Employment Digest

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Transitioning From Military To Civilian Employment: How To Best Present Yourself

Capt. Marc Cervantes, front, fills out paperwork as he and other soldiers line up for outprocessing following a graduation ceremony Friday, May 13, 2005, at Fort Bliss, Texas. The Pentagon on Friday proposed shifting thousands of military jobs to Texas, but many local officials still felt they’d taken a punch to the gut from the plan to close several of the state’s installations.

Military personnel can offer a great deal of experience and dedication to prospective commercial employers. Yet their capabilities are often discounted if they adhere to a formal military-style resume.
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Experience, enthusiasm big factors in landing job

Over the next few weeks thousands of Buffalo area college students will make the big leap from learner to worker. Those lucky enough to have snagged a job will trade the pressures of term papers and exams for bright and early starting times, project deadlines, staff meetings, with the bonus of a grown-up paycheck.

Meanwhile, graduates without clear plans will face a summer of resume writing, want-ad combing, interviews and (hopefully) job offers.
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The art of the interview, US style

Brandeis University professor Andrew Molinsky will never forget the conversations he had with newly settled Russian refugees who wanted to find work with US employers.

Molinsky, a volunteer at the nonprofit Jewish Vocational Service in Boston, taught refugees about the fine art of the American interview. He told them to make direct eye contact, deliver a vigorous hand shake, make small talk and be honest - but not too honest.

However, one Russian client was having so much difficulty that he confided to Molinsky that he felt like he was “committing a crime against my own personality.”
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State of the Sector: Recruitment and Staffing

Employers get smarter about using the Web and strengthen employee referral programs. Meanwhile, companies that match job seekers and employers report that business is picking up.

As more people enter the workforce, a hiring manager in a bind may discover that fresh talent is as close as the nearest computer terminal–and the person sitting in front of it.

The Internet and employee referrals, accounted for more than 61 percent of external hires in 2004 among companies surveyed by CareerXroads, a recruiting technology consultancy in Kendall Park, New Jersey. That figure has jumped in each of the past three years, keeping pressure on traditional means of hiring as the economy improves.
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Wanted: A Resume That Really Works

You’ve seen it for yourself. You’re starting to get more calls from recruiters or, even, directly from companies. The job market for marketers has definitely heated up, and at all levels. The reasons: Pent-up demand? Healthier growth across a number of sectors? Could be

the companies just couldn’t wait any longer to fill critical needs. You can only cut so many costs before you have to deal with driving revenues, right?
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First Rule of Job Hunting: Be Memorable

The concept of me writing an advice column about finding jobs in journalism is laughable. It would be akin to me writing a column giving advice on relationships, meaning it’s only possible if you subscribe to the theory that those who can’t do something teach it (a theory that isn’t very popular among professors in a university setting).

I just graduated college and still haven’t found a job.

Nevertheless, I have made enough mistakes to give some pointers to jobseekers, so perhaps they will not repeat my errors.
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Is that job offer a good deal for your career?

Congratulations! Your search has paid off. One company has made an offer and you expect another one any day. But now you’re faced with a difficult decision - whether to accept the position you’ve been offered, or hold out for a better one.

If you reject the job offer you’ve received and don’t get the one you’re expecting, you’ll have to start your job search all over again. And if you take a job that turns out to be unsatisfactory, again you’re back at square one. Fortunately, most organizations won’t expect you to accept or reject an offer on the spot. You’ll probably have at least a week to make up your mind.
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al.com: Business

When I suggest to my job-seeking clients that they network, I often hear the following reaction, whether they are introverts or extroverts:

“I know networking is important, but it’s so hard to do. I’d much rather answer ads or put my resume on the Internet.”
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Market forces facing age

For tens of millions of baby boomers and younger workers, the basic long-range financial plan is simple: accumulate stocks and bonds while working, then slowly sell them off to keep up a comfortable lifestyle in retirement.

Not so fast, says Jeremy Siegel, the Wharton School finance professor well-known until now for recommending stocks as a long-term investment. In speeches and a new book — The Future for Investors, he is warning that a flood of boomer retirees with trillions of dollars of assets to sell over the next 20 to 40 years threatens to crush stock and bond prices. He says it will take a massive investment in U.S. stocks by people in India, China and other developing countries to prevent a market meltdown.
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Skeptics Take Another Look at Social Sites

There was a time when David Sze, a venture capitalist at Greylock Partners, could be counted among those skeptical of the millions of dollars being poured into Internet companies that were creating online communities to foster business and social contacts.

“Basically, it reminded us a lot of what we saw in the late 1990’s,” Mr. Sze said of the first rush of investment in social networking ventures in 2003. “It was, ‘Let’s hope some users come and if they do, we’ll figure out how to turn that into a business.’ We didn’t see a real business model there.”
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