Author: Michael Mayher

Business, the business that matters to us on a personal level – that related to finding and interviewing for a job, is conducted by direct communication, there is no substitute. But in order to do so, you’ve got to identify who to speak with and then you must establish contact. Anyone who’s read my blog knows what I think of woefully inadequate online pseudo-activities, so much of which never involves speaking with a real person and is largely a waste of time. Increasingly, those activities are about as productive as seeking wealth by purchasing a lottery ticket and crossing your fingers. In my experienced opinion, until such time as you can speak with a decision maker, nothing real can happen. Email has become the initiating step and pre-requisite protocol. Even if you can establish contact by phone email is the next

This short article/blog entry will elicit two distinctly different reactions: some will wince and accuse me of being hard-hearted and, yet, others will see the common sense logic in my perspective and nod in full agreement. No one is entitled to a job per se. Entitlement results in lethargy and mediocrity or, put more bluntly, laziness and a lack of appreciation for what one has. More appropriately, we are and should be entitled to the opportunity of being fairly considered and evaluated according to our abilities, talents, experience and accomplishments. All of us have experienced employees in our daily lives who make us wonder how they can possibly keep their jobs as a result of bad attitudes, lethargy, poor customer service and a general unwillingness to do any more than what is absolutely required of them. In some cases there are those

With each passing year I find more and more people are losing their skills to communicate to not much more than a basic level, incapable of purposeful interaction and, above all, unwilling to take initiative to do the things that can help them to advance their own goals. For some reason they’ve become afraid, yes afraid, to do more than the bare minimum required of them in different aspects of their lives, but none so obvious as their own inability to help themselves when they must find a job. Ironic isn’t it, with more tools available than ever people do less and less; it’s turned upside-down. Most people obediently send their resumes down a virtual black hole to no one in particular about something they saw posted. They do nothing and wait to be called on. Then, when they do get

When you find yourself having to interview for a job, you’ll have a limited window of time within which you need to make the most of the event. The first interview should be about their learning more about you beyond your resume and you should learn more about the job beyond the woefully basic job post you likely responded to.   A typical first face-to-face interview is generally brief, sometimes as short as 30 minutes, and occasionally longer but rarely more than an hour. Regardless, time is limited and finite -- if you want to get all you can from the meeting. I remember when my daughter was a competitive swimmer and it wasn’t so much about the others in the pool as it was a race against the clock. Well, this is no different. I have witnessed many persons aimlessly squander precious

Interview styles differ and then tend to inject the personality of the person conducting the interview, not to mention additional people involved with whom you may also meet and speak and it can be difficult to be prepared for everything. While that may be, there are some predictable patterns in each process, and one that is pretty common is the indication you are nearing the end of the interview. When they ask, “do you have any other questions?” it’s pretty clear you’re near the end and it’s almost over. You have a final chance to ask any remaining and outstanding questions on your mind – so take advantage of it. But there’s one final question I want you to add to your repertoire at almost every single interview you find yourself a part of and for the rest of your career. Ask

As a standard practice, when I represent both hiring managers and candidates during an interview process, I always debrief both sides. Among the questions I ask of both sides, but predominantly the candidate, is one that seems to catch people off-guard and one they are not used to hearing and rarely consider. I ask them, “Was there laughter?” Often this seems an odd question but rather one I have learned, during my long career, to be a key question. And okay, perhaps you were not giggling your way through the meeting but hopefully, there was some smiling and cordiality – the more the better. You see, there is more going on than just whether or not you, as a potential employee, are qualified for a job you seek. Are you qualified and suitable – and it goes both ways? Qualifications are

If you want help from a third party to increase your chances of finding a good job, through a recruiter or an agency, know this, it is rare that you will contact them and, voila, they just so happen to have the perfect job for you and your timing was impeccable and fortuitous. More likely, you will end up in their database and it is the info you provide to them that can accentuate your odds of success, now or later. But like many suggestions I provide, you have to apply a bit of effort in order to separate yourself from the crowd because, as I so-often say, if you look, sound and act like everyone else, why should they choose you over anyone else. It’s your choice -- be boring and un-remarkable and as a result go un-noticed --

Call it what you like, your attitude, energy, aura or something else, you can have a great resume and be perfectly qualified, but if your mojo isn’t working you’re going to come up short in your efforts.   The economy is picking up a bit lately but that often isn’t the issue as much as it is the systems in place that companies and HR departments utilize -- application and resume submission processes that are faceless and leave you wondering if they’ve even received your resume, or if it will be seen by a real person. It is the processes companies use to screen and evaluate potential employees, stupid psychobabble psychometric testing or inane interview questions having nothing to do with one’s ability to do a job, that make people feel powerless during the course of the process. Combined with other issues

Do professionals always apply to themselves what they dictate to others? Does a doctor provide his own family with the same guidance as for a patient?  I’ve heard of instances in which they don’t, such as chemo-therapy, for example, although I’m just posing a hypothetical question. During a recent conversation with an HR Director I know, I spoke about my advice to job seekers; that they should, instead of applying for a job through typical and accepted channels of applying online or establishing contact through HR, I instead suggest an alternate and more direct route. I advise people to do a bit of homework and try to learn who, by name, might be the person they’d work for and/or report to, in a particular company to which they would like to apply and work. Although she also admitted that it irritated her

If or when you look for a job you’ve got to employ multiple methods and use every tool at your disposal. LinkedIn is one of those tools and, if you don’t know it, it is a primary tool used by recruiters and companies looking for potential employees. Doesn’t it make sense that in addition to your own efforts, it would be nice to get an unsolicited inquiry, people who find you instead of you always doing the chasing? But that doesn’t happen all by itself; you have to set the stage correctly and it doesn’t require that much extra effort.   If you’re going to have a LinkedIn profile you should make it something worthy of yourself. If you put a lot of effort into having a good resume it’s simply a matter of posting the same information onto LinkedIn. How tough