Job Listings - Reading between the lines

You spend all day reading through job listings and come across several that you think are a perfect fit for your background and experience, you apply. Days go by and you hear nothing.

This is pretty typical for most of us searching for jobs and we all wonder...what happened to the last 20 jobs that resumes were submitted on or the last 10 positions that are still listed 2 or 3 weeks after?

Unless a Company actually responds to an applicant there is no way to contact them (unless they show the name of the company) it is basically anonymous. What could some of the reasons be for this behavior? I did a little research and this is some of what I found:

1.) The Computer - when someone applies for a job there is a computer that reads the resumes for specific key words related to that job before landing at the Company. If the right keywords aren't there, bye bye resume before it even gets to where it needs to go for consideration and we will never know it happened.

2.) Place in the search engine - If you haven't tweaked a word here and there in your resume (to refresh and keep it at the top of the search engine) at least every couple of weeks your resume will become stale and slide lower and lower in the search engine .

3.) Gathering information - some company's post job listings for information purposes, when we forward our resumes we typically have our name, address and phone number on the resume - paying for a post is far cheaper than buying a mailing list.

4.) Jobs you have no hope of being hired for - Many jobs posted are from company's that are only going to hire from the inside, but by law they have to make them available to outside job seekers - some may actually call you, give you a phone interview and appoint a face to face and then you never hear back from them. It's because it was never their intention to hire from the outside - do they care that they wasted your time? No, they only care about covering their own backs!

5.) Scam jobs - scammers have found a new way to find marks... the job boards. They know that people are desperate to find work and place legitimate looking and sounding job listings, usually with great pay and benefits geared to many different positions. We, thinking it's legit, otherwise it wouldn't be on reputable job boards, apply for them. The next day your getting an email response (usually the email address is gmail - red flag right there) from the supposed employer who is in another country that needs to hire US workers to do business here - they are SCAMS!

In my research I also learned that maybe 30% of jobs listed are actual jobs that are available, so what can a job seeker do? Unfortunately, not much because there is no way to know which jobs are legit and which are not unless you yourself keep a record of every job you read and compare them on a monthly basis and after several months it may tell the real story. That is just way too much work when your looking for a job, so what's the alternative?

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but it is starting to look like that in this recession, unless the job opening is in a company that someone you know works there and has alot of clout, the odds of getting hired may be slim. My research also showed that it takes a minimum of 17 face to face interviews before a job seeker may be offered a job.

I believe that it comes down to who you know and/or getting in front of "the right person" that is looking for "the right person" and not company's who weed great, experienced candidates out by saying they are over qualified, under qualified, made too much money before and will leave later, who has the degree that really isn't needed for the position and so on. That could happen fast or may take some time, but my opinion...chances of it happening from the Internet are slim.

There is a site where jobs are posted directly from inside each company looking to fill openings, these company's NEVER post on outside job boards. The website is: www.linkup.com (NOT linkedin)

I would also continue to look in the Sunday newspaper, believe or not some company's still place want ads the traditional way. Send out your resume to company's that hire in your field - there may be a job coming up where your experience is needed and the company wouldn't need to place ads or wade through mountains of resumes. Also, networking with people you know who have a job.



My next topic is Networking and Job Fairs- do they help better the odds?