How can you find jobs that don't exist?

The first placement I ever made in recruitment was with a senior IT professional who interviewed with a bank who was a client of ours who didn’t actually have a job open but when they heard about this candidate’s background in IT security, decided to interview him anyways. They ended up creating a job for him and hired him for this newly-created position.

In another instance, I had a candidate who was relocating to a particular city and a big hiring company in that area was looking for new staff so with her permission I floated her name and resume past the hiring manager to see if they might be interested in her. She had a background in project management and they were in fact building a new project management team so I felt there was a good chance they’d be interested in her. Sure enough they were interested and after flying her in for an interview, ended up hiring her and relocating her to their city.

So in these two instances, two people were hired for jobs that not only hadn’t previously existed but that had never actually been advertised either. So not only did these two people get a new job created for them based on their skillset they essentially managed to avoid the typical interview process where they have to compete with other candidates for the same position.

Situations like this do happen albeit probably not as frequently as you’d like, where a job is created basd on your skillset and experience. The common aspect of both of these instances was that the two hiring companies in question needed people with a specific skillet and based on their immediate need, were happy with hiring people to fill jobs that hadn’t previously existed and also bypass the need to interview a number of people for this position. Obviously if you’re the only person being interviewed for a job your odds are better than if you were competing with numerous other people!

How can you identify opportunities for yourself like this?

In my case, I identified both companies many months earlier and had in fact called the hiring manager numerous times and over time, the hiring managers shed light on what was happening in their respective companies so I learned more about what they might need every time I called them. So when I came across the two candidates mentioned above I felt confident that the company would be interested in them based on what I’d learned about them over the previous talks with the hiring authority.

Certainly you might not have this time to contact a handful of companies over and over again and hope that something pans out. Having said that I’ve also seen cases where a person identifies a company that interests them and gets an interview but based on what sort of job they’re looking for and based on what the hiring manager needs at that time, sometimes both sides agree to keep in touch until a job opportunity arises that meets what both sides are looking for.

To help you find a job opportunity that might not currently be advertised or might not currently even exist, the first thing you need to do is figure out what skills, experience, education, traits, etc that you have that sets you apart from other people. What do you have in your background that other candidates applying for the same jobs you are don’t have? What is your competitive advantage?

Depending on your experience and background, you might find that you have one or more aspects of your background that a potential hiring company would be very interesated to hear about. The next step of course is to identify companies who would potentially want to directly hear from someone like yourself. When I say directly, I mean you contact the company directly yourself and not through a recruiter for example. Going through a recruiter means that not only does the company then have to decide whether or not they want to hire you, they first have to decide if they want to work with a recruiter who they’d have to pay money to should they hire you. By contacting companies directly you’re cutting out the middleman and decreasing the decisions that the company has to make.

These days, there are companies who exist who would love to have a solid, hard-to-find candidate literally drop in their lap. I’ve seen it happen including recently with a friend of mine in the oil business who directly applied to many companies even when they had no job advertised and even when many were laying people off. He eventually applied to one who was open to meeting with him and in fact desperately needed someone with his skills and after one interview, they basically hired him on the spot.

In the last two days we’ve discussed the lunch interview and the panel interview.

Yesterday I referred to the panel interview as a group interview but there is another form of group interview that is actually quite different, and is one that I have experienced once.

The group interview I experienced actually involved me being interviewed by a panel of staff from the employer along with a group of other job candidates for the same job!

So it was like a panel interview and a group interview rolled into one.

It occurred right after I graduated from university and had moved overseas to New Zealand. The company – a multi national corporation – was looking for an entry level staff member to join their marketing department and I was on the short list with 8 other people from around the country. The whole interview process actually lasted for five days from Monday – Friday, 8am-5pm each day.

The interview process was quite interesting in terms of how it rolled out. An HR staffer from the company acted as a facilitator and for the first few days, the group of us being considered for the job all met together and worked through a series of group activities that were observed and led by the HR staffer.

During the latter part of the week, senior managers were brought in and met with us as a group and then on an individual basis to interview us in the more traditional one-on-one interview that we’ve probably experienced.

Finally, all 9 of us being considered for the job interviewed as a group by 5 executives from the company who sat in a row behind a table in front of us. So the final “interview” was the panel interview and group interview rolled into one that I mentioned earlier.

I recall one question that we were asked to close this interview where the executive asking the question wanted us to tell them the one reason they should hire us.

I offered to go first and I recall mentioning one of my skills that I thought would benefit them. 7 other people in the group took the same tact and mentioned one thing that they felt was a positive.

The last person to answer the question was a woman who started her answer by suggesting that she had a “total package” of skills and when I saw the HR staffer smiling and nodding her head in agreement, I knew she’d given them the answer they were looking for.

I didn’t get the job – I suspect the woman with the “total package” answer did – but I had a good experience with this interview. Given that it took place over a period of days, it wasn’t really an interview per se but rather a drawn out interview process and series of interviews but it was a great experience to have early in my career and a good learning point for me, too.

The panel interview or group interview is another type of interview you can attend that I alluded to several days ago in the stress interview entry.

The panel or group interview is exactly as it sounds: instead of being interviewed by one person, you get interviewed by more than one person simultaneously.

Early in my career, I experienced a panel interview where I was interviewed by the general manager, operations manager and sales manager for a sales job I was interviewing for. The interview was a comfortable one for me and the three people who interviewed me were very nice people and kept it very informal.

I got the job too, so I’m guessing the interview went ok…

Companies choose to do panel interviews for different reasons but one of the benefits to you is that you only need to answer a question once rather than having different people asking you the same question in separate interviews.

It also gives the other people in the room the chance to ask a follow up question after you’ve answered someone else’s question so I’d be prepared for an in depth discussion. I’d also be prepared for follow up questions and for different styles of interviewing since you’ll be in the room with different personalities.

Perhaps you get interviewed by 3-5 people perhaps representing different functional groups in the company including the group or division you’re looking at joining.

In terms of the people in the interview itself, perhaps it includes the person you’d be working for, one or more of their staff, an HR staff member, among other people.

One of the keys to the panel interview is therefore finding out ahead of time whenever possible:

1. The names of each person attending the interview

2. The role (job title) of each person attending the interview.

This way, you’ll be able to prepare for different kinds of questions knowing who is attending the interview and if possible you’ll be able to familiarize yourself with their names beforehand. If you’re interviewing with several people in a panel interview, unless they’re wearing name tags (!) you’ll probably have forgotten their name the moment they mention it since your head will already be full of everything else that you’re trying to remember.

If you’re lucky enough to have been handed a business card by each or most of the people in the room I’d lay them out in front of you in the order that they are seated without drawing too much attention to it, to help with remembering names.

When answering questions, remember to address everyone in the room and to pay particular attention to the person asking the question.

After the interview, I’d follow up by email with a short thank you note to each person that interviewed you.

The lunch interview is a job interview that as you might have already figured out involves being invited out to lunch by the person or people interviewing you for the job.

First off, let’s get the question of “who pays” out of the way. Since the hiring company undoubtedly asked you on the lunch interview, they’ll pay, so we’ve got that part figured out.

Earlier in my career, I was invited out on a lunch interview with two hiring managers who I was considering working for. I’d already met them at their office a few days earlier and they decided to follow up with a second interview in the form of a lunch interview at a local restaurant that they arranged.

Based on what I observed, if I was going on a lunch interview in the near future, there are a number of things I’d do in advance of the interview and during the interview itself:

1. Figure out where the restaurant is: I’d make sure I know exactly where the restaurant is located and how long it will take me to get there especially if I was driving and needed to park.

2. Figure out what the restaurant serves: I’d check out the restaurant’s website to see what they serve and make my choice ahead of time to avoid figuring this out on the day. I’d avoid ordering messy foods that involve me picking them up with my hands (like chicken wings) and I’d pick up a light food rather than a heavy meal. I’d avoid ordering alcohol even if the interviewers ordered it. Ultimately, I’d probably order something that was similar in price to what the person taking me out on the lunch ordered and if they insist I order first, I’d pick a mid-priced meal.

3. Be nice to the staff and mind your manners: I’d remember that the wait staff, etc are people too and I’d be nice them, which I’d do anyways but during an interview where we’re under stress, I’d remember that the interviewers are probably paying attention to how I’m treating the staff, if I complain about the food, have bad table manners, talk with my mouth full, make bad jokes, etc.

4. Focus on the interview not on the food: Remember the goal. You’re on an interview so I’d remember that the goal of the lunch interview is to get you closer to the job. I’d also remember to finish by letting the person interviewing me that I’m interested in the job and I’d leave with a smile and a hand shake, just like I’d do in a regular interview.

5. Figure out what happens next: Depending on how the interview ends – did you get a job offer during the interview? – I’d send a follow up note/email to the person I went to lunch with to thank them for their time and the fact that I appreciated their time and the lunch.

Over the next few days, we’ll look at a few types of popular interview types.

The stress interview is one type of job interview that you might face during your job searches that can throw you for a loop and surprise you if you weren’t expecting it.

The stress interview can take different forms but essentially the goal of it is to see how you handle pressure or how you handle a situation that you’re not expecting.

One sort of stress interview I faced earlier in my career was for a sales job where the interviewer (the sales manager) walked into the office I was waiting in, sat down in the chair and simply said to me “so, what do you want to know?”

So instead of a typical interview where he asked the questions and I answered them, he decided to reverse the situation and have me interview him, essentially.

In hindsight, I think this interview was less an interview that the interviewer tried to turn into a stress interview and more a case of him being a Type A person who had a busy job and preferred to cut to the chase and skip the formalities.

Either way, it did throw me for a loop but I recovered quickly and began asking him the questions I planned on asking him anyways.

Stress interviews can also take the form of a panel interview where a number of people interview you at once and fire off questions at you one after the other. I’ve experienced this type of interview, too. You deal with this by answering the questions as they’re asked and giving eye contact to each person in the room paying particular attention to the person asking the question.

Stress interviews might involve the interviewer cutting you off before you have answered the question completely or acting like you’re not answering the questions correctly. In this instance, keep your answers brief and maintain eye contact with the interviewer to try to gauge when they’re about to interrupt you. Don’t assume that you aren’t doing well in the interview because of the interviewer’s expression because that might be part of the act.

A stress interview might also involve being asked silly questions or trick questions, answering riddles and stuff like that. Whether or not you want to work for a company or manager who utilizes these sorts of tactics is another story…

Part of the issue with stress interviews is finding out about them ahead of time, whenever possible. If you already knew that you were being interviewed by a panel of people, knew their names or at least knew their job titles, you’d be better prepared than had you walked into the interview and then suddenly realized that it was a panel interview. Knowledge is power so asking the right questions before the interview is paramount.

In many cases with the stress interview, the goal can be to put you under stress to see if you crack under pressure.

Don’t give them what they want.

As they used to say in a deodorant commercial from a number of years ago, “never let them see you sweat.”

There are many aspects of interview etiquette to consider when going for job interviews. Some of them should be obvious but here are a few things that I’ve seen arise during interviews that can cost job searchers:

• Arrive on time but not too early.

I’ve seen job searchers arrive for interviews 30 minutes early which is way too early. Arrive 10 minutes early max. If you show up earlier than this, chances are that you could be interrupting the person interviewing you as they could be in the middle of interviewing someone else or doing something otherwise important.

• Shut your cellphone off.

This should be obvious but as the picture above shows, turn your cellphone off! Do it before you go into the interview so you don’t forget.

• Dress appropriately.

Your level of position and industry or profession might dictate this but in general terms for professional positions, a suit for a guy and business suit/attire for a woman is the way to go. In this case you can’t go wrong even if the the people you’re interviewing with are dressed in business casual which many companies do these days. You can dress business casual too but not until after they hire you.

• Remember the hand shake and eye contact and don’t forget non-verbal cues.

I’ve done interviews with people who forget the hand shake on the way in. I’ve done interviews with people who never make eye contact with you and it’s kind of disarming, and not in a good way. A firm handshake and making eye contact with the person or people interviewing you is kind of the way things are done in our culture as far as interviews are concerned. Remember your non-verbal communication cues, too. A sincere smile is good but not so much that you resemble a cheshire cat. Don’t forget to sit upright and don’t fidget or tap your feet or exhibit other nervous tics that can hurt you during an interview. If you’re interviewing with several people, try to give them equal eye contact and don’t forget anyone.

• Follow instructions.

Filling out a form is probably not at the top of your list but if filling out an application or other form is part of the process, do it without making a big deal about it. I had one guy I was interviewing complain about filling out our application because he’d just filled one out at another recruiter’s office. Cry me a river. I didn’t ask him to go to the other recruiter and if he pulled that stunt during an interview with an actual hiring company, he could probably forget about getting a job with them. Not being able to follow instructions (see the part above about showing up on time for the interview) is not a good first impression to leave with someone who has a say in your immediate employment prospects.

• Don’t forget the little people.

I’m being sarcastic but don’t forget the people who you might (incorrectly) assume have no impact on your future prospects with the company you’re interviewing with. Don’t ignore the secretary or receptionist. (S)he might have a say in you getting the job and the hiring manager might ask them about what you did while you were waiting in the lobby. If you interview with a person who would be a peer or even a subordinate to you, expect that if they’re important enough to be part of the interview process that they’re important enough to be asked for their opinion about you, too. I’ve worked for companies where we helped interview staff and if we didn’t like them, they weren’t hired.