Tag Archive | "networking"

Recently I started following my 1,954th person on Twitter. Why is that significant? Well, when every baseball fan hears “1954,” they think of the legendary Willie Mays. In the World Series that year, the centerfielder made what many consider the greatest catch ever made. As the story goes, a young fan asked him after the game if he was nervous while trying to make the catch. “Nervous?” says Mays, “No. Son, this is the World Series. I’m not nervous, just excited. If you can’t get excited for this, you’re in the wrong game. Well, for us at Monster – and especially for those of us social media – this is as exciting as it gets. Bringing the biggest and best collection of jobs to the largest social network on Earth? Yes, please!

Even though you may have plenty of Facebook friends or spend a healthy amount of time on Twitter, you may not think that you can (or should) do “professional networking” online. Perhaps you think of networking as something that only executives or salespeople do at big conventions. Maybe you want to keep your online life and your work life separate. Or maybe you just think that professional networking is too time-consuming or boring.

I’ve been a speaker and attendee at more conferences than I can count. One thing I’ve learned is that in order to get the most value out of your time and money is to set yourself up for success with a little pre-conference planning. Here are some of the ways you can boost your conference experience as well as improve your networking.

The way we hunt for jobs has changed drastically in the past decade — thanks in part to the continuing growth of the Internet, the social-media revolution, and the new ubiquity of mobile computing. Of course, some job interviewing tips remain the same: You still need a great resume — even though it might not be on paper (and may be augmented by video and other multimedia files).

walk through any office setting and the immediate absence of holiday greeting cards makes anyone believe the Grinch has paid a visit. But ask any colleague and chances are, the online greetings have been pouring into email boxes, several a day. A recent MSN Money report looks at the decline in people sending traditional holiday cards this year. Whether due to the rise in social networking and mobile use, or motivated by economics and the desire to practice environmentally friendly green standards, e-greetings are more popular now than ever before. With our inboxes stuffed with impressive and creative virtual greeting cards we’ve received this holiday season, Monster decided to take a look back at the evolution of the holiday card.

Networking allows each of us to make an attempt to get what we need from others. It is also a key element to any job search. As such, the trick is to do it in a way that prevents you from driving those with whom you network crazy. How we go about our networking is important because in the end, if networking isn’t effective, there’s little reason to continue doing it.

Want to start with a disclaimer here: this is only my second blog post, so bear with me. It’s a little bit scary, actually, but if there’s one thing that doesn’t bother me, it’s opening up to the world (as many of you probably know). My problem isn’t knowing what to say about the future of recruiting, it’s where to start. See, I’m a recruiter by trade, so this stuff is in my DNA.