Three Weekly Easy Peasy Lemon Squeezy Job Hunting Tips - June 8, 2015

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Here are three simple job hunting tips for you to begin your week!

1. Keep your résumé updated. It's a lot easier to update your accomplishments on your résumé when they're fresh and easy to remember.
2. Before going out for an interview, polish your shoes. It's awful to detract from a great appearance when you've got scruffy togs. It's even worse when you've got something unpleasant stuck to the soles.
3. Have a list of standard questions for your interviewer. They will almost always ask if you have any questions for them, have some stock questions in your pocket about the company or anything else of professional interest. Having good questions reinforces your interest in the role and shows that you are engaged in the interview process.

Scott Singer is the President and Founder of Insider Career Strategies Resume Writing & Career Coaching, a firm dedicated to guiding job seekers and companies through the job search and hiring process. He is a Human Resources professional and staffing expert with almost two decades of in-house corporate HR and staffing firm experience, and is a Certified Professional Resume Writer (CPRW) and Certified Professional Career Coach (CPCC).

Insider Career Strategies provides resume writing, LinkedIn profile development, and career coaching services, including a free resume review. You can email Scott Singer at scott.singer@insidercs.com, or via the website, www.insidercs.com.

Ten Reasons the Interview Process is Taking so Darn Long!

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You interviewed for that job WEEKS ago. Why is time just melting away? You haven't gotten a yes, a no, or an anything in terms of an definitive answer as to whether you're getting the job.

Ah, welcome to the world of corporate bureaucracy. Here are some reasons the interview process is taking so damn long!

1. They are interviewing more candidates. Company protocols dictate that they interview at least five candidates for every position.
2. The team is expecting a particular highly-qualified internal candidate to apply - of course, nobody's spoken to that internal candidate. The corporate culture values telepathy.
3. The hiring manager thought she knew what she wanted. Then they started interviewing, a new project came up, and now they're rethinking the job specifications.
4. Decisions move slowly at the company. The CEO also drives a Ford Pinto, describing it to his friends as "state of the art".
5. Your hiring manager contracted mononucleosis just after your interview. He's convalescing at home, watching reruns of the Golden Girls. Oh, that Blanche!
6. While all the candidates they've met have had the technical skills for the role, they're "just not feeling it" with the people they've interviewed thus far. Can't quantify it, though.
7. The CEO has decided to take a "special interest" in the role.
8. The interview team is split - half of them loved you, the other half wish you the mumps. The hiring manager is trying to build consensus.
9. Squirrel!
10. They can't make up their f*%#ing mind to save their lives. You've accepted another job.

Scott Singer is the President and Founder of Insider Career Strategies Resume Writing & Career Coaching, a firm dedicated to guiding job seekers and companies through the job search and hiring process. He is a Human Resources professional and staffing expert with almost two decades of in-house corporate HR and staffing firm experience, and is a Certified Professional Resume Writer (CPRW) and Certified Professional Career Coach (CPCC).

Insider Career Strategies provides resume writing, LinkedIn profile development, and career coaching services, including a free resume review. You can email Scott Singer at scott.singer@insidercs.com, or via the website, www.insidercs.com.

Ten Great Ways to Sabotage Your Chances of Getting the Job

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Note: This is a mild rewrite of a piece which appeared a couple months ago. Enjoy!

Here are ten methods I've witnessed candidates - first-hand - employ to ensure that they do everything in their power to sabotage their chances to snag that dream job in the application and interview process.  It's so easy to throw a wrench in the works!

1. Arrive late for the interview. Don't bother to call. Then act like nothing happened.

2. Learn nothing about the company in advance of your interview. Then, when asked by your interviewer "What do you know about us," make something up.

3. Ask how much the job pays. Even after you've already had this discussion with the corporate recruiter. Ask everybody with whom you interview.

4. Tell the recruiter you are close friends with the CEO, when you and she met once in passing. Maybe.

5. Be friendly to everybody you meet in the company. Except to the recruiter. In that case, be a total ass.

6. Bring extra copies of your resume. Folded up into a compact square in your pocket.

7. Send a nice, thoughtful thank you note after the interviews to people you've met.  Generously sprinkle in typos and misspellings.

8. Guess at your prior dates of employment on the job application. Go ahead, just guess. That way, when the company gets ready to hire you and runs the pre-employment background check, nothing adds up and you get disqualified for dishonesty.

9. Leave your cell phone on. When your phone rings during the middle of the interview, casually take the call.

10. Use your referral network to do everything possible to get in the door with the company. Make sure you ask an executive to sponsor you and they use every bit of their personal equity to push you through and get you an offer in another department. Then, AFTER you've received and accepted the offer, make your resume live and searchable on the job boards the company subscribes to, like Monster, so that the recruiter can stumble across it and inform the executive about it.

Scott Singer is the President and Founder of Insider Career Strategies Resume Writing & Career Coaching, a firm dedicated to guiding job seekers and companies through the job search and hiring process. He is a Human Resources professional and staffing expert with almost two decades of in-house corporate HR and staffing firm experience, and is a Certified Professional Resume Writer (CPRW) and Certified Professional Career Coach (CPCC).

Insider Career Strategies provides resume writing, LinkedIn profile development, and career coaching services, including a free resume review. You can email Scott Singer at scott.singer@insidercs.com, or via the website, www.insidercs.com.