Tips to find IT jobs on job boards?

Hey guys,

Currently I do desktop support/Jr. Exchange work. My current job pays me crap worst yet they just hired two people from the outside to be the Exchange admins. Seems like management has a hard time recognizing the talent that they have ...

I've been having a difficult time finding relevant jobs with the keyword I use. Perhaps because I just started job searching before the holidays. I'm not looking for anything in a particular field of IT, I just want admin jobs aka Level 3.

This might seem like a dumb question but what keywords do you guys use on job boards?

Currently I use the following:

Information Security
Systems Analyst
Systems Administrator
Systems Engineer
Network Engineer
Network Administrator
Vmware
Microsoft Exchange

Also:

I'm currently only using indeed as all the other job board listing end up there. I'm avoiding recruiter posts as they are always BS.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated since hiring season is looming.

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Comments

Success101

Those seem like good choices. How do you know hiring season is looming?

Tom Servo

I've found the sometimes the best keywords to look for are the certs you have, or the certs I'd like to have. Looking for info sec? Cissp, security+. Networking? Ccna, ccnp. Windows Sys admin? Mcse, mcsa.

-hype

Success101 wrote: »

Those seem like good choices. How do you know hiring season is looming?

Well I imagine since the holidays are over, new year - people retiring, new budgets, economy picking up... Just an assumption.

olaHalo

I usually just search by certification. Then by job title. And search the Systems section of CL.
But in my area there are not very many jobs so its not hard to find them.

dpsmooth15

Not trying to conduct steal the shine off the OP's Question. ..But Sir/Ma/am Personally I had a "similar" problem, I put in certification/s and received way more pages. That is just me… and it was a great idea

Danielm7

From my searching a lot of the posts are from recruiters, if you cut them all out that really narrows down your options a lot. You might find some flaky recruiters but I wouldn't count them all out on specific jobs.

FloOz

What job sites are you looking at? I recommend indeed, monster, careerbuilder, dice, linkedin, and glassdoor. I use all of them when I am job hunting.

tier~

In addition to the titles and certs, try to search for the particular systems or software you'd like to be working with... ie. Exchange, Active Directory, CentOS, etc.

If you're in the Philly area you shouldn't have much difficulty getting results on titles/certs alone. I'm about 1.5 hours northwest of Philly but typically use Reading/Hamburg as my search area so I can grab Allentown jobs too. If I stretch the search range to 50 miles the results always increase exponentially by picking up everything from KoP to Philly at least on Indeed anyway.

DoubleNNs

Yes, MOST sites end up on Indeed, since Indeed is an aggregate search engine. Still, I think you're doign yourself a disservice by only using it. Sometimes Indeed simply doesn't pick up certain job ads, for whatever reason. On top of that, it doesn't search ALL job ad sites, just a few.
Broaden your job search sites used.

Additionally, in today's economy recruiters seem almost unavoidable for an extensive/expansive job search. Refusing to work w/ recruiters at all limits your options HEAVILY. A lot of recruiters do suck, but that's why it's so important to create positive relationships when you find the good ones. (Something I'm regrettably learning now.)

Still, a great method I found is to look at the job ad sites that are up and find keywords that are commonly used. Then regurgitate those keywords in your searches. You need to know how employers advertise their jobs in order to know how to find them.

Good luck.

Danielm7

DoubleNNs wrote: »

Additionally, in today's economy recruiters seem almost unavoidable for an extensive/expansive job search. Refusing to work w/ recruiters at all limits your options HEAVILY. A lot of recruiters do suck, but that's why it's so important to create positive relationships when you find the good ones. (Something I'm regrettably learning now.)

I haven't actually had success through a recruiter yet but I really just started looking. One other positive I've found with the ones I've talked to is they were able to tell me the actual salary range of a job that was offered while getting that info out of a company directly seems next to impossible. That way at least you know if it's worth going after or if you'll go through calls and interviews only to find out the offer is less than you are even currently making.

Nutsacjac

Get on LinkedIn. Update your profile. Watch the job offers roll in.

It worked for me!

DoubleNNs

I don't know what I'm doing wrong w/ LinkedIn. I never get any job opportunities from there.

Danielm7

Nutsacjac wrote: »

Get on LinkedIn. Update your profile. Watch the job offers roll in.

It worked for me!

Any tricks to this? I mean I have my certs there, mcp, old mcse, ccna, ccna sec, A+, S+ and a bunch of experience. I haven't heard a thing on linkedin. Need to add recruiters to your connections or something? Maybe a setting I'm missing?

tier~

I can echo those same sentiments. I get nothing from Linkedin. Perhaps my profile just sucks. In general though, I'm happy to avoid recruiter spam.

miroa12004

I also echo the same sentiments regarding LinkedIn, even upgraded my membership for a month and nothing came out of it so far.

instant000

Don't upgrade your profile. That's a waste of time.

The recruiters can see your profile, anyway.

What is more sensible is rewriting your profile, trying out new things, or something. Say something in your LinkedIn profile that you don't have space for in your resume.

If you're having an issue with profile visibility, then I recommend connecting to everyone you can find in your geographic area that shares your career interest. A lot of people will be willing to help, if they know you're looking. I contacted one guy, and he gave me all the goods about needs in his company, and even gave me the hiring manager's contact information.

Also, if you can join local meetups, those can be helpful, too. Find a group on there you're interested in, and post in it. Just avoid advertising too much, if you can help it.

One strategy, if you're targeting a particular employer, is look up the people who currently work there, they may be in a group you're interested in, and sometimes people allow other group members to connect with no fuss. There's people on there like JDMurray, who'll connect with anybody, for the purpose of helping others connect. Take advantage of those, but also try to find people in your career area of interest, and really connect with them. Especially connect with people in your geographic area.

People can be more helpful than you could have ever realized.

Hope this helps!

-hype

I'll start searching other boards as well, searching for certs didn't help much at least on indeed.

I'll go ahead and create a linked in profile.

The reason I avoid recruiters is because they usually give out BS salary ranges and BS jobs like with Robert Half - Network Admin 60k - 100k. Or LOL, PhillyPros or Teksystems - Help Desk/Desktop Support Specialist 60k-75k (like that would ever happen!)

I actually went to Robert Half and they wanted to give me a contract for 2 months; scanning inventory for 10$ an hour back when I had my MCITP, I laughed and kindly told them to F%%k off.

Other recruiters don't even have a job, they just want your contact information. The three interviews I've gotten in the past were all from direct applies through the company's website. That's why I thought I'd follow that same approach again.

Danielm7

-hype, I'm not too far from your location so we've probably seen some similar ads. I had a contact from a recruiter yesterday. A month ago I had sent my resume for a security position he had posted. He had replied that he wasn't even sure if the position was open anymore, then didn't reply back after 4 weeks. Then yesterday out of the blue he emails me and calls me sounding really urgent saying he needs to talk about it. I emailed him saying it's hard for me to talk at work can he just email the info over, he replies right back saying he only needs 5 mins and can I call him now... My boss had just stepped out for something so I grabbed my phone and called and he's like... oh hey, so yeah, that position isn't available anymore but I wanted to see if you wanted to be a SQL developer? I noticed you had SQL server written on your resume somewhere (that I had admined them years ago)... oh you aren't a SQL dev, do you want to be one??

devils_haircut

It's important to be careful when working with recruiters, because some of them are only out there to protect their job and couldn't care less if they get you hired for anything.

HOWEVER...

My recruiter, and a handful of others, have approached me numerous times with jobs that are a close fit to my skills that are also not posted anywhere publicly. So the only way I would have found out about the job was from talking to them. I believe it's called the "hidden job market", and it's a good enough reason to keep in contact with the recruiters who are the least scummy.

kohr-ah

devils_haircut wrote: »

My recruiter, and a handful of others, have approached me numerous times with jobs that are a close fit to my skills that are also not posted anywhere publicly. So the only way I would have found out about the job was from talking to them. I believe it's called the "hidden job market", and it's a good enough reason to keep in contact with the recruiters who are the least scummy.

This is my current case. I had a recruiter call me (like most people I don't like them either) but when he called he already knew my resume, had a position lined up, and made sure it is what I wanted (all network engineer and project work)

I searched for the job online and the company didn't have it posted, I didn't find it with other recruiters, I went for it and while it is currently contract to hire it pays 10k more than my last job and so far has been the best job I've ever had in networking.

So from this I've learned to give them a shot but I filter them heavily on how they first present themselves to me. (if you call and say I can help you find work, no thank you. If you call and job positions in mind and can tell me about my resume, we will talk)

roch_greg

The op might be on to something as hiring does usually pick up at the beginning of the year for the reasons stated. I agree with the others when they say your cutting yourself short by not working with recruiters.

Not all companies go out and actively recruit, they use agencies. That being said, are there some bad ones out there, absolutely. Part of learning how the game is played is to know what works for you and what doesn't.

I get some recruiters that call me and I can tell that they've read my resume and matched it with a open position they have with a client. Good, let's talk.

Then again I get calls from other recruiters offering me a position that I can tell they are just looking to get someone in there. That is they haven't read my resume. I thank them for their time and tell them I'm not interested.

Hey everyone's gotta earn a living right? Most important thing is not to burn any bridges. Forming relationships with people who can find you work is the best way to find work. A good recruiter is more likely to know where the jobs are than we will be. Absent knowing someone on the inside of a lot of different companies.

-hype

Thanks for the info guys. I had the day off and been applying all day. Hopefully I hear something soon.