Category Archives: Job Search

October 27, 2016 · 9:44 am

How Long is your Digital Shadow?

I have heard the term “digital revolution” about 10 times this week and I have to say it is wearing a little thin…..I know it’s a big deal but what does it really mean to the average job seeker?

It means that you have many more sources to find out information on industries, people and jobs. We used to have job sites like Monster and now companies post jobs on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and a whole bunch of industry specific lists like AngelList, Freshgigs and TalentEgg.

You can find out about actual companies at sites like Glassdoor. It started out as a place where employees could post salary information anonymously and then quickly morphed into a place where people talked about their interview and employment experiences. This can be handy but like any user fed information source, it is buyer beware. Generally speaking, only the very happy and the very angry/sad/bitter people share their thoughts and feelings. Definitely take info from Glassdoor with a grain of salt.

Here is the real impact point of this digital business: your resume. When your resume is reviewed, chances are, the person reviewing it is looking you up on social media at the same time.

What happens when you search google for your name? (Hint: use quotation marks to get it right i.e. “Laura Machan”).

Check google images and google news (different tabs on the search page).

You need to see and be aware of what others will see when they look you up. Are there lots of people with same name? Are there pictures of you doing weird things? News clippings about some neighbourhood shenanigans?

If there are less-than-professional items, there is not a lot you can do except contact the site owner and ask for material to be taken down.

You also want to able to explain what was happening at the time to provide some context and alleviate any concerns in an interview situation or maybe even in your cover letter.

The better thing way to solve this is to get out and do more positive activities. Volunteer, speak at conferences, get involved in kids sports. Gradually, those images will push the junk to page six or seven of google and most people lose interest after page three.

Take a few minutes this weekend to look yourself up. You might be surprised by what you see.

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Filed under career change, Interview, Job Search, Resume, social media

September 22, 2016 · 9:43 am

How to Make the Most of an Internship

Many people have co-op terms or internships as part of their academic courses. They are fantastic learning experiences but there are some extra things you can do to maximize their impact from a career perspective.

Make sure you add the your title and company to your LinkedIn profile. Add some bullet points about your tasks so that other people can get a feel for what you are doing.

Invite people you are working with to join your network. You can also invite people from outside the company. If you get to shadow someone at a meeting or a conference, pick up business cards and send out the invites.

Your LinkedIn invitations have more impact if you personalize them. If you mention where you met the person and how much you liked their presentation/speech/questions, you will up the chances of them accepting your invite.

Ask if people in your work group will provide a recommendation. Basically, you are asking if they will say a couple of nice things about you that will be visible on your profile.

Start a list in your phone of training and learning opportunities so you can record them as you go. By the end of your term, you won’t remember what happened at the beginning. These are valuable bits to add to your resume when you are done. You want to be able to reference not just what you did, but what you learned. That’s the sort of thing future employers want to see.

When you finish an internship, make sure you note that on your LinkedIn profile. You might also want to take a few minutes to write some thank you notes to your boss and your boss’s boss. Mention how much you learned and how much you enjoyed being part of the team.

None of these items are going to make an internship better but they will help to make sure it is a solid starting point for a satisfying career.

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Filed under Job Search, Networking, Resume, social media

March 10, 2016 · 9:43 am

Keep it Fresh – Great Interview Stories

I heard a great expression this week: “We change our teams every three months to keep things from getting calcified.”

Calcified.

What a great description. When things are in this state, they are steady and stable but only creative or dynamic if you are will to wait for a couple hundred years.

This is not an ideal way to describe what you do or why you are so good at it. I am not saying that you need to treat an interview like a stand up comedy performance but you do need to make sure that your examples sound fresh and interesting.

The best way to do this is to practice. Pick five or six situations that really show your mettle. Think about how to set the stage, describe the players, the problem or situation and the resolution. Once you have those details laid out, grab a friend and practice telling the story.

Have them make notes on your delivery, the brightness of your eyes, how often you smiled and most importantly, how long it took.

Despite my uncle who can always “make a long story short”, examples need to crisp and clear and told in 2-3 minutes. If they take longer, you run the risk of forgetting the question and that is super embarrassing.

This is not unlike preparing to give a toast at a wedding or doing a presentation at work. You have a couple of lines that are proven winners to warm up the audience and then you get to the real stuff. By then, people are hanging on the what you have to say.

Final tip: if you can’t find a friend willing to listen to your practice, then take the hint and sign up for Toastmasters.

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Filed under Interview, Job Search, Uncategorized

February 25, 2016 · 9:43 am

Explore the Unexplored – Find the Best Careers

I am at a conference in Ottawa this week. Not just any conference but the annual meeting of the Canadian Nuclear Association.

When I tell that to people, I get a blank look in return. Completely blank.

This is a not small meeting. There are 800 delegates from across Canada and likely more post graduate degrees per square inch than anywhere outside a university campus.

These people are not just involved in generating power but also mining, food processing, nuclear medicine and more. And it’s not just engineers. The nuclear industry directly employs 60,000 people in Canada. They are responsible for powering many of your laptops and proving the isotopes for your MRIs.

Yesterday was student day and I can’t tell you how many students stopped by our Women in Nuclear booth to say they really knew nothing about the industry but someone told them they should stop by and check it out . Did I mention the free food? That could have been an incentive as well, I suppose.

So, here is an industry that is responsible for putting five billion dollars (yes, billion) into our economy and yet people don’t consider it as a career possibility.

How many other industries are out there under people’s radar?

If you are looking for something new to do, you have to stretch your horizon. It may be lovely to work for a Fortune 500 company but there are so many other interesting, stable, well-paying options.

How do you find these out about these industries? Stop where you are right now. Identify six things that are in your immediate area. Where do they come from? Who made them? Where did they get developed? That’s a good way to start.

For example, there is a banana beside my computer. It took a bunch of people involved in farming, logistics, transportation, export, inspection and distribution to get it to me.

Could I work in one of those industries? I don’t know but I think it’s time to find out.

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Filed under career change, Job Search

September 10, 2015 · 9:45 am

Interview Prep – the Key to Success

Imagine you have just gotten off the phone with your recruiter. You got the interview! But instead of being excited, you feel like you are going to throw up.
How do you harness all that nervous energy and all those great ideas swirling around in your head so that you appear focussed and confident?
Think of the interview as an audition or a tryout. Think about how you used to prepare for those when you were in high school. How did you get ready for the community theatre audition or tryouts for your rec hockey team?

Research
You probably talked to someone who knew the coach or someone who has worked with the director before. It’s good to find out about their style or particular hot buttons before you are face to face with them.

Prepare

Consider the role you are trying out for. What kinds of skills and experience are listed in the job posting? Obviously you have some of those things or you would not have gotten this far.

Develop examples of the top three or four skills required. Where did you perform this skill? For whom? What did the team look like? Were you successful? What did you learn?

Practice

Success at an interview is just like success in any sport or performance. It comes from practice. Do not underestimate this. Winging it based on your charm and relaxed attitude will not work. You can really only pull off the relaxed look if you are super comfortable with your material and that only happen if you practice. Tell your stories to your friends and your spouse and when they are sick of hearing you talk, use the recording app on your phone.

Last bit of advice: check your teeth and your fly on the way in to the interview. Discovering a poppyseed in your teeth when you are back in the car, is a cruel way to finish a great conversation.

Good luck!

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Filed under career change, Interview, Job Search

July 9, 2015 · 9:43 am

Humour and the Job Interview – Tread Lightly

I had a good discussion with one of my friends this week about using humour at work, especially when you are new in a group or organization. That got me thinking about humour in an interview setting.

An interview is like a first date. You are listening and answering to see if there is a fit, to see if you get along. Do you relate to the same things? Do you share a common language or way of speaking?

There certainly can be some shared laughter in that kind of conversation but be careful it’s not nervous humour. High pitched giggles and bathroom humour are definitely out.

If you are going to say something that you think is funny, check first – is it respectful and professional? There is definitely no room for sarcasm in an interview. Even if the hiring manager seems to be okay with it or throwing out some barbs, don’t do it. Sarcasm is mean and even if it’s delivered in a funny way, it can still hurt someone’s feelings.

If the interviewer says something that’s funny to you, check their face before you burst out laughing. If their eyes and mouth are not warm and smiling, perhaps it is not funny to them. Definitely avoid laughing if they are not laughing. This can be very awkward.

So tread carefully and pay attention.

And disregard this whole thing if you are interviewing at a Comedy Club.

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Filed under Interview, Job Search

May 21, 2015 · 9:43 am

Spring Cleaning for your Resume

If you are like me, you spent some time this weekend switching your clothes around. Moved the golf shirts and flower prints to the front and shoved all the black stuff into a box in the garage. That’s what we do in spring.

It is just your closet that should be sorted and updated. Your resume should be refreshed too.

It may not be as important as your smoke detector, but in terms of your career, it should be right up there.

Here are the things to consider:

Has your title changed?

Has the scope of the role been increased?

Did you take any courses or workshops over the winter?

How about any special projects?

Any new volunteer committees or fund raising (yes, the ride to conquer cancer counts)

Once this is done and stored in a place that’s easily retrievable, like Dropbox, you might want to apply the same logic to your LinkedIn profile.

And if you have a few minutes at work, find all those emails that say “thank you” and “you’re a star”. First, email them to yourself and second, print them and take them home. You just never know when you are going to need a little lift or evidence of your great work.

So put on your favourite cotton, short sleeved shirt and get to it!

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Filed under career change, Job Search, Resume

March 12, 2015 · 9:43 am

Smiles for the Job Seeker

Being a job seeker is not all sunshine and roses. Sometimes we just need a laugh to break up the repetitive job listings on LinkedIn and the “thanks but no thanks” emails.

Here a few lines might cheer you up a little. Even a small grin will make a better day.

I just lost my job as a Psychic. I did not see that coming.
I love being a maze designer. I get completely lost in my work..
Inspecting mirrors is a job I could really see myself doing.
Being friends with co-workers is like having pet tigers…. fun in theory but you still wonder when they will turn on you.
I thought I wanted a career. Turns out I just wanted paycheques.
Some days, the best thing about my job is that my chair spins.
Thanks for the advice about my career. Maybe someday you will have one of your own.
My career plans were much more exciting when I was five.
Success is doing what you love and making it a career but I don’t know who will pay me to drink beer while looking at cat pictures.

And finally, put on your headphones and have an interview-fail giggle here. https://youtu.be/2ikXSt4L6BE

Feel free to pass this along to your friends and former colleagues – it might be the best thing they get all day!

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Filed under career change, Interview, Job Search, Uncategorized

January 29, 2015 · 10:11 am

The Myth of the Forever Job

Let me just put this out there: there is no such thing as a forever job. Too many people, candidates and hiring managers alike keep talking about this idea.

Candidates tell me that they are looking for their last job until they retire. They want to settle in and have stability.

Hiring managers are rejecting candidates because they might not stay in a role for five or more years.

Get your head out of the sand, people.

The world is changing and so is work. The Canadian work landscape changed dramatically just last week and there is more change ahead. Can we predict it? Not really.

In realistic terms, we should not be looking for a job or an employee for life. We are looking for a role where we can learn, grow, develop and contribute while we earn a living. That’s about what it boils down to.

When you are examining your job prospects, these are the factors to consider:

Is there room for you to expand your skills?
Are there opportunities to move into other roles?
Will your contribution add value to the company?
Will that value be a point of pride for you?

Hiring a managers need to consider the same factors.

Can this person grow beyond the role they are hired for?
Will they add value on day one, day thirty and day ninety?
Will you be proud to take the credit for hiring them?

We need to stop looking at five to ten year employment windows. Think about what you were doing ten years ago. Could you have predicted that people would be earning tons of money developing ipad apps in their basements? Or blogging about their dogs?

Keep your eyes on the horizon and your resume ready because you never know what’s around the corner.

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Filed under career change, Job Search, Resume

Tagged as candidates, Hiring managers

Category Archives: Job Search

Keep it Fresh – Great Interview Stories

Explore the Unexplored – Find the Best Careers

Interview Prep – the Key to Success

Humour and the Job Interview – Tread Lightly

Spring Cleaning for your Resume

Smiles for the Job Seeker

The Myth of the Forever Job

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