Quote:
Originally Posted by annerk
Grab me with your cover letter. Show personality and show that you can differentiate yourself from the pack. Offer me something besides your work history that is applicable to the job--volunteer work or even an interesting hobby that will translate to some facet of the job. Show me that you are a vibrant person, not some drone. That's what will get you the interview. I cull the pack of resumes hard before I even interview a single person, only 1% even get a phoner. And those are the people who have grabbed my attention with their cover letter.
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Over my lifetime I've hired maybe 100 people and maybe it isn't for everyone but I like to go looking for the right person instead of them looking for me.
Some of my biggest disappointments have come from the traditional search with an advertisement in a newspaper, it may surprise some of you to learn but the internet hasn't been around forever, followed with the interview and usual BS.
But enough of that, let me tell you a couple instances where I hired by accident.
It was the early 1980's and going into work one bitterly cold January morning I passed a young man carrying a car battery being trailed by his young son. We were in the middle of nowhere so I thought a moment before turning around to offer him a ride.
Turns out he was taking the battery to a junk yard for scrap. It was 1982, unemployment was high and times were rough to say the least. Turns out he was concerned about the welfare of his family and was doing whatever he could to bring food to the table. What struck me is he was willing to walk several miles in the bitter cold (maybe 5 degrees) to bring home a couple bucks.
Took him to the junkyard, he got his $2.00 or whatever it was and I offered him a ride back home. We talked a bit and I just got a feeling this was a guy who would make a good worker.
Towards home I told him we could drop his boy off and I'd like to show him where I worked. Getting to the shop we each got a cup of coffee, I showed him around the shop and he impressed me by appearing genuinely interested in what we did especially since a job wasn't mentioned once up to this point.
We were a union company so after "interviewing" for a couple hours I offered a job as a "shop hand" where union membership wasn't required. He started work at noon.
The union owed me a favor, after a few months I got him into the apprentice program and as I knew it would he grabbed the opportunity making the best of it. He made journeyman in 1987 and was one of the guys I sent on a power plant project in Minnesota where his take home pay was never less than a thousand a week for nearly a year. To put it into perspective $1,000 in 1988 was equivalent to $1,924.45 today and that was take home pay.
By 1989 was a project superintendent. With union benefits and pay I like to think he did very well for himself and his family. With the battery he was taking initiative which always gets my attention.
I tell my people never to be afraid to make a decision even if it is wrong. I would rather have a wrong decision than no decision at all. If it is wrong we will talk about it as grown men so it isn't made again. Sometime that is the best way to learn.
We parted in 1990 when I went off to another company but years later I happened to run into him getting gas one day and he was still working and appeared happy.
He was devoted to his family and a church going man. Call me old fashioned but I like to see that in a man it shows responsibility.
What would have happened if he had decided it was to cold, and the walk to long, that cold winter morning?