Career Chaos

HOW LONG WAS YOUR JOB SEARCH?

Based on a recent ExecuNet survey of 122 executives, job search now takes 4.9 months, down from 6.8 months reported in January 2005. In fact, during the past 30 days, these executives have averaged 2.9 interviews. This has spurred executive confidence.

“The employment market has made a quiet comeback during the last twelve months,” says Dave Opton, CEO and Founder of ExecuNet. “As the growth in new job opportunities becomes more apparent, an increasing number of employed executives are starting to explore their options for advancement.”

After all the downsizing, restructuring, and cost containment of the past few years, "advancement" is a nice place to hang around for awhile. I wonder what qualities will rise to the top as those being sought most by hiring authorities.

What do you think? Post your comments to this blog.

You can learn about what the new world of work may ask of you by reading "Careers in Waiting," on the Abilities Enhanced website.

2005 JOB MARKET DATA

Executives are still optimistic that this year will be a good one job-wise, according to today's D-Business News (New York) that reports on an executive survey conducted by TheLadders.com.

The article reported on the survey's data, "Tampa has shown the most growth in the number of $100K+ jobs offered during the first quarter."

What do you think? Are executive jobs plentiful this year, or is it still hard to find a good position? Does it depend where you are in the country, or does it depend on a particular industry?

Your comments are welcome on this blog. I'd really like to hear them.

TOP TEN PET PEEVES OF A CAREER COACH

Working in the careers industry I hear many stories of what "turns off" a hiring authority. Here are some of the top pet peeves along with some of my own. A career coach can support you in modifying these behaviors to enhance opportunities for getting and keeping a job. My comments follow each pet peeve:

1. Conducting more than 5% of a job search in front of a computer - time waster!
2. Answering machine with a child's voice giving instructions - not cute!
3. Message left with a garbled / racing / indistinguishable phone number - delete!
4. Business card collector working a room at a networking event - ineffective!
5. Resume or CV with grammatical, formatting, and data errors - toss!

Want the other 10 pet peeves? Get the whole article in the career articles section of Abilities Enhanced.

FIND A CAREER COACH

On this beautiful afternoon in Kansas City, I've been sitting on my patio with notebook computer and cold drink doing keyword research for my website - you see, keyword research is done for more than just resume writing. Anyway, since I've been blogging the past few months about career change, I decided to check out that phrase for frequency of use by Internet users.

WOW! I learned that about 350,000 search engine searches are done each month for "career change." What's the significance of that? You tell me! What makes a person search for "career change" on the Internet? (Post your comments here.)

My guess is people are seeking help with how to make career change happen as they don't know how to do it themselves. If that sounds like you, maybe it's time to find a career coach to help you figure it out. Just a thought...

BORED WITH THE BOARDS?

I just heard about a new crop of job search boards sprouting up on the Internet. They're called "vertical job search engines" or job aggregators / job consolidators. These guys spider great numbers of job boards and then give you a neat package of results all at one time - while you wait!

They provide no-cost job search services and some even have the capability to search jobs close to a specific zip code. For you execs out there, you'll find that some of the well known $100K websites (including subscription sites) will be searched, too.

Check these out for job search assistance:

Indeed.com

SimplyHired.com

TopJobsUSA.com

WorkTree.com

WorkZoo.com

Thanks to Mark Hovind of JobBait.com for sharing this information!

UNWANTED CAREER CHANGE

Is your career over when you turn 50? Are you truly "over the hill" as the birthday banner proclaims? NO WAY! There are many options open to us - we just have to claim them.

Did you read the May 16 cover story of Fortune magazine? It screamed, "50 and Fired." Executives all over the U.S. sat up and took notice. Their reactions varied:

• Is my career at risk?
• Oh, so that's why I've been out of work for 18 months.
• What's the best franchise for me to purchase?
• I'm too old to make radical changes.

Ah, radical career change - just when we thought we could coast through the next 10-15 years. Change - that dreaded disruption to the status quo. "You can't teach an old dog new tricks" - really? How old is old?