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Archive for recruitment

The New Candidate Profiles and Their Impact on Your Job Search or Business

November 24th, 2020

How many times have you heard the statement to be careful what you post online? Well, it turns out that companies are exploiting information they can access in the public domain about job candidates, including those posts you wish you had never made. Whether full-time, part-time, contract or temporary worker, a company may wish to know just as much about an entrepreneur contracting with them for a month, as they do about a full-time employee.  While there’s a bevy of software available to scan resumes for keywords, more-and-more, organizations are seeking to create a full-fledged profile on their candidates. Is it creepy and Big Brother-esque? Yes, but an unfortunate reality the Internet has facilitated.

What information are they targeting? Old and new resumes, blogs, and social media profiles, including those posts you so often believe are private (they aren’t), certifications, licensing, professional development, academic histories and degrees, military service, awards, presentations, and papers, just to name a few.

While this offers a broader perspective on a potential new hire, the profile they develop on you can be polar opposite of what you are attempting to convey on your resume and in the interview. Hence, why what you post matters, and why those old YouTube videos of you, particularly the live videos that tend to be less than flattering, need to go. From throwing your computer out the window during a temper tantrum, doing live makeup applications with friends in high school and college, and nearly crippling yourself doing wild skateboard jumps, to smoking pot on camera, all can eliminate you from consideration for a job.  Any job! Not to mention get you featured on the show Ridiculousness. Certainly, you may have been intending to garner this attention at the time – but let it go for the sake of your career!

Ask yourself: should the company believe your resume and interview, or the comprehensive profile they developed containing contradictory information? Make them ask that question and we can guess what will happen. Ultimately, I see this technology impacting any aspect of a career, from job search to promotion, entrepreneurs, and for college admissions.

So, what can we do to stop past poor decisions from haunting us? My advice to clients is to go through their social media and to Google themselves to see what else comes up that they have forgotten about over time. First up – scrape all social media, videos, and blogs and get rid of nasty comments (particularly you fighting with others online, and political and religious insults and articles). Be sure to go back to the beginning and clean up your posts. This isn’t about stating you love a particular political candidate or God, but the negative comments and articles that cause issue. Why should a company hire someone they believe will come and start political arguments or push religion or non-religion on others? Trust me, they won’t! 

Next, get rid of excessive cussing in posts, videos, and blogs, look through your pictures and delete most of those with you drinking alcohol (a little bit is okay, but some people are way too “thirsty” in all their pictures) and definitely all of them where you are doing drugs – I shouldn’t have to say why. The fights you get into on social media with others need to go to, and so do all those personal posts on health issues and family problems.  Then find the “friends and family” that continually do the same and unfriend them. But Karen, you say, I can’t unfriend my Mom, best friend, or anyone to whom I am connected. Actually, you can, and my clients regularly do so with just a small explanation about how it can hurt their job search. If these people truly care about you, they will understand. Find the old profiles that you haven’t deleted, old resumes posted on Monster, CareerBuilder, etc., and delete, delete, delete. 

Blessedly, once something is deleted, it will be increasingly harder to find. My clients have seen a job search or career revitalized after ridding their social media of questionable content, negative political and religious opinions, and old profiles they forgot existed. The impact of having a positive overall profile cannot be underestimated with so many companies doing a “deep dive” on candidates.

I realize the temptation that exists to share this information, but do so privately with friends and family in conversation to avoid having it online where it can come back and hurt you. Lastly, always take 24-hours before responding to an email (those can also get shared out on the Internet), post, video, etc., to ensure you have a calmer viewpoint with more context, which often will make you hit the delete button. Purge the negative from your overall “public” profile, and watch your career grow and your job search reinvigorated!

Karen Silins is a multi-certified, award winning resume writer, career, business and personal branding coach working with individuals and small businesses. After graduating with degrees in education and vocal performance, she made her own career transition into the Human Resources realm. Karen left Human Resources to become an entrepreneur and help jobseekers, executives and fellow entrepreneurs achieve their goals. She keeps current regarding trends in the resume writing, coaching, HR, small business and marketing industries by working daily with individual clients on resume development and career coaching, executive/career management coaching, consulting for small businesses in business plan development, marketing, blogging, hiring and overall HR processes, and providing 20-50+ seminars and workshops annually to a variety of organizations in the greater Kansas City area. She can be reached via her website at www.careerandresume.com.

Categories Business Coaching, Career Coaching, Career Management, Human Resources, Interviews, Job Search, Life Coaching, Personal Branding
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The Ghost is not in the Machine, it’s in the Hiring Process!

August 29th, 2016

The Ghost is not in the Machine, it’s in the Hiring Process!

The term Ghosting has become quite popular, and a common term now utilized throughout the dating world.  Even The Business Insider defines it as “the act of cutting off all contact with someone you’re romantically involved with, without offering an explanation.”  Unfortunately, this term is now bandied about in describing the behavior of a company or recruitment firm that interviews a candidate and then never contacts them back about the outcome.

The job of hiring is difficult and takes a great deal of time and energy by those involved, but so does the job search.  Imagine being out of a job for several months, applying to potentially hundreds of jobs, and getting few interviews.  However, you are excited about those interviews you do receive, that is, until there is no follow up, no call, no letter, and ultimately no response of any kind.  How would you feel?

There is never, never, an excuse for ignoring candidates and just leaving them hanging, refusing to call them back.  There is also no excuse for the following:  “if we decide to interview you, we will call you.”  What has happened to civility in the job hunt?  Recruiters, headhunters, HR, hiring managers, or whoever it is doing the hiring or contacting of candidates has a lot of explaining to do.  You simply won’t, or are too lazy, to get back with those you have interviewed.  We aren’t talking about the Applicant Tracking System and the lack of response there (don’t even get me started on that subject), but we are talking about the common courtesy you should show candidates YOU called for phone interviews, or better yet, interviewed in person.

While I understand it can be awkward to tell jobseekers they weren’t selected for a position, you still owe them a call.  They care greatly, and deserve to be notified of the outcome.  However, you choose to leave them hanging, not returning calls, and are, should I say it, rude, if they do happen to catch up to you via phone.  You started this journey – you advertised the job, they spent an hour or more on your system applying for it, you phoned them, you interviewed them, it is your job to get back with them and give them closure!

The Ghost is not in the Machine, it’s in the Hiring Process!

How about we come up with an easy way to give people the unpleasant news?  This doesn’t mean they are going to like being told no, but the candidate will surely appreciate the gesture of a call.  Here is just one example that can leave a very positive impression:

“We really enjoyed getting to know you, and wanted to get back with you as soon as possible.  We had a candidate with more of the particular experience we needed, and while you weren’t selected for this position, you should definitely apply in the future for other positions with our organization.  Thank you so much for your interest in our company.”

Short, sweet, tells them someone else has been hired, encourages them to keep applying.  This person will now go and say nice things about your company, and your follow up skills.

Ghost them instead, and they will most likely no longer apply for any job at your company, and will gladly spread the word about how you treated them.  This is the case with three of my clients within the last month who were promised a call back about the next steps within days (not weeks).  Every one of them had the experience of being called, being brought in for an interview or extensively interviewed over the phone recently, and then nothing, just silence.  Each followed up, and each received no response.  This didn’t happen over a two day period, this is over the last month.

The Ghost is not in the Machine, it’s in the Hiring Process!

I then hear a lot of my recruitment and HR colleagues saying they don’t understand why jobseekers say bad things about their company online.  However, you are making it more difficult for you and your company when the candidates are treated as if they aren’t important enough for a short phone call.

Yes, sometimes the candidate wants to hear why they didn’t get hired in more detail.  Just tell them the other person had more experience and don’t get into the subject of what they can do better unless you are a retained or contingency recruiter advising them for a future, potential position.  Let the jobseeker know again that you are encouraging them to continue to apply for jobs of interest, and wish them great success.

Leaving people hanging is just impolite.  Help a candidate out and give them a call to tell them yes or no, or keep them updated on the process when it takes longer than expected – it will make you feel better, and help them to move on.

 

Karen Silins is a multi-certified, award winning resume writer, career, business and personal branding coach working with individuals and small businesses.  After graduating with degrees in education and vocal performance, she made her own career transition into the Human Resources realm.  Karen left Human Resources to become an entrepreneur and help jobseekers and fellow entrepreneurs achieve their goals.  She keeps current regarding trends in the resume writing, coaching, HR, small business and marketing industries by working daily with individual clients on resume development and career coaching, consulting for small businesses in business plan development, marketing, blogging, hiring and overall HR processes, and providing 50-70+ seminars and workshops annually to a variety of organizations in the greater Kansas City area.  She can be reached via her website at www.careerandresume.com.

Categories Human Resources, Job Search
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Shake It Off

February 11th, 2015

Shake It Off

Bias Wordcloud

About two to three times a year someone writes a “Nasty-Gram” article about how all Career Coaches and Resume Writers are charlatans, and naturally professionals in this industry get very upset.  This is what happened in the most recent case with Matt Charney’s article on Recruiting Daily.  Mind you Matt is “friends” with many of us, including me on some social media outlets, so this was a bit of surprise coming from him.  This is a man who describes himself on Twitter as “snarky and gangsta” and purposely works to get under people’s skin.  Mr. Charney can also be outrageously funny and has a passion for jobseekers being treated well, something I truly appreciate.  The thing about this particular article that really angered our community was his purposeful targeting of colleagues for which Mr. Charney, a very smart guy, didn’t really do his research, but definitely made his suppositions from the limited research as if it were fact.  We need to shake these things off as an industry and continue to do our job well as professionals. Matt is actually, from what colleagues say (I made a couple of calls), a pretty good guy, but I will, as a response from an industry professional that has been in business as a Resume Writer, Career Coach, and Business Coach for 16 years, make a point in this article about the ignorance of blanket categorizations.

Just as in Mr. Charney’s industry, there are people who become a Career Coach or Resume Writer for the wrong reasons, including the hobbyist, the “might get rich” people , the “don’t know anything about the industry” people, the lazy “simple template” people, and the “I think I’m qualified because I offered some career advice or wrote my own resume” people.  When I mentor new resume writers and career coaches I tell them plain and simple – you impact a person’s ability to earn a living, get a job, put food on the table, pay their mortgage, and sometimes self-worth, you had better know your craft, and constantly be educated in it!!!

I also work with recruiters frequently and many of them are good friends and individuals who are incredibly knowledgeable, and I regularly recommend these recruiters to my clients.  Just because there are a few people in recruitment who don’t understand recruitment, HR, applicant tracking systems, the hiring process in general, and only want the potential client commission (the jobseeker be damned), doesn’t mean that is how everyone in the industry operates.

Here’s just a small list of job titles that regularly get complained about in an uninformed manner as if everyone in that profession is problematic:

Recruiters and Headhunters (internal/corporate, contingency and retained)

Web Designers

Human Resources Personnel

Police Officers

Accountants

Doctors

Home Improvement / Construction Personnel

Attorneys

Salespeople

…and any government employee, just to name a few…

So, let’s take a detour about the harm of judging without proper information.  I learned early in my life of the preconceived notions others can have about a profession – my father was a Kansas City, Missouri Police Officer.  No other profession gets the kind of ill treatment and almost gleeful bad press as police officers.  Despite their hard work, he and his colleagues were, and still are, called racists, cruel, stupid, Neo Nazi’s, pigs, and many inappropriate words I can’t put in this article. From being cursed at, yelled at and sometimes nearly killed for giving someone a speeding ticket, to being shot at for trying to stop a crime in process, both the dangers and inane comments are endless.  Yes, some police officers have been awful people, but most civilians know that this is a very small portion of the profession as a whole and don’t spend their time putting ill-informed comments on the Internet saying all policeman are bad.

My father was a true hero in every sense of the word and taught me never to make blanket assertions about a person, their job and industry in general, race, religion or politics, but to look at the whole individual and their true intent.  Here’s a small encapsulation of his career:  Medal of Valor, Police Officer of the Year, Police Officer of the Month, featured on television (multiple interviews), the Kansas City Star, and The Call, numerous commendations, promotion to Detective, promotion to Sergeant, promotion to the head of the Auto Theft Unit, progression to Central Patrol Desk Sergeant in one of the toughest inner city precincts, and Sergeant on the street and Watch Commander (a huge honor), and where he loved to be – helping people directly.  He also passed the torch in both the lives he touched and police officers he mentored.

I know personally he experienced bias and assumptions merely because of the badge he wore, but didn’t allow the ill-informed to keep him from protecting the public. He shook the comments and biases off so he could do his job well.  I am proud to say I am his daughter, I look like him, have his Type A personality, have no fear of speaking in public, am entrepreneurial (he always wanted to own a business), and I don’t judge everyone in stereotypes due to what might have been a bad experience or just ignorance.  Just as my father, we as a profession should not allow an occasional uninformed article to affect our work.

Every single profession, inclusive of entrepreneurs, has the malignant personality, the lazy, the exploiter, the hobbyist, the racist or bigot, the micromanager who trusts no one, and the inept.  To categorize an entire industry negatively makes the person complaining look bad, NOT the industry, as most people reading Mr. Charney’s article will take it for what it is, blathering for attention – sorry Matt, but you are way off base this time (but I still love most of your posts and articles and will continue to share them online – as I am not judging you on just one article).  Some people like to complain about others to make themselves feel better as a person, and some to make people mad.  Shake it off, it’s not worth the anger, worry or emotion.  To quote the Taylor Swift song that I used for the article title, “and the haters gonna hate, hate, hate,” SHAKE IT OFF!

 

Karen Silins is a multi-certified resume writer, career, business and personal branding coach working with individuals and small businesses.  After graduating with degrees in education and vocal performance, she made her own career transition into the Human Resources realm.  Karen left Human Resources to become an entrepreneur and help jobseekers and fellow entrepreneurs achieve their goals.  She keeps her pulse on the resume writing, coaching, HR, small business and marketing industries by consulting for small businesses in business plan development, marketing, hiring and overall HR processes, working daily with individual clients on resume development and career coaching, and providing 50-70+ seminars and workshops annually to a variety of organizations in the greater Kansas City area.  She be reached via her website at www.careerandresume.com. 

Categories Opinion, Personal Branding
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