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Open Positions for Sales Professionals

Searching for open positions is a lot like panning for gold; too much effort for little or no reward. Everyone looking for their next position would love to be able to get online or open the newspaper and search a list of open and available opportunities just right for them; offering top salary and a bright future. Unfortunately, there’s no such thing.

If you’re on a quest for the “perfect” position: stop now and learn the facts about focusing your efforts on this smallest niche of the market.

  • Nearly 25 million people look for a new position everyday in America.
  • Over 8 million seekers are unemployed and available on a moment’s notice.
  • Over 90% of job-seekers focus efforts on internet job-sites and newspapers.
  • These sources account for less than 15% of all available positions on any given day.
  • Recent studies conclude 50-90% of listed positions are already filled or posted only for compliance reasons.
  • According to a February 2004 survey by Career Crossroads:
    • 35% of legitimate open positions listed are filled by internal transfer or promotion
    • 28.5% of external hires are filled by employee referrals

RLS clients avoid getting bogged down by the intense competition for open positions. Only a very small percentage of our clients accept an offer resulting from a typical open position listing. When they do, it’s because it’s exactly what they wanted. They are prepared to be the best candidate and win the job.

The vast majority of our clients capitalize on opportunities developed by focusing efforts on channels designed to minimize competition or create a tailored position just right for them.

n3.5% Internet Job Bank
n15.5% Advertised/ Placement Sources
n23.5% Direct Contacts
n26% Spot Opportunities
n31.5% Unadvertised Sources

For those without the proper tools and knowledge, job-searching has been called one of the most frustrating, rejection-filled, and identity-threatening processes in life. Right now, there are over 5 million job seekers who have been searching for over 3.5 months, 2 million of them for over 6 months.
 
The least encouraging information is that the Department of Labor calls an additional 1.2 million people "discouraged seekers"; those that have quit looking for any position. With the multitude of entry-level and high turnover positions available every day on the internet, it is obvious that these discouraged seekers are those people looking for better quality, higher paying positions. Many of them have been staring at and responding to the same listings day after day without any success.


A better insight to this situation was offered in a recent issue of BusinessWeek.  It reported that in any recent month approximately 3.8 million Americans were separated from their jobs, whether by layoff or by choice. At the same time, slightly more than 3.8 million people began new jobs, resulting in a small net gain in payrolls. The vast majority of these positions just changed hands.
 
What does that mean? Even in this economy, the truth is that the jobs are out there and the key is in demonstrating value to an employer. 

 
  ©2004 R.L.Stevens & Associates, Inc.