RESOURCEFULNESS IN SEEKING OPENINGS

Knowing which vocations we might best explore, we next need to seek openings. Imagination can help a lot in such quests, as it did in the case of the young Clevelander who read a "blind" advertisement of just the newspaper job he wanted. The ad stated only that the opening was in Ohio. He realized that there would be hordes of applicants, and he determined to stand out from the mass. So he secured the names of the managing editors of all the dailies in the state, and wrote letters to each of them. He hit the right man at the right time and landed the job. Tow other editors also made him offers.
In writing letters of application we should see ourselves through the eyes of the person addressed. Since nobody wants a slovenly employee, even our spelling is important. A member of the Procter and Gamble personnel department analyzed 500 letters from applicants and found that 82 percent of them were marred by misspellings.
Instead of individuals' letters, a job-seeking broadside may be indicated. Robert A. Canyock, about to graduate from Syracuse University, sought a career near his home town. To a list of 170 possible employers, he mailed a folder which was so persuasive that it brought him 32 invitations or interviews. Likewise, Leon Turner, while still a student at Saint Louis University, Created a photo-offset brochure which he mailed to 58 companies. A dozen of them replied that they had openings of the kind he was seeking.
A job-seeking interview calls for creative thinking in advance. In planning our strategy we should ask our selves all kinds of questions, including plenty of "What-if?" for the better we foresee contingencies, the better we can meet them. Thus prepared we can more readily answer questions which otherwise might cause us to say that wrong thing, or make us seem slow-minded.
It often pays to go idea hunting in advance of an interview. One young friend of mine came back from war eager to get into a different line. He knew almost nothing about the field he wanted to enter, but he did he did know what firm he wanted to join. He feared that his first interview would spell success or failure. So, instead of applying in the routine way, he spent a week calling on customers of his prospective employer.
Within a week he acquired nearly 50 ideas. Then he secured his interview, during which he modestly brought up his 10 best ideas in the form of tentative questions.
His new boss has since told me that my young veteran friend is getting along famously. "I am mighty glad he didn't just ask me for a job in the usual way" said his employer. "I had already made up my mind not to take on any more men. So I would have turned him down if he hadn't show in our first meeting that he was a man who knew how to get ideas. And I'm glad to say that the same ingenuity he used in getting the job is showing up in his work"
Some employers send representatives to colleges in search of promising young men. An undergraduate friend of mine wanted to work for one for one of these firms. So he spent four weekends interviewing the company's dealers and competitive dealers. The visiting representative was amazed to find out how much this young man knew about that business. Thos two are now at work in the same department.
The higher you aim, the more creative your preparation must be. A man who was making over $15,000 a year decided to go after a better job. He picked the company he wanted to join. He subscribed to all the trade papers in that line of business, and bought all the books that bore on that company's problems. On Saturday he called on its dealers. After four months of such preparation, he wrote a short note to the head of the company, enclosed an idea for overcoming dealer indifference, and asked for an interview. His plan was turned down; but the officials were so impressed with his grasp of their problems that they offered him the post he was seeking.



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