A Tanone dot Net

I got the idea of this post when I visited Jane’s Career Rambling site. Jane is one of the top ‘dedicated commentators’ as Saman coined it after I called him a spammer in one of his hundreds of comments few days ago at John Chow’s blog. I have visited Jane’s site few times and I like the short and sweet suggestion she posted there. I thought it would be a good site to visit if you’re looking for an advice to switching job or if you just graduated and looking for a place to work.

My latest visit to Jane’s site made me wonder if my own experience would benefit any one in their search for a new job or in searching for a career change in their life.

First was my favorite story of job searching that I heard from one of Napoleon Hill’s tape on how he got his first job by writing a letter to the General who owned a law firm. Napoleon had just graduated from the Secretary School and the letter he wrote was so hilarious that the general hired him after calling his father and asked his father to send Napoleon down to the General’s office. I don’t remember which of Napoleon’s tapes it was. May be the one on Science of Personal Achievement. I just hope that they could come up with a CD version to reach more audience as well as to preserve this classic tapes. I used to listen to Napoleon’s tapes in my old car even to this date. Yes, my current old car has a CD and tape players on it too. I like the creative idea behind Napoleon’s story about hiring the General with his first three month ’s salaries.

My second favorite is a recent story I read in Stephan Schiffman’s books. I think it may come from his “101 Successful Sales Strategy.” Well, this was not a story of job search, but the point there is the fact that the guy with only a notepad beated two other competitors that have made long presentations with all the bells-and-whistles they could offer in their Powerpoint presentations to win a contract for a project. The last guy won the contract, simply by asking the most important question during his turn to make the presentation. Instead of a Powerpoint type presentation, he simply open his notepad and asked the interviewers, what do they want to achieve with this project anyway. From that simple question, he impressed them so much and they start to explain about what they really need. Finally they were the one that made an appointment with the company President for this guy so he could get the first hand idea of the project from the boss. He got the contract.

I think the same reasoning should be true in your job search. Long time ago, I love the book of Richard Payne on “How to Get a Better Job Quicker.” Here is the list I found on Chapter 7 of Payne’s book. (I still have that book. It was the third edition published back in 1987.):

uncover the real need of your interviewer
relate yourself to your prospective boss’s need
holding your own under cross-examination, and
going after what you come for.

One other thing I would like to suggest for the job seeker that if you’re looking for job then please don’t forget to network with people you may come in contact with. Sometime, an insider will know if there is any opening in their company before the company puts out an ad. There are pros and cons about this. But the bottom line is, some people are lazy to go through thousands of resumes that pilling up in their desk if the company ever announces the job in the media.

Long time ago I heard a story that a friend got his job simply because he gave his resume to his friend and the friend gave that resume to his boss. By the time the HR people asking that friend’s boss for the candidates list, he went to the guy asking what was his friend’s name, picked up the resume and told the HR people to invite this guy for interview. My friend got his job as simple as that.

That’s why I thought, if you’re looking for a job, please don’t ignore the inside connection, for example, hint, hint,… please be nice to me.

Kidding aside, if you’re looking for a job in IT or engineering field, a visit to my blog may probably give you some ideas on what is my technical field. Post a comment, let me visit your blog. But oh, no! Please don’t inundate me with your resume. I just want to give you a hint, who knows, may be I knew someone in town that is looking for people with your background. Would you give it a try? No guarantee though.

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