Searching for executive jobs in today’s world can be tougher than ever. It’s imperative that executive-level job seekers stand out from their competition and prove to their potential employer that they offer a high return on investment. To do this, job seekers need certain tools, including the essential job-search documents needed to effectively market oneself in the job hunt: executive resume, cover letter, career biography, reference dossier, etc.
If you are a part of the executive job hunt remember that personal branding is important to strategically position you ahead of the crowd. It links your key personal attributes, passions and strengths with your value proposition. Does your resume brand you? What about your LinkedIn profile? Does that let the reader know that you are the leader their company needs? If done right this will translate into a crystal clear message that differentiates your unique promise of value that will resonate with your target audience. By showcasing your expertise and unique personal brand in the best possible light, you’ll open doors that others can’t and be in charge or your career destiny.
Make sure you do your research! Tap into the hidden job market by taking advantage of all that’s available online in the way of targeted industry and company research. Check out websites of companies that interest you and start by identifying the challenges they’re facing, learning about the company culture and attempt to track down warm leads at those companies. It’s important to pinpoint how you can have a positive impact and help those companies reach their goals. Save time by identifying and connecting directly with top decision makers at companies through LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter or other online social networks when possible. Don’t be afraid to reach out to people you’ve never met. LinkedIn is known for its members welcoming connections from unknown contacts. The point is to expand your network and make new connections.
A good executive resume will be the backbone of your job search. It’s important to identify exactly what you want your resume to convey before you get started. Remember, every resume is a one-of-a-kind marketing communication that should tell your story. In order to do that it’s imperative that you make sure your executive resume is well designed and executed. There are a lot of DIY resources and resume writing tips available on the internet that you should take time to review, but in the end it may be better to hire a professional to convey your personal brand. Either way, with a good executive resume in hand that translates your unique attributes you are sure to be on your way to the executive job of your dreams!
There’s something that can cut deep into the benefit of changing jobs.
Before you actually look for new employment, make sure you understand the benefits you currently have, like health insurance, and how those will be affected. Health insurance is a complicated thing so you have to be aware of how a job change changes your status. In a recent survey, almost a quarter of the respondents said that their insurance benefits and out-of-pocket expenses worsened their financial situation more than anticipated.
That survey is cited in an article at the NAIC (National Association of Insurance Commissioners) consumer site, Insure U. Job Seekers Beware: Prospective employer’s financial offer is about more than salary is part of some very helpful resources on Job Change that would be good to keep in mind.
NAIC Recommendations For Job Changers
To avoid surprises, consider the following before saying goodbye to a current employer:
- See if your current group life insurance plan has a conversion privilege. If so, you may have up to 31 days after leaving your job to apply for coverage.
- Find out if you can convert current group disability coverage into a portable disability plan that stays with you from job to job.
- If your job change includes a move, check your homeowners’ policy to make sure personal possessions are covered in-transit. If not, consider a trip transit or floater policy.
- Insurance rates and coverage vary greatly from state to state. Before a move across state lines, contact your state insurance department so you know what to expect.
- Before accepting a new job, compare your current health plan with plans offered to assure the available mix of deductibles, co-pays and coinsurance will cost-effectively meet your needs.
- Find out if your new employer has a mandatory waiting period before health insurance coverage takes effect. If so, consider a short-term plan through new health insurance exchanges to cover the gap. More than 10% of NAIC survey respondents said their overall financial situation was worsened by issues related to “the effective date of new health insurance coverage.”
- If you have children and anticipate a coverage gap, you may also look into government-sponsored programs such as Children’s Health Insurance Plans (CHIP). These plans may provide coverage at low or no cost.
- Finally, if you’re thinking of starting your own business and plan to use your personal car to make deliveries or visit clients, consider business auto coverage. If you’re involved in an accident while conducting these tasks, most personal auto policies won’t cover the losses.
One More Thing To Think About
Before you decide to search for a different job, get acquainted with all the job search resources on our site. You don’t have to explore each one, but the more you know about what you are getting into, the better prepared you will be for making that switch. Something as elementary as health insurance gets missed by many in the promise of a bigger paycheck, so plan carefully.
Many times, someone will look at the price of having a professional resume writer develop their resume and wonder if it is worth the cost. There’s a way to put the cost of a professional resume service into perspective:
How much will it cost you to stay unemployed and searching for a job?
Say you are hoping to find a job that pays $52,000 a year to make this exercise easy. That means your pay before taxes is $1,000 because there are 52 weeks in a year. If you have been looking for a job and nobody is calling you back, your resume usually has a lot to do with that, so your current resume and job search methods have already cost you however many weeks you’ve been using them.
Now take a look at the prices of the various a la carte services or packages. Look at those prices in terms of the salary you are hoping to earn and the time you have been searching for a job — and think how improving your resume or distribution will improve your chances of finding that job. It may cost you less than one day’s worth of future salary to have your current resume critiqued and know how to improve it. It could be less than a week of your future salary to have a professional resume written.
There’s no guarantee that you’ll get hired with a professionally written resume, but you almost certainly will get called in for an interview, and the rest is up to you. It’s costing you quite a bit in lost wages to use an inferior resume that is not getting results.
How To Prepare Your Inbox For A Job Search
Job Search
If you have had an email account for a while, it probably has a lot of stuff in it that you think will be opened someday. Most of us do this and realize one day we have thousands of unopened emails that might have something important to say. Yikes! How is this helping?
The quick answer is that it is not helping. Email is an important part of your professional life and the way you handle it directly affects your job search. Here are three quick ways to get your email inbox ready for action:
Have A Professional Email Account
If your current email address is pretty casual, that email address could be preventing you from getting a job. Start over with another professional email account that is only used for career purposes. In most cases, your first and middle initial with your last name @ gmail.com, or another e-mail provider, is good. If you have a common last name, you may want to use first name, initial, last name. Do a search on the variables and see what an employer will see when they search your name and choose your email address carefully.
This account is only for your job search and things related to that. This is your brand, the label of your digital presence. Don’t sign up for newsletters, use it for family or friends, or anything but business. If your email address is good and it’s just overwhelmed, put everything in a folder “to be sorted” and start over with the next step.
Set Your Inbox To Sort Automatically
Take the time to set up your professional inbox to sort into appropriate folders automatically and you can see at a glance what has come in. Every time you apply to a company, set up a folder with the rule that new mail from that company goes here. Keep an eye on your folders and know you will not miss anything important.
Whatever your account uses, rules and filters and labels can be set up to make your life efficient. Maximize all the tech you can and you will be ahead of the game, both in the job search and in any job you hold. It’s like having an electronic secretary.
Delete, Delete, Delete
I know a manager who deletes everything but never empties the trash folder so she can search for something “just in case.” This drives the tech support staff nuts, but she thinks she needs that security blanket. How about a folder that has the things you truly may need someday (contact information, for instance) and only keep that?
If you are not curating your inbox ruthlessly, there’s a good chance that you will miss an important email someday soon. Learn how to delete the extraneous stuff so you can focus on your future by having an efficient email inbox during your job search.
It’s easy to approach LinkedIn like it’s a professional version of Facebook, but that is not a good idea. Many professionals very carefully do not have any overlap at all between their Facebook and LinkedIn profiles but realize that somehow, somebody will figure out the connections so they are still careful online. In fact, that’s the first mistake you can make:
Common Mistakes Seen On LinkedIn
- Not monitoring the way your name and identity (brand) show up online keeps you from seeing when there’s a problem that needs to be addressed. Set up a Google Alert on all variations of your name and use a few search engines to see how you look to a potential employer who is researching your suitability for an opening.
- No profile picture, or an unprofessional profile picture make an impression all right, an impression that you don’t care about your career enough to use a suitable photograph.
- An incomplete profile reveals your failure in completing a task and triggers questions about how you’ll complete tasks on the job. It also shows you haven’t taken the time to learn how to effectively use the tools at your disposal.
- Not updating your status with recent accomplishments or authoritative content makes you look like nothing is happening.
- Thinking LinkedIn is only for job seekers and ignoring the network until you need a job keeps you from the real benefits of professional networking.
If you are at all serious about your career, you should be regularly paying attention to how to improve your LinkedIn capabilities. There’s been plenty of tips on this blog, and we even offer professional LinkedIn Profile Development if you decide you need that service. The professional networking you have on LinkedIn isn’t like any other type of social media, and it’s worth your time and effort to learn how to avoid making mistakes.
Chris Crum just wrote on the way LinkedIn looks at the ‘State of Student Recruiting’ and says, “there are over 39 million students and recent grads on LinkedIn, and thousands of companies waiting to recruit them.” Of course, there’s a nice infographic and lots of numbers with visual imagery to help you see what the majority of students are looking for in employment goals.
Not surprisingly, the top things that matter to the 18-30 year old category is work/life balance, compensation/benefits, and a strong career path. They are least interested in company vision, flexible work arrangements, and being valued by their employer. I think that if you did similar surveys in different age groups, they’d come up with different priorities because the things you look for in a job depend on what is happening in the rest of your life.
Flexible work arrangements, for instance, are prioritized by people who have responsibilities at home that cannot be delegated. Being valued by your employer starts looking big when you spend years at a job where your contributions are not appreciated. Company vision might not matter at the beginning of your career, but after a while you think about a bigger picture and where your values align. These things don’t necessarily overtake the work/life, compensation/benefit, career path priorities, but they might.
Job recruiters should target your priorities
If you are looking for a job with certain priorities in mind, working with a recruiter who is going on the majority vote can be frustrating. You are on different wavelengths and the recruiter will not be connecting you to the right jobs for you.
This is why Professional Resume Services does things differently with our Recruiter Resume Distributions. Our process targets your preferences and we match you to the recruiters who meet your requirements in industry, position, salary, etc. The database we use is consistently updated and capable of filtering to your unique parameters.
If LinkedIn has over 39 million students and recent grads competing for a job in thousands of companies waiting to recruit them, there’s a lot of stuff to wade through to find the job that has what you are looking for. Recruiters help narrow things down, but they will keep the majority’s goals in mind. We can connect you to the recruiter who will target your priorities.
One Great Way To Target Your Status Updates
Networking
I hope you are on LinkedIn, because it is one of the fastest-growing ways to network with other professionals. The site does a good job of helping you figure out how to improve your profile and potential network, too. One of their helpful tools is found in their Targeted Status Updates list of 10 tips for engaging followers.
Under tip #2:
Informative, useful updates receive the highest engagement rates because that’s the information members expect from companies they follow on LinkedIn. After all, your followers are active on LinkedIn because they want to be more productive and successful professionals.
- 60% of members are interested in industry insights (my emphasis)
- 53% are interested in company news
- 43% are interested in new products and services
Now, a job seeker may not have too much in the way of company news or new products and services. But every job seeker should be staying current on the industry they hope to join once they are hired. You should be doing a lot of reading about your career field anyway, right?
When you update your status with industry insights, you are targeting the majority of professionals in your industry. It doesn’t have to be all original content, either. You can link to something that made you think and add your commentary on the subject, just like I am doing here. I am giving you two things: an authoritative source (LinkedIn) for some useful information and my unique perspective in it.
If you were an employer, you’d say,
Hmm…this person knows where to find valid industry information and knows how to expand on it.
This is good, because the more a potential employer can find on your thought processes, the easier it is for them to give you a chance at a job. Networking is an essential part of the job search, and this simple way to target your status updates strengthens your network and increases your authority.
What Skills Do Successful Job Seekers Have?
Job Search
If you would do a search online for “successful job seeking skills” a long list of opinions would come up. Some of the same skills will be on everybody’s list, but at the same time there’d be some differences. It gets overwhelming, doesn’t it? I think that if you look at the combined lists of skills as a description of your inadequacies and stop there, you’re in trouble.
Probably the worst thing to do when you have been searching for a job unsuccessfully is looking at yourself as a failure and giving up. Probably the best thing to do when you have been searching for a job unsuccessfully is look at yourself as ready to take steps to improve and taking one step.
Do you see what’s different here? It’s not in having all the skills the market is looking for; it’s how you look at yourself honestly, acknowledge your inadequacies, and take action to improve yourself. Those are the skills that successful job seekers have because they have kept working at the various things on their plate and not given up.
Here’s a good first step: start reading the posts on this blog under job search. Here’s a good next step: do something you realize you need to do after reading one of them. And all the steps after that are variations of the same idea: research for solutions and pick one to do. What do you want to/need to change? I know this isn’t easy but with each step you accomplish, you get some confidence. You will develop a skill set that works in any part of life, including the job search and ultimate employment.
