There has been quite the controversy over a recent New York Times article profiling a 2008 graduate who still remains unemployed, living at home with the folks. Scott Nicholson has been on the hunt for a career in “marketing or finance or management training or any career-oriented opening at a big corporation” since he graduated from Colgate University, and like many recent grads, has faced tremendous difficulty. The public uproar, though, is around the fact that Nicholson was offered an entry level position with an insurance company, but turned it down because “rather than waste early years in dead-end work, he reasoned, he would hold out for a corporate position that would draw on his college training and put him, as he sees it, on the bottom rungs of a career ladder.”
Many claim that this is indicative of the millennial generation and that Nicholson has a sense of entitlement in refusing to take anything less than the “perfect” job. Gawker, in response to the piece, called it the “Millennial Job Whine.”
I had the pleasure of discussing the topic with some Peppercom interns on the latest RepChatter podcast, hosted by Peppercom co-founder Steve Cody and COO and Partner Ted Birkhahn. Take a listen and let us know your take on the subject. Should Nicholson have taken the job? What struggles have you faced in your job hunt?
Guest Post by Jerid Gunter
Watch Jerid in the news here.
Job hunting. No doubt, there are several emotions that come with the idea of hunting for a new job, and there are many of us who are aboard the job hunting roller coaster. When I graduated from Western Kentucky University with my BA in public relations back in May 2009, I moved back home to the Kansas City area and was quite hopeful for the opportunities that surely awaited me. Admittedly, I was quite delusional to the fact of how bad the economy was at the time of my graduation. One year later, with an internship and volunteering experience under my belt, I was still at the starting gate with my job hunt. I became completely open to relocating, and I submitted countless resumes and applications to various jobs across the country. The feelings of hope and excitement gave way to anxiety and frustration.
While I was delusional as a fresh college grad, I wasn’t delusional to the fact that my resume wasn’t turning heads. There’s no question that unemployed PR pros with five to 10 years experience are at the front of the line for any open position. I had to come up with something creative. So, with the “trained mind” of a PR practitioner, I tried to get my creative wheels turning. What could I do to stand out from the pack?
Part of the job of a public relations practitioner is to create or raise awareness, whether it’s for an event, organization or individual. In my case, I was looking to raise awareness about myself. I can’t quite tell you how I came up with this idea, but after watching a YouTube video of a creative way a job seeker received attention it must have created a spark for me. I decided I was going to stand on the corner of one of the busiest street corners in Kansas City, wearing a sandwich boy sign and carrying copies of my resume. After much thought of the message for my sign, I came up with: “This college grad can’t get experience without an opportunity. Hire me! jeridgunter@gmail.com.” In addition, I created a group page on Facebook (“Jerid’s Job Hunt Extravaganza!”), inviting all of my friends and sharing my crazy idea with them.
While I thought this was a good start, it certainly wouldn’t be a full-blown PR campaign without a little media attention. While I wasn’t sure if I’d really be considered newsworthy, I went ahead and e-mailed all four major news networks in Kansas City, explaining my situation and what I was planning to do. I told them exactly when and where to find me. One station contacted me via Twitter at about 4 AM the day of my event, telling me they’d possibly come by and cover my story. Sure enough, they contacted me while I was at my post, and did a live shot on the morning news, as well as a taped segment that aired during one of the evening newscasts. If that wasn’t enough, I had another station call me right after my interview with the first station, asking if they could cover my story. Of course, I welcomed the coverage. Yet again, I was featured on the evening news on that station as well.
After my day with the media, I thought I was a shoe-in for a great job. I just thought it was a matter of a couple of days before I’d have a handful of interviews and a couple of job offers on the table. The operative word: thought. The job offers didn’t come. Since my street sign escapade, I’ve had one job interview (not even PR related) and wasn’t awarded the position. I posted the online versions of my news stories on my Facebook profile and group page, as well as on my Twitter and LinkedIn accounts. I got all kinds of praise and encouraging words from friends and people I didn’t even know. While it’s been fun reading all of the comments, I’m still just working my part-time job at a little coffee shop that everyone’s heard of.
Why do I share my seemingly failed attempts of finding a job? It’s not an attempt to throw a pity party for myself. I know I’m one of countless other job-seekers. It’s also not an attempt to discourage you in your job hunt, quite the contrary. I’m certain that my street sign story is going to help me land a job in some form or fashion. Whether the video catches the right eye of a potential employer, or it’s an experience I can refer to during a job interview, it will be a tool I can use to distance myself from other job candidates. I share my story to encourage you to BE CREATIVE. Do something that makes you stand out…just don’t get yourself into trouble doing so.
The final installment of my series on organizing a job hunt with social media tools focuses on LinkedIn. Most of you are probably already on this social networking site (if not, you should be!), but here are a few tips to make the most of it.
Part two of my series on ButtonedUp.com gives a few tips and tricks for organizing a job hunt using Twitter. The full article is here, I hope you find it helpful!
We’ve talked in the past about using social media to help you find a job, but I’d like to share some additional tips for using social media tools to stay organized during a job hunt. I recently had the opportunity to contribute a three-part series on this topic to Buttoned Up, a website dedicated to helping people get organized. Part one focuses on using an aggregation dashboard like Netvibes.com to keep all of your online tools, frequently searched job boards and RSS feeds organized in one place. Feel free to check it out here!
Guest Post by Alex Shippee, 2010 Marist College graduate
As I prepared to graduate this spring, I heard my fair share about how my generation, Generation Y, has a dangerous sense of entitlement. This may be true for some, but I’ve known a lot of exceptions that make me question this wisdom.
When I left Marist College this past week I said ‘goodbye’ to a lot of remarkable friends. Some are attending graduate schools in Madrid or Florence, teaching English in China, or working for Top Five accounting firms. They have more creativity, enthusiasm, and dedication than I can imagine in any one place. So where does this notion of entitlement come from?
It comes from the rest of us. Those of us who can’t point to something we’ve done or a skill that we excel at to justify a high sense of self. Feeling entitled makes it difficult to build something we can feel legitimately proud of so we often simply procrastinate or slack off.
We not only think that we are innately qualified and prepared for whatever comes our way but, more than that, we are owed it. We deserve attendance at a great school, the best opportunities, and the job of our dreams because, quite simply, it’s our right for showing up and being ourselves.
This couldn’t be a more incorrect assumption.
In this weird state of traction, nobody would like to hire us, nor could we handle the position if we got it. But it’s not an indelible character trait that cannot be reversed. What we need is the challenge to our talent and to our drive to prove that we can apply ourselves and achieve something.
Finding professional employment is certainly a tough process but, ultimately, a necessary and rewarding one. Sending out resumes, researching employers, using social media like Twitter and LinkedIn, building relationships and networking, facing rejection and getting back up…that will help break any sense of entitlement we may have.
In the end, as long as employers remain discerning, this will produce applicants willing to work hard for a position they truly want. Employers, likewise, will see the benefit of hiring those that overcame difficult odds and bypassed their careless competitors.
And the harder we have to work to get something the more likely we’ll want to keep it. We’ll have built a foundation that will last. If some members of Generation Y still feel entitled then they won’t for much longer. The current job market is our proving ground to catch up to our already exceptional classmates.
In the next few weeks, we’ll be talking some more about ways that you can use social media to find and land a job. But first, I thought it would be helpful to get some insights into how the PR industry is using social media as a recruitment tool. My colleague Lauren Begley wrote a post for the PepperDigital blog with some guidelines for hiring managers to use social media as a recruiting platform. Take a look at what she has to say, and keep these points in mind when engaging in social media communications:
As Twitter has quadrupled in size and Facebook now rivals the population of the world’s third largest country, social media has forever changed our personal and professional communication practices. While it is often thought of as a tool for a PR or communications department within a corporation, there are other uses that divisions like human resources can exercise.
Recruitment, for example, offers a great opportunity for an HR team to delve into the social media space. Just as a job applicant develops a cover letter and resume touting their best qualities, HR managers can build a strong social media platform to showcase the company’s corporate culture in order to attract top talent. At Peppercom, for example, our intern coordinator Alicia Wells manages a blog all about entry level positions in public relations. This platform provides those outside of our company with a look into our corporate culture and professional values, as well as useful information for the job hunting process. If you too are in this position, here are a few best practices to consider.
1) Listen: In today’s current job climate, prospective employees are turning to the Web to identify job opportunities and highlight their qualifications. Before you launch a social media campaign, it is important to survey the conversations already taking place so you can find the social media tools that are most resonating with the top candidates. To do this, determine the kind of information they are seeking about your corporate culture and job functions. Take notice, specifically, of where they are communications online. By identifying these patterns, you’ll be able to create a social media campaign that will appeal to the type of candidates for which you are looking.
2) Start the Conversation: Once you have a handle on the social media platforms the top talent is comfortable using, you will be able to recognize the means by which you should engage your audience. For example, if participants within your field are active on Twitter, you might consider launching a corporate account to disseminate job information and answer questions in real-time.
3) Let Your Stars Shine: Whether a company provides a platform for its employees or not, most are regularly using digital communication channels on a regular basis. Identify those employees who are already social media savvy and bring them in to help shape the corporate presence online. Providing current employees with the opportunity to become the online voice of your company, will enable authenticity to shine through and offer potential job applicants a glimpse into employee life at your company.
I’m pretty sure I haven’t been on AOL since 1999, but today I stumbled across “Aol Find a Job” and thought it was worth sharing. The site is mainly a job database, but also offers articles with advice for job hunting, employment news and trends, personal development, and more. The most helpful section is the Job Seeker Toolkit, which even has a special section for recent grads. I’d encourage you to check it out for tips on building a resume, interviewing, networking and career searching.
Guest post by Abby Schoffman, Peppercom intern
Gone are the days when a private online existence was a good thing. If you’re looking for a job in PR, a digital presence is a must. Some like to call it personal branding. As someone who spent much of 2009 looking for an entry-level position, I know how important social media is to the job search. While you’re busy researching a company to prepare for an interview, they’re doing the same to get a feel for you. You need to make sure what they find represents you well.
If you’re not already developing your brand online, here are four ways to start using social media to benefit your job search:
1. Start tweeting. I’ve met and interacted with PR people from all across the country thanks to Twitter – people I would never have had the opportunity to talk with if it weren’t for social media. Twitter is a casual, no-pressure way to network. I’ve found job opportunities, been able to connect with people at companies I’ve applied to and even landed interviews because of Twitter.
If you’re looking for a job in the communication industry, it’s time to get on Twitter. Once you’re there, use your bio to let people know you’re looking for a job and your link to send people to your personal blog (assuming it’s appropriate), LinkedIn profile or online portfolio. (For more tips on using Twitter to find a job, check out this post.)
2. Follow and comment on industry blogs. PR is an industry where it’s important to know the latest news and trends. Blogs are a great way to stay informed and continue learning. Many PR bloggers have built a community of followers on their blogs, and the comment section is a great place to be involved in an insightful conversation.
You may not know where to start when looking for blogs to subscribe to, but if you’ve started following smart PR people on Twitter, check out the links in their bios. Most PR agencies also have some sort of blog, so be sure to look for those, too. Following PRiscope is how I found out about Peppercom and eventually landed my internship here.
3. Start your own blog. Blogging is a great way to showcase your writing skills and show that you know what’s going on in the industry. If you can’t dedicate the time needed to start your own blog, ask to guest post on one of your favorite PR blogs or become a contributing blogger. Having posts to share with potential employers is a great way to supplement your traditional portfolio.
4. Update your LinkedIn profile. That’s assuming you already have one, because you should. More and more recruiters are using LinkedIn as a search tool to find job candidates, so it’s important that your profile is complete. Use keywords, share links to your other sites and take advantage of the application that lets you feed your blog to your profile. Look at it as an opportunity to include anything you didn’t have space for on your traditional resume.
LinkedIn is also a great place for you to do research. It’s easy to find information about companies you’re interested in, their employees, the HR contact your e-mail should be addressed to, etc. You can also see if someone you know is connected to someone you want to know, which is a valuable tool when looking for a job.
(Another note about LinkedIn – I recommend joining @heatherhuhman’s group, #PRintern | #EntryPR. Heather does a good job pulling in PR job postings from all over the web.)
With these tips, you’ll be more in control of how you’re projecting yourself to potential employers. And the more you put into the digital space, the better the odds that those potential employers will find something that backs up the skills and qualifications listed on your resume.
Guest post by Stacey Davidson
This semester, I chose to take a public relations ethics class to round out my education at the University of Florida. I began the class not knowing what to expect and now, only four weeks into the semester, I can tell that this is one of the most beneficial classes I have taken in school. What do you think of when you think of ethics? A lot of people will say doing the right thing, or following the law, or even doing the right thing when it means not following the law. To me, ethics is about going above and beyond what is expected, to give back more than you were given, and to treat your publics with more respect than they deserve. Ethics in public relations is something that we cannot fake, both as students and one day as practitioners.
One way that ethics is becoming part of the mainstream is through corporate social responsibility. What was once a small PR tactic to encourage companies to give a donation to charity or provide added benefits to their employees, has now become a competitive business advantage for some companies (e.g. Starbucks) and an entire business model for others (e.g. Tom’s shoes). Corporations are expected to give back to the communities they work in as well as the global economy through sustainability and philanthropy.
Companies with high perceived CSR are more likely to have loyal customers as well as loyal employees and potential employees. Studies show that the average prospective employee would rather work for a socially responsible company, even if it means they receive less pay (the study said that on average people are willing to give up more than $14,000 each year in salary to work for a socially responsible company they respect.) In my job search this semester, CSR is one of the first things I research about a company. My goal is to work for a company whose ethical values mirror my own, because ultimately as an employee I am attaching my reputation to the company’s and vice versa. I want to be associated with a company that is highly respected as much as a company only wants to hire upstanding, ethical citizens.
What do you think? Is CSR something you look for in a potential employer?
