Career Coach Office Hours: May 13 2022 | JobSearchTV.com
By Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter
I answered questions about #jobsearch #hiringstaff #management #leadership #workplace issues. Join me at 1 PM Eastern on Tuesdays and Fridays and put your question into chat. You can also message me on Linkedin before the show and I will answer it, too. #careercoachofficehours #careercoaching #careercoach #jobsearchtips #jobsearchadvice #interviews #hiring #managingpeople #leadershipskills #linkedinlive #linkedinlivestreams
02:14 Are the emails from Indeed saying “X employer has invited you to apply for Y job” real or automated?
03:00 How do you approach your first day on the job, when you have been hired to be the boss of others?
04:38 I was placed with a company by a recruiter but things didn’t work out and I was only there for a month. Does that look bad on my resume?
06:59 I interviewed for a job on 4/29. Sent a thank you email on 5/4. Got a reference check email from the HR department on 5/5. Responded same day and both references have said they filled out everything they needed to fill out. Should I send another email to the interviewer or to HR a asking if they need anything else from me? And if so…when?
09:19 Why do employers prefer an employee referral? 11:04 How long do I need to stay to earn my sign on bonus?
12:29 As a Computer Science student with no internship, how can I improve my chances of getting a well-paid job?
13:53 Are there global companies who look for good administrators? I mean, cost effective administrators or facilities managers for their international real estate portfolio or does everyone just focus on marketing geniuses? How do you find such organizations?
18:14 Should I put ‘banned from Twitter’ on my resume?
19:26 3 virtual and 1 onsite interview couldn’t have went better. was offered the job after salary and start date negotiations. Was introduced to staff as the new network architect, was told offer letter will be sent to recruiter. Then was denied the role the next day. WTF
21:33 Is a job mentioning a “fast-paced environment” good or bad?
22:24 How do you avoid hiring the wrong people for your startup?
26:33 How do I use LinkedIn the right way to get noticed by recruiters?
28:05 Does it look bad if your resume was clearly made using a standard template from Microsoft Word?
6 Tips for Successful Job Search Networking
Are the emails from Indeed saying X employer has invited you to apply for Y job real or automated? The answer is yes. They’re both real and automated. The employer has been notified about you. They’ve said ‘sure, have them apply.’ And thus, Indeed is trying to make it convenient and easy for you to know that a firm is actually interested in you. So by all means, do apply as long as you know that the job is appropriate for you, obviously. And good luck with that. Now, but that wasn’t so hard was it?
How do you approach your first day on the job, when you’ve been hired to be the boss of others? Or hired to be the manager. First thing is get to know everyone. Now, if it’s a 250 person department, that’s not going to be so easy. You’re probably working through subordinates, or leaders or managers within the department. So let’s say you’re the director, and you’ve got managers reporting to you, that allow you to work through them to get results. I think you start by managing by walking around and talking to people get a sense of what their background is like so that in this way you’re learning and not just coming in like a two ton gorilla trying to make changes out of the blue. That never works. Shavon I’ll be with you in just one second. Okay, that never works. So what you do is start noticing and when they start asking you for advice, you can say, ‘How have you done it in the past? How did that work? Didn’t work? Let’s talk about it. What didn’t work?’ And you go through that way. Did work, great. Keep doing it. And that makes it easy for you. So don’t make radical changes. Learn and notice and take the time to get to know your people first.
I was placed by a with a company by a recruiter but things didn’t work out and I was only there for a month. Does that look bad on my resume? Usually, yes. And as a result you know, I wouldn’t necessarily put that on the resume. I would, there’s going to come a point pretty quickly where you’re going to have to show you’re out of work. But when you’re only at a company for a month, it opens up a conversation that’s unpleasant. What’s unpleasant about it? What happened? Why didn’t it work out? Was it them? Was it you? They’re gonna tend to believe it was you more than it was them. So, I would duck the conversation by not even bringing it up, that you worked there. And then in in a couple of months, you know, let me just say, hustle to get a better job. Hustle to land. And the reason I say that isn’t so much about gap in the resume, it’s more about the economy is starting to shift and for all the stories about the great resignation, and the great reshuffle and all the stories about how many jobs are out there. I think we’re coming up on the end game of this pretty soon. I don’t know exactly when. But I’ve been telling people recently, that it’s important to try and land soon, with some version of institution that you think could ride out a bad recession. So, hustle. Get involved with a new firm quickly, and work hard and make yourself indispensable. Own your job there. I think you know what I mean by that. So that this way, they’ll find it harder to lay you off. And if they do, you’re getting great references from them, from your manager, or from their manager, from everyone you work with, as an indispensable person. So, get to work. Get to work at finding work. Okay? I hope that was helpful to you.
I’m recording this as I said on May 13. I interviewed for a job on April 29, sent a thank you letter on May 4, got a reference check email from the HR department on May 5, responded the same day and both references have said they completed everything they needed to complete. Should I send another email to the interviewer or to HR asking if they need anything else from me? And if so, when? The answer is now. Do it. Now. I don’t know when you spoke with your references for all I know it was yesterday. But we don’t know that. So I would send an email that says ‘I understand you were able to successfully get everything back from my references. It would seem like you’re interested in making an offer. What have your thoughts been about compensation?’ And try and engage them that way. ‘Really? You understand that the references got back?’ ‘ Yes, I spoke with so and so and so and so who I provided as references. And they indicated they completed forms. Have you received them, first of all? And if so, what are next steps? Have you been discussing what the salary offer would be?’ Start engaging that conversation in order to see what they’re talking about? Frankly, I would have done it sooner and not put yourself in the position of waiting an extra week. By the way Shavon says yes, that’s what I thought. The company knew that I wasn’t skilled in the area but hired me anyway by promising to train me. You’re very welcome. Shavon. I hope I pronounced your name correctly. I’m glad I could help. You know, you don’t need to tell people stories about that experience. Let it go. Move on. Land somewhere else. Good luck to you.
Answering Behavioral Interview Questions The Right Way
Why do employers prefer employee referrals? The answer is it’s like having a reference check built into the recommendation. What is the reference check? A stranger is interviewed for a job. After they’ve interviewed and we’re interested in making an offer, we want to see if anyone will say nice things about them in their work. That’s a typical reference check. And they cover a couple of different classifications of information but fundamentally, we’re interested in hiring this person. We want to talk to someone and confirm that they don’t suck. So what is an employee referral? Before interviewing, a person says ‘this individual doesn’t suck.’ That seems like a good thing, right? And it is. So, they prefer that because as they say in social media, it is providing social proof, they’re providing social proof that a person is qualified to do the job. That’s a good thing. From an employer perspective, they get the idea that you work hard, are diligent and all those great qualities that employers like to have in staff. And with that, you know, they have the idea that you’ll do a good job. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. So it’s the recommendation that basically says, ‘This person is qualified. You need to talk with them, or you should talk with them. And they do. And thus they got the recommendation at the beginning, rather than at the end.
How long do I need to stay to earn my sign on bonus? Oh, first of all, good for you. You’re getting a sign on bonus. Yay. Woohoo. And I know this circumstance, it’s someone that I coached. And one of the things, the offer came in better than what he was earning. But the offer basically covered inflation. And he was actually looking for like five to 10,000 more. So I said, ‘if they’re not able to do it, ask for a sign on bonus. it often comes from a different budget line. And sometimes firms are very willing to use a sign on, instead of more in the way of salary. I’m not going to go through the reasons for why. And they came in with a $10,000 sign on and now asks, How long do I have to stay and my answer is, ‘whatever it says in the offer letter’ because it’ll be in the offer letter where they’ll say when they’re going to pay it to you, and what you do need to do to fully earn it. So I don’t know the answer. It’ll be in the offer letter.
Making Your Resume ATS Likeable
As a computer science student with no internship, how can I improve my chances of getting a well-paid job? I did, I worked with someone previously, who was a student graduated, had knee surgery. So he was incapacitated for a period of time after his January graduation in 2020. Started to be able to get mobile and then lo and behold, that pandemic and the entire labor market theory was just like a dead roll of attachment. So what did what did we do? Well, after knocking on lots of doors and getting close to offers and knocking across the finish line, I suggested that he try and get himself certified in what his core technology was. As a result, what he was able to do is demonstrate through his certification at baseline knowledge, that interview and then get higher. So if there are things that you can get certified in, by all means, you should do it. And that will help you stand out.
Are there global companies who look for good administrators? I mean, cost effective administrators or facilities managers for their international real estate portfolio or does everyone just focus on marketing geniuses? How do you find such organizations? Now you’re writing to me from LinkedIn. I’m sure there are firms that do this. But from an operational perspective, it’s a head of a function, rather than the person who’s looking at the local level. There may be regional individuals who are looking at facilities management and procurement for those facilities. There may be people working on a global perspective, but they’re providing a high level perspective. I’m sure you can identify people on LinkedIn, who do this kind of work and, from there, I would try to get an informational interview scheduled with them to talk with them about what their background was when they moved into these roles. In doing so, the idea is to engage in conversations with them, to get a sense of what you need to know to qualify for those roles. If you don’t know how to do informational interviews, I have a new course on my website, TheBigGameHunter.us, about informational interviews. I think it’s launched at $15 to purchase and you can rent the course as well for like $7.99 or $8.99, something like that. So if you go to TheBigGameHunter.us/courses, you can find out more about that there. But you need to talk to people who are doing this kind of work, to learn what you need to know, in order to be qualified for these roles. Because that you want to do it doesn’t make you qualified. There’s, I’m sure, steps that you need to master to get close to these roles can be prepare yourself for these roles.
Staying Relevant
Should I put down I was banned by Twitter on my resume? Well, I’m not going to get into the politics or the story about how you got banned from Twitter. But what do you think you’re going to accomplish by putting that out there? I can’t figure it out. If you want to go to a conservative Action Group, if that’s what you got banned for as conservative politics, by all means, put it on and start contacting those organizations. We’ll see if they find you. But I don’t really see a big benefit for you to put that onto your LinkedIn profile. If you can explain it to me what your thinking is, by all means maybe I’ll reconsider. But for now, I just don’t see it. Let it go. Now if you got arrested for climate action because you’re a climate warrior, some people in firms will be impressed by that. But that banned from Twitter.
I’ve had three virtual and one on site interview that could not have gone better. Was offered the job after salary and start date negotiations. Was introduced to the staff as the new network architect. Was told the offer letter will be sent to the recruiter then was turned down for the role the next day. What happened? There’s a couple of possibilities here. Number One is level or two up, may have decided that they didn’t want to hire you. I don’t know why. But there could have been something that got communicated where they didn’t want to hire you. It could also be that they did a reference check because I’m not seeing evidence of a reference check in anything that you were talking about. They did a reference check and someone did you dirty. That’s the most likely of the options. That could certainly be they couldn’t get approval for the money. But I tend to think that it was a reference issue. So what I would say to you is, message them. Say, ‘I’m confused. I know I had great interviews, got an oral offer. We had discussions about the start, then was introduced to the staff as the new network architect. And now I’m turned down. What happened?’ ‘Well, us,’ and they’ll give you some excuse. Try and get to the truth. ‘What do you mean that it doesn’t make sense?’ ‘Could you try explaining it to me a little bit differently?’ And see if that causes them to say something different? Okay? Good luck. I would bet on references. And I hope that’s not the case.
What Is The Best Way to Get a Job When Unemployed And Over 50?
Is the job mentioning a fast-paced environment, good or bad? Yes. And it could be ordinary. Depends on what you’re used to. When I think a fast paced environment, I think of busy, lots of work to do. Generally, lots of work to do. Every every office has lots of work to do, always has slack times. But I can’t judge whether this is good or bad. What I can judge is that people are busy. They work hard. They try. And as a result, if that’s not for you, because the most important thing to you is work life balance, then not for you. Okay?
How do you avoid hiring the wrong people for your startup? Well, get recommendations from people who you know, who will say strong. things about them. And that will cause them to arrive with a recommendation or endorsement. What I would also do is take the time and come up with standardized questions for people to ask, that will make people hit a baseline of knowledge and experience that will cause your staff not to recommend the wrong people. And you can meet with the people that you’re going to be involved with, or be involved with the interview process, and say, ‘This is what I’m thinking about this job. What do you see we really need to have in the way of experience?’ And you listen for a while, and then ask, ‘Why do you think we need that,’ if it’s not obvious, so you can learn how they think, and offer advice to them. Standardizing your interview process around questions will help avoid making knowledge based mistakes. By that I mean mistakes where people just don’t know what you need them to know. Like, for example, Shavon was in the unfortunate position where they knew she didn’t have the knowledge that they needed, promised to train her but hung her out to dry. Don’t put yourself in that kind of a situation as a hiring manager, where you over promise and under deliver. Turnover right now is it 30% within six months of joining an organization. 30%. Three in 10 leave within six months, and not sitting still for your crap. So the long and the short of it is you need to get clear. You need to be in a situation where you know what it is you need someone to know. You’re specific about it. You figure out ways that you can screen for it. You’re completely transparent about what it’s like to work there because surprises won’t be good for them. And then they’ll leave and you don’t want that to happen to you. So, be open, be honest, be persuasive. Answer their questions, honestly. And get everyone on board with how to evaluate people to determine that they’re qualified.
6 Tips for Successful Job Search Networking
How do I use LinkedIn the right way to get noticed by recruiters? My guess is that your LinkedIn profile is not keyword rich. And the result winds up being you’re not being found by them. Now you could certainly have a unique background that no one needs and no one wants to hire for. That happens regularly. But the long and the short of it is you need to have a keyword rich LinkedIn profile. Maybe include your phone number, I’m sorry, your email address in the about field on LinkedIn. So this way, people can message you when they have something appropriate instead of spending $15ish per InMail. To reach out to you. So make a profile that’s keyword rich. And then think that you want people to contact you. There’s a field called about. Put your email address in there. Maybe say something like, ‘if you have questions for me, reach out by email to ‘ and then give your email address. Okay.
Does it look bad if your resume was clearly made by a standard template from Microsoft Word? The biggest issue with the templates from Microsoft Word, they use frames, and some applicant tracking systems have a rough time digesting frames. So what I would do is mimic the template but not use it. Have everything positioned in the same way as the template. Do not use the template because if you’re applying for something using an applicant tracking system, it’s going to cough a lot. It’s gonna have a rough time digesting it. And the result is your resume will get kicked out. No one’s going to input it. You’re screwed.
[svp]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8pvT4drxc8[/svp]
Stupid Resume Mistakes: A Few Doozies!
ABOUT JEFF ALTMAN, THE BIG GAME HUNTER
Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter is a coach who worked as a recruiter for what seems like one hundred years. His work involves career coaching, as well as executive job search coaching, job coaching, and interview coaching. He is the host of “No BS Job Search Advice Radio,” the #1 podcast in iTunes for job search with over 2300 episodes.
Are you interested in 1:1 coaching, interview coaching, advice about networking more effectively, how to negotiate your offer or leadership coaching? Schedule a discovery call at my website, www.TheBigGameHunter.us
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