wheelie-good job finding best practice & tips

Introduction

14 years ago roughly to the day, I was a History graduate signing on at the job centre in a financial recession, oblivious at this point what I wanted to do in life or where my career would take me. A couple of months later, I got a temporary Christmas job in a call centre at a large e-commerce/retailer, dealing with customers who hadn’t had their orders delivered or in some cases had them damaged when they’d received them. In the new year, I attended an interview through an agency, not knowing even what the job was I attending was for. I remember I was asked in the interview to “sell me this pen” and what I would do with a customer who seemed confused. I got the job! And (unexpectedly) stayed at Esure for 4.5 years where I learnt a lot which would be of huge value to me later in my career. I then found myself in recruitment; agency first then crossing the dreaded draw-bridge to the “dark side” of internal.

So why have I written this article? Partly because as well as recruiting for the best part of ten years I have also been a candidate during that time. And whilst my loyalty as a recruiter is to the business I am working for, my service is to you the candidate. This is something I am passionate about, not least of all as I believe in a world where we have more emphasis on service and giving back. If I can help just one person in a tiny way by sharing some knowledge I’ve gleamed, then it’ll have been worth writing it.

I'll also be transparent. For too long we as recruitment/talent professionals have hidden behind the guises of not really showing candidate's what matter to us and what we really do. I'd rather be honest with you, some of it may be unpopular but it is the truth from my point of view.

Before you start applying

Get an excel sheet or notepad and list the jobs you've applied; ordering most pertinent columns; "job title", "hiring manager(s)", "location", "salary", "stage" and "follow up contact" (will come to the latter below). Set yourself a daily or weekly target for applying to roles. This will keep you focused and also re-assure yourself of the work you're putting in to find a job, as it's only your own thoughts & actions you should concern yourself with. Broadly speaking statistically as well you need to be targeting yourself for 5:1 apps to interview for a candidate-led vertical or for more of a loose skills/associate/entry level job 10:1. For interviews, you're likely looking at a minimum of 3 before to offer, meaning you may need to apply/express interest in 30 roles before you get an offer.

Research, research and more research

As a candidate in 2024, you have more resources than ever before to be as selective as you like before applying for a role. Look at an organisation’s Glassdoor for existing employee perspectives, look at what their customers are saying about them on Trustpilot, look up the directors and owners on company house, search for the key people on LinkedIn. Research to your hearts content, as ultimately that extra time doing your own due diligence will save you time in the long run. You’re also then in?a perfect position for when you’re inevitably asked by a hiring manager “what do you know about us” and believe me if a candidate doesn’t know anything or hasn’t taken the time to research, it’s a red-flag. Consequently, also if you don’t do your research, you may find yourself in completely the wrong company and be adding that green banner to your LinkedIn again in 3 months’ time.

Apply early

With most jobs receiving in well in excess of 100 applications, most recruiters will priortise the first few days of a job going live to check through the applications. If you’ve applied and the role has been live for longer than a week or two, you’re not exactly wasting your time, but you ideally want to get in early to maximise the chances of your application being noticed. Also, if it is a volume hires vacancy such as a customer service or graduate position, there might be a limit in the number of hires available to the employer. Applying within the first 1-3 days of the role going live will alleviate any issues with this also. Lastly, to set your own expectations, think about when you need to ideally start a role and add a minimum of 20-30 days from the date of your application to a particular role, as most hirers won't be able to manage your start earlier than this.

Layout your CV clearly

Don’t simply use chat-GPT (will talk more about this below) and think ‘jobs a good’un’. Make your CV simple and clear to read as most recruiters or hiring managers will spend anywhere between 20 seconds and 1.5 minutes looking through it. Additionally; formatting, spelling, grammatical errors and date inconsistencies will be sure to put-off the person reading your CV. If in doubt, get a trusted person to give your CV a once-over before it goes out to potential employers.

Focus on the application form rather than covering letter

Covering letters are becoming a thing of the past, I went there yes. Hiring managers are much more likely to look at your LinkedIn or even google your name to create a complete picture of you as a candidate than arbitrarily looking at a covering letter. According to a poll run recently by “Salt Recruitment”, only 18% of hirers described covering letters as “nice to have” and 66% don’t read them and/or just wanted a CV. Instead, think about the application form and the questions about you being asked. These questions are often pre-selected by a HR, Talent/Recruitment team because they want to know specifics in order to qualify your application. So give the questions some real thought and try to get across your personality in the responses, (albeit try to maintain a professional approach when answering!).

If you’re a grad

DEFINITELY highlight any part-time or voluntary roles you’ve held during your studies. This will help differentiate amongst other graduate peers, helps show your commitment whilst studying and also that you potentially have instantly transferable skills to offer in the job market.

If you’re dealing with a recruiter

Way-up your transparency about your current job search. Some agency recruiters will use this info for their own leads with a view to ‘specing’ (speculative CV sending) alternative candidates than yourself to the company you have just interviewed to. You could also be putting off a potential hirer if the recruiter gives feedback to the hiring manager that your “pre-close” (after final interview/before offer ‘would you accept if we offered you’ chat) was non-committal. So if given the choice between you and another candidate who proverbially bit the recruiter’s hand off when they were “pre-closed” the hiring manager might choose the lower risk (given rejected offers often lead a hirer to start the process from the very beginning) option which wouldn’t be you. If you’re genuinely undecided between two or more potential offers (firstly well done you) but the advice here is not to lie or bend the truth but in a confident and assuring way to convince the recruiter you would seriously consider the offer and would love to receive one!

Prepare for your interview

Ok, now you’re just pointing out the patently obvious..?? But to put it another way, think about preparing for an interview as if you were revising for a real key exam. That exam you took at school, college or university may be the door to unlock your preferred career, and guess what… The interview is exactly the same. It may take more time, but 1-2 days before the interview (if you have that notice, if you don’t you may want to question the employer’s credibility for not providing you enough time), get a note-pad out, bring up the Job Description (all good hirers should provide one before any interview) and then put together examples related to your experience from the JD. I.e, if they’re looking for “excellent customer service experience” under the accountabilities/required experience section, come up with a couple of examples relating to a time you have delivered excellent customer service. Use and write up your examples in the STAR technique format. Repeat this for each bullet point under the accountabilities/required experience section of the JD. Lastly, review your examples and even read them out loud on the day of the interview to help this stick in your head.

Remember that the job application process is a two-way street

More of a point here for hirers to be reminded of, but a potential red-flag from a candidate perspective is when you’ve had a heavily weighted hirer process, with little emphasis on your experience or what you need to know to make the right decision for your career. It may be a lack of transparency on salary or benefits, it may be you’ve had 4 stages of interviews without the hirer giving you time to ask questions, you've met 50% of the staff, had three tours of the building, been on a 500-mile train journey, whatever it is; if you’re getting that feeling the hirer hasn’t taken into consideration your experience or what you need to know, then that can be revealing in itself to you as a candidate. It’s your career, take ownership of it and don’t settle for less.

Follow up

A lot of hirers are busy beavers or at least they’re pretty good at pretending to be. If you have an email, LinkedIn profile or better yet phone no. for a decision maker in the hiring process and you’re trying to get an interview, follow up your application with a call. They will probably thank you for it, at the very least you’re ticking off for them one of the internal risk assessment boxes that hirers have in their head related to a candidate’s motivation & commitment. To a hirer, once they've identified someone they like, it's just like buying something. But imagine now you had the choice between the same item from two different delivery firms; one gave you a guaranteed next day delivery or your money back, the other didn't give you any assurance. Which one would you choose...

Use AI appropriately but don’t rely on it

Platforms such as Chat-GPT have revolutionised the candidate journey & experience, there’s no doubt about it. Having a faithful servant at your 24 hour disposal who holds a 155 IQ isn’t a bad thing, right? But make sure you don’t over-use or even become lazy and replace your brain with AI. This is no more true than when it comes to your CV. If you’re the kind of person who previously (or currently), copies and pastes your CV from an AI platform to improve it, without cross-referencing what they put in it, then please stop right now (thank you very much). Use AI but take ownership of every letter on your CV, as if you’re asked a question in an interview about your CV, you won’t have your faithful AI assistant there to answer it for you.

Remember it's ok to say "no"

If you've got to the point in a few weeks time having attended a number of interviews and have an offer but you're not 100% sure it's right for you, then ask the questions you need to make the most informed decision. If you're still not convinced, turn it down, you'll be saving the hirer and you more time in the long run. If you're lucky enough to have two or more offers around the same time, then pull together a pros & cons list.

Be kind to yourself

Ok ending on a bit of a fluffy one here, but it’s important to take time away from your search, reward your efforts and not be too hard on yourself. Use your family, friends and network. Talk and open up if you’re struggling. Also try to take the good out of any potential negative and remember that ultimately, failure is the first step to success.

Good luck.

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