Nearly all have regular meetings - national or regional - at which career information is exchanged. It's a good place for personal contacts in your field, and for information about future growth and change. For a complete listing of associations, consult the Encyclopedia of Associations and The Directory of Trade and Professional Associations of the United States, Some associations may require that members hold professional-level jobs when they join, but many also sponsor workshops, intern ships, and apprenticeships for those trying to break into the business.
Trade Journals, Company Newsletters & House Organs
Consult the Standard Rate and Data (published by Standard Rate and Data Service), a directory that lists all the trade magazines, newspapers, and journals in each industry, to keep you up-to-date on your field's trends and events, and on the movers and shakers in that industry. Trade journals are devoted to information about a specific field or industry, or about professional fields. Company newsletters are in-house publications sent to employees and designed for a specific public.
Read through the newsletters and journals to get an idea of new areas of growth, new plants or departments opening up, and new directions in the field. Some publications even include classified listings for jobs, although these are generally for experienced personnel.
Other resources that may be particularly helpful for recent grads include articles of interest written by a professional in the field. Contact them to indicate your similar professional commitment. Suggest a meeting. Articles about people can also be helpful. When you read about staff promotions, you should realize that people with new assignments within an organization tend to take on new staff members to assist them, Promotions can also indicate possible vacancies. A third area of interest is information regarding new contracts, research grants, and similar information. New sources of revenue may mean new jobs. Even if the grant or contract is technical in nature, support staff is sometimes added in the areas of contract administration, research, and personnel.
Special Interest Groups
Various organizations may fit this bill: social clubs, such as sororities and fraternities; and issue-oriented clubs, such as women's groups, veterans groups, political organizations, and minority groups. These organizations may be contacted by employers who are seeking certain categories of people or those with certain philosophical beliefs. Al though public relations is a major function of these groups, they may be able to assist with contacts. Check with these organizations to find out how they let people know about job opportunities and whether or not they keep resumes on file.
Want-Ads
The classified job listings provide an overview of what's happening in a local labor market. Consider, for instance, the Sunday edition of the Los Angeles Times want-ads section for April 1,1984, which consisted of over 50 pages. There were 18 pages of engineering openings; six pages of nursing openings; six pages of secretary/clerk openings; and five pages of openings for computer programmers and analysts.
Those ads alone accounted for half the total. What we can learn fi-om this is what kinds of jobs are in demand, and what types of companies are hiring in particular job categories. What we can also learn is which kinds of jobs are difficult to fill because many of the listings will be in the category of hard-to-fill jobs. When you think that a full page ad in the Sunday edition of a major metropolitan newspaper may cost over $10,000, you realize that employers would only spend that kind of money if their need was great, or if they couldn't fill the job through regular channels.
In spite of this, it is still a good idea to use the want-ads as a source. A good idea, however, is to read the want-ads only on the days of its major publication, since nothing could be worse than facing each day with want-ads. For most daily newspapers, that will be the Sunday edition. For specialized newspapers, the major edition is generally a work day.
Realize, before you start, that there are different types of ads. Open-ads list all information: company and location, contact name, title, description of job, and qualifications sought. These ads are generally legitimate. They are placed by employers and the response is directed to employers.
Blind-ads are similar to the open ads, with the exception that you can respond to a box number. Most often, these ads are legitimate. Employers list vacancies in this way so they don't have to respond to un wanted resumes. You will, of course, have no idea who the employer is unless they contact you. Follow-up is impossible.
Catcher ads are the ads to be wary of. They are listed by employment agencies, and are stated as such. The heading are what we call teasers, which means they are designed to capture your interest. A few typical examples are: "Television Broadcasting (4 openings)", or, "Internal Sales/Marketing Consultants to $25,000 Plus Bonus", or "Immediate Openings", just to mention a few. These ads are intended to create a pool of job applicants, and tend to be gimmicky in nature. A word to the wise! Agencies have been accused of listing openings that do not exist. Situation Wanted ads are placed by the potential employee. This type of an approach may be useful if your qualifications are particularly unique, or if you want to attract the attention of an employer who may desire these unusual skills. These ads will be most valuable if placed in special interest publications, such as an architectural journal, a socio logical review, company newsletters, or any type of professional journal, to name a few examples. However, it's certainly cheaper and probably more fitful if you send a letter directly to an employer rather than taking this route.
