Just the job for you.

I found this job for you on craigslist. I kind of want to apply for it. Do you?

Super busy affluent SF Arts/ Entrepreneur who travels a lot for work needs part time help finding a girlfriend/LTR. I figured that someone out there must have the skills and time to do this for me, like hiring a recruiter to help find the right employee. This is a project that might take a month or two. The pay would be $30 an hour up to $5000 with a bonus if we succeed. I am a 50 something year old fit, smart, attractive, cultured, extrovert, humorous, white guy married once no kids. And I am a quasi high profile SF person with full a biography and photos online i.e. not some closet weirdo. I’m looking for a youthful super smart stylish creative urban woman who lives in SF for LTR. That seems pretty straightforward. The job would involve finding and interviewing 5- 10 women online and in person (I am picky visually). It would take a couple months I assume.
If you are interested in this job, please send me a note and let me know why you would be good at it, why I should trust you, and how you would go about it. Confidentiality and discretion on all levels is a priority. I’ve never done this before, and I am neither patient nor experienced with online dating. You need to be SF based, college educated, smart and street savvy, with a highly organized nature, great sense of humor, refined taste and an especially good eye. You can send me a resume if you want, but this is not essential

Twitterployed?

Today Forbes posted an article about using Twitter to find a job. Here are some highlights:

• Make sure your account name contains something about your profession, so your feed shows up when people search associated topics.
  
• Search for industry leaders and other people and companies in your field you’d like to know—some firms even post job openings on their feeds. Sign up to follow their tweets.
  
• In your tweets, offer your opinions on news and seminars relevant to your career. If one of the important people you’ve been following says something notable on a professional topic, forward it or post an open comment.
  
• If you’re following a hiring manager at a firm you’re interested in, tailor your tweets to comment on issues he or she posts about.

Courtesy of Newser.

What have you done lately?

Has it been about 49 years since you wrote or updated your resume? This is a common fear I am hearing somewhat frequently, especially in this so called "economy" where you want to be sure you cram all of the amazing things you have done and know how to do  into a few measly bullet points. How are they going to know how awesome you are?! Why don't they call me for an interview already!? What font should I use!? All of these fears are valid. I don't have a suggestion for some kind of magic class you can take where they will teach you all of these things but I do have some thoughts to help you out. One of them I outlined here. 

Another thought is to get together a group of both employed and job-free friends for a resume review. Start by making your resume like 5 pages long. Just dump everything in there that you can think of. Then you can narrow it down and tailor it to fit the details of certain jobs. Once you have your friends gathered you can have them review your pared down, final one-page resume. I have always heard that it's best for everything to fit on one page. Does anyone know if this is still the case? Are there instances when it is not? Anyway, I think it's best to rely on your friend family to give you input, assuming your friends are smart and honest. Have your other jobless friends bring theirs so that by the end of the night everyone is sort of drunk on Chuck Shaw and has a solid starting point from which to land the job of their dreams. Rad, right?

Whoa, buddy.

Anyone who doesn't have a job knows that there are not many options out there. I remember in 2003 when I was unemployed after a move there were at least 293 jobs per day listed on Craigslist within my given category. Now there are about 9 per day and at least 3 of them are internships. I have contemplated endlessly the future ramifications of having either a bunch of teenagers creating strategic marketing plans or of having 42 year old professional interns at work. Both are depressing. Anyway, I have recently come to the conclusion that it is necessary to take serious sweet time when applying for a job. I have started writing down the details of the job description on a big piece of paper and sitting with it for a day. I list every task and function at previous jobs that relates to each point on the description. I then use that to draft my cover letter and customize my resume. I tangle with the dilemma over whether or not I should be the very first person to apply or if I can literally sound like I have identical experience only submitted a few days after others. It's tough out there, but I think patience is key. At some point the interns will start sucking and they will need us back. 

Card me.

I realized the other day that I was formerly addicted to handing out business cards as a half joke, half tipsy attempt to make tons of friends. Unfortunately, when you don't have a job anymore that effort is challenged by the fact that you don't have any accurate business cards to hand out to people. Random torn up pieces of paper and gum wrappers are not hot, so I decided to order business cards. Have you heard of Vista Print? They like free magic things like business cards. Basically there are 10201010 different designs and you just pay for shipping. I assumed there were other sites where you could make this happen, so just Google "free business cards." You'll be shocked. 

Anyway, thankfully last night I had a social engagement where I found myself the one person with whom I was not intimately acquainted (not like that) and decided to try out my new business card. It was pretty satisfying, not an exact replica for the feeling of confidence that comes with handing out a card associated with an actual job, but close enough!

Post-camp blues.

Yesterday was LaidOffCamp in San Francisco. It was a huge gathering and I had high hopes that I would leave with some kind of amazing inspiration and also a job. Unfortunately, that didn't happen. It was quite unorganized and for someone like me who is overly regimented and likes to plan things to death, I got distracted by the mayhem and had to leave after lunch. However, before I did, I sat through one really informative session about social networking on social media sites and how to brand yourself appropriately. 

John McCrea, VP of Marketing at Plaxo spoke along with Valerie Gonyea, a career consultant. They had a lot of great insight into the job hunt, considering the fact that this is the first major economic downturn with so many efficient tools to leverage one's network. Some thoughts:

• Use people you DO know to make connections to people you DON'T know on LinkedIn. They list connections to certain people who are directly connected to other contacts whose companies are hiring. Request introductions through your contacts.
• When trying to make connections related to a new job, don't go after the HR person but try and find out who the hiring manager is. 
• All networking sites should be accessible to the right people. If you have a personal blog or photo site featuring parties and running around like a freak, make that either an alias or private to only your friends/family. Plaxo has the ability to link all of your sites (Twitter, Flickr, MySpace, Facebook, LinkedIn) but you can edit accessibility so you're able to share different things with different people. 
• Your brand is the sum total of your education, personality, skills and expertise brought together to form an identity. In order to form an online identity, use a dashboard like Plaxo or Friend Feed to bring all of your information together in one place. And to reinforce this, use the exact same user name and photo.  
• Blog! Twitter!
• Make your "About me" the same across all sites.
• When commenting in forums, create a stamp with links to all of your appropriate sites. Comment intelligently on sites that pertain to your industry. When you sound like a serious expert, you want your LinkedIn profile to be the thing they click on to learn more about you.
• Think about the descriptors that best describe who you ARE personally and what you want to BE professionally. Flush out this description and apply that to your profiles.

So, again, I feel like this was a great opportunity that was in some ways squandered. I know they were eager to have the content generated by attendees but I think some kind of expert involvement and pre-planned programming would have lent itself to a more streamlined experience. Anyway, I tried! 

Laid Off Camp.

I previously mentioned that a lot of people are job-free. So many that things called LaidOffCamps are springing up all over the place. The website says:

LaidOffCamp was founded in January 2009 by Chris Hutchins. It is an ad-hoc gathering of unemployed and nontraditionally employed people (including freelancers, entrepreneurs and startups) who want to share ideas and learn from each other. At LaidOffCamp, attendees will discuss topics in sessions that may include: living on an extreme budget, building your personal brand, how to be a freelance consultant and more. The first LaidOffCamp will occur on March 3, 2009 in San Francisco, CA.

I am attending this gathering in the morning with another laid off friend of mine. Like the first day of school, I am a little nervous. It says it's casual but I haven't gotten out of lounge wear in the non-weekend daytime for the past month. Anyway, we decided that we will go find a very cheap bar if it's scary. The website lists upcoming camps in tons of cities nationwide, so check it out. 

Job Huntress.

Ok, so maybe this isn't what my job hunt looks like, but I can use my imagination. Imagine that skull is the amazing job you are going to get. It never stood a chance, right? But how did you go about beheading it and making it your own? Here are some thoughts:

• Who is the connector in your group? Who knows everyone? Buy them a (happy hour) drink and pick their brain. Ask them to introduce you to people who work in fields that interest you. I think it's called networking, but that is for losers. You're a winner.
• Make a HUGE list of every company you like. Which brands are you loyal to? Who are their competitors? Where do your friends work? Can you have them bring you to work for a day to see if you like their job? Make this list LONG and detailed. 
• What are your hobbies? I like to cook so I have been trying to figure out whether or not culinary school is a good option for me. I also like eye shadow, so maybe that could be a job for me? Get my point? You don't have to stick to what you were doing. Maybe you'll take a pay cut. Maybe you'll also be happier.
• Update all of your profiles. Make your LinkedIn profile robust and detailed. Make your facebook and myspace profiles private. When you had a job it didn't matter as much if your boss saw something embarrassing. You don't likely want to be considered for a job based on your ability to write a witty status update. Know what I'm sayin?

I will get into some more detail about these things later, these are just some ideas to start kicking around. I think the most important thing here is, don't look for a job for 8 hours a day the first week you're unemployed. That will make you sad and may lead to feelings of hopelessness which is the opposite of chic.