Maine's Job Matchmaker

Wouldn’t it be great to have the opportunity to meet with over 100
prospective employers under one roof? Tomorrow you can! Come join me at the University of Maine Career Fair from 10 am to 3 pm at the Student
Recreation and Fitness Center!

So, get your resumes ready (in bulk), put on your best professional attire, and get ready to find a new job. Be sure to stop by the jobmatchME table to say hi!

For those who have been laid off, using an employment agency might be
the answer. I spoke with Dora of Work Source Staffing Services in
Bangor and she gave me lots of great insight for those who are at the
very least looking to bring in some income while looking for their new
career path.

Dora told me that she currently has a handful of candidates for every position that comes her way.  I asked her how one might stand out in her hiring process and she gave me the following tips:

• When you go in and meet with her for the first time, go in as if you are having an interview.  Dress appropriately, be on time, and be prepared. It’s important for her to know that you are professional so that she can recommend you to the employers that come to her to fill positions. Sell yourself to her as you would at any
  interview.
• Once registering with her service, it’s important to follow up.  If you never follow up, she has no idea if you are still looking for employment or if you found another job. She attaches all e mail correspondence to a candidate’s file  so she knows the status of each candidate. Checking in on a weekly basis will remind her that you are still looking.
• Keep your options open. If Dora offers you a temporary part-time position, it could lead to a full time position. She has had many times (some very recently) where a client of Work Source has found their temporary position leading to full time employment with that company. Treat that temporary position like a try-out and you just might get a better role than you imagined!

I think this advice holds true not only for staffing agencies but with
any other company you might be interested in working for. It’s never been more important than now to stand out as a job seeker who is professional, dependable and flexible. Those qualities will help you rise to the top!

Four Maine companies have announced layoffs in the last week and more likely will follow. This isn’t an easy time to be job seeking, and it isn’t a comfortable time for those employed either. Some layoffs are unavoidable during a recession, but you may be able to help yourself by
taking a few steps now.

First, this is the time to make yourself the most reliable employee
around. Be at work when you are supposed to be there; and make your
hours at work productive, not just riding the wave until 5 pm “looking
busy.” Those employees who go above and beyond are noticed just as much as those who skate through the day hoping nobody notices.  Second, take advantage of tuition reimbursement if offered with your current employers. There is no way to better improve your value to your employer than by improving your knowledge base. Another way of becoming more valuable to your employer is to be flexible, adaptable and willing to learn as much as possible when given different tasks to complete.  Stating “it’s not in my job description” certainly is not a good idea in this day and age! Next, I offer three words of advice:  network, network, network! It never pays to talk badly about your current employer; but it does pay huge dividends if others in your line of work know who you are and what you are capable of doing. One online site that is an invaluable tool is Linkedin.com. If you use sites such as Facebook or Myspace, make sure there is nothing there that you wouldn’t want your current or future employer seeing.  Most HR managers and recruiters tell me they do go to Google to check out their candidate before an interview!

Let’s face it, even good employees do get laid off. It is best to prepare
that it might happen. If your job is specific that could be done across multiple companies, you could market yourself as a consultant. Maybe it’s time to go back to school full time or it’s time to take a step back and wonder if another career path would be a better option for you. One proactive approach an employee can take is to have their profile up to date on jobmatchME where they can specify they are a “passive” job seeker. By having a profile you will get notified when positions that you qualify for are posted. I found a blog, Colleen on Careers, that has great advice for those who have gotten laid of.

The adage comes to mind to “prepare for the worst and hope for the best.” Every economy downturn does eventually have an upswing; and whether we like it or not, we are all a part of the ride. It isn’t a time to sit back and just go along for the ride, it’s time to take over the drivers seat!

JobmatchME.com has listened to you job seekers! We have received a lot
of feedback about the search feature on our site. Overwhelmingly, the
response was that people did not like having to register before being
able to search the site by town or zip code. So, as of today you no
longer have to register in order to search the jobs! You can enter how
many miles you are willing to travel from your zip code or you can
enter which towns specifically you want to search for jobs in.

I do encourage everyone to create a profile because it’s the profiles
that prospective employers use to figure out who is qualified for the
posted jobs.

Yesterday, I was helping an employer publish her
company’s first job on Jobmatchme. Once the job description was saved
but before it was published, she saw that our site had searched the
more than 5,000 profiles placed by job seekers and narrowed the list of
qualified applicants to the best-qualified candidates. Those who didn’t
list their qualifications didn’t get chosen. This is why it’s
advantageous for job seekers to have their profile set up. So please
fill out those profiles when you get a chance. For now, however, you
can easily search for jobs whenever the urge strikes you!

Happy job hunting!

JobmatchME.com now has over 5,000 job seekers registered online! With 300 job opportunities posted, what does that mean for you?  It means that each one of you needs to find a way to stand out in the crowd. I have a few hints on how you can use the tools in jobmatchME to make you do that!

The first thing an employer is going to notice about  your profile is your email address, so make sure your address sounds professional. Names such as goodkisser, sweetpea, mudkicker, or any other fun-sounding nickname with any email address is going to not give the best first impression. My suggestion would be to use any of the free email accounts such as gmail, yahoo, or hotmail and use a combination of your first and last name with perhaps your lucky number (if your name is taken). This will immediately connect the online person with a genuine person-you!

Next, as a job seeker you need to utilize all of the jobmatchME tools to connect you with employers. When employers publish a job they will automatically have a list generated of matched candidates and how closely, on a scale of 1-100, job seekers meet their qualifications. So, as a job seeker you need to input all of the qualifications you have in all of the drop-down fields. By doing this, you have a better chance of being on the top of the list that the employer sees!

If you don’t have a resume, create one and upload it onto the job site.  If you need help with a resume the Career Centers throughout Maine are an invaluable resource. There are also many free resume templates available online. A few  that I found useful are: resumetemplates.org, landjob.com, and microsoft.com. Once that resume is created, check your spelling, proof read it, and have someone else proof read it again before uploading it online. Remember, it will be the first document that your prospective employer will have that has been created by you!

Lastly, log in to jobmatchME on a regular basis, preferably daily. Positions are uploaded daily at the Bangor Daily News onto the site and employers are uploading jobs as they decide to post them. Some employers may choose to initiate communication between themselves and the candidates online through jobmatchME. You don’t want to go weeks between logging in to your account in case an employer has contacted you for more information. This is especially important if you create an e mail account specifically for job seeking and you do not check it as often as you check your regular e mail account.

JobmatchME is a great new tool for job seekers and employers alike. It’s worth taking the time to put as much information as possible into your jobmatchme profile. You can log in at any time to edit and add more details that will help you to stand out as the job seeker to hire! If you have any questions at all feel free to e mail me at jobs@bangordailynews.net. Happy job hunting!

With the New Year there are many people out there looking for a new job. Maybe your company has downsized, or maybe you are just ready for a change and ready to try something new!  Last week I met with Vince Wank, owner of Innovative Marketing Solutions in the Target Industrial Circle in Bangor.  Vince told me exactly the type of employee he is looking for to work in his call center, “I’m looking for those people who have worked fast food or restaurant jobs who want to make better money. The reason I’m looking at those industries for my future employees is because I know they have a good work ethic and know what working hard is all about.”  So, if you are one of those job seekers who has restaurant or fast food experience be sure to go to jobmatchme.com and check out his job!