A skills matrix identifies gaps, to help a candidate determine what parts of their background might be considered weaker than other candidates competing for the same position. I present the idea of a skills matrix as a chart that compares your top 10 skills, skills needed for your target job, and skills you’d like to gain in your next position.

Read more …

To give an overly obvious example – If you are a janitor, and your target job is to be an airline pilot, you probably have some gaps between your skills and minimum job requirements. It’s important to understand those gaps, determine which gaps you might cover with close experience and if you will need to gain certain experience first before having a realistic shot at the job. Our janitor friend’s skills matrix might show that a few flying lessons might be a good start.

Your own skills gaps are probably less obvious but a skills matrix will make them much clearer to you.

I’ve included a downloadable link to the skills matrix I provide to clients at the end of this article. I develop a skills matrix as a simple spreadsheet, but by taking your time and really thinking about its completion you’ll likely see some eye openers. I’ve had many clients that have re-prioritized job goals after completing this exercise. Here’s what often happens when a skills matrix demonstrates inconsistencies between these job search goals:

1. Ideal job – Often, when candidates step back and consider a job move, they start to look at the whole picture (What do they really want to do, quality of life issues, age issues if more senior, risk). This is even more likely if the candidate has been laid off or comes from an industry that has been decimated by the current recession.
2. Market realities – It may seem natural that this is a good time to think about alternatives, but the hyper-competitiveness of today’s job market makes it difficult to compete for those “stretch jobs” or skill transfer positions. The easiest time to transfer skills, gain stretch positions, change jobs into promotions, change industries or functions is during an economic boom – when there are more jobs than candidates. Candidate shortages are more likely to force hiring managers to be more open to taking a risk on employees. However, when there is candidate oversupply, employers are less likely to take a risk – instead hiring candidates with direct and exacting experience. While this doesn’t mean you can’t beat the trend, it means the odds are against you – at a minimum you should expect a longer search.
3. Competition – Due to the current economy combined with the perfect storm of candidate information, employer expectations, and automated hiring tools, candidates have never faced more competition than today. If the job you are applying to has been advertised online, even if you were referred by your network, you should expect hundreds or possibly thousands of competitors. This applies for lower level positions as well as executive positions – plenty of applicants aren’t even close to being qualified, but may click submit because there’s zero time investment and they “might get lucky”. That’s still competition for the well qualified candidates. Since most companies interview 12-20 people for a position out of a wide pool of candidates, the wider your gaps, the less likely you are to get the position or even an interview.
4. Time frame – It’s critical to understand your time frame for finding a new job. While some passive candidates, or those with large savings aren’t time pressed to find the “right position”, many job seekers don’t have that luxury. When you consider it’s taking an average job seeker 6 months to find a new position, Senior Manager/Executives 9 months – 1 year on average, and CEO/Presidents an average 18 months to land a new job, making a search even longer can scare many from their ideal goals. These are averages – attempting to transfer skills, gain stretch positions, change jobs into promotions, change industries or functions all cause an expected longer search. Do you have this much time in your present work situation or savings level?

In better job markets, candidates had more chances to stretch their goals – and may have had more time to be patient to find their dream job. With housing values down, savings still suffering from the 2008 crash, fewer people are prepared to endure a long job search.

Don’t get me wrong – I’m not saying that making a career change is impossible. I’ve written dozens of articles helping people to change careers. But it definitely is more challenging and time intensive given the economy, and candidates are wise to make these decisions with as much information as possible. You can’t reclaim your job search time sent chasing goals with low odds of reaching given your own time constraints.

You’ll save yourself much frustration if you realize all of this at the beginning of your search, rather than a few months in – A skills matrix helps you.

Here’s how to complete a skills matrix, so that you can have this information, and gain an idea of how achievable your dream job is … or if you’ll want to take interim steps (example – flying lessons):

• My Skills – List your top 10 skills going down the left column. Keep these short, capturing your skills in just a few words.
• Market Demands – Research your target position online, looking at a number of ads for a specific job type. List the most common job requirements (10 requirements). B ebrief here also – just use a few words to describe rather than cutting and pasting a whole job description.
• Experiences Desired – What are the top 10 skills you want to work on in your next job? These can be skills you currently have, or new skills you want to add. Keep this brief also
• Why Experiences Desired? – Here’s where to get wordy, by describing why you want each desired experience. This helps you to see how important this experience will be. If you’re going for a job as a library researcher, and you really want to pick up sales experience – this conflict might cause you to rethink how you will pick up sales experience if it is important to you.

Nothing in this chart has to be a disqualifier in itself. A skills matrix merely demonstrates gaps and inconsistencies. Perhaps you can pick up desired skills through education, a part time job, volunteering, or starting a side business. A skills matrix also starts to outline a path to get from where you are now – to where you want to be. Maybe that means you take flight lessons on the weekends, to train for certifications.

A well done sills matrix can also clarify visually why you’re a perfect fit for a job, so you can more easily explain this to your audience – through your resume. Some clients do a skills matrix as a step prior to customizing a resume for a specific reader, so they can explain fit concisely and clearly.

Nearly every day I read at least one piece of jaw-droppingly bad career advice. It’s depressing. Still, we can’t blame the editors of the papers that print this stuff. It’s not like printing recipes in the paper. If readers write in to say “That caramel soufflé was the worst thing I’ve ever tasted,” the editor would have to take the feedback seriously. With job search advice, it’s nearly impossible to tie the bad advice to a reader’s failure to get the job – so the bad advice keeps showing up, year after year.

The worst part is that the bad job search advice flying around could hurt you. Here are the top three worst bits of job search advice I’ve run across:

RESUME STYLE

They say: Keep Your Resume Formal

This is code for “write your resume in the stiff American corporate-speak boilerplate style beloved by millions.” That’s the style that government manual-writers and the most stuffy HR policy-writers use, too. That sort of writing sucks the life out of your resume. Don’t do it!

I say: Put a Human Voice in Your Resume

Hiring managers are starved for human ingenuity, personality and spark. Replace “results-oriented professional with a bottom-line orientation” with “I love to dismantle the ugliest project-management roadblocks and get amazing products to the market ahead of the competition.”

CAREER HISTORY

They say: If a Job Isn’t Listed On Your Resume, Don’t Mention It

The idea is that if you held a job so long ago that it no longer appears on your resume — before 1985, for instance — you can’t reference accomplishments from that job (or roles or skills or clients) elsewhere on your resume. The fear built into this bad advice is that if someone asked you “What do you mean here in your resume when you talk about Sales? I don’t see a Sales job on your resume,” you’d be caught in a lie of omission.

I say: Claim Everything You’ve Done, and Begin Your Career History Where You Like

People don’t list their entire career histories on resumes because they’re worried about age discrimination. No question, age discrimination is real. But here’s the thing: the ability to solve employer pain trumps age, and it trumps another dozen or so common job search worries. No one’s going to care how old you are if you can relieve the pain they’re feeling. No one is going to care that you don’t have the right degree or inside-the-industry experience, either. You can go back as far as you like in your resume, and if you choose not to do that, you can reference cool projects and satisfying accomplishments without actually listing the title, dates and milestones for every role you mention.

How would this look? Let’s say that your stint as Marketing Manager at Acme Dynamite is not included on your resume, because you left there in 1981.

Your resume Summary could still say this:

‘I’m a Call Center Manager who thrives on building nimble systems to get customers thoughtful answers to their questions. I built the Call Center for a voice recognition software startup and established the training, tech infrastructure and career path that allowed that company to grow 500% in three years. Earlier, as Marketing Manager for Acme Dynamite, I saw the strong connection between top-drawer Customer Support and long-term brand loyalty…”

Acme Dynamite isn’t listed on your resume. No problem! Your confidence and ‘brandedness’ in talking about your Call Center passion and mission come through. Not a hiring manager on earth would toss your resume because the Acme Dynamite assignment shows up in your resume Summary and nowhere else. 

COVER LETTER

They say: Write a cover letter template, and add employer details to customize it.

Nearly every cover letter advice article tells you to write a standard, boring letter and insert the company’s name in it, along with the name of the job you’re applying for. That won’t get you to first base.

I say: Write a pithy Pain Letter from scratch, one that names the dragon the hiring manager is up against.

To get your hiring manager’s attention, you’ve got to dig in, identifying the hiring manager by name in your letter, spotting and tagging the pain the hiring manager is likely to be feeling, and talking about your experience with that set of challenges in your Pain Letter.

Don’t fall for half-baked job search advice. Follow your instinct, trust your gut and your years of experience, and break the mold to get your job search engine humming.

We want to keep our jobs, advance in our career, we’re told to work hard, do our best and follow the leader, but is this really the best advice? Obviously it depends on the leader – we are best served if we

pick a good one to tie our future to which is not as easy as we’d like.

There was a time, when business models allowed for companies to invest in comprehensive training programs for bright graduates right out of college. IBM, Xerox, EDS are great examples and the programs resulted in consistent leadership, philosophies and actions based on cultures that worked. These programs elicited a high degree of loyalty and pride, as program participants and graduates bragged about their accomplishments and the companies they worked for. But alas those days seem to be gone. The efficiencies of business models today don’t allow for that level of investment, companies rely on business school grads, executive coaching and internal training programs and all have their positives – they just don’t provide the consistency the programs of the past did and as a result you don’t always get the best leader to follow.

So what do you look for in a leader? Here’s a few attributes to consider, if your manager / leader has these then work hard, learn all you can and let them know clearly your desire to advance your career:

• Focuses on goals that move the company forward
• Desires measurement and accountability
• Enjoys competition and winning
• Is fair and honest at all times
• Rewards for a job well done more than disciplines for the wrong outcomes

And if you are not interested in advancing your career then find the right leader to support, as they move or advance in or outside the company your opportunities can increase…as long as you’ve impressed enough to follow your leader.

Yes, Twitter can help you find a job … it’s not just for telling the world what you ate for lunch.

Yes Twitter is for adults … A recent study published by Pingdom.com established that 64% of Twitter users are 35+ and the average Twitter user is 39 years old.

Since Google, Yahoo, and Bing now index Twitter posts, using Twitter for your job search has become even more valuable in the last six months. Twitter can now help you get found, help recruiters find you, help you brand your subject matter expertise, help you increase your page ranking, and help you promote and find content.

If an Employer, HR staff, or recruiter Googles a job seeker by name, your Twitter profile will likely turn up in the results. Job seekers should assume that they will be searched online by recruiters, before an interview is scheduled, when making short list decisions, and before a final offer is extended.

In addition, recruiters and HR departments are not just searching to find dirt, but are using Twitter and Google more frequently to find new candidates. Employers, HR reps, and recruiters have increased their usage of Twitter in the past year to post jobs, find candidates, and search backgrounds. During 2009 & 2010 new tools and capabilities have emerged to make it easier and more powerful for employers to use Twitter in the search process.

For the job seeker, the greater number of Twitter followers you have, the more relevant your account is to Google, and higher your Twitter account will rank on Google results. You can also increase your Google rankings by posting comments, links, by having your posts reTweeted, and by being included on Twitter lists. Basically, the more you use Twitter, the greater impact your profile have on Google rankings. Twitter usage can also increase rankings of your blog, online portfolio, Linkedin profile, Facebook profile, and other online presence.

Here’s some steps of developing a well planned Twitter strategy to brand yourself as a candidate:

Inventory and Plan

1. Inventory & Search: If you have a Twitter account, review your past tweets. Then search Twitter for mentions of you by name or username. Anything embarrassing out there? Any mentions about how you hate your job, your boss, anything you wouldn’t want your Mom or boss to see? Create a spreadsheet listing any questionable items, including date.

2. Same or new account: Depending on what you’ve found in your Twitter inventory, you might want to start fresh with a new username. If there is a lot of content that isn’t boss or work friendly, unless it’s really old with LOTS of safe newer content in front of it, start with a new account. If you have many followers (many meaning thousands) a new user account should be balanced versus the effort to rebuild a follower base. If your existing account is used specifically for a hobby, side job or other use where you need to maintain existing branding you’ve built, then create a new account.

3. Passive or Active? Remember that Twitter is public, and that Tweets can’t be erased once published. Passive job seekers can still safely use Twitter, but with different tactics. Passive candidates might not want to use their name as a username, and might not want to reference their current company. Passive candidates might not want to Tweet that they are looking for a job (not the best idea whether active or passive), but can effectively use Twitter to promote industry expertise. Passive candidates can still do much on Twitter, as long as their username and Tweets don’t identify them to co-workers who might find their information.

Build Your Professional Profile

4. Username, bio, picture, links, background, links: Again, your choices may be impacted by your status as active or passive job seeker.
If you’re active, I recommend that transparency builds trust:
* Use your name as username
* Write a brief bio – You only get 160 characters. If you need more, include links to profile, resublog, portfolio
* Use a recent picture
* Include a link to your Linkedin profile ( http://recareered.blogspot.com/2010/02/job-seekers-20-ways-to-brand-yourself_25.html ), resublog ( http://recareered.blogspot.com/2008/05/you-dont-have-to-be-shakespeare-to.html), or online portfolio ( http://recareered.blogspot.com/2008/06/how-online-portfolios-put-you-at-top-of.html.
If you’re a passive job seeker, be more discreet:
* Choose a user name that’s industry – related
* Make your bio broad
* Include an avatar or graphic as your picture
* use a URL shortener for your links (Tinyurl.com, Bit.ly, etc)

5. Settings:
* Name (Your name as opposed to username – Consider whether active or passive)
* Email notification – Do you want to be notified everytime someone follow you? It’s a great way to engage followers and make the first step from contact to relationship. Keep in mind that as your networking efforts grow this takes time, and it’s a tradeoff. (Ex: When I started Twitter, I sent thank you’s to every follower – as my followers and other social network activity grew, it became impossible to continue).
* Design – If you’re a designer, creative, or marketing professional then design will be critical. Design a custom background, or explore having a professional design for you. Otherwise, use one of Twitter’s standard designs.

6. Mobile? Location? Privacy? Do you really need to get updates on your cell phone? Do you really want to post your location with each post? I recommend starting with each of these features turned off – if you want to experiment with them, it’s easy to turn them back on later. Privacy – If you are a passive job seeker, one way to stay under the radar is to check “Protect My Tweets”, so only people in your network can see your tweets, and they’re not public. I don’t recommend this – it prevents your tweets from being indexed by Google, and from getting discovered by recruiters and industry insiders. I recommend that passive job seekers do not protect their tweets, but are careful about what they tweet. Tweeting as an industry or functional expert is ok if you’re passive – tweeting “I’m looking to get out of my dead end job” … probably not such a good idea.

Build your Twitter Network:

7. Follow & Be Followed: Following people allows you to see content. Being followed allows others to see your content. A good Twitter strategy is to start out finding and following some industry leaders to see what’s successful on Twitter. As you start to publish Tweets, it will be more important to encourage others to follow you – to get the widest distribution of your content. Others will follow you because you publish interesting content – chances are your lunch menu will interest a very small audience beyond your mom. Publishing links to relevant industry articles is one of the best ways to get started publishing content. If these are articles that you’ve written for your blog, all the better. If you’re not a writer, publish relevant industry or functional articles you find on the internet.

8. Build relevancy: Tweeting about the great movie you saw or the party you are on your way to may be entertaining for your friends, but it’s not building your industry relevancy. If you want to use Twitter to keep your posse updated on your every move, consider a separate professional Twitter account, to build industry relevancy. You can build relevancy by passing tips to others in your field, publishing links to interesting articles, writing your own articles, commenting on industry news. Notice that it probably doesn’t have much to do with what’s on TV tonight.

9. Subscribe to lists & get listed: Twitter Lists is a relatively new function, that allows users to publish lists of followers ( http://recareered.blogspot.com/2009/11/how-can-twitter-lists-help-job-seekers.html. For example, I publish one of the largest lists on Twitter of job listing accounts (@philreCareered/jobtweets). If you follow these lists, you’ll get a stream of job tweets from hundreds of sources on Twitter, but the entire stream will be jobs – you can even take an RSS feed. Getting listed is even more powerful as you seek relevancy. You can start by requesting to be listed as a job seeker on @philreCareered/jobseekers, so subscribers (recruiters and hiring managers subscribe) can more easily see your tweets.

10. Industry recruiters: Search for recruiters in your industry and follow them. Many recruiters will also tweet jobs – might be a good idea for a list of your own, so you can easily separate these tweets from all the “stuff” on Twitter. Invite them to follow you back, so they can see the great industry content you publish. Note: Recruiters don’t care what you’ve had for lunch either.

11. Target companies: Search for employees of companies in your industry and on your target list. Follow and invite to follow you back. Tempt them with the great industry knowledge you publish, but start conversations with target company employees. Be a source of information to them, because eventually you’ll want information from them as well ( http://recareered.blogspot.com/2009/11/guerrilla-job-search-tactics.html ).

Build and Promote Your Expertise:

12. Use Twitter as a megaphone: Once you’ve built followers, start publishing. Twitter is a great megaphone, to share relevant content widely. Whether it’s to build readership for your resublog, or to build relevance on Twitter, Twitter is a great tool to tell lots of people that you’ve written or found something interesting, that you think they’ll find useful also. The better the content is that you tweet, the bigger and more focused your followers will be. A-List Twitterati have huge followings either due to great content published on Twitter like Gary Vaynerchuk (and his 850K followers of his postings on wine) or pre-existing celebrity like Ashton Kutcher (and his 4.6M followers of his postings on … Ashton).

13. ReTweet others & get ReTweeted By ReTweeting other’s content, you increase your relevance to your defined market and build goodwill with other users. Later, ask them to ReTweet what you’ve posted, to increase the reach of your megaphone.

14. Hashtags: Look for the hashtags used in your industry, job function or specialty. Searching for hashtags can help you find content, and can help other users of that content to find you and your tweets. For example, I use the hashtags #career #jobs #jobsearch and #jobseeker for my tweets.

15. Find content: Finding relevant content that others have posted can help you in a number of ways:
* Identifying content for you to ReTweet
* Identifying industry leaders on Twitter who you might want to follow
* Identifying the audience of the industry leaders, who you might want to invite to follow you. You are likely to find industry and target company contacts in industry leader audiences
* Building a relationship with industry leaders can give you the ability to learn how they use Twitter effectively

16. Twitter is just part of your strategy: Twitter by itself has limited power. Its true potential is seen when used in combination with other social media tools – Linkedin, Facebook, Blogs ( http://recareered.blogspot.com/2010/03/5-ways-social-media-gives-job-seekers.html ).

For Those Not Comfortable with Social Media:

17. Twitter is a time waster: It can be, if you hang out on Twitter all day to see what Ashton’s up to. Twitter can also be productive if you use it to build an audience and share relevant content.

18. Hiring managers aren’t on Twitter: While many hiring managers don’t hang out all day on Twitter, that’s changing. Twitter is now almost twice the size of Linkedin, and has similar age demographics. As businesses are seeing new business uses for Twitter, more hiring mangers are using it to find out industry information, gain quick answers to questions, market products, and to find candidates. In the past year a number of companies have launched applications using Twitter to help hiring managers find candidates, and publicize jobs. Twitter is still early in it’s growth stage, and is comparable to Facebook 2 years ago. You’d find that establishing your expertise now will be much easier than waiting until you’re between jobs to start Tweeting.

Twitter is Just One of Many Job Search Tools

19. What Twitter won’t do: Twitter won’t find you a job – only you can find yourself a job. Twitter is a tool that can help you network and build your social brand ( http://recareered.blogspot.com/2009/12/why-use-social-branding.html ).

20. Twitter isn’t the only answer: Twitter is just one tool – it’s not a magic pill, and it won’t solve all your problems.

One of the best things about Twitter is the ability to build your online brand much more quickly and with less time investment than Linkedin or Facebook. Twitter helps job seekers control and promote their personal brand very effectively, to a wide audience. In addition, a well designed Twitter strategy can get your information into the databases of many industry leaders, recruiters, and contacts, increasing your chances to “get lucky”.

This helpful article is by Phil Rosenberg

So why is this specific company’s culture so successful and why on the one hand am I so high on the company yet frustrated because they are not the norm? As with any company, the culture emanates from the CEO, the leader. No matter the size, how goes this individual so goes the rest of the organization. The CEO I met yesterday was sure of himself, but open to other ideas and perceptions. He is centered and communicates in the moment.

If you are looking for your next career opportunity, take the time to read employee reviews at Glassdoor and look for a balanced CEO. By doing your research on your next employer to make sure the company is the best fit for you, the more likely you will increase your chances of finding a great place to work.
bef63f4c-328d-11df-a57e-123139069a14

But so much of that measurement is focused on whether employees access the tools organizations use to communicate with them.

You know, questions such as do they read the newsletter, do they access the corporate blog, do they find the information sessions interesting. None of these questions prove that your employee communication tools measure engagement which is what every CEO wants to know. There is one key reason; you are measuring the acceptance of communication tools, not measuring employee communication strategy. So here’s what you do.

1. Every organization conducts market research surveys. These surveys typically measure customer satisfaction levels across services and products provided by your organization. Sometimes they even ask questions about competitor products and services. Organizations then take that information and work towards improving the rating they received by introducing improvements to services, products and information.

Now many organizations have a human resources department that usually conduct a staff survey annually. This survey typically includes questions about communication within the organization, understanding the corporate vision, satisfaction with employee benefits and training and so on. What I suggest is that organizations include a supplementary survey of just 10 questions at the end of this survey. And these questions should be framed by selecting key questions from the customer survey and asking staff what do you think customers think about X? These 10 questions in effect become your employee communication engagement measure.

2. Typically the result demonstrates disparity between what customers think and what employees think customers think. Once you have the difference measured between perception and reality then you have the opportunity to commence dialogue about with your employees about what customers really think. Most importantly it allows you to design employee communication strategies specifically to target that business issue. So now you have a business and know the key messages for your employee communication strategy.

3. One year on when the customer survey is conducted, you ask the same questions and again do the same with the staff survey. What you seek to find is that the measure of the perception staff have of what customers think and what customers actually think have moved closer together and towards the organizations desired outcome. This becomes your business measure of whether you have engaged employees.

4. This information is important because your ultimate aim in employee communication has to be to create the “Aha Moment”. The Aha Moment is based on information that challenges the employee’s belief about an aspect of the business. The information that suddenly helps employees say, “Now it makes sense”, “Now I understand”, “Now I can do something about it”. It is only once you see this gap close between what customers actually think about an issue and what employees think the customer thinks that you have a measure that demonstrates your employee communication engagement strategy has been successful. If the gap still exists then the design of your employee communication strategy is flawed in someway.

5. Finally, it is important that we measure employee communication tools such as readership of our staff magazine, access of our intranet and other tools. However the only way to impact perceptions of the value that the employee communication function contributes to an organization is to measure engagement strategies against business outcomes.

This approach to measurement is low cost. The investment in the human resources staff survey and the marketing departments’ customer research is already locked in. You are simply adding 10 questions to the end of the human resources survey based on the marketing questions. The engagement strategies are generally low cost because they involve people, not tools. By this I mean that employees are involved in doing something differently to bring about change in an organization. The staff newsletter and other information tools already exist, all you do is tailor the articles to reflect the main focus of your employee engagement strategy. This low cost yet highly effective approach will ensure that you can measure your employee communication strategies against business outcomes. ]]> https://rightmatch.wordpress.com/2010/03/10/employee-communication-5-ways-to-measure-the-impact-on-business-outcomes-by-marcia-xenitelis/feed/ 0 78 19.217655 72.852146 19.217655 72.852146 rightmatch employee communication https://rightmatch.wordpress.com/2010/03/10/benefits-of-video-interviews-and-how-to-make-your-video-better/ https://rightmatch.wordpress.com/2010/03/10/benefits-of-video-interviews-and-how-to-make-your-video-better/#respond Wed, 10 Mar 2010 04:55:58 +0000 http://rightmatch.wordpress.com/?p=75

I recently joined the Board of HireVue whose business is to conduct video interviewing. So let’s start from the position that I am biased and I believe that video interviewing is going to one day becomes a standard job search application.  Remove my association with HireVue and I would still say there are a lot of factors pointing towards video interviewing being here to stay.  Consider these as good reasons:

• Corporate recruiting staffs have been decimated, and recruiters and hiring managers are looking to technology for efficiency and productivity
• Travel budgets have been slashed both for recruiters and candidates
• Job candidates are more skittish than ever about taking time off from work so convenience to interview on their own time is enticing
• Technology advances have brought Skype and other video applications into part of the normal course of business
• It’s green and all things green are in favor

I am sure there are some people who think video interviewing will no way take hold.  Of course, these might be the same people who didn’t think voicemail, email, conference calling, or videoconferencing would take hold either. Of course, they did.

If you are still with me to this point, then consider these tips to make your video interview better:

• Think About Dressing Up. Imagine you are a TV News Anchor when you choose how to dress. We are used to watching credible people on TV being well-dressed, so I would suggest that you might want to dress even a little better than you would if you were going to meet a recruiter personally.  You are being compared to what someone expects to see, so a little more formal might be better.

• Tilt Up. Raise your chair so the camera is looking up at you. There is a reason why you see the White House correspondents all standing on boxes and the camera looking up at them slightly. That camera angle tilted up at you gives you a look of authority.

• Show More Than Your Face. Let the camera see enough of the table in front of you that if you folded your hands and rested them on the table that your hands would still be in the frame but just barely.  This will have you close enough but not too close.  You don’t want to lean into the web camera like you are talking in a web chat.

• Manage Your Environment. Make sure the lighting doesn’t leave you with shadows on your face and make sure the background is not distracting.  We love that you went to college and you are a loyal alumni, but that university flag in the background can take the attention off of you.

• Tidy Up. Most webcams are not in high-definition (yet) but still this is not the time to go with the unshaven or granola look. You don’t have to hire a makeup artist but being tidied up doesn’t hurt.

• Be Crisp, Clear and Deliberate in Your Answers. Chances are you are not the only candidate to be answering the exact same question and you will be evaluated alongside others.  The more crisp and to the point you are, the better.

• Invite Company. Consider having someone else in the room with you. Whenever I do a TV interview when it is me with an ear piece, a fake background and staring into a red light, I want someone else in the room with me. Of course I can’t look at them but just having another human being in the room adds some adrenaline and ups my game. Consider the same for a video interview.

We will get better at video interviewing as we do more of them in the future. In the meantime, if you think you will be asked to video interview soon, I would suggest you get a Skype account and find someone who you can practice with now.  Sometime soon, I predict, we will all be providing a video interview for every job we want.

This helpful article is by Rusty Rueff

The process of communicating with a heavy flow of talent traffic requires a plan, the right technology and consistent execution. Below is an example of how the hiring process should work when looking at bringing in a person for an executive position; however the strategy can be used for any position at any level. Here I share a real world example I received from an executive recruiter:

1. Send all talent traffic (aka resumes  and other supporting information) into an Applicant Tracking System

2. Automatically send each applicant an email describing the process and include an automated assessment instrument such as a Qualifying Questionnaire. Note: ask your current ATS vendor for the best method for providing a questionnaire to – there are plenty of ATS solutions for companies of all sizes. Here is a sample automated response:

Thank you for your interest in the Marketing Manager opportunity. The next step in our process is a short online questionnaire.  In consideration of your schedule, we’ve engineered this step to be as concise as possible.  I anticipate the questionnaire will take roughly five minutes to complete.  This questionnaire will provide us a deeper understanding of your experience and qualifications as they relate to the requirements of this opportunity in a format that is easily presented to our hiring team.

To begin the online questionnaire, please click the following link…

3. Within a week of first contact, send all the talent an email thanking them for their interest and letting them know if they are under consideration or not. The Qualifying Questionnaire process can be automatically weighted to help with this process. Here’s a sample of a follow-up response email:

Thank you for your interest in the Controller opportunity.  The interest and response to this opportunity has been high. I wanted to communicate that I am personally reviewing the talent and am focused on sourcing a Controller serving a publically traded company in a Medical Diagnostics or Healthcare related industry. I am in the process of screening this talent set first and plan to complete this week.

Thanks for your patience and again I appreciate your interest and consideration.

4. And once a candidate has been selected, send a third and final email letting all talent know that the position is closed. Thank them again for their time and consideration.

Jobseekers appreciate a timely gracious response, they deserve it. Through this considerate process, employers protect their corporate brand – an employment communications practice that should be the norm. Right?

And thanks to a clear and well-thought out talent traffic plan, you may end up receiving emails like this from job candidates:

Dear Mr. Jones,

Thank you for the follow up.  Even though it was not the response I had hoped for, I appreciate the reply.  I have sent a few resumes out in this past couple weeks and am surprised at how few recipients even acknowledge receipt.

With the current market, job openings are probably flooded with applicants but each one represents a person and I feel, in the job hunt and beyond, it’s all about relationships.  It’s amazing how many people don’t understand that.

Please keep me on file and hopefully something will cross your desk that will be a good match for me.

At the end of the day, corporate graciousness during the hiring process will have a positive return on your brand and what company wouldn’t want that?

Article by Hank Stringer

However, it’s not uncommon for a job candidate to get to the job interview then arrive and “fumble the ball.” The worst thing you can do in an interview is make little mistakes that destroy your chances of getting a position. So before going on your next interview, take a look at these mistakes that could definitely ruin it.

Don’t Arrive Late (or Too Early)

One fatal error that could hurt your chances of acquiring the position you desire is to arrive to the job interview late. Hiring managers are very busy people, and they often schedule several interviews within the same hour. If you show up late, you give an indication of what the employer could expect from you as an employee – not a good thing.

However, it’s also good to keep in mind that arriving too early could work against you too. While arriving 15 minutes prior to the interview is perfectly acceptable, arriving 30 minutes early could also through off the interviewer’s schedule and is generally frowned upon.

Don’t Trash a Previous Employer

If you had a bad experience with a previous employer, don’t tell the prospective employer about it. For instance, never talk about how you disagreed with your last boss at every turn, and instead, simply say that you’d left because your goals didn’t line up with the missions of the company. But to say that the manager “sucks” will likely leave a bad taste in the interviewers mouth.

Don’t Get Too “Familiar”

Some hiring managers have complained that job applicants often get too familiar or friendly with them during an interview. Don’t bring up personal relationships, or you’ll alienate your potential new boss and ruin your chances at a call back.

Don’t Dress Inappropriately (or Sloppy)

We all know that wearing a t-shirt or provocative attire is unacceptable during an interview, but many employers also frown upon attire that looks cheap, or even you not ironing your suit or having scuffs in your shoes. Remember that there’s no better time for dressing well and looking impeccable than a job interview.

Don’t Question Pay and Benefits Too Soon

You may be anxious to know whether the position you’re interested in will pay will or offer health insurance benefits, but the time to ask is not when you walk through the door for the interview. If during the interview, you’re offered the position then it’s good to be prepared to negotiate. Hold your tongue until that point, though, if you don’t want to appear to have a sense of entitlement.

If you think in terms of what you should and should not do in an interview, you can strengthen your chances of getting the position you want. Besides, what’s the point in working so hard on a resume if you’re just going to sabotage the efforts in your interview?

post from 1001careertips

Sophos’ study has found that 57 percent of users have received spam via their social networking sites. Worse though, is that 36 percent of those surveyed say they have been sent malware via these sites.

Five hundred firms were polled and the large majority of them (72 percent) were concerned that the time spent on social networks by their employees is putting their businesses at risk through the sharing of sensitive personal and business information.

BOTTOM LINE: During WW II there was a famous slogan advising Americans that “Loose Lips Sink Ships.”  Fast forward 65 years and while we may be texting more than talking, it might be wise for us all to think before we type.

by,

Leni Chauvin