She Got Four Jobs From A Board (Ours!); How You Can Too

We're often down on job boards 'cuz they feel so impersonal. You don't really know where your lovingly crafted resume is going after you hit that Submit buttonwhereas if you're networking, you can make a connection much easier. But Tiffany Black wrote us to let us know she's gotten three jobs in four years using mediabistro.com's job board. Seriously? "Job boards work," Black told us. "If your resume matches what people want, if you have the right key words, you will bubble up to the top." We spoke with her about how you can make a job board a productive jobsearch tool. In short: Customization, selectivity, and a little help from your friends. More after the jump. The backstory Black teaches classes for mediabistro (a gig she got after applying, via our board, to be a teaching assistant) and surfs our board regularly to find job listings to send to her students. "I saw this job [for a senior producer at Inc.com] and realizedwait, this one's for me!" She saw the job on a Friday. By Sunday, she'd sent in her application, and by the following Thursday, they gave her a call. Black's first day at Inc is this Monday. The cover letter "Every time I apply for a job, I rewrite the letter, taking exactly what I've done that applies to that job. You just need three strong paragraphs so they know exactly why you fit that position. I'd rather they skim my letter than have to try to figure it out by matching my resume to what the job description says." The resume "I have 10 years of experience, but my resume's still one page. Everybody, especially working in digital, they want the quick hit. I make sure I have really strong bullets. I have one standard resume but I will change it slightly, based on the job, to make sure the bullets align with what they want. Don't apply to everything "I'm very selective about jobhunting, and maybe because I'm so selective, I put more into the cover letter." Get help The job posting was on a Friday. By that night, I had written the first draft of the cover letter. Then I have 3-5 people look at it before I submit it, because I'm a type A personality. It's a combination of my mentors, whichever mentor could look at it on the weekend, former coworkers, friends who are not even in the business because they can offer a fresh perspective. One of my ex-boyfriends, because he's so good at editing. "You should definitely have people who know you and who know what you do [look over your letter]. My friends will be like, 'Why didn't you include this?' If you just go to one of those services, they don't know you as a person. "Even if you're not looking for a job, go on job boards to make sure your skills are on point. You never know when you will lose your job. For people looking for jobs, let people know that you're looking because they'll look out for you. Like crazy people like me who go on mediabistro's job board 3 times a week. It's not something to be ashamed of; you want people to know you're looking so they can help you."

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She Got Four Jobs From A Board (Ours!); How You Can Too

Rachel Kaufman

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Rachel Kaufman