Should people hold out for the job they want right now, or be satisfied to get any job they can?
I never counsel anybody to do that. If you have to put food on the table and your back’s to the wall, then, yes, you don’t get to wait for the exact job to come along. But here’s the folly: When you take any job that comes along, your heart’s not in it. You are going to leave, or be fired. And you don’t want that on your resume.
You say “perfect practice makes perfect.” What job-search concepts should people practice?
As soon as you’re looking for a job, get your “kitchen cabinet” — two, three, four friends who care about you — together and get them over to your living room. Then film it with a video camera as they conduct a mock interview, asking tough, substantive questions over and over again. You gain poise. You gain confidence. You increase the probability that you’re going to present yourself better.
Can social networking really be used to get a job?
There’s nothing wrong with being out there [on social media], but more importantly, you have to go to weddings and funerals and chamber of commerce events. You have to physically be out there so people see you as a human being. Social [media] networking is another arrow in your quiver, but don’t rely just on that.
What’s an example of the conventional job-search wisdom being wrong?
We’ve been brought up our whole life that first is best. In job seeking, last is best. You want to position yourself as close to the decision-making process as you can. People forget 50 percent of what they hear in four hours, so you don’t want to be the warm-up act. You walk out of that interview, you want them to remember you.