December 1999 Column
AIRS
I – FIND RESUMES
I
was recently lucky enough to be an attendee at an AIRS seminar in St. Louis. For
those of you that have not heard of AIRS, they are currently, in my humble
opinion, the standard and benchmark in Internet Recruiting Training. Until AIRS,
there wasn’t much recruiting of ‘passive candidates’. No one knew there
were passive candidates on the Internet. If your target didn’t answer an ad or
post his resume to a career site, you didn’t normally find him. My day was
filled with invaluable training I know I will make extensive use of in my
day-to-day candidate sourcing duties. They took me, step-by-step, through their
methods, tools and techniques to find resumes on the Internet and I will do my
best to impart some of that to you. It would not be fair of me to divulge all of
their secrets in the context of this article so I will write more on their
approach and their subject matter than on specific search technology.
I
must start with their articulate, energetic, and knowledgeable trainer, Candice
Wright. She says she is one of five AIRS trainers that travel the countryside
preaching the AIRS gospel. You can tell Candice loves her job as she had a smile
on her face all day long. She presented a lot of information to us, answered all
of our questions and kept up the pace all day. It was a great presentation that
combined a prepared slide show with live Internet resume search activity.
She
started by having us introduce ourselves. We were a cozy group of eleven and
what I found interesting was that there was one retained search firm represented
and three MIS/IT placement/consulting firms represented (including myself). The
rest of the group was representing large employers in the area – our clients.
Draw your own conclusions.
I
have to add… I liked the fact that all of the web resources we explored that
day were free to the public. AIRS training is not inexpensive but once you get
past the price of admission, there is little cost from there to take advantage
of all their good advice. I could easily see the technology used here to allow
some agencies to rid themselves of some of the expensive resume services that
many of us belong to. I also liked the fact that I did not have to take a lot of
notes, not a strong point of mine. Each attendee was supplied with a packet of
hard-copy information allowing us to follow along with the prepared portions of
the presentation.
Organize.
After
a quick AIRS I overview, she dove right into desktop organization, a subject
very important to the AIRS people and a subject very dear to my heart as well.
What good is all this information if we don’t save it or can’t find it when
we need it? They don’t just talk about it – the don’t just tell you how to
do it - they do most of it for you by providing all their alumni with the
AIRSWare Browser, an software product that integrates with both Internet
Explorer and Netscape browsers. Once installed, you will see a new AIRS toolbar
in your browser. Using this toolbar, you are able to save and organize all of
your collections of search engines, search strings, candidates (resumes), custom
forms, job reqs (for keyword research), bookmarks, internet tools, meta tools,
important links, alumni services, and reference materials that you will need in
order to effectively use all of the AIRS training. You can also create new
folders within the AIRS folders to organize your desktop the way you want it.
They have designed this product to go hand-in-hand with their training and would
be welcomed by any recruiter using their methods and techniques.
Keywords
- building blocks of search strings.
I
never thought much about the importance of keywords as I always thought I knew
all about them. A rude awakening for me to find out I had a lot to learn, and
still do. I used to open up the search engine, type in a few simple keywords,
hit the GO button and then sift through the first 50 or so responses from what
are normally thousands of hits. I found out how to narrow my search parameters -
how to do Internet research on my job orders in order to produce the perfect
search string. A technique that results in far fewer results but little wasted
time. One of the most important things I learned today was that with the proper
combination of keywords and Boolean operators and modifiers, and using the
proper syntax specific to the search engine you are using, you zero in on your
target and actually get what you ask for.
AIRS
claims, and I tend to agree, there are 20+ million resumes out on the Internet
spread around hundreds of career sites, resume banks, college alumni sites,
newsgroups, virtual communities, ISP servers and online services. Most of these
people are either passive job seekers or not seeking employment at all. AIRS
teaches you how to research these sites and extract resumes from places you
would not even think to look. Seems like their R&D department has been very
busy ferreting out hidden resume repositories on the Internet. They touched on
pay sites, noting that OCC (now Monster), the first career site on the WWW first
was started in 1995, less than five years ago. Talk about a growing industry. It
was pointed out that many of the resumes we download from our expensive pay
services were originally posted on newsgroups and free sites, then re-sold to us
unsuspecting recruiters. Also pointed out was that only a fraction of available
candidates would even think about posting their resume on a career site for all
to see. All the more reason to you – the recruiter – to be proactive in your
search, rather than waiting around for the right candidate to post his or her
resume on some career site. We were introduced to Deja.Com, a free service that
we have previously written about in this column. We were taught the difference
between resume groups and discussion groups, and how to find resumes in each.
You are also taught how to use the Deja Tracker, which notifies you of new
results matching your search criteria.
GeoCities is one we learned about. This enormous gathering
place for Internet denizens, when searched for resumes yields thousands of hits.
We learned all about finding resumes on GeoCities. We learned how to use
Boardwatch to identify ISP’s (Internet Service Providers) in our geographic
area, then search those ISP’s for resumes. We were taught how to search the
ISP’s for resumes with Snap.Com’s power search option. College Recruiting?
Even if you don’t place entry-level, most colleges and universities maintain
an alumni service, many of which have resumes posted. Try it.
Engines
vs. Directories – what to search?
Answer
is… both. They use Yahoo as an example of an enormous, very popular directory
(one of THE most popular sites on the Internet) where you can search thousands
of resumes. Within a few minutes of sitting down at the PC, and using the proper
search syntax to zero in on your target, you could walk away with a couple of
solid leads to contact. Directories differ from engines in that a resume must be
‘posted’ to the directory, missing some of the more passive candidates.
I
soaked this up like a sponge. Candice said at one point that one of the most
important skills to have to successfully find resumes on the Internet was to
learn proper search syntax. A BIG part of developing that skill is becoming an
expert on Boolean logic. Honestly, not very hard but a must-do. There are only
four operators: AND, OR, NOT, and sometimes NEAR and three modifiers: “
” (quote marks for phrases), ( )
(parenthesis for subsets), and * (asterisks for wildcards). I also learned that
different search engines required different search syntax. For example, some
require use of the plus sign, +, instead of the AND operator. We were taught how
to weed out non-resumes from our search results by using the AND NOT operators
– you’ll love it. Although not supported by all engines, the NEAR operator
can be indispensable when searching for a combination of two common words. For
example: instead of searching for Programmer AND Analyst, which would result in
too many hits, you search for Programmer NEAR Analyst and not only do you pare
the result list considerably but the likelihood of your results containing
Programmer/Analyst are greatly enhanced.
Recommended
sites.
We
wrapped up the afternoon by reviewing a number of recommended Internet sites
(live on the Internet), ones that contain resumes for us to search including
AltaVista, Infoseek, Snap, Northern Lights and were taught how to locate resumes
on all. Also included was searching for resumes using Meta Search Tools, a
category of search tools that allows you to search a number of sites
simultaneously.
Alumni
services.
They
don’t just take your money, train you and run. AIRS offers alumni follow-up
services and assistance. You can participate in live, Internet-based discussion
groups with AIRS trainers or log onto the chat archives and search for
discussions on topics important to you. Additionally, I am told that personal
attention is given to their alumni through toll-free customer support and a help
desk (email support) as well.
AIRS
Internet site.
Something
for everyone. This is a must-visit site (http://www.airsdirectory.com)
whether you have taken the AIRS training or not. On this site your will find
countless links to Career Sites, Company Profiles, Discussion Groups, Free
Resumes, Industry Resources, International Resources, Lookups, Meta Search
Tools, News Index, Robots, Search Engines, etc., etc., etc.
You
can also sign up for a daily news feed for recruiters, free of charge. The feed
includes AIRS Layoff Report, RecruitNews, RealTools, NetNews, and AIRS Mergers
& Acquisitions/ IPO Report. You can pick the specific topic days you want to
receive. Send an email to news@airsdirectory.com
indicating subscribe in the header.
Each
participant is given a CD-ROM containing a number of helpful software products.
These are mostly trial or lite versions of third party, Internet-related
software products AIRS recommends. The first to be mentioned and the most highly
recommended is the AltaVista Personal Indexer. This product works in conjunction
with the AIRSWare Browser mentioned above to index your personal Candidates
Folder in order to perform your searches more quickly. Other products of note
available on the CD include Campaign by Arial Software (bulk emailer),
Newsmonger by TechSmith (search engine for newsgroups), Ferrets by Ferretsoft
and Mata Hari by WebTools (meta search tools), Eudora, Alexa, PKZip, Adobe and
others.
R&D
Department
Last
but not least to mention is their full time research department that provides
all the backup for the AIRS website, providing research for the AIRS Search
Guides, researching changes in search engines and dealing directly with the
trainers regarding newly discovered issues pertaining to Internet recruiting.
Pricing
I
contacted Tim McKegney, Director of Sales, regarding their pricing. He stated
the charge for AIRS I or AIRS II is $995.00 with a $50.00 discount given if paid
by credit card for a net price of $945. When both are taken together (they are
normally offered on consecutive days), the charge is $1890.00 with a $100.00
discount given if paid by credit card for a net price of $1790.00. You can reach
Tim directly with any questions or comments by telephone at 800/466-4010 or via
email at tmckegney@airsdirectory.com
Sign
up and sign up now.
Post-Conclusion
Within
a few hours of receiving this training I was in my home office trying out their
ideas. I wanted to locate the resumes of Visual Basic programmers in the St.
Louis area, not an exact science. Applying my new knowledge, I constructed the
following search string: (url:resume OR title:resume)
AND (missouri OR MO) AND (314 OR 636) AND “visual basic”. I then went
to the free Internet search engine, AltaVista, and chose their Advanced Search
option, pasted my search string into the proper box and before I knew it I was
in possession of several St. Louis candidates new to me and my firm. Are they
all VB experts? No – but they all had Visual Basic on their resume, they were
all expert in something we could use and they were all from the St. Louis area.
We will call them all. The entire project took about three minutes. There was
virtually zero time wasted in culling useless resumes from my search results.
I
then went to power search option on Snap.Com, one of the recommended search
engines, typed in domain:brick.net (my local ISP) and then required the use of
the word “resume”. Got two resumes, one of which was an outstanding local
web programmer. A keeper.
I
also found out these skills could be applied to non-recruiting areas as well. My
six-year-old son and I decided that we needed a Pokemon checklist. (for those of
you who do not know what Pokemon is – don’t ask). Went to the AltaVista
search engine and first typed in – pokemon AND checklist – and were
presented with a disappointing list of prospects. Then typed in “pokemon
checklist” and received three perfect hits.
Unfortunately,
I was only able to attend AIRS I this go around. AIRS II promises to teach you
how to find people, not resumes. Hopefully early next year – can’t wait.
Tip
of the month
When
searching communities using key words, some of the hits don't look like they fit
at first glance. For example, a
simple search on Geocities.com for telecom engineers with BGP experience (resume
+bgp) yielded about 250 hits. One
of the hits was:
80.
Remember: The Lost History of Star Trek - Franz Joseph
by
Greg Tyler Contents Exclusive 1999 interview with Karen Dick, Franz Joseph's
daughter Paul Newitt's 1982 interview with Franz Joseph Gallery of Franz Joseph
artwork Karen Dick's chronology of the Franz Joseph's interactions with Gene
Roddenberry. 95% 7390 bytes, 1999/09/10
http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Stargate/9081/rememberfj.html
Go
to the command line in your browser (top of browser page) and see the url
http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Stargate/9081/rememberfj.html
Place
your cursor on the end of the url and highlight "rememberfj.html" and
hit the delete key. This makes the
url look like:
http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Stargate/9081/
Then
hit the enter key. This is called
"peeling back" a url.
What
you will learn is that the home page address is the 4 digit number in the url on
Geocities. It is a great place to
go when the hit on your search doesn't make perfect sense.
In this case, it produced the resume of a technical candidate who happens
to enjoy Star Trek and had the following skills:
Visual
Basic, C, C++, SQL, Ada, IBM assembly language, COBOL, Basic, G/LabVIEW, Matlab,
LabWindows/CVI
We’ll
take it.