Who do you want to work for? Do you know??

Who do you want to work for? Do you know???

In this blog we’re going to look quite specifically at figuring out where it is you want to work and how to go about it as well as a little tip about Search Optimising the CV based on how recruitment software works.

So, assuming you’re looking for a new role, and if you’re reading this I guess that’s a safe assumption, you should at least have developed some class of strategy to get your new job.

But, are you just being reactive, that is, keeping an eye on various jobsites, speaking to recruiters to see what’s out there and so on?

Is that really good enough? Are you content to be moved around by currents, effectively rudderless?

I’m aware that sounds a bit controversial but think of it like this; by keeping an eye on what’s out there and even emailing and visiting recruitment consultants, you’re fishing. Sitting on the bank waiting for a fish, occasionally putting some bait on the line and casting into the water and seeing what you catch?

I put it to you that you can do better and you should. You should put on the right clothes, select specific bait and wade into the water with a net and a big stick, tell the family you won’t be home for a few days and catch the big one!

This is what I’d call extreme jobhunting! What you’re doing here is effectively becoming very proactive in the search, being laser focussed on the exact role you want and full on going for it.

So, how do you go about it, taking control and direction of the jobsearch.

It’s always one of the questions I ask my clients. Where do you want to work? Are there any companies that you actively would like to work for? You’re at a crossroads in your career right now, why not take a different approach to the jobsearch and instead of focussing on what is going to pay the bills, use these circumstances as an opportunity for making your career a happier place!

So, to this end, make a list of the companies that you’d like to work for.

Is it Google? Is it Microsoft? Is it that excellent pet shop down the road?

Perhaps you’d like to work for a company that is opening up in Ireland, or a company in a different country.

Let’s say that you’ve now identified five companies that you want to work for.

There are a number of steps that you can take to get in front of the right person. Generally it’s unlikely that a simple phone call will work, you’re getting into the world of gatekeepers and people who say no for a living so don’t go there.

Here are the steps and I’ll expand on each:

Who is the main decision maker for the role you want?

What is their email address?

Tailoring the Cover Email and the CV

Background information and how to find it

Tracking and following up

Not taking no for an answer

So to address each point:

Who is the main decision maker for the role you want?

The very easiest and simplest way to do this is to firstly figure out the position or job title of the person that you’d report to.

Would it be Sales Director, Managing Director? HR Manager? Figure it out and write it down.

Now, put that title in inverted commas and the company name and city, Dublin, Cork, London or whatever into a search engine.

Chances are you’ll find out their names.

Alternatively you could use LinkedIn which if you’re not on, you should be.

If it’s not forthcoming, then you use the telephone and ask!

Now we need to find their email address.

This is generally very easy once you have the name as each company generally has a certain format of the name followed by the website address as no doubt you know. At mynewcv.ie we’re firstname at mynewcv.ie.

How do we figure this out?

Enter the web address, for example cpl.ie without the www into a search engine. The first page of results shows that it’s first name dot last name @cpl.ie.

If this gives you no joy you can use inverted commas, asterisk at cpl.ie close inverted commas into an engine.

Now we have the right person and their email address.

Tailoring the Cover Email and the CV

Assuming you’re familiar with the brand, you’ll have noticed that the website, and all sites follow this theme, or corporate brand is uniform across their business.

View the font used on their website and change your CV and Cover email to this font. This goes a long way towards mirroring their corporate image from the start and believe it or not, employees of this company, especially at a senior level, where you’re aiming view this font all day every day, so mirroring it is a great psychological advantage for your application.

If you don’t know what font is being used, feel free to ask us here or put it out to your social media network, crowdsource it! But more of that anon.

Bear in mind that you may need to reformat the CV because certain fonts change sizes etc, but take your time and do it right. Retitle the CV to Google CV or whatever and save it as such, this will help the reader to realise that you’ve taken the effort to approach them specifically and will bolster their good impression.

The Cover email should be simple and contain three things:
Why you’re writing

Why you’re good for the company and a

Call to action:

If you’re applying internationally, ensure to correct the documents to the local language or version of English, UK, Irish or American/Australian etc. A small thing but the fewer red lines on their screen the better. Remember, they won’t have the same spellcheck installed as you, so be aware of this, have the CV opened on a different machine than the one that you composed it on and this will give a good idea of how it will look when opened on the far side. If possible for this instance use PDFs as they hold formatting 100% but failing that save the Word document as RTF or Rich Text Format as it’s not as good but better than .doc. What ever you do, try not to use doc.x format as depending on the software on the other side of the desk, it may not open correctly or indeed at all, or may have to be converted taking about ten seconds which is a poor first impression!

Background information and how to find it

As above, we mentioned crowdsourcing. This is a chapter by itself however for this purpose and prior to sending the CV I’ll explain how to crowdsource to get some information on the company in question and how it can be useful.

Assuming you’re on Facebook, Twitter and or LinkedIn or even boards.ie or online forums you frequent what I strongly advise you to do is to ask your network about the company.

Post a status update or start a new thread saying: anyone here work for or know anything about working for company x?

You’ll be getting into the laws of unintended consequences here but here are the possibilities:

Someone you know either works there, used to work there or knows someone there.

You’ve told people you’re interested in working for this company.

Somebody will tell somebody else about you

Someone will tell you what it’s like

Someone will ask for your CV, tell you who the new hiring manager is and so on….

This is effectively using your social network to work for you. It’s impossible to gauge how well this will work, but what is 100% guaranteed is that you won’t get if you don’t ask. The whole point of this exercise is to take as much control as possible and follow your stated aim to work for company X or Y.

You can then use what you have found out, perhaps a new project upcoming within the company that you have had prior experience in, put it in the cover email, or indeed a current employee lets you know that they have an in house referral scheme and he/she will get €500 if they bring a new employee on board.

The best outcome here can be that you forward your CV to a friend and they pass it on internally.

Thinking across the desk again, put yourself in the position of the hiring manager. A colleague emails or hands you a CV of a friend or acquaintance of theirs. Unless they want to risk some seriously messy internal politics from their point of view they will at least review the CV and get back either to you or your friend with feedback.

Bear in mind that with all of this process it’s important to remember that there just may not be a place for you here, but as you’re sick of me saying in different ways, if you’re not in you can’t win!

Tracking and following up

Working off your initial list of say five companies, identifying the best person and contact details, amending your brand to mirror theirs and crowdsourcing for additional information, you are ready to send your emails.

It is vital and I cannot stress this enough, to track every contact you have with these companies.

You have to know when and to who and what exactly you have sent. This will avoid confusion and you must look good all of the time!

Use a spreadsheet, a hardback notebook, a word document, whatever you use have a system, saying all of the above and have it dated.

You may not hear immediately about your email, the recipient may be on holidays or very busy or may even delete the email, but you need to be ready to follow up.

In my experience one week is the optimum time to follow up.

Prepare and send an email, ideally forwarding the original without the CV this time politely asking if the hiring manager has had the chance to review the previous email and if they require any clarification on the initial email.

Also, take this opportunity to get closer to them, use your research to demonstrate that you are following the company closely.

e.g. I’m very eager to work for a company like X as I feel closely aligned to your key ethics and I love the product/service etc.

I wouldn’t use that exact quote but phrase it in such a way that doesn’t feel wrong to you, but you must get that sentiment across. And log and track everything.

Now here’s the really tricky part.

I suggest that if you get not satisfaction or feedback, then keep going. Call the hiring manager, send them another email until such time as they give you an answer. Never lose the positive tone and the demonstration of passion and constant research.

Which ties in nicely to the final point;

Not taking no for an answer

You get no response or you get a Dear John response as was so eloquently put by a client of mine recently. I normally use a ruder expression but you know what I mean.

Is that it? Do you close the door on this company that you really want to work for?
If the answer is yes, that you walk away and say, oh well at least I tried…then I put it to you that you weren’t actually that interested in the company in the first place. Start again and this time, name the company that you do really want to work for.

But if you get a no, that at least is a response, you’re not being ignored. Depending on the nature of the contact your response must be for more information, that is to ask “when would be a good time to get back in touch”?
What advice would you give me about certain courses to do or specific industry experience would I require to be considered next time? Would you be happy for me to contact you in three months?

And a million other responses all saying, I hear you when you say that you have no role for me now and why that is, however I’m not giving up as I really want to work for this company and I want to know what steps I should take to be considered next time.

Also, try and keep abreast of what’s happening locally in this company. Use LinkedIn to see who is working with, joining and leaving this company.

Get in touch if you need some help with this, how and why to do it.

Use Google alerts to be automatically emailed each time this company is mentioned online. Join their Facebook group, follow them on Twitter and use your real name.

Get yourself super familiar with their brand and if possible begin conversing with people who work there, irrespective of what department they are in.

Email and general electronic contact is great for this kind of thing. I recently saw a documentary that included a given artist talking about something. I Googled the person and emailed them with a question. Before I knew it I’m Facebook friends with this artist and we keep in touch regularly. Same goes for politicians and celebrities. It’s really easy to do, and people don’t get freaked out by random people like us contacting them in this way as they know they can just delete the contact.

Calling on the phone every day or hanging around their houses is definitely not recommended but you should effectively cyberstalk the people in question.

To conclude and recap; if you know who you want to work for and you’re serious about doing so, you have no excuse in not putting yourself forward in as intelligent and focused way you can.

This company are unlikely to ring you and offer you a job. Offer them a great employee!

I hope all of this makes sense, but please email me at sales@mynewcv.ie for clarifications and also if there’s anything else I can advise on in this whole area.

Cover Letters and Cover Emails. What's it all about?

I often get asked about Cover Letters and Cover Emails and I get sent a lot of them to review. Recruiters and hiring managers get many many examples of good and bad, but ask yourself. What is the point of the Cover Letter/Email? It's to be used as a brief selling tool but mostly (90%) to make sure that your CV gets read and considered for the right role. What not to do! Don't write your life story! Don't make any mistakes! Simple is best. Recently on behalf of a friend I reviewed 100 CVs in one hour to create a shortlist for a job he had advertised. About 40 of them had cover emails so poor that it was obvious from even that much that could not do the job in hand. Which gives a 60% pass rate even before we get to the CV! What should it say? It should be as simple as possible and contain. Why you're getting in contact! Why you have the experience they're looking for! Call to action! Contact Details! All of this sounds obvious but if you can get this right, you're already ahead of 40% of the competition. Feel free to contact me for specific advice on this and other issues.

Ruadhri meets Olive from City Channel to discuss CVs and Social Media

Ruadhri meets Olive from City Channel to discuss CVs and Social Media.

Ardiff's Law: What's my daily rate - IT Contractors

I realised recently when asked this question by a friend that there’s no obvious formula out there, so I found one.

It’s called Ardiff’s Law and it breaks down like this.

Basic Salary, add 43.5% divide that by 230 and you get your daily rate.

Here’s the logic behind it.

If a basic salary was 60000 I'd divide that by 230 working days in the year that's 260 of a daily rate, then I'd add on 25% to cover the contractor for PRSI, holiday pay etc (that's 10.75% and 12% for PRSI and Working Time Regulations, or holiday pay respectively) which brings us to 325 per day, then add on an extra 15% for the sheer inconvenience of it all:) bringing the daily rate to:
€374 per day.

When that's reversed engineered you could be told that that's equivalent to a salary of €86,020 per annum!
Therefore, the shortcut is to add 43% to your current salary or required.

Therefore, if you're on
100,000
+43.5% =
143,500
/230 =
€624 per day

In light of the Bruton Putsch, it put me in mind of this scene, where the PFJ and the JPF (splitters) fight it out, leaving poor old Enda Kenny Facing Brian and Brian the Centurions. Divide and conquer? Or the value of staying on message?

The best websites to help with your jobsearch!

How can you maximise your time online when looking for a new job?

The biggest and best online CV database apart from Google is definitely www.monster.com, especially from the hiring manager or recruiters’ database.

All of them, certainly of a specific size will have access to this database. Even if you’re in a job, you can make the CV anonymous and if it’s written correctly it will be found, as Monster power users will have set up predefined parameters for their searches.

LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter are all obvious places that you should make sure to be, but have you considered thinking a little bit outside of the normal boxes? Perhaps then you should use a site like Visual CV.

This is a fantastic resource as you can create, upload, share and make sure that you can be found. There are others in this area but it’s a really cool way of making your CV stand out. You can also export it as a pdf and send on directly for jobs!

Flavors.me is another way of creating an online identity. It’s free for access to their basic offering and it allows you to amalgamate all of your skills and experiences that would be on a standard CV or resume, but with something different. At mynewcv we also offer another way to stand out which is to have your CV formatted for mobile devices, such as the iPhone. This is a great way to get the edge on the competition for a given role. Check it out here on an iPhone or mobile device to view it. In standard desktop mode it is optimised for printing!
GatorApp is an Irish based site that will effectively do the same job as a predefined Google Alert, but can be much broader than that and also links well with the Twitter api. Each territory has it’s own one, but if you don’t have a Google Alert set up for your perfect role, how will you know?

Search Engine Optimizing your CV or Resume

As an ex recruiter my clients often ask me what steps they can take to make sure that their CVs are found on Recruiter and Company CV Databases.

It’s relatively simple once you understand the nature of these Databases. Essentially they act like little search engines, mini Googles if you will.

A query run by a recruiter is based on keywords which in turn should be based on the main skills required for their client. You as the jobseeker have a number of ways to manipulate the odds in your favour by using two simple tricks.

Keyword Density

To determine what the best keywords are for your desired role, have a think about what a recruiter would use to find you! If you are a Java programmer, make sure that the word Java is included more times than you currently have, of course without being too obvious. If you have a degree, mention it in your Career Summary as well as your Education section.

The same applies to job titles, industries and so on.

Updating the Recruiter

The second part to keeping your CV high on the list is to make sure that you contact your recruiters via email regularly. Their databases work on a combination of keyword density and recent updating of your file. For example, if the recruiter has two identical CVs in terms of keywords on their database, the one that was updated most recently will rank higher.

Assuming the recruiter or their administrator is diligent in updating contact on their database, (also bearing in mind the larger recruiters have smart software that automatically import emails to a given candidate’s file) sending an email that does not require a response, i.e. “just letting you know that I am still on the lookout for specific roles, feel free to contact me should a suitable role come your way”, on a regular basis will keep you at the top of searches, remind the recruiter that you’re still on the market and will ultimately ensure that you get called before the competition for the right role.

So remember, Search Engine Optimize your CV and keep in regular contact with your Recruiters.

To learn more about CV and Jobsearching advice visit www.mynewcv.ie or contact sales@mynewcv.ie
www.mynewcv.ie is a company dedicated to maximising candidate's chances of securing and steering interviews to a successful conclusion. 

How to get the most from Recruiters

Firstly, I do have to declare my own bias, for good or ill. I’ve had a number of years as a recruiter and have also been a candidate with good, bad and indifferent experiences with recruiters, so please indulge me if you think I’m a bit skewed!

There are certain truths about the recruitment profession and to benefit most as a jobseeker you need to understand these truths.

Candidates do not pay recruiters, hiring companies do, and then generally only when the candidate has been placed, has started and indeed stays with the company for an amount of time. Also bearing in mind that most recruiters are in competition with other recruiters on the same job, and mostly in competition with the hiring company themselves. You, as a jobseeker, are a commodity, a means to an end, and although many many recruiters get great pleasure from getting jobs for people, they don’t get any money!

So, how it generally works from the recruiter’s point of view is as follows.

Their client supplies a requirement, the two companies should agree a fee, based on a percentage of the successful candidate’s first years salary, a jobspec and interview process and ideally a timeframe for filling the role.

Now it’s a race against time for most recruiters, to get the best candidate in front of the hiring manager as fast as they can, before the competition can. This is why you might find some recruiters being abrupt and you may feel pressured into going for a role that may not suit you upon first glance. A point to make here which is vitally important for you as a jobseeker is to get confirmation of your application from the recruiter in writing.

A couple of years ago, when I was still in recruitment, I was looking for a new role and I found that a recruiter with whom I had been in touch had sent my CV to a couple of companies without my express permission and in one case against my specific wishes. Suffice to say I refused point blank to deal with the company again! So, if your recruiter gives any resistance at all to you sending written confirmation that your CV has been sent, walk away.

Back to the process, the recruiter now has to supply feedback to the candidate, but in fairness to them, the majority of times when there is no feedback is due to the fact that there is no feedback from the hiring company. Either that or it’s bad news and the recruiter is spending their time either speaking to more successful candidates or finding new ones. Courtesy would suggest that you should be told as soon as there is feedback, but courtesy is unfortunately often nothing to do with it! Suffice to say if indeed you are being called for an interview, you’ll know all about it.

So, you need to remember that it’s a process, you’re a commodity to the recruiter, if it works well, from your perspective you have one or more people working for you, to achieve your ends, for FREE.

Think about that. Think about when you got interviews through a recruiter, what did you get out of it, and what did you give them? Conversely of course, if it does not go well, they were using you for free to make money! So, it’s all in the mind, how it’s taken, so the important thing here is to be very clear that it’s business, not personal. If you feel a recruiter hates your guts, it doesn’t matter one jot as they will place you if they can make money from it. Now that’s not a reflection on their personality or yours, it’s just business.

Recruiters often talk about being in a sales industry where the product is unpredictable, talks back, changes its mind and generally messes them around. But of course, it’s all in their minds too.

There are genuinely lots and lots of honest, ethical recruiters out there, but their function, their loyalty, their paymasters are the companies that use their services. I would put it to you as a jobseeker, that when you start paying recruiters to get you a job, then you can expect top class service from them all, but until that happens, same old same old I’m afraid.

So, what you need to do is to establish who are the best recruiters in your industry. Both companies and individuals. Get your details in front of them using the following steps.

CV - Use MS Word as most of the recruiters use search technologies requiring MS word for their databases. Make sure that the version of the CV you submit is keyword rich, in the same way that google uses keyword density to decide page rank, the same applies.

Therefore some good advice for agency recruiter management is to create an extra page to your CV, a skills matrix if you will, listing in bullet form your skills, experiences and qualifications. This will get you found.

Your cover email must tell the agent what they want to know.

Required salary or rate

Availability to start and or interview

Notice period in current role if applicable

Ability to work in the country, visa issues if any

Desire for contract and or permanent work

Desired physical location of your next role

Industry and anything related they may need to know such as, if you’re getting married towards the end of the year, the prospective employer will need to know that you’ll be on honeymoon not long after starting, for instance.

Don’t send a CV to a lot of agencies and expect them all to be banging your door down. Trust me, recruitment technology is such nowadays that when a role comes up that could make them money they will be onto you very quickly.

However, I recommend that you come back to your list of contacts within the industry and email them on the same day each month. Be it the first or last day, just to make sure that they are aware of you. They may not get back to you immediately or at all, but all that means is that they can’t make money from you.

What to watch out for, how to spot unethical recruiters

Like any industry there are cowboys, so let’s find out how to spot them. Ask for written confirmation as discussed, if it’s not forthcoming, run away, demand that your details be taken from their system and quote Data Protection at them, that’ll do the trick.

Watch out for recruiters trying to get you to take a pay cut! Enough said. Also, request that the CV that was sent to a client be also sent to you, including cover email, to make sure at interview that there have been no lies told on your behalf. It’s important to ask for this, because you could lose control of an interview if this happens.

In conclusion, recruiters are perceived as a necessary evil, but a lot of them do a great job for their clients, but you have to remember that you are not their clients! You are the commodity and as you don’t pay them, they don’t owe you anything.

You in fact use their resources to get a role, their wages, their fixtures and fittings. On the other hand, you have to watch out for the unethical ones.

As mentioned, establish who are the best ones for you, put them on a list and contact them. Then contact them regularly until such time as you have finished your jobsearch.

Ruadhri McGarry of mynewcv.ie on City Channel's Evening Show discussing CVs with David Harvey. Broadcast 23rd March 2010.

Alternatives to the traditional CV

It's probably safe to say that most jobseekers at present have their two or three page CV created and saved in Microsoft Word. It's also equally safe to say that if you're a jobseeker, you're in the same situation as a large number of similarly qualified and experienced candidates, who have similar MS Word based CVs.
A question to ask yourself is, how are you standing out?.
If the answer is that you're not standing out, then perhaps you may want to think about it from the perspective of a hiring manager with a job to fill.
This manager will have a large amount of CVs to sift through, all of them in MS Word or variants. However, here are some simple steps to help your application stand out from the rest.

1: The World Wide Web
There are a number of ways of hosting your CV on the internet, and rather than just emailing your CV to the hiring company, why not consider emailing a link to your online CV or Resume as well?
My favourite site in this area is www.visualcv.com. They allow you to host your CV for free, creating a custom url or web address based on your name, e.g. www.visualcv.com/ruadhri where you can view an example that Ive created.
Also bearing in mind that more and more people are using mobile devices to view their email, why not create a version of your CV that can be easily used and designed for mobile devices?
Here at mynewcv.ie we are pioneering this method, feel free to get in touch to learn more about this service.
Don't forget about sites like www.linkedin.com and www.xing.com, not only are they great networking tools, but they are also places to get recruited!

2: Portable Document File
Also known as PDF, Adobes product is an excellent way of creating a static, read only version of MS Word documents.
They print better, look better and cannot be manipulated, plus as they are effectively an image rather than a standard file, they hold any and all formatting, irrespective of the software being used on the hiring managers technology.
The only caveat Id mention about PDFs is that if youre sending the document to a recruiter or to a large company to be held on file, most recruitment searching technology is geared towards MS Word, rather than PDFs.
That's not to say that they're not searchable, but only that its easier not to.

3: Consider the Resume
Especially in Western Europe, the mindset has been to use the CV as the main sales document, however, feedback from hiring companies, bearing in mind how quickly they must decide on candidates for specific roles, a one page resume can get you to the top of the pile.
If your communication skills are such that you can condense your career into one page, then what are you waiting for? It will guarantee that you stand out from the other applicants, and if well written, will leave the reader wanting to know more. Plus its an excellent interview tool, just one page, with space for notes by the interviewer of course can be very useful.

If you require more information on converting your CV to a Resume, feel free to contact us.

Using Social Media for Jobsearching

Firstly, how would you define social media. In my view it simply boils down to the whole web 2.0 concept, interactive web based marketing if you will.

Depending on where you are in your jobsearch you can have different avenues open to you, but if you’re already in employment, its not necessarily a good idea to have your CV absolutely everywhere including in front of your current bosses, who tend to take a dim view of this kind of behaviour

So for this exercise we’ll take the point of view of someone who has their CV ready but is not currently working and attack the market using the web and social media.

For jobsearching using these tools there are three big sites that you need to become acquainted with, namely www.LinkedIn.com, www.Twitter.com and www.Facebook.com.

LinkedIn I believe to be the most effective as it’s purely professionally based, theoretically about business relationships and not fun! Although that’s a matter of perception!

If you’re not on LinkedIn and you are looking for a new role, what are you waiting for? It’s a great place to have your details, even if you’re not looking for a role and allows people to find you or your skillset. It’s also very much a recruiting place to be for hiring managers and recruiters alike. It’s very user friendly and you can import your CV, however, a resume or one page abridged version of the CV is much more useful for this purpose.

There is a guide to help you to create a full profile, but essentially once these steps are followed, you will have entered your career and educational history, plus what kind of contact you’re looking for, job opportunities, contact from old colleagues etc, you can then start to use it in a smart fashion using the following steps.

Use your gmail and or hotmail etc. accounts to find existing contacts who are already on LinkedIn and connect with them. Recommend someone who is not expecting it. This means writing a short paragraph on them and how wonderful they are which they can then display on their own page.

Grab a personalised url, that is, linkedin.com/Ruadhri for instance. This can then be used on your email signature. Get a photo up, not so much because of how you look, but because its now de riguer to do so and you will stand out for the wrong reasons if you don’t have one. But remember, this is a business website so the Xmas party photographs are not the ones to use!!!

Once you have these mechanics created, start getting into it. Use the comment box to say what your current situation is. Those who view your profile will see this as well as those who are connected to you already.

Start seeking out those whom you know and connect with them, browse their connections to see who they know. Of course etiquette as always plays a part so be sensible rather than taking a blunderbuss approach to connecting. Always write a brief note to the person, rather than use a default I’d like to connect paragraph provided.

Once you’re more comfortable with LinkedIn use the Groups Function to get in touch with likeminded people in your sector or position or even use the careers advice group, one great one is Paul Mullan’s Measurability jobs club. Ask questions, or even better answer questions, become an authority and before you know it you’re having lunch with people and discussing opportunities.

The second mentioned site, and of course there are many but we’re focussing on the top three, is of course Twitter. If you’re not familiar with it, well where have you been but it’s a micro blog where you have 140 characters to post on what’s happening. The idea is that you follow people, and they can follow you. However, there is a facility to private message and have conversations off the main site which is where the genius is.

In terms of personal branding it’s important to stay on message and as mentioned in previous podcasts, try to stay away from being controversial.

Anyway, get yourself a username and a good image or picture of yourself and begin to follow people. Do this in a similar way to your LinkedIn profile, find people you know, respect and or like and follow them. Chances are they’ll follow you.

However, the popular idea abroad is that Twitter is some kind of game where you try to get as many followers as possible. I don’t buy that, the trick is to create a dedicated news channel if you will, following what’s going on in your sector by getting the smartest people in it to tell you. Also, many many recruiters and job boards and hiring companies “tweet” their jobs so keep your eye out.

Going even deeper into twitter, I recommend downloading the free tool TweetDeck.com where you can have various columns of styles of tweets, predefined searches, so that as soon as someone tweets “Project Manager, Dublin” you’ll know about it in real time. Get your application in first! Also, check out Tweetdeck’s integration with TwitJobsearch.com, this is a tailored job search engine using whoever is already on Twitter. It’s a tiny bit technical if you’re not that way inclined but give it a go, it’s really easy once you get into it. There are lots and lots of roles out there, but if you don’t know about them…..

Feel free to email me on sales@mynewcv.ie if you require hints and tips, for instance who’s good to follow. Bill Gates tweets now, but chances are he won’t tell you about a job, but people like mneylon from Blacknight hosting or the aforementioned Paul Mullan may!

Finally on the big three Facebook. This comes with a health warning as if you go on Facebook with only the aim of getting a new role, and your boss sees you there and requests to befriend you and you either let her see what you’re doing or say no…..you can guess the rest.

Having said that, there are tons of groups, lots of people to get back in touch with and so many people to whom you can communicate your current situation to.

For instance, if you search “job” “Ireland” under the business drop down list, there are 95 dedicated groups including support groups, recruiters, hiring companies and job boards. Facebook themselves have sourced a large proportion of their employees through this method.

Another health warning with Facebook is that it can be great fun, very time consuming and you may find yourself sidetracked with getting that email out to the guy you were in secondary school with and saying aaaah over pictures of his honeymoon when you’re supposed to be finding your dream role. But if you must go all social, make sure your contacts know that you’re looking for that dream job and write down what it is on your “wall” or homepage. Because you can bet your life that someone is looking for you but will they find you?

Some quick hits here Monster.ie The best CV database (bar enigmasearch.com of course) many many hiring managers and recruiters have access to this database so get the CV there and make sure that you fill out the correct parameters. If you can’t get to the job you want, you should take pains to make sure that it can come to you!

Visual CV.com is a favourite of mine, this will allow you to create your own CV, looking rreally good and professional using a series of templates, and a printable PDF Adobe document page too. More and more hiring companies are viewing Visual CV, so get your bespoke URL or web page, e.g. visualcv.com/Ruadhri and put this on your email signature too!

Moving onto Blogging. Anyone can go to bloggertone or google’s Blogspot and create their own page. The trick is to talk about what it is that you are an expert on. Blogging can be time consuming and you often can find yourself thinking about what it is that you’re supposed to say! Having said that, if you’re not going to position yourself as a subject matter expert, why not use a google based blog like blogspot.com to get your CV online on a platform that’s supported by the biggest search engine! Makes perfect sense and of course, as more CVs go on the internet, more people looking for strong candidates are using google and bing etc to find them. Bespoke tools like enigmasearch.com and CVfox utilise google’s Custom Search engine to find these exact candidates for free, so remember the Irish Sweepstake Slogan, “if you’re not in, you can’t win”.

Forums such as boards.ie and askaboutmoney.com have excellent places to ask questions, but again, be conscious of your internet profile, always vanity search, that is put your name into a search engine and see if there’s anything up there that a potential employer will view as a negative.