What's the best job seeking site for IT?

In My Humble Opinion
1

I haven’t had to look for a job in a long time, so I have no idea where to go on the interwebs.

Not that I’m likely to get any sort of decent job at this point - I went to school in the early 2000s and then played poker for a living for a few years, my resume is pretty empty. A few jobs I’ve inquired about - they see not only no experience, and a 4 year resume gap, and there’s no way I even get an interview.

Which sucks, because I’m competant and have a really well rounded knowledge of computers. I can build and fix them, program them, setup, design, administer networks, all that stuff. But if you can’t get a chance to prove it…

In any case, I guess, I can keep trying. How’s the job market in the various IT sub-fields? Seems like in the late 90s, when they shipped off manufacturing jobs, they told people to learn tech jobs, including IT, because it was the wave of the future. Then a few years later they shipped off the tech jobs - leaving lots of newly trained people to compete for fewer jobs.

Is monster.com still the big, generalized job site? Are there IT-specialized ones or anything like that?

Any general advice that anyone has about getting back into the field would be appreciated.

2

I’ve scored three IT jobs in three years off craigslist.org. The last time was just last month - I lost my job on May 31 and had an offer exactly two weeks later.

3

www.dice.com is the monster.com of the IT industry and it is very active. The only issue is that it is a little weighted towards contracting so expect to get a call from several contracting agencies pretty quickly. If you are open to that, it is great (better pay, no benefits), but there are also permanent jobs as well as contract to perm (which is actually a great gig in general BTW).

4

As to the hot subareas… I learned years ago that the thing that they can’t outsource is IT combined with business knowledge. That is why I made myself a consulting business systems analyst which is a really hard job to describe but it encompasses everything from programming to project management to training to running big meetings. We serve as an expert resource on lots of issues and often offer definitive opinions on controversial issues within the corporation and we have to be semi-adversarial on things we know aren’t be done the right way. Business systems analysts exist mainly in mid-sized companies and up.

The tried and true way to break back into IT is through QA. It tends to be very tedious and detail oriented work. Good QA people catch mistakes from the programmers and others before they move into production. Still, they are professional positions and you would work alongside all of the other IT staff. Some people love QA enough to stick with that career path but many move on to programming or other types of IT.

5

SenorBeef,

At this point, it looks like you need a plan. You can’t move toward a goal if you don’t know what the goal is. Sounds simple, but a lot of people forget this step and get overwhelmed by all those choices on Dice, Monster, and specialty websites. It sounds like you’ve seen this already. It’s a two step process. First, decide what you want to do, then market yourself to those jobs.

Well, what do you want to do? Don’t let your past constrain your view of the future. We’ll get to that in the next step. This is the wish list, what you like to do. Do you want to do run the network? Hardware installation or software integration? Training? End user support? International or national travel? Any specific industries you like, such as banking, gambling, defense, medical? Narrow this down to 2 or 3 distinct job classifications. Skimming Dice or Monster can give you ideas of the wide variety of options available.

So now that you know where you’ll end up, how do you get there? Successfully market your self to those jobs. How? A great cover letter that generates enough interest in SenorBeef that the hiring authority wants to talk to you. Short and sweet, an introductory paragraph that identifies the position you’re applying for (referring to the source, too), 2 or 3 paragraphs that match your qualities to those specified in the job description, and a closing paragraph that includes your e-mail addy, phone number and, most important, asks for an interview.

I emphasize the cover letter because the hiring authority usually sees it first. If he likes it, he’ll either skim your resume and/or put your cover letter/resume in the callback pile. This is where you can make his job easier by pointing out explicitly why you’re the best person for the job. While you’re at it, include something that makes you stand out from the crowd, something that the recruiter who’s looking through a few hundred cover letters is going to remember. Could professional poker playing generate some interest?

Let’s take a couple of points in your OP. A 4-year resume gap, you say? I see an opportunity to show how, as a professional poker player, you take initiative. You take risks. You can read people. You’ll probably be great dealing with users or customers. Systems education with no specific experience? I see someone who doesn’t have a bunch of bad habits the next employer will have to break. Someone with a bedrock upon which the new employer can build.

I apologize for the incoherence. It’s getting late here. Plus I like giving job search advice. I love the thrill of the hunt when I’m looking for a job.

6

If you can do all these things, you can do none of them well. That will be the opinion of any employer that has an IT department - as opposed to a small business “looking for an IT guy.” Craft your resume for the job. Employers like to hear “the more I learn, the more I realize how much more I have to learn” - not “oh, yeah, I can program, configure your router, design an enterprise network, troubleshoot with a sniffer, and set up Active Directory to talk to your Solaris boxes - no problem.”

So if you want to do all those things - target a small shop. Your best bet may be networking with consultants - one of them has a client who is getting big enough to need a full time guy. Or go into business for yourself.

7

It’s important to understand how the hiring process works. As a hiring manager, I don’t have time to look at every single resume that is submitted. I have an office manager who pre-screens them. Usually this job is performed by some internal HR rep or recruiter at a company, but basically it’s the same - someone who knows little about the actual job looking for key words or work experience. Often these resumes are forwarded along by an outside recruiter who does basically the same thing.

By the time it gets to me, the hiring manager, I basically ignore the cover leter and spend about 10 minutes looking at the resume where I will try to figure out what this person has done and what I think they can do for me.

So my advise is a long, detailed, keyword intensive resume for online to catch search hits, but a condensed (never more than 2 pages) resume for actually submitting once you get a lead.

8

Actually, my advice is to spend more time networking with people. Most companies give referral bonuses to employees and give more consideration to those resumes.

9

msmith537,
I appreciate your input and should clarify my previous post–a good reason not to submit just before bed. I should have noted that this post was aimed toward a systems contracting job search. I guess I had “Shagnasty on the brain.” (post 3) A couple years as a contractor is probably a good way for SenorBeef to get his computer career on track.

Why did I make my suggestion, which seems so different than your experiences? I’ve noticed that contracting can have different hiring standards than permanent positions. Contracting companies appear more willing to consider people with marginal skills. Why? Contractors can be disposed of at a moment’s notice with no reason given. If a company takes a chance on me and I’m not a good fit, to paraphrase Scott Adams, it can just toss me in the trash can because I’m too big to flush. As a manager, you know how hard it is to fire permanent employees. In some companies, it can take months to build up a sufficient paper trail to cover your a** for when the ex-employee sues. So you’re probably going to be a lot picker on your employee selection than a contracting recruiter would be.

Plus, I’ve been a similar position to SenorBeef. I’ve got a general business degree and a masters in business, too. I had no real systems experience prior to starting my career. Just those two nontechnical degrees. I’ve had to demonstrate how my apparently nontechnical background is applicable to these systems positions. Here’s where Shag and I agree again: I combined my business knowledge (what people do with computers) with how to use computers. Did I let my lack of Oracle or SQL Server experience stop me from a database software integration position I wanted? Did my lack of medical experience block me from getting my current contracts with an electronic medical record system? No to both questions.

So how did I get these positions, because looking at my resume alone, you probably wouldn’t have thought of me for them. By having a great cover letter that showed how I was best for the job, step 2 of my first post. I crafted those cover letters because I knew what I was looking for, step 1 of my first post.

SenorBeef, as you can see, there is no one right answer in career searches. I hope all of our answers have expanded your mind to encompass the variety of possibilities and will help you decide how to proceed. Good luck and keep the questions coming.