During the job search, many people make the classic mistake of chucking their resume at every website imaginable and filling out numerous online applications, not even interacting with the company they’re applying to. What they don’t realize, however, is that the best resource that they could possibly use is right at their fingertips. THE PEOPLE YOU KNOW. This is what we call networking.
- Put your foot in the door and make connections with a company you’re interested in. Don’t know a single person in the company? That’s fine. Go to their website, find an email address and start asking questions. Once you start asking questions and advice, you make a connection with someone. This is far better than directly asking for a job.
- Like I said earlier,THE PEOPLE YOU KNOW might know more about job openings than you realize. Ask around. Somebody might have heard from their sister’s hairdresser that So and So Company is looking for a new I.T. guy. You haven’t talked to that super-cool chem professor from last semester in a while? Shoot him an email and re-establish a connection with him and see what he knows about job opportunities.
- Talk with everyone about it. Katie, who works with me on the Career Services team, told me about an awesome networking experience she had. She was a teller at a Wells Fargo and had a regular customer. She brought up her search for a job-shadowing position with him, and lo-and-behold he knew of one at the hospital he worked at and she got the job. The key word here is talk. Finding about positions through word of mouth is more common than you think.