Job Search Lesson 8 – using LinkedIn to find contacts to interview

LinkedIn is an excellent tool for identifying people to have an informational interview with. I know that when I was searching for contacts, I used the Advanced People Search tool extensively.

I began by searching for contacts in my network with the specific job title (including any derivatives) that I was interested in. For example, when I wanted to work in Brand Management, I searched for “Brand Manager” OR “Brand Management” OR “Marketing Manager”. Note: using the quotation marks around words returns that exact phrase. Using the OR operator, returns results with any of the items you listed (as opposed to ALL of the items you listed).

Job Search Lesson 7 - who to target for informational interviews

In my earlier post on the topic, I recommended that you first conduct informational interviews with friends of yours who work in the field that you’re interested in. If you ask the right questions and do the right follow-up, you should be able to tee up informational interviews with your friends-of-friends… then their friends...and so on.

But who else should you target for informational interviews?

Here’s a brief list of people I reached out to when I was looking to change careers… feel free to suggest others!

People to target for informational interviews

• Friends
• Friends of friends

Job Search Lesson 6 – keep track of your networking activities

As you conduct informational interviews and network to uncover unadvertised roles, I recommend that you develop a system for keeping track of your networking activities.

I approached this by taking notes just after I’d completed an informational interview while the material was still fresh in my mind. I then populated a table much like the one below. 

That way I always knew when I’d met with someone, what I’d taken away from the meeting, who had introduced me to them and whether I had done the appropriate post-informational interview follow-up.

Job Search Lesson 5 – post-informational interview follow-up

Step 1 - Within 24 hours of your informational interview send a thank-you email to your contact. Not only does this show the appropriate amount of appreciation for the time and expertise they provided, but it’s also a useful reminder for them to put you in touch with their contacts.

Here’s how I might word the thank-you note:

Subject line

Thanks for your time