In
Britain, one in six people got their jobs through
speculative
applications. Don't just post off
loads
of general CVs with a standard covering letter. This is
usually a waste of time and only benefits the post office! Rather,
you should try and identify a specific need
within
an organisation and then demonstrate why you are, the person to
cover it. These needs might be:
a)
a vacancy for which the employer has not yet started to advertise;
b)
a post for which the employer has advertised but which s/he has
been unable to fill satisfactorily.
In
a more general sense, you can try to convince an employer that
there is a job which needs to be done which s/he has not
identified. S/he may have identified the problem but not the fact
that someone needs
to be hired
to solve it.
You
can get the necessary information from specialist magazines for
your profession and from
trade fairs
oriented to your line of work. Talk to people and accumulate as
much insider information as possible. Being seen is always
important. Give potential employers every opportunity to know that
you exist.
Use
newspaper and journal information intelligently. Adverts for
managers for new teams or business units suggest that the person
chosen will soon be looking for the people who are going to report
to him/her. Get in there first. Indirect information can also be
very useful. If an article tells you about a
resignation,
a retirement, a promotion or a
shake-up
in a company there are likely to be job opportunities somewhere in
the structure. Information about companies which have won
contracts, relocated or opened new offices may also tell you about
job opportunities.
Up to 30%
of staff leave a company when the location of the workplace
changes - even though the new
site
is only a few kilometres from the old one.
Try
to identify how a company
underutilises
its capacity or has missed a business opportunity. Use all the
information you have available
to find
out who is the best person in the organisation to write
to and then
get in touch with that person.
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