Good luck, job hunters!

I'm glad I am not out beating the bushes looking for a job. It's highly competitive today and you better know all there is to know about current technology if you want any chance to succeed. Then, next week when the technology takes another step forward and leaves your knowledge from the week before obsolete, you have to re-invent yourself again to establish another positive online identity.

According to Dilemma #1 on the CareerBuilder list, you need to have your name showing up in search engines like LinkedIn and making sure you are carefully leveraging the site. You also need to be on additional social networking sites like Plaxo, XING, or Viadeo and be sure you are on Facebook for professional networking. Don’t forget social media sites like Twitter and be sure to create a blog using a platform that will sync to your LinkedIn profile.

I don’t know about you but I don’t understand what a lot of that even means. My first job after college in 1969 was at Lever Brothers Company calling on headquarter and retail accounts selling Lever products like Dove Soap, Imperial Margarine, Close-Up Toothpaste, and many other items.

Nothing listed in the first two paragraphs above were heard of yet so I went to the want ads in the Kansas City Star newspaper. Want ads are extinct now but they were a good way to find a job in the 1960s. I saw the ad from Lever for a salesman and made a call on a pay phone for an appointment.

Since the appointment was a few days off, I had to type up a resume to submit to the interviewer so I got a book from the library about how to do a resume, and typed one up on my 1955 Smith-Corona typewriter.

When I arrived for the interview, I felt that I was ready although I was nervous as hell. I had my checklist covered: shined black shoes, dark blue suit, conservative white shirt and tie, good haircut, close shave, no political or religious buttons, nothing weird hanging out of my nose, and hopefully a polished, professional demeanor.

The interview went well and after one more interview I got the job. I don’t know if I was that great or the other guys interviewed were a bunch of stiffs and I didn’t care. I had a $140 a week job and a 1968 Ford company car. Combined with my wife’s teaching job we were pulling in a cool $13,500 a year, not bad in 1969 dollars where two steaks and a bottle of wine went for about $10!

I have no problem with the technology of today; it is what it is. Today you need all the items mentioned above to even have hope of an interview. I got mine with one call on a pay phone and when I typed my resume on that long gone Smith-Corona, I don’t think I even had liquid paper to correct mistakes.

Good luck, job hunters!