Jeff Hunter

San Francisco, CA

Guest Blogger Jeff Hunter is a member of the Glassdoor.com Clearview Collection and is an award-winning technologist, strategist, author and entrepreneur. He currently serves as the Vice President of HR Solutions at Dolby Laboratories. Prior to joining Dolby, Jeff served as Sr. Director of EA University at Electronic Arts, the world’s largest digital entertainment company. In 2007, Jeff launched the “Talent Unconference” a meeting of the top minds in HR, business and technology to discuss new methods for developing and driving talent-centric businesses.

Other ways to follow Jeff: http://www.talentism.com/ |

Recent Posts by Jeff

Tips For Finding Your Next Job Through Social Media

Posted by • May 10th, 2010 • more

Last week I shared how important social media and networking are to many recruiters, even those who are looking to fill hourly jobs in retail, construction, hospitality and healthcare. Here are some great practical nuggets I learned at last week’s speech:

Don’t Rely on job boards – Some of the recruiters I heard last week said that they are starting to move away from job boards. Their complaints: too crowded and too difficult to differentiate themselves. Job boards like Monster still contain a lot of great jobs, and you should include them in your search. Just don’t believe that Monster is a one-stop shop.

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Why Social Media Is A Must For ALL Job Seekers

Posted by • May 3rd, 2010 • more

This past week I gave the keynote address at a recruiting event in Phoenix. The room was filled with recruiters who had come to share their perspectives on using social media and networking for recruiting. I was there to talk about how to take advantage of new social media tools like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and blogs for the benefit of corporate recruiting.

The truth is, I thought the conference may be a waste of my time. I have spent most of the last 10 years around recruiting departments who have been searching for high-tech, highly-paid talent. When it is tough to find someone with a particular skill set (say “advanced audio codec engineering”) you are willing to invest a lot of money to connect and form relationships with people who may lead you to great hires. Using social media and social networking to help in my recruiting efforts was sort of a no-brainer: if that is where the talent is, that is where you go.

But the room in Phoenix wasn’t filled with high-tech recruiters….

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The Problem With Job Interviews

Posted by • April 12th, 2010 • more

Let’s face it: resume reviews, phone screens, technical screens and interviews are all a bit of a crap shoot. We like to think that they are some sort of science, but we all know people who looked like they were a great fit who end up flaming out. And we also know a lot of people who were written off only to become a top performer.

In my humble opinion, the problem starts with the basic approach recruiters and hiring managers take to evaluating talent. Every recruiter I know starts with two basic filters: education and experience. First they look at where you went to school and what degree you received, then they look at the companies you have worked for in the past. In fact some companies have turned this into religious doctrine: if you didn’t get the right grades at the right college and have the right previous work experience you might as well be a felon on the run.

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Why Are You Working? Ask Yourself the Lottery Question

Posted by • April 5th, 2010 • more

In my profession I interview a lot of people. In my spare time I like to coach people. In either case my purpose is to help people achieve their career dreams. And I believe the best way to discover what someone’s dreams really are is to ask the lottery question:

“What would you do if you won the lottery and had economic security for the rest of your life?”

Most of us live this illusion that if we could just have enough money all our problems would be solved. Asking people to think about their lives without that money filter helps them get to what they feel is missing in their lives.

Over time a pattern has emerged. The responses to the lottery question seem to fall into one of four categories:

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Goldilocks And The Three Interviews

Posted by • March 29th, 2010 • more

You probably remember the tale of Goldilocks and the three bears in which Goldie was looking for the ‘just right’ porridge. Well have you heard about Goldilocks and the three interviews? It’s a modern tale of three job candidates speaking to Goldie, the hiring manager, who is looking for that ‘just right’ employee.

Here is a look into the interviews of three unique job candidates in this present-day allegory:

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How To Pick The Right Career Wave: Tips For Surfers

Posted by • March 22nd, 2010 • more

There is an earthquake on your career summit. The skies are cloudy, avalanches abound and the trail is dark. Why risk your professional life for a goal that might not even be there by the time you get near the top? Time to go career surfing!

The first step in career surfing is to understand some simple rules for picking waves…

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Are You Climbing The Career Mountain Or Surfing The Career Wave?

Posted by • March 15th, 2010 • more

I recently met with Abby, a former employee who has worked hard to rise through the ranks. She had just successfully navigated a major systems implementation, bringing the project in on time and under budget. Abby’s manager was thrilled with the results and praised her extensively. Then he asked the killer question “What do you want to do next?”

Abby is a go-getter, so she had her response ready: she wanted to manage the next big systems project. Her logic was iron-clad. It was what people in her role did to get ahead. She had some serious doubts about the project, but she put those aside to ensure she would hit the next point on the way to her career summit.

Unfortunately, Abby’s next project was canceled and her climb was put on hold. All her careful planning and preparation went to waste because she was so focused on the next step that she didn’t realize that she wasn’t climbing a career mountain. Abby, like many of us, was surfing a career wave.

What’s the difference between a career mountain climber and a career surfer?

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Have We Been Putting Our Careers At Risk Since The Recession Hit?

Posted by • March 8th, 2010 • more

When I talk with people who are looking for work I get the sense that it is not just the change of employment status that is causing their anger and confusion. It is the sense that the entire way the employment contract works has been radically shifted on them. Many of our fathers and mothers worked for the same company for a long time, retiring after committing themselves to a lifetime of loyal and faithful service. That has somehow flipped into hoping we can get a contract job with a 30-day separation clause.

Over the past 20 years we have grown our economy by buying stuff we don’t need with money we don’t have from companies we don’t like. We bought cheap clothes at warehouse stores while bemoaning the loss of textile jobs in the south and Wal-Mart’s labor practices. We grabbed the latest deal on electronics at the local Best Buy while feeling robbed of solid high-tech jobs that were being shipped overseas. And many of us (me included) have participated in cost-cutting exercises at work only to feel a nervous shiver through our spine when we think about our childrens’ future.

As consumers we have demanded that things be cheaper, faster, better and more accessible. But as employees we are experiencing first-hand the consequences of those demands. It is what might be called a “total bummer”: Can’t I buy what is cheap, available and makes me feel good and forget all the other stuff?

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Career Banks: Are You Invested Or Overdrawn?

Posted by • March 1st, 2010 • more

How’s your Career Bank? Are you borrowing from it or investing in it? Are you starting to bounce career checks?

Your Career Bank is like any other bank: you put stuff into it during the good times so that you can take stuff out during the rough times. When you are looking for a job you are going to make a lot of withdrawals from your Career Bank.

So what happens when your Career Bank balance is low?

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3 Ways To Help Companies Hire Smarter Sooner; Hint – Go Public

Posted by • February 22nd, 2010 • more

Quick: Name one product that you have purchased because you heard their recruiting practices were simply awesome? How about a stock that you invested in because a company recruiting department rocked? Ever recommended a stock because you liked how a recruiter treated you?

If you can answer “yes” to any of those questions then you are a rare person indeed. You hear stories all the time about people who don’t buy a product or service because of how they were treated. But buying or investing because you are treated well? Not so much.

Here is the harsh reality of the present recruiting landscape…

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