I was speaking with a colleague of long-standing (an old friend). He's newly unemployed. He's been a tester for years, and for the last few years has been a developer. He'd like to keep doing development kinds of work, possibly creating automated tests or for a product. But he's resigned himself to being a tester.

I asked him what he wanted to do. "Oh, development. But no one will hire me for that." I asked why. "Because I was a tester for so long".

Your attitude around a potential job will shine through in an interview. If you would not hire yourself for a particular job, no one else will. Part of your job search is to manage your reactions to a potential job as you search. Some ideas about what you can do:

1. Know what you want to do. If you see a job you could do, but it's not what you want, reassess whether you want to investigate this job. If they hired you, would you work there? Sometimes the answer is "yes, because I'm broke." But more often, the answer is "Hmm, that's not really the right job for me."
2. If you're relatively new to a particular role, and you have a ton of experience in another role, make a list of all the reasons why your more junior role is the role for you. Go back to your resume and take a look at your accomplishments.
3. Use those accomplishments to explain your value to other people. Take the time to articulate your story of why you are valuable in your preferred job. My colleague has a bunch of stories to support how his testing expertise makes him an amazing developer, especially in a test-driven environment.

Your attitude about a potential job has a huge effect on an interviewer. What does your attitude say?

You might not be aware of the pattern, "Broken Windows." Well, I think it's a pattern. It's at least a parable. The idea is that if you allow a broken window, pretty soon the neighborhood deteriorates, because other people think it's ok to leave broken windows, litter, graffiti, and more. Soon enough, you have a neighborhood no one wants to live in.

We see the Broken Window pattern at work all the time: builds that stay broken or take too long, defects that remain open, coffee machines where the coffee has boiled away, recycling containers where no one has taken out the recycling.

Broken Windows matter even more on a resume. If you can't somehow help the hiring manager see that you don't tolerate small problems on your resume, the hiring manager thinks you can tolerate them at work.

Make sure someone else reviews your resume. Look for Broken Windows in all of your work. Talk about it in an interview--you'll make points :-)

Don't leave a mess for other people to clean up. They won't.

While there was a time when job seekers could afford to be choosy about the roles they took on, which company they worked for and the hours they worked, unfortunately, there's no doubt recession and large-scale redundancies have had an impact on the IT industry, turning the job-scene very much into a buyer's market. As candidates find themselves competing with many others for fewer roles, flexibility will be a key factor on deciding who gets the job.

Although there are definitely jobs available in the market, especially for those with specialist skills and relevant experience, candidates who are willing to show flexibility in their requirements do give themselves an added advantage. Whether it involves taking on a different role than you're used to, working different hours than usual or considering short term rather than longer term contract work, a willingness to adapt to the changing needs of the market could be the one key skill that propels you to the top of a potential employer's list.

Nor does flexibility necessarily involve making sacrifices; one very positive effect of the new jobs market is that it has removed some of the barriers that have stopped candidates putting themselves forward for certain roles in the past. Perceptions about the kind of roles and responsibilities they could get or take on have often caused candidates to take a cautious approach to job-seeking in the past. Now, however, as employers demonstrably place more value on specific skills (rather than generic 'IT skills') and a willingness to understand the wider business context, candidates are in a position to explore avenues that they may not once have considered, whether that involves applying for a different type of role, considering a change in sector or approaching a different kind of organisation.

As long as they remain realistic and willing to negotiate, there are still many opportunities for IT workers in today's market; while knowledge and skills are always important, a change in mindset can be the key factor that makes the difference between finding or keeping a job and not.

Just about everybody uses Times New Roman. It's the default for Microsoft Word, and although it's perfectly serviceable as a typeface, there are better choices. Perhaps as someone with graphic design and typography training, I'm biased - but steering clear of the default is always a good way to make your CV more distinctive.

I'd stick to serifed typefaces for most purposes - there is a wealth of professional looking, readable faces suitable for using in a CV. Classics such as Garamond or Caslon are good, but delve into your font collection and suit what suits your needs and image best.


Long CVs, along with the closely related CVs-set-in-a-6pt-font, are not the best way to present yourself, even if you do have a massive repertoire of skills. If a CV is too long, you can pretty much guarantee it won't be read - 2 pages is the standard allowance, and works just fine for most people. If you find yourself slipping into smaller font sizes to make it fit, or you are considering going to three pages (or beyond) - you might want to cut out some of the content.

I realize that many people are hunkered down, working hard at their jobs. And, a bunch of people are unemployed, looking for work. But what about all those people who are still employed but are unhappy and want to look for a job? How open can they be?

I'm from the school of "be honest with your boss" while you are looking. Somehow, I always managed to send my resume to people who were friendly with my bosses! And, once you've found a job, give two weeks notice. But if you're too scared to be honest with your boss, try these ideas:

• As you update your social networking sites, say that you're open for any and all contacts: reconnecting, networking to help other people, and interesting options.
• As you tell people that you are looking for a job, also explain you do not want to put your current job in jeopardy.
• Make sure you use reputable recruiters. The disreputable ones will send your resume to everyone they know. The reputable ones focus your search.
• Only send your resume to a company that's honest about who they are. Never send a resume to a cloaked ad.
  

If your boss discovers you are looking, come clean--at least, about your job search, if not the reason behind it.

It's not easy to find a job, but they are out there.

As you can tell, I have portfolios on my mind these days :-) But there's a reason for that. A portfolio is a collection of work that you can assess over time. One way to prepare for an interview is to build your accomplishment portfolio.

It's easy to describe how to build this portfolio: In reverse chronological order (most recent job first), list each accomplishment and the meaning behind that accomplishment. A key piece of recognizing an accomplishment is to ask yourself "so what?" If you can answer that question in a way that has meaning for a hiring manager, you've got a great accomplishment.

Here's an example. If one of my accomplishments is to coach a project manager, I can say "Coach PM, with result that he saw more risks and took more proactive actions. Project came in on time, allowing company to recognize revenue in Q2." It's even better if I can put a specific dollar amount on that accomplishment, so I answer the implicit "so what" question.

So, that sounds pretty easy, right? Well, the difficult part is deciding which accomplishments you want to discuss from each job you've had. For example, if you've been working for 20 years, do you include the accomplishments from 15 years ago? Probably not, unless one of them led to a pattern of similar accomplishments in which your responsibility has grown over time. For the past 10 years? Probably.

The key is to use accomplishments which highlight your ever-increasing areas of responsibility, challenge, and knowledge. Make sure you think about accomplishments which point to work you want to take on more of, not work you don't want to do anymore.

If you've been working for a while and you haven't written down your accomplishments, start with your current or most recent job first, and write those down. Then, start moving backwards in your career. If you can, use the accomplishments as bullet points on your resume. If you think you really have some career-spanning accomplishments, consider a resume cover page (not a cover letter) that highlights your accomplishments over your career.

Whatever you do, remember to update your resume and accomplishments at least once a quarter, if not once a month. Doing this periodically helps you see where your career is going, and if you're headed on the right track for you. If you have a quarter where you haven't accomplished anything, consider whether this job is helping or hurting you, or if you could reorganize or remake part of your job.

Your portfolio is an indication of the kind of person you are and the kind of worker you tend to be. Use that information to help you manage your career.

Maybe you've been laid off. Maybe you just want another job. Yes, there are people hiring--but how do you find them?

Just as hiring managers need a strategy for hiring people, candidates need a strategy for looking for a job. Let's assume you're looking in an area in which you have experience. In that case, think about how you use these approaches:

Make sure you use social networks. You cannot afford to avoid LinkedIn, Facebook, or Twitter. Maybe you have another social network that you prefer. Fine, as long as your potential hiring managers and/or recruiters use that network. Your network might be a specific tool's user group, as long as you don't mind getting a job using that tool.

Expect to customize your resume for each job you apply for. This sounds like a lot of work. "Can't I just customize my cover letter?" Yes, you can, and that may not be enough. You aren't applying for a generic job; why send in a generic resume?

Consider using a couple of recruiters. Yes, the recruiters are having trouble, but they still have positions which require experience, especially a lot of experience.

Make sure you have thought about all of the ways to reach potential hiring managers.

Now, what do you do if you want to change jobs to something you don't have experience in?

Try getting some experience. You can be an unpaid intern (ok, a paid internship is even better, but don't bet on it), work on an open source project, or some other way that allows you to work with people (so you have references), and build your experience.

Expand your network as much as possible. If you want to change jobs in this economy you have to meet more and more and more people. You need to build a reputation as someone who can get things done. Now, do all the things I mentioned above.

It's not impossible to find a new job; it's just difficult. Start now.

With unemployment figures predicted to reach 2.9 million by the end of the year, workers across the UK are under no illusion of the difficulties we all face in the year ahead. As IT professionals, we've already seen a spate of job cuts across the industry with more likely to follow as companies look to curb their spending and reduce overheads. Of course, opinion and impact varies widely from company to company so it's often difficult to gauge the full impact of something which is yet to run its course. That said, the IT industry is facing intense scrutiny at the moment and it's up to you as an IT professional to make yourself heard.

Whether you're just starting your IT career or you're a seasoned professional, the prospect of redundancies and lay-offs is undeniably daunting. The current condition of the IT market is in some ways similar to what's happening on a consumer level. As consumers cut down on "luxury" items, such as IT support and staff at the lower end of the technical spectrum, companies can save some cash. This in itself doesn't always solve the problem, in fact, we've seen instances of companies making cuts and then themselves recruiting for the same positions a relatively short time later.

Of course when it comes to redundancy, it's often out of the employees hands as to who goes and when. If you do feel under the cosh, then having a clear and open conversation with your employer will help matters. Though some companies find that redundancy is the only option, many do have other alternative solutions. Some may seek applications for staff to work flexibly, others may reduce or ban overtime, some may even retrain employees and move them on to different parts of the organisation. All these options are of course down to the discretion of your employer but nonetheless are important for you to be aware of.

Redundancy needn't sound the death knell for your IT career, it can in some cases allow people to assess their career options and take a different path. The picture for IT recruitment is still one of vibrancy, with specialist skills and flexibility still very much in demand. We've seen a number of former permanent IT workers now flourishing in the contract arena. For the right candidate opportunities will always exist, it's just a matter of being positive about your strengths and abilities. When you're suddenly pushed out of work, confidence can be hard to come by, but another role in the industry should not be out of the question, provided you have the determination and drive to find it.

OK, so you are out of work and you are not getting any interviews. How can you improve your chances of getting a new job quickly?

Well like anything in this World you've got to work at it. In fact your new job..is to find a new job! Yes, that's right, you've got to work at it 8 hours a day (at least!). So what does this "job" involve? First things first, give your CV a complete makeover, make sure that you have a really strong profile and set out some of your key achievements and skills clearly. Have a look at my earlier blog on this subject - Writing a Winning CV With your new (and hopefully much improved) CV, you can place this on a job board like www.cwjobs.co.uk. This should generate interest from recruiters. At the same time you should be actively responding to job advertisements on the the job boards. Start pro-actively calling some of the better recruitment agencies and build relationships with several recruitment consultants. Try to identify Consultants who either specialise in your field or frequently advertise jobs in your field. Many Recruitment Consultancies have teams who focus on particular sectors (ie. Legal, Retail, Telco, etc.) while others focus on specific roles. (ie. Business Analysts, Developers and so on) either way it makes sense to work with Consultants who understand what you do and will be actively canvassing employers for your kind of job. Once you identify the right Consultants, offer to go and see them. Even if you meet up for coffee for ten minutes it's worth meeting face-to-face. Recruiters will be impressed by your motivation and will be more likely to think of you when the right job comes up.

What else can you do to improve your chances? Start thinking about the companies you would like to work for. Who were your last employer's competitors? What other companies or organisations operate in the same field? Try sending your CV to these companies on a speculative basis.

Don't forget to network, pull out that little black book (or Blackberry) and get in touch with all your old contacts and make sure that they are all aware that you are available. You might also consider attending industry events. There are a surprising number of free IT Conferences that you can attend which provide excellent opportunities for networking, have a look at http://www.events-on.net/ for the latest conference news and don't forget to take your CV!

Good luck with you new job!

When you look for a job, what do you look for? Some people look for stability or a large/small company or an entrepreneurial approach, or something else. I look for something fun and a lot to learn.

The key is that I'm willing to look for any number of fun things: the product, the language, the OS, whatever. But I have two distinct criteria: I need to have fun. And, I need to be able to learn from other people on the job.

What do I mean by "have fun"? For me, having fun means to stretch my brain and avoid drudgery. I don't mind a repetitive job if I have the opportunity to automate it. But, I don't want to do the same thing day in and day out. I need to learn enough so I don't have the same year of experience over and over again. (See What Was Your Last Year of Experience? What Will This Year's of Experience Be?)

Who can I learn from? I expect to learn about management things from my manager, and I expect to learn about technical things from my colleagues, all over the organization. I once took a job where the previous management had deliberately hired the lowest-cost folk, expecting them to be the least capable. A majority were not very capable. I found it frustrating.

When you have fun and learn from people across the organization, you have an opportunity to get a great job, because you can collect a wide variety of data from others telling your potential employers how good you are. See I have a document like this and so should you.

Do you have criteria for your next job? You don't have to have mine, but I suggest you think about what would make your next job your best.