Needle, Meet Haystack

Cover letters are a necessary evil these days – it’s hard to know the right tone, and you can get really uncomfortable with it, feeling like you have more of a false personality than your actual self in there.  It’s easy to feel trapped and get bogged down by the monotony of corporate buzzwords.

Joey Comeau’s Overqualified is a great break from the norm: it’s a collection of hilarious cover letters (just check out the “look inside” contents!).  It’s a great way to relax, and might give you some insight on other approaches of letter writing.  Plus, it’s a book!  When was the last time you got one of those?  Buy it for some good readin’ in dead tree or Kindle form.

It’s time for another Job That Might Seem Cool But Actually Kinda Sucks!  Today,  we take a look at the stuntman or stuntwoman.  This edition is brought to you by the letters T.N.T. (that’s right, T paid double).

It’s a pretty cool job, right?  You do the stuff most people dream about and actors are too scared to do – flip cars, fight ninjas, jump from rooftops and so on.  You’re pretty much a superhero.  Your job is a real-life version of “Burnout” or “Street Fighter” or, um, “Stuntman.”  And you get paid to do it!

BUT: Factor in your insanely high insurance costs, the likelihood of death, dismemberment, disfigurement, permanent injury, brain damage and the lack of recognition you get besides an awards show on Spike TV (if it’s still on) and a tiny credit after most people have left the theater, and you have to wonder if it’s still worth it.  It’s an incredibly high-risk job, and as you age, you become a less valuable commodity.  Pretty soon, you’ll be getting hit in the nuts on MTV just to make ends meet.

Well, hypothetical audience, you may have noticed that over the past week, most of the posts have been about what not to do, be it habits, application methods or myths to believe.  So, in honor of the weekend and all the hope it brings, here’s something positive: what you SHOULD do!

The best way to get a job is to show your competitive advantage (also called the unique selling proposition, or USP).  The competitive advantage is just like it sounds – something that makes you better than the other candidates, be it job experience, projects worked on, clients, skills or other achievements.  If you highlight these in the right way, you can have a clearer shot at getting the job.

Even if you think that your experience as a camp counselor is only tangentially related to your application for the job of a financial adviser, put it in.  After all, the skills of being a counselor (organizing events, crisis management and resolution, etc.) can translate into skills needed for the financial analyst position.  Remember, unrelated experiences can still build on each other and be beneficial to your job search!

All this positive-ness is making me want to go out and romp and frolic or something.  Have a great weekend, and good luck with your job search!

…was the name of an article I once wrote. I hate to say this, but there’s no single method that anyone can give you to ensure career success. That is, unless you are a lucky victim of forced organizational nepotism. But we’ll get to you lucky jerks in a minute.

Here’s some myths that you should know are MYTHS because they’re not true:

- The best candidate gets the job. Are you kidding me? Your qualifications in previous internships, your old job, your education, and the seminars and books and blogs and all that crud doesn’t mean much if you don’t impress your potential employer. People like people who are like themselves. Hate golf but hear that your potential future boss loves it? Get on that effing green.

- You’ll get the right job if you hold out. Really? So if I wait around like the weird girl in the corner on prom night, the varsity quarterback will know to come over and sweep me off my feet? Why would he do that when he’s dancing with the cheerleading squad’s captain or chief or grand poobah (or whatever they’re called)? I would rather go the teen movie route and get glammed up and grab him myself. And I didn’t mean to emasculate myself there, but such is the way of the extended metaphor.

- You have to know someone working at the company to really have a shot working there. Well, I don’t know about you, but I’ve had jobs before where I didn’t know anyone working there before I met them during interviews or on the first day. It’s not all about contacts, though they do help.

Anyway, you can get attention by sticking out and doing something different. Show off your competitive advantage (we’ll talk about that in another post) and convince the people you’re applying with that you’re worth their time, and you can usually get at least a few toes in the door.

Waiting around, as we’ve discussed before, is about as useful as a single-use toilet. Sure, it might make you feel relaxed and good once, but after that, you find yourself sitting around in shit and have no one to blame but yourself. Yeah, I came up with that one too.

Finally, the contacts thing (nepotism people, this is where you come in): it doesn’t matter if you know an employee at the firm, especially one in your age group. They can’t do much to help you, and don’t want to be the person who wasted the managers’ time with someone who doesn’t get hired in the end (especially before another round of layoffs is coming). But if you know managers or upper-strata employees, then you have a shot. Make these contacts and use them like you’ll win something if you do (the prize is a career). Yes, I am actually telling you to make friends with old people. It’s okay, really!

I can’t promise you’ll get the job you want and grow rich, but at least you’ll be less likely to be stuck reading a bunch of articles about getting work that use horrible metaphors.

One of the main concerns that arises with looking for work is what to do when one thinks they’re getting a job.  You’ve passed several rounds of interviews, and are just waiting for a response…it’s in the bag, right?

If you’ve read this blog at all, you should know that the response to questions like that is almost always “no.”

Look, I’m not saying you should be a pessimist, just that one should never rest on their laurels and assume that a job will be handed over.  In some cases, you can be brought right in, the interview process might be short a few steps, and so on, but more often than not, there’s going to be someone else waiting for the call, just like you.  After all, companies with multi-step hiring processes have such processes for a reason.

I had a month-long interviewing process that included simulated business calls, meeting various office employees, some basic job training, and several loooong meetings with managers.  Ultimately, they decided not to hire me at the very last step because of my proximity to the office (or it may have been due to my not having had a car at the time).  Then again, this is what they told me, and they knew where I lived from my initial application’s return address.  Personally, I believe that I didn’t get the job because the managing director of the office didn’t like one of the questions that I asked him during the interview.

But during that entire month, I continued sending out applications.  I even did so on the day before I could have been hired.  And one of those applications got me a great contract job with some terrific people that I am still in contact with today.  had I focused solely on that one job all month, I would have been even further behind the ball, and might have never picked up the position I ended up getting.

A friend of mine told me she won’t apply for other jobs until she hears back from one she interviewed with, because she really wants the position.  I hope that she doesn’t waste a month on it.

One of the biggest problems people face is not what job to apply for, but what job to take.  This might seem like a weird thing to talk about – isn’t this blog about finding work, not deciding on it?  Why, yes, hypothetical audience, it is.  But bear with me.

When many people get out of school, most of the time they will decide to take a career in whatever their major was.  This makes sense, as this is the subject they are most knowledgeable about, familiar with, and so on.  But does that mean that you must become a concert pianist or accountant?  No!  It’s okay to look for jobs in other fields than the ones you’re comfortable with.

Just because Mr. Potato Head has a different hat or eyes doesn’t mean he’s not Mr. Potato Head.  And I’m not saying that your head looks like a potato.  Except for you, Adrian!  Your head totally looks like a potato.

Side-note: how awesome would that be if some potato-headed person named Adrian was reading this just now?  I swear, I just picked a random name.  Put yours in if you think that you have a spud-shaped cranium.

In times when the economy is tough (like now) and the job market is tough (also like now), it might seem more prudent to take whatever job you can get.  Why bother holding on to a dream of becoming the world’s best theoretical geologist when you’ve got bills to pay?  Hell, you don’t even LIKE legal work!

Besides the throngs of angry peasants with pitchforks and torches chasing after you because of your financial security (myself included), there are several things you should be aware of and consider before you take a position you’re not sure if you’re that keen on.  I’ve presented them as questions:

- Do you need the money?  How badly?  How long can you hold off with what you have?

- Is there some part of the job that you enjoy?  What were your impressions of the people you saw working there?  What about the interviewer?

- What other offers are on the table?  Did you search for this job, or did they approach you?

- Can you see yourself doing this job?  For how long?  What will you gain from it?  What will you give up?

- If you had to decide now, what would your decision be?  Like right now.

There’s some statistic I read somewhere about people changing career fields an average of seven times (or something like that); think of how many times you changed majors in school, or hobbies, or even friends.  It’s okay to look for a career in a different field; just think of what people with a degree in English do (other than become English teachers).

Just because you start off in some career doesn’t mean you’ll end up there.  Two examples (these are people I know):

“Barry” went to undergrad for animal science with the plan to become a veterinarian.  He then went for a master’s degree in nuclear engineering.  After that, he planned on going for a doctorate in biology, but ended up becoming a college professor.  He then moved to a new city and opened a barber shop.

“Susan” has a degree in music theory with a specialization in the flute.  After taking some different jobs, including secretarial and temp work, she got a solid career in film editing.  She now works as a television producer.

What do their fields of study or early jobs have to do with their later positions?  Next to nothing!  So if you decide you do need the job, or if you’re thinking of looking into work in other fields, don’t worry about it too much – you’re trying something new.  One of the worst things you can do is miss out on a great opportunity because it’s not your “thing.”

If I had a job, I would have off from work today!

But seriously, this day is for commemorating those who sacrificed their lives so all of us can have jobs in management, food service, hospitality, marketing, retail, and pretty much anything else.  If you can, take a few minutes to say thanks.

You can find a list of Memorial Day ceremonies here.

It seems like every day, there are ten gazillion different numbers being thrown around about the unemployment rate.  This article helps to explain how things actually work, and why the numbers are so gosh darn confusing.

Enjoy the rest of the weekend!

Mmm…sure looks good, doesn’t it?  Everything’s artfully arranged in a decadent, mouth-watering array of foodstuffs that makes you want to lick your monitor.  And although these poses may seem completely natural, they are all from the creative mind of a food stylist.

Yes, that’s right.  People get paid to make your food look sexy.  From jell-o to sodas and beyond, the food stylist knows just how to pull the pizza slice off so the cheese is gooey.  They can make anything look good.

This sounds like a pretty nice job, right?  Getting to play with food all day, and getting paid a good amount to do it.  Well, try keeping that enthusiasm once you have to scoop another mountain of ice cream in a perfect array, just like the last SEVEN mountains because the lights melted them before you could get the exact angle that the clients want.  Or think of the joys of keeping a hand model satisfied – after they’ve been holding that pizza in the exact same position for 20 minutes and can’t feel their fingers.  Maybe you’d like to spend hours throwing ice cubes in a glass so that the photographer can get the soda to splash out just right?

Oh, and there are laws requiring that you have to use the actual product for visual representation.  That means that you get to figure out how to make an actual Snickers bar sexy and artistic.  Oh, and the chocolate is melting again.

If you’ve ever felt bad about people starving anywhere at any time, and I mean EVER, you might hate yourself if you did this.  Think of the sheer volume of food that you’re wasting just to get that perfect squeeze of mustard onto the hot dog.

And could you really imagine spending a whole day setting up for photos of a pickle?

BONUS: Check out this site to see some examples of food stylin’ wizardry.

The Internet has made a lot of things easier: research, communications, sharing information, illegal downloading, and so on.  And perhaps one of the greatest beneficiaries of this expansion is job hunting.  No longer do you need to pour through the classifieds or make cold calls; bring up a website and you’re good to go!

Unfortunately, there are some major downsides to this.  Besides the number of job sites being only second to adult entertainment on the web, it can be hard to shift through the mountains of scams, advertisements, and jobs that one is just not qualified for.  While there are a few sites that are more guilty of this than others *cough*monsterandcareerbuilder*cough*, the problem can be seen almost anywhere.  I remember finding a dozen career postings for a single company on a dozen different websites, and they were not even centralized on the company’s own page!

Nevertheless, it’s easy to upload a Word document, type some info about yourself, copy and paste a cover letter, and hope for the best.  It’s easy, and it gets your info to the source, right?  WRONG.

Many companies admit to hiring less than 5% of their staff from online applications.  Foregoing personal relationships and recommendations, sniping from competitors, alumni connections and so on, there is another reason for this.

It’s called the “delete” key.

Back in the days of mailing in resumes and phone calls, someone might actually have to go through your stuff, or talk to you.  Now, they can just delete your application, or ignore it.  Although many companies probably don’t follow this practice, it’s never a good idea to just send in one online application.

By the way, that’s how this connects to the Showtime Rotisserie – it has nothing to do with job hunting not cooking your food, but rather that you can’t just “set it and forget it.”

You have to be persistent.  Attack on multiple fronts – mail, phone, email, billboards; whatever you can get.  If you want the job, show that you do.  Give them a reason to talk to you.  Or be the squeaky wheel.  Either way, sending in an online application isn’t enough.  You have to do more.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to see about a 6 pound turkey.