Find a Job on the Internet - Susan C. Daffron

Losing a job is one of the most stressful things
that can happen to a person. However, if you have
access to the Internet, your stint in the unemployment
line may be brief. The Internet is a great new tool
you can use to find your next job quickly and easily.
With your computer and your favorite Web browser,
you can search employment listings to find job
openings, or even post your resume to resume databases,
so that recruiters and companies can find you
first.

Start with a directory

One easy way to get started in your next job search
is to check out the links from one of the many job search directories. These pages have links to
pages upon pages of jobs. One well known directory
site that has been around a long time is the Riley
Guide (http://www.rileyguide.com). Although the
Riley Guide has a lot of links, it also is filled with lots
of useful information on how to find a job. College
career center sites often are good starting points as
well. For example, Purdue’s listing of on-line job
search resources
(http://www.cco.purdue.edu/Student/jobsites.htm) was set up to help new job seekers and can be a good source of advice.

In addition to copious job listings, most job
sites also give you lots of information about the hiring
process. Sites have information on everything from
assessing your career and researching companies,
to interviewing tactics. The Career Resource
Center (http://www.careers.org), for example, is a site
that contains extensive resources for the job seeker.
Billing itself as the Internet’s "most complete" career
directory, the site has 11,000 links to jobs,
employers, colleges, libraries, and state employment offices.

Another approach you can take in the job search
is to go straight to your favorite company site and see
if they are hiring. Some sites such as the 1st Steps
In The Hunt site
(http://www.interbiznet.com/hunt) make the process a little easier by listing
companies with links to their employment pages. Using this
site, you can surf to the individual company home
pages to scan job listings and research the company all
at the very same time. By learning about
prospective companies, you can wow them with your
knowledge during an the interview and, more importantly,
weed out places you would never want to work for in
the first place (which can save everyone a lot of grief
in the long run).

Key into keywords

Most of the big job sites let you search through
the listings by typing in a keyword or selecting a type
of job. For example, on the Career City site
(http://www.careercity.com/jobs/jobs.htm) to search
for a job such as a Web programmer, you choose a
category, or categories, such as Computer (programmer), and geographic location. If you end up
with too many matches, you can narrow the search
by adding specific keywords for job qualifications, or
job title, description, or company name.

Check the classifieds

The traditional approach of searching through
the help wanted ads is available on the Internet as
well. The CareerPath site
(http://www.careerpath.com) lets you access a huge database of help wanted
ads from newspapers from around the country. It has
ads from big metropolitan papers such as the New
York Times, LA Times, and Washington
Post and smaller regional papers as well. You can search the ads
by newspaper, job type, and keyword to narrow down your list to a more reasonable size. The Yahoo
Employment Section (http://classifieds.yahoo.com
/employment.html) is another site that lets
you cruise through the advertising sections of
newspapers from large cities such as Boston, Chicago,
Dallas, Los Angeles, New York, and Washington D.C.

Get local

If you want to check out the local job scene in
Idaho, you can start at the Idaho Department of Labor
Job Search page
(http://www.doe.state.id.us/pubjs2/occmenu.htm). This site lists all the jobs that have been submitted to the state job service. You also
can check out the web pages for the local
newspapers. You can find the Spokesman Review at
http://www.spokane.net and the Coeur d’Alene Press
at http://www.cdapress.com.

Scope newsgroups

For an overwhelming glimpse into just how very many jobs there are out there in the world, you
can check out the USENET newsgroups. The process
of weeding through the postings is time-consuming
and not for the faint of heart, however. For a more
productive search, you may want to try a job site,
such as CareerMosaic
(http://www.careermosaic.com) instead or search through newsgroups using a
tool such as Deja (www.deja.com). In addition to
their own employment listings, many large job sites
also include a newsgroup searching feature you can use
to search the postings by keyword.

Post your resume

Another way to get the word out is to post your
resume to resume databases and newsgroups. However, bear in mind that when you post your
resume to a newsgroup, it’s available to the entire
Internet. Not everything or everyone is lovely on the
Internet, so be careful. Even posting an innocent e-mail
address could lead to endless unwanted e-mail
(generally referred to as spam).

Posting your resume to one of the many resume banks available on the Web is a more sane way to
get your resume into the hands of people who can use
it (and out of the hands of those who would abuse
it). Resume sites generally only let participating
employers view your resume and require employers to
enter a password before they search the database.
The Monster Board (http://www.monster.com) is
a popular resume site because it’s free. Certain
sites charge you to upload your resume, so be sure
you read the site’s information carefully. Also note
that many sites require a "text-only" version of your
resume, so you may need to do some reformatting to make it readable without the aid of bold and
italic. Some resume banks also have you fill out a
standard form instead of uploading a resume. The theory
is that by making the resumes more consistent, they
are easier for prospective employers to screen. If you
are searching for work in a specific field, you may want
to bypass large resume banks like CareerMosaic and
find a resume bank that is targeted toward employers
in your field.

Surf for success

If you’ve lost your job, recently graduated, or just
desperately need a paycheck, getting employment
information has never been easier. Whether you are looking for a job or a whole new career, you can
probably find something useful on the Internet. So
get ready: you may be just a few mouse clicks away
from your next job.