After the Internship

Unfortunately summer is coming to a rapid close.  Back to school has become the current retail season, the days are getting shorter, and it seems like everyone is talking about when they are going to be moving back to school.  Hopefully everyone had a fantastic and productive internship to set them on a more focused course!   

If you have not already started talking with your supervisor and co workers about letters of recommendation, don't hesitate another minute.  If you have a final date for your internship, schedule an exit interview with the person(s) with whom you worked most closely.  This is your opportunity to crow about what you accomplished and how having you in this internship benefited the company.  Take some time to put these accomplishments into a professional presentation, be sure to refresh your resume with these accomplishments too.  Take some time to thank everyone you worked with over the course of the summer, hand written notes are a nice touch that leave a lasting impression.  With your updated resume in hand be sure to check in with the HR department as you check out.  Let them know your graduation date and that you would appreciate being considered for employment.  Keep all avenues of communication open, hopefully you have made some key contacts and built some strong relationships that you will be able to call on in your job search post graduation.

For those of you not headed back to campus, the above applies to you but you need to turn up the intensity of our quest for full time employment.  One intern recently told me some of the best advise she received this summer was from an employee that started as an intern.  The advise?  "Find something that makes you so valuable to the organization they will go out of their way to hire you."  I am sure what was meant   was honest hard work and benefit to the organization and not black mail.  What was your stand out accomplishment and how does it benefit the department or whole organization?  Take some time to package that accomplishment or series of accomplishments into a sales presentation.  This may be your sales pitch into a paid career.

Take Some Time Now

With Memorial Day and the "start" of summer less than  a week over,  it's easy to start relaxing into our cut offs and flip flop mode!  Don't get too comfy yet, deadlines for fall internship applications are quickly approaching.  Don't be left out on a great internship experience because you missed the date by a day or two. 

Make your search and application process your other summer job.  Dedicate at least an hour every day to going on line and researching companies and opportunities.  Can't concentrate or don't have the best internet connection at home?  Take your laptop to the library or nearest free wifi coffee shop and get busy.  Going out is more like going to work.

Where do you start?  Go back to the positions you applied for or considered applying for last round.  What do you have to offer now that you didn't have six months ago?  Look at the companies or organizations that do what you would like to do, check out their "open positions"  for internship opportunities.  Go to the job boards that are specific to your field, search on internships.  Don't forget to look for guilds and governing bodies in certain industries, often times internships will be posted through them.

Get creative, start asking everyone you come in contact with who or what they know about your chosen field.  In some jobs companies are offering "virtual" internships so you can intern from home or campus.  Whatever you do keep thinking of the next step in your career plan.  Interning is one of the best ways to set yourself apart from your competition when you're ready to start your career. 

Custom Resumes?

Customize your resume for each job you apply to?  You bet, especially if you are submitting your resume electronically.  Yes it's a hassle knowing what to change, or how to change it without loosing something but here is the rationale for doing it.  No one is going to read your resume until it passes through the electronic filter.  The job search landscape has a new tool and you need to know how to use it.

1.)  Look very carefully at the job post, what is it asking for?  You have many of those skills asked for and you think the job would be interesting.

2.)  Look at your resume, (yes the one you worked so hard on) .  How many words do you have in your resume descriptions that are the exact words used in the job description in the post?

3.)  Change your words to match the terms and phrases in the post.  (Make sure it actually makes sense and the descriptions are accurate)

Why?  Your resume and all other resumes sent in answer to this job post will be parsed electronically looking for the best matches.  Only the resumes that most closely match will be sent to the hiring manager.

Yes you may argue that your resume says the same thing in a different way, not good enough.  Remember the first round of selection is not with a reasoning person it's with a automated computer program.  No need to get sentimental about your carefully crafted resume, the reality sometimes in getting a job is how well you play the game.

What Are You Really Worth?

On my way into the office this morning I glanced at the Wall Street Journal headline, "CEOs See Pay Fall Again".  Unemployment is still in the double digits in many geographic regions and most states have extended unemployment benefits to workers dealing with longer than expected unemployment.  So why are there unemployed people refusing interviews because the positions don't pay what they made two years ago?

We all have been forced to rethink and restructure our lives after this economic crisis hit.  Companies are needing to get more done with fewer employees, and often take less for their products and services.  It only follows that employees may be asked to take less with the hope that things will turn around.  Add to this scenario the number of employees that lost jobs due to the mass downsizing of corporate America.  Hopefully these employees have been actively seeking reemployment, volunteering to keep their skills sharp, or retraining for work in another field.  The biggest hurdle they need to overcome is the sticker shock of the new compensation packages.  Economics 101:  Supply and Demand.  The market is flooded with eager workers and there just aren't enough jobs to go around, something has to give.  What are you really worth?

I am not suggesting anyone undersell themselves or "settle" for just any job.  My biggest word of caution is, that upon hearing what the job pays, don't react immediately, take some time to look at the package from every conceiveable angle.  Does this job utilize and challenge your interests and skills?  What does the total compensation add up to?  If you once worked for salary and benefits and you are presented with a job that is base salary, benefits and either a commission or bonus program, don't be quick to turn down the interview because the base salary doesn't equal the salary of your last job.  Stop to consider commission and/or bonus may be structured to allow you to make much more than the salary you had. To clarify my point; a recruiter friend of mine called someone, who had been out of work for 25 months,  she was trying to fill a position almost identical to the one he was right sized out of.  The company was new to the market so the growth potential was unlimited, the office was within five miles of his house.  The compensation was base salary, generous medical, and performance based bonus.  Unfortunately the candidate only heard the base salary number and turned down the interview because his last salary was more.  He not only lost out on a "seemed to be written for him opportunity" but he torched the bridge with my recruiter friend.

In your own job search be open to all possibilities.  By interviewing frequently for jobs that offer promise or almost fit you are broadening your reach of contacts allowing you to find the perfect job, just be realistic and thoughtful as to what you're worth.

The World's Oldest Profession

No, I know what you are thinking and this is not about prostitution.  The oldest profession is sales of which prostitution is just a sub group, funny how it has been tagged as , "the oldest profession".  Now why does sales belong on a blog about interns and job search?  Simply put, getting a job or internship requires some selling.

When I did sales training the sales model of the day was "need/benefit sales".  It was a very straight forward concept, ask the buyer a series of probing questions to uncover what was important to him/her in a product (needs).  Using that information demonstrate how your product addressed what the buyer deemed important (benefit).

Again you ask, "why am I going off on a tangent about sales models?  This is supposed to be about landing a job!"   Stop and think, every time you write a resume or cover letter or go for an interview you are selling.  The product is you.  Now in the context of "need/benefit" selling start thinking in terms of how employing you will benefit the organization you are interviewing.  Too often we get caught up in "the job" and we fail to see beyond the interview and how we see ourselves in a particular position within the organization.  When the hiring manager tells you the job description do you think "sounds interesting", or do you think "I did something like that as.....(volunteer, intern, practicum, last position) and this is how effective I was...(any measurable outcome)?  If you were the hiring manager which train of thought would you seriously consider?  If you did not already "sell" that you are qualified for the job you would not be asked to interview.  Now the hiring manager is looking for the one candidate that will not just do the job but benefit the organization.  The selling doesn't stop because you got the interview, the interview is the stage for your best selling effort.

To effectively sell yourself in the interview you need to have researched the organization.  Know who you are interviewing with, what the organization does, who their competitors are, what their market share is, what the corporate climate is like, what does the open position involve, what are the qualifications.  The internet is a big help with many of these unknowns, better yet is finding someone on the inside.  From this information try to determine what you offer that is of benefit to the organization.  What problem can you solve, where can you improve the bottom line, what needs does employing you benefit?  Now go sell, that one product you should know better than anything else, yourself.