Put the Googles to Work Finding Job Openings
Yesterday we shared how to utilize Westlaw to search for jobs with federal agencies. Today we wanted to highlight another job searching suggestion from the AvidCareerist Blog: set up Google Alerts to search for jobs as part of your on-line strategy.
My job search clients and I use Google Alerts, in addition to job boards, to find job openings on-line. Alerts pull more openings than the major boards, they pick up openings from Craigslist, and they help my clients find niche job boards for additional feeds.
“What’s a Google Alert and how do I set one up?” you ask. See here.
The AvidCareerist in her blog uses the job title example of a “contract recruiter” — how can you translate this to looking for public interest legal positions?
Let’s say you are looking for a staff attorney position at a nonprofit, you could set up the following alert: {“staff attorney”} {litigate AND research} {“staff attorney” AND apply}. What if you want to restrict this to search for ONLY jobs in California, then: {“staff attorney”} {litigate AND research} {“staff attorney” AND apply AND california}.
If you are interested in a particular practice area, for example civil rights, you could set up an alert tailored to that preference: {“attorney”} AND {“attorney” and apply or submit} AND {“civil rights”}. You can also set up alerts to search for new opportunities at specific organizations, for example: {“attorney”} AND {“attorney” and apply or submit} AND {“U.S. Department of Education”}. To set up your personalized google job alerts go here.
A note of caution from the AvidCareerist:
However, put a strict limit on the amount of time you spend using alerts and feeds to find and respond to job openings. Why? First, as mentioned above, you will only find a tiny portion of the available openings using these tactics. Second, these are the easiest openings to find. Thus, you will have a lot of competition from other job seekers. I suggest that you spend no more than 30 minutes a day building feeds and alerts and responding to postings. How do you that? Only respond to postings that you are well qualified for.
Want more job search resources? Visit PSLawNet’s Career Central.
