Martin Yate - Knockem Dead 2010: The Ultimate Job Search Guide

You don't come to a book like this because everything is good in your professional life; you come here in times of crisis and change. So I'm not going to waste your time. You live in a global information economy, where corporate structures have flattened and downsized and outsourced work forces, where professional jobs get ever more complex and the competition for them gets ever greater. This is not an easy world in which to pursue a professional career it requires serious attention.

You stand somewhere in the middle of a fifty-year career, and it is likely that you will change jobs every three or four years (not always by choice). You may have as many as three distinct careers over the span of this half-century work life. Your career is a marathon, not a sprint, and stamina and tactics count for a lot. This is probably not your first job search, and it almost certainly won't be your last.

Look at your current situation from this perspective, and commit yourself to carrying out this job search in a way that will leave you with a firm understanding of how to manage your career.

Knock'em Dead: The Ultimate Job Search Guide will show you how to achieve this goal. I'll show you the best ways to research job opportunities, effectively turn them into interviews, and transform not one, but many of those interviews into job offers. I'll show you how to ace the aptitude tests and negotiate the best salary and benefit package for yourself. In these pages, you'll find a cohesive approach to job searching that will not only help you land jobs but will also supply you with the tools to make you successful once on the payroll.

Yet, because other job changes will come along in your life, sometimes unexpectedly, the greatest benefit you will reap from this book is preparedness for those future strategic career moves. If you follow my advice you will already have a plan of attack, a comprehensive job map of employers who want to hire you, and an almost inexhaustible supply of professionals with whom to network all assets I'll wager you don't have today. In short, you will be in much greater control of your professional destiny.

I wrote Knock'em Dead because too much of what I found in bookstores lacked practical advice about vitally important situations. Much of what I read was puerile at best and seriously detrimental at worst. I knew there was room for a different approach. Twenty-three years and millions of copies later, Knock'em Dead has become a time-tested and proven commodity both here in America and around the world, effectively helping people with job change and career management in many different languages and cultures. This is only possible because the approaches you will find in these pages reflect a clear understanding of what it is that makes business tick. It couples that understanding with a unique, honest, and practical way of packaging yourself as a highly desirable professional.

Perhaps you are trying to land your first job or returning to the work force after an absence. Maybe you are a seasoned executive taking another step up the ladder of success. Wherever you are at this point in your career, this book can help. It will guide you through the job searching process and the toughest interview scenarios you will ever face.

The book is written in a series of interconnected parts. The Well-Stocked Briefcase gets you ready for the fray. Here, you will learn to build a rsum with broad appeal and use a unique customizing technique guaranteed to make your candidacy stand out.

Once you are ready for action, Getting the Word Out will show you just about every truly effective job search technique that exists and how to tap into thousands of opportunities that never reach the newspaper or your favorite Web site. You will learn simple and effective techniques for setting up multiple interviews and how to navigate through the intimidating telephone screening process.

The job interview is a measured and ritualistic mating dance in which the best partners whirl away with the glittering prizes. Learn the steps and you, too, can dance the dance. The Great Answers to Tough Interview Questions section gives you a comprehensive understanding of why interviewers ask the questions they do, what is behind them, and how to answer in a way that advances your candidacy. Your partner in the dance is the interviewer, who will lead with tough questions that contain subtleties hidden to the untrained ear. You will learn how to recognize these questions within questions. You'll get hundreds of sneaky, mean, low-down trick questions beloved of interviewers. With each question, I will show you what the interviewer wants to find out and explain how you should reply. After each explanation, I'll give you a sample answer and advice on how to customize it to your individual circumstances. The examples themselves come from real life (I've been at this for thirty years) they're all things that people like you have done on the job to get noticed. I'll show you how they packaged those responses and how they used their practical experience to turn a job interview into a job offer. With this knowledge you will be cooler, calmer, and more collected at your job interviews.