Multiple Job Offers in 10 Days!: A Road Map to Finding a Great Job, Whether It's Your 1st or 21st

By Jonathan R. Price

Multiple Job Offers in 10 Days will show you how to generate outrageous interest in you! Why hasn't anyone told you this before? Because it is hard! Written in plain English and peppered with interesting anecdotes, this book offers a completely unique approach to the entire job-search process.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Career Press
• Release date: Sep 15, 2006
• ISBN: 9781601638199

Jonathan R. Price

Jonathan R. Price is the Senior Manager for one of the nation's leading Executive Career Advancement firms. He has used these same proven methods to help his clients land jobs earning $50,000, $100,000, $200,000 and even more! He lives and works in Fort Myers, Florida.

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Copyright © 2007 by Chokoloskee Ventures, LLC

All rights reserved under the Pan-American and International Copyright Conventions. This book may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, in any form or by any means electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system now known or hereafter invented, without written permission from the publisher, The Career Press.

MultipleJob Offers in 10 Days!

Edited by Jodi Brandon

Typeset by Kate Henches

Cover design by Johnson Design

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9781564149022_001_0002_002

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Price, Jonathan R., 1970-

    Multiple job offers in 10 days : a road map to finding a great job, whether it’s your 1st or 21st / by Jonathan R. Price.

        p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN-13: 978-1-56414-902-2

ISBN-10: 1-56414-902-1

eISBN : 9781601638199

    1. Job hunting. 2. Vocational advice. I. Title. II Title: Multiple job offers in ten days.

HF5382.7.P74502006

650.14—dc22

2006013628

www.redwheelweiser.com

www.redwheelweiser.com/newsletter

Acknowledgments

There are several people that are near and dear to me that made this book not only possible, but are the real reason it was written. These are the people that I work with on a daily basis, they are my coworkers, they are my friends, and, in my mind, they are my family. Words can’t express just how much they have helped, but I’ll give it a try anyway.

Nancy Eardley—Proposal proofreading. Chapter proofreading. Nancy was my first line editor. Thanks to her I didn’t look like a total inept moron to my editors at the publishing house. (Luckily Nancy already knows how bad my writing is, and she graciously agreed to make me look good. Big thanks to her!) Nancy has really been my cheerleader and my coach throughout the book. She kept me on track when I veered off into the lazy life, and she kept me excited even when it meant that I ate at my desk every day for six weeks during the final crunch. I feel that she has written this book just as much as I have.

Kim Clower—Proposal proofreading. Various research projects. Formatting of resumes, and help with the mail merge tutorial. She has also given me advice, support, and inspiration. She is one of my best friends, and I am always glad she is there to talk about the book, and all the other crazy things we discuss!

Gina Panettieri—My Agent. Wow—found a brand-new writer and immediately put me on the map. She was great, and took my writing-virginity with laughter and enthusiasm.

Career Press/New Page Books—A great publishing company, with an all-star lineup of talented writers. I am incredibly grateful for the chance they took with me, and I can only hope that I live up to their expectations.

Michael W. Dean—$30 Writing School convinced me to get off my duff and write a book already!

George Devore—For great technical contributions and an in-depth understanding of puns.

Bruce and Nanette Scoville—For supporting me in this project, even though I am giving away all of their secrets, for mentoring me, for the genuine friendship they have provided, and for basically adopting me as their own. Bruce and Nanette taught me virtually everything I know about looking for work. Much of what is said in this book is the hard-learned tips, techniques, and principles that they have developed throughout their years working with countless numbers of executives and professionals, listening to blowhard job-seekers tell these two well-meaning people that they were wrong, were only trying to take advantage of them, and were a scam; when in reality they were just preaching a truth that most people can’t stand to look at. Overcoming the status quo and convincing a person to finally try something different is a harder battle than most people realize.

You guys are terrific and I owe so much of what I have to your support and friendship.

Contents

Title Page

Copyright

Foreword

Introduction: What This Book Isn’t and What It Is

How Do I Know This Is the Best Method for Finding Work?

A General Overview of Your Job Search: How You Will Change the Pitfalls to Triumphs by Using This Book!

The 10-Day Method

Chapter 1 - Day 1: Understanding Your Marketability:

Taking Off the Blinders

Your Day 1 Assignment—Step 1

Your Day 1 Assignment—Step 2

Your Day 1 Assignment—Step 3

Chapter 2 - Day 2: The Resume and Cover Letter:

Your Tag-Team Salesman

Human Communication 101

Why Are You Bothering Me? Your Cover Letter Is the Agent for Your Resume

The Six-Pack Resume: Creating a Position Build-Up in a Story

The Six-Pack Resume

Your Day 2 Assignment—Step 1

Your Day 2 Assignment—Step 2

Your Day 2 Assignment—Step 3

Chapter 3 - Day 3: Who to Get in Front of and How:

The Guerilla Marketing Approach!

Why Is Direct Mail Marketing Still Done? Cause it Works!

Developing Your Market Plan

SIC/NAICS Codes: The 30,000-Foot View

Geo, Title, and Salary

Getting a Nosebleed

Your Day 3 Assignment—Step 1

Your Day 3 Assignment—Step 2

Your Day 3 Assignment—Step 3

Alternate Sources for Lists: The Internet, Chambers of Commerce, and Libraries

Chapter 4 - Days 4 and 5: Getting Your Resume Out There,

Where the Rubber Meets the Road!

Do-It-Yourself: The Do’s and Don’ts

Getting Professional Help: (For Your Mailing, Not Your Personal Problems)

Your Days 4 and 5 Assignment—Step 1

Your Days 4 and 5 Assignment—Step 2

Your Days 4 and 5 Assignment—Step 3

Chapter 5 - Day 6: What to Expect, What Not to Expect,

and Why

First results: The Depressing Realities of Direct Mail

Thank-You Letters (Yours and Theirs)

Networking Your New Contacts

Now Is NOT the Time to Sit Back and Wait for the Action!

Phones, Voice Mail, and Answering Machines (And Why Your kids Are Not Cute)

Your Day 6 Assignment—Step 1

Your Day 6 Assignment—Step 2

Your Day 6 Assignment—Step 3

Sample Thank-You Letters for Most Occasions

Chapter 6 - Days 7, 8, and 9: How to Handle the Interviews

Treat EVERY Opportunity as the Best Thing Since Sliced Bread

Accept EVERY Interview Offered

The 7 Deadly Sins of the Phone Interview

The 7 Deadlier Sins of the Face-to-Face Interview

Never Walk Out the Door Without Knowing Where You Stand in the Running

A Good Example of What Not to Do When the Calls Start Coming In

Set Your Expectations Correctly

Your Days 7, 8, and 9 Assignment—Step 1

Your Days 7, 8, and 9 Assignment—Step 2

Your Days 7, 8, and 9 Assignment—Step 3

Chapter 7 - Day 10: Accepting Several Job Offers!

Don’t Just Take the First Thing That Comes Along—Take Everything That Comes Along

Leverage: It’s Not Just for Physicists Anymore!

Using One Offer to Improve Another Offer

Your Day 10 Assignment—Step 1

Your Day 10 Assignment—Step 2

Your Day 10 Assignment—Step 3

Chapter 8 - Negotiating the Best Salary Possible

Don’t Undervalue Yourself (But Don’t Price Yourself out of the Running)

How to Determine What You Are Worth, Anywhere in the Country

How to Avoid Getting Calls for Jobs That Don’t Pay Enough

Getting Sign-On Bonuses and Relocation Reimbursements: Make Them Bribe You!

Getting All the Commitments in Writing (An Insurance Policy for Your New Job)

The Numbers Game

The Three C’s to Consider Before You Negotiate

Win-Win

Chapter 9 - Your Ongoing Job Search (aka Your Second Career)

Keeping the Job Search Simmering

The Ongoing Job Search: Your Second Career

Know Your Rights: Non-Competes CAN’T Compete!

Chapter 10 - Your Marketing Approach:

You Don’t Have One!

Your Marketing Materials

Your Resume: All the Usual Suspects

Gaps: Were You in Prison or in Rehab?

Bullet Points: Do You Only Speak in Clipped Sentences at the Top of Your Voice?

Why You Should Never Put Your Picture on Your Resume

Are You Spamming Your Next Employer? How the Digital Revolution Is Contributing to Your Unemployment

Chapter 11 - Your Career Choices:

Why Are You Looking for Work?

Self-Analysis

Did You Get Downsized?

Are You Unhappy With Your Challenges?

Not Getting Paid Enough?

Are You Afraid to Take the Next Step up the Ladder? (Or Is Something Holding You Back?)

Chapter 12 - The Scary Truth About the Holy Trinity!

Job Boards: Why You and 3 Million Other Disgruntled Employees Aren’t Getting Hired

Networking: Do You Have Any Friends Left?

Recruiters: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly Truth

Chapter 13 - Why You Are Unemployed or Still Stuck

in the Same Lousy Job

Human Resources: The Black Hole of Death!

Outplacement and Severance: Adult Daycare

The 12-Month Plan for Reemployment: Chasing Fireflies

Interview Mistakes You Don’t Even Know You’re Making

Chapter 14 - The Fears, Phobias, and Fallacies

That Are Holding You Back

(and How to Overcome Them)

Looking for Work Stinks

Are You Participating in Pink Slip Parties?

Success Is Easier Than You Think, as Long as You Work Smarter, Not Harder!

Conclusion - Wrapping It Up

Appendix A - Creating a Form Letter Using Mail Merge

Appendix B - Resources

SIC/NAIC Links

Pay Lists

Chambers of Commerce, Libraries, and Free Online List Sources

Appendix C - SIC/NAIC Code Listings

SIC Division Structure

NAIC Major Groups and Subgroups

Index

About the Author

Foreword

This book is a compendium of the knowledge that has been collected by myself, as well as the author, over the last decade of hard work. It has been the goal of our company, as well as all of the staff that has collaborated to make it as successful as it is today, to help people. That’s what we do. When individuals find themselves cast adrift in the tumultuous sea of unemployment, it has been the job of highly gifted and caring people such as Jonathan to throw them a much-needed safety line, to pull them back in, and to provide them the succor and support that they so desperately need.

Helping people find work is a tough job. Anyone who has had to find a new job knows that it can be a harder full-time job than anything else they’ve done in their career. In the 10-plus years that Jonathan has been with our firm, he has been instrumental in developing not only a successful business, but also in developing approaches and strategies that help our clients land jobs, land them faster, and find opportunities that are better than they had hoped for.

Streamlining the resume-creation process is one of the most critical improvements we’ve had in our business. When I first launched my company, creating a resume was a long, arduous task that involved dozens of hours of labor on the part of a professional writer, with several weeks of painful and time-consuming back and forth sessions between the client and the writer, trying to boil down dozens of years of work history into a document that made sense and still conveyed to the reader who our client was, and what he or she had to offer.

Today, our clients not only have a new resume within a couple of days of coming on board, they also have learned how to create a resume! The process that Jonathan pioneered has led to our clients’ receiving better responses to the mailings, having better interviews, and reporting that they are better able to communicate their strengths and successes in the interview and evaluation process.

In this book, Jonathan has given away the store. He has shared with you, the reader, all of the hard-earned secrets and lessons that we’ve earned the hard way. That’s okay. That’s why we’re here—to help people. Good luck with your job search.

Bruce B. Scoville

Founder and CEO, Barton Industries Inc.

Introduction

What This Book Isn’t

and What It Is

First, let me explain to you what this book isn’t.

It isn’t a dry, stiff, boring non-fiction book. I personally don’t like non-fiction. I refused to buy the textbooks in college. (Instead I took good notes and really listened to the professors.)

This also isn’t a book written by a professional writer who has done some research on finding jobs and is trying to think back to the last time he had to look for real work.

This isn’t about theories. Just cold hard facts and proven methods— proven by me and thousands of my clients who have used these methods, have been successful in generating multiple offers in parallel, and have leveraged those opportunities to maximize their potential.

There. Now that we have gotten that out of the way, let me explain who I am and what this book is.

My name is Jonathan Price. I’m not a recruiter or a career coach. I don’t call on companies to see if they have a job requisition to be filled, and I don’t give people personality tests to see what makes them happy.

The best way to describe what I am is to say I am an executive career marketer. Over the last decade I have provided marketing to thousands of professionals, helping them find their next job in the fastest way I know how. I’ve worked with entry-level, recent college (even high school) grads all the way to chief executives making more in one year than I made in the entire decade I was helping those people find work! (I haven’t been doing this to get rich, just making a living while helping others make a living as well.)

This book is about teaching you how to do for yourself exactly what I have done for my clients: get the exposure you need to find your next great job.

You’ve probably heard of the Hidden Job Market. Well, that is a load of BS—the only thing hidden in the job market is YOU!

In preparing for this book, I read most of the other books on the shelf next to this one. Some of them were okay, a couple were even pretty good, but some were just plain terrible. Regardless, none of them told me how to actually generate significant activity in my job search. Let’s face it: That’s really where the rubber meets the road, and that’s what this book is going to show you how to do.

I’ll be honest. The main reason none of the other books you’ve looked at told you how to generate activity is because they don’t know how. The authors have researched it, but they’ve never DONE it.

Looking for work effectively is full-time work.

The company that I work for shares the same basic information that’s in this book with our prospective clients, and some of them actually take that knowledge away with them and DO IT. A significant number of those people realize that this is more work than they are willing to do, and they pay my company several thousand dollars to do it for them. It’s worth it, and nine out of 10 times clients see that value almost immediately.

In this book I am going to share all of my experience, knowledge, and secrets with you, and then I will encourage you, with all my heart, to go out there and DO IT.

DO IT because this is the most effective strategy to find a great job that I have ever seen.

How Do I Know This Is the Best Method for Finding Work?

If you have been looking for a job for more than a day, I’m sure you have gotten advice on how to go about it. Probably from your family, your friends, maybe even a trusted mentor. They all absolutely had your best interests in mind, but their advice is probably the worst thing you’ll ever run into! Why?

Answer this simple question: Does your friend, or family member, or mentor look for work on a full-time basis? (And if you answered yes because one of them is a recruiter or an HR person, you are WRONG!)

The answer is no. They don’t look for work every day. They might look at resumes that cross their desks occasionally, they might even interview people to hire for their companies, but they aren’t out there looking for work. Put simply, they have no idea how to effectively and quickly find a job.

Think of going to them for advice on looking for work as going to your Great Aunt Mabel (who makes the best rhubarb pie in the entire family) and asking her if you should go with the single or quadruple bypass surgery.

It sounds funny, but it is just as devastating to your life.

I can’t tell you how many times I have spoken to successful, intelligent people who have had a tremendous career, earning more than $100,000 a year for a decade or more—up until a year or 18 months ago. Now they are working at Home Depot (great company) making $9.50 an hour, wondering if 49 is too early to retire and how to make ends meet.

How did they end up there? Was it alcohol, drugs, or gambling? No. It was the well-meant advice from their friends.

I don’t want to scare you. But I have to. It’s not a joke, and you just can’t imagine how fast things spiral out of control when you don’t have a solid, proven plan in place to find work quickly.

There is light at the end of this depressing tunnel that I am leading you down. I have seen that same individual literally take off the Home Depot apron, pack a bag, and be flown off to another city to interview for a chief operations position with a company almost as big as the one he or she was just clerking in. (And get that job.)

I’ve worked with clients who have overcome much greater obstacles than that. Getting fired is an easy hurdle to jump compared to explaining why you can no longer practice medicine because of a little indiscretion you’d rather not talk about….

Before you put this book down, thinking that this is just for executives, or think that this is the same as those infomercials with the disclaimer "These results are unique and will never happen for you," let me assure you: This is a perfect fit for you.

The approach that you will learn in this book is incredibly effective. (I’ll let the cat out of the bag: We’re going to be discussing direct marketing. Don’t be scared; it’s not a