ben351
13-02-2012, 12:03 PM
Guys I thought I might start a thread up as I do get a lot of general enquiries and questions regarding employment advice and I guess it might be easier to have them all in one place.
For those that don’t know me I have worked in the recruitment industry for about 5 years now and have had experience in all fields of recruitment on both Blue and White collar side of things and both agency and internal recruitment. I have also Managed a couple of agencies both branch and on site.
I do my best to answer everyone and I apologise if I have missed anyone over the years but it wasn’t intentional. Most of the PM’s I receive are in regards to “ Who do I get a job on the mines “.
To answer this simply there are two ways I can advise. Now please be mindful these are just my suggestions and might not be what you want to hear or do but regardless … I won’t lose sleep either way.
The first is go get a few tickets and throw your number in the hat with all the other rookies and hope that one of the companies picks you out and calls you up. To better help your case I suggest people get a few things as a bare minimum to help them – these include a clean HR license / White card ( new blue card ) / any form of plant ticket ( Bobcat / excavator / front end loader / dump truck / dozer … PM BLAAA for details and cheapest prices in Perth for these ) and make sure you can provide a clean Drug and Alcohol screen to any potential employer. You can also look at getting you Mine Workers Health Surveillance clearance as soon enough these will be a requirement for all mine sites in WA. The process isn’t cheap and I understand that some people don’t have the means to do all this straight off the bat but these are the associated risks you take when wanting to enter the industry without experience … so for those people I suggest option 2.
Option 2 is doing it the hard way in some people’s eyes but in my opinion it’s the right way. Figure out exactly what it is you want to do as a worker in the mines and get a local job with a construction company or civil works company and get some experience up that way – entry level positions for labourers or general hands would be your best bet if you are inexperienced. The local civil / construction industry is going gang busters at the minute with a tonne of local projects and government funded buildings / site under way. Now getting experience at a local level will not only give you an idea what the work is going to be like ( add 20 degrees of hot weather ) but it provide you income to be able to afford the tickets and licenses. Working in the Building and Construction industry puts you in the running for a lot of government funding also so with a bit of luck you might even get your tickets cheaper. Working for a local company might also open doors for FIFO and DIDO work as more and more local companies are tendering for regional work. This is also another foot in the door to reach your goal of Mines work as you already have the experience and by now you would have the tickets to back it up. Some local companies I can suggest hitting up are John Holland / Georgiou Group / Doric / Pindan / McMahons / VDM Group ( Malavoca )ect ect.
You would be surprised how many people think it’s a walk in the park doing FIFO or DIDO roles. I don’t think you realise that the only reason you get paid so much is because you are worked like a dog for 12 hrs a day 7 days a week ( sometimes you get an RDO depending on the company ) It can be a huge strain on people mentally and physically and can also impact your relationships indirectly. Think long and hard before committing to any position and make sure it’s the right move for you.
In regards to putting applications in you need to do EVERYTHING possible to make your application the easiest to read and also provide ALL the relevant information required. Please … and I cannot stress this enough … PLEASE take the time to read the advert for the position you are applying for because in my experience it doesn’t matter how many times I list required experience / tickets 7 out of 10 applications don’t have the required experience or tickets and have clearly not read past the title of the advert. The mentality of “ ahhh well just apply and see what happens “ in 100% incorrect and does nothing but waste recruiters time. We ask for the required experience or tickets because you are not going to get on site / be able to operate machinery without them. Cover letters are not essential with Blue Collar workers and I can say you only make yourself look stupid providing one. We know what you are and we know what position you are applying for. White collar roles I recommend nothing longer than three quarters of a page … brief outline of why you think you would be suitable. Less is better as you don’t want to “ put out on the first date “ … leave them wanting more and subsequently they will want to interview you. Don’t write a 3 page cover letter which by the end of it they know every aspect of your life and don’t need to or don’t want to interview you anymore.
When submitting your CV a couple of things to remember .. Don’t ever, EVER put a photo on there. If we want to know what you look like ( admin or receptionist positions ) we can use facebook. Don’t ever use humour or witty lines like “ looking for a crane operator ?? THEN IM YOUR GUY “ No, no you are not and your CV just landed in the bin. CV’s need to be as simple as possible … no fancy fonts … no colour pictures in the back ground … no borders or quotes or inspirational sayings … just keep it Simple / effective/ and informative.
Start with personal details – name / address / email / mobile number / marital status.
Then you can put in an objectives or Career Objectives summary. These are not really a requirement but if you must keep it simple and to the point “ to land a position in a company where my skills and experiences will make me a valuable member of the team “ or something like that.
Then list education including High schools / Tafes / Uni’s and any extra courses you have attended.
The list Qualifications – any certificates / licenses / tickets you have and WHEN you obtained them.
Then list your work history. The easiest layout to use for blue collar is the company Name / location and the sates you worked there following buy DETAILED but brief BULLET POINT on your daily / weekly / monthly duties. Do not write paragraphs. Bullet points only.
Then finish it off by listing Referees – try to use supervisors / managers / Directors. Don’t use you mate and try to avoid relatives.
With your Cv attach copies of all your tickets and licences and certificates. They need to be clear and preferably in colour. This saves having to chase up at a later date and voids any reason people might think you are lying on your CV.
Now where you chose to submit your CV’s is another tricky preference and there are big differences between Internal HR recruiters and Agency recruiters.
You can research on seek and then visit the company’s websites and apply direct. The problem with this is sometimes you CV can go unnoticed due to pure volume of applications. You are always added to the data base and will be informed on upcoming positions generally but this isn’t always the most effective way to go about it. Internal HR recruiters are not pressured to perform profit wise but do experience direct pressure from Project Managers and Supervisors if their workforce is short and the project is falling behind due to lack of labour.
The other way you can do it would be to research on seek and apply to a few agencies who are advertising for positions you suit. The thing to remember with agency recruiters is everything is SALES and PROFIT related. If they don’t bend over backwards to help you or their client … they might not meet their KPI’s and might not get their bonus for the month. On a positive note some recruiters have excellent relationships with their clients and sometimes can use these relationships to push your CV to the right person and bypass the backlog in HR. As is with everything in life there can be sour points – some recruiters don’t get back to you on time – some recruiters won’t help you out if you are too much hard work – some recruiters are just really bad at their job.
Either way I suggest using seek as you main use of research for positions. They have some great tools int eh website and you can get market averages for salaries in your required fields. Not many people advertise for these types of roles in the paper anymore it is predominantly agencies using it as a means to get their brand out there and have you recognise them over other agencies.
For White Collar people I suggest creating a Linkedin profile. Linkedin is basically an online resume and networking tool. Head hunters and recruiters constantly troll these places for new candidates.
I hope this helps and I hope I covered off on everything and like I mentioned it’s just a suggestion based off my experiences and welcome any other recruiters input here.
If you need help with your CV or want someone to look over your it I am always happy to help out and have done so with several people off here already with great success !!
For those that don’t know me I have worked in the recruitment industry for about 5 years now and have had experience in all fields of recruitment on both Blue and White collar side of things and both agency and internal recruitment. I have also Managed a couple of agencies both branch and on site.
I do my best to answer everyone and I apologise if I have missed anyone over the years but it wasn’t intentional. Most of the PM’s I receive are in regards to “ Who do I get a job on the mines “.
To answer this simply there are two ways I can advise. Now please be mindful these are just my suggestions and might not be what you want to hear or do but regardless … I won’t lose sleep either way.
The first is go get a few tickets and throw your number in the hat with all the other rookies and hope that one of the companies picks you out and calls you up. To better help your case I suggest people get a few things as a bare minimum to help them – these include a clean HR license / White card ( new blue card ) / any form of plant ticket ( Bobcat / excavator / front end loader / dump truck / dozer … PM BLAAA for details and cheapest prices in Perth for these ) and make sure you can provide a clean Drug and Alcohol screen to any potential employer. You can also look at getting you Mine Workers Health Surveillance clearance as soon enough these will be a requirement for all mine sites in WA. The process isn’t cheap and I understand that some people don’t have the means to do all this straight off the bat but these are the associated risks you take when wanting to enter the industry without experience … so for those people I suggest option 2.
Option 2 is doing it the hard way in some people’s eyes but in my opinion it’s the right way. Figure out exactly what it is you want to do as a worker in the mines and get a local job with a construction company or civil works company and get some experience up that way – entry level positions for labourers or general hands would be your best bet if you are inexperienced. The local civil / construction industry is going gang busters at the minute with a tonne of local projects and government funded buildings / site under way. Now getting experience at a local level will not only give you an idea what the work is going to be like ( add 20 degrees of hot weather ) but it provide you income to be able to afford the tickets and licenses. Working in the Building and Construction industry puts you in the running for a lot of government funding also so with a bit of luck you might even get your tickets cheaper. Working for a local company might also open doors for FIFO and DIDO work as more and more local companies are tendering for regional work. This is also another foot in the door to reach your goal of Mines work as you already have the experience and by now you would have the tickets to back it up. Some local companies I can suggest hitting up are John Holland / Georgiou Group / Doric / Pindan / McMahons / VDM Group ( Malavoca )ect ect.
You would be surprised how many people think it’s a walk in the park doing FIFO or DIDO roles. I don’t think you realise that the only reason you get paid so much is because you are worked like a dog for 12 hrs a day 7 days a week ( sometimes you get an RDO depending on the company ) It can be a huge strain on people mentally and physically and can also impact your relationships indirectly. Think long and hard before committing to any position and make sure it’s the right move for you.
In regards to putting applications in you need to do EVERYTHING possible to make your application the easiest to read and also provide ALL the relevant information required. Please … and I cannot stress this enough … PLEASE take the time to read the advert for the position you are applying for because in my experience it doesn’t matter how many times I list required experience / tickets 7 out of 10 applications don’t have the required experience or tickets and have clearly not read past the title of the advert. The mentality of “ ahhh well just apply and see what happens “ in 100% incorrect and does nothing but waste recruiters time. We ask for the required experience or tickets because you are not going to get on site / be able to operate machinery without them. Cover letters are not essential with Blue Collar workers and I can say you only make yourself look stupid providing one. We know what you are and we know what position you are applying for. White collar roles I recommend nothing longer than three quarters of a page … brief outline of why you think you would be suitable. Less is better as you don’t want to “ put out on the first date “ … leave them wanting more and subsequently they will want to interview you. Don’t write a 3 page cover letter which by the end of it they know every aspect of your life and don’t need to or don’t want to interview you anymore.
When submitting your CV a couple of things to remember .. Don’t ever, EVER put a photo on there. If we want to know what you look like ( admin or receptionist positions ) we can use facebook. Don’t ever use humour or witty lines like “ looking for a crane operator ?? THEN IM YOUR GUY “ No, no you are not and your CV just landed in the bin. CV’s need to be as simple as possible … no fancy fonts … no colour pictures in the back ground … no borders or quotes or inspirational sayings … just keep it Simple / effective/ and informative.
Start with personal details – name / address / email / mobile number / marital status.
Then you can put in an objectives or Career Objectives summary. These are not really a requirement but if you must keep it simple and to the point “ to land a position in a company where my skills and experiences will make me a valuable member of the team “ or something like that.
Then list education including High schools / Tafes / Uni’s and any extra courses you have attended.
The list Qualifications – any certificates / licenses / tickets you have and WHEN you obtained them.
Then list your work history. The easiest layout to use for blue collar is the company Name / location and the sates you worked there following buy DETAILED but brief BULLET POINT on your daily / weekly / monthly duties. Do not write paragraphs. Bullet points only.
Then finish it off by listing Referees – try to use supervisors / managers / Directors. Don’t use you mate and try to avoid relatives.
With your Cv attach copies of all your tickets and licences and certificates. They need to be clear and preferably in colour. This saves having to chase up at a later date and voids any reason people might think you are lying on your CV.
Now where you chose to submit your CV’s is another tricky preference and there are big differences between Internal HR recruiters and Agency recruiters.
You can research on seek and then visit the company’s websites and apply direct. The problem with this is sometimes you CV can go unnoticed due to pure volume of applications. You are always added to the data base and will be informed on upcoming positions generally but this isn’t always the most effective way to go about it. Internal HR recruiters are not pressured to perform profit wise but do experience direct pressure from Project Managers and Supervisors if their workforce is short and the project is falling behind due to lack of labour.
The other way you can do it would be to research on seek and apply to a few agencies who are advertising for positions you suit. The thing to remember with agency recruiters is everything is SALES and PROFIT related. If they don’t bend over backwards to help you or their client … they might not meet their KPI’s and might not get their bonus for the month. On a positive note some recruiters have excellent relationships with their clients and sometimes can use these relationships to push your CV to the right person and bypass the backlog in HR. As is with everything in life there can be sour points – some recruiters don’t get back to you on time – some recruiters won’t help you out if you are too much hard work – some recruiters are just really bad at their job.
Either way I suggest using seek as you main use of research for positions. They have some great tools int eh website and you can get market averages for salaries in your required fields. Not many people advertise for these types of roles in the paper anymore it is predominantly agencies using it as a means to get their brand out there and have you recognise them over other agencies.
For White Collar people I suggest creating a Linkedin profile. Linkedin is basically an online resume and networking tool. Head hunters and recruiters constantly troll these places for new candidates.
I hope this helps and I hope I covered off on everything and like I mentioned it’s just a suggestion based off my experiences and welcome any other recruiters input here.
If you need help with your CV or want someone to look over your it I am always happy to help out and have done so with several people off here already with great success !!