[Closed] The Elusive Unadvertised Job Market

probably... many companies don’t advertise but use word of mouth recommendations from employees / know associates - people they met through work /networking etc. Given this I see little way you can access this secret network unless you know them all.
Stats true ish secrets to sell BS

Yes.

Give me £5000 and I'll tell you how.

6k!!! 😯

I think the old saying of 'Its not what you know, but who you know' applies very much to finding work.

I think the only way to even get close to tapping into that area of the job market is to just send out CV's to any company (regardless of advertising or not) that looks like they may do something you're vaguely interested in!

spongebob - at a desperate time a while back, I was tempted by one of these (albeit for a mere £3k!) then saw sense.

They have nothing you don't already have. Find companies you want to work for, find out who the decision makers are, send them a tailored CV showing how much more money you can make/save them as well as a good covering letter, follow up with a call to make sure they have received it.

DON'T just fire out CVs by email and hope people will get back to you - they won't.

Spongebob - the secret is nothing more than networking and the courses they will be selling will be showing you how to network more effectively.

There is a lot of value to that, but not £6k's worth, not even £3k's worth.

Among the areas I've worked in, I did three years within the outplacement consulting industry. Outplacement is typically bought by companies on behalf of employees they are making redundant and the service is designed to help those individuals out of their current role and into something else.

Networking was always a hugely valuable component of the programmes we provided, but it never accounted for more than about £400 per person in terms of the overall programme cost.

as above - they'll tell you 'common sense' stuff rather than some huge secret.

It's about networking, cold calling and blind luck really 🙁

I had kinda figured this out for myself, but wanted to learn of others' experiences.

Directly approching companies is a better strategy than these virtually pointless online job boards, but you still need to reach the decision maker.

I think success in finding a good job is 90% luck. Perhaps more.

I'd disagree - it's 90% getting off your bum and findign people - it's pretty easy to find out who makes decsions now - have a trawl around LinkedIn or similar.

The 10% luck is catching them on a day when a) they want to talk and b) are prepared to listen.

90% luck

100% true.

I think success in finding a good job is 90% luck. Perhaps more.

You'll increase that luck factor if you do it right though.

A cunning trick is to find out a director's name. Then find the person who does recruitment. Tell them you've been handed their name by that director (this takes balls). Always work "top down" not the other way round. Start from the top and you are likely to be given the right name. Start from the bottom and no one will dare refer you "up" the ladder.

Also use the double name technique - "Can I speak to John (small pause then a "remembering" of formality), John Smith please. Just "John" is too informal. "John Smith" sounds like you don't know him.

Spongebob, what line are you in?

Networking starting with contacts you already have. Never ask your contacts for a job- if they know you and have a job you could do they will offer without you asking. Just arrange to meet them or have a phone conversation to ask their advice on possible opportunities. From this you will get further names to follow up. It can be hard to do if you're of an introverted nature and some people can never bring themselves to do it but it works. I ended up once with a job offer from someone who was a contact of a contact of a contact of a contact.

Never send out CV's randomly. If you want to send out CVs see Surf-matt's post.

The more people you randomly talk to with one eye on their potential to help you find a job, the luckier you will become.

Good networkers will have opporuntities for whatever objective they have always somewhere in the back of their mind, even in chance social encounters. To illustrate:

I once made the mistake of getting on the wrong train home. Turns out I was not the only person who made that mistake because of platform notification error. Along with the lady sat opposite me, I was heading non-stop to Hastings (90 minutes away) when I actually wanted to go to London Bridge (five minutes away!)

Because of our shared misfortune we ended up having avery animated conversation. Turns out she was company secretary for a firm I had been trying to get a meeting with for about 6 months. That lady referred me to a colleague, who took a meeting with me and helped me close a decent size deal.

The situation could just have easily been about finding a job.

My job wasn't advertised, but then I spent over a year volunteering with the organisation first.