7 Tools To Organize Your Job Search In 2013

By Kristin Johnson


Is your goal to organize your job search this year?
As the New Year rolls in, many of us resolve to quit smoking, control our finances, or lose weight. I know I could shed more than a few pounds.

In order to write something that would be useful to you for your New Year’s resolution, but keep it career-related, I thought I’d do a little research first. According to the website Statistic Brain, the most popular resolution was to lose weight. (I think they are trying to tell me something.) The second most popular was “Getting Organized.” Third was “Spend Less, Save More.”

Organize Your Job Search With These Tools

While I can’t help you with the weight loss, (actually, I did major in Dietetics, so I should be able to, but I’ll stick to careers) I can help you with staying organized and spending less on your career management or job search.

Here are some great job search tools to help you keep your thoughts straight for little or no cost when it comes to your career.

1. Evernote

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways!

With this website, you can create “notes” within a “notebook” and further organize these into a “stack.” As a job seeker, you could have stacks like “Career Documents,” “Employers,” “Social Media,” and so on.

Within the “Career Documents,” you have a notebook with versions of your resume, another with cover letters, reference dossiers, and any other categories of correspondence. Start an “Atta Girl” or “Atta Boy” note with testimonials from performance reviews or your boss or stats from projects you worked on for inclusion on your resume.

Within Employers, start a notebook for each company on your target list. Notes might be: “Website Notes,” “Networking Contacts,” and “Financials,” for example. The possibilities are endless!

It’s pretty slick, and you can tag each note with keywords, so it’s easier to search for them than to find that old Post-It you scribbled on six months ago.

2. Jibber Jobber

This website has a funny name, but a seriously bad-ass capability to manage relationships, companies, and processes for your job search. Plus, the free version will keep all of your contacts and information indefinitely, so it’s available to you for your next search.

Jibber Jobber allows you to import social media contacts, keep detailed notes about the relationship, develop action items, and link them to your target companies. With video tutorials, webinars, and a great FAQ, it’s easy to learn and implement right away.

3. Doodle

Not the drawings you do in a meeting when you’re bored, but a tech-savvy way to set up networking meetings and keep yourself sane while doing it. Pick some times that are good for you to meet for coffee with your contact, set up a poll on Doodle, invite the participants, and confirm the final date and time.

Compared to emailing back and forth multiple times to set up meetings, it’s amazingly simple. Especially when multiple people are involved.

4. Dropbox

I don’t know what I’d do without this service. It gives me access to all of my files, audios, and images on my desktop, laptop, iPad, and phone. I can share stuff with people without having to e-mail it. Google Drive is great, too, but I prefer the layout of Dropbox and the ability to restore previous versions of documents.

Tool 5-7 and Complete Careerealism Article