Tag Archives: IT headhunters

Are Your Emails Hurting Your IT Career?

In information technology, email is often the most commonly used way to communicate between IT consultants and their coworkers, clients, bosses, etc.  If your emails aren’t done well, you could be communicating poorly with any of these people.  Worse, you might be ruining your reputation with various IT recruiters and IT staffing firms (and thus hurting your chances at getting new IT jobs in the future!).  Even with stellar resumes, no IT headhunters can work with IT professionals with poor communication skills.  How do you make sure your emails are making stellar impressions on your fellow IT contractors, etc and helping your reputation with technical recruiters (rather than hurting it)?  Consider these factors:

1. Clarity and brevity.  Are your emails short, to the point, and easy to understand?  You might be speaking the same language as your recipient.  However, if your thoughts aren’t organized, clear, and uncluttered, it might be the same as writing in a foreign language!  Especially if you are providing information to somebody who needs it quickly or asking for something, it’s very important that your emails are short and easy to digest for the important points.  Most people in IT just don’t have time to wade through long, unclear emails.

2. Speediness of your responses.  While it’s not advisable to try responding for speed alone, it is important to answer emails quickly.  If you’re waiting on something to be able to respond adequately, you can simply respond with an estimate of when you’ll be ready to give a final, complete response.  Your recipient will appreciate knowing that their request or question is on your radar, even if you can’t take care of it right away.

3. Politeness and respect.  Email takes away two of the best tools we usually have for communication: tone of voice and facial expression.  Since you’re only using your words to communicate, tread lightly.  Leave out sarcasm, most jokes, and anything that might look aggressive or rude.  It’s too hard to explain later what your true intention was—make it hard to assume you were being anything but polite and pleasant from the get-to.

Should All IT Meetings Be ‘Stand Up Meetings’?

Recent studies show that IT professionals could benefit from making all their meetings stand up meetings—literally.  Recent studies show that when employees hold meetings while standing (versus sitting) they are far more creative and mentally engaged.  Everyone in the information technology industry, from IT recruiters, to IT contractors, to IT managers, could benefit from applying this information to their IT jobs.

Beyond simply applying this information to meetings, it’s worth noting that IT contractors and IT headhunters may benefit any time they stand at work.  Particularly in projects that require a great deal of creativity, it’s worth considering standing for at least part of the work you’ll be doing.  Who knows, maybe you’ll find a new idea pop out of nowhere!

 

Why Doing Favors are Key to Succeeding in Your IT Job

It doesn’t matter what industry you’re in—from information technology to fashion to publishing, making sure you get your priorities taken care of by your reports and coworkers is hardly ever an easy task.  How can IT recruiters, IT contractors, and IT managers all make sure they get the help they need on their most valued projects?  It starts by setting a standard of teamwork—in subtle and not-so-subtle ways.

When IT headhunters and IT consultants readily offer to help out, or respond to requests for help, from their coworkers, they set the stage for getting help in the future.  These favors don’t have to be huge.  Sometimes a small, unexpected favor will go pretty far just because it’s unexpected.

There’s a second, very important step to this process, though: Saying out loud after completing these favors, ‘No problem, I’m sure you’d do the same for me.’  The sentence will really drive home the message of teamwork.  Coupled with the action of doing that favor for somebody, this step will set the stage to make it easy to ask for future favors from coworkers and reports.

 

The Most Important Part of Your IT Resume

All IT recruiters have a list of generic tips for IT professionals who are polishing their resumes. These may vary from IT staffing firms to IT staffing firms, but there is one major rule that all IT contractors should abide by if they want to attract a lot of attention from technical recruiters and IT managers: have a killer ‘Technical Proficiencies’ or skills section.

Why is this section so important? It provides a very efficient response to the question that most IT headhunters and the managers they’re working for have: can you take care of the particular kind of problems and work we need taken care of? While things like making sure you’re a great cultural fit are important, it’s imperative for managers to hire people who can do the work they need done. Your ‘Technical Proficiencies’ section will answer this question immediately, especially if you put it at the top of your resume. Polishing this section can quickly bring you to the top of the ‘yes’ pile!

 

 

3 Easy Ways to Organize Your IT Job Hunt

With the right IT recruiters, IT contractors can have a relatively short hunt for IT jobs.  However, IT consultants will still save themselves a lot of confusion and frustration in their job hunt, no matter how short it is or how good their IT headhunters are, if they organize themselves a bit.  Here are 3 easy ways IT professionals can get themselves organized and get their dream job faster.

  1. Use a paper planner:  Keeping everything in email is fine, but at some point it will be tough to visualize it all.  Keeping one planner on paper that you frequently update will make a big difference.
  2. Keep an excel spreadsheet of jobs you’re applying to: You’ll never need to ask about a job description for a second time or be confused again if you start logging your jobs and relevant details into an excel spreadsheet.  Updating often will make it an easy task, too.
  3. Clean and separate your interview clothes: You never want to have to scramble for the right interview day outfit.  Set a few aside and make sure they’re always clean and ready to go.

 

France’s Email Decision: Will it Affect IT Workers Worldwide?

By now, most IT professionals around the world probably know about the big move by the information technology field’s labor unions in France.  The move to give IT contractors, IT recruiters, and IT managers the right to disconnect from their IT jobs and email after 6 pm has made epic waves around the internet.  In fact, the story has made a particularly large impact just because it’s been misinterpreted so often.  Some are taking the story as France banning email after 6 pm for all workers in all industries.

While the story has largely been impactful because of its misinterpretation, it may be impactful in the future for actually affecting more than just IT consultants and IT headhunters.  This movement was actually a pretty niche one, only affecting a small part of France’s population.  However, it has already begun a surge of blog posts and op-eds about how the policy should be affected world-wide in a far more concrete way.  This story may be only the beginning of a bigger revolution around the world.

 

3 Ways to Stop Letting Email Hurt Your IT Career

Most IT professionals- from the IT headhunters to the IT consultants – wouldn’t be able to function without email.  But maybe the way you use email is hurting you in your IT jobs.  Maybe your inbox is flooded with useless emails from other IT recruiters or IT contractors.  Or worse, maybe you’re the one sending useless emails to IT managers and slowly making them lose confidence in you.  Here are 3 ways to stop hurting yourself professionally with your email.

  1. Stop and think before reading or sending.  Will I benefit from reading this or will somebody benefit if I send this?  Can I just send this as part of another message or, better yet, in person or on the phone?  Can I stop by and say hello to this person instead of reading their silly forward?  Do your part to stop the email madness and your productivity and coworkers and managers will appreciate it.
  2. Keep it clean.  Literally and figuratively.  Never put anything in an email that you wouldn’t want the entire world to see.  Who knows when something you say might be forwarded to somebody else?  And keep a clean email box.  Never deleting anything means you can never find that important email with the info that will save the day.
  3. Cut the addiction and save yourself and others some time.  Responding to every email immediately will only breed more emails.  Do yourself a favor and answer emails only a few set times a day.  You’ll be able to focus on your work and get more done and your coworkers and managers will notice your productivity.  They’ll probably appreciate the cleaner inboxes, too.

 

3 Ways to Start Your IT Work Day Off Right

IT professionals from all over the Information Technology industry can agree that there are universally wonderful and terrible ways to start the day at their IT jobs.   Here are a 3 ways everyone from IT recruiters, to IT consultants, to IT managers can start their days.

  1. Get up right away.  Sleeping beyond one snooze button isn’t doing your body any favors and actually makes it harder to wake up.
  1. Check and update your calendar and to do list.  Making a plan for the day is helpful whether you’re one of the IT headhunters crowd or a programmer.  Being organized and having goals for the day will help you accomplish more by COB.
  2. Glance at email- but don’t deal with it yet.  If there are any glaring emergency emails, by all means, respond to them.  Leave the rest for later and get going on your actual work.  The more you respond to emails, the more you’ll invite.  And the more emails you invite, the more distractions you’re creating for yourself.  Start the day off with fewer emails and see how much more you can get done.

What You Shouldn’t Bring to IT Jobs

It’s common knowledge that sparkling resumes and references make IT consultants very attractive to IT headhunters and IT managers.  Sometimes it’s what IT contractors don’t bring to the table that makes them so easy for IT recruiters to market, though.  Here are a few things IT Professionals should never bring to their IT jobs.

  1. Limits to your job.  Strike “that’s not my job,” or “I don’t have time for that project” from your vocabulary if you really want to stand out.  Even if either, or both are true, finding a way to do them will eventually pay off.  You’ll gain new skills and some truly glowing references when you leave the job.  If you’re worried about being taken advantage of, start documenting these extra projects.  Use them to ask for a raise at an appropriate time or a reference when you leave.  Make sure you add them to your resume, too!
  2. Personal conflicts.  It’s fine to want to avoid certain people outside the office or to actively disagree with people.  At work, it can be the kiss of death.  Work on your ability and willingness to work with and engage well with all types of people in the office environment.  Being easy to work with is a special attribute, especially in IT.  Stand out as a diamond in the rough with some outstanding interpersonal skills.  You won’t regret it.
  3. Concepts of fairness.  It’s easy to find little injustices all over some offices.  But the truth is, you can’t do anything about them.  The sooner you let the concept of fairness go, the sooner you’ll feel better and be able to focus better on your work.  Complaining about injustices won’t change them. It will only bring negative attention to you.  When you stop noticing or caring about these things, your silence will speak volumes because managers will understand that you have the same priorities they do: getting the work done!

 

Complaining about IT Coworkers Effectively

IT professionals in every corner of the Information technology industry—from IT consultants to IT headhunters—have to deal with the occasional issue with a coworker.  The best case scenario is to have to avoid bringing the issue to IT managers.  However, sometimes IT contractors and IT recruiters have no choice.  For those unfortunate times, here are some strategies to complain about a coworker with minimal damage to your reputation or theirs.

  1. Assess the situation first:  Is this an issue that impedes your ability to get work done, or is it merely irritating.  If it’s irritating, you may want to shelve this issue for now and try to avoid it.  If it impedes your work, try to pinpoint for yourself exactly how it does so and what the effect is for the company and/or your team.
  2. Write down your grievance and try to brainstorm a few ways that your manager could resolve it.
  3. Bring your grievance to your boss at a time when they’re neither busy, nor upset about something else.
  4. Present your issue and brainstormed options to your manager in a calm way.  Try to mention a few things the person does well beforehand to cushion the blow.  Keep the conversation away from the realm of personal vendetta.  This is a work issue and your boss will likely want to help you solve any work issues.  Personal issues are a waste of their time.