Norm Elrod
Jackson Heights, NY
joblessandless[at]gmail[dot]com

January 15, 2010

Conan O’Brien
Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien
100 Universal City Plaza
Building 2220
4th floor
Universal City, CA 91608

Dear Conan:

I’m so sorry to learn of your recent job troubles. Employers can be such a pain sometimes. I know from experience, having been laid off four times in the last decade, most recently in October 2008. They never seem to do things right. And the little guy pays for it.

My purpose in reaching out isn’t to belittle employers; they’re already good at making themselves look bad. I’m writing to offer my advice and support in your upcoming unemployment and job search. I’ve been out of work for over a year, applied to hundreds of jobs and networked my way through much of New York City. I know what I’m doing. It’s a difficult job market out there. Decent-paying positions are few and far between, even for those with education and experience. You’ll need expert help to land on your feet.

The first thing to remember is that the pending layoff isn’t your fault. You showed up bright and early to work every day. You were generally funny or interesting or at least amusing to look at. You shot wax replicas of Tom Cruise and The Fonz out of cannons and let company clients, like Bruno, make inappropriate advances. In short, you did your job. NBC is reneging on its end of the deal. This is nothing new; many of my former employers told me my performance was good and my job secure, right up until my layoff. And then they let me go without severance or, once, my last paycheck. Sometimes a situation just isn’t right, and circumstances are beyond your control. Economies tank; television networks program terrible prime-time shows and yield to unfunny has-been celebrities. It happens. Don’t get down about it. A bad attitude won’t help you move forward.

Staying positive may be the hardest part of unemployment, possibly harder than finding a full-time job. I’ll let you know which is worse when I succeed at one of them. The trick, they say, is to start the day strong. Set the alarm for a reasonable hour. I’m guessing your typical day starts around noon. Stick to that. Don’t sleep in, and don’t lay in bed staring at the ceiling wondering if you’ll ever find work again. Get up and get going.

Tackling the day head on will boost your spirits and prepare you to be productive. Keep the same early afternoon ritual… shower, coffee, hair sculpting, Chinese massage, whatever it may be. Those flannel pajamas with pink bunnies and a hole in the crotch may be comfortable, but they’re for lounging around the house. No one in the real world wants to see you in those. Dress for success. You had a dream job, and you will again.

You’ll be commuting down the hall rather than to the studio. Getting a job is your full-time job now. So set aside a little space as an office. This may be hard when sharing a home with a wife and two young kids; I’ve taken over half of the dining room table. But a place to concentrate and work is essential for job search success. Those unemployment checks will stop coming before you know it.

I spent my first few days of unemployment reaching out to contacts. Given the public nature of your employment issues, let’s assume everyone knows you’re in the market. The next step is to sign up for a few of the major job boards… CareerBuilder, HotJobs, Monster. Enter in your resume and click through the pages. See what’s out there for a comedian with network and freelance experience and a degree from Harvard. Then set up some job alerts to ping you with appropriate leads.

A quick search for “talk show host” openings in the Los Angeles area yielded 15 results. There seems to be work as a movie extra. What a coincidence…  I get same sort of listings when looking for marketing jobs. You’re a little gangly and have beady eyes, and competition is fierce for these positions. Given your experience, they might also be a small step back. Sometimes sacrifice is needed to get ahead. But don’t settle just yet. There’s also an opening for a bi-lingual tax preparer and director of catering sales. Both are worth a look, as a part-time change of pace to bring in a little money during the job search. Experts say to allow a month for every $10,000 of annual income you expect to earn. So your unemployment may last for many, many years.

A job search shouldn’t fill every waking hour. You’ll go crazy looking for something that doesn’t seem to want to be found. Find a hobby, a distraction to fill up the days. I started a blog called Jobless and Less about my experiences with unemployment. The idea was to be productive and learn new skills, which I have. You could take to breeding pigeons or scaring children or something. Lots of volunteer organizations need help too. And that’s a good way to network. Regardless, stay active and get out of the house each day. There’s more to life than work, or finding work.

I know this is a lot to digest, particularly while going through a drawn-out layoff. Reading about it day in and day out, combined with news of the nation’s ongoing employment crisis and my own problems, is pretty discouraging.

You’ve given me a lot over the years. So let me extend my offer one step further. Come hang out at my apartment in NYC, and I’ll mentor you in the ways of unemployment. The job market has changed a lot since you were last unemployed many years ago. With the Internet as the main job search tool, the potential for rejection and disappointment has increased exponentially. Let me help you ease into unemployment and what will likely be a prolonged job search.

New York hasn’t changed much since you left, though my neighborhood of Jackson Heights is pretty far from Rockefeller Center, culturally speaking. There’s plenty of room at my dining room table for another laptop. We can comb the job boards together, proof each other’s resumes and lunch at Subway on $5 footlongs (have to watch the pennies now). We can lift weights and play video games to take out our frustrations. And if the wife kicks you out because you can’t provide for her and the kids anymore, you can crash on my couch. Though consumed with worry, you might have trouble sleeping. Carson Daly can help with that.

So that’s my offer: unemployment advice and tutelage. Think it over and contact me at joblessandless[at]gmail[dot]com if you’re interested. In the meantime, I’ll keep my eyes pealed for openings that match your skill set. I hope the layoff goes smoothly and they send you off with a nice severance package and cover your COBRA. And keep your sense of humor; they can’t take that. Good luck.

Norm Elrod

How I schedule my day. (courtesy of http://www.yourfunnystuff.com)

I spend a lot of time online these days, between reading email and cruising the Internet in search of gainful employment. And I’ve arrived at one immutable and irrefutable conclusion… lists suck. Feel free to disagree. Feel free to argue. Feel free to accuse me of crimes against the Internet for dressing down the vaunted list – king of the blog post and online article – in the public square. But know deep down in your heart that I’m still right and you’re still wrong. [Note: For the record, I'm rubber and you're glue too.]

I can’t open an email message or click a link without coming across a list disguised as an article. How to write a blog post… how to find a job… how to write a resume… 10 best ways to do just about anything. These lists are everywhere in my world, and most of them are bad retreads of bad retreads. Some ex-hippie with a ponytail turned corporate guru with a ponytail discovered (or decided) that information is more digestible in list form. He wrote an article. Someone cited that article. David Letterman adopted the theory for comedy. And before your friendly neighborhood unemployed blogger could come to the rescue, the world was overrun with lists of all shapes and sizes. The list has become the scourge of the online written word. But breathe easy, I’m here to take a golf club to its back window.

Allow me to present the top 5 reasons I hate lists, in an easily digestible format but no particular order…

1. Lists are lazy. The Internet is awash in re-purposed content. Everyone wants a blog or website and the untold riches that accompany it. Just look at me… I haven’t worked a single day in the last year. No one wants to create the content for that blog or website. It takes time and effort to write, and most of that time and effort goes unpaid. So they steal, borrow or quote extensively from other sources. Or they make a list from the stolen, borrowed and quoted and pass it off as original material.
2. Lists cover up bad writing. Write the whole damn paragraph, not just the topic sentence. This shouldn’t be a problem, if the author has thought through his ideas and has a decent grasp of the English language. Some complete sentences would be nice too. As would a few transitions, to take the reader from one idea to the next.
3. Lists don’t convey enough information to be useful. A bulleted list of topic sentences for would-be paragraphs is fine for a PowerPoint presentation. The speaker adds in the relevant details, while directing attention with a red laser pointer that always makes me think there’s a sniper in the crowd. But this approach doesn’t work so well online. Lists give the reader the what, without the who, where, why and how. Links may lead to additional information on other pages of the site. “Click here for more information,” the screen beckons. But why isn’t that information found on the original page? Answer: to increase website traffic and click-through rates.
4. Lists tell me things I already know. This is more a function of the lists I’m reading than lists in general. Only so much can be said about how to network, write a resume or become a better job candidate. Yet people keep saying it, over and over and over and over. Job search methods just aren’t changing that fast. So either come up with something new and interesting or stop pinging me with the same old advice. I already know to spell-check my resume.
5. Lists are boring. No one reads lists for fun. We read fleshed-out paragraphs strung together into some sort of narrative. People read lists for information on how to do something or how to do something better. And sometimes we get that information and smile because we’re happy. We may even accidentally enjoy reading the list. But potential enjoyment isn’t what got us there and will soon be taking us away to ESPN or The Onion.
6. Lists create anxiety. Lists remind me of all the things I have left to do rather than all the things I’ve done. One task – find a job – has locked down pole position for over a year. And my list keeps growing, even as I check things off. I feel further behind every day.
7. Lists remind me of the grocery store. Don’t get me wrong, I like the grocery store; there’s lots of yummy food there. But many of my trips to the grocery store involve lists of vegetables and spices needed for a recipe. And I can never remember what’s what. It’s all green and leafy and looks kind of the same to me. If only they packaged veggies like cereal… I could identify the kale or arugula from a goofy cartoon martian on the packaging. Sometimes I figure it out on my own, and sometimes I don’t. But the uncertainty provides undue stress.
8. Lists speed up life unnecessarily. No one has time to read anymore, not even us unemployed. So people scan emails and articles on PDAs while walking down busy city streets, running into people and glaring at them because that person didn’t get out of the way. Lists facilitate and perpetuate this behavior. Lists make it easy to “read” what should be saved for later, back at the office, where I’m not walking.

Who's up for some lunch? (courtesy of http://blogs.sun.com)

Something was missing in my life. My days felt a little darker, my nights a little lonelier. There was an emptiness in my stomach, in my soul, in my bank account, that no amount of cookies or Maury reruns could fill. I perused the job boards looking for solace, but none was to be found. Charles Williams, Senior Vice President of Delany, Byczinski & Potamkin – my trusted spammer friend and business associate who promised to deliver me from unemployment – was gone. And I was all alone.

Our last correspondence gave me so much hope. He promised to find me the job of my dreams, and I believed him. Why wouldn’t I?  He’d picked me – and me alone – to contact, out of all the job candidates in the world. And he had access to situations at my income level and in my geographic area. This was more of a sure thing than the lottery, or the Redskins winning another Super Bowl in my lifetime. All he needed to get started was my bank account number, my pin and my mother’s maiden name. My social security number would help too, though Chuck (we were good friends by this point) considered that more of a nice-to-have than a requirement. I gave everything willingly, knowing that my personal information is a small, though necessary, price to pay for employment happiness. Online solicitors are the most trustworthy of businessmen. And such requirements are not unusual in the job search process. This is how reputable employment agencies find work for shrewd job seekers like me.

But soon my bank balance was down to $1.37, from the princely sum of $12.82 I’d worked so hard to save. And Chuck wouldn’t return my calls. Oh, how I tried to reach him, day and night. But only the computer ever answered the phone. The curt and monotone “leave a message” assured me that Chuck and Company were on the case. He’d just just stepped out, again, for the 87th time, moments before my call. But he would soon return from the 24-hour, all-you-can-eat buffet or the Circle K or the peepshows or the Cayman Islands. And then, satiated and relaxed, having spent my $11.45, he would surely return my call. But he never did.

Sometimes, when I was alone, on CareerBuilder with my thoughts, I dreamed about just how close I’d come to working again. I would replay our relationship in my head and wonder where I went wrong. Sometimes I even played the name game in hopes that the cosmos might grant me another chance…

Chuck, Chuck, bo-buck,

Banana-fana fo-f***

Fee-fi-mo-uck

Chuck!

And then it happened. Chuck contacted me again; maybe he heard my lonely song. His recent email reads as though we have no history, as if we’re only meeting now – online – for the first time. In fact, it has the same wording as before. How could Chuck not remember me after all we’ve been through? I’m hurt. But I’m not going to dwell on the past. I’m back in the game. Gainful employment… here I come!

Here’s the letter, in the hope that my unemployed brothers and sisters can benefit as much as I will…

Are you still in the market?

[For what, Chuck? Are we back to square one? I thought you knew me better than that.]

We felt your resume indicated that we may have immediate openings at DBP that could be right for you. However, if you are interested, we need some added information.

[Interesting that my resume indicated some openings at DBP. I didn’t know it had that kind of power. Can my resume maybe indicate up a free pizza, or maybe a burrito? How about an unlimited subway fare card to get me to and from all those interviews I’m not getting?]

Delaney enjoys a growing reputation as a fast growing recruiting service. Our clients include small and large employers, growth companies, and Fortune 1,000 corporations. We deal only in professional and executive openings and there are no fees.

[I see you haven’t yet settled on a spelling for the company name. Is it Delaney or Delany? Best to keep it up in the air, keep everyone guessing. The mystery builds credibility.]

To register with us, as well as to review current situations at your income level and in your geographic area, please do the following.

[Well, my income level is currently $0. So I'd really rather not review other current situations at that level. Unemployed is bad enough. I don’t really want to be dead or incarcerated. Feel free to suggest other, better situations if you know of any.]

Click on http://jobs15.dbpexecusearch.com

[But, Chuck, this is a different web address from before. And the link doesn’t work. Is there something you’re not telling me, Chuck? Does it have to do with the money “borrowed” from my account?]

The “Post Resume” button will take you to the profile information that we need.

Regards,

Charles Williams
Senior Vice President
Delany, Byczinski & Potamkin

My spam is better than your spam

We welcome you to the land of the shadow people. (courtesy of http://www.brandeis.edu)

Job sites annoy me. It admittedly doesn’t take much, given my current unemployed state. I’ve yet to encounter one that provides the ideal job search experience, if something so oxymoronic even exists. Every job site, from the all-encompassing (Monster, HotJobs), to the industry-specific (American Marketing Association, Media Bistro), to the company-specific (Joe’s Burritos and Plumbing Supplies International, Inc., Fred’s Pornographic Balloon Animals, LLC), has problems. Some are barely speed bumps on the endless road to not getting a job, and some are more like cement dividers piled high and connected to multiple nuclear devices that detonate and wipe out an entire city when breached. In other words, they’re impassable, at least until Jerry Bruckheimer makes a movie about finding work in a jobless post-recession recovery. Given that a job site’s purpose is to display job openings and attract users – essentially market the company to applicants who may become employees or customers – the problems are all inexcusable. Here is but a sampling, presented in my own top-secret order that I will carry with me to the grave, watery or otherwise.

Sites display an alphabetical list of all the countries in the world, from which the applicant chooses his home country. The US is near the bottom, though it likely provides most of the applicants, at least for domestic jobs. Afghanistan is at the top, though it’s citizens likely have more pressing issues, such as staying alive. Really, is it so hard to list the US first? It would save 99.98% of the 10,000 applicants vying for that one assistant coffee getter opening five precious seconds. That’s time that could be spent perfecting the art of tearing open multiple sugar packets at once. This minor oversight shows a lack of forethought and care, which will manifest itself in more significant ways elsewhere.

Sites often require way more detail than necessary. The exact dates I was in school or previously employed, down to the day, can’t possibly matter. That I graduated college on May 5, 1994 won’t be of any use until I’m famous and the subject of a question in Trivial Pursuit: The 21st Century Underachiever Edition. Maybe I can also find out the weather for that Spring day in Lancaster, PA, when my career began, or the addresses of the barns that the Amish raised before working in the fields and churning butter. There’s plenty of useless facts out there. Exact dates don’t add anything to the conversation. (Norm: “Can I have a job?” Company: “No.”) Wouldn’t “May, 1994″ suffice, or even just “1994?”

Sites often require a home phone number as part of my contact info. I have a cell phone, but no home phone, like 20% of the population. It’s easy enough to simply fill in the field with my cell number. That mythological call would get to me either way… no harm, no foul. But stay with me on this one. I apply to many media and marketing companies and departments. They market to users via many channels, including wireless. It seems like they should understand enough about their business to recognize this disconnect and do something about it. After all, the lines of communication between corporate departments are always wide open. More likely with small problems like this is that they just don’t care.

Job sites sometimes don’t work on Firefox, my web browser of choice. The last time I checked, Firefox had a 25% usage share; one quarter of the people online are using it. Is any company so amazingly fantastically stupendously awesome that it can afford to risk missing 25% of the potential applicants for a job? Those missed users may even be a tad more Internet savvy than the average job seeker, given that the Firefox is open source and not standard on new computers. This shortcoming speaks volumes about a company, and none of it’s good.

Job sites often bombard me with useless information, before, during or after my resume submission. One site routinely serves me with a “get your degree online” ad before letting me apply for a job or even see the description. This marketing message might show better results if linked to certain types of jobs. It’s called targeting. They probably teach it at the schools being marketed. Online education is a valuable service, and some people will want more information. But serving this ad repeatedly, to everybody, does more to drive users from the site than it does to endear them to a service. I personally have stopped using the offending site.

More infuriating still are the sites that sell off my information to spammers, who then bombard me with travel deals and Viagra ads. The spam arrives in my otherwise pristine inbox within minutes of uploading a resume. It can’t be a coincidence. Or maybe the site just knows that I always crave a trip to The Bahamas or a four-hour erection ending in blindness and heart attack right after combing the Internet for jobs. Can’t these sites just pretend that they have my best interests in mind, even though they don’t? There are plenty of ways to make a buck without selling my personal information.

And the grand poobah of all job site annoyances… THEY DON’T WORK! Job sites aren’t my only means of attack, but I use them probably more than necessary. And the results are, at best, pretty damn sucky. They’re overrun with garbage, hucksters and, sadly, deserving candidates like me who just want to work. But there’s always the outside chance that my resume, submitted online, will find its way back to me in the form of a job. I’m not counting on it. But at this point in my unemployment, I can’t afford to not try.

[Ben continues to fight the good fight, looking for work wherever he might find it. He fell a little short of the promised land in his last post. This time, well, he's even further away and feeling a little desperate.]

Ben Breier, 23, was a reporter and web producer for the New York Observer’s Politicker.com, a political news network that suffered massive cutbacks last December. Prior to working in New York City, Ben covered climate change and energy-related issues at the federal policy level for Inside Washington Publishers, a trade publication network in Washington, DC. A graduate of Kent State University’s journalism program in 2007, Ben lives in Greenpoint, Brooklyn.

Ben can be reached at ben.breier[at]gmail[dot]com. His resume can be found here.

I caused quite a stir on a popular New York City technology discussion group a little while back. The site describes itself as… “a fun way to connect both socially and professionally with up and comers who have a stake in future of tech and new media in New York City.” They tend to focus on Web 2.0/3.0 and related topics. I’ve been lurking there lately (rather than actively contributing), mostly because I lack the technical knowledge to comment on MySQL, intuitive query builders and other sexy and exciting topics. But I recently weighed in with a couple of questions…

• How does someone make the transition from the media world to Web 2.0 without an expert knowledge of programming languages?
• What kinds of jobs exist in the industry for people with my mixed online and journalism background?

My questions proved polarizing. One group member lashed out, calling me desperate. Another defended my actions, asking what was wrong with desperation in this tough economic climate. The responses were definitely more positive than negative, and I learned a lot by simply posing the questions.

Desperation isn’t a terrible thing, especially when coupled with the desire to work hard and learn new things. But an overwhelming desire to be employed can definitely play tricks on your mind. I recently applied for an administrative assistant job I found through Indeed – the Google of job sites. For the record, Indeed is a key resource in my job hunt. I simply key in my salary range and location, and the site spits out thousands of appropriate job openings. If you’re unemployed, do yourself a huge favor and try it out.

In this instance, Indeed linked me to a shady-looking, spam-infested site with design aesthetics left over from 1999. I forwarded my resume; a job’s a job to me. Ten seconds after clicking the submit button, I got a call from a telemarketing service that wanted to know if I was interested in pursuing higher education.

In this economy, people are looking to take advantage of everybody – and unfortunately, that includes the unemployed. Desperation, or at least the perception of desperation, makes you an easy target. Norm discussed some of his experiences on Jobless and Less a few months back. Unemployed people need to be active in looking for work. But we also need to be vigilant in protecting ourselves. If a job application asks for information more personal than an email address, such as a phone number, think before providing it. Does the company seem reputable? Will your information end up in the hands of spammers? The quality of their site will often reveal the answer.

Desperation is like hot sauce – a little bit can go a long way. But too much will set your pallet on fire, and send you scrambling for the nearest thing to put out the blaze. Sometimes all you’ll find is a crap sandwich.

Does this make anyone else think of McDonalds? (courtesy of www.highlands-ortho.com)

Looking for a job is sort of an all-or-nothing deal. Either you find one, or you don’t. I haven’t, for seven months. There’s some comfort to be had in knowing that the job market stinks. Companies continue to layoff employees, and those hiring receive millions of resumes, even for that freelance position scraping burnt gunk off of boiler room walls with a screwdriver. Knowing may be half the battle, but it doesn’t pay the bills. There’s also some satisfaction in getting the occasional callback or interview. Validation that I’m doing something right does give me the warm fuzzies. But it too doesn’t pay the bills.

Job boards are a giant waste of time (though I did find my last job through one). At best they give a decent sense of the current job market and skills needed for a particular type of job. At worst, they help companies gather our personal information and sell it off to marketers who then spam the crap out of us. And where would I be without those more-than-obvious, less-than-useful job search tip emails? Step #1… figure out the type of job you want; step #2… apply for those jobs. I only ever respond to listings for which I’m qualified. My resume is optimized for keywords that appear in these listings. My cover letter describes why I’m the ideal candidate for the job. In my oh so humble opinion, my inquiries kick some major ass. They’re practically lethal. If you come across one in a dark alley, keep your hands in plain sight and back away slowly. And call me as soon as you can, as we will have just discovered where they all go when I hit the send button.

Still I try and try and try, or at least I did. The countless hours slaving over my (and wifey’s) laptop have given me an on again/off again case of carpal tunnel syndrome, or as I call it, “Ouch, My F**king Hand, err, Syndrome” (OMFHeS). The pain is mostly along the back of my right hand and up into the knuckles. It also sneaks around the side beneath the pinkie and up along it on bad days. OMFHeS is brought on by repetitive motion – like scrolling with the mouse track pad through endless, useless job listings and clicking on possibly interesting listings that never turn out to be. Typing doesn’t help. Using a mouse is better, but my hand still aches. The pain disappears when I’m off the computer, but it’s never far from the surface.

A few months ago, I switched up my approach to the job search. Whereas I once devoted serious time to trolling the online listings, now I barely skim the automated searches that appear to my inbox. Sorry, CareerBuilder, none of those 17 Avon positions served up in my last email actually applied, but thanks anyway. My job search is all about networking lately. Starbucks’ second quarter numbers will probably show a spike; I’m keeping half of their NYC locations in business with my informational meetings. I have the third-degree burns on my tongue and the pictures taken of me from a neighboring Starbucks to prove it.

Lucky for me employed types are willing to chat these days. Maybe they want good job search karma, should they get bounced. Maybe they like free coffee, though many don’t even let me pay. Maybe they’re attracted to my winning resume and charming personality like metal to a magnet. Alright, so it’s probably the coffee and karma. But people have been really generous with their time. I’m getting way more informational meetings than I thought I would, and learning a ton of stuff. And I’m meeting many friendly and interesting individuals. Who knew it was just a matter of asking?

There’s one serious drawback. You guessed it… OMFHeS. Shaking hands is really painful, yet unavoidable when networking. It’s how one greets another when they meet. “Hello, my name is…” [shake, shake] “I’m a marketing professional with blah, blah, blah.” In a networking environment, refusing to shake someone’s hand is akin to kicking them in the shin and cursing their mother.  It’s just not the best way to start things off. Explaining that I have OMFHeS makes me look like a weirdo. And no one likes talking to a weirdo, except when drunk in Penn Station at 3:00 a.m., waiting for the train back to Long Island. They definitely don’t want to hire a weirdo and be forced to talk with them everyday, sober, for the foreseeable future.

OMFHeS is bearable in one-on-one meetings. There’s one handshake as a greeting and another as a farewell, with 30 minutes to an hour of interesting conversation in between. Networking events – already painful for other reasons – are the worst. The two requisite handshakes are only separated by a couple minutes of conversation. And everyone there is trying to seem strong and confident (read employable), so they squeeze and shake harder. It’s all about eye contact and a firm grip. After a little while, I have to consciously try not to grimace. As mentioned before, no one wants to work with a weirdo, or for that matter, a wuss.

I’m not a wuss. Let me repeat that, for anyone who nodded off around the 800-word mark and is rejoining us now. I’m not a wuss. These, of course, are the words uttered by someone who is a wuss when faced with their wussiness. But I’m not. I played tackle football. I’ve been beaned with an 80 mph fastball. I can do a lot of pushups and crunches. But OMFHeS really hurts sometimes. And it tends to zap my confidence at the moments I need it most – first impressions. Thanks for the additional obstacle in the job search, unemployment. Next time just send the polar bear, or maybe the black smoke, out of the jungle to get me.

I wrote the following post for The Wall Street Journal blog “Laid Off And Looking” a little while back…

Getting Help After Multiple Layoffs

The piece discussed the Obama administration’s policy in Iraq and Afghanistan and the political and social repercussions in a nation fighting many battles at home and abroad. Or maybe it explored ways to avoid a collective “f**k off” from one’s network after repeated requests for job search help. I’m pretty sure it was the latter. But I’m positive the piece went over BIG! A month – and 17 magazine covers, twelve books, five feature-length films, three albums of show tune covers, two Jerry Springer appearances in drag and one line of unemployment-themed dolls carrying my likeness – later, and not much has changed. I’m huge in Sweden (not ABBA or Europe huge, but close), and still unemployed here. The good times continue to roll.

My post did resonate with some, which makes me all warm and fuzzy. (Self-medicating with my own special Crunk Juice – mouthwash and Mountain Dew – helps too.) And just yesterday the Inside Office Online blog – part of the Microsoft Developer Network – revived my teachings. Follow along, my children…

The care and feeding of your (jobs) network

Giving back to one’s network – helping those who help you – is as important now as it was last month. Times are still hard. Inside Office Online has partnered with career site Monster.com to help job seekers find work. The Office Online Career Center‘s “4 steps to find the right job” are…

1. Plan a job search strategy
2. Search for the right jobs
3. Build a great resume
4. Post your resume on Monster.com

I guess my plan could use a little fine-tuning…

1. Apply to every opening possible because working beats eating canned dog food
2. Consider every job that pays money for services rendered – even those that require late hours under the elevated subway – the right job
3. Write “PAY ME TO WORK, I DO STUFF GOOD” in crayon on used cocktail napkins
4. Tape my “resume” to telephone polls and stop signs near tall buildings

I joke because I love. But if finding work were as easy as they suggest, we’d all be happily employed and the recession but a distant memory. It’s not, and we’re not. And, um, it’s not. A productive job search requires a fair bit more subtlety, not to mention skill and luck. Their list is completely obvious, unhelpful and self-serving. But believe it or not the site does provide some valuable resources behind the marketing speak.

Included is a varied collection of resume templates, broken down by profession and career phase. There are more than I can shake a stick it, and I’m one talented stick shaker. The site also offers a job search log template in Excel. I couldn’t download it because my computer is Justin Long and not John Hodgman. But Excel is my preferred method of tracking resume submissions, and it works very well.

There’s also a ton of valuable content. An article on resume keywords jumped out at me; fortunately, I was able to fend it off with my superior linguistic (and stick) skills. Filling one’s resume with the keywords that hiring managers use to describe a position betters one’s chances of being considered for that position. This is sound advice. Another article talks about highlighting transferable skills when changing careers. Many of us are exploring multiple fields in a tough job market, and could use this advice.

Let’s not forget the job listings. Monster has a ton of them, which may or may not be helpful. In theory, all the tools found on the site will help turn one of them into a job. In practice, that may be true in some small way. Who knows? It can’t hurt to look around and fire off a few resumes. At the very least, job listings provide a sense of the job market’s current state. And maybe you’ll stumble upon the perfect position for that special someone in your network… a little gift to show you care.

I’ve received lots of help from lots of people throughout my job search. And I am grateful. Without your support, I’d be unemployed AND feel ignored. Somewhere along the line I would’ve taken to drink to soothe my fragile ego. Alcohol – being the gateway to depravity and debauchery my teachers always claimed it to be – would’ve led to marijuana, all-night parties and tattoos memorializing my dead homies. Marijuana to crack. And crack to death, in a dark alley, while clutching my crumpled resume, wearing adult diapers and mumbling something about dental plans and company matches.

As it stands I just need to cut way back on the caffeine and random websites. My mental filter could probably use a recalibration too. (Did I really just write that last paragraph?) My point is… thanks for the suggestions, leads and kind words. They do help.

In the interest of paying forward, to follow is info about upcoming career events in NYC. Some of our esteemed public institutions are getting behind us unemployed types. Maybe the NY state government could take a cue and boost those unemployment payments a little. They’re among the lowest in the Northeast, though cost of living is among the highest in the country. But I digress.

The Vanderbilt YMCA is holding multiple career events in the coming weeks. Presenter John Crant is the president of Provident Resource , a managerial and professional-level search firm. He is also the author of Self Recruiter: Changing the Rules – a book about how to be your own recruiter and ride the economic crisis to your next career challenge.

Here are the sessions…

Organizing & Managing Your Job Search

Times: Friday, April 24, 10 a.m.; Tuesday, May 19, 6 p.m.

Place: Vanderbilt YMCA (224 East 47th Street in Manhattan)

Cost: FREE, pre-registration required.

Description: In this class, you’ll learn how to plan, set goals, and manage your job search. Class includes Workbook & Forms needed to plan your Job Search activities; how to set your personal goals for those activities; and forms to manage the Job Search process as you move toward your next career opportunity.

Highlights:

• Job Search Activity Goals & Tracking
• Networking Strategy
• Resumes Sent, Tracking & Follow Up
• Calling a Hiring Manager, and Strategy
• 30-Second Calling ‘Script’ Preparation before Calling
• Tracking Your Interview Goals
• Weekly Review of Your Goals

Resume Renovation

Times: Wednesday, April 29, 6 p.m.; Tuesday, May 12, 10 a.m.

Place: Vanderbilt YMCA (224 East 47th Street in Manhattan)

Cost: FREE, pre-registration required.

Description: In this class, you’ll learn how to increase the value of the items on your resume, and how to make the cuts necessary, to be seen as a stand-out during your job search. Class includes Workbook & Forms needed to complete your Resume Renovation, as you move toward your next career opportunity.

Highlights:

• Resume: ‘New’ Definition
• Resume Goals
• Understanding ‘Stacks of Incoming Resumes’
• ‘3-Second’ Test
• One Page Resume, Unless It’s Two
• Value, Value Everywhere, but Nowhere to be Seen – Accomplishments Worksheet / Focus on Your Brand
• Degrees of Degrees
• The Headless Horseman: Don’t Send a Word Doc

YMCA members and non-members are welcome. But space is limited and pre-registration required.

To register, email your class request (including class title, date and time) to Paul Crawford, YMCA Special Events Coordinator at pcrawford[at]ymcanyc[dot]org.

Get loaded and maybe get lucky!

There might be one or two of you out there who are unemployed. I can’t imagine what the problem is given all the jobs I see and hear about. Why just this morning three recruiters accosted me in the subway station with promises of everlasting joy if I signed up with them. Alright, so technically they wanted me to join Jehovah’s Witnesses. And maybe the pay is a little low. But the medical and dental is top notch, and the life insurance is out of this world.

A more earthly opportunity is coming up next week for the unemployed in New York City. The industrious gang over at The 405 Club is hosting the PROJECT 405 PARTY: Race to Place Challenge. It will be a casual gathering with recruiters, advisers, counselors and fellow unemployed New Yorkers. I will definitely be there, as this morning’s opportunity fell through when I requested a face-to-face meeting with the big boss. It’s always something.

Please RSVP. And if you see me there, be sure to say hello. I’ll be the guy who looks unemployed.

Because my resume is posted everywhere, job sites, recruiters and job search companies spam the crap out of me. Some emails are intended to be helpful – 10 tips to improve your resume, 8 ways to turbo-charge your job search, 6 reasons not to drink whatever you find under the sink and end the misery. Some offer jobs that don’t remotely suit or interest me; at least once a week I’m recruited to be a nurse. The real point of course is to get me or keep me visiting their site.

Some of the stuff I receive is extra brilliant, in a so bad it’s good kind of way. Whoever sent it clearly has no clue who I am or what I’m looking for. And they don’t care. They want my personal info and eventually my money. What a wonderful world we live in where people try to scam the unemployed. As soon as I get the money that Nigerian government official promised me, I can forget about this job search nonsense.

Today’s winning spam comes from Charles Williams, Senior Vice President for DBP Execusearch. I wouldn’t reveal names if he were a real person at a real company. But since it’s so obviously a scam, all bets are off. Take it away, Chuck…

Are you still in the market?

[For what… a parakeet, some slammin’ rims for my new Hummer, a cookie? Then that would be a definite maybe. Please tempt me some more, Chuck. Show me the way.]

We felt your resume indicated that we may have immediate openings at DBP that could be right for you. However, if you are interested, we need some added information.

[Are you sure you want to commit to “resume” and “indicated” there, Chuck? There's room to be even more vague. “Resume”  could be “resume/CV/online application/graffiti on truck stop bathroom wall.” That would work better. I still get a whiff of meaning from the first version. Or the cat just took a dump in the litter box. Who can really tell?]

Delany enjoys a growing reputation as a fast growing recruiting service. our clients include small and large employers, growth companies, and Fortune 1,000 corporations. We deal only in professional and executive openings and there are no fees.

[That’s a whole lot of growing to be enjoying in a down economy, Chuck. Must mean you really know what you’re doing, or Bernie Madoff is running things. Either way, good luck with that.]

To register with us, as well as to review current situations at your income level and in your geographic area, please do the following:

[“Situations,” well that sounds pretty fancy, Chuck. But I'd expect nothing less from DBP aka DBP Execusearch aka Delany aka Delaney, Byczinski and Potamkin aka Management Jobs. Here’s my credit card number. Sign me up!]

Click on http://www.managementjobs.com/site.data/3

[Glad to see you splurged for the best graphic designers in the biz to create and scan in your blurry collateral. And making the whole page a giant link... pure marketing genius, Chuck. Who wants to have to aim? I'd only suggest that next time you spring for a new tie for homeslice with the mustache. Just a thought.]

The “register now” button will take you to the profile information that we need.

Regards,

Charles Williams, Senior Vice President

Unemployed man’s best spammer friend returns