It was 1995 and I was living in San Diego, California and I got a phone call from a recruiter. Remember those days... the phone would ring and the person on the other side of the call would ask if your were open to other opportunities. This call was for a job at a start-up Internet company in Champaign, Illinois. The company was Spyglass and they were commercializing a product named Mosaic for a thing called the World Wide Web. The company was planning an IPO and they were looking for someone with my skills and abilities.
Most people who accessed the Internet then used dial-up and AOL was the big boy on the block. Of course there weren’t jobs posted in the Web and résumés’ were sent to prospective employers via the US Mail. There was no LinkedIn, Facebook or Twitter and The Cloud was a white puffy thing in the sky.
There is only one thing that has remained the same in Job Search over the decade and a half since 1995. Back then only 20% of jobs were advertised and today... only 20% of jobs are advertised. I realize that the laws of “supply and demand” were completely reversed back in 1995 as opposed to today. Still, back then, people found jobs as a result of networking. I guess that the percentage was smaller then. In 2002, one study posted that 60.7% of jobs were found through networking. Today, I’ve heard of numbers upward of 85% and some believe that is conservative.
So has technology helped or hurt the job seeker? I would suggest that it is a lot easier to sit at your computer and search for jobs via the Internet. However, tools like LinkedIn, Twitter and a host of other social networking sites have presented a variety of ways to feel productive.
I had one client tell me that he went back and counted 1500 applications he posted over the year he was out. After attending one of my classes and changing his focus, he started networking and he has had eight interviews in the last three week. What was his hit rate responding to on-line postings? Zero! (0:1500... no wonder he hugged me when he told me this news!) Yet, like Zamir situation, using LinkedIn and similar tools can help the job seeker or anyone be more effective at networking... and getting interviews.
Most people who accessed the Internet then used dial-up and AOL was the big boy on the block. Of course there weren’t jobs posted in the Web and résumés’ were sent to prospective employers via the US Mail. There was no LinkedIn, Facebook or Twitter and The Cloud was a white puffy thing in the sky.
There is only one thing that has remained the same in Job Search over the decade and a half since 1995. Back then only 20% of jobs were advertised and today... only 20% of jobs are advertised. I realize that the laws of “supply and demand” were completely reversed back in 1995 as opposed to today. Still, back then, people found jobs as a result of networking. I guess that the percentage was smaller then. In 2002, one study posted that 60.7% of jobs were found through networking. Today, I’ve heard of numbers upward of 85% and some believe that is conservative.
So has technology helped or hurt the job seeker? I would suggest that it is a lot easier to sit at your computer and search for jobs via the Internet. However, tools like LinkedIn, Twitter and a host of other social networking sites have presented a variety of ways to feel productive.
I had one client tell me that he went back and counted 1500 applications he posted over the year he was out. After attending one of my classes and changing his focus, he started networking and he has had eight interviews in the last three week. What was his hit rate responding to on-line postings? Zero! (0:1500... no wonder he hugged me when he told me this news!) Yet, like Zamir situation, using LinkedIn and similar tools can help the job seeker or anyone be more effective at networking... and getting interviews.
I discovered another tool a few months back called Xtranormal that has helped me help job seekers better prepare for networking and job search. I’ve been told that knowing what to say to people is the hardest thing about networking. So here are three examples to help... and if these avatars can do it so can you.
- How to answer the question, “Tell me about yourself?”
- How to ask for a network meeting over the phone?
- How to get new contacts by asking three questions?
Happy Networking.
An interesting data point. Enhanced Mosaic by Spyglass, became the first version of Microsoft's Internet Explorer as part of Window's 95. This changed the world of on-line computing and ended the Browser Wars of the day.
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