How do I know if I will like the new job?
In this economy, you really want to be sure, right? You really want a job you can enjoy. One you will like getting up each morning to go to work and spend eight or more hours of your day.
How do you make sure you will like the new job?
The time to figure this out is before you are hired. Crazy concept, huh?
Ok, here are some steps to help make sure you like the new job:
- Do your homework on the company first. How?
- Check out the company website and review what the product lines or services offered are.
- Check out the company on LinkedIn. You can see who on LinkedIn is employed with the company and see many aspects about the company. See Greenheck Fan Corporation, a prominent manufacturing firm in Wausau on LinkedIn here. You can learn who in your network is part of the company. Greenheck has a careers page on LinkedIn with current job postings and a section called “What our employees are saying.”
- Check out financial records. If a company is publicly traded, it often has a bio page on CNN or other financial websites. For example, MMM is 3M’s New York Stock Exchange listing ID. By going to MMM site on CNN Money, I can get links to the latest press releases, today’s trading, growth and valuation information, competitors, financials such as last year’s annual revenue, and more.
- Do a Google search to see random information. If there is any breaking news on the company, it will turn up and you can also see if there are consumer or other complaints or even potential lawsuits.
- Conduct informational interviewing. Perhaps you already know people who work there. Take them out to coffee or lunch. Your LinkedIn company research may have also turned up some connections you didn’t know about or some people you know who are connected to others who work there.
- Attend professional organization meetings. If you are an Engineer, you might start going to the meetings for the Professional Engineering group. You can gather more information from people who work at the firm you are targeting from talking to others in the industry, some may work there and some may just work with others who do work there. Industry knowledge is always a good place to start.
Perhaps these examples have helped you think of even more ways to find out more information about a company so that when you are ready to make the move, it will be a good fit for you and the company.
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Hi Julie –
Great info!! Another resource for company research is Glassdoor.com (http://www.glassdoor.com/index.htm)
With all the resources at our fingertips, it’s much easier to conduct pre-interview / pre-employment research. And make educated career decisions.
Thanks for the wonderful guidance on determining fit.
Good point, Dawn. I need to explore Glassdoor.com more. I have been there to read Jacqui’s articles but business has kept me hopping this year.
These are great resources, Julie!
I have used Glassdoor.com with clients — it provides a lot of information, particularly for the bigger companies. There is some discrepancy among the ratings, so it’s good to go in with the mindset of YMMV. Reading all the different perspectives helps a client to not go into a situation with rose-colored glasses.
Melissa, thanks for the great pointers!