Well here it is, still in draft phase, but hopefully the start of something good. The idea here is for all of us to participate and help each other in our job search, through sharing our contacts in various industries and profession levels. We may want to be a bit selective in who we refer understandably, but keep in mind we're all here because we're out of work or looking for better work. That said, we all should be willing to help our fellow colleague, in the hopes that they or someone they know can help us, over time as we all continue to get through this.
THIS IS NOT A JOB BANK! Unless you know of something specific WITH a contact person or sure of something going on, we will not post job alerts, postings or whatever. You have other sources for that. This is to get people/personal contacts that we can directly contact to ask about opportunities at companies for jobs we would not otherwise have known about without you & your contacts. Same goes the other way.
THIS IS NOT A CONTACT MINE! You had to provide at least one contact to get to this site. That was to provide equal access to you and others and their contacts. NOTE: those who abuse, or take advantage of colleague contacts in any way (such as not sharing after being helped, providing false info, or other non-cooperation) will be blocked from the site and denied access forever.
THIS IS TO IMPROVE OUR NETWORK! We've heard enough seminars about making networking contacts. We have over 300 people in Gainfully Unemployed, with about 30-40 people regularly doing something with the group or writing some comment on the webpage. We have people who have come & gone and may come back again. Therefore all of us are out there in the world, have made some contacts, and can share a few of them with others of us who (like you) are trying to get a better economic situation. You wanna build networking skills? Why not start with each other?
THIS IS A JOB LEAD REFERRAL SITE! And let's for the forseeable future keep it that way. Most of us are not finding jobs in our fields because the jobs have dried up. Sending resumes to job postings all day ain't gonna do it, folks ~ we need to find those secret passageways called "who-knows-who". Among the 300 of us who are in this group, even 20 percent participation would yield 60 names of job contacts.
THIS IS ALSO NOT A PHONE DIRECTORY! Understandably large corporations have contacts far away in other big cities and lots of infrastructure. I have that problem with places I have worked, or the people are no longer there. You don't really need those contacts because they can't help you. But you may have a name of someone who's been around in that big company who is willing to take resumes and get it in front of someone if they can. That's someone we want. Names of people who are powerless, who are out of the loop, who are no longer there are useless to us and unfair to give out. Confirm your sources that the person is still there, if not if another name is there we can contact or if neither if the person went somewhere else. If you know someone on the inside (a friend you worked with), that is often better than any HR person's name you can give. We encourage those!
THIS IS A PATHWAY TO FINDING JOBS IN OUR FIELDS OR ALTERNATIVE JOBS WE CAN QUALIFY AND/OR TRANSFER OUR SKILLS TO. So go ahead and start adding names to the list.
