Confessions of a Job Seeker (and Recruiter)

Recruiter Chris Brablc fresh off his own job search shared the highlights of what he learned from the process for both sides of the job-search fence.

Cover letters still matter. They were a differentiator for him on several occassions.
Stalk a company. More and more advice says to target a company then break into the social networks [...]

NABE Economists Predict “Jobless Recovery” Until Summer 2010

The nation’s leading business economists are growing more optimistic about the prospects of an economic recovery this quarter and next.
Members of the National Association of Business Economists (NABE) said they expect (survey) the economy to grow at an annual rate of 3 percent for the fourth quarter and to grow 3.2 percent in 2010. NABE [...]

Hired Guns Too Often Shoot Blanks

Does it pay to hire the best candidate money can buy? Probably not, said Jeffrey Pfeffer, a professor of organizational behavior at Stanford’s Graduate School of Business.
More often than not the hired gun is a dud, he said. “Outside successors seldom succeed.” Nevertheless, businesses love hiring outsiders (especially for chief executive officer and other C-level [...]

Executive Compensation Limits Not Driving Out Talent: Pay Czar Kenneth Feinberg

Executive compensation rules are not driving away talent at seven affected banks, said Kenneth Feinberg, the Obama administration’s “Pay Czar.”
Feinberg said Thursday the restrictions were “based on fact, cooperative input and evaluating evidence presented to him,” said a MarketWatch report.
“I don’t believe we are discouraging talent,” Feinberg said at a Bloomberg Summit in Washington. Feinberg’s [...]

JPMorgan Chase to Hire 1,200 in 23 States

MarketWatch: JPMorgan & Chase announced plans Tuesday to hire 1,200 mortgage loan officers as the bank moves to expand its home loan business.
New loan officers will be hired in 23 states, including finance jobs in Chicago, New York, California, Florida and Texas, according to CNNMoney.
Chase weathered the downturn in the housing market better than rival [...]

Prepare for a “Jobless Recovery”: Fed Officials

Miami Herald: Unemployment likely will remain high for the next several years because the economic recovery won’t be strong enough to spur robust hiring, Federal Reserve officials warned Tuesday.
…rising unemployment could crimp consumers, restraining the recovery. Consumer spending accounts for about 70 percent of economic activity.
“With such a slow rebound, unemployment could well stay high [...]

Employment Background Checks Send Job Seekers to Court

Wall Street Journal: U.S. job seekers are crashing into the worst employment market in years and background checks that reach deeper than ever into their pasts. The result: a surge of people seeking to legally clear their criminal records.
(Image by dbking via Flickr, CC3.0)
For more on employment background checks:

Checklist: Clean Up Your Web Trail
What Can [...]

New Job Openings Rise, But Barely

The Labor Department’s Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey, released yesterday, showed that the number of new, open positions increased slightly in August and September.
The number of unfilled positions rose 57,000 (or about 2 percent) to 2.48 million, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) report. Openings remain down by 2.3 million, or 48 [...]

Guess Which Resume Got Ignored

Secrets of the Job Search shared the tale today of a hiring manager at a small company with no human resources department to rely on who managed to screen through 77 resumes and discard most in just a few days.
How she did it offers a lesson in how to submit your resume, right down to [...]

Turn the Table on the Job Interviewer at Your Own Peril

What’s your pet peeve in an employee?
The blog Clue Wagon recommends a job seeker ask a potential manager this question during a job interview. “This is a great question to ask your potential boss. You may save each other a lot of grief.” (8 Questions to Ask in a Job Interview)
It might also cause [...]