Successful Use of Social Networking Sites to Find a Job

I currently hold a position as regional safety manager for an international solar power and energy efficiency services company. The industry that I am in is known as the environmental industry or the green services industry. I found this job through a number of sources including a friend who told me where job boards for this industry were located, using the actual job board, and then attending networking events to find out how to best go through the interview process.

I used technology in my most recent job search in a number of ways. For instance, I used social networking sites to find alumni at my alma mater so that I could have more leads for my job search. I used the job boards to find the actual positions after being led to the right places by my friends. I also bought some job search software, but I was able to find a job before I actually needed to use it.

If I was applying for the exact same job position tomorrow with a different company, I would make myself stand out among the crowd by listing my experience first. I had three years of interning and working with green energy dating back to high school. However, I led with my education, which mostly all of the other candidates for my positions also had. If I had led with the unique experience that I had, then I think that I would have gotten a lot more attention. I would also have made my resume much more up to date. There are simply so many options for someone trying to get a job today to stand out. I would have created a short film expressing my interest in the company. I would have added how to videos to a digital resume. I would have recorded my recommendations on video or at least on audio so that my professors and colleagues could show my prospective employers through gestures and vocal tone how cool I was, LOL. There are just so many more ways to stand out.

The types of technologies that I used to connect with professionals in my field were the messageboards and job boards that were unique to my industry. They were both definitely helpful in finding me a job, and much more helpful than the generic job boards which list everything. I also used social networking to find these websites, as I did not know where they were until I asked certain people on the networking sites. The job search software that I had would have been great as it had many tools that I was using in a less professional way. For instance, I was keeping track of my interview and phone schedule by Excel. But the job software would have connected it right to my Contacts list in my computer and in my smartphone and given me alarms that would have let me know that it was time to check in with a particular person. One job interview that stands out was my worst interview ever. My car had a flat tire, it was raining, and I walked in with my clothes and my resume soaked. I thought that they would understand, but it was apparent that the interviewer did not like me at the very beginning because of my appearance. I learned from this that it is essential to be prepared for absolutely everything. Have an extra shirt and tie in the car. Have many copies of your paper resume. And have a copy of your resume on a mobile drive as well. I can't believe that I did not use these technologies earlier, but you live and you learn.

The single most important thing that I learned about the pro job search market was that you must always be prepared. In the interviews in which I called ahead of time to check who I was interviewing with, I did extremely well and usually got passed on to the second stage of the process. Also, when I had done background information on the company I did extremely well also. I think that in every interview that I "passed" I asked a question specific to the company or the interviewer.

I did use the services that were offered by my unversity's Career Services program. I tried to use them to find alumni in my field that already had positions in the industry. I also used it to find out when recruiters were coming by and what companies they were from. There were also many talks about how to form a resume, how to speak at interviews, etc. I would always go to those kinds of talks.

If I could redo one event from my professional career I would definitely have put my internship information first on my resume. That would have saved me so much trouble. By the time the interviewer had to ask me a question like, "What is special about you?" or "Tell me why I should hire you," I found that they had already made up their minds on me as a no-go. I would also have taken a few more classes in engineering than I did in school. I am trying to find the time to go back, because the engineers in this industry are the ones that really have the upward mobility and the opportunity to become someone great.

This is a true career story as told to AllEnvironmentalJobs.com and is one of many interviews with environmental professionals, which among others include an environmental scientist and an environmental operations manager.