Blog: Holiday Job Search - Real Life Results
- 18 December, 2007 08:06
- Comments
Aggressively pursuing your job search during the holidays CAN pay off, as my own personal results and research can attest.
Three weeks ago I wrote that recruiting and placement experts all encourage job seekers to continue their efforts into and through the holidays. I noted that I would be ramping up some specific elements of my own search during the holidays. Based on my experience looking for a new job during the holidays and that of my friends and contacts who are also seeking new jobs, the experts appear to be correct.
Prior to Thanksgiving, I averaged 2.4 interviews per week, 57% of which were phone interviews and 43% were face-to-face. My best week was in mid-November, when I had seven interviews during one week.
Since the week of Thanksgiving, the average number of interviews I do each week has increased to 3.6, with the majority now face-to-face. With four more interviews already scheduled for this week and another three in process, my averages could increase even higher. Two firms have indicated their desire to make a decision before year-end, and two others have indicated a decision "very soon," which further supports the experts I quoted three weeks ago.
While my interview "hit rate" appears to be consistently higher than other job seekers I know (presumably due to my job search project plan methodology), my fellow job seekers who are aggressively pursuing their searches through the holidays are also landing more interviews during these weeks than they did prior to the holidays.
David Krull, the fellow job seeker I referred to in my first Holiday Job Search article, notes that he is averaging 2.8 interviews each week during the holidays, compared with 1.3 interviews per week before the holidays.
David and I are also both employing unique holiday-specific tactics to increase our exposure to hiring decision makers and executive recruiters.
For example, I am sending out holiday cards to a number of executive recruiters with a brief note reminding them of my interest in their clients. Meanwhile, David, who is a networker extraordinaire, is attending several events each week during the holidays. In addition to founding several networking groups in Chicago, David uses LinkedIn and his personal contacts to identify additional live networking opportunities to attend. He says that these networking events have increased during the holidays, and that he has a number of new interviews and other opportunities just about to come to fruition from his increased attendance.
Time will tell if and how our additional efforts will play out for us. But with these statistically significant improvements in our results as positive feedback, we are well placed ahead of other job seekers for January's new hire surge.
I am very interested to hear how many other executive job seekers decided to kick their job search into high gear during the holidays and what you did to stand out.
Happy Holidays!!!
Mark
Join the CIO Australia group on LinkedIn. The group is open to CIOs, IT Directors, COOs, CTOs and senior IT managers.
- Bookmark this page
- Share this article
- Got more on this story? Email CIO
- Follow CIO on twitter
-
Monash Uni reduces IT teams after consolidation project
-
FTC warns makers of background checking apps
-
Time to get Agile
-
QLD govt demands answers after pay glitch
-
Monash Uni reduces IT teams after consolidation project
-
IBM zEnterprise System Brings Hybrid Computing Capabilities to Midsize Organisations
This paper focuses on the IBM z114 cross-tier solution, which brings IBM AIX Unix and Linux workloads into the mix, with Microsoft Windows support to follow in the future. This blended approach to computing allows workloads running on any of those operating systems to communicate more quickly and effectively with the System z, producing business benefits from the orchestration, or coordination, of management for all of the workloads running across all of the linked platforms. -
Case Study: BNP Paribas Deploys Oracle Exadata to Accelerate Information Processing - The Hardware Perspective
Datacenters are an aggregate of very heterogeneous elements interacting with each other and incurring a complex chain of dependencies, particularly around the point of contact between hardware and software. Against this backdrop, IDC is observing a great push from suppliers and end users alike toward a consumption model based on pre-integrated blocks of optimized hardware and software that IT departments need only to fine-tune, as opposed to build out of a collection of different components. Read on. -
Book 1 - The Practical Guide to Assuring Compliance
In today’s integrated, regulated, litigated environment, it is necessary to provide assurance to customers, business partners, regulators, and sometimes even the courts that you have done your due diligence in securing your IT infrastructure. New and updated United States laws are increasingly making corporate management responsible for ensuring compliance, as companies face substantial fines and penalties for not doing so. Existing and emerging global security and privacy laws and regulations make keeping up with multinational compliance requirements imperative. Read on.
-
Office 2007 All-In-One Desk Reference for Dummies
-
Windows 7 for Seniors for Dummies®
-
Teach Yourself Visually Windows 7
-
Windows 7 for Dummies®
-
Office 2007 for Dummies
-
MYOB Software for Dummies 6E Australian Edition
-
Computers for Seniors for Dummies, 2nd Edition
-
Microsoft Office
-
Excel 2007 All-In-One Desk Reference for Dummies











Comments
Post new comment