JobSync

Getting a Little Culture

April 4, 2012

As a jobseeker, you ideally want it all: a great salary, great benefits, and a great working environment that fits you like a glove with colleagues who share common values. However, learning more about a company’s corporate culture is not always as straightforward a task as one would hope. Chances are, neither you nor someone in your network knows someone you can talk to who actually works for a company you are applying to. And a company’s website can only tell you so much.

However, as a recent blog at U.S. News & World Report’s website points out, all is not lost. There are plenty of other resources one can tap to gain a sense of whether a company’s corporate culture would be right for you, and the piece offers these five suggestions:

1. Follow a company on Twitter. Many company’s routinely tweet news on Twitter. To learn even more, track down employee and manager accounts on Twitter by searching for the company’s name plus the terms “HR” and “jobs.” Also take note of whom a company follows on Twitter to guage what is important to them.

2. Follow a company on Facebook. More and more companies are using Facebook to showcase their culture, including company success stories and involvement with the community. They often post pictures as well, giving you even more of an inside look.

3. Set up Google Alerts about a company and its CEO. Whenever your target company and its leader are mentioned in the news, Google will notify you and help you stay on top of company developments.

4. Set up informational interviews. Don’t know anyone who works at the company? Use LinkedIn to see if the company’s LinkedIn page features any shared groups or if you have a mutual contact with an employee there that you didn’t know you had before. Reach out to them and see if they are open to speaking with you.

5. Check out third-party review sites. Employee review sites like careerbliss.com can offer another interesting insider’s perspective from past and present employees about a company’s culture. However, keep in mind that those employees who dislike a particular company are more likely to post comments than those who like the company.

And if you are still looking for a company whose corporate culture would be a good fit for you, sign up for JobSync today and complete a profile if you haven’t already done so!

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Should You Hire Happy Employees?

April 3, 2012

As a recruiter or hiring manager, the first impulse to the answer of this question is, "Why of course!" Intuitively, we suspect unhappy people do not get along with others in a collegial environment, and if their unhappiness is linked to depression, it’s quite possible such employees will be low-energy, unfocused, and unproductive. And as a recent blog at BusinessInsider.com pointed out, there is a study to support such a hiring decision.

The research found that how happy people were as college freshman was an indicator of how much money they earned nineteen years later. Following the lives of over 13,000 people, researchers discovered that not only did college freshman who demonstrated a higher cheerfulness rating earn more money later in their lives, they also had a higher level of job satisfaction and were less likely to ever have been unemployed. From the perspective of employers, this is important. Low job satisfaction decreases productivity and often forces companies to take extra measures to incentivize higher employee performance, which costs companies money. And if an unhappy employee is more likely to leave a company or get fired, this disruption will also cost a company in terms of lost productivity and the cost of recruiting to find that employee’s replacement.

The effect encounters diminishing returns at the higher cheerfulness end of the spectrum, so employers shouldn’t necessarily shoot for overbearingly gleeful employees. And one could also argue that incorrigibly happy people who find the silver lining in every company cloud may not be the best-suited to acknowledge the severity of a company’s setbacks or obstacles, which are often growth opportunities for a maturing company.

So come on, get happy! But not too happy.

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Is the Cover Letter Still Relevant?

April 2, 2012

With the rise of applicant tracking systems that screen for keywords in the high volumes of resumes submitted to companies, many are beginning to wonder if the cover letter has lost its importance. Making matters worse, many candidates also look at cover letters as not an opportunity to be exploited but a hurdle not to be conspicuously haphazard on. And with the age of email being blamed for undermining the quality and expectations of written correspondence, it would seem that the cover letter is on its way out today.

However, according to survey conducted by OfficeTeam, an administrative staffing service, cover letters are hardly passé. OfficeTeam interviewed more than a 1,000 senior managers at companies with 20 or more employees, and their survey provided some eye-opening results. According to their research, 21% of managers find a cover letter "very valuable," while 70% find it "somewhat valuable."

With more than 9 in 10 managers finding a cover letter at least somewhat valuable, how often are resumes accompanied by a cover letter? Not very. OfficeTeam’s study found that only 21% of managers said it was "very common" to receive a cover letter; 58% said it was "somewhat common," while 16% said it was "not common at all."

Cover letters are still relevant, and OfficeTeam suggests five simple ways to make them impactful. First, follow all of a job posting’s instructions with respect to submitting a cover letter. Second, find out the name of the hiring manager and address your cover letter to that person, not the generic "To Whom It May Concern." Third, create a hook for your letter, either by mentioning a referral or explaining why something unique in your background makes you a unique fit for the job. Fourth, keep your cover letter to two or three concise, compelling paragraphs. And finally, have another person review your letter to give you another set of eyes to edit content and typos.

Don’t let a poor cover letter make hiring managers run for cover. Instead, follow these easy steps so they’ll run for the telephone to schedule your first interview.

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No Time for Resumes

March 28, 2012

Remember the good old days when company recruiters spent a minute reviewing a resume? No?

How about when they used to spend 30 seconds? Well, those days are gone, too.

Forbes.com is reporting new research from theladders.com claims that recruiters only spend 6.25 seconds reviewing a resume on average. And how are they spending that 6.25 seconds? According to the study, 80% is spent looking at six things: 1) your name, 2) your current title and employer 3) your previous title and employer, 4) your previous position’s start and end dates, 5) your current position’s start and end dates, and 6) your education. The other 20% was used to look for keywords that were applicable to the open position. Interestingly, TheLadders.com research found that resumes which included a picture drew 19% of a recruiter’s 6.25 seconds.

The startling results of the research are a sobering reminder of how inefficient traditional recruiting methods are. Can any piece of paper tell a candidate’s story or what they can achieve for a company? Hardly. The study also reinforces the importance of having a clear, easy-to-read resume.

Naturally, TheLadders.com used the results of the research as a springboard to highlight the benefits of using their resume writing services. But the Forbes blog wisely points out a general flaw of resume writing services: Once you advance to the interviewing phase, a recruiter or hiring manager is quickly going to recognize that the writing style is not you. Only you can write your story, and once an interviewer realizes you and your resume are not a match, the interviewer may start to wonder whether you are not a match for the company either.

At JobSync, we know you are more than just your resume. And we know you are worth more than 6.25 seconds. And you don’t need 6.25 seconds to see the companies in our network feel the same way.

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Getting Your Job Search into the Zone

March 27, 2012

Do you remember a time when you applied for a highly desirable job and anything that could’ve gone right did? Whether it was finding the original job posting, whipping up a compelling cover letter, and zipping through the interview process, making the right moves came easy. Oh sure, there was a lot of hard work involved, but it never felt like hard work.

How did you make it all happen? You were in the zone.

That window of optimal performance is something we all strive to put ourselves in. If you find your job search has been zone-less, James Allworth might be able to help get you in it. An author and former fellow at the Harvard Business School, Allworth recently posted an intriguing blog about getting into the zone at the Harvard Business Review.

Allworth begins by laying down three rules for understanding the dynamics of getting into the zone. First, it is not possible to enter the zone for a new activity – only things you have done scores or hundreds of time that rely increasingly less on the conscious mind apply. Fortunately (and unfortunately) for too many jobseekers today, they have applied for jobs hundreds of times. Which brings us to Allworth’s second rule: Getting to the zone requires your subconscious. While meditation can help, creative visualization is another avenue (e.g., ace an interview by pretending you have been coached by Geoffrey Rush’s character from The King’s Speech). Finally, use emotions constructively to get into the zone. Channel passion into your approach to a company, and let go of all self-consciousness so you can be relaxed during your final interview.

Beyond that, Allworth also offers five concrete tips to help you get into the zone: 1) Find the right environment to do your best efforts, 2) Listen to music, 3) Try caffeine, 4) Exercise your body and mind, and 5) Know your body’s rhythms, and try to enter the zone during your best parts of the day to do your best work.

And if none of this works, always remember that JobSync is one zone where you can find your best work.

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