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New cures for new ills
Youth tips: Finding a job in this new world of unemployment.
The days of eagerly awaiting the newspaper jobs' section and dispatching CVs indiscriminately, are over. Primarily because this latest recession is unlike any that has gone before. The traditional ways of employment are, as a result, somewhat redundant. No longer is it enough to consult newspaper advertisements or recruitment websites. Where once, in those distant boom days, there were roughly eight applicants to each vacancy, today the job to applicant ratio stands at an incredible 150 applicants to every vacancy.
David Barrett, an occupational psychologist and director of 'Cut-e' , a company specialising in designing recruitment methods, was recently advising graduates and the unemployed at a seminar on the new job-seeking landscape. He stated that one must be proactive and take positive steps to get a job nowadays, rather than waiting for the job advertisements. Proactive is so often a catch all term, but in this case Mr. Barrett, in outlining a number of steps to take, defined the term for this situation.
We must now view the UK, with a population of over 60 million, as an extension of Ireland. The gasps from the 1916 patriots aside, this in effect means considering the UK job market as a strong possible option. Upon reflection, the UK is geographically closer to most Irish people than Donegal, Cork or Kerry is.
The UK also has a much larger 'Small and Medium Enterprise sector', a fact all the more relevant when Barrett revealed the most interesting statistic of the seminar: 90% of all job vacancies in the economy are in the SME sector, but these companies only advertise 20% of their vacancies. Such a statistic reveals why searching newspapers and recruitment websites proves a fruitless exercise for so many.
But new pathways exist. Websites such as Enterprise Ireland and those of other industry associations, will contain information on companies doing well and who may have unadvertised vacancies. The IDA can also be used to track foreign direct investment, which may in turn indicate companies on the verge expansion.
Concluding his advice to those job-hunting, Mr. Barrett presented a to-do list for job seeking:
- Create a list of 30 companies not advertising
- Try to get a name of someone in the company
- Have a clear reason why you want to work for them
- Always follow up with an email/phone call
- Above all be enthusiastic and friendly
These steps, combined with positive thinking, are not magic cure alls, designed to work instantly. Finding a job is always difficult, particularly with the economy at such a low ebb.
Half the battle, however, is being armed with the most relevant advice and research.
By: Peter Harper
Enterprise Ireland
Web: www.enterprise-ireland.com/
Phone: 01 727 2000
Enterprise Ireland is the government organisation responsible for the development and growth of Irish enterprises in world markets.
