Have you ever heard of these? Let me put this into perspective:
If I was in a job search right now, I would spend about 80% of my time trying to get, and doing, informational interviews. I could only do that because I would use JibberJobber to manage the administration of who I meet, when to follow-up, etc. Otherwise I’d spend about 60% of my time doing that, and the 20% difference monkeying around with the spreadsheet trying to keep track of it all.
This is the single most important tactic I can think of, for job seekers.
If you don’t know what I’m talking about, read Barb Poole’s LinkedIn article: Using Informational Meetings to Outpace Your Competition.
I agree with everything Barb wrote. I would like to suggest this additional tidbit:
Do not come across as a job seeker. When you go into these meetings, you want to be a peer or colleague of the person you are meeting with. Job seeker usually means “needy.” Worse, the way you start your relationship is they have power, you need help. If you are a peer/colleague, you are equal.
Something I learned many years ago is that even though we are in a job search, we are still professionals. Not professional job seekers, mind you, but professional marketers, or executives, or whatever our last title(s) were. Job seeker is a temporary status, not who we are.
Let me cut this blog post short, right here, so you can read Barb’s article, and then email some people to ask for these meetings. It’s that important.