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April 24, 2024

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Tipping the Scales on the Job-Search Odds
If you're out of a job in this market, you may be a little nervous. No doubt you've heard that the average executive needs a month of job-hunting for every $10,000 in annual salary.

That's a 7-month search if you're making $70,000 a year. Pretty scary! Fortunately, this myth isn't true. By using certain techniques, it's possible for senior executives and managers to snare new positions within two to six weeks.

If you want to stand head and shoulders above the competition, consider applying two strategies that are relatively unknown to the majority of job hunters. Don't think you can simply put on sweat pants and sneakers and buy the Sunday paper for the want ads.

Sending a resume in response to an ad is one of the least effective methods of finding a job, according to J. Michael Farr, author of "Getting the Job You Really Want" (JIST Works Inc., 2002). This is because hundreds of other candidates are responding to ads, causing a deluge of resumes in human resources departments.

One internal recruiter for a biotechnology firm in Menlo Park, Calif., confides, "On any given day, I've had up to 750 resumes sitting on my desk. It's overwhelming. I hate to admit it, but on a bad day, I've been known to throw away a resume simply because I didn't like the font."

He motions to the paper shredder. "With the volume of resumes we receive, if the resume doesn't catch my eye in the first few seconds it goes into the 'revolving file.'"

Strategy No. 1: The 'Q' Letter

To get around this scenario, don't send a resume. Instead, send a "Q" or â€œqualificationsâ€ letter. This document is a short letter that compares your qualifications with the employer's requirements for the job. It's brief and concise enough to catch the reader's eye with highly relevant material within those first crucial seconds. When you compose a Q letter, list only those qualifications that you meet or exceed. Requirements that you don't meet or exceed should be omitted from the letter.

Q letters can be especially effective for qualified candidates who haven't succeeded with traditional direct-mail methods. After being laid off in October 2001 from a high-tech corporation in Cupertino, Calif., a marketing and communications director mailed more than 300 resumes to employers and posted her resume on several Internet sites, but didn't receive any interview invitations. After meeting with a career counselor, she decided to send Q letters to employers in response to their published ads.

The marketing pro located an ad for a position she liked and drafted a letter. The company wanted applicants to have three to five years' experience (she had 10), and preferably, an M.B.A. (she had a B.A.) and other qualifications.

The marketing director started her letter with a brief introduction to express her interest. She then listed the company's requirements for the job on the left side of the page and her qualifications on the right side, creating a simple chart.

"I was a bit apprehensive about sending it alone, without a resume, but I decided to give it a try," she says. "After 300 resume submissions and no serious replies, I decided any technique might be better than the ones I'd been using."

She applied to four ads posted on the Internet with tailored Q letters, which she then faxed (without resumes) to the employer. The next day, she received three responses. She interviewed with two of the companies and received an offer from her top choice. Within four weeks she was employed in the marketing department at Cisco Systems Inc. in San Jose, Calif.

How can such a brief and unconventional job-search tool have such a powerful effect on employers? Angie Dahl, a former staffing manager and recruiter who's now a consultant in San Jose, Calif., with Lee Hecht Harrison, a national outplacement firm, evaluates hundreds of resumes weekly. A Q letter saves time for recruiters because it "quickly gets to the bottom line," she says.

"You're already doing the work of 'connecting the dots' for the employer," says Ms. Dahl. "In a competitive market, you're establishing yourself as someone who stands out from the mainstream."

Strategy No. 2: Cold Calling

This second, and possibly most powerful, strategy conjures up feelings of "yuck" in many candidates. Executives view this technique as beneath them. Some job hunters are frightened of calling people they don't know.

Before describing how to use the technique, it's important to consider the hiring "cycle." A new hire doesn't appear out of thin air. Usually, the hiring process is a response to an executive, manager or supervisor trying to find the right person to fill a need. This need and the idea to fill it may have originated nine months to a year before the opportunity is advertised in newspapers or on the Internet.

Jobs that are filled before they're advertised comprise the "hidden job market." These make up about three-fourths of all available jobs, according to the U.S. Department of Labor. So what's the best way to learn about hidden jobs? How do you locate positions that exist only in the minds of directors, vice presidents and company leaders?

One way is to network, but this process is slow compared to cold calling. And cold calling isn't as scary as it sounds. You're probably already thinking, "I don't want to sell myself. I'm not a telemarketer. Let them seek me out before I intrude on them. It's beneath my dignity!"

Stop. Realize that when you make a cold call, you're doing the employer a favor. First, you're saving the company time. You're decreasing the time required for a new hire to be approved, reducing months of paperwork in human resources, weeks of advertising, and weeksâ€”even monthsâ€”of interviews to choose a candidate.

Secondly, you're reducing funds spent on productivity lost when between one and seven managers have to take time out of their regular workdays to interview potential hires. You'll also save the company on newspapers, magazines, Internet and trade-publication help-wanted advertising costs. Hiring is expensive!

Learning the Script

One director of operations learned and rehearsed a phone script for making cold calls, then decided to test the technique at 7:30 p.m. one Friday. Who would work so late on a Friday? He was stunned when the company president answered. After the director repeated the phone script he'd rehearsed, the president said, "You want an interview? Come see me at 10 a.m. Monday." After a series of interviews, the director of operations was offered and accepted the job.

A consultant in vocational rehabilitation also tried cold calling and was invited to interview with a small company in Santa Cruz, Calif. She was hired to begin work two weeks later. When she arrived for her orientation, she learned she got the job because, unlike other professionals, she had made a cold call. It showed she was assertive and proactive, qualities the department head was seeking in candidates.

Some employers are so disarmed by a cold caller's guts that they can't say no. Others will have no problem turning you down. The vast majority of employers are likely to say no. However, when you consider the chances of gaining interviews through help-wanted ads, the odds are a vast improvement. You must expect rejection; toughen your skin; and don't give up.

The Phone Script

What magic words make an employer want to hire you over the phone? The script resembles the following (you fill in the blanks):

"Hello, my name is _________. I have _______ years experience as a ____________, specializing in _____________, ____________, and ______________. I have a (B.A., M.S., Ph.D., certificate) in _______________ and I recently completed (name a recent successful project with a measurable result). When can I come in for an interview?"
These words are so simple that you may feel foolish saying them at first. "At first I didn't feel comfortable using the phone script. It seemed wooden, without spontaneity," says a computer hardware engineer. "Then I discovered it doesn't really matter how you say itâ€”rote, friendly or funnyâ€”the words just seem to work. I got four interviews in 20 minutes."

Mr. Farr and a JIST Works group in Philadelphia asked hundreds of job seekers to use the script for an experiment during a recession in the early 1980s. About 96%, working on job-search activities for at least 25 hours a week, were employed within 2.03 weeks. During my 12 years in counseling, 90% of job seekers I've introduced to this cold-calling method have found jobs they wanted within two to six weeks.

Cold calling works. It just takes courage and practice to implement it into your overall strategy. Some tips:

* Practice the script out loud a few times.
* Say your whole script without small talk and without interruption as soon as the hiring manager answers the phone.
* Don't say, "Can I come in for an interview?" Say, "When can I come in for an interview?"

Then, get out your Palm Pilot and set the date!

Author: Marky Stein

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