Sweet Aromas

I must start off this blog with the sweet beginnings of my work day downtown. Anyone who knows Specialty's knows that their sweet fresh baked aroma awakens the senses from a distance away. I love that smell and feel better when headed out of the subway station because of the convenient location of the Montgomery one. Thank you for doing what you do Specialty's. Maybe one of these days I'll buy one and try out the other sense and see how good the cookies taste.

But really, this blog is to serve the purpose for the readers that are job searching right now. This morning the unemployment rate has risen from 8.9 to 9.4%, YIKES! This is scary times for many people out there. Everyone has tips, but I would like to share mine.

Step 1:
Determine if you are looking for a job to pay some bills or you're looking for a career. These are 2 different search strategies. Personally, I realized soon after my career search that I had to also do a generic job search.

Step 2:
In the career search, it's important to look at what you want to do etc, but also to stretch how you normally think. The reason why is, because nothing is how it normally is.

Expansion on Step 2:
> Attend Events. What kind you ask?
Associations, Alumni Events, Friends' Get-Togethers, Conferences (volunteer at a conference), Luncheons with successful people
> Email Campaign - informing people that you're happily searching and could use help on leads and ATTACH YOUR RESUME and be specific on what you're looking for.
> Accept all part time work you can get, because A.) you need the money and B.) it might transpire into a full time gig before your eyes and of course C.) new skills to add to the bag.

Step 3:
Be a Sleuth! Look for jobs that haven't been posted yet. So ask your friends for openings and be the first to knock on HR's door. Get referred by an employee. This might be the only way to really compete with the massive competition out there for jobs. Also don't look for the jobs at companies that are well known because everyone is looking there too. Look for the unknown companies and be the one that gets interviews.
I can't remind you enough to be flexible and to let go of only striving for Top Fortune 500 companies. I had to let go of this dream and have been very productive ever since.

However, if you not willing to let this go. I understand. Apply for contract work with these companies and seek out their temp agencies that they work through. This has proven to be successful for others that I know of.

Step 4:
Link with everyone you can with Facebook and Linked In etc. But solely using that won't quite cut it. It must be a culmination of being active that will get you on the right path.

Enjoy these ideas. Best of luck and if you refuse work in hopes of a full time position, you have to weight out the risks for yourself and do what is best.

All the Best,
MBA Marketing Guru

Survival of the 6-hr Interview!!

In my few years of interviewing, I've experienced an array of interviews. One company had me interview with a panel of 9 members (some who were jet lagged from flying in from HQ in Texas), for a new position that was way out of my league that was needless to say good practice for me when I was in my mid-20's.
Then when I was interviewing for another position with a very small company I must have returned upon their request for 5 additional interviews! They required me to meet with everyone in the department and the seniors in the company. I even attended their company wide reception event at Horizons in Sausalito. When people asked my role with the company, I responded with, "I'm interviewing for the marketing coordinator position." This was a company that rescind their offer because I countered and maybe I was better off. This was the time in my life that I realized putting off grad school was a bad idea and that I should go FULL FORCE with getting my MBA.
So that brings me to yesterday's 6-hr interview that I survived by 9 different people. To my advantage I had the endurance and stamina to meet with all 9 people and entertain their engaging and thought provoking questions. Whew! At the end of it all, I was examined on the quintessential of Office software applications like Access, Excel, Outlook, PowerPoint, and Word.

Time to gear up for the next interview this Friday afternoon.

The FIFO of Office Life

So now that I'm back to the grind and have been fortunate enough to have been placed with temporary work with an awesome office furniture and project management firm downtown. I found made an interesting observation. I should also mention that after running into an old classmate of mine from undergrad and racing through the busy sidewalks, this idea came to me.

In some office positions, it's important not to be the Last In and the First Out. So business majors, think back to your Financial Accounting days. Remember inventory systems of LIFO and FIFO? Well the idea of being the First In and Last Out is the initial strategy that employees use to make themselves "look good". In all honesty, putting in the hours should not really make someone look good, but apparently it does. I feel that using time wisely during the day and being productive is how we as employees should position our strengths. So why do people bother showing up early just to have long lunch breaks, taking longer than their share of 15 minute breaks? Facebook all day and gossip around the water cooler. After this temp position I would like to keep to the hours of the company but not get caught up with the looking good facade.

BTW, I have 2 interviews next week and hope to keep more coming in the pipeline until the golden offer is presented to me.

Just in case you wonder why I haven't blogged, I had graduation celebrations for memorial day weekend and other personal matters.

Am Much Better Than 1 Month Ago...

As my finals wrap up and my two year academic endeavor comes to an end, I feel proud for all the sweat that I have been through for my MBA.

I just heard back from Pacific Natural Foods about their Associate Brand Manager position and after a few months they have closed the position. That position is located in Oregon. Phew!

I also heard back from the Fairmont hotel about an unpaid summer internship and their eagerness to interview me. Err, I haven't sought after an unpaid internship in ten years. I would be honored to work for such an amazing hotelier, but unable to work pro bono at this time.

Currently I'm keeping up with several part time temporary jobs for the meantime. We'll see how well my pipeline opportunities keep me busy in the next few weeks.

Happy Tuesday

I can't wait to try out my new job searching strategy that was thought up this past weekend with Dr. Fraser. He recognized that my competency to perform a Budget Analyst function at research hospitals like UCSF, VA Hospital, and SF General. He gave me some contacts for leads.

So the reason why I haven't been able to try out this approach as of yet, is that I am still an MBA student and have end of the semester project to finish up. Although, finding a job sets precedence, it's also duly important to finish my degree with honor and integrity. I just finished writing up a research paper on Remote Monitoring Devices in the healthcare space. Actually, it was extremely fascinating that I didn't solicit any group members to join me on this project. It was great to work with groups in grad school, but my final project was a testament to the new skills that I learned.

The latest on the job front....
I just booked a temp job for a few weeks in June.
I also booked to manage a marketing promotion on a weekend in June (possibly the same weekend as Union St Fair)
I haven't booked the actual dates, but will also be promoting the tasty Liquer from Skyy all summer long.
And, my market research project is taking me to a new realm this week as well.

Beginning to Compile the Company List

Beginning to compile this list. Well, lets see, just yesterday I applied to over 10 positions at Booz Allen Hamilton. I had received a referral from someone that I know in San Diego. I was actually really interested in a position at Spawars from a career fair that I attended back in November. After several online submissions, we were still in touch but my application never hit her desk. She said she were forward me along to BAH. And a few months later, so she did.
I have also applied for a fantastic position at Denny's HQ in South Carolina. I had met Mr. Mark Chmiel, CMO for Denny's at the Economist Marketing Forum in SF back in March. I sat next to him all morning. I watched him blackberry all morning as well! Busy guy. It was really neat because his assistant must have set up his travel packet, because he had a roster printed out with him. So after a few emails, he said to follow up directly with the VP of Mktg Mr. John Dillon, but unfortunately, my email has once again gotten lost within the inbox of a very busy person.
Additionally, this past Saturday I went to Genentech to a NSH- MBA networking event/career fair. I had the pleasure of speaking with recruiters from Safeway, Del Monte, as well as Genentech. We'll see how well my follow ups go this week.
Although I don't have my fulltime offer, my 2 golden nuggets for the day are: my temp agency booked me for 3 wks in June (=rent is now paid for June) and my market research firm rebooked me for another project. Do I dare tell you what kind of market research I'm conducting this week? Well let's just say, I'm interviewing OB-GYNs.

Opening Blog

I've been thinking about this and talking about doing this for some time now, guess what folks? The time has come. I'm blogging about my job search. The point is not for me to vent to an interface but to track this process for those that really don't believe that I have applied to over 500 positions by May 2009.
When asked the question, what do you want to do?
I ponder and think Brand Management for a CPG company, so naturally in San Francisco that includes Clorox (yes I know the chemical company- but they also own food and Burt's Bees) and also Del Monte. Well, how far have I come along with either company? Well at both companies I have had internal champions forward my resume along. Well at least at Clorox I received an email at the time stating that they don't do business with my MBA school for internships. So how do I can a job if I can't even get an internship? Del Monte has never materialized into anything. Thank you to my brother from Delta Sigma Pi for all of her efforts thus far. But I have to navigate in a different way to get some results.

By the way, one of these days I will aggregate the companies that have received my resume and you'll see the positions quickly add up to 500!