, combined with her attitude and creativity seemed to help her reengage and do something that no one has ever done before in the film industry.

Will your experience "launch you?"

Here is a short video clip and some interesting fired facts.

Interviewing Strategy - Knowledge Is Power

A frequently asked question during an employment interview. Savvy candidates have done their homework by sleuthing the internet for company histories and annual reports or have used search engines such as Google to find out details about organizations and organizational structures.

Having worked in the Human Resources and recruiting field for close to 25 years, I have observed significantly different levels of sophistication in the "interview process" of a number of different organizations both as a potential candidate and a recruiting professional and HR business partner. I've seen structured processes where hiring entities ask highly relevant, job related behavioral and competency based questions followed by a variety of psychometric tests. I have also encountered organizations with hiring entities that ask very broad based questions ("tell me about yourself") and had discussions that seemed very unstructured.

Consider the following:

"Because job applicants are becoming increasingly sophisticated, it is not unusual for a company to inadvertently hire an individual who makes the best impression, rather than the person who is best suited for the position."
--Users Guide, Caliper

"Most people hire people they like, rather than the most competent person. Research shows that most decision-makers make their hiring decisions in the first five minutes of an interview and spend the rest of the interview rationalizing their choice."
-- Orv Owens, psychologist, in the New York Times

As a candidate, is there anything you can do to either leverage an interviewer's cognitive bias in your favor, find a connection or position yourself to be a person that they "like?" Perhaps another important question for candidates to know the answer to is "What do you know about the person interviewing you?"

Knowledge of a hiring entity's background, interests, involvement or passions could be leveraged in an interviewing situation and could quite possibly make a difference in the outcome of an interview.

Candidates scheduled for on site interviews by a recruiter should inquire "who will I possibly be interviewing with?" Those names can be researched through internet tools such as Linkedin or Zoominfo. Most search engines fail when it comes to people search. Since most personal profiles, public records and other people-related documents are stored in databases and not on static web pages, most of the higher-quality information about people is simply "invisible" to a regular search engine. You can search what is referred to as the "deep web" with Pipl.

In any case, savvy candidates are the most prepared candidates and they know that "knowledge is power." Not only will they leverage internet tools for more information, they will use the acquired knowledge in the interview, or take it a step further and perform a reference check on the people who will be interviewing them that could potentially become their new boss.

Job Search Networking Metrics

Over the years I have attended many networking meetings and have met with countless people in transition. I'm often asked

"Are you aware of any metrics for networking during job search?"

This is a cry for information... for a simple guide that can be utilized as a benchmark for activity level and help keep people on task, moving in the right direction.

Not long ago, I had the pleasure of attending a presentation on Power Networking by Paul Duski, of Robertson Lowstuter. Paul presented to a full room of HRMAC members. His presentation was well crafted and chock full of useful information and very comprehensive. The graphic below represents some key information captured from the power networking presentation in the form of a one pager, helpful reference tool. Clicking on the graphic will yield a larger, more readable version.

Chicago VP HR Market Heats Up

Recently, I had the pleasure of having a conversation regarding the Chicago Human Resources job market with Paul Schneider, partner with SSP, an outplacement and executive coaching firm with offices in Oakbrook Terrace, Chicago, Deerfield, Racine, WI and St. Louis, MO. Long recognized as an HR networking icon and HR market authority in Chicago, Paul seems to know where senior leadership is on the "Chicago HR Chess Board" at any given moment and what moves are about to take place. Consequently, our conversation focused on what the Chicago market looked like at the Vice President, Human Resources level.

Since 2002, Paul has compiled market data which he regularly shares in his newsletter,SSP Perspective.

Acccording to Paul,

"The Senior VP HR Market looks strong - It's up over 40% compared to this time last year - These VP openings are the bell weather of how the economy is growing."

The data indicates that there are 21 openings in Q1 2007 as opposed to just 15 at this time a year ago. This undoubtably will have a trickle down effect for positions reporting into the VP level. Good news indeed for those seeking senior level HR opportunities and networking in the Chicago market.

Survey Says - LinkedIn

Recently, Bullhorn (a global leader in On Demand, front office staffing and recruiting software, and integrated solutions for staffing and recruiting firms) conducted an industry-wide “Tools of the Trade 2007″ study on established and emerging websites, online social networks, job boards, professional development sites and blogs.

"The Survey Says"
(free download here)

"The majority of staffing and recruiting professionals (68 percent) listed LinkedIn as the online social network they use most frequently, followed by ZoomInfo (12 percent) and Electronic Recruiter Exchange (ERE) (9 percent). Just 4 percent use Jobster most frequently. Only 1 percent and 2 percent of respondents, respectively, reported using Facebook and MySpace most often."

Not surprising, considering the following:

• Recently, I attended an information session on LinkedIn thanks to the kind folks at Challenger Gray & Christmas and Baker & McKenzie. During the presentation, Sherman Hu, Regional Sales Manager for LinkedIn commented "People who have >20 connections are Thirty Four times more likely to be approached by a recruiter than people with <5".
• Early in 2006, recruiting/sourcing icon Jim Stroud interviewed Konstantin Guericke, co-founder and former VP of Marketing with LinkedIn (now with Jaxtr). Jim captured the interview as a podcast in his Recruiter's Lounge. During the interview, Konstantin Guericke describes how LinkedIn has become an essential tool in the recruiting tool kit and mentions that over 100,000 of LinkedIn's paying customers are "Recruiters".
• Master Cybersluething Pioneer Shally Steckerl knows the importance of LinkedIn. Shally is helping recruiting and sourcing professionals learn cutting edge tips and techniques to leverage LinkedIn through JobMachine's LinkedIn Cheat Sheet which provides excellent insight into advance searches in LinkedIn.

Now Consider this....

• Internationally recognized speaker, Gerry Crispin of Career Crossroads determined that based on his recent source of hire survey, Employee Referrals are Fifty Four times as likely to result in a hire than all the job boards put together. (see blog entry).

If you are networking for new opportunities do you want to be....
LinkedIn or Left Out? You decide. Here are some resources to help you:

• The unofficial users guide for executive and professionals - published by the Global Human Capital Journal.
• Virtual Rolodex video tutorial - Detailed tutorial on LinkedIn by Otis Collier.
  

Leverage Web 2.0 For The "Heavy Lifting" In Your Job Search

I've met many people in transition that search for opportunities on the web by visiting a variety of major job boards and running search queries each time they visit a site. Additional time is spent visiting company sites, checking often to see if positions they are interested in have been posted.

This can be very time consuming and can take time away from more important activities such as networking. There is a technological solution that can help. The web has become more interactive through Web 2.0 applications.

Job seekers can leverage the power of these applications to help reduce much of the "heavy lifting" involved in online job search.

The strategy here is to use vertical job search engines that "scrape" jobs from all the major job boards as well as many company sites. The results show up in the search engine with links that will take you to the actual postings. A few of the top rated vertical job search engines are (in no particular order) Jobster, Indeed,or SimplyHired (my favorite . Also, websites such as Craigslist and Google Base should be utilized.

Upon running a search query at any one of the sites listed above the user is typically afforded the ability to get automated email alerts for specific job search queries on a daily basis. This is helpful but it can quickly overload an email in box. The answer to this problem is to utilize the power of XML or RSS feeds to bring relevant content (specific job leads) directly to a user's desktop.

Before running a job search query at any of the vertical search engines or other sites mentioned, an RSS Feed Reader or Aggregator should be set up. There are many out there including IGoogle and My Yahoo! - both of which are free

If you are going to use either of these you will need to register and set them up. Just follow the directions. Once your account is set up, visit the vertical search engines mentioned above. Next, run a search query and then scan the page for a link called RSS FEED, XML or click on the little orange box.

You will be asked if you want to add the feed to a feed aggregator. Various feed aggregators will be listed, including My Yahoo! IGoogle or Favorite Feeds in Internet Explorer (version 7.0 or better). Follow the onscreen instructions to add your search query information to the feed aggregator that you have previously selected and set up. If you are using My Yahoo!, change your internet browser homepage to My Yahoo or IGoogle and let them serve as your launch point. Now all the position postings that meet your search criteria automatically come to you. No more heavy lifting! Here is an example of what your homepage can look like:

SHEIFGAB! - Motivationaly Speaking

I've had the great fortune of seeing Conor Cunneen, C.A.S.H. - Consultant, Author, Speaker, Humorist make presentations on several different occasions. His presentations are high value offerings of both humor and substance.

A favorite of mine is one in which Conor crafts a wonderfully inspirational and humorous presentation called "SHEIFGAB The World". (video clip)

"SHEIFGAB"? Conor's pleasant Irish brogue and quick wit may lead you to assume that the term "SHEIFGAB" has some mystical Gaelic meaning but he is fast to point out that it is a memorable acronym he created to help explain eight powerful building blocks designed to get and keep a person motivated during their career transition.

The Eight Powerful Building Block developed by Conor are:

S - Structure (your life)
H - Help (others)
E - Environment (change it)
I - Improve (yourself)
F - Family (communicate with)
G - Goals (set and achieve)
A - Attitude (determines your success)
B - Boss (Bruce Springsteen anecdote)

Conor will be presenting "SHEIFGAB The World" on

Saturday, April 21, 2007

Immanuel Lutheran Church
200 N. Plum Grove Road
Palatine, IL. (map)

Program - 9:00am - 10:30am
Informal Networking - 10:30am - Noon

Conor's presentation is made possible through St. Hubert Job Ministry (contact Bob Podgorski for any event questions at 847-925-6005).

Don't miss this one.

Job Search Hack - Client Is Confidential?

Several months ago I was contacted by a search firm that was conducting a "confidential" search for a client of theirs in Chicago. This happened late in the day on a Friday. The search firm indicated that they came across my name through the course of business networking. We had a brief telephone conversation and during the course of the discussion the search associate told me that they were not at liberty to reveal the name of their client. I asked them to send me the position specification so I could take a closer look and further evaluate the opportunity.

The specification came via email as promised, with an added bonus, the identity of the client company. Huh?? - By using the file>properties option on the Microsoft Word attachment, I could clearly see the name of the client they were working for. It seems that many administrative assistants who take formalized training in Microsoft Office Suite are instructed to complete these fields. Amazing yet simple.

Job Search Hack - Blind Posting?

I've seen this happen countless times. A job posting is placed on a site favored by recruiters such as Craigslist, Jobkabob or The Ladders. The recruiter describes the client but decides not to reveal the client name. This is a blind posting. Or is it? Well it just might not be.

Copy and paste is one of the first editing techniques people learn when working with text on computers. The process saves time, but in the recruiting world, particularly in the realm of contingency recruiting, the time saved may not be worth it.

Recruiters who want to maintain client anonymity should avoid using client fed job descriptions verbatim. Rewriting the position posting to avoid the use of unique verbiage or descriptors can help. Alas some recruiters prefer to copy and paste and fail to do this, not realizing the client may have previously posted the position elsewhere on a less effective medium or one that is less focused on the target market.

Savvy job searchers are leveraging the power of vertical job search engines as a method to expose blind ads. It does not work all of the time but sometimes it does. It is a simple three step process that involves:

1. Finding the blind position and (here is the irony) copying unique verbiage. In this case "appropriate mix of compensation vehicles".

2. Choosing your favorite vertical search engine and (more irony) pasting unique verbiage "appropriate mix of compensation vehicles" into "What": then clicking the gray Find Jobs button.

3. Reviewing the results and following the links to see detail and possibly who the company is. In this case, the company is Nicor, Inc. Note that "appropriate mix of compensation vehicles" is highlighted below.


As a reference, here is a listing (in no particular order) of some of the more popular vertical job search engines in the United States - Indeed.com, SimplyHired.com, Jobster, Just-Posted.com

Inaugural Post - Chicagoland HR Transition Group

The inaugural post for this blog profiles The Chicagoland HR Transition Group, a networking group that has helped countless HR professionals in the Chicago metropolitan area in transition. The networking group is a virtual community. Membership is restricted to HR professionals in transition, group alumni and HR professionals wishing to network.

Currently the group, a Yahoo! Group, is comprised of 320 professionals seeking opportunities in the metropolitan Chicago and suburban areas. The group was formed upon the merger of two Chicago area HR networking groups (Northwest HR Group and JobNetworkILHR). Members contribute to the success of the group and support one another by actively sharing leads and providing feedback to information requests. This is accomplished by posting information to the Yahoo Group as well as by sharing information in face to face group meetings which occur weekly.

Information shared includes job leads and positions not typically posted elsewhere, networking advice, meeting notices, landing reports, requests for contacts at specific companies and other helpful job search information. The Chicagoland HR Transition Group alternates meetings between downtown Chicago at Scherer, Schneider, Paulick and suburban Rolling Meadows at Arlington Resources Inc.