[SECC] Atlanta Area SECC Members Please Read

[Jeffrey Clarke]

 Hi All....

 As may of you might know (or maybe you don't) my family and I
relocated
to the Atlanta metro area about 3 months ago. What you might not know
is that we moved here without me having a job here.

 I work in the IT (Information Technology) field and have always known
that for the last 10-15 years that Atlanta is a hotbed for these kind
of jobs. I have not had to look for a job for over 20 years so I was
pretty rusty on how to go about it. The hot way (at least they say it
is) for looking for jobs these days is via the internet, using job
boards such as monster.com etc... This is the approach I took when we
were still living in Ohio and preparing to move down here. I didn't
have
much luck and after talking to a former boss, who now works for a
recruiting firm , I came out of that discussion thinking the reason I
wasn't having any luck was that companies/recruiters usually don't
consider you if you live out of town when they have local applicants
they can choose from. With that information in hand I discussed with my
wife what we should do. Since we had some savings in the bank we
decided
to move here anyway and my luck would change since I would now be
local.....


 Unfortunately for me my luck has not changed much. We have been here
for about 3 months and I have only had a few interviews for the
hundreds
of jobs I have applied for via the internet. That really got me to
questioning my skills/abilities until I picked up a book this week -
"What Color Is Your Parachute" by Richard Bolles. It's amazing but he
has described the situation I am in to a tee !!!  It was interesting to
read that the worst possible way to look for a job is via the internet
because of the sheer number of people doing their job search this way.
Whenever a recruiter or company advertises a position they get
overwelmed by resumes..... so they might never see yours even though
you might be fully qualified for a position. In fact, he goes on to say
that only 3% of companies that have hired someone have hired a person
who only used the internet for their job search....


 You might be asking.... Why are you telling me this ???? Well, the
reason is that one of the best ways (as the book describes) to go about
finding a job is to network through friends and family. Since I am not
from this area I really don't have a big network of friends yet. What I
am looking for is some good advice for those of you who might be in the
IT field in the Atlanta area. I know that both W4AN and AA4LR are both
in the IT field and both have offered some tips to me. Many of you I
know through contesting but we haven't met in person yet. Can anyone
else offer any tips, contacts etc ????? Thanks....


                   73's  Jeff KU8E
  

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