How To Geek On

The most efficient job hunts belong to the most responsive people. During my last career transition I invested in a Blackberry because I wanted to be more responsive and more accessible. How accessible are you during your current job search? Which technologies can help?

The entire world has sped up in the last few years, much more so than at anytime before. I realized this when I started using my Blackberry. I could never figure out how I could receive 5 new emails before I got back to my desk regarding the architecture meeting I’d just left. How did these people get anything done aside from writing email? And who was building the architecture if that’s all they did?

When I got my first Blackberry I understood quickly. All the people without one suddenly appeared to be stuck in a different dimension – a very slow and unresponsive one.

The feeling was akin to working on a T1 connection for the first time and then having to come home to a 56k internet connection. Ugh.

Now that I’ve been using a RIM device for a few years, I can’t figure out why my emails sometimes go for days without a response! By the time I get a response I’ve forgotten why that conversation was important or I’ve moved on.

The same thing happened when I got on Facebook. I would see these people who I knew hadn’t spoken with each other in several days and they’d have this inside conversation I knew nothing about. It was weird! Then I signed up for Facebook and added my friends. The situation turned around. Suddenly, I was connected and my non-Facebook-using-friends couldn’t understand how I’d already heard “the news”.

Before I figured out the Events feature on LinkedIn and what a tweetup was, I was mesmerized by all the events the people around attended. How did they find out about all these great events?

I don’t know why some of my friends don’t know about How to Geek On and our services – I’ve announced them on Facebook and LinkedIn and Twitter and Email and etc… where were they?

So what if you were a Hiring Manager for a software company and you were immersed in all these technologies? You’re highly available, highly accessible, and plowing through a bazillion candidates for a Software Engineer’s position. You’ve posted the position, tweeted it, and announced it on FB and LinkedIn.

You get a tweet within minutes from a qualified candidate, followed by an email with resume and link to the candidate’s LinkedIn profile. You quickly find someone who knows this candidate through Facebook and work with them to checkout their profile. Nearly all of this you do in 10 minutes with your thumbs while waiting for the coffee maker to finish. Stirring in your sugar and creamer you thumb an email asking the candidate to meet for lunch.

If you’re that hiring manager and you have your choice between this candidate and the one that sends you an email 2 days later – resume attached, no twitter handle, no LinkedIn profile, which will you pick? Keep in mind, by then you have 300 other resumes.

Remember, this is a technical position. As the hiring manager, is it in your company’s best interest to hire the person using technology from 2003?

As with any technology the ground rules remain the same: stay courteous; be professional; do what you commit to doing. Using twitter doesn’t lower the bar with respect to your grammar or professional conduct, just like email without proper capitalization and punctuation is no longer acceptable (since about 1998). It may get by right now, because we’re still learning to think in 140 characters, but that will change. Be on the leading edge of that curve.

The medium and timing of career transitions has changed vastly. Learn about new technologies and how to employ them. Then, beat your competition to the punch by being more responsive!