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Successful job hunts require more than just a resume

Many baby boomers can still remember the days when applying for a job often involved long hours in front of a typewriter, painstakingly crafting cover letters to potential employers and stuffing them along with a resume into envelopes for mailing.

Technological advances have expedited the process. Thanks to computers and the Internet, today’s jobseekers can apply for dozens of jobs in a day, submitting their credentials in a matter of seconds, not days.

One thing hasn’t changed, however, and that’s the anxiety some jobseekers have about whether and when to follow up to see if a prospective company has received their resume and whether the boss is interested in hiring them.

Spring Valley resident Andrew Riviere says he generally likes to follow up within two days of submitting his resume to an employer.

It’s part and parcel of the search for work that jobseekers follow up in a timely manner, says the 22-year-old Riviere, who recently graduated from Monroe College in New Rochelle with a degree in accounting.

He usually follows up by e-mail.

Riviere may be a little too eager and may want to follow up by phone rather than e-mail, says Bruce Blackwell, president of Career Strategies International in White Plains.

Blackwell says it’s a bit unrealistic to expect the hiring staff to review all submissions in 48 hours given the dozens if not hundreds of responses that employers receive in response to ads for open positions.

“You don’t want to be on it too fast, because if they haven’t received it yet you don’t have a lot to talk about (when you call),” he says.

Moreover, Blackwell says calling, rather than e-mailing, shows hiring managers that you’re serious about your job search.

“E-mails are too easy,” he says. “It’s better than nothing, but it’s still not as good as a phone call.”

That’s not to say that making follow-up phone calls is especially difficult. Nobody — including jobseekers — likes doing them, Blackwell says. “(But) those that do are generally regarded as having a little bit more courage, a little bit more dedication.”

Not everyone agrees that phone calls are the best route, however.

Pamela Weisberg, executive director at Tomorrow’s Workplace in Spring Valley, prefers candidates follow up with written correspondence, be it an e-mail or a letter.

“People get annoyed with the phone calls,” she says.

Like Blackwell, however, Weisberg suggests jobseekers wait about a week to 10 days before following up.

Additionally, both employment experts say that handwritten correspondence isn’t an appropriate way to follow up a resume submission. It’s an intimate gesture that’s best used after an interview or meeting, Weisberg says.

While technology has made things vastly easier for jobseekers, including the ability to apply for positions anywhere in the world, it has made following up with some employers more difficult. That’s because Internet job boards allow for employers to cloak their ads, which can leave applicants scrambling to other sources to find street or e-mail addresses or telephone numbers.

In such an instance, jobseekers may have to be more resourceful, taking the time to research contact information in a business database such as Hoover’s, which Tomorrow’s Workplace has available for use by its clients.

If jobseekers aren’t getting responses to their resumes, Weisberg says, it’s time to take a look at reformatting it in a more eye-catching manner or better highlighting career experiences.

And sometimes it’s just a matter of waiting, which can be anxiety producing in its own right.

But Riviere doesn’t let any lack of response get him down.

“It doesn’t bother me,” he says. “You always have to keep your options open.”