Excellent news! Congrats!
Seeing first-hand how my former employer used to handle the job search process, it’s amazing to me that anyone gets hired anywhere.
We have the standard “Careers” section of our web site, however nobody knows where, if anywhere, those applications go. There is no way for a hiring manager to even find any of those resume submissions.
We deal with a couple of headhunters but their candidates are usually garbage.
We also attend campus career fairs. The important thing to know is that for any particular fair, we recieve over a hundred resumes. Whoever you speak to at the fair will likely either put a “check” or an “X” indicating whether they liked you or thought you were a weirdo in the 30 seconds they met you. The stack of resumes will then drift in limbo for months while people try to figure out what to do with them.
Really the best way to get hired is to alrady know someone at the company who can pass your resume to a hiring manager.
Note that we also hired an HR recruiter who is completely incompetant (much like most of the organization) so the internal referral process is now even more confusing.
So basically you resume most likely ended up as one more needle in a stack of needles.
I just got off the phone with a hiring manager at a store in a nearby town. I have an interview tomorrow. Wish me luck, dopers. It isn’t the type of job I was hoping to get now that I have graduated college, but it pays more than enough and the work would be steady. Woo Hoo!
Brendon Small
Woohoo. Sending lucky thoughts your way.
Would anyone care to share their “what’s going on” letter? You know, the one you send to the interviewer when you haven’t heard back from them? I REALLY can’t write these, I’ve tried and tried, and I usually delete them and go back to twiddling my thumbs and hoping silently.
My highest hopes are resting on a position which I and the interviewer both knew wasn’t an ideal match for my skills. She told me during the interview that had I had a little more staff supervisory experience, that I would be her perfect candidate. She also called me ‘fascinating’ 
and we talked for nearly two hours. Then she said she’d let me know by the middle of the next week. As in, May 1. As in, 2 weeks ago. And I’ve heard precisely nothing.
My slightly-less-high hopes are resting on another place; the position I interviewed for went to an internal candidate (I hate those!) but the interviewer told me of another upcoming job that would suit me perfectly. That was three weeks ago. She said, ‘Don’t go and get a job somewhere else, now.’ Since then, I’ve heard… nothing.
I’m disheartened. I’m extremely bored. There’s only so much Scrabulous one can play (we should have a game sometime, twickster! I have the same nick there, look out for me.) I’m also failing miserably at housewifery; on Sunday I exploded the gravy, and MaxTheVool and I are still picking shards of glass out of our eyeballs. (Not really But it was quite a mess.) And yesterday’s laundry had tissues in the pockets, which are now appliqued to all of our clothing.
I applied for four new jobs yesterday. My Spanish lessons start next week. I’ve been swimming every morning. The love is excellent. But I just want to work.
I have an interview tomorrow. The job sounds reasonable and the salary’s all right. It was one which had come up before the wedding, but there were some delays at the company’s end which seem to have worked to my advantage.
I’ve been a bit down and I’ve had a head cold or something for the past couple of days, so it’s rather nice to have a bit of hope. Wish me luck!
Sending lucky thoughts your way!
Well thank you. The good luck worked so far. I had the interview with the location manager today and it went well, so he asked me back tomorrow for an interview with the district fellow. I guess I’ll know by the end of the week, or at least I hope.
Brendon
I guess I have to join in this thread, too. My grad school plans didn’t work out, so job hunting is is. Crap.
I’ve sent out some resumes to several positions at one company today, and tomorrow I’ll check a couple more biomed companies websites and see if they have good openings.
Remember the interview I had last week where there was a bad match between what they’re looking for and what I have to offer? They were looking for a yuppie marketing type, and I’m a hippie editing type. In my thank-you email, I suggested they rethink how they go about staffing that slot, and go ahead and hire a marketing type – but pointed out that by not having a good editor in there, they were presenting a publication with numerous grammatical and typographical errors. Oh dear, said my correspondent, like what?
Tuesday I mailed a two-page letter describing some of the errors, and sorting out which of them would have been caught by a competent proofreader, which of them could have been prevented by a competent copy editor (which is what I had suggested they hire), and which of them could only be dealt with by a higher-level editor … such as myself.
I don’t necessarily want a full-time job with these folks, but would love some kind of contract/telecommuting/freelance gig while I look for something permanent – keep your fingers crossed.
Bah. Fingers recrossed for you now.
I’ve heard little back in my search. Just nice form letters telling me that I suck.
Twickster, sending lucky thoughts your way! My search is on hold now until probably near July.
At the end of this month I go in for (yet another) operation. I was willing to put it on hold when I had an opportunity looming, but since there are no immediate ones now, I will put my search on hold instead. Recovery will take about 3 weeks, so that puts me close to July.
Still, my thoughts will be with all of you (even if I start to check in less and less.)
Keeping my fingers crossed for all the interviewees and Woo Hoo! to Ms MacPhisto.
As soon as I had posted in this thread I fell sick and ended up having to interview with the head honcho while labouring under the assumption of pneumonia - I looked like a freaky clown / Rudolph’s slightly deranged red-nosed cousin. However, the head honcho apparently ended up liking me.
But then the good news ended: My application had to go before the board, since the company is not actually hiring, but letting people go, so every external application has to be approved. And apparently, they are still deliberating. Outlook: Not so good. There apparently has been an edict from way up high that nobody wants to cross. Have I mentioned that tomorrow is the last day I can legally quit and still start at the appointed date?
Which is disheartening because I’ve been dragging my sick body to work for the past two weeks since everybody but me seems to be on vacation, and *somebody *has to deal with all our clients. But I’ve kept myself upright with the thought that it wouldn’t be for long, and with the new company, everything would be better. Wishful thinking, probably triggered by fever hallucinations.
Can I share a minor bitch?
Why the hell do some agencies and companies make everyone fill out a standard job application? I’m a professional candidate with 10+ years experience; I am sending a detailed resume, writing sample, and reference list. Now I have to add to that some bullshit stock application form (frequently multiple pages) asking for such unnecessary information as where I went to high school. Who cares? My last three addresses – who cares? Do I have any college degrees? Did I go to graduate school? Why do I have to tell you that again? It’s on my resume.
And thes stupid applications are invariably .pdf files that are not write-able. What do they expect the applicant to do? Buy and install Adobe Pro to creat write-able forms? Own a typewriter? (Who still owns a typewriter?) Or fill out the forms as neatly as possible by hand with a ball-point pen? I’m doing the last of these and it sticks in my craw; hand-written responses are so unprofessional, but what choice do I have?
I feel like I’m 18 again, applying for a job at Pizza Hut.
Hear! Hear! I’ve got just such an application sitting on my desk (not one for the interview I had) and I can’t tell you how tempting it is to write in “See resume.” I even have a nice, neat, up-to-date sheet of references with contact information I can send people, but instead I wind up writing it in in spaces which are too small. The box in which I’m to list the name and location of each school I went to is 2 1/4" by about 5/16". One of the schools I went to is a community college. I do feel sorry for the people who have to read that information from my application. Then again, it is on my resume.
I share the gripe about the standard applications. Good luck to everyone with something in the works. Good luck to everyone who doesn’t.
The Oral Exam was discouraging and surreal. It was a ‘fixed question’ format. What would you do if… What is most important to consider when… I answered the questions briefly and simply to the best of my ability. To stony silence. “Are you ready for the next question?” It was a really bizarre ritual, only four questions, and I didn’t feel encouraged to go off topic to sing my own paeons to my reliability, etc. Nor was it allowed to present reference letters.
They’ll let me know in 4-8 weeks if I ‘qualify’.
OK, then. I’ll just be out here in the hall, holding my breath.
I feel so depressed. I just applied for an entry-level job. My last job was a senior-level position. 
I get occasional calls from the state employment board (or some such agency) with job referrals for … industrial production planners. (Hey, it’s the Rust Belt.) When I make my weekly unemployment claim, I’m asked whether I got any referrals. I have to answer “yes”, and go through a lengthy process to justify why I didn’t followup on them. “I’m an URBAN planner, not a production planner or financial planner or wedding planner or party planner or conference planner! URBAN! URBAN! URBAN!”
Hey folks, I’m soon to be entering the market again as I return to the United States. Gotta say, it doesn’t sound super promising, but I’ll have a little time to find something after the big homecoming.
Anyone wanna pitch some advice on one of my resume entries?
Here’s what I’ve been doing for almost a year now:
– NOTE-- Sections that I particularly want help with are in blue.
Job Title: Editor (I haven’t decided on the Job Title, really, so help me out by looking at my responsibilities)
Responsibilities:
Head English-language editor
Primary writer and editor for all [company] textbooks and scripts
Editor for [company] English-language magazine
Assistant Director for the televised [company] education program and [video series name] series (This one I’ve having trouble with, too. I also wrote the scripts for these programs and sometimes acted in them ;), so how do I best write that in a succinct manner?)
The biggest problem is that these various responsibilities really almost seem like different positions. My role as the head English editor extended to every facet of our company products, so that’s why it seems like I’m involved at every step of the process. Is there a good, brief way to convey that? The Korean names for such things are simply unwieldy to translate.
Also, should I list responsibilities that I’m supposed to have, but never exercised in all the months I’ve been at my company? For example, under my contract, I have the ability to consult talent agencies, have final word on hiring or firing voice actors and other talent, and should be consulted in the hiring of other English editors. However, we haven’t had to do any of that in the time I’ve been here. So should I list that anyway?
Yikes! I got spontaneously hired on Friday!!! Of course, this meant I equally spontaneously had to quit my current job the same day. Which was not really pleasant, but hey, what can you do. does happy dance
So everybody keep your chin up - sometimes things go faster than you think!
Crocodiles And Boulevards: I would list all responsibilities you had, even if you didn’t exercise them, since you’re really describing your position. And IMHO it would still be important to a future employer that you were once entrusted with the responsibility e.g. to hire or fire people even if you then didn’t actually do it.
Good luck in your new career!