Career Builder

 

Myths that people believe about looking for a job are many and persistent. The most common ones are these:  

Myth #1: A résumé should be only one page.

Absolutely not! The normal length of a résumé is two to three pages (at most). It is fine to have addendum pages such as a list of references or published articles. A one-page résumé is only appropriate for a recent college grad. 

Myth #2: If you go on an interview through a contingency or search firm, you cannot speak directly to the person who interviewed you after the interview.

The person who interviewed you is either a decision-maker or an influencer in the hiring process. Ask him during the interview if he minds if you contac....

 

Do all the employees at your dream company have an MBA? What is a typical day like in a big-city newsroom? What types of questions might someone be asked when interviewing for a position in the health-care industry? 

If you've got questions about a career, an informational interview might be your ticket to answers. 

"An informational interview can help you better understand a career, industry, company, organization or specific position you are potentially interested in by finding out what really goes on behind the scenes versus what you've heard or what you imagine," says Debra Condren, author of "Ambition Is Not a Dirty Word," a career guide for women. "Having a more accurate picture will help you decide i....

 

Headline after headline about corporate downsizing and businesses folding can leave you wondering: Is anybody out there actually finding a job? 

Yes (though oftentimes not very quickly). Here are three real-life success stories of people who persevered through prolonged unemployment before landing a new position. 

Volunteer work leads to paid position
"During unemployment, I became extremely hard on myself, questioning what was wrong with me as a job candidate that would cause my searching to be so fruitless," says Margaret White of New York City, who encountered a not-very-welcoming job market after leaving school in 2008. "I also felt enormously guilty that I was a burden on ....

 

Gaining a great deal of support from career industry professionals, recruiters and human resource specialists worldwide, Twitter is revolutionizing how people hunt for jobs in today's economy.

How? Susan Britton Whitcomb, co-author of "The Twitter Job Search Guide," explains: "In the past, you had to go through a maze of gatekeepers to get to the cloistered person in charge of hiring decisions. Now you can have access to them with the click of a Follow button. The ability to level the playing field -- placing you nearly peer-to-peer with influencers, leaders and hiring authorities -- is extremely powerful."

And that's not all. "Using Twitter you can find insight, encouragement, connections, job leads and co....

 

As the economy continues to recover and we see more encouraging news regarding employment -- inevitably, people start thinking about finding new work. According to findings from the 2009 Kelly Global Work force Index, 40 percent of employees across the United States intend to look for another job within the next year, including as many as 62 percent of workers from Generation X (ages 30-47).

Their reasons for moving on vary -- ranging from personal preference, to better personal reward or compensation, or simply because new opportunities came available. What motivates you most when you're ready to find a new job? Rank these in order of importance:

a) Personal preference for one working envi....

 

All the stars are aligning. You've been offered a great opportunity, maybe even your dream job: the company you've admired, top-notch staff, terrific benefits, ideal location.  You've aced the interview, and you know you'd be a perfect fit.  What more could you ask for?

Maybe that's the wrong question.  Maybe you should be asking, what less would you be willing to take?

A 2009 CNN Money report says, "With more than three job seekers for every opening, more workers are having to take significant pay cuts to find employment."

Many are out of work through no fault of their own and can't afford to wait for the dream job to open.  Others discover the jobs....

 

Age discrimination. Ask any baby boomer who's been job hunting for several months and they'll likely tell you a personal horror story. Although the practice is illegal, many over-40 job hunters report that an employer was excited about them as a candidate until they met in person, and then once employer saw they were older, the employers seemed to immediately change their minds leaving the older candidate with the sneaking suspicion that their age had everything to do with not getting hired.

Can age discrimination be hampering your job search?  According to the survey results of hiring managers (conducted and published in my new book "Over 40 & You're Hired")....

 

The economy's current state might be better than it was in the tail end of 2008, but it definitely has room for improvement. The unemployment rate cracked 10 percent and companies continue to cut jobs. People want to find jobs now, and understandably so.

The march toward recovery is frustratingly slow, however, which means job seekers who are looking for work today also need to keep an eye on the future. Industries that aren't thriving today will bounce back and grow in the coming years. Therefore, you can job hunt now and still work toward your long-term career goals.

Where the jobs are now
In his new book, "Where the Jobs Are Now," Joe Watson looks at the industries that are hiring right now....

 

Imagine someone walking up to you at the top of every hour and handing you a $20 bill. You'd be earning approximately the same amount of money that the average American does.  According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the national mean for hourly wages is $20.44.

That said, wouldn't it be nice to earn more than the average? Not that a $20.44/hour gig is anything to sneeze at, but a bigger paycheck is never a bad thing. At least it's fun to daydream about having more money in your checking account. That's why we play the lottery, after all.

We've put together a list of jobs that earn at least 10 dollars more than the national average just to give you an idea of how some people are earning their nice paych....

 

It may not be listed in the official job description, but being able to deal with smells is definitely part of some positions. While in many cases the aroma can be seen as a job perk (fresh soup simmering from your restaurant's kitchen, anyone?), other occupations can leave workers wanting to hold their noses.

Here are some fields in which success never smelled so sweet (or so awful).

The  best-smelling
Baker
Steve Abrams, owner of Magnolia Bakery in New York City, says that his establishment was designed to involve all the senses but that "the most visceral and evocative is that first smell when you walk in the door, which immediatel....

 

Part-time jobs are all around us, yet few people think about them. In all the talk of the economy and layoffs, part-time work gets ignored. Conversations concerning jobs rarely take into account people who don't work a standard 40-hour work week.

The definition of a part-time worker, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, is anyone who works between one and 34 hours each week. Ever industry employs part-time workers in some capacity. Professions in the administrative, retail and customer service fields are often the first ones you think of when discuss part-time works. While those part-time positions are some of the most popular, many therapists, dentists and pharmacists choose to work less than 35 h....

 

Students in certain fields, such as English or philosophy, are used to family and friends asking, "What do you plan to do with your degree? Teach?" Although many do go on to teach, others take their skills to occupations that are nowhere near a classroom.

On the flip side, few people question the future of law students. If they're studying law, they must want to be lawyers. (And many people don't know much about law beyond "Law and Order" episodes and John Grisham books, so they also assume all law students will be trial lawyers in exciting, high-profile cases.)

Au contraire. Although law programs can offer a clear path to a career as an attorney, not everyone chooses that path. Even among the....

 

Regardless of the economy's state -- whether it's booming or withering -- people care about money. It pays the bills, after all. While salary is important, it doesn't exist in a vacuum. How much you earn often depends on where you live, and where you live affects how far your dollar goes. All of these factors depend on the overall economy, which we all know depends on several other factors.

Right now, everyone is looking for a sign that the future is going to be better than the last couple of years. Executives, analysts, teachers and college seniors and everyone in between want to know they will have a job tomorrow and be able to earn a livable income. No one can predict the future, unfortunately, but we c....

 

In any economic climate, job hunting is nobody's idea of fun. And with the growing number of folks hitting the bricks these days, it seems the task is getting even harder. But that's not precisely true, because the actual job-hunting strategies and techniques remain the same in any climate. What is bothersome, however, is that the process is likely to take longer. This leads to increased stress: financial stress, physical stress, emotional stress and family stress.

Most people do not perform at their best in stressful situations. They get tired more quickly, they get frustrated and run out of patience, and they make mistakes. Here are six job-hunting mistakes frequent....

 

If you turn on the TV, you're probably going to see a character who has one of the following jobs: lawyer, doctor, criminal investigator or generic business professional who must wear a suit.

Not that we don't love those jobs (and those shows), but the media in general seem to forget about the millions of workers who are in other  fields. To give some coverage to other occupations, we decided to highlight 40 jobs that are in one of these industries: construction, maintenance, operations, production and material handling. These careers are typically considered blue-collar jobs and are some of the top-earning in each field.

Based on data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and CBSalary.com, here are 40....

 

President Barack Obama gets a nice little salary. Certainly some CEOs, entrepreneurs and movie stars are earning millions (and in some cases billions) of dollars, so he's by no means the richest person on the planet with his $400,000 annual salary. And he gets some pretty sweet perks -- a fancy plane, an amazing chef and one of the most famous addresses in the world.

But if you stop to think about all his job entails, he's never really off the clock. Although he takes vacations, he can't completely clock out as long as he is in office. Regardless of where  he is, the Secret Service is monitoring his every move and he must respond to an....

 

Everyone has a different idea of what's a good or bad salary. Some people are happy just to make ends meet. Others won't settle for less than six figures. A lot of factors go into what makes a salary seem reasonable.

Therefore you can't really classify any single salary as high or low without bringing in your own bias. That said, sometimes salaries just don't seem large enough. We put together a list of 10 jobs that have salaries we thought would be bigger. Don't mistake these jobs for having salaries that are impossible to live on; instead, these are salaries that seem too low for the amount of work, time or risk they involve.

Here are 10 jobs we thought would pay more:

1.

 

With 2010 in full swing, it's hopeful that things are starting to look up for those who had a tough time in 2009, professionally or otherwise. While the hope is that those who have been unemployed in recent months have found a job, recent numbers show many people are still looking for work.

Out of the 15.3 million people reported to be unemployed in December 2009, 6.1 million had been unemployed for more than 27 weeks, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. In December, 4 in 10 unemployed workers were jobless for 27 weeks or longer. That's a long time for anything, especially to be out of work.

This year, try doing things totally different than you've been doing in the past. Write a new résumé,....

 

Everyone wants to earn a hefty salary in their careers, and it's no secret that some of the highest-paid people are doctors, dentists and lawyers. It's even less of a secret that those careers aren't easy to come by. They require years of schooling -- something that not everyone can (or wants to) handle.

But don't despair. If you want to earn a lot of money, but don't necessarily want to earn  and advanced degree, check out these 20 careers. Although you won't start out earning six figures, with your bachelor's degree in tow, you can easily work your way up.

Here are 20 high-paying jobs that req....

 

Although 2009 saw some of the most desolate unemployment numbers in history, there is reason to believe that things are starting to look up.

Both the unemployment rate and the number of jobless persons decreased in November to 10 percent and 15.4 million, respectively, according to the most recent date from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. That was down from October, when the unemployment was at an all-time-high of 10.2 percent and there were 15.7 million unemployed persons.

In addition, although employment fell in several industries, several groups saw little change or added jobs in November. Employment in professional and business services rose by 86,000, with temporary help services adding 52,000 ....