If you’re interviewing for a position, you’ve heard the old adage: “Research the company.” Yes, that’s true, and it’s not enough. It’s time to research the hiring manager also. Here’s how you research the company and the hiring manager: Research the company by reading the web site. Read the annual and quarterly reports. Read the […]
When we have recessions (or whatever this economic slowdown is), people lose their jobs. At first, the marginal people lose their jobs, along with people who made bad job choices. However, since the layoffs started in the high tech industry, more experienced people are losing their jobs and have stopped looking for technical jobs. One
In a previous post, Attracting Suitable Candidates, Laurent caught me being vague. In Screening Out, he points to a great skit, where the technical people are talking about people skills but the HR people are talking about tools and technology.Too many recruiters just don’t get it — that software is much more people and perseverance
I had a heated discussion last week with a hiring manager. He was convinced games and puzzles helped him discriminate between suitable and unsuitable candidates. I told him I’d probably fail the games he had for project managers. “Uh, what do you mean the games for project managers?” “Don’t you have separate games or puzzles
In one of my presentations this week at the Software Development conference, someone asked, “How do I attract suitable candidates? I can attract lots of candidates, but how do I get the most appropriate people to respond to my open req?” In this economy, that’s hard. Even so, you have some options: Use your personal
It doesn’t matter what kind of paper your resume is printed on. It does matter how your resume looks to potential employers. Here’s a little checklist to make sure you’re presenting yourself in the best light: Is your experience in reverse chronological order? It’s too hard to quickly read a resume in any other way.
You’re hiring someone. You don’t want to waste your time in the interview. So, if you want to ask good interview questions, ask people about how they’ve worked in the past. People repeat perceived successful behaviors (whether those behaviors were successful or not). Behavior-description questions elicit the candidate’s story of how they worked in the
Once you’ve worked for 10 years or more, it’s worthwhile creating a one-paragraph summary of your experience. It’s not easy to create that paragraph, and it’s necessary, so that you can grab and retain the hiring manager’s attention. So what’s a one-paragraph summary? Here are some: A proven track record of improving business processes through
“Just go network. You’ll find the people (or the job) you’re looking for.” Yeah. Right. Wouldn’t it be nice if it were that easy? If you’re like most technical managers (or technical people looking for a job), networking is not one of your innate skills. Here are some suggestions to help you network: Attend local
You know you’re supposed to keep your resume to two pages. But you’ve been working for 20+ years, and you have lots of great experience. Instead of pages and pages of the chronological resume, think about the kinds of things you’ve done in your work. Have you rescued projects? Have you facilitated strategic planning? Have