The last thing in the world you want to happen is your current boss getting to know that you are searching for a new job. Employers normally do support career development, but only within their own company. Here are some useful tips of how to avoid the awkward situation when you have to explain why you are going for job interviews and, basically, considering a job change.

Never involve company facilities usage into your job search.

This includes phone line, Internet, fax, and computer. Many employers monitor Internet usage and check phone logs. It is also not secure to store your resume and cover letter, job applications, references from former employers and correspondence with potential ones, - somebody can just come across with them accidentally and, believe me, will get very suspicious.

Never use your business email address for this purpose.

You might think that it looks more professional, when the email address on your resume contains the name of your company, but you are not quite right. First, you destroy the idea of confidential job search, letting everybody know who you are. Second, in many companies business email address usage is prohibited for personal purposes, and your employer might be reviewing the external email traffic, and might quite easily discover that you are job hunting. You should rather use a personal email account or set up a free of charge mailbox at gmail.com, for example.

Daily millions of job seekers browse the Internet in the search of the vacancies to apply for. Thus, the World Wide Web has become an effective tool for finding an appropriate job, and has also facilitated the recruitment process for the employers. In this respect, a successful job-hunter should take into consideration some crucial issues that can aid in the task:

1. Build Your Web-site.
Beware, that just posting your CV on multiple Internet sites will not necessarily bring the expected fruit. You can do much more than this. Build (or have it built) your own site which will contain your resume, body of work, contact information. The fun thing is also to add the Google Talk’s gadget to your web-site so that your visitors can reach you online. Attach the http reference to your resume and post it in different job-search databases. It will definitely contribute to your success.

2. Google Yourself.
Make sure you check Google in order to find out what your potential employer will see in case he does the same. It is extremely important since you will have a chance to eliminate the unwanted risks and clean-up the information on you available online.

3. Use the Advanced Search Options.
This is very important, because usually job-search engines have too many job ads. Narrow the choice by the region, industry, type of employment (part-time, shifts etc.). The helpful thing here is the key-word search s well.

Do you know what is better than a traditional resume? A traditional resume supplemented by a video one – a short movie made by the applicant, describing their personal skills and qualifications.

In fact, 89% of employers said they wish they could watch a video resume before inviting a candidate for a face-to-face job interview. They believe that from such a video material one can derive useful information about the applicant’s professional presentation, personal habits and behavior; and thus create the first impression.

Nevertheless, do not get too crazy with the idea – a nice video resume on its own is not going to win you the position advertised. It is just a good supplement to the traditional one that can increase the chances of your candidacy being considered.

Further you will find some useful tips for making a good video resume.

1. Define the direction. Hopefully, you had enough time when studying at college to figure out what you would like to do for a living. Otherwise, take some more time and make up your mind about the field in which you would like to build your career. Now. You cannot put it off any further.

Make sure you take all your strengths and weaknesses, likes and dislikes, interests and talents into consideration when deciding on that point. It is also a good idea to search for information on the fields that interest you and people who are involved into working in them. This will aid you in creating a better vision of the prospective job, and decide whether it appeals to you or not.

2. Research. Since you are already aware of the career you wish to take, you can proceed to looking for tangible companies that could offer you the employment you long to. It is extremely important to discover as many of those as possible, and scan all the available information on what exactly each company does, and whether it is stable or not.

You can find out much from the companies’ websites. However, each company strives to present their business in the best possible way as well as from the management’s perspective. Thus, specialized forum discussions and news archives should not be neglected – they often contain ‘real people’ opinions and light the things up from a different angle. The more you know – the better. Your part here is to shape your opinion as a third party’s one.