Narrowing the Job Search

After doing some more research, I've decided to keep my job search quite narrow. Normally this is a terrible idea. However, I have my reasons. Here are my current job hunting goals:

1) Apply only for jobs that can count as service toward my pension. That means anything with TRS or ERS (the latter can be transferred). Why:
a) Every year I work, I qualify for an extra year of retirement pay. (That's tens of thousands of dollars.)
b) Every year I work, I add 2.3% of the average of my 5 most highly-paid years to my retirement salary forever. (It would take quite a lot of savings to generate that much money myself.)

2) Apply only for UT jobs. Why:
a) If my last job where I qualify for insurance is a state job that is not one of the UT system components, I can't get the good, free health insurance. (The alternative is a high-deductible health insurance is fine for now, but might not stay fine all the way until I am 65.)
b) The other UT system components are farther away than I want to commute.

3) Don't apply for UTemp jobs. They do not count toward the pension. I suppose I could get one of these in the near future and keep hunting for other jobs.

This is very limiting. I'm going to a retirement presentation next week to confirm all this.

Job Hunting Seminars

Wednesday I went to three job hunting seminars presented by Workforce Solutions. I figured they might be useful but even if they weren't, they'd count toward the five job-hunting activities I'm supposed to do every week to qualify for unemployment compensation. As it turns out, I did learn a few things.

First I learned where the center was. There are three centers in Austin, and it was recommended that I go to the one in the scary part of town (i.e., east Austin, not that far south of 12th Street). It was, indeed, easy to get to, and although I could see the projects all around it, they still look in good shape. More importantly, the center is on an Austin Community College campus which is a rather large oasis, so I felt safe.

Basic Resume Lab

I figured we'd be in a lab entering our information into their system. Nope, the class was a lecture.

I also figured it was quite likely this would be mostly useless to me, but I was wrong. First, I learned about GoodWill's free tutorials on lots of interesting stuff: job hunting skills, different kinds of software and social networking sites, and other odd things like finances. I have not yet tried any of the tutorials, but it looks promising for beginner information.

I also learned a few strategies for dealing with their system that I might not have guessed on my own:
* Leave the Career Objectives section blank unless you are only looking for one very specific kind of job.
* List job skills in the Job Duties section - no one cares what you did for someone else; they want to know what you can do for them.
* Even if you have important skills, don't use any of the skills sections when printing your resume. Instead, include those skills in the Summary of Qualifications section which is front and center.
* Always select the PDF version--it can be read by anyone if you're sending it out, and it can easily more be copied and pasted into a wordprocessing document than the HTML version.

Other things I will have to think about:
* Use only 3 - 5 bullet points per job.
* Use "NA" instead of leaving sections blank. I prefer "n/a." I should probably look up whether there is preferred usage.

Advanced Resumes and Cover Letters

This one was by a different instructor. Here are some things he emphasized that I might not have thought of myself:
* Resumes are forever. Employers can continue doing keyword matching even after the job you applied for is closed. And they will because they don't like posting jobs.
* People do not need to know everything you know or everything you've done. Just tell them what they need to know, when they need to know it--don't let yourself look overqualified.

He emphasized listing key results rather than job duties. I've never thought I could word things like that. For example, I don't know how many course changes I processed or how much more accurate degree audits became as a result. I can't measure how much more competent, efficient, and/or stress-free my trainees were after I completed training sessions with them. I don't think quoting people who've called me a lifesaver or some sort of deity are exactly appropriate.

He likes one-page "combination" resumes where you list your relevant experiences separately from your employment history, but also recommends that you describe what each employer does in the employment history section. I use two-page chronological resumes. (I'm finally looking for work that's quite a bit like the work I just did, so this seems appropriate to me.) And he admits two pages are okay if you really need all that information; it's just that most people don't. I may try to make a resume like he recommends and compare it to the type of resume I normally make and see what I think. I definitely want to try fitting everything on one page and see how I think that represents me.

This class ran over by 30 minutes, so I'd only have to wait 30 minutes instead of an hour for the next class, to be offered by the same guy, so I decided to stay, thus saving myself a trip some other time. Fortunately, I had brought a small lunch (thinking I might need a snack).

Job Search Strategies

First he said than when employers need a new person, they try to find them using the following avenues, from favorite to least favorite:
* the principal (someone who gets it), the owners (who have the most to lose), and the senior department heads (who also have a lot to lose)
* customers (who are vested in them) and vendors (also vested in them)
* friends and relatives (the people who they have been bragging to)
* HR (which are no longer personnel but just screen people out and ensure compliance)
* staffing agencies
* the state workforce commission
* the newspaper

Those first three bullets are networking. The worst-case scenario is advertising the job.

He concludes that you should spend 80% of your day following up with your networks and only 20% of your time on the other stuff--which is the opposite of what most job hunters do.

Unfortunately, his ideas about networking all disgust me. It's a lot of pushy salesman strategies. But I do need to make sure that my work colleagues know whether I'm available and how to reach me. I can't help thinking that all UT jobs have to be advertised, but of course I just got three unadvertised jobs there, so clearly I've been wrong about that. I now think I will used LinkedIn as well as e-mails to accomplish this networking.

There are also a lot of handouts to read (which were not thorough covered in class), so I'll be doing that.

I might try this same workshop at the north Austin location to see how another instructor would handle it.

In summary, this place is not a bad resource. Last time I went there, back when it was located downtown, I found them completely useless. I filled in a bunch of information and they sent me so-called job matches that were barely minimum wage and had nothing to do with my past experience or what I was looking for. I didn't notice any other resources (well, maybe there were some one-page papers on things like resumes and cover letters). But that was over two decades ago now.