Category Archives: Job Search Tips

There Is a Fine Line Between Effective Interview Follow Up and Being A Pest

Job search experts tell you to follow up immediately after an interview with an email or hand-written thank you note to each of the interviewers. This very important step of the interview process is skipped by so many job seekers because they don’t think it is worth their time. Well, quite a few hiring managers and recruiters have told me that no follow up helps them weed out the less motivated candidates.

How to Do It

Because email is the go-to method for business communication these days, actually taking the time to send a hand-written note just might nudge you above the other candidates. It does not need to be a long note, but make sure it doesn’t look like a canned, generic message that you send every interviewer. The most effective approach is to mention something relevant to your skills or experience that you discussed during the interview and express your eagerness to join their team. Continue the conversation and keep yourself in the running. Continue reading →

Is It Time to Add a Trained Professional to Your Job Search Toolkit?

This whole process of looking for a job is just one more thing that’s changed drastically over the last few years. It’s hard to keep up, isn’t it? It used to be easy to find and land a new job, but today’s digital job search is so much more complicated. The job market is crowded and super-competitive because digital platforms like LinkedIn have expanded the candidate pool. To gain an employer’s attention in our highly connected world, you need to rise above the online noise to stand out among your competitors. To do so takes strategic action and a willingness to let go of outdated ideas that may no longer serve your interests. Is there a job search 2.0 tool that can help? You bet.

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Take a minute to see what Certified Career Transition Coaches do. As trained professionals, they help you apply industry best practices so you can avoid the hassle of learning by trial and error. Offering an impartial view of your career goals and personal branding, a career coach can help you gain the competitive edge so you can get in front of decision makers at your target companies. Continue reading →

What Does a Career Coach Actually Do?

Do I need a career coach? Where do they fit into my job search?

If you’re wondering about the difference between a career coach and a recruiter, it’s actually pretty clear-cut. A recruiter works for the employer – a career coach works for YOU. When it comes to helping you reach your career goals, that’s a big difference. As your career coach, I have your best interest at heart. I will make sure you are prepared for success and will guide you along your journey.

Now you’re thinking, “Okay, so you work for me. But what exactly do you do?” I’m so glad you asked. My role is to help you gain a competitive edge in a crowded job market. I do this by helping you establish realistic career goals, articulate the incredible value you offer an organization and actually get in front of decision makers.

As a Certified Career Transition Coach, I can help you identify your career drivers and preferred communication style as well as the work environment in which you thrive. When you are in a role that aligns with who you are as a person and how you operate, you are generally happier and more successful.

As a leader, you drive success by filling your team with experts. Why should your approach to managing your career be any different?

Career coaching is a truly collaborative process through which I help you determine what you’d like to see in your next role and where you would like to work. We develop a branding strategy and then a step-by-step action plan to get you into that new role.

Want more? As a professional resume and LinkedIn profile writer, I also help you position yourself as an expert in your field. Through our conversations and coaching exercises, I will pull all the important content from you, and weave it into a compelling career narrative written in your voice. Describing your own career accomplishments is difficult for many people, but the objective viewpoint of a trained coach facilitates this process. Another bonus? A professionally written resume does so much to boost a job seeker’s confidence, which in turn, promotes success!

Can a career coach really help?

How many times have you thought: “Why should I hire a career coach? I have always written my own resume.” It’s a common question. Let’s look for answers. Continue reading →

Are You Ready for the Post-COVID Hiring Blitz?

In today’s competitive job market, the difference between advancing your executive career and spinning your wheels is leveraging the strength of technology to promote your professional brand.

You’ve embraced technology in nearly every other aspect of your life, so why not to advance your career ? New job search rules require new tools.

Executives need to be on LinkedIn too

As a group, executives have been resistant to the digital job search, but most are now finding that it cannot be ignored. Case in point: my client Ambrose, who was looking to make the jump from Sr. VP into the C-Suite. For nearly five years, he had been passed over for internal promotions and could not make any headway at his target company. After working with me for only three weeks, he was asked by his Board of Directors to consider a newly created leadership role and received a meeting invitation from the CEO he’d been pursuing at his company’s biggest competitor. We clarified his goal, mapped out a strategy to enhance his professional image and made it happen using a combination of LinkedIn and online industry resources.

Everybody and everything is online these days, including career management. From recruiters locating and screening candidates online to job seekers expanding their professional network using social media, finding your next opportunity is firmly entrenched in today’s technology. You know that exposure and reputation management are crucial to career advancement. Here’s how you can use technology to expand your reach beyond your immediate sphere of influence through strategic planning and consistent, intentional effort.

Technology and Your Job Search

Before online technology, a job search consisted of Continue reading →

How LinkedIn Can Help You Advance Your Career

With 740 million worldwide users, LinkedIn can help you establish a wide professional network. It is also a powerful marketing tool that can boost or derail your job search. A reported 93% of recruiters source passive job candidates on the social network for busy professionals.. So, if you are a jobseeker and not on LinkedIn – you are basically invisible.

The keys to leveraging the strength of LinkedIn? SEO, KLT and TOM

Continue reading →

A 3-Step Year End Review Will Rejuvenate Your Job Search

[Back by popular demand and updated for 2018.]

Albert Einstein once said, “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”. If your job search is not winning job offers, then it is time to change your approach.

Photo by Bruce Mars on Unsplash

A year-end job search review helps jobseekers to reflect upon their strategies, evaluate their progress and determine which actions they should continue and which they should change.

Step #1: Clarify Your Goal

Do you have a crystal clear picture of what you offer an organization and a defined list of target companies? If you cannot articulate your career goal, how can you possibly achieve it? The crucial first step is to determine who you would like to work for and how you can help them achieve their organizational objectives. What do you offer that other candidates do not? Continue reading →

I’ve Applied to Hundreds of Jobs Online, but Never Hear Back

The most common frustrations I hear from jobseekers are related to applying for jobs online. The application process itself is time-consuming, can be confusing and most of the time you don’t hear back after you’ve submitted your application materials. First of all, if you have applied to hundreds of jobs – STOP! Either you are applying for the wrong type of jobs or your resume is not selling you as well as it could. It might not even be making it through the Applicant Tracking Systems. Read on to see how you can turn things around.

Why Is My Online Job Search Failing?

Here’s the problem with applying to jobs online: your application is only one of hundreds, if not thousands, submitted for each opening. With employers’ increased reliance on Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) to screen for the most qualified candidates, your application may not even be reviewed by a person if it does not include the right keywords or proper formatting. For more information about getting through these online filters, see my previous blog “Are Applicant Tracking Systems Rigged Against Jobseekers?”.

Making it through the ATS is step #1. Continue reading →

Step into the Spotlight! It’s Time to Ace Your Recorded Job Interview.

Welcome to the third installment of my blog series on virtual job interviews. In my last blog, I shared tips on mastering Skype interviews. If you missed it, you can catch up here.

Employers are continually looking to make the hiring process more efficient. To this end, they have started using recorded job interviews as a quick way to screen candidates. In a recorded interview, also known as a one-way video interview, the company sends you pre-scripted interview questions that you answer on video and submit by a specific date. When you record your answers to the questions, you cannot see the interviewer, but they will scrutinize you when viewing and listening to your answers.

Getting Ready for Your Close-Up

Continue reading →

Does Your 2018 New Year’s Resolution Include a Career Change? Planning Will Make Your Dream a Reality.

A new year brings new possibilities. As we turn over the calendar, we tend to look forward to the New Year as a chance to reset ourselves and we resolve to make improvements, both personally and professionally. If your New Year’s resolution is to be a happier person in 2018, a new job could be just the answer. Considering how much time we spend at work, enjoying your job can significantly impact your overall happiness. You deserve job satisfaction ― and it is achievable.

So you’ve made your New Year’s resolution to change jobs or maybe even reinvent yourself in a new career, but how do you make this happen? What do you do first? Where do you begin? How do you get from hopes and wishes to reality? It’s common to feel overwhelmed by the prospect of a job search. I have learned that the key to a successful job transition is in the planning.
Continue reading →

How to Turn Your Resume Into an Interview Magnet

Whether you are transitioning to a new career or looking to achieve your next professional milestone, a successful job search is all about selling yourself to prospective employers. Never thought you’d be in sales? When competing for a job, you are marketing yourself as both the product and the salesperson, and your most effective tool is your resume.

In my experience as a Career Coach, I’ve found that many people don’t know how to sell themselves when looking for a job. Writing about yourself is difficult, no doubt about it. That is why so many people hire professional resume help.

Here are a few key points to make it easier:

Continue reading →

Are You Sabotaging Your Job Search by Not Including a Cover Letter?

No one really likes writing cover letters – not even me, and I write clients’ career marketing documents every day. Personally, I find creating resumes, executive bios and LinkedIn profiles much more fun. But – cover letters are an important part of your job search that you cannot overlook.

Typically, your cover letter is the first writing sample reviewed by a potential employer, so make sure yours will help, not hurt, your chances of winning an interview. Continue reading →

Interview Prep 101: Conquer the Fear!

Would you rather walk into a job interview with confidence or fear? Interviews can unnerve even the most experienced job seeker, and in today’s competitive job market proper preparation can be the difference between a job offer and a rejection.

You wouldn’t ever walk onto a stage for a big presentation without preparing your words and practicing your delivery, would you? A job interview requires the same sort of preparation, but the process does not need to be overwhelming. You can increase your odds for success by Continue reading →

How to Quickly Land a Job in a Tough Economy

I speak with job seekers every day who are frustrated and overwhelmed by today’s job search. I’ll share with you the strategy I have used successfully with hundreds of my clients who are now working at jobs they love.

While it is true that the job market has never been more competitive, when you break it down there are really only 2 steps to landing a great new job.

You need to:

Get in front of your target audience
Make yourself memorable

A networking strategy that combines face-to-face and online networking has been key to landing a job in recent years and is even more effective today. An increasing number of employers are abandoning the big paid-to-post job boards because they do not want to sort through the flood of resumes from hundreds, if not thousands, of anxious jobseekers, many of whom are not qualified.

So, if you don’t search online for job postings, what do you do? It’s easy: you create your own job opportunities by building a list of target companies and impressing the decision makers. It is not as difficult as it sounds. I can teach you how. Continue reading →

8 Reasons Why You Got Fired from Your Job and How to Fix Them

Guest post by Michael Klazema of Backgroundchecks.com.

You were recently let go by your employer and are currently in the process of searching for a new job. If you were fired, your boss likely informed you of the reasons why. However, the bigger question now is what you can do to avoid those fire-able offenses or behaviors in the future.

However, the bigger question now is what you can do to avoid those fire-able offenses or behaviors in the future.

The bad news is that future employees are going to look at your job experience, check your references, and ask you why you left or were let go from your previous job. A termination doesn’t exactly inspire confidence in prospective employers. The good news is that you can turn over a new leaf and use your dismissal to become a better employee.

Here are eight of the most common reasons for dismissal along with what you can do to avoid similar pitfalls in the future. Continue reading →

How to Do It

Do I need a career coach? Where do they fit into my job search?

As a leader, you drive success by filling your team with experts. Why should your approach to managing your career be any different?

Can a career coach really help?

Where Do Recruiters Fit in Job Search?

Executives need to be on LinkedIn too

Technology and Your Job Search

The keys to leveraging the strength of LinkedIn? SEO, KLT and TOM

Step #1: Clarify Your Goal

Why Is My Online Job Search Failing?

Getting Ready for Your Close-Up

Here are a few key points to make it easier: