Month: March 2016

Pay Attention

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Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter tells a story about a job hunter with great experience could not find work and why. 

 

Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter has been a career coach and recruiter for what seems like one hundred years.

Follow him at The Big Game Hunter, Inc. on LinkedIn for more articles, videos and podcasts than what are offered here and jobs he is recruiting for.

Visit http://www.TheBigGameHunter.us. There’s a lot more advice there.

Connect with me on LinkedIn

Pay what you want for my books about job search

Subscribe to TheBigGameHunterTV on YouTube  for advice about job hunting and hiring. Like videos, share and comment.

Trying to hire someone? Email me at JeffAltman@TheBigGameHunter.us

Do you need more in-depth coaching? Join my Coaching program.

Want to ask me questions via phone, Skype or Facetime? Have your job search questions answered.

Job Search Radio – How to Write Your Resume to Get it Through The Talent Pipeline

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Helping you play bigger and find work FASTER!
Helping you play bigger and find work FASTER!

Every company and third party recruiter sets up talent pipelines that resumes need to flow through with obstacles to prevent useless ones to arrive at an interview stage.

My, guest, Debra Mastic and I speak about how to get your resume through the filters/obstacles and arrive at its goal of getting you an interview, as well as the benefits of hiring a resume writer to do it for you.

Listen to the podcast

Also in iTunes, Stitcher, Tunein and others

Receive a complementary subscription to No B.S. Job Search Advice Ezine by subscribing in the right column of my website.

My job search advice and career coaching has helped thousands people find work. If you would like my help throughout your search, schedule time for us to speak.

Working with a Recruiter: Who Should You Choose?

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I’ve been a recruiter for more than 45 years and, frankly, few people have more or better experience than I do.

Yet, I am not for everyone, nor am I interested in representing you. My focus is on serving my corporate clients  —  they pay me and you don’t: unless you are in my VIP Program, a service I created to allow  me help more people and justify taking the time to do so.

Does this mean that I ignore individuals? Of course not. But the fact remains that my interests start off with the fact that I am paid to fill jobs for a living in service to my corporate customers. I don’t “place people”.

When you evaluate whom to work with, I would see who has a job that fits what I do. Are they with a firm that seems to have positions for what I do? What is the experience level of the search professional? (I am sorry to say that many have been schooled to lie when they answer that question. So listen to what they say in order to figure out whether to take their advice.)

A specialist or specialist firm does not guarantee success. Frankly, after I spent most of my career as a technology recruiter, several of my clients pushed me into a few other areas, making me more of a generalist with strong technology capabilities. Does that make me “less competent” than a specialist with three years or thirteen years experience? Obviously not.

If they ask to meet you, ask them what they will be screening for and what they hope to find out about you? Although many years ago, meeting you was designed to give you the “once over” to see how you presented yourself, most experienced recruiters are now capable of discerning what they need in a ten-minute phone call. Why be dragged in for a meeting that does little more than seek confirmation that you know how to dress and can string three sentences together?

 

© The Big Game Hunter, Inc. Asheville, NC  2010, 2016

One Page Resumes or Longer Resumes (Video)

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I was having a conversation with a professional resume writer today who advocated for one page resumes.

Here’s my thinking.

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Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter has been a career coach and recruiter for what seems like one hundred years.

Follow him at The Big Game Hunter, Inc. on LinkedIn for more articles, videos and podcasts than what are offered here and jobs he is recruiting for.

Visit www.TheBigGameHunter.us. There’s a lot more advice there.

Connect with me on LinkedIn

Pay what you want for my books about job search

Subscribe to TheBigGameHunterTV on YouTube  for advice about job hunting and hiring. Like videos, share and comment.

Trying to hire someone? Email me at JeffAltman@TheBigGameHunter.us

Do you need more in-depth coaching? Join my Coaching program.

Want to ask me questions via phone, Skype or Facetime? Have your job search questions answered.

Why People Quit (Video)

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There are many reasons why people quit. Here are a few of the biggies. Correct your behavior if any of them resonate with you.

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Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter has been a career coach and recruiter for what seems like one hundred years.

Follow him at The Big Game Hunter, Inc. on LinkedIn for more articles, videos and podcasts than what are offered here and jobs he is recruiting for.

Visit www.TheBigGameHunter.us. There’s a lot more advice there.

Connect with me on LinkedIn

Pay what you want for my books about job search

Subscribe to TheBigGameHunterTV on YouTube  for advice about job hunting and hiring. Like videos, share and comment.

Trying to hire someone? Email me at JeffAltman@TheBigGameHunter.us

What Kind of Contact Do You Expect from a Recruiter?

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I received an e-mail from someone who sent a resume for a job a client was trying to fill, asking me about the status. Two weeks had already gone by and, I’m sure most of you know that two weeks normally means no interest.

I responded to his e-mail letting him know that the client was not interested and received a response back that I interpreted as being sarcastic. I then thought that if he thinks this way, certainly others do, too. That is the germination of this article.

A typical day has me arrive at my office between 8 and 8:30 a.m. to somewhere in the area of 100 e-mails (spam is filtered out). As I start to read them, more keep arriving and calls start to come in. I try to respond to every e-mail I receive with a call, an e-mail acknowledging that I received the e-mail and offering some services through my website that they might find helpful or with an e-mail asking a few questions.

Often, these calls require additional action — interviewing someone, calling someone, inputting the resume into our system for later retrieval, submitting a resume to a client.

I leave messages; I read more resumes, receive more calls, and schedule some interviews.

Opportunities start to present themselves that require that I check back to see if someone is still available. Sometimes I need to re-schedule an interview because one party or another needs to make a change.

Oh, yes, I eat lunch, do some networking, write an article or two for my blogs, ezine or book and answer a call or two from my wife or a friend.

So, what gives if I respond to everyone who wants to check and find out “what’s going on”?

Unless someone is in my coaching program, you don’t pay me for anything I do; I am paid by the institution to evaluate and assess people for their suitability for a jobmy coaching  and I am paid quite well, thank you.

Obviously, I need to understand a person and their needs, wants, skills and such in order to bring the two sides together. But until someone starts paying me, I’ll decide how I manage my time to help the most people.

If you work with a recruiter who has the time to take all your calls and tell you ever piece of minutiae that they are doing to help you there will come a time where they will not be there to help you in the future. They have too much time on their hands.

 

© The Big Game Hunter, Inc. Asheville, NC  2008, 2016

LinkedIn – Connecting, Not Networking

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Someone wrote a letter that asked, in effect, why, when someone asks a question, the replies are either platitudes or brief.

My response was to tell the questioner to be thankful for any kind of response since he was probably connected to many people with whom he had no relationship and that these people were taking time out of busy lives to help him.

The question has caused me to correct a mis-impression you probably have about the value of your LinkedIn, Facebook, Plaxo, myspace, Ning and other networks.

When LinkedIn was formed, it had the idea that you should only connect with your friends and business associates.

They still encourage the same thing but the members have a different idea; they believe you should try to connect with anyone who might be able to help them in some way at any time in the future.

The result is that we are all connected to people with whom we have no real relationship.

As of today, I have 15,305 direct connections that connect me to many millions of people worldwide. As recruiters go, that’s pretty good but not extraordinary.

Generally, I do not request connections. Instead people reach out to me and have done so since I joined LinkedIn many years ago.

How many of these people do you think would be willing to help me? How many of your connections do you think would actually help you get a good connection with their employer or with someone that they really knew?

Probably very few.

 

© The Big Game Hunter, Inc. Asheville, NC  2008, 2016

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Do you really think employers are trying to help you? You already know you can’t trust recruiters—they tell as they think you need to know to take the job they after representing so they collect their payday.

Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter has been a career coach and recruiter for what seems like one hundred years.

JobSearchCoachingHQ.com is there to change that with great advice for job hunters—videos, my books and guides to job hunting, podcasts, articles, PLUS a community for you to ask questions of PLUS the ability to ask me questions where I function as your ally with no conflict of interest answering your questions.

Connect with me on LinkedIn

 

Training Camp

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Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter talks about the importance of training camp for athletes and job hunters. 

 

Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter has been a career coach and recruiter for what seems like one hundred years.

Follow him at The Big Game Hunter, Inc. on LinkedIn for more articles, videos and podcasts than what are offered here and jobs he is recruiting for.

Visit http://www.TheBigGameHunter.us. There’s a lot more advice there.

Connect with me on LinkedIn

Pay what you want for my books about job search

Subscribe to TheBigGameHunterTV on YouTube  for advice about job hunting and hiring. Like videos, share and comment.

Trying to hire someone? Email me at JeffAltman@TheBigGameHunter.us

Do you need more in-depth coaching? Join my Coaching program.

Want to ask me questions via phone, Skype or Facetime? Have your job search questions answered.

Get Found

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Many years ago, a friend of mine was an assistant vice president running a department in a bank that has since been acquired. He felt roadblocked by his boss and asked for some advice. “I don’t hate my job,” he said. “I have a good team supporting me but I know I’m not going anywhere here. I want to explore alternatives, but not aggressively.”

The strategy offered was simple. “Become an expert. Start writing for trade publications; become a public speaker. The calls will come.”

When I heard from him ten years later, he had changed jobs three times  —  once to another bank as a VP; then to a management consulting firm as a partner; and finally, on his last stop before retirement, back to banking at a salary of $750,000 a year with a two-year guarantee.

For years, savvy job hunters have been using trade publications in order to be found for new positions. They write articles that brand them as experts in their disciplines and wait for calls to come. They will be public speakers; they will write for trade publications; they are published regularly. You can Google their name and get results.

Some professions lend themselves easily to this strategy — finance and technology are two obvious ones. But what can you do to be found?

Do you have a personal website yet?

Do you blog on a subject?

Have you ever sent out a press release on a subject in your area of expertise?

For managers, do you have a press kit that you might send to the media to be interviewed?

Have you ever developed a mailing list or e-mailing list where you could send announcements of significant accomplishments?

If you search my name on Google, this is what you’ll find. It is not ideal, but I’m number four with the comedian of the same name getting most of the attention. If you search “Jeff Atman” AND recruiter, you’ll find me immediately. Same with Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter.

Be creative and start to look at the press, the web and the public as a gateway to your next job, and not just job boards.

One day, a call may come that leads you to your next job.

 

© The Big Game Hunter, Inc. Asheville, NC  2008, 2016

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Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter has been a career coach and recruiter for what seems like one hundred years.

Follow him at The Big Game Hunter, Inc. on LinkedIn for more articles, videos and podcasts than what are offered here and jobs he is recruiting for.

Visit www.TheBigGameHunter.us. There’s a lot more advice there.

Connect with me on LinkedIn

Pay what you want for my books about job search

Subscribe to TheBigGameHunterTV on YouTube  for advice about job hunting and hiring. Like videos, share and comment.

Trying to hire someone? Email me at JeffAltman@TheBigGameHunter.us

Do you need more in-depth coaching? Join my Coaching program.

Want to ask me questions via phone, Skype or Facetime? Have your job search questions answered.

How to Fix The Hole in Your Résumé

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Jeff Altman Identifies the hole in most people’s resume and how easy it is to fix it. 

 

Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter has been a career coach and recruiter for what seems like one hundred years.

Follow him at The Big Game Hunter, Inc. on LinkedIn for more articles, videos and podcasts than what are offered here and jobs he is recruiting for.

Visit http://www.TheBigGameHunter.us. There’s a lot more advice there.

Connect with me on LinkedIn

Pay what you want for my books about job search

Subscribe to TheBigGameHunterTV on YouTube  for advice about job hunting and hiring. Like videos, share and comment.

Trying to hire someone? Email me at JeffAltman@TheBigGameHunter.us

Do you need more in-depth coaching? Join my Coaching program.

Want to ask me questions via phone, Skype or Facetime? Have your job search questions answered.