Over on JobsBlog, Jenna talks making a job change and the all too typical jobseeker reaction of chewing off your tail to make a quick escape.  You may need that tail of yours someday, so if you feel stuck and aren’t sure what to do next, Jenna provides some great advice on how to evaluate and put a plan around your situation.

What I thought was interesting about Jenna’s post is that she talks about her own situation and how once – unhappy with her job at Microsoft – she found herself ready for a job change.  She went through the steps of exiting an old job and entering a new one, but never had to leave her current company. 

Heck, when I was at Microsoft, I had three completely different jobs (recruiter, programs manager, and marketing manager) AND worked on five completely different teams (international recruiting, college recruiting, industry recruiting, sourcing, and marketing).  The number of times I put together a resume or prepped for my next job search or interview round was probably even higher than if I had been bouncing from company to company.

Companies and employees often forget – or don’t realize – that an internal recruiting or job search process can be just as daunting and complex as an external search.  One of our colleagues in the employment marketing space was recently telling us about how his company’s solution – intended for external purposes – was going to be implemented within a large company internally.  Yeah, external recruiting is always a problem, but this company found their employees and divisions had a tough time connecting.  I also know of another major employer who planned to integrate internal blogging as a way to build brand and recruiting awareness inside the company. 

And on the employee side, things aren’t much better.  Internal transfer programs which assist employees in driving their next career move are beginning to spring up again here and there – but it’s a slow march, and in most places, it’s still up to the employee to drive his or her own job search, unaided.

I don’t usually pitch our services over here on the blog, but someone asked us today if we would ever help employees search for jobs internally – or help hiring managers better brand their career opportunities internally.  Of course, we would.  Recruiting isn’t always an externally-facing business, and in fact, companies can surely make themselves lean, mean, efficient customer pleasing profit making machine :)  if they wisely retain and redistribute their existing talent.  (That’s HR speak for ya.)  Getting the right talent in the right jobs does not necessarily require you to take your job or candidate search outside.

g

Edit 10/31:  turning off comments on this post to curb the spam