Well I think everyone can share my sentiment when I say that job hunting sucks, plain and simple. Those fortunate enough to be personally referred to an employer or to be recruited have saved a lot of headache and pressure. Of course the ideal scenario is if your personal network of family, friends, classmates, and/or business connections is able to land you a job. But if the type of job you’re looking for isn’t related to your network, or if you simply have a very limited network, there’s a mountain of frustration during job hunting.
So at this point I’ll say that I’m one of those job hunters. It’s been about two weeks since the completion of my internship with Discovery Bay Games, and now I’m searching for a full-time job in design and/or marketing (and on the side, I’m always thinking about or working on my own business ideas). For the record, you can check out my online resume at my LinkedIn profile.
Anyways, I’m not sure where to begin, but I’m sure that everything I will say will not be of any surprise to any of you, and in all likelihood will resonate with your own job hunting woes. First and foremost, there’s the giant black hole of online job hunting. Even though the develop of the Internet has made many aspects of our lives easier, it hasn’t really improved job hunting at all. And the problem is that it has made it too easy for everyone to submit a cover letter and resume. So what ends up happening is that a large number of people apply to any single position, and many times the HR managers have no time to read through countless numbers of resumes carefully. And even if you truly are the perfect fit for a position, you might find it difficult to articulate that in writing. Even worse is if you’re applying to corporate giants like Microsoft, who may receive hundreds of applications per job position, and they use resume filtering software that looks for key words as a first step to reducing the volume. It’s about the most inaccurate method ever.
And even if I wanted to get more personal in my job hunting, most employers explicitly state that they do not want phone calls and/or walk-ins, so you’re basically forced to go the online route, hoping that your cover letter and resume will be carefully reviewed. And in my case, my portfolio as well. Perhaps the worst part is never knowing exactly why you never got the position you wanted. Is it because you are under-qualified? Over-qualified? Is it because they have already filled the position and your timing wasn’t right? Is it because someone else got an extra plug from a recommendation within the company? Usually, if not always, you will never know. Either they never give you a reply back or they just send you an email saying that they’ve found more suitable candidates.
Perhaps I should be more aggressive in my search. I wouldn’t call my job hunting full-time. But I definitely put in a considerable amount of time each day, and take breaks here and there before I lose my sanity.
You know I just thought about a story I heard one time about a person’s job hunt. I can’t remember it well, so I’ll have to put it very generally. So basically this guy wanted a very specific job at a specific firm. I believe he wanted to work directly with the founder or something. Anyways, the firm’s receptionist said that there were no job openings available in any positions, and the position the guy was looking for doesn’t even exist. But the guy wouldn’t have it. So every day for about 2 weeks, he would arrive at the firm and sit in the lobby waiting room for 8 hours (just like normal working hours) a day. He would of course bring other things to do, but he never spent any energy applying to other jobs. And so after 2 weeks, the founder finally stepped into the lobby waiting room and asked the guy if he wanted to talk. He did and made the most convincing argument for why the founder should create a new position for him and why he wanted to work alongside the founder. It ended well, and the guy finally got the job and eventually made partner.
