Is Follow-up the Secret to Success?

Sunday, July 06, 2008

Is Follow-up the Secret to Success?

By Jason Alba
Career Transition Editor

You know what we, as job seekers, hate? I mean really, really hate!

When recruiters, HR and hiring managers don’t follow up with us. That is one of the top complaints I hear throughout the country.

We send resumes in and we never hear back!

We leave voice mails and we don’t get a return call!

We shoot off e-mails and we don’t get a reply!

How disgusting! How rude! How inconsiderate!

How common it is to not follow-up. The funny thing is, I didn’t follow-up much in my job search. I was as bad as “they” were at following-up. And I hear from recruiters and hiring managers and HR that if we would just follow-up with a simple card, e-mail, or letter, we would really stand out.

Same thing with networking… if we would simply send a follow-up note, we would really stand out. Yet many of us don’t do it. Why not? Don’t want to inconvenience someone? It doesn’t matter – they’ll appreciate it, and you’ll definitely stand out. My advice is to keep the follow-up short.

I recently read a blog post by networking and job coach extraordinaire Alexandra Levit titled The Secret of My Success. She quickly dispels the idea that she’s going to brag about a lot of personal success, and states that her secret is to simply follow-up within 24 hours. That’s it.

Think about how you will stand out, be remembered, and put yourself forefront on other people’s minds. How powerful. How different. How important.

Alexandra suggests you take an hour a day to follow-up. This might sound like a lot, but it would ensure that you do follow-up, and perhaps it will help ensure the rest of your day is well-structured so you can take that hour. This might just result in a more effective day!

Can you be better at following-up? Shoot me an e-mail and share your follow-up success stories with me!

Jason Alba is the CEO and creator of JibberJobber.com, and author of “I’m on LinkedIn – Now What???” After a corporate downsizing impacted Jason in 2006, he experienced firsthand the difficulties of conducting a job search. Drawing on his extensive computer software and IT experience, Jason analyzed the job search process and developed JibberJobber.com, the gold standard in career management technology.

Widely acknowledged as a leading career management evangelist, Jason continues to spread the word to job seekers through his blog, JibberJobber.com/blog. He is co-author of “I’m on Facebook – Now What???”and offers tutorials on how to fulfill the role of being CEO of You, Inc.