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Education & Healthcare Careers

From news reports and career tracking journals, educational and health-maintenance institutions presumably provide thousands of jobs every year.  Often times, universities and hospitals can be some of the largest employers in a state, and to give you a general idea of just how many people these institutions routinely employ, I've provided some data produced by InfoUSA and also accessed on the web at www.acinet.org.

If you've taken a moment to review the data, you can clearly see that learning centers and hospitals are ranked amongst the top twenty largest employers for the states of New York and Michigan, which I also found to be the case for many other U.S. states.  Because these institutions are some of the country's largest employers, they are usually great places for jobseekers to begin their career searches.  Not only do universities and hospitals add newly created positions to their job rosters yearly but they also regularly need to fill expired positions because of employees exiting due to health reasons, retirement, death, relocation to other states, resignation from jobs and employer-forced terminations.  Many of these job openings are listed with newspapers but they can also be uncovered directly from the institution's website where jobseekers can also apply for these same jobs online.

Several former jobseekers that I had the good pleasure of working with told me about their fast success at landing jobs with hospitals by posting their resumes with the hospital's online resume submission network and also by sending in a paper copy of their resume to the institution's human resources department.  They chose to submit their resumes through two separate channels for a good reason.  They decided if the online application system wasn't rigorously maintained and resumes were allowed to collect profusely with little or no follow up after submission of resumes, then hopefully the hard copies mailed in to their human resources departments would produce better results.  Fortunately, their extra steps proved beneficial.  Both former job hunters landed jobs within one month of submitting their resumes to the institution's human resources department.

College's Career Services Office

If you're still in school or a recent college graduate don't neglect to research part-time and full-time job opportunities at your college's career placement office.  Often times employers in your area will post job openings with your school's career services center.  Some colleges where the commitment to provide jobs to both current and former students is high and also where there is a strong relationship with the business community, there may be more jobs routinely posted at these centers.  Since jobs at the career center can be introduced weekly or bimonthly, you should check back often for new entries.

Career Fairs

Try connecting with employers through career fairs.  Some useful resources to uncover job fair dates, locations, list of employers attending particular career fairs can be gathered at the following sites:  Women For Hire, Hire Quest, Carousel Expo and PSI Job Fair. 

If you're specifically looking to find out about job expos or career fairs in your particular region of the country, then visit your local newspaper's website (preferably a major paper servicing your region).  From their home page, look for links like "jobs" or "careers."  Click on a link and it'll take you straight to the paper's job listings.  You'll notice that many of the best newspaper sites will not only provide you with current job postings but will also provide a list of upcoming career fairs in your area.  Make sure to mark the dates and locations of the job fairs on your calendar.  If you're still without a job as the fairs get closer, make sure you get up early those mornings and go meet your potential new employers.  Make sure to dress professionally and always bring copies of your resume (at least 15-20 copies) with you.

Ask Around

Another way to locate jobs is by simply asking around.  Make sure to ask friends or family members if they know of job openings about to be announced with their employers.  Call up or write different companies in your area and ask if they are actively hiring or currently accepting applications.  You should never take for granted that companies will automatically post their job openings in newspapers.  Many jobseekers walk away with promising jobs that never even hit the papers or popular job sites so make sure you don't just rely on these two sources when conducting your job search.

Job Placement Agencies

Test out the services of temporary or job placement agencies in your area.  Keep in mind that some are better in producing results than others.  Some simply collect your resume to add to their already bloated resume database so they can proudly boast to employers of their huge candidate selection pools.  However, there are some really good job placement agencies around that really do help to team jobseekers up with exciting jobs and good employers.  As a matter of fact, years ago before getting involved in recruitment myself and looking for work to supplement my increasing college expenses, I found a cool job through the assistance of a private employment agency.  I even have a friend who recently landed a great job through the help of a state-funded staffing agency. 

So what's my closing words to you as I look to end this article?  It's simple.  Try everything out there.  Don't close your mind to temp or job placement agencies until you've given a few of them a try.  Don't close your mind to the possibilities of uncovering job leads through family and friends until you've tried this route as well.  Keep your mind open to roads not ventured before.  Don't stubbornly stick to just one or two means for investigating job openings unless you're willing to risk the grave chance of still looking for work in 2005 when next year's college graduates are eager to compete with you for the small pool of jobs available then.

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This article is © 2004 by Tracy P. Miller and may not be reposted without written permission from the author and may not be reprinted for profit.