Ch. 6

This chapter is about what to do when your job hunting just isn't working.

Bolles begins his chapter with quotes. I find this quote, originally said by Franklin D. Roosevelt, quite inspirational,"It is common sense. To take a method and try it. If it fails, admit it frankly and try another. But above all, try something." When applying for jobs and having interview after interview without luck, it is easy to feel hopeless. Bolles specifically says 3 times to "never give up." You need to not try harder, but find a different strategy to work with. Maybe the one you're using just isn't as useful as another way.

There are 2 ways to hunt for a job, the Traditional way and the Parachute way. The Traditional way is the way we've always done it. Put together a resume, get it out there for companies to see, and if someone gets back to you, then that's great it worked! Then there's the Parachute way where you begin with yourself and not the job-market. Once you realize what you love to do, you must approach the organizations that match that. Except you must approach through what they call a bridge person. Someone who knows them who also knows you to put in a good word for you. So really, when Bolles says you should use a different strategy when one fails, the Parachute way is the other strategy to try.

The last half of the chapter gives a list of the best and worst ways to look for a job. Some of them are using strategies from the Traditional way, and normally don't work. Some of them are pretty successful most of the time. As he goes through his list, he gives percentages of how often that method works when job-hunting. 11 of those approaches work at a range from 5%-70%. The last (but not least) approach is the Parachute way, which is proven to work 86% of the time!