I have been getting quite a few calls lately from late-career professionals who are convinced that they have failed to earn interviews or job offers because they are older than their competitors. Many of them are angry and embarrassed about being turned away by managers younger than their own kids. They think no one wants to hire an old person.   They're right.   Old people have stale ideas and are stuck in their ways; they favor the status quo over moving ahead. Old people lack the energy to meet the demands of a vigorous workplace and can’t relate to young customers, vendors and coworkers…

It was an eerily similar experience each of the 350 times I asked my opening question: one or two participants would answer “yes” while the other eight or ten would nod “no.” I was conducting executive career search skills training seminars at the time; the room was usually filled with job seeking professionals, there to learn to present their wares more effectively. The workshops lasted three and a half hours. While I had an agenda to teach, the program was designed to collect information too, so that I could ensure ongoing relevance to what real hiring decision makers were asking and how …

I read today that there exist over 100,000 job boards and countless other career advice sites on the web. Given the number, it is impossible, even for a gifted Career Coach, to know or visit them all. But, I do a pretty good job staying current with the best and most versatile. Each year I research my brains out to make sure that I am presenting the 80 or so most useful ones on my Job Guy website resources page. Obviously, this means that I know of 80+ links that are pretty cool. But Patch won’t give me enough space to write about all 80+, so I am forced to go with my Job Guy Top Five. …

The Mansfield High School track team starts competing next week; I am clued into this by the growing number of kids in shorts running endless loops around the cul-de-sac as I chase windblown oak leaves across my front yard. Maybe because I have been coaching careers since before some of these young athletes were born, I tend to connect everything to some part of job search, but track makes me think of resumes. To be more accurate, track reminds me of obstacle courses that remind me of resumes. It sometimes seems when it comes to resumes that everyone has some problem with something to …

Who cares about LinkedIn and online networking? I do, and you should. But like lots of other people, I didn’t always feel this way. It was Dec. 9,, 2004, at 2:18 p.m., when I finally relented and signed up for LinkedIn. I had been approached to join before, but I was always able to fancy dance or ignore my way out of it. I was certain that this trendy little interface would soon go the way of Pets.com and I would be the wiser for not having wasted time with it. That all came to a screeching halt on that winter day when my boss “suggested” that I accept a LinkedIn invitation from a big-fee job…

Early in my career coaching life, I was charged with the responsibility of presenting weekly job search strategy seminars to groups of executive clients. After a month of doing most of the talking, it occurred to me that these executives were “experts” in their own right. After all, who knows more about what decision-makers want than the decision-makers themselves? So I asked them.   Armed with what is now over 4000 points of view, I have discovered some interesting patterns regarding what works well, and what does not, in a job search. Obviously, no one style or strategy will work perfectly …