Messmer - Job Hunting For Dummies

Max Messmers mother once told him to start pulling his own weight and get a job. So at age 11, he began making ladies hand-crafted bracelets. He sold scores of them to her friends, neighbors, students, and even teachers. He enjoyed selling them so much it created a stir at school and took him away from his studies. His mom then put him out of business, forcing him back to basic homework.

He learned something, though. Nothing happens until you make a sale. The job hunting process is no exception. No one will know your capabilities until you become an expert at selling them. (And if you saw these bracelets today, youd know what a sales job it was, he says.) Inability to sell ones skills is one of the most frequent failings of job candidates, according to Messmer.

Today, Max Messmer is chairman and CEO of Robert Half International Inc. (RHI), the worlds largest specialized staffing firm, and one of the foremost experts on job searching and career management.

Messmer has written several critically acclaimed books, including Human Resources Kit For Dummies (Wiley, 1999), The Fast Forward MBA in Hiring (John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 1998), 50 Ways to Get Hired (William Morrow & Co., Inc., 1994), and Staffing Europe (Acropolis Books Ltd., 1991). Messmers expertise has been featured in major business publications such as Fortune, Forbes, and The Wall Street Journal, and he has also written hundreds of bylined articles and columns on job seeking, employment, and management topics.

Robert Half International (NYSE symbol: RHI), a Fortune 1000 firm, ranked in the top 1 percent of all firms actively traded on the New York Stock Exchange, based on returns to investors for the five-year period ended 1 2/31/98. Messmers company is the only staffing firm included in this top ranking. RHI was also one of only 31 companies to be included on The Wall Street Journals 1998 Honor Roll for its stock market returns to investors for the previous one-, three-, five-, and ten-year periods ended 1 2/31/97 and recently ranked number one in the temporary staffing industry on Fortune magazines list of Americas Most Admired Companies.

Founded in 1948, the companys specialized temporary, project, and full-time staffing services include Accountemps, Robert Half, and RHI Management Resources, for accounting and finance; RHI Consulting, for information technology; OfficeTeam, for highly skilled office support; The Affiliates, for legal staffing; and The Creative Group, for project staffing in the advertising, marketing, and Web design fields. The company serves its clients and candidates through more than 240 offices worldwide and through online job search services at its divisional Web sites, all of which can be accessed at www.rhii.com.

Messmer has been ranked by Chief Executive magazine among the top 100 CEOs in the nation for the past four consecutive years. He is a member of the board of directors of a number of major corporations, including Airborne Freight Corporation, Health Care Property Investors, Inc., and Spieker Properties, Inc. Previously, Messmer served on the boards of First Interstate, NationsBank (of North Carolina), Pacific Enterprises, and Southern California Gas Company, among others. During the Reagan administration, he served on the Presidents Advisory Committee on Trade Negotiations. Valedictorian of his graduating class at Loyola University, Messmer also graduated cum laude from the New York University School of Law.