By Nick Friesen Nick is a recent graduate of Seattle University’s Creative Writing & Film Studies program Throughout high school, I worked as a grocery store clerk – a fairly run-of-the-mill job, but one that gave me spending money and skills that have come in handy in later jobs. Plenty of kids my age had part-time work, of course, but while I was chatting up retirees and playing Tetris with five cartons of oat milk and a banana, a few of my pioneering peers were already pursuing less traditional sources of income. Back in those days, one of the hot side jobs was shoe reselling, but sinc ..read more

By Karen Friesen I remember it as if it were yesterday. I’d landed an interview for a job I really wanted, prepped my rear end off, and sashayed my way into the meeting ready to nail it. Fast forward an hour and I slunk out of it having, well, not nailed it at all. If the entire scene had been a sitcom, the audience would have been ROFL. But in my real life? Not so funny. Years later, I still cringe. It was a panel of three wolves (disguised as regular people) across an intimidatingly long table from increasingly unnerved and overwhelmed me. And as they asked questions – as interviewers ..read more

Some of you probably know that I wrote a book this year. It’s already available for preorder, which is incredibly exciting and a bit surreal. I’ve been asked a lot of questions about how I landed the opportunity, what the process was like, if I’d do it again, and what comes next, so I thought I’d share a bit about the experience here. The Opportunity I have several friends who have already written (terrific) books— Ash Ambirge (The Middle Finger Project), Paul Angone (101 Secrets for Your Twenties, and several other titles), Tess Vigeland (Leap), and Vanessa Van Edwards (Cues is her current be ..read more

The struggle is real. Trust us. We've worked with thousands of job seekers and transitioning professionals over the years. And if there's one universal truth when it comes to creating a compelling resume, it's this: It's hard. It's just plain awkward to write about yourself in a powerful (yet, not cocky) way. It often feels overwhelming, confusing, or even impossible. And this extends to even the smartest and most articulate among us, including leaders (right on up to the c-suite) and aspiring managers. In fact, writing a relevant and convincing resume that tells the reviewer (in an instant) t ..read more

By Karen Friesen What a fantastic day it would be if the hiring manager for your dream job were to roll up to your house, Publishers Clearing House-style, and drop a spectacular job offer right in your lap. I mean, riiiight? Alas, job search typically requires no small amount of strategy, planning, effort and innovation. And, part of that strategy may well involve working with recruiters. Yet, for many, the idea of finding, reaching out to, and working with recruiters seems rather daunting, and raises plenty of questions. How do they work, exactly? Do you have to pay them? How do find the rig ..read more

I’m in Portland, Oregon. It’s 96 degrees and sunny today, but this is a VERY new development for us. For April, May, and even most of June, we “enjoyed” record-breaking rain and cold. I literally had a turtleneck on like a week ago. It’s been positively gross. But just like magic, it’s now summer. It’s glorious … and the perfect time to tell you about a new resume service we’re trialing in July and August, the Summer Resume Refresh. You may have noticed the teal bar that often spans the top of JobJenny.com, announcing that we’ve sold out of services for the month. As a small team (that very g ..read more

PROOF is an occasional series that celebrates people who employed new job search strategies and landed an amazing new job or promotion — or shifted into an entirely new career. Diane Gonzalez-Ferranti had an incredible, decades-long career with the Detroit Pistons and the NBA franchise’s parent company, Palace Sports & Entertainment. Her progressive communications and production leadership roles were all fast-paced, demanding, and decidedly high-profile — and she loved every minute of it. She also assumed that she’d ultimately retire from the organization. But life doesn’t always unfold i ..read more

By Karen Friesen Remember when you were little and people would ask what you wanted to be when you grew up —and you’d blurt out "firefighter!” or “dancer!” without a moment of hesitation? Then you turned 18 and it was time to go to college and you were pretty sure you wanted to be, let’s say, an engineer, so that’s what you did. Then you graduated, did the engineering thing for a few years, and said to yourself: What was I thinking?! And now you’re 42 and guess what? You finally know what you what to be when you grow up. Yay! But guess what again? It’s not an engineer. Ugh. It can be exciting ..read more

By Karen Friesen Not long ago, I received an email from a frustrated job seeker who claims to have sent out more than 35,000 job applications without a single offer. Thirty. Five. Thousand. Just imagine the universe lightly blanketed with copies of this guy’s (let’s call him “Joe”) resume, single sheets of 8 ½ x11 paper drifting gently on a light breeze. Sure, sure. He almost certainly applied online, fingers flying frantically over his keyboard, but still. That’s 70 reams of virtual paper we’re talking about. And no offers. Guess what? Joe was feeling a little frustrated. Where, exactly, was ..read more

Stephanie Derham was more than 20 years into her dream career with Nike when the proverbial shoe dropped. As part of a massive reorganization, she was laid off – an event, Stephanie admits, hit hard. “No matter how much you prepare yourself for the possibility, it still stings,” she said. “So I took a few months off to decompress with my family before jumping into the job search.” Stephanie had some clear ideas about the kind of work she wanted to do next: continue to build emotional connections between a brand and customers through powerful creative activations, for starters. She also wanted ..read more