Resumes are digital now. That’s good for everybody–easy to share, easy to search, easy to save, easy on the trees.  It’s all good. But in an attempt for job seekers to keep their resume files organized, people are forgetting that other people read not only the content, but the file name you give your sweet little piece of literary masterwork*. Be warned. Some resumes may get a bad-rap from the beginning because of a slip-up in the file name.

My recommendation is a file name that actually sells you a little bit. For example, if you’re going for a project manager position and your name is Joe Cool, try out a file name like: “Resume–Joe_Cool–Talented_Project_Manager.pdf” and just see if you don’t get more bites on that little nugget of visual eye-candy of a hook!

Some real-world examples of either bad file names or pet-peeves of recruiters (ok, of me):

• resume.doc – Really? I am a recruiter. Do you think I may, possibly, already have a file named that already somewhere on my system? I will have to rename your resume in order to save it (or rename some other file).  You may risk just getting deleted if you’re not a standout candidate.
• 2009 resume.doc – This is worse than the previous one. Not only are you absent of creativity, you also haven’t updated your resume since last year.  Believe it or not, I have seen years in resume file-names dating back three years.
• 2010 resume.doc – This one tells me that you look for a job at least annually.  This one is your current years’ attempt at a new gig.  I should tell facilities to not spend a lot on your office’s name-plate. You won’t be around long.
• Micorsoft Resume.doc – If you’re applying for a job at a company (say, Microsoft), and you use that company name in the resume file name, please spell it right!
• Apple Resume.doc — If you’re applying for a job at a company (say, Microsoft), please get the company name right!
• anything.docx – “docx” is the new file format used in Microsoft Office 2007 or later. Some people don’t have that version of office and may not read your resume… or it may come out formatted very differently than you intended!
• anything.doc – In fact, not every company uses Microsoft Word. You’d be much better off saving your resume as a PDF file, which is nearly universal in both availability to view and formatting fidelity.  Use something like PDFCreator (free) to “print” any document to a PDF file.
• Joe_2010.05.0113.doc – You’re either seriously OCD organized, a librarian or an operating system. I don’t know what that says about you, but be aware.
• Resume10_v3.doc – This doesn’t really matter to me what version your resume is, other than for some reason you keep changing it.  I don’t care, but you did lose an opportunity to share something about you in your file-name that might have made you a little more memorable.

*Please, please do not actually try and make your resume anything resembling a literary masterwork.

I’m presenting at the Utah County Job Club tomorrow on how recruiters view your resume.  This event is held in the North meeting room of the East Bay Cafe on the Novell campus. Novell* graciously donates this space for the club’s use to the community. Come and see what “recruiter blinders” are and how your carefully hand-crafted resume actually looks from my eyes (hint: I don’t see what you see)

Also, check out/join the Job Club community on LinkedIn. If you can’t come tomorrow (or you might), at least participate in the conversation and share what you know!

Directions to the Meeting

The Utah County Job Club meets every Wednesday at 8am-9am at East Bay Cafe, the Novell Cafeteria. There is no fee to be a part of the group and you’re welcome to buy something to eat at the East Bay Cafe. This group is about providing a place where job seekers can connect to support each other and learn about effective job searching.

Address/Directions:
1800 South Novell Place
Provo, UT 84606

View Larger Map

Parking available on the south end of the campus – near the large main building H. Walk along the west side of Bldg H back to the East Bay Cafe (you’ll see a large orange sign). The meeting is held in the conference room on the far north end of the cafeteria area.

In the mean-time, here’s how to write the perfect resume. (finally!) Also a post of mine on adjusting your LinkedIn profile to act like a resume,  and below is a great SlideShare presentation called “Resume Zen” by Chris Ferdinandi over at EMC Career Services.  I’m too ADD to listen to the audio track without skipping here and there, but I agree with the content!

*Novell is my employer

A colleague of mine is doing a presentation on Salary, or Offer Negotiations and I thought it might be interesting to experiment with a little crowd-sourcing. Please comment or blog about this topic and link back here so I can see your thoughts on the matter.  The commenting tool below should allow you to easily sign in with OpenID, twitter, gmail, yahoo or MSN. Engage in the conversation and see what we can all come up with together!

How do you negotiate salary/pay?

Do you believe the “rules” of salary negotiations have “changed”? Salary.com does–do you?

Should you negotiate even when the offer is already more than you expected, but below your target?

(“Unlucky” over at JibberJobber says:

Salary negotiation when the number is put on the table is easy. Yu go higher, and wait for the counter. BUT ,when you are in desperate need of the job, and the offer is suitable, I take the offer and do not negotiate. Best next thing, is prove yourself and later , negotiate for higher number, evidencing proof of you work accomplishments.

• Do you agree with Unlucky? A better question is… do you do the same thing?

Do you play “games” with the recruiter/hiring manager? Good-cop/bad-cop? MN Headhunter says: “There are many schools of thought about salary negotiations and it appears that a great many of them involve game playing, duplicity, and tiptoeing around an actual number.”

• When do you reveal your “number”?
• Do you force the company/client to reveal their number first?

Justin Kownacki gives these 5 things to remember while negotiating… do you agree?

5 Things to Remember About Yourself When Negotiating

1. Your work matters, or they wouldn’t have hired you in the first place.
2. It’s not your job to always make the offer.
3. What would they have to pay in order to replace you?
4. You’re doing your employer a favor by allowing them to employ you.
5. Your job is not a jail cell; you can always leave.

PayScale posts the following strategy:  Does this help?

1. Do your homework.
2. Know your needs and wants.
3. Learn a methodology for handling the questions, “What are you looking for?” and “What kind of salary do you want?”\
4. Know your options and ask, ask, ask.
5. Always negotiate in person.

• Do you “Always negotiate in person”?

Please comment, below!

Liz Seasholtz at WetFeet.com gives 12 really smart ways to fail your first impression in a job interview, and how you could avoid them or turn them around (if possible)

In the book You Are the Message, media executive Roger Ailes wrote that you only have seven seconds to make a first impression. With a job on the line in an interview, the pressure to immediately impress is even more intense. No wonder we get flustered.

Here’s the 12 ways to under-whelm that she mentions.  What are yours?
(click through for her good advice for each)

1. Show up sick.
2. You have a black eye (or other injury)
3. You have a nose-ring (unless it’s the right culture for that)
4. You’re sweating.
5. You’re underdressed.
6. You’re late.
7. You’re early.
8. You misuse your lobby-time.
9. Your handshake isn’t up to par.
10. You’re bad at small-talk.
11. You haven’t done your research.
12. You have a personal tick.

A post over at JibberJobber got me thinking about how agency recruiters and corporate recruiters often have a different view of the world and, for a job-seeker, knowing the ropes here can make a world of difference in the success (or failure) of your career search.

Corporate Recruiters

Corporate Recruiters generally get paid a salary (not commission) by the company for whom they are hiring. They are full-time, salaried employees who have been hired as an internal, dedicated resource aligned to support some unit(s) or function(s) of the company.  They are required to focus not only on “the fill” of a position, but often have some say in the big-picture of a company’s recruiting strategy.  They (or their bosses) are (hopefully) involved in talent management initiatives along with workforce/succession planning.  They are often deployed against solving special deficiencies in the organization around certain talent requirements.  The corporate recruiter has to focus not only on the transactional element of the jobs they fill, but also on the overall impact to their organization and they have a long-term, vested interest in the success of the organization overall thanks, in part, to the talent they bring to the table.

Corporate recruiters often have a set of job requisitions, or a “req load” that they are tasked with filling.  Many companies measure their recruiters in terms of the old stand-by metric: “time to fill” (how long a job is open before it is closed) while many progressive organizations are tying in other metrics designed to determine overall “ROI” of the acquired talent back to the business.  They are often part of a recruiting or staffing division of a larger Human Resources department.

Corporate recruiters are often focused on the strategy and quality of a hire long before the posting goes live on the website and long after the newly minted employee smiles for their security badge on day one.

Agency Recruiters

Agency/External/Third-party Recruiters work either alone or in concert with others in an agency/vendor model.  Their fee structure can be either contingency (pay-per-placement), contract (on-site, but paid as a consultant) or retained (off-site recruiting, but paid a flat fee per search or set of searches) search.  Contingency recruiting is the most-common type of external third-party recruiting agency you will find. Their focus is generally on a specific market and/or set of companies/industries or skills.  You may find agencies dedicated to nursing, finance, or engineering, or you will find general “full-service” agencies with specialized divisions to help across several of your business needs.

Agency recruiters (sometimes called headhunters) are simultaneously trying to please two clients–the company that pays their headhunting fees and the candidates who they find, develop and submit to companies.  If push comes to shove, the corporation wins the fight between the two because having the best, most-qualified candidate doesn’t do any good if nobody will hire them from you (and pay the fee).

Some agencies may have dedicated business-development people out selling the firm’s abilities and locking in contracts. In the “back office”, there may be one or several recruiters and even sourcing/support people searching for and dialing up people that fit the newly caught job orders the sales people bring in the front door.  In this model, the recruiter owns the candidate relationship while the sales person owns the client/business relationship.

Other firms, especially smaller boutique/custom recruiting shops have recruiters who run a “full-cycle desk” meaning they are responsible for finding opportunities to fill and filling the jobs–the entire recruiting lifecycle.  Often, these are the most highly specialized, niched recruiters.  Often with several years of good recruiting behind them (and the nice car and bling to prove it) or a chosen preference for controlling everything (or both), these recruiters  are usually the best in the business and have seen and heard it all.  Efficient, quick, and expensive, they make hiring manager’s headaches go away, and they are paid well for it. Often, these recruiters tend to specialize in high-level, executive recruiting or very niched industries where there may be a very limited number of candidates in the world who could perform the job.

Agency recruiters are deployed when either companies do not have the internal resources to do a qualified search for a given job, or they want to outsource much of the finding, screening and administrative work of hiring. Often, companies of all sizes, including startups will partner with agencies to provide a “second pair of eyes” to ensure the right person gets hired for the job, no matter if they came from an agency, or from a direct applicant.

Compare / Contrast

Some key differences you should note about each recruiter is to understand their focus, how they get paid, and how they view a “hire”.

Both roles are highly transactional, but the agency recruiter is very narrowly focused on filling their open positions quickly. That drives the kinds of conversations you can have.  They aren’t naturally going to spend a lot of time with you unless you’re similar to talent they have placed before.

Also note that while corporate recruiters are generally paid salaries, headhunters earn some sort of commission-based incentive either straight-commissions or a low base salary and they have to earn the rest of their keep. Time is money for all of us, but even more for agency recruiters.  So. Please. Be. Brief.

Agency recruiters will work to staff up a whole team of people if hired to do so, but that is the extent of their influence on the organization.  An internal recruiter is tasked with (and takes on) owning long-term per-placement quality overall.  Therefore, they are more apt to develop long-tail relationships and develop broader pipelines knowing that a wide net may be better in the long-run than lots of small, focused nets being cast in the short-run.

Its not fair, but recruiters pwn you when it comes to getting an interview. Until you’ve moved beyond the screening stage and your recruiter is actively working with you, TREAD CAREFULLY or some of these behaviors might lead to an eternal busy signal when calling your recruiter.

If you want to hurry up and wait, here’s some great ways to skip the line and jump headfirst into the “resume blackhole”:

1. Blah, blah, blah and don’t respect their time.
   Once you get a meeting with a recruiter, its good to find out if they have time for you, and how much. Then keep to it. That shows respect, and smarts on your part… to juggle a conversation, and exit gracefully when the time is right. If the conversation is going well, but it’s time to leave, simply state something like, “I’d like to continue this, but I know we’re out of time. Should we reschedule?”
2. Ask for an interview without knowing if there’s even a job open.
   Candidates know the recruiter is their gateway into the company. Coaches and job-hunters tell you to get an interview at all costs, but asking for one before you know there’s even a job can end up killing your chances to get one at all.Remember: The recruiter’s job is not to interview. The recruiter’s job is to find the right person to fill open positions. The interview is a tool in that process to be used with the right people at the right time. Not anytime.
3. Call back. A lot. A few times everyday works best.
   It’s appropriate to call an office line and then maybe a mobile phone if they didn’t pick up. Leave a courteous message briefly reminding them of who you are and what specific position you’re interested in. Chances are high they know you called, but just can’t get back to you at the moment.  Recruiters have caller ID , too, and a hyper-sensitive awareness of phone-numbers and people (which are some basic DNA characteristics of a recruiter). If you consistently call multiple times a day (especially if you’re as reliable as Old Faithful), your recruiter may begin to find things to be busy with when you call. Or worse, out of nowhere, you’ll get a voicemail they left late at night (on purpose so you wouldn’t be there to answer) saying “Thanks, but no thanks.”Call. Leave a brief, specific message (referring to the exact role you’re interested in ). Possibly email the next day or two days later mentioning that you called a few days before, and asking for an update on the status of your application and/or the specific job you are interested in.  Let them know that, if there is no progress, or if you are no-longer a candidate, it’s OK for them to tell you.
4. Promise to follow-up if they don’t get back to you.
   Don’t say, “I’ll check back in a few days if I don’t hear from you.”  A busy recruiter will simply say to themself, “OK, great. I don’t have to call you back, let’s see if you follow-through on your promise.” Its not polite to give someone a deadline for no reason at all. Putting them on the hook may just guarantee the phone stays on the hook whenever you call.
5. Don’t take “no” for an answer.
   When you’re being told a position isn’t right for you, It’s completely fair to ask what was missing from your background or experience to keep you out of the running.  Ask for candid feedback, and request if there’s a seperate set of positions they feel you’d be more qualified for, or  if the things which limited your candidacy this time around can be improved upon for the next time.  Phrasing your questions like, “Is there something in the job requirements I do not meet?” will encourage your recruiter to be open and honest with you, and you’ll likely avoid platitudes like, “well, you’re just not a match” (the recruiter version of “we’re just not that into you”).

   Finally, when the call is complete, you may ask permission to email or call the recruiter if future opportunities arise, if you can connect with them on LinkedIn or another network you both use (LinkedIn recommendations are an excellent “parting gift” to your recruiter, btw), and then graciously thank them for their time and let them off the phone.

You should note that all of these suggestions change when you’ve moved beyond the passive/tense/delicate “screening” process and into the active “interviewing” process . In the latter, all of the above change, except the respect thing. That one seems to stick around for, well, ever.

The summary is to remember that your recruiter is just as interested in finding the right person to fill their jobs as you are in making the right move. Help them help you. Openness and respect mutually in the beginning will pay dividends. Respect them, be low-maintenance, don’t make them work hard for you and, when the timing is right, they will work very hard for you.

Good luck!

P.S. Enjoy a good laugh at other jobseeker’s sakes at NotHired.com. Some links may be NSFW. Others may make you roll with laughter.

Utah’s economy continues to outpace the United States, though we’re losing ground on key economic indicators, we’re losing that ground more slowly than the nation as a whole and many states around the country.

September 2008 Unemployment Rate Utah VS. USA Click for latest employment situation report
Utah: 3.5%	U.S.: 6.1%
Year-Over Nonfarm Growth
Utah: 0.1%	U.S.: -0.4%

With economists and pundits expecting the worst Christmas shopping season in a generation.  Like Alisa Roth with Marketplace says it, “It’s hard to believe. But it looks like Americans may have quit shopping. Retail sales fell nearly 3 percent in October. And that’s the biggest drop since the Commerce Department started keeping track back in 1992.”

Things aren’t getting nicer, either:

Jerry Yang at Yahoo! calls it quits, meanwhile Republicans appear to be pushing Detroit off the cliff they’re facing.

How is the economy and recession (which Jeff Thredgold estimates began nearly a year ago) affecting YOU, personally?

What have you changed about your lifestyle? No-longer online window shopping? Stricter budgeting? Only perusing certain aisles at the grocery store? Job change? Changes in retirement goals?

PLEASE LEAVE YOUR COMMENTS. What’s happening out there?

If you’re vying for a position at a company, there is a fine line you must walk between looking like everyone else and being so different you don’t fit in at all.

Here’s a few simple ideas I can suggest for getting around the gatekeepers, receiving straight feedback, and (if you’re right for it) the job.

• Research: Candidates who do their research on their target company immediately jump ahead of the rest when all skills are equal. And, don’t just regurgitate what the website says, dig deeper. Find out competitors, read analyst reports, blogs, insider opinions or comments left around the web by employees. Really look into the organization!A key research item people don’t consider is the people who you may know that work (or have worked) for that company. Respect their time (a.k.a. buy them lunch) and see how they would recommend you move forward with approaching the company.
• Focus your Message: No joke, I received a resume today that said, “Objective: Any management position anywhere in your company.”  I have no idea what the rest of the resume said because I moved on instantly.Your goal is to coordinate all of the various skills and items on your resume into a cohesive, easilly-digested, sugar-coated tablet of skilled resume goodness. It needs to be an authentic representation of who you are (and what you’ve done), but it also needs to easilly/bluntly/obviously answer the question: “What will do you do for me that nobody else can do?”The most-crucial step of focusing your message is to also focus on your target audiences*! Will you speak to a recruiter first? A hiring manager? A gatekeeper of some other sort? If you’ve done enough research, this should be clear.* I made “audiences” plural on purpose. Don’t think for a second that your messaging to the recruiter and the VP should be the same!
• Consistently Deliver the Message: Red flags get drawn all over your application when your story seems to change without rhyme or reason.Know your availability, know your schedule, know your salary expectations, and above all, know your elevator pitch – cold.Your presentation to whoever you speak with, on the phone, by email, or in-person, should reflect both the intensity and passion you want to bring to the job, plus your humanity and personality that would make working with you a breeze.Candidates who shift their message, or push too hard with their message, are equally as likely to be turned down as candidates who don’t have a rational message at all.

What other things have YOU done to find success with standing out from the crowd? Please share!

Checkout medical jobs at Health Jobs USA.

A friend asked me last night for some advice in his job situation.  He’s been there only a short time, and interested in long-term salary increases and other promotions, etc. He was, in effect, asking me how and when to negotiate your next moves within a company.

How to do this?

LISTEN TO YOUR COACH

Your “coach” in this sense is your best advocate. They want you to win.

My usage of the term here comes from the Miller-Heiman sales training series where a “coach” is defined as a certain individual of particular influence in the “buying” process… here, the so-called sale is you-being-promoted.

The unique and very special role of a Coach is to guide you to your particular sales objective by leading you to the other Buyers (people with other types of influence on the decision) and by giving you information that you need to position yourself effectively with each one… Your Coach’s focus is on helping you make this sale. [The New Strategic Selling by Robert B. Miller and Stephen E. Heiman, p. 68-69]

The point is, find the person in your organization who wants most for you to win, and can introduce you to the other people who will ultimately make the decisions about your promotion, etc… the “buyers”.

Your coach might be:

• Your boss
• Your CEO
• The CEO’s admin
• Your recruiter
• An outside consultant
• Another team’s director
• The receptionist

When you determine who your coach is, ask for their time. Buy them lunch if you need to get them offsite, and let them know what you’re trying to accomplish and ASK FOR THEIR HELP and ADVICE.

Note: Make sure to give them the opportunity to back out. Coaching doesn’t work when they don’t really want YOU to win THIS promotion. If this backfires on them–if they even sniff that in the air–they will run from you like you have the plague.

Finally, remember the COACH watches from the sidelines. Strategy and Timing. YOU have to EXECUTE. Nobody ever blamed a coach when the receiver fumbled the ball. Don’t forget your part… execution.

GO, FIGHT, WIN!

Job Searching is emotional.

Angel Matos is led away by his coach after kicking the match referee

And, sometimes, things simply don’t turn out as you planned it. But, like most things in life, its not what happens to you, but how you react to what happens that matters. And, yes, there is a right way and a wrong way to handle job-search defeat.

… and there’s also a very wrong way.

I thought of this when I learned about Cuban Olympic Taekwondo competitor Angel Matos, who lost his match due to what he felt was an unfair disqualification… he took too long for a medical injury break.

Feeling that you were disqualified unfairly is one thing, but how he reacted to the disqualification is totally something else, and totally inappropriate:

From AP: “Cuba’s Angel Matos deliberately kicked a referee square in the face after he was disqualified in a bronze-medal match, prompting the World Taekwondo Federation to recommend he be banned for life.”

Angel Valodia Matos (L) kicks Taekwondo Referee Chakir Chelbat of Sweden after being disqualified from an olympic match

Matos was winning 3-2, with 1:02 left in the second round, when he fell to the mat after being hit by his opponent, Kazakhstan’s Arman Chilmanov. Matos was sitting there, awaiting medical attention, when he was disqualified for taking too much injury time. Fighters get one minute, and Matos was disqualified when his time ran out.

Matos angrily questioned the call, pushed a judge, then pushed and kicked referee Chakir Chelbat of Sweden, who will require stitches in his lip. Matos spat on the floor and was escorted out. [Source: NBCOlympics.com]

Watching video of the altercation makes it clear Matos was warned of the timing, and apears to have been disqualified fairly.

In terms of job searching, there are countless reasons why a company may have disqualified you from landing the current position. Whatever they tell you may seem trite or even insulting… if they deliver the news at all.

But again, it’s how you react to the dissapointment that can make all the difference. Here’s some possible reactions that might not land you a job there, but will ensure you don’t get “banned for life” in terms of possible employment by that company, or the people who work there:

1. Thank them graciously.
   Some thoughtful, but simple thank-you notes to those who interviewed you could go a long way to making sure you aren’t a sore loser. Keep it very simple:
   Mary,Thank you for considering me for your position. Sorry it didn’t work out this time, but I am glad you found the right match. Good luck with your endeavors and please let me know if there is anything I can do for you in the future.

   Take care,
   [Signature & contact information]

2. Don’t go away mad, but please… go away.
   For some, thank-you notes might seem too out of character. No problem. But, emails or voicemails pleading or begging for another chance just adds insult to the situation–for you, and the company that turned you away.Just let it go. Really, it’s better that way.
3. Don’t let grudges develop.
   If you see these people at events or other functions, be cheerful and cordial. Ask a polite question about the project you were being considered for, but BEWARE not to show off, or get overly exuberant with your former would-be employer that you end up making a fool of yourself (think: lampshade images from company christmas party-kind of foolishness).Be courteous and genuine, but be BRIEF. Wish them well, and be on your way.

What do you think? How have you handled losing a job opportunity better than Matos lost his gold-medal opportunity?

Hopefully, it won’t happen, but when times are tough, a company might come up with a need for executing a pay-cut. There are a few ways to look at this:

• At least you’re not being fired.
• Maybe this is negotiable.
• What an opportunity to find something new!

Yahoo Hot Jobs posted a great set of questions you should investigate before agreeing to any kind of pay-cut, but before getting to that, the most immediate and important thing for you to do when presented with a reduction in salary is to NOT ACCEPT ANYTHING:

When your supervisor breaks the news to you about your pay cut, do not accept anything immediately. In other words, refrain from conveying any type of agreement, either verbally or in writing. If pushed, you may say something to the effect of “This is a lot to process right now. I need to think about this and discuss it with my family this evening.”

Once you’ve had a chance to catch your breath, here’s the things Yahoo suggests you should ask your superiors, followed by some things you should ask yourself:

Questions to ask your boss(es) include:

• Is this a mandatory or voluntary pay cut?
• How much will your pay be lowered by?
• Who else is affected by the pay cut?
• How long will the pay cut last?
• Could there be retroactive reimbursement?
• How will this affect raises, bonuses and benefits?
• Are you going to have to work longer hours or take on additional tasks?
• What are the company’s plans to turn things around?

Questions to ask yourself include:

• How much do you need this job?
• Do you have faith that the company will recover from this setback?
• Can you trust what your superiors are telling you?
• Is it time to move on?

At the end of the day, if you feel you’re being strong-armed by the company into accepting less wages, the red flags should start waving. I recommend seeking legal counsel and weighing your options very carefully. To protect yourself, do what you can to collect and document information that you might need to use later on, if necessary, to protect yourself if a court-case develops. As yourself: “If I am suddenly forced to leave the company, will I need this?”

A friend called on Saturday, frantic, because they have a telephone interview Monday morning. They had never had a telephone interview before, and her nerves were getting to her.

The key is to control what you can control, knowing that you are as ready as possible. Here are some other tips to help you out:

1. Attend to your surroundings.
   Taking a tip from Penelope Trunk, make sure your surroundings are right. Be ready, place and time. This is a crucial first step that many people overlook. Life is busy, but being ready speaks a lot:

   “Don’t take the interview when you are at your desk and can’t talk freely. Don’t take the call when there is too much noise in the background. And don’t walk from one place to another because the breathlessness that comes from walking and talking at the same time subconsciously conveys lack of authority to someone who doesn’t know you.”

2. Keep Notes at the Ready
   This is an excellent benefit to phone interviews… you can keep NOTES!

   Maureen Crawford Hentz over at QuintCareers says it like this. You should “consider keeping some notecards or an outline in front of you to remind yourself of key points you want to cover with the interviewer. You don’t want your responses to sound scripted, but you don’t want to fumble for important points either. Do also have your resume in front of you so you can remember highlights of your experience and accomplishments.”

3. Get Some Practice

   Alison Doyle at About says, “Talking on the phone isn’t as easy as it seems. I’ve always found it’s helpful to practice. Have a friend or family member conduct a mock interview and tape record it so you can see how you sound over the phone. Any cassette recorder will work. You’ll be able to hear your “ums” and “uhs” and “okays” and you can practice reducing them from your conversational speech. Also rehearse answers to those typical questions you’ll be asked. “

4. Know your skeletons
   Nobody’s perfect, but everyone has reasons things happen. Be ready to answere questions about things like “job hopping, being fired. Avoid weak excuses. NEVER CRITICIZE YOUR FORMER EMPLOYERS.Role-play and rehearse your responses to difficult or uncomfortable issues that may come up in the conversation.” [Source: HimJobs.com]

Matthew Reinbold was kind enough to use a few of my comments in a recent piece on Utah Job Growth at UtahPulse.com.

Here’s some of the takeaways:

“Unemployment is still below the generally-accepted measure for ‘full-employment’ of 4-5%,” Robert Merrill, Technical Account Manager for SOS Engineering and Technology, said. “This means that people who would otherwise choose not to work are taking jobs and staying employed.”

“Current travel prices have become a particularly poignant concern for job-hunters,” said Robert. “Many recent placements we have made resulted from people wanting to limit their commutes or ‘stay closer to home’”

“I would be cautious to believe that we have hit bottom,” concludes Robert, “but Utah seems to have an interesting connection with industries either benefiting or otherwise unaffected by national events (energy, transportation, natural resources, military). The combination of those things leads me to believe Utah will likely have an even-stronger opportunity to take-advantage of the new technologies and innovations our companies are already investing in.”

Note: Matthew Reinbold and I participate togetether in producing the Couchcast Internet Talk Radio Show

There’s no question something interesting is happening with Utah’s professional/technical workforce right now, and I think there are no less than four competing factors at play any business-owner should be paying very close attention to:

1. Real and Wage Inflation
2. Intense Competition for Talent
3. Corporate cost-cutting
4. High Energy/Commute Costs

The hardest part to pin-down is that the economic indicators show a market that is schizophrenic. Utah’s high tech job market is part recessionary and part booming. There’s both signs of weakness, but signs of boom-cycle madness.

If there were ever a time to unveil the invisible hand and see what’s really going to happen to this economy over the next six-12 months, now is the time… those who navigate this juncture well stand to gain a lot of opportunity, while these massive icebergs of clashing forces might very well crush entire sections of our economy and workforce if we’re not paying close attention.

Real and Wage Inflation

The Fed won’t admit there’s inflation yet, even though everyone else is worried about it… but one trip to the grocery store tells you a dollar doesn’t go as far these days. This plays into issues 3 and 4, and is the driver for issue 2.

Bottom-line: If the same amount of money you made last year isn’t cutting it, talented people will demand higher wages for the same jobs they were doing a year ago.

If the company they currently work for won’t pay up, no problem, they’ll just move.

Intense Competition for Talent

As a recruiter, I use every tool I can find. The job boards, these days, are as silent and un-exciting as a Hillary Clinton rally in Payson. The war for top-talent has moved from remote, tactical operations using unmanned email probes and remote-controlled resume submittal to (continuing the analogy) hand-to-hand, street fighting. Candidates are being approached at every angle, from every recruiter, in very creative ways…. and they’re getting hired, too!

At the Blogger Dinner last Thursday, Steve Spencer quipped something like: This is just like the late 90s. It doesn’t matter if you can actually do any of the stuff on your resume, but if you have the right acronyms, you’re hired!

(And, yes, Steve’s company is hiring… tell ‘em I sent ya)

Corporate Cost-Cutting

Client after client of mine has issued cost-cutting warnings. Several more companies are putting in-place hiring freezes, readjusting their priorities, laying people off or closing down all together.

This hyper-sensitive focus on costs can be unacceptable to a workforce already in high-demand.

One jobseeker for a Salt Lake-based IT Outsourcing firm told me last Thursday that his current employer has”implemented a new performance-based pay plan where you get a “very low base wage” and, if you hit certain quotas every day, you will get paid more.

The story goes that these employees, if they are industrious little busy bees, can earn even more than they have been making, but the employees don’t quite see it that way.

“Its a joke,” my jobseeker friend told me. “I’ve done the math. It is impossible to make anything close to what I have been making. I am outta here.”

There’s bound to be losses when a company needs to refocus. A recent article by Tiffany Hsu in the Baltimore Sun explains this very well:

“It costs a lot to let someone go,” said Don McNamara, president of Heritage Associates Inc., a management consultant company based in Laguna Niguel, Calif. “So we’ve got to circle the wagons and pull in a little bit.”

Businesses, he said, can cross-train employees in multiple roles to boost productivity and restructure to remove inefficiencies…. but employers can’t cut too many expenses and perks without risking driving workers away.

“You’ve got to be sensitive to your people and make sure morale isn’t one of the things you cut,” McNamara said. “If this comes as a surprise to them, they might be tempted to update their resumes at another company.”

High Energy/Commute Costs

Even thinking about high gas/energy prices makes me exhausted, but the simple fact is we are receiving regular calls and updates from our candidates seeking more commute-friendly work options, telecomuting, shorter commutes, or other benefits to offset the incredible rise in fuel costs this last year has seen. For once, the State has taken a lead here, generating (I predict) pressure on many new fronts to allow employees to have more control over when, where and how much they work.

On the flip-side, a lot of people who otherwise want to keep their current job are interested right now in part-time, flexible, contract-based work options too. That is an unforeseen consequence of these higher prices.

Summary

At the end of the day, companies are asking their employees to do more with less, while these same high-demand employees are not afraid of feeling out their options and making a more lucrative move if needed.

I fear, for companies too cost-conscious, this will become a race to mediocrity unless they very creatively examine their work demands, and be very open and honest with their employees. Find out what they need/want and even while cutting costs, you can make work fun and, heck, maybe even more productive.

It’s likely a result of the current economy, but we have noticed a very high percentage of people coming to us and looking for part-time or extra work on graveyards/evenings/weekends.

These are generally very talented individuals who like their current job/employer, but are looking for additional work to take on.

Likewise, these same people are usually willing to take a decrease in their “day-time wage” for a flexible work opportunity because of the, well, flexibility of it.

Some are cutting their pay-rate down as much as 75% of what they would deserve in a day-time/full-time gig because they are not looking for just income, but additional income.

If you are a software development manager and I was willing to experiment with adding flexible/additional staff (especially if you’re already considering outsourcing where there are time-differences anyway), this might be the time to seriously consider bringing on a swing/night shift (your programmers are already there all night anyway, right?) and acquire some excellent talent at a discount.

Of course, finding the people to do this is what we do all day (at SOS Engineering & Technology, where I work). Even if you had your own person in mind, contracting them through an agency like mine (so you would not have to hire them permanently, or deal with 1099 messes) can remove a lot of headaches and legal issues down the road.

If you’re curious about how an agency like mine could help you, please feel free to contact me.

If you know of companies that are accepting candidates for non-traditional work hours, and you want to share, please feel free to leave a comment!

A provocative post about Helicopter Parenting on Modite this morning reminded me of some advice I frequently give to job-seekers, but I don’t know that I’ve ever really mentioned it clearly here.

Don’t lie. Admit when you don’t know something… but immediately prove to me that you can assemble the resources to get it figured out.

This is the age of Google, not Brittanica.

You don’t have to be a ‘Know It All’, but you should be a ‘Know How to Find-out It All’.

Funny thing is, like most “advice”, it sounds pretty plain and, well my millenial little sister would simply reply with “duh…”

But maybe someone will take value from it. What do YOU think? Have you ever LIED in an interview?

Today, I listened to Peter Clayton’s Total Picture Radio interview with Jim McGovern of ItzBig.  In the interview, he addressed something in a way–I am embarassed to admit–I never fully grasped before:

The Anonymity Problem for Job Seekers

The simple fact of the matter is, the Recruiting Industry has long been too sympathetic to the employer or hiring manager, and far too hard on the seeker.

Regularly, I have HR/Hiring managers confess to me their worst sins… like throwing out a whole stack of resumes or deleting their whole “candidates” folder in their email program “on accident” because they needed to clean up space on their hard-drive to make room for their grandson’s little league photos.

At the end of the day, I do believe job-seekers work too hard to have their careers tossed into black holes, set to puree, and hopefully something turns out at the other end.

More than that, McGovern is right–truly excellent, talented candidates who are currently employed can’t afford to be found looking around.  In an economy like ours where “bouncing back” from being fired would be relatively hard… passive candidates need better tools to keep their identity private when job-seeking until they are ready to reveal it.

ItzBig’s subtitle says it all: “Be Found — Not Found Out” I wish them all the luck.

Over and over again when I meet people seeking a job change, there’s three basic things everyone needs:

• A Purpose - I am amazed at the number of people that don’t quite know what they want… they just want something different. Well, that’s a start, but won’t get you far.
• A Resume that Works – There’s a key difference between a resume, and a resume that works… does it help you accomplish your Purpose (see above) or simply list where you’ve been and when you left?
• Promoters – Its hard for anybody to tell their own story. Our society doesn’t believe self-promoters much. Who do you have cheering for you? This isn’t just references, but people who will make calls on your behalf (and your mom shouldn’t be one of them… Hi mom). Marketers hire celebrities and rock-stars to help them tell their stories… who can help you tell yours?

Kiley Newbold, fellow blogger and colleague, asked the following question on LinkedIn:

How much is the state of the economy (I.E. the alleged impending recession) a result of media hype?

I am convinced the media plays a major role in stimulating or slowing the economy. Please share your thoughts on this. To what extent will the media hype (and the public reaction) be responsible if the US enters an official recession?

To which I replied…

Recession is part of the pie. You can NOT have expansion without recession. They are forever linked. Like the waves of the ocean–you can not have a high without a low. Like the old song says, “Baby… that’s just the way it is, baby.”

A few things to consider:

• Contrary to popular opinion, that somehow “the Fed” or the President’s Economic Policy has something to do with the recession, there has been a recession in the United States of America EVERY SIX YEARS since 1776, except for the period between 1990 and 2000. That was the longest economic expansion in history, blamed mostly on the Internet’s ability to radically reduce cost and spread resources to the most-efficient markets.

  What the government CAN do is try to prevent a deep recession, a depression, and control inflation… but there will always, always, always be corrections and recessions.

•  This last period of economic expansion officially started in 2001-2002. Forward six years and you have THIS YEAR. We’re DUE.

• Except for one outlier (1990-2000), statistics prove that recessions are normal, recurring and important to the general economic health of a country. The GDP has always been HIGHER at the high-point of the NEXT expansion than the last, so we’re always growing. And, other than the Great Depression, the trough of the recession has not really ever been AS BAD as the recession before.
• Finally, there has never been a recession in an election year before. If a recession does hit this year, it will cause incredible stress on the candidates when all the OTHER issues will take a backseat to the one issue: MY MONEY. Get a good seat. This will be a good one to watch.

Besides, when has the news or the media really EVER been out in front of a trend. They don’t care about creating anything…. they only want EYEBALLS watching their program, so they will scour all the possible stories to find the one story just ghastly enough to get people to “tune in at 11″ and find out

I think I just wrote the best blog post of my life… and it wasn’t even on MY BLOG.  It was on Jason’s… down in the comments. It’s how to get yourself noticed by a hiring manager when you have too many skills, or you’re overqualified, or you  are a round-peg in a square-hole.