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You mean at home speaking with my sexy staffing specialist and being very agressive and creative bytracking down old colleagues instead of standing in the unemployment line waiting to get in a building with 500 people all trying to sell themselves.
You sound like you think you are different from the rest of us unemployed people. WOW! I would not miss any opportunity to network
I used to go just for the chachki's, but they don't even have good one's in this bad economy. I mean how many cheap pen's can you collect?
I do find, in an open job fair, you can do some professional networking.
I was watching Fox News this afternoon and they were showing how long the line was and ow many people are looking for work. What exactly will I accomplish from going somewhere where 400 other unemployed people are? I mean has anyone on here ever accomplished anything going to a job fair?? My goal is to seperate myself from all the other people in my area looking for work not be in the same place they are trying to sell myself.
I went to a job fair last year for a school district. There were hundreds of people there. I wound up with two iron-clad offers out of four interviews... and the other two principals said they didn't need a teacher for my subject areas. So, I was two for two.
And do you want to know why I was two for two? Because I knew how to sell myself. That's where a lot of job applicants fall flat. They are out for money because nobody really wants a job anyway... they all just want the money... but if you're going to get a job, you have to convince the manager that he/she wants YOU and not anyone else. You have to know how to sell. Sales, as a profession, isn't as sleazy as you might think. You just have to be selling something in which you have true confidence... and if you have true confidence in yourself, you'll be able to get a job no matter how bad the market is. Companies are still hiring- they just aren't hiring as many people and there is stiffer competition. Cool. Go out there and trounce the competition- and you'll get a job anyway.
Better yet- start your own business. Then you won't have to worry about some hiring manager giving you BS lines about how they'll keep your application on file for six months and if something come up blah blah blah blah blah.
I once posted a fake job on craigslist saying I was hiring a couple people for a simple job doing general labor tasks. Pay 8-9 non negotiable.
I got ~200 resumes in 48 hours. Oh and this was back in 2007 before craiglist started charging.
No shortage of labor in this country, even skilled. When someone gives you their overcharged rate, 30/hr just pass on it. You can find someone who will do the job for 10/hr.
I use to work in Human Resources and was responsible for recruiting and interviewing administrative support staff. We would go to the job fairs and was always shocked at the poor quality applicants. Didn't the people ever look at a job hunting book? Or did they take English classes in school? Or didn't anyone say that you should dress up for an interview or job fair?
Anyway, we always went through 100s of resumes but only 10% were worth a dam.
My point is that the job fair could work even with hundreds of applicants because most people do not stand out and have lousy resumes. If you are a great applicant you will be noticed and invited to the corporate office. As with sales, you have to talk to many people and rejected numerous times before you will be successful. At least at a job fair you can look at them eye to eye and not just be a piece of paper in a resume data base.
Last edited by spring greenery; 02-27-2009 at 07:23 AM..
I think if you have the skills and experience, prepare yourself before the job fair, be professional and sell what you can offer to the company, job fairs can be beneficial. It's a great opportunity to meet employers directly and gives you the chance to spend time with them to talk to them and let them know why you would be the right person, as opposed to them reading your application that you sent through a job site.
Another added benefit is to network with other professionals who are looking for a job. There are a lot of seasoned professionals who are looking for work. By meeting new people and extending your network, maybe someone you met could become a resource to you in the future.
If there is a job fair one day, and you have no interviews or anything planned - what is the harm in attending and see what comes out of it? If there are 500 people there, and you didn't get anything out of it - maybe you didn't stand out or sell yourself well enough. Maybe you just blended in with the 90% of the people who are just there to be there, instead of the 10% that were there to get a job.
How do you prepare for a job fair?
1. Find out which employers will be there and what positions they are looking to fill. Then decide the top 5 or 10 employers you want to talk to. Find out where their booths/tables will be to ensure you don't get lost and miss out on one.
2. Prepare a 2-3 minute "sales pitch" to the employers on why you should be the person for this job. Don't try to wing it on the day of.
3. Prepare a customized cover letter for each of the employers you will be speaking with. This will let them know you did your homework and did not come with 100 copies of your resume to pass to each employer.
4. Bring enough copies of your resume. Last thing you want to do is run out if someone asks you for it.
I had a former colleague who was laid off from a bank and went to a job fair in NYC, Madison Square Garden, and there was over a thousand people attending. He did those things above and sold himself and made sure they remembered him. In the end, he got 2 interviews at the office during the job fair and 1 employer called him a week later for a interview. And this is out of a thousand people.
I can't speak of the quality of the job fairs in other cities, but personally, I just don't see the problem with going to a job fair and doing what you can to land a job if your unemployed. Worse case is that you lose a few hours and miss Jerry Springer.
Hey, it's like lotto, you 'got to be in it' to win it.
Try all tactics. Eventually you will get something. And, hope there are a lot of stupid people in bad clothes with poor English--it makes those of us who know what to wear and how to speak stand out much better.
I think if you have the skills and experience, prepare yourself before the job fair, be professional and sell what you can offer to the company, job fairs can be beneficial. It's a great opportunity to meet employers directly and gives you the chance to spend time with them to talk to them and let them know why you would be the right person, as opposed to them reading your application that you sent through a job site.
Another added benefit is to network with other professionals who are looking for a job. There are a lot of seasoned professionals who are looking for work. By meeting new people and extending your network, maybe someone you met could become a resource to you in the future.
If there is a job fair one day, and you have no interviews or anything planned - what is the harm in attending and see what comes out of it? If there are 500 people there, and you didn't get anything out of it - maybe you didn't stand out or sell yourself well enough. Maybe you just blended in with the 90% of the people who are just there to be there, instead of the 10% that were there to get a job.
How do you prepare for a job fair?
1. Find out which employers will be there and what positions they are looking to fill. Then decide the top 5 or 10 employers you want to talk to. Find out where their booths/tables will be to ensure you don't get lost and miss out on one.
2. Prepare a 2-3 minute "sales pitch" to the employers on why you should be the person for this job. Don't try to wing it on the day of.
3. Prepare a customized cover letter for each of the employers you will be speaking with. This will let them know you did your homework and did not come with 100 copies of your resume to pass to each employer.
4. Bring enough copies of your resume. Last thing you want to do is run out if someone asks you for it.
I had a former colleague who was laid off from a bank and went to a job fair in NYC, Madison Square Garden, and there was over a thousand people attending. He did those things above and sold himself and made sure they remembered him. In the end, he got 2 interviews at the office during the job fair and 1 employer called him a week later for a interview. And this is out of a thousand people.
I can't speak of the quality of the job fairs in other cities, but personally, I just don't see the problem with going to a job fair and doing what you can to land a job if your unemployed. Worse case is that you lose a few hours and miss Jerry Springer.
There will be a job fair for people who are in my line of work next thursday so I will go ahead and make a go for it since I just bought these $90 dress pants but if I get there and the line is around the corner, I will turn back around and go home because I have no interest in standing in line with hundreds of unemployed people like me.
I think if you have the skills and experience, prepare yourself before the job fair, be professional and sell what you can offer to the company, job fairs can be beneficial. It's a great opportunity to meet employers directly and gives you the chance to spend time with them to talk to them and let them know why you would be the right person, as opposed to them reading your application that you sent through a job site.
Another added benefit is to network with other professionals who are looking for a job. There are a lot of seasoned professionals who are looking for work. By meeting new people and extending your network, maybe someone you met could become a resource to you in the future.
If there is a job fair one day, and you have no interviews or anything planned - what is the harm in attending and see what comes out of it? If there are 500 people there, and you didn't get anything out of it - maybe you didn't stand out or sell yourself well enough. Maybe you just blended in with the 90% of the people who are just there to be there, instead of the 10% that were there to get a job.
How do you prepare for a job fair?
1. Find out which employers will be there and what positions they are looking to fill. Then decide the top 5 or 10 employers you want to talk to. Find out where their booths/tables will be to ensure you don't get lost and miss out on one.
2. Prepare a 2-3 minute "sales pitch" to the employers on why you should be the person for this job. Don't try to wing it on the day of.
3. Prepare a customized cover letter for each of the employers you will be speaking with. This will let them know you did your homework and did not come with 100 copies of your resume to pass to each employer.
4. Bring enough copies of your resume. Last thing you want to do is run out if someone asks you for it.
I had a former colleague who was laid off from a bank and went to a job fair in NYC, Madison Square Garden, and there was over a thousand people attending. He did those things above and sold himself and made sure they remembered him. In the end, he got 2 interviews at the office during the job fair and 1 employer called him a week later for a interview. And this is out of a thousand people.
I can't speak of the quality of the job fairs in other cities, but personally, I just don't see the problem with going to a job fair and doing what you can to land a job if your unemployed. Worse case is that you lose a few hours and miss Jerry Springer.
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