As unemployment rises and a new crop of college grads faces the most challenging job market in years, there’s little doubt that the competition for positions is stiff. Anyone looking for work must step up her game in the job search.

It’s no longer just who you know. In today’s economy you must focus deliberately on who knows you. That means aggressively marketing yourself to decision-makers and the people who influence those decision-makers. Start by doing an honest assessment of your efforts to determine if you’re doing everything you possibly can to secure an offer.

Click here to find out what seven questions you need to ask yourself about your job search right now.

Women For Hire’s Boot Camp for Recent Grads
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
8:30am-6:00pm
Manhattan Center Grand Ballroom

As a registered attendee, you’ll learn to: think beyond job boards, network with ease, sell yourself and stand out from the competition. We’ll teach you how to ace an interview, follow-up effectively, negotiate a job offer and be a star from day one.

Women For Hire CEO Tory Johnson, who is also the Workplace Contributor on ABC’s Good Morning America, will lead the fast-paced program, which includes:

• Expert advice from decision makers at some of the world’s best employers will share the inside scoop on how to get hired. Hear directly from recruiters at Google, Lifetime TV, IBM, Booz Allen, Disney ABC Media Networks, KPMG, Enterprise, Memorial Sloan Kettering, Frito-Lay, Coca-Cola, and Starbucks. (*This is a rare opportunity to meet with the people who can help you get your foot in the door at this highly competitive companies!)

• Best practices from the top staffing firms in New York on how to get them to help you land a job. Learn the myths and truths that most people don’t know about working with staffing firms.

• Finance 101 with Jean Chatzky (Today and Oprah financial contributor) and WABC anchor Lori Stokes on finding your passion and establishing your own professional identity.

• Strategies on getting in the door, overcoming the Internet “black hole,” mastering self-promotion, nailing the negotiation and so much more.

• Participate in a stellar networking activity to start the day, plus lunch, snacks and surprises throughout the hands-on program.

• We’ll wrap up with an hour-long informal networking event with more than 100 recruiters from top employers in just about every industry. This will be the ultimate “Toast to Sweet Success” and it’s a perfect chance to put to use all of the advice and inspiration gained throughout the day.

This Career Boot Camp will benefit anyone who is frustrated with the job search process and believes there’s got to be a better way to find meaningful work!

• Format: One third of resumes utilize the wrong structure - either a chronological when a functional would do better or vice versa. The choice of structure can make a significant impact on the effectiveness of a resume.
• Generic Objectives: Almost half of the objective statements did not provide any information on the job or industry that the job seeker was pursuing. Generic objective statements, such as the common “I want to utilize my skills and abilities to the benefit of my employer” serve no purpose and are, at best, a waste of space.
• Accomplishments: 27% of job seekers provided no accomplishments and only 40% of job seekers provided three or more accomplishments for each job held. Most job seekers emphasized their responsibilities. Although responsibilities are important on a resume, they must be backed up by accomplishments. The average resume contained 2.5 accomplishments per position and 3.2 responsibilities per position.
• Personal Information: When personal information, such as hobbies, interests and family status was provided, it very rarely related to the job seeker’s career.
• Grammar and Spelling: Very few resumes have a mistake. Less than 8% of the resumes surveyed contained a single spelling or grammatical error and less than 3% contained multiple errors.
• Continuing Education: 77% of resumes included a list of continuing education activities that the job seeker had completed within the education section of their resume.
• Employment Dates: Only half of the resumes provided both months and years for the start and end date of each position listed, leaving the other half of resumes missing key data most hiring managers want.

The 2008 Resume Benchmarking Survey is available for download on Palladian International’s Career Resources website at www.palladiancr.com/survey.html. The 2008 Resume Benchmarking Survey evaluated resumes from active job seekers within three categories: Manufacturing Executives with more than 10 years of experience, Sales & Marketing Managers with more than 10 years of experience and recent college graduates entering the workforce.

Researched and compiled by CPEhr’s Director of Marketing, Ari Rosenstein, the white paper is based on CPEhr’s extensive experience working with California businesses.

“California is clearly the most complex state in which to do business,” says Rosenstein. “Employers face an ever-growing barrage of regulations and governmental compliance, and the average entrepreneur is simply unable to manage them all. HR Outsourcing has become an increasingly attractive option for these small and mid-sized business owners.”

The white paper focuses on the role HR Outsourcing plays in the California business landscape, and the enormous growth of the industry. It demonstrates how outsourcing certain personnel functions to a professional HRO or PEO firm can reduce the risk of lawsuits, increase internal efficiencies and improve employee productivity.

The niche Professional Employer Organizations (PEO) industry is highlighted, with a detailed description of the services and value offered to small and mid-sized business owners. These include:

-Reducing administrative paperwork
-Protecting against potential employee lawsuits
-Attracting top talent with robust health insurance and benefits
-Implementing OSHA compliant safety policies
-Filing taxes and processing payroll

Rosenstein notes, “The value PEOs and HR Outsourcing Firms bring to an organization is obvious. By eliminating cumbersome activities and partnering with an expert in the area of HR, companies can leverage their existing staff more efficiently, and avoid costly lawsuits.”

About CPEhr:
CPEhr has been a leader of HR Outsourcing and PEO services since 1982. With over 15,000 serviced employees and hundreds of clients, CPEhr is the largest privately-held PEO based in California. With 25 years of service and experience in the local marketplace, CPEhr is familiar with the needs of California employers, and is able to deliver a solution that fits those needs. A free copy of the HR White Paper can be downloaded from their corporate website.

The CareerTV team traveled around the world to see social responsibility in action. The Peace Corps, Teach for America, the Mayo Clinic, and the US Air Force were among the organizations profiled.

Below are the Top 10 Most Socially Responsible Employers, according to Universum’s annual survey*:
1. Peace Corps
2. Teach For America
3. Mayo Clinic
4. U.S. Air Force
5. U.S. Army
6. Ernst & Young
7. U.S. Customs and Border Patrol
8. Internal Revenue Service
9. KPMG
10. HCA

“This show is loaded with the philanthropic views and actions of more than a dozen employers,” says CareerTV Executive Producer Sean O’Grady. “It was tremendously rewarding to showcase the hard work and passion of so many diverse employers.”

One of the individuals interviewed was U.S. Air Force Captain Alex Fafinski. He and his KC-10 flight crew were featured in this episode for their humanitarian efforts abroad. “When you think of the military, you’re automatically going to think about the Global War on Terrorism, but what people aren’t hearing about is the thousands upon thousands of pounds of water, food, and medical aid we drop every day in places around the world. I’m proud to know college students recognized this and I’m equally proud of CareerTV for telling this under-reported story,” added Melissa Uhniat, CareerTV’s Producer.

Teach for America Educators at Cardozo High School were also featured. “We’re working very hard every day to close the achievement gap for underprivileged students. I hope this story inspires college students who are thinking about a teaching career to take the plunge and join us,” said TFA member Clarisse Mendoza.

This is the second CareerTV episode in the 2008 season. It will air on over 50 TV stations around the U.S. Next month the CareerTV team will focus on the Top 10 Undergraduate Employers in the country.

*Each year, Universum, CareerTV’s sister company, surveys over 230,000 students globally to help top organizations around the world improve the effectiveness of their employer brand to attract, recruit and retain top talent.

About CareerTV
CareerTV is the nation’s leading career video website and has the largest collection of recruitment videos online. We help students and young professionals learn more about careers at companies across all industries. Our online employer video library includes inside perspectives to corporate culture and career opportunities at some of America’s top employers such as Google, L’Oreal, JP Morgan, and Walt Disney. In addition CareerTV works to promote employer brands with media companies such as WetFeet, Jungle Media, and hundreds of colleges and universities across the country.

The Institute of Spa Management has always been proud to make spa management education accessible to students worldwide, and now ISM looks forward to bridging the gap between career professionals looking for spa management positions and employers looking to hire the best management talent in the spa industry. Spa related job postings can be emailed directly to jobcenter @ spamanagementschool.com or visit ISM online at www.spacollege.org for more information.

About Institute of Spa Management:
The mission of the Institute of Spa Management (ISM) is to further the spa industry by offering advanced college-level training for spa professionals that is accessible, affordable and self paced. ISM offers Spa Management and Spa Ownership programs at reasonable prices in an effective combination distance education and online learning format that enables learning and knowledge retention. ISM believes that the future of the spa industry belongs to those who treat clients with the highest level of integrity and provide innovative services in well run facilities. These necessary elements for spa success can only occur when quality education is the premise for spa managers and directors.

The updated website was developed in partnership with the General Services Administration (GSA), OPM’s telework.gov partner. Users can read and download recent telework guidance and legislation, reports, and studies. A search database allows users to input telework-related questions, and if answers are not found onsite the questions can be routed to experts who will respond via email. The site offers telework guidance and direction to employees and managers, as well as telework coordinators.

Additional features of the updated site include quick links to key pages, online telework training, and easy access to telework-related policies such as reasonable accommodation and emergency closure. Finally, the site displays a green color scheme throughout, chosen to reflect the environmentally friendly aspects of telework.

Telework in the Federal Government has increased significantly since 2001, 110,000 employees currently telework according to OPM’s latest report to Congress. The report also found that while overall telework numbers were down slightly from 2005, a majority of agencies increased telework over the previous year, and that 42% fully integrated telework into their emergency planning.

According to Laurence Shatkin, Ph.D., a senior product developer at JIST Publishing, “Some occupations are now expected to grow considerably faster than was previously expected, notably those in the Finance and Insurance and Human Service clusters. Overall, however, projections for job growth now are a little less optimistic than two years ago, especially in the Manufacturing and Retail and Wholesale Sales and Service clusters. Job-growth forecasts also have been cut back, though to a lesser extent, for the high-flying Health Science and Education and Training clusters.”

Service Providing Industries on the Rise

The new OOH also predicts that service-providing industries will fair the strongest in upcoming years, while goods-producing sectors experience a decline. In fact, service-providing industries will generate almost all of the employment gain and will provide more than three-quarters of all jobs in 2016. The only goods-producing sector expected to grow, however, is construction.

“The U.S. economy has shifted toward service industries such as health care and hospitality. As a result, more and more opportunities will be found in jobs that involve a lot of interpersonal contact, and chances to work alone will become more scarce,” says Shatkin.

Expect a More Diverse Workforce

In addition to providing information about more than 270 jobs, the OOH also offers insight about the future workforce. Based on feedback from economic forecasters, the OOH includes the following projections about the 10-year period ending in 2016:

• The labor force will become more racially and ethnically diverse, despite growing more slowly than in the past.
• The number of workers in the 55-and-older group is expected to grow by almost 47 percent.
• The number of prime-age workers–those between 25 and 54 years old–will increase by 2.4 percent, but their share of the labor force will decline from 68.4 to 64.4 percent.

About the Occupational Outlook Handbook 2008-2009

The OOH is America’s most widely used and dependable resource for career information. Packed with 270 job descriptions, the OOH includes essential facts about each job’s earnings, training and education requirements, job growth, and much more. JIST Publishing’s version of this best-selling resource is the most accurate version available–free of hundreds of errors found in other online and print versions.

Alison Doyle, author of a new book, “Internet Your Way to a New Job - How to Really Find a Job Online” (Happy About; $19.95, March 2008) points out that you can waste hours searching, and applying for jobs. Since most employers post jobs to one or two sites, targeting just a fewjob search sites isn’t enough. The job market is becoming increasingly competitive, and has changed hiring practices which has changed job searching. Rather than just posting your resume on job sites like Monster, CareerBuilder, or HotJobs, you need to use all the online job search tools to your advantage. The book will teach you what you what you need to know to navigate the new realities of a job search. Learn the process of online job searching and how to find a job using all the tools available online. Doyle uses her years of experience in the industry to deliver uncomplicated advice, tips, and techniques.

“I’m excited to bring this book to market as we expect it will directly contribute to thousands of individuals finding new jobs. What greater value can one give back to society” says Mitchell Levy, CEO of book publisher Happy About.

“There is a misperception that people don’t really find jobs online - which is simply not true,” notes Doyle. From job search web sites like to niche sites and job search engines, along with the social networking sites, you need a guide. According to Doyle, the biggest mistake people make when looking for a job online is posting their resume online and waiting for employers to come to them. What should they do instead? “Many people think that looking for a job online is complicated and difficult. However, that’s simply not true.” Doyle notes. You can learn how to find a job utilizing everything from large job sites to social and professional networking sites like Facebook and LinkedIn.

About the Author
Alison Doyle is a job search expert with many years of experience in human resources, career development, and job searching, with a focus on online job searching and job search technology. Doyle has been the Guide for the About Job Searching (http://jobsearch.about.com) site since 1998. In addition, Doyle has spent the last sixteen years in a college career services office, currently as Associate Director for Information Technology at Skidmore College developing resources to assist students and alumni with their search for a job or internship. She is the author of the About.com Guide to Job Searching (2006) and writes and consults on these topics. More information is available at http://alisondoyle.com.

Also in the first show, actor Tom Hanks reveals the lessons he learned from his first job. Click here for more info.

The site continues to significantly grow traffic and number of videos available with 500-plus currently online. Of these, the top five most viewed career advice videos in February were:

1.   Resume & Interview Advice
2.   Cover Letters: Right Way-Wrong Way
3.   Resume Advice: Keyword Tips
4.   Apprentice Interviews
5.   Learn how an internship can propel you to the next level.

To see more career and employer videos, go to CareerTV.com

About CareerTV
CareerTV is the nation’s leading career video website and has the largest collection of recruitment videos online. We help students and young professionals learn more about careers at companies across all industries. Our online employer video library includes inside perspectives to corporate culture and career opportunities at some of America’s top employers such as Google, L’Oreal, JP Morgan, and Walt Disney. In addition CareerTV works to promote employer brands with media companies such as WetFeet, Jungle Media, and hundreds of colleges and universities across the country. CareerTV is a sister company to Universum — the world’s leader in student surveys, and whose independent research is cited by CNN, Fortune Magazine, New York Times, and Wall Street Journal.