Jobworksaz.com - Job Seeker Tips

Finding a Job Via Company Web Sites
By Joyce Lain Kennedy

Dear Joyce: I am a recent college graduate with a master's degree in computer science and I'm looking for employment. Many employers tell me I have no experience, but several say that with a master's degree I'm too expensive. What can I do to improve my chances of getting a job? -- N.N.T.

Dear N.N.T.: In short, last year's gold rush to hire information-technology grads is this year's slowdown. Not only experience, but also hot skills are employment passwords -- Bluetooth, dot-Net and XML. If you didn't learn them in school, quickly catch up with independent study and volunteer projects.

Speaking of skills, sharpen yours in a job search and downscale your expectations of good starting pay.

Competition is stiff. In addition to jobs taken by a flood of foreign programming workers who came cheap (and are now shamefully being hung out to dry with little money and threats of deportation), U.S. computer science programs are pumping out 2,000 students each year.

Translation: New graduates may have to work at low-paying contract jobs for a few months to gain experience. Try information technology staffing companies, birddog professors, fellow grads, alumnae, everyone you know. Log onto corporate Web sites that recruit online. These sites have been players in the recruitment industry for the past five years, but they're fast becoming superstars.

New Study
ILogos Research, a division of Recruitsoft Inc., an online recruitment system provider, in its 2001 survey of Global 500 corporations -- the world's biggest -- finds that 88 percent recruit new staff on their corporate Web sites, up from 29 percent in 1998. Almost all big U.S. companies now recruit online. For job seekers, job searches are taking on a whole new look.

Myth Busting
Another new iLogos study challenges commonly held but mistaken perceptions. According to iLogos Research Vice President Alice Snell, the study shows that experienced, employed job seekers are going online to find jobs; job boards are not the most trafficked roads into large corporate employment; online candidates will answer skills-based questions and more than half of applicants will provide salary data.

Sea Change
Whether it's the best of resources or the worst of resources, corporate Web sites have become a fact of life. After talking with Snell, here are several suggestions on using them to look for employment:

Target Your Research
While job boards, such as Monster.com, are centralized, the universe of corporate Web sites is decentralized. Exploring that universe is time consuming. I recently spent two hours taking the measure of three corporate sites; even then I felt that I had only scratched the surface of what I should know as a job seeker to maximize opportunity.

Begin by compiling a list of prospective employers. You can use company briefs on Hoover's online and information from the business section of newspapers to prioritize your list.

Notice Company Interests
As you scan the corporate site, look at press releases and general areas for any edge you can use to enhance your application when you move to the careers area.

For information technology, look for clues as to which skills the company worships. If you have them, flaunt them. If you come up short, say you're learning them now in a specific environment (school, volunteer work and independent study).

Understand Procedure
Some companies ask you to attach your résumé. Others require that you cut and paste it into a standard form. Still others ask that you fill out a rigid standard form. If you have a choice, attach your résumé or cut and paste text that you have thoroughly proofread. Be prepared to take online employment tests and provide good information on your skills and interests.

Most systems will send you an automatic receipt of your application, commenting that if they want to talk to you, they'll make contact. Does this mean you can't hit the phones to spur action? No. Just don't ask a transparent question: "Did you receive my résumé?" Instead say, "I've had another job offer, which prompts me to ask if you had planned to contact me within the week."

As job searches stretch out, pay attention to the Internet-driven employment opportunities you can uncover on corporate Web sites.

Send career questions for possible use in this column to Joyce Lain Kennedy at Box 368, Cardiff, CA 92007, or e-mail her at jlk@sunfeatures.com. Sorry, the volume of mail makes personal replies impossible.