5 Criteria for Choosing Your Next Job

Article by Susan P. Joyce on Work Coach Cafe

When you see an interesting job posting, use this five-step approach to analyze the posting to choose the best jobs for you.

Your job search will be less discouraging when the jobs are a good fit for you. And, the results will be better, too.

1. The right job title

First, of course, to find the right jobs, you would add a job title to the location in your search criteria. But, which job title would you add? Hopefully, you would use the job title your target employer(s) use for the job you want next. This isn’t as simple a matter as it might seem.

For example, perhaps you are an administrative assistant and want to be a senioradministrative assistant in your next job. How does you target employer describe that job? They could use the title “executive assistant” or “sr. administrative assistant” or “senior admin assistant” or something else entirely. A site like Indeed.com will help you try to figure that out by showing job postings with similar titles. Other sites do not.

2. The right employer

When you have a list of job postings with the right job title, the next question is which employer is best for you.

To determine the best employer, check the employer’s website to see what you can find. Then, use Google, Bing, or your favorite search engine for more research. For example, do searches like the twelve below.

To get started, do a simple search on the employer’s name to see what the top search results are. This can be very helpful.

Then, look for good news:

• “[company name]” “revenue up”
• “[company name]” expanding
• “[company name]” hiring
• “[company name]” announced
• “[company name]” “new jobs”
• “[company name]” “new location”

Also, look for bad news that might make you want to avoid an employer:

• “[company name]” scams
• “[company name]” complaints
• “[company name]” “lawsuit pending”
• “[company name]” “layoffs”
• “[company name]” “profits down”

(Replace [company name] with the employer’s name for the searches above, and be sure to use double quotation marks – ” ” – around phrases in your query, as they are used in these examples.)

You may find nothing using a search engine. Possibly you could discover information that makes you want to avoid this employer or, conversely, puts this employer at the top of your list of target employers. You won’t know until you do the research.

NOTE: If all you find are job postings associated with the employer’s name, that’s usually a sign that the employer is not legitimate and the jobs are scams. A genuinebusiness must do more than relentlessly hire new employees to continue to operate.

If the employer is a restaurant or other retail business, reviews on a site like Yelp! can be very enlightening.

Also, do a search on Glassdoor.com, which offers not only reviews of employers but also typical interview questions. If this employer is included in Glassdoor, you may discover some very interesting information.

3. The right location

Speaking as someone who commuted for more than two hours every day (round-trip) to a job over 50 miles from my home, I can only say what a relief it was when I no longer had to face that commute. Yes, if you are taking public transportation, you can certainly get some things done, from reading books or listening to music to writing reports on your laptop. But, somehow, whatever you manage to accomplish doesn’t make up for that enormous time lost. So, think about that when you are considering a job. Would it be worth the commute?

4. The right duties and/or responsibilities

Sometimes the job title, employer, and location are great, but the job requires you to spend a portion of every week or day doing something you hate to do. Maybe you hate bookkeeping duties, even “light” ones – or maybe you love them. Maybe you hate to write reports – or maybe you love to. Check them out so you don’t apply for a job that would make you miserable and put you back in the job market too soon.

5. The right job requirements

Checking the job requirements described in the job description can be a big time-saver. Perhaps it specifies that applicants “must” have an advanced degree or certification that you don’t have. You have done the job, so you know that the requirement is senseless. But, reasonable or not, if you don’t meet the requirement, applying for the job may be a complete waste of your time.

A Little Analysis Will Save Your Valuable Time

Employers are buried under an avalanche of applications and resumes whenever they post a job. To stand out from the crowd of applicants, you need to apply for jobs that are good fits for you and for your career. Analyzing the job postings before you apply will save you time and effort as well as helping you avoid frustration and, hopefully, a new job search too soon after landing this next new job.

Top 10 Career Tips for Veterans

(Original Article by Roth Staffing Companies)

Getting out of the service can be daunting. Newly-found autonomy can leave a lot of servicemembers bewildered and a little uneasy about their future career options. Roth Staffing Companies got in touch with Jonathan Boyd, a Marine for 10 years and current business analyst, for the top 10 career tips for Veterans. Being able to break the process down into component steps is important to job-hunting success.

1) Prepare: You should be thinking about transitioning out well before you actually do. Think in terms of months or years, not weeks. Job searching is difficult and often takes a long time, and it’s even harder if your chosen career requires post-secondary education that you don’t yet possess. The key is to form at least a basic plan while understanding that it’s okay to re-strategize at any point. Preparation helps you get moving – stagnation is the only surefire path to trouble.

2) Equip: Every branch of the military provides programs and workshops to help servicemembers transition into the civilian workforce. It’s tempting to kick up your boots, but the final few months of your service are some of the most critical to post-military success. The programs you’ll be exposed to are valuable opportunities to kick your plans into gear and ensure that you face the civilian job market with a good cache of search tools.

3) Define: One of the biggest problems veterans face is translating military jargon to corporate-speak. While the content of what you’re saying is important, you need to be able to use terminology and phrases that civilian employers will understand. If you’re a little lost on which civilian jobs dovetail with your former MOS, check out Military.com’s skills translator.

4) Utilize: Aside from workshops and expert advice, there are many financial benefits that the military offers. A recent analysis by Omaha.com showed that “only 36% of American Veterans use the GI Bill’s educational benefits.” College degrees aren’t a guarantee that you’ll land a career right out the door, but they do help a lot in your search and usually lead to higher paychecks.

5) Network: Many servicemembers experience camaraderie in the military to a degree not often seen in the civilian world. Your transition is the perfect time to reach into the military network and start making connections with others. There are numerous groups and organizations that bring veterans together to help each other find jobs and stabilize life as a civilian.

6) Contact: It’s important to spread your options wide when it comes to searching for jobs. Contacting staffing agencies and other veteran-specific job search programs will give you access to professionals who know how the system works and most likely understand where you’re coming from.

7) Examine: In the world of social media, an unprofessional online presence can seriously curtail your job options. Whether it’s maintaining a modest profile and lowering public access or simply scrubbing your accounts of compromising behavior, make sure that when employers search for you on the internet, they’ll find a potential employee, not a loose cannon.

8) Mobilize: The military provides another huge advantage for veteran job seekers: help with relocation. Often, employers will disfavor candidates because they live too far away – it might not be worth assisting with your relocation fees if you’re coming in from halfway across the country. If you haven’t moved yet, keep this information in mind when being interviewed, it may be a useful bargaining chip.

9) Select: If you’ve planned appropriately and aren’t in financial trouble, be selective about your job options. It might be unnerving to turn something down, but it’s important to your well-being that you choose a job that pays what you need and doesn’t make you completely miserable.

10) Strategize: The entire process of searching for a civilian job can be overwhelming, but if you treat it like another mission, you’ll be fine. Determine your objective, break down the process into multiple steps, and execute the plan. If you’re still drawing blanks and are absolutely confounded, consult job-hunting experts for assistance.

5 Tricks to Ace Any Job Interview

By: LOU ADLER

(original post from Business Insider: http://www.businessinsider.com/how-to-ace-the-job-interview-2014-2)

Over the past few weeks I’ve interviewed about 20 people for a VP-level position.

… candidates aren’t judged on how well they do their jobs; they’re judged on how well they describe how they do their jobs.

Not one of these candidates applied for the job. I found them all through LinkedIn or via a referral. Nonetheless, I was dumbfounded that many of these people weren’t great interviewees, yet I suspect they were all remarkable people doing their jobs.

Unfortunately, candidates aren’t judged on how well they do their jobs; they’re judged on how well they describe how they do their jobs. When hiring someone, it would be better if the person could go through an actual tryout, similar to how athletes are evaluated. But that will never happen, at least for candidates who are being aggressively wooed. So instead we’re left with judging potential employees via the one-on-one interview.

Recognize that if you’re a candidate looking for a job, even a passive candidate, how you present yourself matters. With this in mind, here are some ideas on how to best present yourself.

First, understand that all interviewers are attempting to evaluate the following:

• How skilled you are and how you applied these skills on the job
• If what you’ve accomplished is comparable to what needs to be accomplished
• How you’d fit with the team, work well with the hiring manager, and fit with the company “culture”
• Your level of drive, initiative, and motivation
• Your upside potential

While all of these factors are important, how they’re measured is pretty unscientific. Techies overvalue the depth of a person’s technical brilliance. Just about all non-techies overvalue the candidate’s first impression, appearance, warmth, and friendliness. Most managers overvalue their intuition and gut feel. Just about everyone has their own pet questions and private techniques they swear by to decide yay or nay. And right or wrong, everyone makes their assessment on all of these things based on how well you communicate your answers. Given this state of affairs, here’s some advice on how to not blow the interview. It starts by communicating better.

Talk in paragraphs, not sentences

The big idea is to talk for 2-3 minutes in response to any question. Short one or two sentence answers are deal-breakers. In these cases, the interviewer has to work too hard to pry the information out of the candidate, and since they don’t know what information they need pry out, it will likely be wrong. So talk more than less, but no more than 2-3 minutes per answer, otherwise you’re considered boring, ego-centric, and insensitive.

You should practice the multi-paragraph response approach using the SAFW structure below. Then use the SMARTTe or STAR acronym to clarify the example.

• SAFW – just Say A Few Words. To format your basic answers start by making a general opening Statement, Amplify or clarify this opening with a few sentences, then provide a Few examples to prove your opening point. End your answer with a summary Wrap-up and some hooks to get the interviewer to ask a logical follow-up question.
• Give SMARTT Examples. For the example chosen, describe the Specific task; throw in some Metrics to add color, scope, and scale; add Action verbs describing what you Actually did; define the Result as a deliverable; put a Timeframe around the task, describing when it took place and how long it took; describe the Team involved; and then describe the environment including the pace, the resources available, the challenges involved, and role your boss played.
• Use STAR. This is an alternative approach for interviewers asking behavioral questions. When they ask you to give an example of when you used some behavior, skill, or competency, they’ll follow up by asking about the Situation, Task, Action taken, and the Result achieved. You can beat them to the punch by framing your responses the STAR way.
• End with a Hook. Don’t spill everything out at once. You only have 2-3 minutes, so leave a few key details unanswered. This will prompt the interviewer to follow up with some logical questions. A forced hook is something like, “Is this type of project relevant to what you need done?”
• Remember the Big E for Example. If you forget all of this, don’t forget to give lots of examples of actual accomplishments to prove every strength and neutralize every weakness.

Interviewers really like it when they don’t have to work too hard to figure out if you’re any good. Well-constructed answers provide insight into your intelligence and potential, your enthusiasm and motivation, your ability to deal with people, and of course how competent you are. Most important of all: your ability to influence others to make important decisions starts by influencing them to hire you.

Note: if you don’t want to wait for more job-seeker advice on this blog, I’ve put a video series together that covers job-seeking from A-Z. There’s also a bunch of job-seeker secrets hidden in plain sight in The Essential Guide for Hiring & Getting Hired. This post, Learn to Dance and Other Job-Hunting Secrets, provides a non-traditional approach to finding a job and getting interviewed.

7 Secrets for Successful Military Career Transitions

(Original Article from Military.com by Lewis Lin, CEO of Impact Interview: http://www.military.com/veteran-jobs/career-advice/military-transition/secrets-for-successful-military-career-transition.html) 

Transitioning from military to civilian life can seem like a daunting task. Here are my top tips for a successful military transition:

1. Attend a Transition Assistance Program (TAP) workshop

TAP was created to give employment and training information to armed forces members within 180 days of separation or retirement. TAP offers a three-day workshop that all ex-military job seekers should use. The workshop covers the following topics:

1. Career exploration
2. Job search strategies
3. Resume, cover letter, and interview preparation

You can find the participant manual from the TAP workshop here. 

2. Think about transferrable skills

How can you describe your military experiences for a corporate role? Take for example:

1. If you trained over 200 people on the Bradley Fighting Vehicle, think how your training preparation, delivery, and results could apply in a corporate classroom setting.
2. If you helped the Navy save $3 million dollars by administering 37 government travel accounts, think how this experience could apply to a financial controller position.
3. If you were in charge of an aircraft repair department, think how the Six Sigma principles you learned could apply to a manufacturing or operations job.

3. Find military-friendly employers

Several employers appreciate the qualities ex-military personnel bring to a civilian job. Furthermore, you’re likely to find co-workers who formerly served in the military. They can mentor you as you ease into a new working environment. For example, P&G has a networking group called “Blue and Grey” where ex-military employees help one another. Home Depot, General Electric, and Proctor and Gamble actively recruit former military officers.

4. Adjust from military to corporate speak

A key to getting the job is fitting in — not only do you have to demonstrate the right skills, but you also need to adopt the right body language and speech. Here are a few examples:

1. Be wary of military jargon. Rather than say you were the “black swan” expert, explain that you developed contingency plans for rare events.
2. Rather than use military time, use civilian time. That is, instead of confirming an interview for 15-hundred hours, use 3 pm.
3. No need to address your professional contacts as Sir or Ma’am. You can typically address them by their first name.

5. Connect with recruiters and headhunters who focus on military to civilian transitions. 

Two of the key leaders in the field include Lucas Group and Bradley Morris. Lucas Group has helped 25,000 officers and technicians to transition from military service into civilian careers, usually matching more junior personnel with technical and sales roles, and senior personnel with director of business development roles. Bradley Morris is another military-focused headhunter that boasts a 96% customer satisfaction rate. 

6. Play up your strengths as an ex-military candidate. 

Military veterans are known for precise communication, individual accountability, impeccable execution and natural leadership. Don’t forget to showcase this during the interview. All four skills are in high demand, regardless of position. Give yourself credit for strengths that many non-military job candidates lack. Other key skills to play up: poise, ingenuity, and ability to handle stressful situations well. 

7. Network, network, network. 

Applying for jobs online may seem like an efficiency way to get jobs, but the reality is it doesn’t work well. For any given job opening, recruiters are bombarded with hundreds, possibly thousands of openings. To rise above the noise, you’ll have to network.

Start with veterans who are now in the corporate world. Don’t rush to ask for a job. If there’s no job available, the remaining time becomes one big letdown. Instead, take time to know the person. Ask how they approached the transition from a military to civilian career. Only at the end of the conversation is it ok for you to ask whether or not they are aware of any job openings.

—

Lewis Lin is the CEO of Impact Interview. He has over 10 years of experience in the career management industry. Before Impact Interview, Lewis was Microsoft’s Director of Product Management and Marketing. Lewis also worked in Microsoft’s Hotmail product planning and Windows Server marketing teams, and has held key roles at Google, Citigroup, and Sun Microsystems (now Oracle).

Lewis received his MBA from Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management. Lewis also has a bachelor’s degree in computer science from Stanford University.

Warriors to the Workforce Hiring Event

You are hereby invited to participate in the Warriors To The Workforce Hiring Event presented in association with Still Serving Veterans to be held in conjunction with the 2014 AUSA Winter Symposium on February 19 -21, 2014. This one of a kind event is part of the American Freedom Foundation’s nationwide initiative to help veterans find jobs. The event will bring together major companies from throughout the country to profile their services and provide employment opportunities for our veterans. Attending veterans will have the chance to talk with employers, submit qualifications, and even participate in job interviews on the spot.

In addition to the hiring event, Warriors To The Workforce will include workshops for veterans each day providing resources and information on subjects such as mental readiness, confidence building, networking and presentation skills, resume writing, interviewing techniques, job searching, career planning through goal setting, translating military skills and training into civilian life and corporate experience, among others.

Both companies and veterans can register HERE

Note: It is important that everyone pre-register for this event!

The event will be held in VBCs East Hall #3. Click here to view map of VBC.

Daily Agenda
0800 – Exhibitor set-up and registration

0900 – Opening remarks & welcome (East Hall #3 & Workshops)

1200 – Break for Lunch (booths remain open)

1600 – End/Exhibitor Breakdown

****Important Information for Exhibitors****

On this downloadable PDF, Click here for Exhibitor Instructions and Helpful Information, you will find valuable information about this event including what is included in your registration, check in, where to ship equipment for your site, and information about parking, hotels, food and beverage and more to make your experience more enjoyable. Click here for Exhibitor and Sponsorship Information and Full Event PDF

****Important Information for Veterans****

For all our attending veterans, we thank you for your service and hope this experience will result in opportunties for employment.  On this downloadable PDF, Click here for Helpful Information, you will find valuable information about parking, Metro access, hotels, registrations and check in.

• Be prepared to meet employers
• Dress for success
• Bring enough resumes (Both private and government)
• Arrive early as registration may take some time and we want you to be ready to go at 0900
• Peruse websites for housing, parking, directions, etc. (See below)
• Peruse websites of participating companies to get an idea of job availability and descriptions

Additional Links

Hotel Information and Directions

Event Parking and Directions

Convention Center Map

Conference Websites:

Warriors To The Workforce

2014 AUSA Winter Symposium and Exposition