marketing yourself through social media cb

90 Grove Street, Suite 210, Ridgefield, CT 06877 www.campbellbirch.com Tel (US): (1) 203.403.9460 Email: [email protected] Tel (UK): +44 (0) 1344.424117

Copyright Suzanne Birch 2015 All Rights Reserved 1 of 14

Suzanne Birch, CEO Campbell Birch International USA and MD Campbell Birch UK Now incorporating all the services of IACCM Resourcing. With 25 years’ experience interviewing and shortlisting commercial, contracts, legal and procurement professionals for leading global employers, Suzanne is an expert adviser on CV/résumé writing, job search strategy, interview techniques and career steering. Campbell Birch (previously IACCM Resourcing) gives IACCM Corporate Members and Members business priority; advanced interviewing and skills profiling significantly improves the quality of short lists and offer/acceptance ratios. We deliver services worldwide - Retained Headhunting as well as Contingency Supply. Consultancy includes Skills Profiling, Talent Recruitment and Retention, Outsourced Support for Professionals in Transition, Enhanced Salary and Benefits Surveys, Building Talent Pools for Interim Work and Talent Pipelines to Support Regional Growth.

IACCM WNG WEBINAR 10th MARCH 2015

Social Networking Sites: New Ways to Showcase Yourself through Visual Content

An overview of the revitalised jobs market

10 quick tips to being prepared for career advancement

5 quick tips towards job search success

5 Steps to a better personal brand

Get noticed on Social Networking Sites

Looking Beyond the Major Jobs Boards

The focus of the webinar, with a bias towards finding a new position, was to raise

awareness of how so called e-recruiting has advanced and now dominates the

resourcing process, how recruiters use the internet to find candidates so that you can

prepare your media presence to be noticed, and the many other ways to use social

media to enhance your career prospects.

mailto:[email protected]


INTRODUCTION This presentation is packed with broad information leads and tips, and whilst it is comprehensive, is far from being the definitive guide. The objective is to develop your ability to take charge of your career direction and drive your motivation to explore the many ways that you can professionally and safely showcase your skills and competency’s across the internet with content that will catch the attention of e-recruiters. With the objective securely in mind, we have to look back at the building blocks that will get you there. You can’t just enthusiastically dive head first into the social media and hope for the best. Success comes from getting highly organised so that you are always ready for the next step in your career which will place you in control of and enable you to manage your career direction; preparing an effective CV/résumé and covering letter; maximising your potential through savvy and clever use of all the facilities the internet has to offer; and from developing a solid, detailed, project plan. These are the building blocks for a successful job search whether through social media, networking or the traditional route of responding to advertising. Get the foundations right and you’ll be in control of your job search, enabling you to be selective and confident that any application you make will be successful.

AN OVERVIEW OF THE CURRENT REVITALIZED JOBS MARKET

According to news reports from London and New York (7TH/8TH March 2015), America and the UK are pretty much on a par for jobs creation and unemployment figures – both now down to 5.5% - their best unemployment figures since 2007. Both are finding they are enjoying the best monthly jobs creation figures since the late 90s. Certain other countries in the EU are not so good, but even in these countries the staffing trends are up, and this is good news. Salary trends. That said, whilst placement volumes grow rapidly, salary budgets are straggling. Over the last 5 years, the typical salary increase annually has been around 1 to 3%; the typical salary increase for changing employers has been 17%. In this revitalised market place, this means employers must start considering that raising salaries is the number one way to retain talent, although I don’t envisage much change for at least a year to 18 months. Other changes to look out for. Professionals are likely to be highly motivated to move employers to improve on a stagnant salary, and they will find a greater volume of opportunities for career advancement or for a sideways move that could greatly improve work/life balance as well as income. Upon resignation, valued staff will likely have their employers counter offer – but accepting needs careful consideration - our own research indicates that 12 months after accepting a counter offer to stay with an employer, 80% of individuals are on the job hunt again, regretting the decision.


In the past six years, until the third quarter of 2014, it has been a case of job losses, and a very slowly climbing rate of jobs gain. Without a doubt, an ‘employer driven’ market place. Employers enjoyed a period of plentiful applicants for each vacancy, often applicants hungry for work having been laid off/made redundant, and prepared to compromise on salary and benefits just to keep employed. But now the pendulum is shifting, and in 2015 we will likely see a very different culture emerging. It will be a ‘candidate driven’ environment. Job seekers will have more opportunities to consider. In my view, this indicates that employers will have to adapt and will need to innovate rather more enticing selling pitches to attract interest in their vacancies, and ultimately it will prompt them to seek ‘talent’ rather than demand a very close match to a position description. Add the advancement of technology, the great new resourcing search & recruitment management software that employers and social media sites now have installed, and this has created a whole new culture to recruiting processes and an evolution in sourcing candidates through social media. Some interesting resourcing facts from a recent LinkedIn survey:

75% of professionals (on the LinkedIn site) consider themselves

“passive” (not actively looking for a new job). 75% of those who consider themselves passive remain open to being

approached. 25% say they are active, ranging from casually looking to being

aggressively proactive. In the UK 95% of employers have active e-sourcing policies. 91% in

the US. 87% is the global average. All the top search consultancies have advanced software, systems

and extremely well practiced skills in e-sourcing.

How the current culture may affect your decision to look for a new job The benefits to job seekers are plentiful. Professionals should be able to scan the market place and access more opportunities than ever before. In this current and developing jobs market climate, anyone actively searching for a new position, who has prepared effectively, should be able to find up to six positions that meet their personal criteria, and should be able to convert three of these to offers. You’ll also find that, even if you are not actively looking to change jobs, the e-recruiters will be out hunting for you, and if you want to be noticed, you’ll need to become an expert at marketing yourself through a wide variety of social media. However, waiting passively for employers to find you is not the best option. Every professional needs to be in control of their personal career plan and it’s not a good a good thing to let employers drive your changes and possibly push you off-course.


This can also happen internally if you are offered a role away from the commercial contracts or supply chain hub, and can happen if e-recruiters tempt your interest with a well-paid but non-core opportunity. Such roles, whilst putting you in the positon of being a subject matter expert, often have low level glass ceilings and, if you stay too long specialising in a non-core role, may also cut off your route to your ultimate career goal as Head of Commercial Contracts at a Director or VP level. So make sure that if you do go down these routes you’ve studied the long term implications to your personal career goals. The market conditions as they are now should enable the prepared job seeker to identify multiple opportunities, but the market will still be very competitive, now that the jobs market feels more grounded and secure, many more professionals will be casually if not seriously looking for career advancement, and professionals will need to be prepared, and very savvy about how they present themselves throughout the internet, in order to get noticed and invited to interview; and then you also have to groom yourself to get through the interview process. Recruiters and interviewers flow-process rivers of applications, yours has to get noticed – your application has to stand out from the crowd, your interviewing skills have to be robust and appealing.

ESTABLISHING YOUR CAREER PLAN

Time invested in preparation is never wasted. Snagging that perfect career advancement from an easy application to an advertisement, or a head-hunter’s call out of the blue, rarely happens when you most want it to. The majority of professionals are frustrated when:

You submit an application for a job you know you could deliver well, and

you don’t even get a response. An e-recruiter or search consultant calls you, chats, spurs your interest in an

opportunity, and never rings back. You are seeking a job urgently, and just can’t find enough good

opportunities to apply for. Your colleagues get promoted ahead of you.

You can develop expertise so that you can conquer all of these frustrations, but it doesn’t come handed to you in a one hour webinar….we’ll give you the hints, tips and leads, but only you can put in the time and focus to get organised, to firmly establish a cornerstone on which to build your career. It’s a case of the old adage: If you are thinking of a job change, start by planning an hour in your coming week to think about how to take charge of your career and future, make some notes for yourself, and from that platform make the time to develop a detailed project plan. In an ideal world, taking control of your career by getting organised begins shortly after you took over your first job, but let’s make it easy and say shortly after you took over the job you have now.


10 Quick Tips to Being Prepared for Career Advancement

1. Keep a diary. What do General’s, politicians, great actors, astronauts and leaders in industry have in common? They all keep diaries. Keep a business diary…then regularly review the activities you’ve been involved in, and particularly you’re prime contributions and achievements and what you feel you have learned. You’ll need this reference when you come to write your fresh CV, and you’ll find it really helps to prepare you for interviews, and it will also help you feel confident at your annual review. Make a particular note of what went well and what, not so much. And write down notes if you feel you want to change something – this will spur you on to actually achieving it. Make sure you have a planning and action column – set your page up as if it were a board meeting, minutes on one side, action column on the other.

2. Analyse your activities. Do a bit of old fashioned work study – understand how long

tasks take, where your time is spent. This is the key to expert time-management. If spending 30% of your time on a diverse task, means you can’t deliver another aspect of your given remit, then the sooner you identify this, and get it into your formal remit, and if not then hand it off, the better. There’s no career achievement in successfully delivering something that’s not likely to be assessed as part of your annual review.

3. Develop personal metrics. Notebook or spreadsheet, existing company reporting

procedures or Greenfield start: get organised. Metrics matter, facts matter – in the longer perspective, focused factual statements in your résumé and at interview will win respect and impress. Being able to discuss activities concisely with accurate recall, without the ‘ums’ and ‘ahs’, fudging of figures and rambling through your mind for an answer, is one of the most important conversational/presentation techniques that influence you being viewed as ready for promotion, and will certainly impress at external interviews.

The process starts with noting the state of the remit when you took it over, the metrics of the department – break your work down into primary processes and activities, into something that you can monitor and measure – measure against colleagues or team, against divisional targets, and the like. Try to see if any improvements/changes you initiate and implement can be traced right through the business process to the bottom line. The higher up the management chain you get, the more everything you achieve has to reflect as a saving or a profit; the higher the managerial level of the person you are communicating with, the more that person wants to learn from you that your achievements and your recommendations for change will effect savings or profits for the better. Don’t overlook that saving big chunks of time, individually or collectively, achieving more with less, can be tracked right back to the bottom line. There are many web sites to help anyone explore the subject and decide on a methodology that will suit them, try: www.Socialresearchmethods.net. And Wikipedia is as good a site as any for explanations on the differences between performance metrics, analytics, statistics, and qualitative and quantitative measures.

http://www.socialresearchmethods.net/


4. Set your self-improvement targets. Once you have the basics in place, set yourself (project plan!) some personal targets:

Improvements/changes that will enable you to deliver your remit more

effectively, to achieve more. Improvements that will show you as adding value. Ideas for measurable changes, changes that could be adopted team or

company-wide. Activities that will help set you apart as an achiever (eg early completion of a

task or project). Things you want to learn, or advance your knowledge of.

5. Be a proactive learner. At interview hiring managers are less interested in the courses

you have completed, and more in identifying you as a proactive and constant learner. You are a trusted adviser to your business: you must be able to show that your professional knowledge base and skills are undeniably “best practice”. Identify and keep a list of the training/coaching/work experience that you have already, and then document what you want to undertake, that will form the bedrock for your development. Each year, target a new subject that you’d like to advance your knowledge of, become a subject matter expert. Be imaginative about finding sources for training and learning, list the possibilities, internal and external, and pursue them. Imagine how effective this will sound at interview. It will be a whole lot more effective than complaining of the lack of budget for or training support from your current employer.

6. Understand the bigger picture. Make the time to fully understand the department

head’s/you’re immediate manager’s function and responsibilities, as well as his/her immediate priorities. Part of being seen as ‘golden’ is to ensure that what you do well reflects right back to your Manager; helping your Manager achieve his/her goals is actually part of your remit, although it’s not something that’s usually openly discussed or documented.

Once you feel well informed. Deliberately aim to improve your knowledge of the Division/Corporate business goals – read the five year business plan; read the company’s annual report, understand the company’s finances, revenues, profits, strengths and weaknesses, markets and trading regions, and don’t forget about competitors. You have to learn to see your remit as part of the bigger picture, the corporate structure. If you don’t understand this, you won’t react and behave, or be instinctive in your decision making and conversation, in a manner that will ensure you are seen as a prospect for promotion.

7. Establish yourself with a mentor (or two). Once you’re settled in, proactively look for

a leadership level mentor, the person who will befriend you when you need to learn more about the bigger picture in business, the person who will provide a key reference (whether for internal promotion or an external opportunity). Preferably someone outside your reporting line. The best way to capture a star mentor for yourself is to ask someone near or at Board level, whom you greatly respect, if they could recommend who you should approach to be your mentor – very likely they’ll be impressed and offer themselves…


8. Groom yourself for promotion. The higher up the career ladder you reach for, the more soft skills affect the outcome of your interview. Think about your personal image both in the present – the office, on-line, in social media, everywhere. It is key that you consider the art of ‘grooming’ yourself for that step forwards, in the physical and present sense and in the virtual world. Most major global Corporations have dedicated personal coaches available to all their senior management up to and including board level. If it’s important at VP level, then it’s certainly important to you. Hone in on your soft skills. It isn’t just how you look, it is your mannerisms and demeanour; it isn’t just your communicating skills, it’s your vocabulary and keeping on point that will dictate how you are noticed for your relationships. It isn’t the subject of the message you send in writing it’s the vocabulary, the grammar, the tone, the spelling and structure that will get you noticed. It isn’t rocket science; it’s mostly practical common sense, good basic business skills, good manners and being prepared to evolve in order to achieve your career goals. Dress and personal grooming. In the traditional sense is one of those tetchy hard to handle subjects that nobody wants to discuss. Another emphasis here is that taking good look at the people who work in a company and trying to find out more about the organisations work culture is as important to you as it is for the company when they’re assessing you. You may not want to pursue our application when you find out more. If you do, it’s not difficult to find images of people in similar appointments in the target company, and people who will likely be interviewing you, and to be able to take a lead from this. Big tip, if you aren’t used to wearing a formal business suit/suit and tie at work, but it looks important for the job you’re applying for, wear one every day for a week before your interview so that you look, and you personally feel, very comfortable in the outfit. If you are seeking promotion with your current employer, fall back on the old adage: dress for the job you want, not the job you’ve got.

9. Review your progress. Once a year, a good six weeks before your annual review, revisit

your notes and plans and write your CV as though you are looking for a new position; remember to drop your new résumé into the HR department, perhaps ask for it to be included in your annual review file when it is delivered to your boss. Make up a Commercial and Management Skills Check List of your own and keep it with your CV. If you can’t show yourself that you have reached the skills know-how, knowledge and experience targets you set out for yourself at the beginning of the year, if you can’t add fresh detail about your achievements and contributions, if you can’t upgrade your skills and commercial knowledge profile, then you are in that proverbial professional rut and it certainly is time to start looking in earnest for that new position.

10. Evolve – don’t be afraid to change your plans. Hey – life happens! Don’t be afraid to

change your goals, let them develop as your life unfolds. If you relocate driven by your partner’s career you may have to rethink and replan a little; if you get laid off perhaps just getting back into work has to take priority. At the point of starting a career break, it is important to have a plan in place that you can work through to stay in touch with your profession, to keep abreast of professional skills and trends, and a big part of this is continual training/updating and doing some relevant work if you can. If it is maternity leave, offering to do work from home can keep you in touch, whether you decide to go back to that employer or not and, along with continual training, using social media to maintain your profile in the marketplace works to ones advantage as well. Keep your focus on your long term goals.


FIVE QUICK TIPS TOWARDS JOB SEARCH SUCCESS

1. Time spent on preparation is never wasted! – Basics

Make yourself some dedicated office space at home. Plan/diarize time for your project and keep to it. Set up your PC, establish a project plan and spreadsheet. Set yourself a realistic target date for success. If you are not employed, dress for the office, keep to office hours, and tell your family and friends how important it is that you spend 8-5 in the office, no distractions. Check your voice-mail messages, home and mobile – ensure they are business standard – “This is Mike, leave a message” isn’t good enough! List the type of jobs that you feel are your targets and why. List what you think this type of job would do to help you achieve your next career move, how it would add value to your career goals. Reinvigorate your network of contacts. Make up spreadsheets of target individuals to network with, companies you’d like to work for, major job sites you’ll search, then start researching and filling in the details – one click to target company jobs pages, one click to key job sites, a spreadsheet of emails and telephone numbers of people you want to network with. This will enable you maximize your results speedily when you are ready to make progress. Make a list of places where you can place your CV announcing you are seeking a new position – but be careful if you are currently employed, your own company may be cruising the site! Search for appropriate conferences and seminars you can attend; appropriate professional Job Fairs, some are virtual some regional, some run by your own city. Set yourself some benchmarks - list what you have to do today, tomorrow, next week, so you can tick off your progress. Set up Internet RSS feeds and get news delivered to you. Select publications, blogs and web sites that provide career advice, industry news and job postings. Keep your mind alive to your search. RSS (Rich Site Summary); originally RDF Site Summary; often called Really Simple Syndication


2. Develop a fresh master CV, a template to adjust for every application

Remember the purpose: The objective of submitting your CV is to get an invitation to interview, not to get the job offer. The initial impact must say “high potential”, your CV is your marketing tool, it’s the first impression the employer has of you.

Use a variety of sources to find some modern formats to consider.

Make a start with your template CV – type one up from scratch, don’t keep updating.

Make it an easy format to adjust for each application; bullet points work best.

CAMPBELL BIRCH INTERNATIONAL RESOURCING has a really good short guide to CV writing and how to write a covering letter that can be sent on request.

3. Practice your interview skills.

Make use of your Smartphone or Tablet! Try videoing yourself, and practice responding to interview questions and techniques. Assess your verbal communicating and body language. Practice sounding cheerful and enthusiastic without being OTT.

4. Develop your network and your networking skills.

Skilful networking is critical. Half of professional level job openings are never advertised, either because an applicant networked their way in before advertising was published, or the company has a policy of e-recruiting before advertising or using a retained agent. Career networking starts with a creative structured target list:

LinkedIn – your existing network, grow your existing network Business Colleagues – internal and external Places you can find new contacts: professional associations, business meetings,

training, seminars, conferences, industry groups….

Be Proactive, don’t wait till you’re looking for a job to build your network. Devote time to nurturing a strong network of career contacts well in advance. Prepare for networking. Practice drafting some creative and interesting email communications. When you have a referral, use that person’s name up front ‘Daniel Defoe thought you’d be a great resource for me as I’m looking for opportunities in the publishing industry’. Ask if you could discuss your targeted companies; ask if he/she could recommend other sources and names of other possible contacts. People love to help! Target people you’d like to talk with at meetings. Conduct on-line research before you go to meetings to find out more about other attendees, looking for common interests/professional experience – a bit of reverse e-recruiting! Practice conversation. Big tip to the question ‘What do you do’?...Don’t say ‘I’m a contracts manager’…. Try ‘I shape and negotiate the deals that help make my company the largest defence contractor in the world’…For example, I don’t say ‘I’m a recruiter’ – I say ‘I deliver solutions to clients recruiting needs”.


5. Spruce up your Personal Brand – the next fully detailed topic, below As a last thought on this subject, if you’re serious about finding a new job, it’s a good idea to keep mum about your job search, don’t tell your boss or your work colleagues and wherever possible prepare and work from home. Searching for a new job whilst currently employed is a risky business and if the news gets out you could damage trust in your current business relationships. And, for example, get into the habit of upgrading your LinkedIn profile and any other social media profiles every six months so you don’t set off the alarm bells when you do it because you are job hunting. Consider and plan your essential time out for interview preparation and interviewing. If you have the luxury of having six months to plan ahead, take a couple of afternoons off to get organised, then when you book time off for interviews it won’t be considered unusual.

YOUR ‘PERSONAL BRAND’

Your personal brand is the image of yourself that you wish to present to the world, whether on paper, in person or on line.

On behalf of employers, e-skilled corporate hiring staff, e-recruiting services, recruiting agencies and top end search consultancies, all scour the internet daily for potential applicants for vacancies through a very wide range of social sites and data resources, to reach out for you to discuss vacancies and, after application, to (blatantly) check you out. So it’s essential that professionals develop a savvy understanding of how these recruiters operate and what they are looking for, in order to present oneself and get noticed. Here’s some interesting statistics from recent (LeeHechtHarrison) research:

94% of recruiters use or plan to use social media for recruiting (Jobvite) 89% of all recruiters report hiring someone through LinkedIn, Facebook or Twitter (HerdWisdom) 59% of recruiters rated candidates sourced from social networks as ‘high calibre’ (Jobvite) 30% of all Google searches are employment related (UnbridledTalent) 93% of all recruiters (in-house and external services) use LinkedIn (LinkedIn)

Whether or not some aspects of recruiters’ searches could be considered unethical snooping, to be legally within bounds or unethical, is too big a subject to get deeply into is this presentation – you just have to be aware that on both sides of the Atlantic, the law is trying to catch up with the advances of technology and developing e-sourcing practices, and even though many employers have ethical polices established, and new legislation will soon be putting boundaries for good practice in place, it is unlikely that this will stop e-resourcers from trawling for information offered openly on social media sites and which can be found in other parts of the internet. Your CV lands on a recruiter’s desk, you appear to be an interesting prospect, and a quick internet search needs to back this up – not let you down. You may not have been following it but I recommend that you pick up a thread of communicating from Jon W Hansen on LinkedIn (March 2015). It’s been crossing over to several sites, and has been on the IACCM Contracts and Commercial Management LinkedIn Group site. Look it up – it’s controversial but very relevant – the title for tracking it is “How would these employee profile pics influence your decision to do business with this company?” And the title speaks for itself.


FIVE QUICK TIPS FOR A BETTER PERSONAL BRAND

1. Be aware of what recruiters are looking for when they scour social networking sites and prepare your media content accordingly.

According to recent research (RésuméBear), employers use social media checks to screen candidates: 65% evaluate a candidate’s professionalism in terms of social conduct. 52% evaluate a candidate’s fit into company culture. 45% want to learn more about the candidate’s qualifications. 43% said they used information on-line to help them decide on whether to progress an application or to hire.

Perhaps, more surprising, is that poor grammar and spelling, use of slang, are seen as worse sins than airing and sharing your latest misadventures and social faux pars. Here’s a list of sites recruiters commonly access, apart from the main search engines: LinkedIn – the smart advice is to use LinkedIn as your primary social media. Facebook – keep your privacy settings high, but most savvy recruiters will find a way in. Twitter – reviewed to check out your character traits and interests. FourSquare – lets recruiters find out whether you are attending conferences or classes Instagram – gives recruiters the opportunity to learn more about you. Your personal web site (if you have one) Google – a restricted membership site that recruiters join in order to access you You Tube – checking out your interests and your personality Pinterest – where users create and share collections Vine – a platform for personal videos Tumbir – a micro-blogging platform Flickr – a photo-sharing community Snapchat – a photo-messaging site

And many, many more.

2. Make sure your personal on-line brand is up to the wysiwyg standard

What you see is what you get…… Make sure your personal brand/your public image is up to date and consistent across all platforms, this includes your résumé, your LinkedIn profile, your current bio if you’re making presentations or having articles published, your personal web site, and any other social media that you contribute to that has a business bias. Be sure to showcase your strengths and achievements up front – a common recruiter/hiring manager skill is to speed read/scan a résumé or profile first, looking at headings and the first few words or couple of lines of each paragraph. Make your opportunity for initial impact count. Be sure you have included key words and skills to draw recruiters’ searches your way.


Think about your personal long term career plan; your brand should reflect your potential and where you want to be in five years’ time. If you are active on other sites, check your privacy settings, check out just what recruiters might access and review. If you feel it’s necessary, remove anything that you think might negatively influence prospective employers. Set your privacy settings on high or close your account for a while. This might not deter the more resourceful researcher, but many will not dig too deep below the surface. Look yourself up on any search engine and try to have removed any content not consistent with the on-line brand you want to portray. Remember website privacy controls only work when they are turned on. If you are on LinkedIn already, envisage yourself as a recruiter and type in a search using key words that you think would be used to find someone for the job you want – see if your name comes up. If it doesn’t, think it through and build appropriate key words into your profile box. This also applies if you have a personal web site. Employers and recruiters subscribe to higher level search tools in sites like LinkedIn, but this for the most part enables them to search greater volumes of data quickly, if you don’t have this higher level access just work your way through with patience. If you are seeking promotion, consider the job you want and the likely people who will be decision makers to your application, and who you are likely to meet at interview. Plan your photo image and word content to fit in with likely corporate expectation, and make sure that your image is similar to how you will look when you appear for interview.

3. Nobody’s perfect. How to deal with a past that may influence negatively an employer’s decision? Some things you may not be empowered to remove or have removed from public record. It will take time and patience, but take every step you can to have items removed if at all possible. Don’t put any reference on your résumé. List what you find and practice till perfect concise responses/explanations in case the subject comes up at interview; concise and to the point is the key – don’t be tempted into lengthy explanations or mitigations. You might well lose out on some opportunities through being checked out but showcasing your achievements and presenting yourself competitively and expertly for the job you want, is your best chance to influence positively. Expert advice is available if you need further help – try asking a search engine: “How do I expunge my record” or “How do I remove personal data from the Internet”, et al.

4. Protect your information. Manage your brand by setting search engine alerts for your

name and monitor your social media pages daily. Speak to your friends who may blog or Twitter about you, publish photos of you, and ask them to resist activity whilst you are actively searching for a new job.

5. Follow-through. Brand development and management is a continuous process. The

more you engage, share and interact at a professional level, the more opportunity you have to take control and create a positive on-line presence.


GET NOTICED ON SOCIAL NETWORKING SITES Get savvy about the way you use the social networks. The art of showcasing yourself offers you huge potential to get noticed, to stand out from the crowd. If you’re not an active participant in social networking communities, you risk losing out on potential career opportunities. There’s a term used in social networking called “lurking” – it describes someone who observes but does not contribute. Lurking won’t provide the visibility you need to attract potential employers. The key to success is careful selection of where you will contribute and frequency. You have to think about your career environment and culture – most of the advice on the net is aimed at millennials, tech-nics, sales, marketing, and aspiring entrepreneurs of all kinds. You are none of these, you are a little of each, you are a business professional. The transference to showcasing your career through new visual content ideas, using social sites such as LinkedIn effectively, will get you noticed so that recruiters will find you, and it will be as much fun as it is challenging.

1. Have a professional head and shoulders photo taken. Listen to the photographer who

will guide you to a great pose, and use the same shot, or a selection of very similar pictures, for your CV and all your social media sites.

2. Expand your reach. Whilst most people are using LinkedIn and Facebook, take the

time to explore and consider other sites? 3. Select at least 5 blogs to follow and contribute wisely. Follow up with people who

‘Like’ your contributions, and with other contributors – if they could be useful networking leads, ask them to join your network and develop the personal contact.

4. Consider a personal, branded web site. Today more and more professionals are

creating their own personal web sites, and this could work for you especially as you are in a profession where a portfolio of skills and achievements is essential. Even more so if you are an interim consultant. This is a place where you can expand on and sell your experience, skills and achievements, helping to keep your CV attractively concise. Your personal web site acts as your on-line résumé, it should pop up on any name search, or key word search, speeding recruiters’ virtual pathways straight to you.

5. Stand out from the crowd, use your media space wisely, with a concise but clear

presentation of yourself, and by using good vocabulary and grammar to describe your career to date. No gimmicks, but try using colour and innovative formatting.

6. Get clever with profile boxes, on media sites, and your résumé. Be very careful not

to make rigid statements about what you are looking for – it could cut you out of being reviewed for certain opportunities. And don’t just write clichés such as wanting challenge and more responsibility. You’ll have to be more imaginative than that to get noticed. On your CV, as you’ll be adjusting it for every application, the profile box is the place where you concisely showcase all your skills and experience that match the requirements listed in the position description. Remember my earlier comment in relation to recruiters and hiring managers’ speed reading and scanning applications.


7. Maximise your showcase. LinkedIn will likely be your primary social media and is

certainly the one most recruiters mainly use. Maximise your sales pitch here:

Make sure your telephone number and email address are easy to find.

Add any recently delivered presentations, video or recording link.

Add your LinkedIn tag so it’s easy for recruiters to forward your details on.

Add links to any articles published.

If you are running with a business related Twitter or blog, add the link.

If you have a personal web site, ensure the link is here.

8. Be sure your email and telephone number easily found, on your LinkedIn profile, other

sites – don’t make the recruiter have to hunt the information out or go through the laborious process of sending an in-mail.

9. Consider a separate phone or having a dedicated number just for job search activities,

have a message on it just for recruiters. This will protect you if you use your company phone as your personal phone. Same principle – you might like to consider opening up an email address, and keeping it just for networking and job search activities.

JOB SEARCH STRATEGY: BEYOND THE OBVIOUS JOBS BOARDS Just a few key words typed into a search engine will deliver you a plethora of major jobs boards, all purporting to offer you maximum access to legal, commercial, contracts, procurement and supply chain opportunities. Big ones that immediately come to mind are Indeed, Monster, and The Ladders. Although you’ll find relevant vacancies in these sites, they are by no means comprehensive. There are thousands of highly targeted jobs boards and on-line communities that cover specific companies, industries and professions, providing a very efficient alternative to the big board search. Remember, jobs boards work but they are only one job search technique you must tap in to. The bottom line: add multiple tactics to your strategy and get highly organised so that you can efficiently and regularly cruise selected jobs boards. Here are five other sources of job postings that every job seeker should explore:

1. LinkedIn Groups. Seek out and the myriad of relevant LinkedIn Groups, some

professional niche and others regional. Subscribe to receive daily updates so that you are aware of any new job postings shared with members of the group.

2. Niche boards. For our professional community the large boards are not always the

best option. Seek out web sites specializing in a profession, industry sector, salary level, or location that’s important to you. Check out sites such as Good.Co for lists.

3. Company sites. Don’t forget about companies’ own web sites.

1. Company on-line communities. Many employers are creating their own on-line

communities in sites like Glassdoor, LinkedIn and Face-book. These sites often create discussion points around their current vacancies

4. Professional associations. Many companies look for top-tier, credentialed talent on the websites of professional associations. These sites often carry the best and most comprehensive listings of appropriate vacancies in our community.

End.

marketing yourself through social media cb

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