When I was in college in the mid-80s, my mom already had many years of experience as an HR professional. I never forgot the rules-of-thumb that she taught me:
90% of all successful placements come from people who have personal contacts with the hiring manager or somewhere else at the place doing the hiring.
90% of the remainder (9% of the total) come from headhunting firms that are actively looking for candidates to fill a particular special position.
The final 1% comes from placement advertisements and job search facilities.
And this from the lady who ran the job search facility for the University of Oklahoma (at Norman), called the “Job Location Program”. It covered every single staff and faculty position that was being hired for across the entire University.
So far as I can tell, the job placement situation hasn’t really changed much in the 30 or so years since.
So, you have to ask yourself, where do you want to spend your time and money? Do you want to spend it all in the area with only 1% placement success, or do you want to spend it somewhere else that might have a higher probability of getting you something?
90% of all successful placements come from people who have personal contacts with the hiring manager or somewhere else at the place doing the hiring.
90% of the remainder (9% of the total) come from headhunting firms that are actively looking for candidates to fill a particular special position.
The final 1% comes from placement advertisements and job search facilities.
And this from the lady who ran the job search facility for the University of Oklahoma (at Norman), called the “Job Location Program”. It covered every single staff and faculty position that was being hired for across the entire University.
So far as I can tell, the job placement situation hasn’t really changed much in the 30 or so years since.
So, you have to ask yourself, where do you want to spend your time and money? Do you want to spend it all in the area with only 1% placement success, or do you want to spend it somewhere else that might have a higher probability of getting you something?