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The Three Most Effective Ways to Find a Position

18 August 2006

Tactic 1

Find the industry and then pinpoint the company you’d most like to work for. Research every angle of the company and the industry. Use your contacts and talk to the person who’s most likely to be able to make the decision to hire you.

This tactic works for 86 out of 100 people who try it in this country and recent research has indicated that the same would hold true for most other industrialized countries.

Tactic 2

Apply in person to businesses you’d most like to work for. This isn’t as effective as having a contact inside the organization but it still works. Studies show that this tactic works reliably for around 47% of people who try it.

Tactic 3

Use contacts, friends or relatives to keep an eye or ear open for any job leads that come up. The amount of people whom I’ve asked how they got their job and they reply “my brother works in accounts and told me about it,” or “my Mom was talking to a friend about how I was looking for work and the friend knew someone who needed someone” still amazes me.

Once again, recent figures indicate that actively networking works for between 27% and 34% of people who try it. (Of course, some positions such as news-reader or current-affairs host, etc, never get advertised. Obviously people get these jobs through their active networks of contacts and friends.)

Out of all the examples above you can see that Tactic 1 works the best. In fact it’s nearly twice as successful as anything else you may try and 16 times more successful than applying to ads in the paper. You have 2 choices. You can do things the hard way or the easy way.

So, just to recap, researching companies you want to work for and then making personal contact with the people who have the power to hire you is successful for 86% of the people who try it. Make contact with these people any way you can (email, phone call, meeting) and ask them questions. Have your resumé ready to give them.

Find out as much as you can from them about the industry, the firm, what they look for in staff, etc. For more information on this issue, our book Job Secrets Revealed goes into more detail.

I’d seriously suggest that you make this approach part of your job hunting strategy. The reason it works is because:

So few people use it
The employer gets to meet you face-to-face and you build a relationship with them
It shows you are serious about working for your chosen firm, not just looking for a job
You might never write another application again if you use this technique properly.

by Acland Brierty

SHAMELESS PLUG: Job Secrets Revealed will teach you how to read between the lines of any ’situations vacant’ ad to work out how to best pitch your application, regardless of whether you meet their up-front skills or experience requirements.

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