Six Steps & You're Hired from DEC Consultants

Reasons for Not Getting the Interviews

Previous post was talking about the reasons for not getting past the interviews.  Now would like to turn your attention to actually getting the interviews.  Or rather - reasons for not getting the interviews.

Chicago Examiner's Andrea Persico gives 10 of such reasons in her August 8, 2010 article.

1. Sending a resume to the wrong person: don't miss the opportunity to send it to a higher level person, especially when you are very qualified for the position.
2. Lack of Follow Up.  That's exactly what I meant in the end of the last post - getting an interview is only half of the work, making sure that you keep your candidacy in front of the mind of the hiring party is extremely important considering the high competition in today's job market.
3. Resumes in a bizarre format.  Follow requirements and keep it simple, avoid extravaganza.
4. TMI, i.e. Too Much Information.  Focus on the job and your skills in the writing and during the oral conversation, skip over-sharing pictures or personal stories.
5. You are not on LinkedIn.  And you have to be in this day and age.  Otherwise you may be considered out of touch with modern trends.  And you may miss out on finding job openings posted only on LinkedIn.
6. Off Key.  Use as many keywords from the job description as possible in the resume and interview.
7. Socially Unacceptable. If keeping up with the trends is not a problem for you, then you can likely be found on Facebook, Twitter or other social network, in which case it makes sense to keep them "clean" enough in case your prospective employer decides to check you out there.
8. Disorganized.  Remember which companies and positions you applied for, otherwise you may leave a bad first impression right during the first conversation with the potential employer.
9. Not Qualified.  If you don't meet minimum job requirements, the chances are so low for getting a response, that it's not worth spending time on this kind of application.
10. Cyber stalker.  Refers to a person who applies to numerous positions in the same company telling the employer that you lack focus and can't properly estimate your strength and qualifications, because you can't be qualified to all positions!

Reasons Why Employers Take a Pass on Applicants

San Francisco Examiner ran a good article by Marvin Walberg on January 5, 2010 titled "Reasons why employers take a pass on applicants."  Among the reasons why applicants are said to fail during the interview process are:

• Not being over the previous job or expressing anger or disappointment with previous employer
• Not asking for the job or not inquiring to what the net step is
• Lacking humor, warmth or personality
• Failing to set yourself apart from others
• Trying to set yourself apart from others
• Trying to be "all things to all people"
• Not successfully transferring past experience to the current opportunity
• Making an inappropriate personal presentation
• Not following up frequently and assertively

Try to practice these advices throughout the whole application process, starting from resume and cover letter building and all the way to the interview follow up, because remember - interview is only one step of getting your foot in the door!

'Milestone' stem cell advance reported

The possible discovery of taking ordinary human skin cells and converting them into chameleon-like powers of embryonic stem cells is an exciting possible breakthrough that might someday deliver the medical payoffs of embryo cloning without the controversy. Interesting article on latest developments here.

This trend will contribute to the long-term job security and need for individuals to choose a career Health care -- the hot field to find a job in with  demand expected to grow 26% in 7 years!