Cv for Interviews

Archive for January, 2009

Have you just completed your teaching degree and are looking to start your career? Are you a seasoned teacher who is looking for an exciting new challenge? Or are you a professional outside of the education industry who is looking to make a career switch to a teaching position?

Finding a new teaching opportunity can be a daunting process, especially since seasoned teachers with tenure or long-standing success at a school are typically automatically re-invited to teach each school year. The result is that available teaching positions may be limited, and the competition for these positions fierce.

A big part of the job search process is knowing where to look for teaching positions.

The following tips and tricks are designed to take some of the headache out of your search, by giving you some guidelines on steps you can take to land your ideal teaching opportunity.

Visit the Human Resources andor recruiting departments of local school systems and universities to inquire about available positions. If there are no current vacancies, ask if you can submit your resume to remain on file should future openings match what you are seeking. Keep in mind that schools do the bulk of their hiring several months before the new school year starts.

Accept a substitute teaching position at the school(s) at which you are focusing your job search. This will not only allow you to network at the school by putting in the midst of fellow teachers and administrators, but also allow you to meet some of the students you may be teaching. It is not unusual for substitute teachers who have made a strong bond with the students to be offered a full-time position when an opening comes up.

Take time to get to know and develop a relationship with the administrators at the school(s) you are interested in. Your likelihood of landing an interview (leading to a position) as a known commodity is higher than it is for a nameless teacher who on one has met.

Colleges and universities that offer teaching degrees often have a database of available positions in the schools Career Center. Career Center advisors are also excellent sources of information on how to network in the industry and get your foot in the door. Many school limit Career Center resource access to current students or alumni, though, so you may be limited to your alma matar.

Network, network, network! Let friends, family, and casual acquaintances know that you are on the market for a new position. Since most companies are much more willing to interview (and potentially hire) candidates who have already been vouched for, its important to get the word out that you are available and seeking a new opportunity.

Dont forgot to investigate often-overlooked teaching avenues such as:

oTutoring either one-on-one student tutoring or tutoring through an established company such as the Sylvan Learning Center
oCorporate trainers
oAdjunct faculty positions
oUniversities and colleges seeking teachers for teaching degree programs
oMentorship Shadowing programs

Dont be adverse to accepting a contract or training position. This are often a great way to get you foot in the door in the teaching profession. It also gives you a chance to evaluate a school to ensure it is a match before fully committing yourself to a long-term full-time position.

Use the internet. Searching for teacher, educator, professor or teaching on major job boards will unearth hundreds of available openings just be aware that competition for these positions is stiff since hundreds of other teachers are looking at and applying for the exact same jobs.

Searching teaching-specific job boards for available opportunities is a great way to target only those jobs that require your degree and background. There are a number of excellent sites that speacialize in teachers jobs. You can find details at my site below.

How To Find A Nursing Job – 8 Tips To Take Some Of The Headache Out Of Your Search

Do you have your nursing degree and are ready to take the medical industry by storm? Are you an experienced nurse looking for an exciting new challenge? Regardless of the level of your nursing experience, looking for a new job can be a time-consuming and frequently frustrating process. A big part of the job search process is knowing where to look for nursing positions.

The following tips and tricks are designed to take some of the headache out of your search, by giving you some guidelines on steps you can take to land your ideal nursing position.

1. Visit the recruiting departments of local hospitals, medical centers, and doctors offices to inquire about available positions. If there are no current vacancies, ask if you can submit your resume to remain on file should future openings match what you are seeking.

2. Contact recruitment and contract employment agencies. Aligning yourself with a recruiter can give you access to jobs that are often not advertised to the public. The great thing about recruiting agencies is that allow you to apply for positions at multiple companies simultaneously with a single resume submittal, since most recruiters will shop your resume around to all of the available openings.

3. Use the internet to your advantage. Searching for nurse or nursing on major job boards such as Monster.com and Hotjobs.com will unearth hundreds of available openings just be aware that competition for these positions is stiff since hundreds of other nurses are looking at and applying for the exact same jobs.

4. Dont be adverse to accepting a contract or training position. This are often a great way to get you foot in the door in the medical profession. It also gives you a chance to evaluate an organization and department to ensure it is a match before fully committing yourself to a long-term full-time position.

5. Colleges and universities that offer nursing degrees often have a database of available positions in the schools Career Center. Career Center advisors are also excellent sources of information on how to network in the industry and get your foot in the door. Many schools limit Career Center resource access to current students or alumni, though, so you may be limited to your Alma Matar.

6. Network, network, network! Let friends, family, and casual acquaintances know that you are on the market for a new position. Since most companies are much more willing to interview (and potentially hire) candidates who have already been vouched for, its important to get the word out that you are available and seeking a new opportunity.

7. Dont forgot to investigate often-overlooked nursing avenues such as:

oSchool nurses (contact the local School Board for openings)
oHealth Department Openings (both localcounty and state offices)
oHealth insurance companies
oAssisted living facilities and retirement homes
oUniversities and colleges seeking teachers for nursing school programs
oMentorship programs
oTraveling nurse programs that place you on short assignments at different locations around the country

8. Searching nursing-specific job boards for available opportunities is a great way to target only those jobs that require your degree and background. For example, visit internet sites http:www.NursingJobs.org and http:www.NurseOptions.com offer free access to a wide range of nursing positions nationwide. There are many other excellent on-line resources for nursing job information.

Ah, the technical interview. Nothing like it. Not only does it cause anxiety, but it causes anxiety for several different reasons.

How many people will be asking questions? From experience I can tell you theres nothing like walking into a room and seeing nine people on the other side of the table.

Second, what will you be asked? Youll sometimes hear people say the questions they were asked in a technical interview were easy, which translated means they asked me stuff I happened to know. Sometimes youll hear people say the questions were hard, which translated means they asked me stuff I didnt know, or they asked me about stuff Ive never even heard of.

Having been on both sides of the technical interview table, Id like to share some tips for those being interviewed. In doing so, Ill share some of the more memorable interviews Ive been involved in.

No good interviewer expects you to know everything. The problem is, youre not always going to be interviewed by someone whos good at it.

Sometimes, the person whos giving you a technical interview was asked to do it about ten minutes before you showed up. Maybe theyve never interviewed anyone before, or maybe theyre just in a bad mood. Ive heard of technical interviewers where the interviewer derided an answer, and thats totally unprofessional. Ive had many a job candidate give a bad answer to a question, and my only response was silence followed by moving on to the next question. If your interviewer mocks any of your answers, you didnt want to work there anyway.

None of us know everything. If youre asked a question you just dont know the answer to, dont try to BS your way past it. This is a good opportunity to tell the interviewer how you would research that particular question. Its not about knowing everything, its about being able to find out anything.

If your interviewer acts like heshe already dislikes you, thats because they do. I once worked with a technician who felt threatened by anyone who applied for a job there, but especially if the applicant had a professional certification and then had the nerve to know what they were doing.

This technician participated in a group technical interview where the applicant was an incredibly bright guy, and had a particular skill that the department really needed. Problem was, the technician considered himself the man when it came to that skill. Recipe for disaster, right?

The applicant fielded four questions from the rest of us flawlessly, then faced this particular tech for a question. The threatened tech had a list of questions for the interview, but decided to ad lib. Big mistake. He asked a convoluted question that Rube Goldberg would have been proud of. When he was done, the applicant answered:

You cant do what you just described.

The tech started defending his question, and it became obvious that he hadnt been able to follow his own question! The interview went into a bit of a meltdown from there.

Realize right now that there are some unprofessional people out there giving technical interviews. Be prepared for it, but remain professional yourself.

Be prepared for a practical technical interview. The best technical interviewers find a way to get you in front of the technology youll be working with. A great way to quickly find out whether you know what youre talking about is to ask you to actually perform common and perhaps some not-so-common tasks. We can talk about technology and take all the computer-based exams we want, but it all comes down to performance. Be prepared to prove you belong on your interview day.

Be professional. This covers a lot of ground, so let me make a quick list for you.

Show up 15 minutes early. Nothing makes a technical interviewer more surly than waiting for the applicant.

Dress for success. The way you look when you walk into a room leads to your interviewers first impression of you.

Dont chew gum during the interview.

Dont be arrogant. Look, theres nothing wrong with having an ego and acting confident. I do, and you should. But dont come into the interview room acting like youre too good to be there.

Finally, relax. Easy to say, hard to do? Not really. Realize that the majority of interviewers youll ever meet are going to be professional about the entire thing. The worlds not going to end if you miss a question. If you were not qualified on paper for the job, you wouldnt be in there.

Do not look upon the interview as something negative. Rather, look at it as an opportunity to prove you know what youre talking about. With the proper mental attitude, your technical interview will be a springboard to the next step in your career!

Chris Bryant

CCIE #12933

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Conducting a job search is a daunting task, even for seasoned professionals. There are many pieces to the puzzle, and each piece plays its own important role in the process. Knowing the pieces of the process is a crucial element for your success.

While there is no such thing as doing too much, there is a basic guide to follow. It consists of five painless steps that will outline your work ahead. Together, they form the foundation of a job hunt that will yield exceptional results.

1. Put together a great resume.

Before your job search ever begins, you need a resume. The resume is the first contact you will have with a prospective employer. It is an extension of your life and a summary of your accomplishments. It is how a manager will pick you out of hundredspossibly thousands of applicants. It can mean the difference between exciting job interviews and a phone that never rings, between success and failure.

This is a complex task for two pages (maximum) of paper. Thats right, two little pages to talk about your education, job experience, accomplishments and awards, special skills, training, professional experienceaffiliation, and so on. Basically, you need to sum up your life, and make it interesting, in two pages.

There are numerous websites that can help with writing a bullet proof resume. Some offer free information and examples for you to follow, and some will write the resume for you (for a fee of course). Careerbuilder.com is an excellent website for writing and posting your resume.

Professional resume writing, when done by a human resource expert, can give you a significant edge over the competition. You can expect to pay 100 or more for this service, and can be well worth the money. However, before hiring someone to write it for you be sure to check their credentials.

2. Determine the locations you may want to live.

Once you have your resume polished and shiny, its time to think about where you want to live. Determining a location can have a significant impact on your income earning potential. Some jobs are concentrated in certain areas and the pay can be dramatically more than where you live. For example, the vast majority of computer programming jobs in the U.S. are in Silicon Valley, California. Jobs there can pay up to five times more than other parts of the country.

Unfortunately, pay isnt everything. To accurately assess your situation, other factors must come into play. Cost of living, for example, can be dramatically different from one city to another. A 50,000 a year income in Mobile, Alabama is equal to over 122,350 in Manhattan, New York, a 145% increase.

Other factors, such as quality of schools, real estate, environmental quality, quality of life, and proximity to friends and family should also be evaluated. These factors are more difficult to measure than cost of living. Not having your mom to watch the kids can cost you thousands of pounds a year and must be a part of your decision. Write down pros and cons for each factor and take a look at the entire picture.

3. Put Out the Word.

Once you have a resume and decide your desired location, its time to get hustling. The most important place to start, and the most often overlooked place, is your network. Your network is the group of family, friends, coworkers, and acquaintances that make up your life. They are the backbone of your search and a great source of information and leads.

The big advantage of your network is that it is compiled with people who already know you. Depending on your relationship, many people in your network will feel a vested interest in your success, and will go out of their way to help. If they come in contact with a potential employer, they can vouch for your character and work ethic on the spot and help you leap to the top of the prospect pool.

4. Look Online

With the advent of the internet, the first place many job seekers look for job listings is now online on the internet. There are more job search websites than you know what to do with and each one is telling you they are the best. The truth is they are.

Monster.com is another excellent job search website. They have great tips, will write your resume and cover letter for, and get you job hunting in minutes.

You can find more by going to Google.com and doing a search for jobs. The key to successfully using these websites is being systematic. Pick a time everyday when you can spend time working online (example: from 2pm to 6pm daily). Start a daily journal and write down what job search sites you visit and the job listings you apply to. This journal will keep you from back tracking and can save you hours of time.

5. Look Offline

Do not overlook the tried and true ways of finding a job. Get the daily newspaper and other classified periodicals to look for listings. Also, get a copy of the Sunday edition from the papers in the locations you are interested in living. Be mindful of signs and conversations everywhere you go, and let new contacts know you are on the hunt.

With the warm breeze of summer wind a numerous number of high school graduates gets ready to enter the university. This is the moment theyve been waiting for all their lives and now time to choose one career out of the hundreds has come. First of all you are to decide what are you interested in, what skills or abilities you have and what your aim in life is. It is also time to ask somebody for a good piece of advice. Your assessment of yourself is quite subjective, if you want to here bare truth, which is better in this situation, turn to your family or a friend and theyll tell you what is it you are good at. It also depends on your physical and mental abilities. As one may hear the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak. You may be a genius in mathematics and a complete failure in building a dog house. One can be very skillful in designing a house but feel hopeless in front of the blank sheet of paper and a pen with the task to write an essay. One may be a master of the word but be puzzled by simple procedure of changing the light bulb. Thats why you are to consider all your past experiences in everything you did. That will help you to find your true calling.

Before heading off to college, you are to consider the financial income youll get when being awarded with a college diploma. For example the salary of a lawyer and a teacher differ in some digits, and this is also a rule in different countries. So if you dream to do what you like and make a fortune by it, you are to reconsider and find the suitable way out. Now we see how many things is one to know before getting prepared to forward your college application essay. You are to consider a lot of different things and facts. Just imagine how many dull college application essays do universities receive from students. You are to make it bright and very informative. You may have a dream to become a famous actress, but your appearance (lets be frank) and your skills leave something more to be desired. Of course you may dream on and stay miserable for the rest of the days, but you may also be a great psychologist, a specialist you were advised to become and be happy helping people, making small performances on Christmas Eve for your family.

Youve chosen your career and feel that you are ready to get your teeth into knowledge but again you face the reality, looking at your grades and the cost of your studies. You have to bee good enough to get a scholarship, but your grades make you come back down to earth and leave no hope for a successful career. Get focused and get necessary points. Once becoming a freshman at high school you are to think already. If you drop out, you will never make a proper career, except some rare cases of extreme luck, will and efforts. Once youve considered everything and thought your choice carefully over, you might have gained confidence in the future. And here you are facing the wide walls of your dormitory and thinking about future. If youve gone through all above mentioned steps and feel very easy and relaxed. You will make a successful career and be happy till the rest of your days.