The concept of marketing yourself is key to
a successful job search. Thinking of yourself
as marketing a product -- you -- is an effective
way to sell yourself to employers. This issue
of QuintZine expands on this important concept
Using a SWOT Analysis to Launch a Self-Marketing Plan
A key tool in the strategic-planning process can
also be applied to career planning. This tool
is a marketing analysis using the SWOT technique.
A SWOT analysis focuses on the internal and external environments,
examining strengths and weaknesses in
the internal environment (you) and opportunities and threats
in the external environment (the job market).
Read more about how a SWOT Analysis can help you
plan your self-marketing approach -- complete with
diagrams and samples.
Quintessential Careers Site Award: 5 O'Clock Club
Fittingly, the Five O'Clock Club's Web site is
full of great self-marketing ideas. We especially
like the "Good Search" minicourse.
The Five O'Clock Club is a national career counseling network
with certified career counselors across the United States. The
Club uses a proven methodology -- based on 12 years of research --
to help members find jobs. While some of the material
on the Five O'Clock Club's Web site is for members only,
much is available to anyone, including a section describing
Five O'Clock Club's books, a guide to the key steps in
finding a job, information on how to become a member, a
collection of free career-search articles, and a section on how to book
a Five O'Clock Club speaker or connect with a 5OCC career coach
(Fees range from $60 to $150 per hour for coaching).
Aquent --
a place for creative and technical professionals can find contract, project-based, and permanent work. Each job-seeker is assigned a “talent agent”
who helps in your career management and client choices. You can search for jobs, sign up for an email job-alert program and submit your resume/application.
Free to job-seekers.
Career
Resources Homepage -- a clearinghouse of employment-related information available on the Internet, including job sites; job databases;
resume databases; professional organizations; career services offices; and much more. A great resource that has an extra special placing
because its roots are in academia, just as with Quintessential Careers. Free to job-seekers.
Get
Recruited -- which allows all students to be recruited (for free) by colleges, universities, graduate schools, and professional schools.
Students simply need to complete a brief online questionnaire, which is then sent to colleges and universities around the U.S. Schools that
determine matches with you will then contact you via email or postal mail with more information. Free.
JobSummit.com
-- where job-seekers looking for employment by some of Southern California’s (including San Diego, Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, Ventura, and
San Bernardino counties) top employers can search for jobs by region, job category, and keywords - or simply browse by companies or job categories.
Job openings in all industries and at all skill levels. Free to job-seekers.
Find even more additions to Quintessential Careers by visiting our
Latest
Additions section.
Angie writes: "I am not unhappy at my job, but I am currently
exploring my opportunities because I know I am worth
more than I currently get paid. What is the correct way
to answer the question when a potential employer asks you
why you are looking for a new job?"
Q TIPS: Quick and Quintessential Career & Job Tips
Not sure what you want to do? Consider one of the
jobs listed among the top five best overall jobs by Jobs Rated Almanac:
1.
2.
3.
4. (tie)
4. (tie)
Financial planner
Web site manager
Computer-systems analyst
Actuary
Computer programmer
Next step up from simply marketing yourself
to get a job? Becoming a "career activist."
An activist is, according to career counselor
Barbara Moses, "vigilant, sometimes cocky,
maybe even a little paranoid."
Fast Company magazine quotes Moses as characterizing career
activists this way: "They define themselves independently
from their organizations and take charge of their own career
choices." Some tips to help you become a career activist:
Engage people by expressing who you are. Don't be phony
or play a role -- just be dynamically yourself.
Network!
Don't rule out your current company as the source
of your best new career opportunity.
Moses's own Web site mostly describes her
paid services and books, but a few interesting
articles also are available.
Business Week reports a job-seeker trend
toward using smaller, niche job-seeking sites
to find jobs better tailored to the the
job-seeker's skills than the vast array of
listings at sites such as Monster.com.
"Many savvy job-seekers...find their time is better
spent zeroing in on job boards with more focused listings.
There they don't go through cumbersome procedure
to post a resume, and they have more control over what
their resume looks like...Another attraction: Niche sites seem
to have a higher percentage of mid- and upper-management
jobs than the giant job boards," writes Alex Salkever in Business
Week.
WATCH FOR feature articles on these topics in upcoming
issues of QuintZine:
* Pantsuits vs. skirtsuits for interviews
* Case-based and behavior-based interviews
* Online Assessments
* Interviewing: It's more fun than you think
* Graduate school for working professionals
* Phone etiquette in the job hunt
* Guide to the company visit
* Letters of recommendation and references
* Completing a job application
* How to choose a college
* Changing Careers
* How to land an internship
* Temping
* Build your career through volunteering
* Hot jobs for 2001
* Q&As with well-known career experts
. . . and much, much more!
Advertisements
RESUMES * JOB SEARCH CORRESPONDENCE FROM TRUSTED EXPERTS * COVER LETTERS
Quintessential Resumes and Cover Letters is up and running,
providing quality job-search correspondence at some of
the lowest prices on the Web.
We create resumes,
cover letters, curriculum vitae, thank-you and
follow-up letters, and list-formatted documents,
such as salary histories and reference lists.
We also can provide critiques and makeovers of
your resume or cover letter. Credit cards accepted.
Check out Quintessential Resumes
and Cover Letters!
QuintZine
A publication of
Quintessential Careers
Publisher: Dr. Randall S. Hansen
Editor: Katharine Hansen
ISSN: 1528-9443
