Graduation is near for many of the nation’s college students.  In order to prepare for this many students will be looking for jobs in all the wrong places.  Many of the large internet sites will make the list of frequent surfing.  In light of this increased amount of job searching among college students or recent college grads I ask you to consider this stat.

Last week I was the bi-annual meeting for the Career Services Advisory board of the Community College of Allegheny County in Pittsburgh.  At this meeting a recruiter from Enterprise Rent-A-Car was sitting next to me.  During the meeting he made the point that they hire nearly 50% of their people from employee referrals.  Did you catch that?

The largest employer of new college grads, 8,000 a year, said that they hire nearly half of all their new hires from employee referrals.  So I will ask again; why are you spending the majority of your time surfing Monster, CareerBuilder, and HotJobs, when you should be spending at least half of your time trying to network with current employees at the company you want to work at.  The numbers have been in for a long time, network beats every other job search strategy around.

Jobinar.com launches it’s first teleseminar.

How to Get a Job In Medical Sales Without Any Experience!

Take a look at this new resource for job seekers. I don’t think you will be disapointed. This is the first of many teleseminars for this new service.

I will be interviewing Peggy McKee from Medical Sales Recruiter blog. She has many years of experience in the medical sales recruiting field so I am sure you will love the content from this teleseminar.

Click here for all the details over at Jobinar.com

When I planned on coming to Santa Fe I did not plan on dealing with SNOW!  I am from Pittsburgh so I thought by traveling to the southwest for a conference I could avoid the typical Pittsburgh weather, but I was so wrong as you can see below.

Since my last post was on career assessments here is a compilations from other great writers on this subject that I recommend.

• Career Assessment dos and Don’ts - Quint Careers
• The Riley Guide on Self Assessment
• Cal U Berkley’s Career Center - Career Tests: Panacea or Snake Oil?
• Human Resources at MIT - Assessment Tools

I am not a career counselor; however I have become fascinated with the career development industry.  My view of career advice and comes from experience and the experiences of others.

Today I want to focus on career development and planning.

Did I ever take a career assessment?  Sure, who hasn’t?  All of us sat in the guidance counselor’s office in high school completing those meaningless tests to try and tell us what we should do for a living.  To be honest with you I cannot remember what my results said, do you?  If that is the only opportunity for career assessment or if that is the only time we ever think about your career options how does that prepare anyone for their future?  How do you choose your career?  How do you know what you want to do if a high school career assessment is your only opportunity for consideration?

I currently work at the Pittsburgh Technology Council in Pittsburgh, PA.  I often say in speeches that I did not wake up one morning and say, “I really want to work at the Pittsburgh Technology Council one day!”  I landed there because of an internship that a professor in college helped me get.  My career assessment was not very thorough or planned.  My own career journey happened with much inquiry and on the job assessment.  I was willing to try just about anything.  My internship was enjoyable, I enjoyed the work, I enjoyed the people I worked with and I believed in the mission of the company.  And now I have been there almost five years.

These three principles has kept me at the Council and are the three principles that keep most people at their employer or makes them want to work for a particular company.

1. Enjoy what you do
2. Enjoy who you work with
3. Believe in the mission

Has your career happened because of much planning and pre-assessment or did it happen by a random or probably divine set of events?  It would be an interesting study to determine how many people in the workforce are working in a field they studied for or planned for and how many are there for reasons they cannot explain.

How about you?  Are you in a company or job you planned for or did it happen in a seemingly divine series of events?

I am in Santa Fe, New Mexico this week for a summit on the state of Science and Technology in the United States.  I will have more information to come on this topic but here are some statistics to wet your whistle.

• Only 5% of Hispanic students and 2% of African-American students scored at the proficient level in science, according to the 2005 National Assessment of Educational Progress.
• US 12th graders ranked 16th in an international science test given to students in 21 countries in 1998.  Just 40 percent of students grasped basic concepts such as the relationship between pressure and volume.
• 68% of parents and 64% of elementary school teachers do not consider themselves to be scientifically literate.
• Currently, almost half of employers report having trouble finding qualified US workers in a wide range of occupations, from engineers to entry-level workers.
• Over two-thirds of employers report that high school graduates are “deficient” in almost all essential workplace skills.
• Business executives ranked education and workforce preparedness as their top concern, ahead of healthcare, energy, global competitiveness, and national security.

Attention employers!!

If you are interested in hiring quality talent from the pool of mostly unqualified people you might want to consider a few cosmetic changes when it comes to your office and hiring practices.

If candidates walk into an office environment and are greeted by an unenthusiastic receptionist or no receptionist at all what image does that portray of the company to the candidate?

If a candidate walks in to hear the CEO yelling at a roomful of employees about God knows what; how does that enable the candidate to have a strong desire to work at your company? Are they going to be subjected to this type of treatment?

If a candidate is interviewed in a room that consists of lingering cigarette smoke and ash what type of image does that portray of the company? Will it encourage the candidate to want to work there? What is their office going to smell like? How long has that donut been laying on the counter?

I hear so many companies telling job seekers what they must do to get noticed by employers but I hear very little talk around what companies must do to get noticed by job seekers. As the baby boomers begin to retire in greater numbers many futurists state that the labor shortage will continue to grow at a rapid pace. If companies aren’t planning for their labor challenge now it may be too late when the market is really tight.

If your company is in a growth mode and are hiring a large number of people you might want to consider putting a plan in place to ensure that your company looks attractive to perspective candidates. Let’s face it; the talented and qualified job seekers will work at companies who emanate greatness. If the candidate is great they aren’t going to settle for a sub-par company that is just getting by. They want to work for a company that has their act together so their career can flourish and at the same time they can help an exciting company grow.

It is easy to give good advice but it is even harder to follow it when it is your own.

The other day I had a chance to speak on a panel discussion with eight other employers to some student athletes about career choices.

The discussion really centered on resumes and resume writing, but after listening, and participating, in this discussion I walked away with a few thoughts.

1. All employers have different views about what should or should not be on your resume.
2. Internships and experience is very important when looking for a job
3. Your resume will get you in the door but the employer won’t hire you based on your resume alone; they will hire you based on who you are.
4. The job interview process is getting longer and longer because companies cannot afford to hire the wrong person
5. The real world and college differ drastically; the only way to fully understand how life works in the real world is to experience it.