Rejected Again Time to Create Your Own Website

Rejected Again Time to Create Your Own Website If youre  well and truly sick of spending hours applying for jobs online only to receive the same thank you for applying, unfortunately on this occasion you have been unsuccessful automated email each time, youre going to need to re-shape your approach. The jobs market is competitive; we know this. When a position  is being advertised online, theres literally nothing stopping every man and his dog from applying.  You might know youre perfectly  suited to a  role, but if you cant cut through the noise, youll never  get the chance to prove it to the hiring manager. You need to differentiate yourself from other applicants, but how? If your cover letter is already absolutely sizzling, your resume is as good as its ever going to be and your LinkedIn profile is up to date, it might be time to consider creating a professional website for yourself. How can having your own website help in your job search? Showcase Your own professional website is a great place to showcase your portfolio and bring your experience to life. Given  you can include videos, pictures, reports, graphs, campaign screenshots and other interesting visuals to support your career to date, having your own website often well surpasses the effectiveness of your resume. You can design your website to reflect your  personal, professional brand and use it as a platform to sell yourself. Control Having your own website is also a great way to  gain more control over what people are finding  about you online. When hiring managers and recruiters come across your application, theyre likely to Google your name  to see if all your claims stack up. Dont just let them find your Facebook page and severely outdated MySpace  photo gallery, have them sent straight to your professional platform. If you include the URL to your website on your resume,  decision makers who want to know more about your capabilities will  naturally follow their nose. This will instantly set you apart from other applicants who remain faceless PDF documents until the interview. How can you get started? First of all, you want to buy your domain name   ideally your first and last name  (.com).  Sites like  GoDaddy  make it easy to search whats available and purchase. Dont stress if your name is taken, you can always experiment with professional variations of your name just remember to think professional and timeless. Next youll need to find a host for your website;  WordPress.com  is a popular and free choice. Other free options are Squarespace, Weebly  and Tumblr have a look around and see what  feels right for you. Once youve sorted the site basics out, its time to get uploading and personalising. At a minimum, make sure you have a professional About Me page, a portfolio page(s) and a Contact Me page. You could also think about including a video introduction (to showcase how you present yourself), a testimonials section (where you include references / recommendations) and a resume page (outlining your previous engagements). Some people include a blog where they share professional thoughts and expertise, and post regularly to keep things current. Things to consider first Your professional website should be just that professional. Your website will become a reflection of your capabilities and should sell you as a desirable  employee. You dont have to make  it obvious on your website that you are looking for a new job; instead keep it as a portfolio platform for you to showcase your personal brand. It is also worth checking out your current companys policies around employee internet usage and make sure youre not revealing  / publishing  sensitive information about your employer on your website. For example, if you are embedding examples of your work, be sure to check you have the right to do so. It might also be worth keeping some areas of your website or the entire thing password protected. This would mean that only people you give your URL and password to can access the site. If you do this, just be careful who you are giving the  password to, and remember if you dont give your password out on your job application (with your URL), your website will be useless to boosting your chances at scoring an interview!

Facebook Home Launched and LinkedIn Mentions Added

Facebook Home Launched and LinkedIn Mentions Added Last month saw big changes and big milestones  for all the major social networks, and this month harbours nothing much different, but on a smaller scale. LinkedIn are introducing mentions, and launching a new app, and Facebook have published a brand new operating system for mobile as well as changes elsewhere. Here is my social media round up for April 2013. LinkedIn Mentions and New Applications At the beginning of this month, LinkedIn announced a new feature  to the site which many users would have seen on Facebook and Twitter already mentions. However, these mentions work differently to those on Facebook and Twitter you are only able to mention a user or company in a status update or on a comment in a thread.  After upgrading the Search feature to increase engagement last month, LinkedIn say that they introduced this feature to allow users to have conversations with their connects more easily, but  the feature is limited to only your connections, or those users in a discussion thread. Will it become useful? Considering LinkedIn does not have a wall feature (like on Facebook), and the only communication between users is via InMail, it could be a new way to contact your connections. Once you mention a user or company, it appears in their Notifications. However, will it become unsolicited with mentions that you would rather not have? This is the fear and it may be used to spam connections (especially for LIONs LinkedIn Open Networkers), and create unsolicited messages. It will be interesting to see how LinkedIn deal with this new feature and the obvious mis-use which will come. Heavy outlined 5 ways to use LinkedIn Mentions to boost your brand awareness, but Andy Headworth at Sirona Consulting asked whether it is LinkedIn were seeing or a mash-up of the other networks? The LinkedIn Mentions function is slowly being rolled out to everyone, and does not work perfectly yet. It will be interesting to see how it is used and the reaction, and whether LinkedIn will remove it in the future. Another new feature which LinkedIn is slowly launching is an app marketed as a new personal assistant for users LinkedIn Contacts: According to Wired, LinkedIn Contacts will mix with your phone contacts and email contacts, to help keen them in order. It will give  notifications  of job changes and birthdays, but is only available in the US at present, and via waiting list. Linked Into Business have even said that its the best thing to happen to LinkedIn since LinkedIn! However, if you want to be first to find out when it is available in your location, you can join the waiting list  via this link. This is something Ive been wanting for a long time do you know any good contact applications for smart phones? Let us know in the comments below! New Facebook iOS App Updates Facebook Home After major changes to the desktop version of Facebook last month, this month saw the introduction of two major updates to Facebooks mobile platform.  At the beginning of the month, Facebook officially announced Home. Facebook Home is a new operating system, currently only available on Android. The features seem to be brilliant (I have an iPhone so cant test it) and Techradar summarised everything you need to know about it in this short two minute clip: Since its launch, the app has been download over half a million times   a good stat.  However, according to the Google Play store, almost 15,000 people have reviewed it, and the average rating is only two stars. Oops! Is this a mistake that Facebook have made and people just dont want Facebook messing up their Home? Convince and Convert were even asking whether Facebook Home was the beginning or the end? Personally I think it needs some time to grow. As with all the major Facebook changes, there will be some people who massively dislike it, but if Facebook nurture it in the same way as with all their other applications, I feel it can really work. Although it is only available on Android currently, Facebook have placed some of the features into their iOS update including floating chat heads  and stickers (as well as new feed features). These features are fun and make the experience a lot more interactive its also easier to see when messages arrive as a little notification is added to the chat head. There has also been a layout update for Facebook pages on mobile   something which I believe has been needed for a long time! What could come next for Facebook on desktop or mobile? Who knows! Well have to wait and see. Other Momentos: Those are my main moments from this month, but there was changes elsewhere: Twitter #music  After  turning 7 last month,  Twitter launched #music  this month a new way for people to find music, through Twitter. Ive tried it a few times and it is quite confusing, however it seems to be something which could grow into a much bigger and better monster. Foursquare After 4 years and over 3.5 billion check-ins, FourSquare have updated their app and website, giving both a much needed revamp. Are you a Foursquare fan? Have check-ins had their day? Let us know in the comments below. What were your moments from this month? Let us know on our Facebook page or via Twitter (@UndercoverRec).

Post Placement Setting New Hires Up For Success

Post Placement Setting New Hires Up For Success Setting new employees up for success starts before you make anyone an offer and ensuring they continue to be a contributing member of your team extends well and truly beyond their probation period. In this post, I’m going to cover off on some of the main reasons people don’t work out and what you can do to help avoid this happening in your business. So why do some people work out and some people don’t? Ultimately it comes down to alignment, or misalignment, of expectations, and broadly speaking there are two sides to the equation: Candidate fails to meet the performance expectations of the business hiring them; Business hiring fails to meet the expectations of the candidate they hire; Candidate fails to meet the expectations of the company employing them In the case of a candidate failing to meet the performance expectations of a business it is usually one of two things: The employee is not technically capable of completing the tasks required for the position they were hired in; The employee is not willing to “work hard enough”/cultural fit. If you have hired someone that isn’t technically capable of doing a job, then that is on you and is usually a case of, “I liked them so I thought they would be good,” rather than they can do the job. Having a standard interview process in which each potential candidate completes a: Technical interview; Technical competency test; Psych tests; References; Will go a long way to ensuring that you hire people that you both: Like; and Are technically capable; Many businesses we work with will have a rapid screening test where each candidate will answer 3 or 4 technical questions before attending an interview. Candidates do get a little frustrated by completing tests prior to attending interviews; however, this is one way to  ensure you are only meeting candidates that are technically capable and interested in the role. In the case of employees who aren’t willing to “work hard enough” or are a poor cultural fit, then you need to ask yourself: How well did I explain what it is like to work here on a day to day basis and my expectations?; What questions did I ask them about performance requirements at their previous place of employment?; When I took the references, did I explain our culture to the referee and did I ask them how they think this person would cope in that environment? No one accepts a job hoping to fail. Asking people questions about their current place of employment during the interview process gives you the opportunity to work out if they are going to be able to cope. If you know your work is tough, then you need to be painting the picture to candidates throughout the process, explaining to them that this is what it is going to be like. If people know what they are getting themselves in for, they are far more likely to commit to that decision and in turn, perform at the levels required. Business hiring fails to meet the expectations of the candidate they hire The recruitment process, as a rule, is heavily skewed towards determining if a candidate is suitable for a business and not the other way around. One of the best pieces of advice I was given when I first started in recruitment was that after the first interview you should push the candidate away from the job and see if they come back. The main reason for this is: Everyone’s circumstances are different, and it is impossible to know all the factors and the weight they assign to each when considering a job. By giving people all the information, good and bad, they need to decide for themselves, painting the picture of what the business is like to work for and encouraging them to speak with a couple of people, they will take ownership over their choice and ultimately commit to that decision. In a roundabout way, it’s the same reason why in primary school the teacher would ask everyone in the class, “What rules do we want to have this year?” Somehow we always ended up with “put your hand up if you have a question and don’t interrupt others  if they are talking”. Moving on. The main areas a business falls short of employee expectations are: Job responsibilities; Manager; Systems; Culture; Job Responsibilities Unless there has been a significant change in business operations, there is no reason in my mind why someone should be in a job they weren’t expecting. During the recruitment process, make sure you: Explain the job in detail including day to day, weekly, monthly outcomes; Ask the candidates to explain what they understand the position to be; Clarify any differences. Hiring Manager A few quotes are floating around the interweb along the lines of, “people don’t quit their jobs, they quit their manager.” I’d be interested in seeing the empirical evidence, however, can say that while it isn’t the sole reason it is often a contributing factor. If you are hiring people, you need to be very conscious of doing all you can to make sure new hires know what you are going to be like to work with regardless of how demanding / hands on you might be. Once they have started, feedback is essential and the questions people have when they start a new job are: Am I completing my work to an acceptable standard; What could I be doing better; Do people like me? I believe that you should have a 5 to 10-minute catch up with new hires at: Day 1; One week; Two weeks; One month; Two months; Three months. As a worst case, you need to pull new hires  aside even quickly to reassure them on the above and let them know when they can expect to have a more formal catch up. Systems If someone is coming from a larger business, there is a good chance they are used to having good policies and will find working in a company that doesn’t look challenging. I’m sure by now you see a theme developing here. Spending time to ask candidates about the systems they use, explain what your systems are like, and the main frustrations using real examples will mean that there are no surprises when they start. Culture I remember reading an employment advertisement for a place I used to work which said: Work/life balance; Flexible working environment; Lunchtime gym sessions; Regular training and development. It just wasn’t right and if you accepted a position with them for any of the above reasons you would have been let down. They worked 8 am 6 pm, micromanaged, had a strict 1-hour lunch policy and the training consisted of a recruitment video from the ’90s. Every business culture is different, I’ve recruited for businesses that work 38 hours a week and those that expect people to work 70 hours a week, every week. In my experience, regardless of how tough a working culture is, if you are transparent and explain to people what it is actually like to work with your business, and ask them to really think about what that means, you will give yourself the best chance of hiring the right people and getting them to stay. In closing, ensuring people work out starts from the first interview. By running a systematic interview process and spending time on really explaining to candidates what it is going to be like to work with your business, you will give yourself  the best chance of hiring the right person, providing feedback once they will ensure they stay engaged.

3 Lunch Interview Tips Thatll Help You Nail It - Algrim.co

3 Lunch Interview Tips That'll Help You Nail It - Algrim.co

10 Blogs for Job Search, Personal Branding and Career Help - Executive Career Brandâ„¢

10 Blogs for Job Search, Personal Branding and Career Help Prompted by the theme for this months Career Development Carnival, a showcase of the best blog posts from career experts, I’ve compiled a short list of excellent blogs and websites for job seekers and careerists. By no means the only ones I read regularly â€" and not necessarily my top 10 favorites â€" the following sites are ones I come back to frequently and always find value in reading. I hope you do, too. I often tweet these blogs, and they  also inspire many of the blog posts I write. There are actually 12 in my list. Two of my favorite writers run two sites. Not only focused on job search, careers and personal branding, the sites Ive chosen also  speak to  marketing, social media, leadership, technology and personal development. In no particular order, other than starting with the blogs/sites of a few  colleagues of mine, here’s my list: 1.   Susan P. Joyce’s Job-Hunt.org and Work Coach Cafe 2.   Hannah Morgan’s Career Sherpa 3.   Jason Alba’s  Im On  â€"  Now What???  and JibberJobber  Blog 4.   Drew McLellan’s Drews Marketing Minute 5.   Forbes Work in Progress Career talk for women 6.   Wall Street Journals At Work Blog 7.   Harvard Business Review Blog 8.   Marketing Profs Daily Fix 9.   Social Media Today 10.   Blog To find out which blogs other career professionals suggest you read, check out this month’s Career Development Carnival on Lynn Desserts blogsite, Elephants At Work, the week of May 13th. Related posts: Top 10 Personal Branding and Executive Job Search Blog Posts of the Year Personal Branding and Executive Job Search Book â€" Second Edition 55 Top Job Search Experts To Follow On Twitter graphic by Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com 00 0

Who Do I Turn To For Advice

Who Do I Turn To For Advice Sometimes we dont have all the answers.   What to do?   The answers we are looking for could be about our career, our personal life, our finances, our car, technology or any other area. In order to ask for advice, a couple of things need to happen first. 1. You have to know what advice you are looking for. 2. You have to identify someone you trust. Asking for advice shouldnt be so hard, you think to yourself.   But what you ask will determine what you get. Start by thinking it through.   Try asking yourself these questions: What is it that I am struggling with? What have I done to try and fix it myself? Why didnt my fixes work? Am I looking at the problem/situation objectively? Hopefully, you will have some information or lack of information that will make asking for advice clearer. Now, who to ask?   Do you have a friend who has been through a similar situation?   Is there someone in your extended family you respect?   Is there an ex-boss or co-worker you value?   Do you have a mentor? Instead of emailing your conundrum, call them on the phone.   It will be difficult for you to explain your situation in writing.   Frequently the written word is misinterpreted. Remember, you arent necessarily looking for answers, but possible solutions.   There is always more than one way to skin a cat.

Free Resume Writing Programs For Desktop Computers - Do They Work?

Free Resume Writing Programs For Desktop Computers - Do They Work?If you are currently a freelancer or have recently started your own online business, then you have most likely seen the plethora of free resume writing programs for desktop computers that are available on the internet. Most of these free programs offer very basic resume writing tools that don't even come close to meeting the quality of professional software. When you compare the two, it is easy to see why so many people choose to use a professional program.For the most part, the free programs are poorly written and offered with no support. There is virtually no way to contact the author of these programs. This could be one of the main reasons why so many freelancers are choosing to use programs that they were told are free.The only reason that most people continue to use these free programs is because they are too lazy to get their hands on a quality application. When you do finally get the program up and running, you are faced with the same old resume writing problems that you ran into when you used an amateur resume writing program. This is why many people still use these programs, even though they are junk.You can see why a person who has a laptop and a desktop computer is better suited to use a professional resume writing program. This is because they have the benefit of using the program with an actual computer and not just a paper based resume. This is how professional writers actually work, and many times, they spend more time creating their resume than they do doing the actual writing.Not all free resume programs are worthless, however. There are several programs that offer tools that will enable you to write a quality resume. The great thing about these programs is that they offer such a large selection of templates and options that you can tailor your resume to exactly what you want it to look like. If you find a good program, you can customize your resume completely.If you were to comp are this to the amount of time you spend trying to create a different resume, it would be nothing but a waste of time. These programs also offer templates that will help you create a resume that will best meet your needs. They are constantly being updated and are constantly getting better. This is why so many people choose to use these programs over the free ones.Free programs to make your resume look bad. A quality resume writing program will make it look professional looking. A professional resume can stand out in a crowd, and if it is created in the right way, it will give you the advantage in your job hunt. That is why so many people choose to use a professional program.You are going to spend hours creating your own resume. These programs allow you to make your resume look the way you want it to. If you choose to use a professional program, you can rest assured that you will not have any trouble getting the job that you are after.