Friday, September 07, 2007

Jobs 101 or 101 Jobs?

Qualifications:

• Masters degree in a relevant discipline plus at least three years of progressively responsible experience in the idustry supporting programs in Africa, the Middle East, Latin America.... Asia (East, West and South), the Confederate States of Micronesia and Antarctica.
• Proficiency in Arabic, Spanish, and/or French.... Urdu, Pashto, Farsi, Tagalog, and American Sign Language.... required.
• Experience with proposal development, developing new business opportunities.... microfinance, macrofinance, conflict resolution, peacekeeping, babysitting, thumbsucking....
• Strong writing and editing skills are essential.... have you been published??

As I skim through thousands of job postings, I am learning a lot more about what I want out of a job than what the job actually wants out of me. As I look at some of the posted qualifications, I have to wonder, does this declared ideal candidate actually exist? Just the same, I apply. I apply like mad -- averaging 10 to 15 applications per day. My fingers fly as I tweak different versions of my resume and rework cover letters. Perhaps at the end of this week I could forgo a continued job hunt and start my own business on how to perfectly tailor your CV to fit the narrow categories allowed by different job-posting sites and online auto-application forms.

1 comment:

giovanni said...

But then, after succesful application, you may also want to train candidates for the interview. To my surprise, in a bookshop at Kuala Lumpur airport I saw hundreds of popular book about how to achieve successful interviews. A whole new world I was unaware of -- thanks to having created 20 years ago my onw "business". The price of it is job insecurity. You may want to have a look at my business at www.fondad.org