{"id":40564,"date":"2013-09-26T10:30:42","date_gmt":"2013-09-26T14:30:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/?p=40564"},"modified":"2018-07-03T11:27:27","modified_gmt":"2018-07-03T16:27:27","slug":"what-not-to-do-while-job-searching","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/?p=40564","title":{"rendered":"What Not to Do While Job Searching"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Stephanie Leigh Taylor, Head Editor, INALJ British Columbia<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

What Not to Do While Job Searching<\/span><\/h3>\n

Everybody has a piece of advice that they like to trot out when somebody they know is searching for a job, likely because they feel it\u2019s how they got their<\/i> job. I\u2019m no better, and have been known to word-vomit all over someone who\u2019s job searching with my advice and stories and reminiscences. But there are definitely things you should never, ever, in a million years do while job searching, such as:<\/p>\n

Tracking down recruiters and HR professionals on social media sites like Twitter and Facebook and contact them.<\/b> While it may allow them to get an idea of who you are before interviews, it\u2019s really creepy and stalker-y, it can come across as threatening, and people will not appreciate their personal accounts being targeted by strangers who want something from them.\u00a0 LinkedIn is different and in a professional context, ok.<\/p>\n

Tracking down recruiters and HR professionals at their home addresses or personal phone numbers.<\/b>\u00a0Again, really creepy, kinda threatening, not appreciated; for sure if you contact someone who is making hiring decisions at their home they will not select you for anything except the round file. Unless the job is for a private investigator, in which case you are beyond doubt on the wrong site.<\/p>\n

Failing to follow instructions for applying. <\/b>\u00a0You may simply miss something important while applying (which is bad in another way), but if you deliberately fail to follow the employer\u2019s instructions in order to stand out by submitting a different format or not all the required documents (or extraneous, unasked-for documents), you are going to annoy the employer. If you can\u2019t even follow the instructions they\u2019ve provided on how they prefer applications to be done, they\u2019re going to think you can\u2019t follow any <\/i>instructions.<\/p>\n

Gettin\u2019 gimmicky with your resume.<\/b>\u00a0Keep it classic and easy to read; coloured papers or backgrounds, kooky fonts, lots of logos and pictures, sending just the cover letter with an invitation to ask for the complete resume if interested, sending along\u00a0 treats or gift cards – this smacks of hubris, and a tiny, unacknowledged part of recruiters hate people who do this. Sure, everyone wants to stand out from the crowd, but do this with your achievements, experience, and education.<\/p>\n

Repeatedly contacting potential employers.<\/b>\u00a0If they\u2019re not contacting you, there is a reason – they don\u2019t think you\u2019re right for the job. While it is commendable to contact places where you\u2019ve applied to ask if hiring or interview decisions have been made or to ask if you could speak to a member of the hiring committee to see if they have any questions, repeatedly contacting a potential employer after submitting an application or an interview suggests you don\u2019t know when you\u2019re beat. Don\u2019t get in a huff and fire off an angry email about their lack of contact either – you\u2019ll be \u201cthat dork who got all angry\u201d over something that is extremely common in today\u2019s job market.<\/p>\n

Lying on your resume.<\/b>\u00a0I\u2019m not sure who would ever actually tell you to do this but don\u2019t. Ever. It\u2019s been said before on INALJ <\/a>and it will be said again, because you shouldn\u2019t do it but people do. So we have to tell the Internet again.\u00a0Don\u2019t. Do. It.<\/p>\n

Asking hiring managers or HR staff at potential employers for advice on job searching.<\/b>\u00a0This was so bizarre to me that I couldn\u2019t believe it actually happened, but I\u2019ve been assured it does. Just\u2026what? Don\u2019t do this – people in hiring positions or in HR have jobs, and theirs don\u2019t include helping you get one unless it\u2019s with them, for a job they are hiring for.\u00a0 This is not an informational interview with a librarian which is OK.<\/p>\n

For more tips<\/a> on what not to do, refer to Alison Green, who writes the Ask a Manager<\/a> blog. It\u2019s invaluable as an insight to blunders job searchers make and what hiring staff are really thinking.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Stephanie Leigh Taylor, Head Editor, INALJ British Columbia What Not to Do While Job Searching Everybody has a piece of advice that they like to trot out when somebody they know is searching for a job, likely because they feel it\u2019s how they got their job. I\u2019m no better, and have been known to…<\/p>\n

Read more \u2192<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[145],"tags":[69,3592,5379,3992,266,4604,3995],"class_list":["post-40564","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles","tag-article","tag-blog","tag-etiquette","tag-inalj-british-columbia","tag-job-search","tag-mistakes","tag-stephanie-leigh-taylor"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1WoMK-ayg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40564","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=40564"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40564\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=40564"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=40564"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inalj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=40564"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}