Organize to Maximize the Result

If you use assistance at every stage of your job search, you could well spend upwards of $1,000 on all the services! If this seems like an enormous investment, remember it is in your career, and getting the right job is well worth it. Of course, you don't have to spend anywhere near that amount if you handle the mechanical aspects of your search on your own. As an example, if you don't want to invest in word processing for your broadcast letter, you can have the body of your letter run off by a photo-offset printer, and then slip each printed letter back in your typewriter for addressing. But if you go this route, you've got to spend the time to locate an offset printer with a machine good enough to duplicate your original letter so well that when you do type in the address, it looks as if the entire letter came out of a typewriter. The important thing to keep in mind is that the less you spend, the more time you've got to allocate to the purely mechanical aspects of your search-the stuffing, stamping, sealing, etc. The choice is yours. Just be prepared with the time or money if you want to do the job right.

Organize your time in a way that will maximize the results of your search

You obviously can't do everything at once in your campaign, so it pays to concentrate on those things necessary to produce the greatest return for your time spent. In this respect, the following priority schedule makes a good deal of sense:

• As a first priority, get as many professionals working on your behalf as you possibly can,
  

The more executive recruiters or ethical employment agents who are on the lookout for the right job for you, the more you can multiply the speed with which you can land the job you want. Getting the job-search professionals to work on your search for you is not unlike getting your home "multiple listed" when you plan to sell it: you have a lot more leverage than if you try to sell it on your own.

• As a secondary priority, go after the jobs that are 'Here and now".
  

As soon as you learn of any job opening suited to you, no matter how you learn of it, take action to make sure you are considered for the position. To locate as many "here and now" jobs as you possibly can, you'll need to start reading local papers, national newspapers like the Wall Street Journal, appropriate trade journals, and the like, and to read as many as you can get your hands on. The point is simply that once you've made sure you've got the professionals working for you, make sure you're in touch with all the sources that can help you locate jobs on your own. And don't skimp on subscription money. You can cancel your newspaper subscription the day you get a new job. In the interim it's worth every penny for the leads it creates.

• As a third priority, get your friends and associates working in your behalf.
  

The thing to keep in mind is that when you've got your campaign to recruiting professionals in full swing, and have lined up your "here and now" leads, you've reached the point in your search where you should turn your full energies toward getting as much nonprofessional help in landing a new job as you possibly can.

• The last priority on your campaign list is to seek out job opportunities that don't exist until you, yourself, create them.
  

Obviously, developing a job for your talents with a company that isn't actively looking for someone like you has got to be a long shot! But this type of activity has yielded many job-seekers good positions, and it's worth exploring. The only thing to keep in mind is that the odds of creating your own position are pretty steep, so it must take a back seat to your other efforts to get a team working to locate jobs that actually exist, and to pursue, on your own, the opportunities that you know are available. By now, you may have drafted your "cold-turkey" letter to companies you'd like to work for. My point in discussing them here is simply to caution you that as you lay out your campaign, this phase of it has to take a back seat to the other activities I've outlined.