How to Identify Free Good Career Advice on the Internet

The internet is overflowing with all kinds of free information. Career advice and career information is no exception. Many jobseekers have a hard time sorting through good career advice versus bad career advice on the Internet. One of the first steps career management professionals usually take when working with new clients is to help them identify which good career advice they have been following and which bad career habits they might have picked up. Many of those bad career habits will come from some bad career advice the jobseeker might have accessed on the Internet.

Not all the career advice you read on the Internet will be obviously wrong at first read. Some of it will be more subtle. Obviously wrong career advice that I have seen on the internet includes – ‘Employers don’t mind a 5-6 page resume.” An example of more subtle bad career advice could be, “if you want to get hired by a certain company, find out where the hiring manager eats lunch and go there to meet him or her.” Although it is legitimate to try and connect with hiring professionals, including hiring managers, through professional association meetings etc, stalking a hiring manager at a lunch counter, could do more harm than good. With some career advice you read from so called professionals, your gut instincts will immediately tell you – this is bogus and proceed with caution.

One of the ways to identify good career advice on the Internet is to use the same Internet to do some research on the source of the career advice. Six ways to research the “career expert” who is giving career advice:

– Ask others for recommendations

– Read recommendations for the career professional online such as through a LinkedIn profile

– Read the tweet timeline on Twitter if they have a twitter account. What kind of advice do they offer? Are they just retweeting inspirational quotes?

– Check out their their career blogs for longevity and current information.

– Look at how someone is connected on the internet. To whom do they link and who links back to them?

– Look closely at what qualifies them to be a career professional. Be careful of the certifications. They are everywhere and sometimes not worth the paper they are printed on!


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