Job counselors: Take what you can get

With a surplus of talented, experienced professionals flooding the job market, some career counselors are giving advice they have never given before: Take what you can get.

And be ready to move.

Unemployment has increasingly been reaching higher into the ranks, and the odds are against a professional who loses a job and wants to replace it with a better one.

So be satisfied not to lose ground, said Lance Coachman, president of EXI Inc., which counsels jobseekers and connects them to companies.

“In the old days, we would never counsel these people to take a lateral move.”

But these are not the old days. The state jobless rate has climbed in a year from 5.9 percent to its highest point ever at 9.7 percent in May, according to figures released Thursday by the state Labor Department, leaving roughly 464,000 Georgians unemployed.

In two decades as an executive recruiter and adviser, Coachman has never seen such weak hiring, he said. “We do have people getting hired, but the offers are lower — people are making lateral moves. We are counseling people to take them.”

Advisers have typically warned professionals against selling themselves short: Don’t limit future choices.

But then again, the choices right now aren’t so good.

Job counselors say the deep applicant pool has created a fierce tussle for attention.

Getting to the top means being persistent, creative and assertive, Coachman said. “I am coaching people to have a really good ‘elevator speech.’ You’ve got, say, 60 seconds to tell someone the benefits of hiring you without being obnoxious.”

It helps to get a critique of your style, suggested Jay Hassell of Suwanee, a coach for 360JobInterview.com who advises jobseekers how to make the best impression.

“Once you get that interview, you’ve got to nail it.”

That perspective for many is new.

As owner of Resumes By Joyce, Joyce Harold is working with a man who owns a local real estate development company that had done lucrative work until the housing market crashed. “Now, he is willing to take anything. He just wants to fulfill his family obligations.”

For many people, the stakes are high and the odds have grown long, she said. “It’s desperation. I don’t think that’s too strong a word.”

Metro Atlanta has for decades been a virtual engine of job growth, soaking up local jobseekers while drawing tens of thousands of newcomers each year. A series of recent announcements — including the high-profile news that NCR will shift its headquarters here — show some companies will keep moving operations here in coming years.

Yet an increasing number of Atlanta professionals have been guided to look elsewhere for their next paycheck.

“They had the realization that they’ve got to uproot the family to get employment,” Harold said.

But not everyone who takes an out-of-town job also takes the family, said Jodie Charlop, who coaches business and career advancement for Potential Matters.

“I have a client who is in Birmingham, her husband is here,” she said. “They’ve got two young kids. He can’t leave because he’s got an equity position [in his company]. She is in a specialized industry. So they are living a 21st-century lifestyle.”

The family needs two incomes. “People are in the mind to do what they need to do to survive and then see,” Charlop said. “Anybody can do anything for about two years. After that, things start to wear.”

To improve their chances, jobseekers must treat the search like a mission, she suggests: They must prepare for interviews, network incessantly, study the employer and look for advocates on the inside of the company.

“You’ve got to be at the top of your game,” Charlop said. “Your story, your interview — everything has to be at its peak. There is no room for error.”