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Break These Job-Search Rules And Get Hired

This article is more than 9 years old.

I want job-seekers to know that when they're frustrated and angry over the time and energy it takes them to fill out those awful online job applications, they have every right to be. Those systems are horrible. They're badly designed, expensive, bureaucratic, slow and inefficient.

If you place a job ad and throw a bunch of keywords into it, how long do you think it's going to take the average job-seeker to figure out that s/he needs to cut and paste the same keywords into his or her online application?

If everybody does that, then the keyword-searching algorithm is useless. Didn't any of the software developers or product managers developing Applicant Tracking Systems twenty years ago think of that?

There is a much easier, faster and more human way to hire people than to use an applicant tracking system, but this column is for job-seekers. There is a better way to get a job, too.

I don't want you to lob any more resumes or applications into faceless corporate Black Holes.

If you ever hear back from an employer after pitching another application into the void, the response is most likely to be a terse auto-responder that says "Your materials have been received. If we want to contact you, we know how to reach you. Feel free to jump in a lake, in the meantime."

It is a new job market now. You need to break some rules to get hired , especially if you want a job that will interest you and pay you what you're worth.

Hiring managers have problems they need to have solved, and the inflexible corporate and institutional hiring processes they're stuck with don't help them hire great people, especially if they need help now.

You can bypass the recruiting process completely and send your materials straight to your hiring manager's desk. You're going to break ten traditional job search rules in the process. Here's a list of the ten rules you're going to break:

  1. First, you'll break the rule that tells you to send a stiff, formal resume that makes you sound like every other banana in the bunch. Forget that! You have your own voice and personality. You won't come across as a live human being on the page unless you put a human voice in your resume. Here are instructions for doing that. 
  2. Second, you'll break the rule that prohibits the use of the word "I" in your resume. That's an old, idiotic rule that makes no sense. Your resume is a branding document. Of course you're going to use the word "I" in it! Here's how.
  3. Third, you're going to break the rule that tells you not to contact your hiring manager directly. You haven't signed an agreement that says you're bound by whatever instructions appear in an employer's job ad, have you? Good! Then you're free to contact whomever you like. You're going to write to your hiring manager directly at his or her desk. You're going to send him or her two documents, stapled together, in an envelope. Those two documents are your Pain Letter and your Human-Voiced Resume.
  4. Fourth, you'll break the rule that tells you to respond to a job ad by writing about the match between your qualifications and the bullet points on the job ad. You couldn't care less about the job ad, which is full of weenie boilerplate language cut and pasted from the last job ad, anyway.  You're going to read between the lines in the job ad, and talk to your hiring manager about his or her Business Pain, instead. That's a much more interesting topic!
  5. Fifth, you will break the rule that says "Don't apply for a job unless you have all or most of the qualifications listed in the job ad." If employers only hired people who had all the fanciful-bordering-on-delusional requirements they list in job ads, they'd never hire anyone at all! If you can see yourself performing the job you're interested in, go ahead and apply for it!
  6. Sixth, you are going to break the rule that tells you to use the standard cover letter language and format when you write to your hiring manager. That's out!  Every traditional cover letter looks exactly the same. A Pain Letter is a very different approach. It's called a Pain Letter because you'll talk in your letter about the pain lurking behind the job ad. Read more about that approach here!
  7. Seventh, you will ignore the rule that tells you to fill out endless forms and fields in an online job application. When you send a Pain Letter to your hiring manager, you'll skip the online application and go right to the hiring decision-maker!
  8. Eighth, you'll break the rule that tells you that you can only apply for jobs that are posted.  You can send a Pain Letter with your Human-Voiced Resume to any hiring manager you want! If you're interested in a particular company, go ahead and send a Pain Letter to your hiring manager. Here's how to find that person using LinkedIn.
  9. Ninth, you'll trample on the rule that tells you to include your salary history in the correspondence you send to your hiring manager. Forget that nonsense! Your salary history is your own business, and no one else's.  Read about that topic here. 
  10. Last and most importantly, you'll completely forget the old rule that told us that the employer is on top and lowly job-seekers are on the bottom. You have incredible skills that hiring managers need to solve their thorniest problems.

Remember who you are and where you've come from. It is a new day -- the Human Workplace is already here, and more and more employers are getting the memo every day! Break these rules and take control of your job search now. In the worst case, you won't hear anything back -- but since that's what you're already dealing with, the only place to go is up!