Give Your Job Search More Direction

By ARA Content

Job hunting has evolved from searching the classifieds to browsing online job boards and career search engines. But before you get settled in front of your computer, you should ask yourself some important questions – then be prepared to go social.
Marc Scoleri, director of Career Services at The Art Institute of New York City, recommends doing a self-directed job search in conjunction with other search techniques.
A self-directed job search takes into account your personal preferences and businesses of interest. Realizing personal preferences and having a sense of self-awareness as it relates to your career is important when determining which companies to research.
In working with students attending Art Institute schools, Scoleri compiled the following inventory questions, which can help any jobseeker clarify objectives and plan a more focused job search:
• What industry is most interesting to you for a career? Why?
• What geographic location is most appealing?
• What duties do you enjoy doing most and least as they relate to your industry?
• What is the minimum pay you can survive on?
• What topics within your industry do you want to learn most about?
• What are some of the job titles that interest you?
• What position do you want three to five years from now?
• What personal goals can you achieve by obtaining a position in your chosen industry?
• What is your ideal work schedule?
• What employer-offered benefits are important to you?
• Whom can you contact within your industry of choice?
After you’ve answered all the questions, target companies based on your responses. Then contact managers within the departments of interest, even if they are not currently hiring.
"Personally, I’d prefer to interview someone who went out of his or her way to call me directly, over someone who found a posting on some stale job board," Scoleri says. This is where socializing begins and networks are developed.
LinkedIn.com has become one of the most respected online networking tools for professionals. Complete a profile on LinkedIn.com and you’ve taken an important step toward creating a powerful online network. It takes, on average, 65 contacts to create a network large enough to result in substantial and meaningful findings on LinkedIn, notes Victoria Snabon-Heath, career services director at The Art Institute of Tampa. She urges jobseekers to set themselves apart from the ordinary, dime-a-dozen applicants who inundate companies on a daily basis. "Go social. Begin utilizing virtual, social marketing techniques in addition to your online job search."
Snabon-Heath says it’s important that students, recent graduates and the unemployed extend themselves by joining and volunteering with professional organizations in their field of focus. Attend a monthly professional organization meeting, such as one of the local chapters of IEEE if engineering or technology is your profession.
"Students have participated in monthly social mixers in order to meet the hiring managers and directors who may be too busy during the workweek to respond to emails and phone calls from eager prospective hires," she says. "Put yourself out there. It’s who you know that can help get you in the door and what you know that keeps you there."


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