Although we are not real advocates of chasing online job postings, mostly because many of those jobs either don’t exist or have been propagated across so many job boards that the competition is unwieldy, we recognize that at least part of your search (most of our coaches say no more than 10 percent) will be spent online.
We recently uncovered an interesting resource from Jeff Altman, who calls himself the Big Game Hunter with a no B.S. approach to job search advice. Jeff has assembled a master list of job search sites online, covering all the bases, including resume assistance and reference checking, the big job boards like Yahoo HotJobs and Monster, and the smaller job sites specializing in fashion, architecture, engineering, etc. These job boards don’t necessarily filter their listings by salary level or other criteria, so if you are pursuing opportunities here use your good judgment. Also be careful that you don’t end up pursuing the same opportunity more than once. Many of these job sites scrape listings from other sites, so watch for similar wording in the job descriptions and other telltales so you don’t duplicate.
The more discriminating you can be in your online job search, the better your chances of landing. That’s why NETSHARE vets all of our job listings to make sure they are legitimate, and we offer a number of exclusive listings because recruiters and hiring managers know we cater to senior managers and executives, and they don’t want to have to sift through all the unqualified resumes that come flooding in when they open the taps using Monster or Yahoo HotJobs.
Of course, if you pursue any of these opportunities, it means you are looking for a perfect fit to someone else’s hiring criteria. We still recommend that the best way to find a satisfying job is to target the right company, network your way in, and demonstrate your value so you can create your own opportunity. Don’t spend too much time chasing Web rainbows, but who knows, many have landed with a pot of gold using targeted job boards.