4 New Job Search Tools to Check Out in 2012

July 23, 2012

by Joshua Waldman | From Recruiter.com

The year 2012 seems to be the year of innovation around the job search. They say great inventions come when people find a better way to solve a problem. Others say laziness is the mother of all invention. But I say that great innovations happen when millions of Americans are out of work and finding a job sucks.

So in honor of America’s comeback, here are four of my favorite innovations so far this year.

Take Harvard and MIT Classes for Free!

July 9, 2012

Two Elite Academic Institutions Are Using a New Online Education Initiative to Offer Students Free Courses
By Sarah Shemkus, Salary.com contributing writer

Two of the country’s premier academic institutions — the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University — have joined forces to launch an online education initiative that might just “reinvent education,” according to Anant Agarwal, president of the new program.

Dubbed edX, the program is based on MITx, a similar initiative launched by the science and technology school earlier this year. EdX will act as a sort of umbrella organization, allowing participating institutions to offer free, online courses from their curricula. Harvard and MIT are the initial partners in the program, but already other universities are expressing interest in participating, Agarwal said.

“We’ve had an extraordinary amount of interest from a large number of universities, in the United States and around the world,” he said.

There will be no admissions requirements; anyone with an internet connection and the drive to learn can enroll. The online courses are intended to be as rigorous as the versions offered to full-time students at Harvard and MIT. The online learning software platform used by edX was developed at MIT; courses will include videos, reading materials, and discussion forums that allow students to interact with instructors and each other.

Upon completion of courses, students will be able to pay a small fee to receive a certificate attesting that they mastered that material.

To learn more about this unique program and opportunity, or to read the article in its entirety, please click here.

Introducing “Silicon Harbor”: Charleston, SC

June 18, 2012

By Shane Snow
From Fast Company

Despite being the 75th largest metro area in the U.S., Charleston is ranked in the top 10 fastest growing cities for software and Internet technology. Here’s why.

Using Pinterest as a Job-Search and Branding Tool

May 14, 2012

From NACE Spotlight for Career Services Professionals

Pinterest—a content-sharing social media website on which account holders “pin” images, videos, and more to their virtual pinboards—is gaining popularity for its broad spectrum of uses.

Thom Rakes, career center director at the University of North Carolina Wilmington, sees two ways students can use Pinterest to enhance their job-search efforts—as a tool to research potential employers and as means for students to market themselves.

“Some large and cutting-edge companies have created Pinterest pages, providing a different view of the employer than more traditional web pages,” Rakes says. “And since the focus of Pinterest is on graphics and images, it is of most use to students pursuing visually related careers, such as graphic or digital design and marketing. It may help more visually orientated job seekers stand out.”

Brie Weiler Reynolds, the content and social media manager at FlexJobs and a former career counselor at Emmanuel College, agrees, saying it’s much easier for students in creative majors to use Pinterest because of the visual component.

“The arts, graphic design, marketing, and other heavily visual majors will probably find using Pinterest for their job search to be easy and straightforward,” Reynolds says. “Students in more traditional majors—business, social and life sciences, and others—will need to be more creative in their use of Pinterest.”

Why is Pinterest attractive to job seekers? First, it’s easy to get started. Unlike setting up a website or professional blog, it takes just a few seconds to create an account and start pinning, Reynolds says.

“It shouldn’t necessarily replace those other two options for personal branding, but it’s a good way to get started,” she adds. “And, it’s a strictly visual medium in a world of text-based job-search tools, so it’s very different from other options.”

With that in mind, Reynolds touts the importance of students thinking about how they can represent their majors and career interests visually—whether it’s by using pictures of organizations with which they’ve interned, or pins of student organizations and activities with which they’ve been involved.

Reynolds offers some other tips for career services practitioners to share with college students using or interested in using Pinterest as a personal branding or job-search tool. To use Pinterest as a personal branding tool, college students should:

• Create resume boards on which they pin pictures related to their schooling and experiences.
• Create portfolio boards with examples of their work, which is especially good for creative fields.
• Pin a copy of their resume with text that says “please share me.”
• Create boards related to their interests to give more insight into them.
• Place their Pinterest URLs on their job-search materials, including resumes, cover letters, e-mail signatures, profiles on LinkedIn, and more. Make sure they use their actual name as their Pinterest page name so people can easily find them through a search.

For using Pinterest as a job-search tool, students should:

• Follow employers they want to work for on Pinterest to learn about the employers’ marketing efforts and corporate culture.
• Follow career services offices and experts to learn the best job-search strategies, trends, and advice.
• Get ideas for places to work by seeing what organizations their employers of interest follow.
• Create boards for “Places I’d Like to Work” and “Jobs I’d Like to Have.”
• Use keywords like “hiring,” “human resources,” “recruiting,” and more to find employers that are using Pinterest to recruit.

Reynolds says that one of the biggest mistakes college students make is thinking they can use Pinterest for both personal and professional purposes.

“Students will want to keep their Pinterest pages clean and professional, because they never know who might be looking at [the pages],” she explains. Reynolds also strongly suggests that students make use of the text box available for each picture.

“[Students should] say something about each picture they pin—what it is, how they were involved, when and where it occurred,” she says. “That text is the student’s only chance to tell viewers what they’re looking at, and how it relates to the student as a professional.”

The 10 Best Job Hunting Apps to Get You Hired

April 16, 2012

Looking for a Job? There’s an App for That!
By Dawn Dugan, Salary.com contributing writer

Today’s tsunami of technology means savvy job seekers have jumped on the app wagon in an effort to give themselves the leading edge in the job search process. Mobile apps allow job seekers to search discreetly for positions — anytime, anywhere — and respond to postings quickly. There are apps that help with career planning, organize the job search process, alert job seekers to compatible positions, and can even upload and send resumes to recruiters.

This article explores the 10 mobile apps (in no particular order) every job seeker should know about.

Who Gets Promoted, Who Doesn’t & Why

April 9, 2012

10 Things You’d Better Do if You Want to Get Ahead
By Wendy Ryan and Aaron Gouveia, Salary.com contributing writers

If you’re a fast-tracker striving for career advancement like a heat-seeking missile then this is a podcast you can’t afford to miss. On this week’s episode of Salary Talk, Aaron flies solo in this interview with Donald Asher, author of “Who Gets Promoted, Who Doesn’t and Why” and “Cracking the Hidden Job Market,” who deals exclusively with career professionals who aren’t happy unless they’re earning a promotion every 12-18 months. You’ll find out why raises aren’t about past performance, being indispensable isn’t a good thing and discover why talent is a distant second to timing. Asher’s insight into the corporate culture of raises and promotions could have you earning more in no time.

To view or listen to the entire podcast please click here.

How social media can help—and hurt—your professional prospects

February 6, 2012

By Aimee Hosier, Schools.com

If you want some insight on how current or potential employers view you, try Googling yourself.

According to a Harris Interactive study, 45 percent of hiring managers used social media to screen and recruit new applicants in 2009, and 35 percent declined to hire a candidate thanks to content uncovered this way. The Wall Street Journal notes that some employers even continue to monitor your social media activity long after the hiring process, using certain posts as grounds for termination. While this trend can be troublesome for some job seekers or employees, others have turned it on its head.

“One of the best ways to gain recognition in a specific field is to use social media,” says career coach Debra Yergen, author of the “Creating Job Security Resource Guide.” In other words, the positive PR you generate using social networks can help you land a job just as easily as other activities (ahem) can make you lose one. The difference is in knowing how to use these tools appropriately.

Facebook, Google and Dropbox Are Hiring Interns by the Boatload

January 9, 2012

From BusinessInsder.com
By Ellis Hamburger, SAI: Tools at Business Insider

Silicon Valley mainstays and start ups like Google and Dropbox are hiring tons of interns for this coming summer, the Wall Street Journal Reports.

Dropbox plans to hire three times as many interns for this summer as for last summer. This would make interns one whole third of Dropbox’s entire engineering team.

Facebook plans to hire 625 interns for this coming summer, while Google plans to hire more than a thousand youngsters for summer jobs.

So why all the hiring up? Finding and keeping full-time hires is tough enough at a tech company because of rampant poaching, so these companies have been increasingly turning to college students for first-year employees.

Most of these companies offer interns around $10,000 for a summer-long gig.

Read the rest of the report and about other companies battling for tech internships at the Wall Street Journal.

The 5 Hardest Jobs to Fill in 2012

January 3, 2012

By Keith Cline @ VentureFizz
From Inc.com

While you’re planning your expansion, you’re going to find that talent is in short supply, especially in these five areas.

So, what are the most competitive areas for talent these days? Here’s a look.

Who Gets Promoted, Who Doesn’t & Why: 10 Things You’d Better Do if You Want to Get Ahead

October 10, 2011

PODCAST
From Salary.com

If you’re a fast-tracker striving for career advancement like a heat-seeking missile then this is a podcast you can’t afford to miss. On this week’s episode of Salary Talk, we interview Donald Asher, author of “Who Gets Promoted, Who Doesn’t and Why” and “Cracking the Hidden Job Market,” who deals exclusively with career professionals who aren’t happy unless they’re earning a promotion every 12-18 months. You’ll find out why raises aren’t about past performance, being indispensable isn’t a good thing and discover why talent is a distant second to timing. Asher’s insight into the corporate culture of raises and promotions could have you earning more in no time.

To listen to the interview podcast, please click here.

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