Experts recommend not slowing down job search over holidays

From the Star Telegram BY SCOTT NISHIMURA snishimura@star-telegram.com

Mark Randall, who had been out of a job since June, was running an errand in his 1971 Jeep CJ-5 two days before Thanksgiving when he got the call and the offer. He’ll start Monday managing vehicle fleets for the state in Carrollton.

"I couldn’t believe it," said Randall, 54, of The Colony, who had to pull his open-top Jeep off the road so he could hear the caller. "It was a good Thanksgiving."

Many job seekers traditionally dial down their searches during the holidays, but experts said they should be doing the opposite, networking and pursuing leads like Randall, who estimated that he was working five strong leads when things finally broke his way.

For job seekers who don’t take a break, hiring managers are more relaxed, and opportunities to attend parties and network abound, experts say.

And contrary to popular belief, hiring happens, as firms close the old budget year or move into the new one with money to spend. Some employers, such as call-center operators, must fill training classes that begin after the new year.

"There are fewer people trying to network, and hiring managers are not traveling as much during the holidays and they’re usually less busy," said Jimmy Taylor, chief operating officer for Novotus, a Texas employment services firm. "They’re much more likely to answer the phone, they’re much more likely to return your phone call, and they’re more likely to be in the holiday cheer and want to help."

Patty Revis is the Fort Worth community relations manager for the jobing.com site. "If you’re the job seeker who doesn’t lay back, the more likely you are to be at the head of the pack," she said.

Not that the economy is roaring ahead just yet. The Southlake Focus Group, a popular networking group, packed 400 people into Thursday’s weekly meeting at White’s Chapel United Methodist Church. However, Fred Gehring, a financial adviser and member of the Southlake leadership team, projected that reported landings will reach 140 in the November-January period.

In the seven years the group has tracked the numbers, about a third of its annual landings come during this period, Gehring said. This year should be similar, he predicted.

Like others trying to help job seekers score positions, Gehring stressed that people must network to have the best chance of rooting out available jobs, not spend all their time firing off résumés through the computer. Many open jobs never get posted on the big boards such as Monster.com.

"There’s hiring going in companies that are laying people off, and there’s hiring going on in companies that have hiring freezes," Gehring said. Firms have cut so deeply that "they’ve got certain skill sets that they need" to hire people for.

Taking a job

At Novotus, which works in 30 states, hiring for clients has picked up this quarter after slow second and third quarters, Taylor said. He estimated that the firm has had 1,200 hires in October and November.

Despite the tough economy and slew of job seekers, Taylor said he’s been having trouble finding candidates for some call-center jobs, and he has even seen an uptick in candidates this year who don’t show for their interviews.

From 2006 to 2008, 82.6 percent of call-center candidates showed up for scheduled interviews. This year, that’s fallen to 75.2 percent, he said. The same trend isn’t the case for higher-paying jobs.

Taylor said some job seekers who are seeking lower-paying work have suggested to Novotus that they do better on federal unemployment benefits, which the government has extended during the recession, than accepting $10-per-hour jobs.

"We’ve had to work a little harder than normal to find candidates," said Taylor, who is looking for 80 candidates to fill training classes at Travelocity call centers in San Antonio and Wilkes-Barre, Pa., that begin after the new year. "Some people are just not working it."

And that might be a mistake. Taylor said he expects hiring in North Texas to pick up next year. And when it does, people who already have jobs will be in a better position to find new ones, he said.

"There’s just an unspoken bias toward that" among hiring managers, he said. "It’s much better for somebody to take a job, even if they’re going to continue to look for other things."

Some fresh job posts late in the year might be for openings down the road, as employers push new hires into 2010.

But even that can lead to opportunities for job seekers to meet recruiters, said Foster Williams, a longtime recruiter who runs the search4uinc.com Web site, which powers the job boards of several North Texas career groups.

Recruiters "spend time networking, getting out" during the holidays, he said. "They start showing up at the networking functions."

Don’t let up

Ret Martin is another job seeker who isn’t dialing it down right now.

As a leader of the Fort Worth Career Search Network, whose main group meets Mondays at North Fort Worth Baptist Church, Martin has been helping lead the chorus on not letting up during the holidays.

Martin, 48, has been looking for a job for 22 months. He grew up in the Dunlap Co., the Fort Worth retailer that owned Stripling & Cox, as a member of the family who ran the company since the 1920s. He lost his job as senior vice president and corporate secretary when the company closed.

Martin, whose expertise is in employee relations, benefits and training, said the big titles on his résumé are likely scaring off some potential employers.

"I don’t have to be a director or a VP," he said.

Martin has been tapping his individual retirement account, doing consulting work, helping his artist wife with her business and splitting real estate commissions with his father — both are licensed real estate agents — to get by.

During the holidays, Martin said he plans to attend the upcoming holiday fete being thrown by the Fort Worth Human Resource Management Association and is getting together with peers from the firm that handled Dunlap’s insurance needs.