BATTLE PLAN

Q: Dear Dr. Culp, An unscrupulous business associate cost me $5 million in sales in December, 2009. For the last two and one-half years of college, my son has had to fend for himself, living in his car for a semester and getting an eviction notice because of sublessees who defaulted on rent. Medical bills ruined his credit. He’s earning his degree, applying for jobs, doing well in interviews, but losing out because of his credit rating. What can he do? Mom

A: Dear Mom, He must convince employers just before they do a background check that the poor credit rating they’ll see resulted from a family reversal, making it impossible for him to receive any financial help for almost three years. Then, to demonstrate good character, he should state that he was so committed to getting his diploma that he lived in his car one semester and has developed a plan for paying creditors.

He shouldn’t mention the specific type of bills to avoid unnecessary discussion of his personal health. To avoid questions, he also shouldn’t mention the cause of the family reversal. mlc

WHAT I DID

Q: Hello, Dr. Culp. I was having a hard time finding a job. I supplied references, including one active client, at the bottom of my resume and put my resume around. A prospective employer told me in confidence that one reference was speaking really poorly of me. I’d gotten his permission to use his name and he brought me a lot of business.

While he was good enough to work with, he had nothing good to say about me behind my back. I removed his name from my list of references, stopped working with him and soon thereafter found a job. Was that the right approach? Working

A: Dear Working, You’re wise to question changing your tactics, even though you found a job shortly thereafter.

Never include your references on your resume. Even if they’re all saying good things about you, you risk having them get so many calls that they’ll tell you not to use them any more. When you hunt online, make certain you REALLY want a job that requires you to send references, so much so that you’re willing to do the research to figure out which company is advertising and who specifically is doing the hiring. mlc

**BlogTip**

GOING ALL-OUT

What inspires job hunters to do something to stand out from the pack? Is it the knowledge that they’re skilled at job hunting, or do they do something extraordinary that turns non-results into results?

After more than a year of fruitless searching on and off, Hanna Phan (sliderocket.com) was so frustrated that she embarked on a mid-course correction. Getting informational interviews from networking individually and at events, using social media and targeting specific companies hadn’t created a winning formula.

Hatching a new plan – starting with her first-choice company – could make something happen. She invested three weeks in developing strategy for a high-tech campaign utilizing an online application combined with social media. Phan threw herself into the process and, inspired herself, pulled out all the stops to develop what became her entertaining, informative and visually appealing “presume” (presentation resume).

Company lore has it that she targeted the CEO by tweeting him her online presentation on his company’s software. His response arrived in minutes – tweeted from 30,000 feet in the air.

As soon as he stepped off the plane, they scheduled an interview by telephone. Shortly thereafter, Phan became a product manager at SlideRocket Inc. See why:

http://portal.sliderocket.com/AIWCI/Iwanttoworkatsliderocket.