As the economic slump spills into 2002, out-of-work IT professionals may have a difficult time finding work if they limit their searches to job Web sites.
According to Drake Beam Morin, a New York-based outplacement consulting firm, only six per cent of company managers found jobs on Internet sites, compared with 61 per cent who found work through networking.
A separate study by CareerXroads, a Kendall Park, N.J.-based consulting firm, uncovered similar results. CareerXroads surveyed nine public companies, which hired a combined total of 63,000 employees last year. Of that total, eight per cent found their jobs through Internet sites, such as Monster.com, while 16 per cent found jobs through the corporate Web sites of the firms that eventually hired them. But 19,500 workers, or roughly one-third of the new hires, found their jobs through employee referrals.
Tom Schlinkert, senior vice-president of core innovations at Drake Beam Morin, said the survey results underscore the importance of networking for job seekers, particularly in the IT industry, where project- and personnel-management skills often set candidates apart from those with only technical skills.
“Corporate America doesn’t appreciate strangers as much as a friendly,” said Tom Schlinkert, a senior vice-president of core innovations at Drake Beam Morin. “We are by human nature more attracted to people that we know and trust than people we don’t.”