No matter how qualified you are for a job or how much you truly think you'd be a good fit for the position, sometimes the interview just doesn't go your way. For bad interviews, quickly correcting the mistakes can wash that bad taste out of your interviewer's mouth and allow you to be re-considered [...]
Job interviews over video platforms like Skype and FaceTime have become a very common part of job hunting, as they provide the flexibility of a phone call with the benefits of meeting in person. In many ways you should treat these just like any face-to-face interview, but here are some specific tips to help you [...]
It won’t be much longer before autumn in the Canadian prairies will come to an inevitable blizzardy close, and we will don our down-filled parkas and woolly accessories. While we love a cozy mitten/toque/scarf set as much as the next person, continental climates pose unique challenges when it comes to job interviews in the winter months. Here [...]
Today’s job market is fiercely competitive and it can be hard to get noticed in a sea of applications. That said, there are some strategies you can apply to help you break through the noise and land your dream role. We spoke to our team of Recruitment Consultants to gather their 7 best ideas for improving [...]
Fresh From Our Desk: What's Hot In IT Across Western Canada, the tech boom has given IT professionals a lot of choice in where they can work. The industry is rapidly evolving, with business needs changing, new technology launching, and start-ups taking off. IT job seekers often come to us curious about the hiring trends [...]
9 out of 10 times an interviewer is going to ask you the reasons for leaving your last job, so it pays to prepare and rehearse how you’re going to answer when the question pops up [...]
At times, it is the personal touch of a cover letter that really impresses the team. Here are some of the cover letter tactics that have impressed us over the years.
Three Ways To Celebrate Temping In Your Resume At TempsAhead and The Headhunters, we love to see temporary work experience on resumes because it tells us that the applicant likes to stay busy between permanent jobs. In other words, such candidates are hardworking and keen to develop transferable skills. However, many job seekers feel like [...]
Body Language To Improve Your Interviews Award-winning author, James Borg, maintains that the most accurate way to gauge feelings, attitudes and emotions is through analysis of body language. So, to convince people—especially people we are meeting for the first time—that what we are saying is really true, we cannot allow our body language to devalue [...]
Three Ways To Enhance Your Job Search Ettiquette While setbacks in the final round of interviews are gut-wrenching, the recruiter or hiring manager, when asked, will likely tell you where you could improve in the future. Such feedback, however, is a benefit of making it to the interview stage. But what about improving the earlier stages of your [...]
Five Answers: 'What Would You Like To Improve About Yourself?' Some “stock” interview questions are relatively easy to prepare for and provide with you an opportunity to highlight your value as an employee. Nevertheless, as an interviewee, you should also be prepared for those stock questions that trip-up even the most qualified candidates. “What would [...]
There’s an urban legend that Microsoft liked to test the analytical thinking of its potential recruits, asking them brainteasers to see how they handled them. Legend has it that when Nobel Prize winning physicist, Richard Feynman, was interviewed, Microsoft asked him to explain why most manhole covers are round (as opposed to square). Perhaps offended, [...]
Video interviews are becoming an increasingly popular medium for conducting interviews. They can be ran either in real time, a.k.a a live interview, or be recorded with pre-set questions asked, a.k.a a one-way interview. As virtual interviews are relatively new, they still remain a foreign concept to many job seekers. However, their usage is likely to [...]
Your job hunt may be a long, hard road at times, especially if you are seeking a specialized position in a tough market. While true success is rarely struck upon easily, there are many ways to improve your job search, both in practical and emotional terms. Take it from some of the most iconic [...]
Over the last five years, cutting-edge tech jobs have been innovated and re-imagined at a staggering rate. In fact, North American hiring managers, who hadn’t heard of a UX designer or an e-business specialist in 2010, are now recruiting candidates who are qualified for these jobs without hesitation. As such, people who can thrive in [...]
Sometimes the competition for a job can be so intense that candidates go the extra mile to get noticed during the application and interview process. In our industry we often come across great stories about the unusual ways people have applied for jobs, here's some of our favourites: (Just remember, if you get inspired and [...]
It’s one of the first and last impressions you’ll leave with an interviewer so it’s time to revisit one of our favourite topics – The Handshake. Your handshake says a lot about you, it can exude confidence, enthusiasm, anxiety, honesty... this list goes on. So what’s your handshake saying about you? The Wet Lettuce: The [...]
When first starting the hiring process, employers typically review resumes, create a shortlist and contact applicants for interviews. It seems like an extra step, but a valuable method for expediting the process is through initial phone interviews with promising applicants. This preliminary screen by phone gives employers the opportunity to distinguish better qualified candidates and save time later on [...]
Did you know that 93% of our communication is non-verbal? This means that when you're in an interview, those prepared answers you have in your head are only 7% of the equation. This video from behavioural investigator, Vanessa Van Edwards, shares some great do's and don'ts of non-verbal communication to ace your next job interview. [...]
When it comes to salary negotiations, not all positions are created equal. However, the payoff can be considerable. In a study of new graduates it was found that those who negotiated were able to increase their starting salaries by 7.4 percent on average. While there can be a strong case to negotiate in most circumstances, [...]
We’ve all been through an interview process or two, and some of us have heard similar questions in multiple interviews. So, why do all employers ask these questions to candidates? What are they looking to get from the answers? Here are some popular interview questions broken down, and some suggestions on what interviewers are looking [...]
When someone is reviewing your resume, you only have a few short seconds to make a positive impression. In this time, you should effectively do everything within your power to captivate your reader, which doesn't include any of the following common but little known resume mistakes. Weird or Small Fonts Even though Comic Sans or Papyrus [...]
Behavioural interviews are becoming more and more almost all industries. Employers use the behavioural interview method in order to assess their prospective employee's potential for success by considering his or her past experiences and actions. The person conducting the behavioural interview will have already identified what skills and qualities the company seeks in an employee and will [...]
Congratulations! You have made it to your job interview. The bad news is that you have discovered that it is a group interview. It is hard enough to interview for your perfect job, but doing so in a group setting can be even more nerve-wracking. Group job interviews are often used by employers who [...]
Being unprepared is one of the biggest mistakes you can make when it comes to a job interview. Employers are on the lookout for well organized, informed candidates that stand out from the competition. Increase your wow-factor by following these interview tips and tricks to find yourself at the head of the pack: Don’t get [...]
When it comes to submitting your resume to a recruiter, you have to keep in mind that we receive literally hundreds of resumes in a given month. That’s a lot of reading material! So keeping your submissions concise and engaging will get the attention you’re seeking. With that said, there is no silver bullet when [...]
Are you hoping to land that perfect job just out of college, or are you about to begin your search for new employment after years in the same job? If so, take a look at these essential skills employers are looking for in top candidates: A deep awareness and understanding of your particular field [...]
Your cover letter is your opportunity to inject personality into your application and set yourself apart from the competition. Don’t waste the space simply regurgitating your resume, instead follow these five essential cover letter tips to stand out. 1. Speak Their Language You’ve probably heard of “mirroring” tone and body language as a way [...]
Your resume plays a vital role in your quest for a job. It is a form of self-advertisement that highlights your strengths, educational background and work experiences. In other words, it is a basis used by prospective employers in determining why they should at least invite you for an interview. Here are some tips that [...]
A new year has begun! What better time to dust off those interview skills and take stock of what tactics should be applied in 2014. Just like we did with old and new school resume writing approaches, we’ll walk through the aspects of going for a job interview and compare what traditional and modern [...]
When it comes to writing your resume there’s a lot of old and outdated advice out there. But not all the “old” ways are necessarily irrelevant. On the flipside, not all the shiny new resume trends out there are worth following blindly. Let’s take a walk through the different stages of preparing your resume [...]
A multi-talented job seeker asked about how and if she should include her side business and blog in her resume - I graduated a year ago with a marketing degree and have been working as an Admin/Marketing assistant for the past 8 months. My employer is great but there’s not a lot of room for [...]
All our consultants use LinkedIn to source and research potential candidates. And it’s not just us; a survey by Jobvite found that over 93 per cent of respondent companies use LinkedIn for recruiting. Unlike most other social media, the majority of LinkedIn users don’t use and update their profile regularly. Our recruitment consultants are [...]
Do you know what makes the difference between a good and a GREAT resume? Unfortunately most people settle for 'good enough' when it comes to their resumes. But to really stand out from the pack, we dare you to settle for nothing less than greatness! Below is our breakdown of what makes a truly great [...]
Does anyone read cover letters anymore? Why should I include one? Isn’t it just a repetition of what’s on your resume? These are questions constantly being asked by hungry job seekers across the country. And we get it. Job hunting is tough and spending that extra time crafting a witty customized cover letter is [...]
A job seeker wrote in with a question about interviews: I’m a bit curious.. As recruiters you probably conduct hundreds of interviews, so it had me thinking – are there any common interview questions that people often answer badly? I consider myself a pretty good interviewee but my recent string of rejections had me wondering [...]
We continue to get many questions from job seekers regarding their resume. The biggest question is “why don’t I hear back from employers when I send my resume?” Below are immediate changes you can make to your job search to ensure a call back. (Please note we have not covered the obvious mistakes like spelling [...]
There’s so much resume advice out there for job seekers, just googling “resume advice” returns over 158 MILLION results. Yikes! Plus there are those pearls of wisdom from your mum, your dad, your professor, your neighbour, your old colleague… the list goes on. Unfortunately most of the advice out there is either outdated or [...]
Wouldn't it be wonderful if everyone we brought in to interview was a real “A” player? That may be a bit of a hiring pipe dream but it’s closer than you think. Phone screening is a great way to vet your candidate shortlist but it’s an extremely underutilized part of the recruitment process. An [...]
You can’t get a job without experience and you can’t get experience without a job. Ever hear that saying? For new graduates looking for that first job, those words strike fear in the hearts of the unemployed. We’ve received a couple of emails lately from new grads asking for advice to help land that elusive first [...]
You may wonder “What’s wrong with being overqualified? Why wouldn’t they want someone with much more experience than required??” But a hiring manager doesn’t just see impressive qualifications; they look down the track to a few potential problems: You will get bored You are just looking for ‘any job’ and will leave once something better [...]
Over the phone, in a group, technical testing, intimidating interviewers, clueless bosses - it's an unpredictable world out there for job seekers going on interviews! But you can prepare yourself for any type of interview and interviewer with the help of this infographic put together by Interview Success Formula. They look at 5 common types of [...]
Making its debut on the web this week is the first we’ve seen of a Chocolate Bar Resume. Redditor elilanger shared this photo of his friend’s ‘Resume Bar’. He got the job. In a feisty job market, job seekers are getting increasingly creative (or wacky) in their quest to stand out from the pack. [...]
"I’m nervous about a job interview I have soon. I have an eight month gap on my resume and I just know it’s going to come up. The reason for the gap is quite involved and personal; one that I really don’t feel like explaining in great depth to an interviewer. So should I just [...]
A job seeker asks us about one of the most over-looked parts of your job search: reference checks. I was asked to provide at least three work-related references for a job I’m applying for. I have past supervisors who agreed to act as references when I originally left their respective companies, but two are from [...]
Just how much can you trust a resume or CV? This latest infograhpic based on data from The Society of Human Resource Managers shows the most common lies told by job applicants. Some Highlights: 46% of resumes submitted by job applicants have some measure of false information. 70% of college students said they would [...]
At the beginning of a new year, many job hunting hopefuls have big resolutions to find a new job and begin shooting off applications left, right and centre. But before you hit that send button, we want to revise some easily overlooked errors when applying for jobs. Some of this may seem like common [...]
Losing your job is a hard pill to swallow but explaining that to future employers can be downright nauseating. 9 out of 10 times an interviewer is going to ask you the reasons for leaving your last job, so it pays to prepare and rehearse how you’re going to answer when the question pops out. [...]
It might seem like it is “just a phone interview” but it is a very important step in the way a company assesses your application and your fit for the role. It can increase your chances in getting an in-person interview or end your application all together. You prepare for an in-person interview, so why [...]
In this digital age job seekers have a wide range of useful tools at their fingertips to help them stand out from the pack. One of our favourite alternatives to the traditional resume is a SlideShare visual resume. SlideShare is the world's largest community for sharing presentations. Users can upload a presentation and easily share it [...]
Learning proper interviewer techniques should be vital to your recruitment strategy. Having untrained interviewers can cost you reliable information and insights and lead to bad hiring decisions further down the track. The flip side is candidates rightly see interviews as a chance for them to assess an organization and a bad interview experience can cost [...]
We love this infographic from Classes and Careers. It really hammers home the point that personal appearance and being prepared and confident are key to nailing the Perfect Interview! 33 per cent of bosses decide within the first 90 seconds if they will hire someone Failure to smile and having no knowledge of the company are [...]
When you're reading through hundreds of resumes, certain missteps can mean the difference between making the shortlist or the rejection pile. Our Headhunters share some of their resume pet peeves that can land your application in the shredder. 1. Objective Statements Firstly, let’s clarify we’re talking about those statements which sound something like this: [...]
Have you ever sat in an interview and received a question like this.. “Tell me about a time when you were particularly overwhelmed at work. What strategies did you use to deal with this pressure?” And thought to yourself.. “This question itself is overwhelming me!” The question above is a perfect example of Behavioural Interviewing and [...]
We’ve seen thousands of cover letters. THOUSANDS. The good, the bad and the oddball have all crossed our desks and regardless of profession, industry or seniority it’s probably time we all took a refresher. But just like your cover letter, there’s no need to be too wordy about it; so here’s our top Dos and Don’ts of [...]
