Staying ahead of the pack

By JJ LEVINE
Finding a job is rarely a piece of cake, but workers in the hi-tech field have gotten used to being the object of desire for companies willing to put up impressive salary and benefit plans to get the best workers. With the ongoing global crisis, however, the story has become very different, and hi-tech workers looking for a job will need to use all the resources available to them just to get interviewed for a position. Daniella Slasky of Nefesh B'nefesh says she recommends that new olim who are seeking a job make the best of their spare time by learning Hebrew, for example, and networking with people who might be able to lead them to a job. Indeed, one field that seems to actually be growing as a result of the worldwide slump is Internet social networking, with sites such as Facebook and LinkedIn becoming primary tools in today's job search. Jacob Share is the founder of Jobmob.co.il, a free site with a blog, as well as plenty of handy links and FAQs to help guide the process of finding a job. "Job seekers these days are updating their resumes, browsing online job listings and going to job fairs," says Share. "In the past few years, more people have begun to leverage social networks such as LinkedIn as a way to get attention to their online resume and find so-called 'hidden jobs' that are never advertised anywhere." Jacob Richman, who has been helping job-seekers in Israel for years, says one tip for finding a job is to keep a close watch on Internet financial news sites. "Follow these sites religiously. If you see one company that has just won a contract, you know it will be needing workers. You should immediately send a resume with a cover letter referring to the recent news. These companies receive dozens of resumes, so you have to make sure yours stands out." Richman says that in addition to working assiduously on maintaining contacts on social networking sites, it's a good idea for a laid-off worker with time on his hands to continue attending conferences and going to job fairs. "We've been here before, and we will eventually come back up. This round is especially bad, with companies laying off that haven't done so in years. But the world uses computers to run it, and to do that it needs software programmers," says Richman.