Tightening Job Market Calls for Creative Approache

USA Today

'Desperate times call for creative measures'

USA Today reports that the tightening job market has driven candidates to new extremes in their search for work, including sending cakes and flowers to hiring managers, passing out résumés on street corners, and even taking jobs for no pay.

For employers, it means getting concessions that would have been unthinkable a few years ago. Executives at SeaBridge Software, a provider of customer retention software in San Francisco, posted an ad online offering job candidates stock options — but no pay. Nevertheless, more than 500 résumés were received, and six employees were hired.

"Some people told me, 'You won't get anybody who will work for no cash,' but I still get résumés," SeaBridge founder Jamie Pardi told USA Today.

Tiffany Fox of Houston got fed up after months of failing to land a job in the usual ways, so she made a sign that read "Hire Me" and stood on a busy corner. Fox handed out information with her phone number and background.

She wound up getting a sales job for a telecommunications firm after a manager drove by and asked, "Is this for real?"

"Desperate times call for creative measures," says Fox, who got more than 150 phone calls, 10 interviews, and "quite a few marriage proposals."

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