July 24th marks 71 years since Robert Ronald established The Job Forum in San Francisco. As the longest continually running job search organization in the SF Bay Area, we’d like to remind you of the legacy a 26 year old immigrant left on generations of job hunters. An arduous journey to say the least, Robert fled Nazi Germany for Paris at the age of 7. The perils of war-torn Europe followed the boy and his family from the South of France to Havana, Cuba. The Ronald Family was fortunate enough to flee persecution thanks to visas provided by the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society. As the grandson of two Holocaust survivors, I was all ears learning about Ronald’s harrowing experience and the importance he put on setting career goals.

He created a forum setting where local business managers coached job coaching job seekers around a conference table. Even as events in offices have converted to the virtual Zoom setting, we carry on so many of his guiding principles. Still affiliated and sponsored by the SF Chamber of Commerce, more than 2600 job hunters received services from The Job Forum in the last year. Our team of dedicated volunteers strives to get people back to work and connects newcomers with managers at great Bay Area companies. Our founder passed away in May, 2022 at the age of 96. In large part through his inspiration and action, we have continued to pave the way for job seekers in the current work climate. Please think about helping by donations to the Robert Ronald Memorial Job Forum Fund.

To quote the great Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu, “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach him how to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.” Our support network will be here for you however long your job search runs its course! Our valuable services including but not limited to resume proofreading, LinkedIn 101, and industry q&a give job hunters a wealth of sustenance.  Every single week for 70 years, the job seeker has felt empowered thanks to the organizational leadership displayed by volunteers at The Job Forum. The advice offered and comradery gives our attendees the firepower to “keep calm and carry on” during their career journeys. I can guarantee you’ll walk away from a workshop with a newfound connection or skill to help tackle a challenge.

Whether you’re in the process of seeking a new job or transitioning careers, The Job Forum is your one-stop shop. We want to create continuity and expansion of this proven community service for many more decades to come. Cheers to 70 more years as a powerful and positive impact in the San Francisco Bay Area. Thank you, Robert Ronald, for crafting an organization that continues to prevail in these unprecedented times.

The importance of connecting in-person was on full display during The Job Forum’s annual volunteers’ dinner. On Thursday June 8th, a lively group of more than 40 volunteers dined and mingled at the Toy Soldier restaurant. In between our delicious entrees and closing prize drawing, each attendee was given the mic to introduce themselves and share an update. What an impressive group of great people!. Over the past 3 years, we’ve seen our events migrate from The Russ Building in Downtown San Francisco to a video communications on Zoom. Seeing many of our dedicated volunteers together in the same room sharing new professional and personal updates was a wonderful sight! Extra, extra read all about it, The Job Forum has new and exciting updates to share!

Job Forum Events

We’re now offering job hunters events to help them skill up and land the jobs they want on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and most Thursdays. From 1-1 advising, to group job search strategy meetings every Wed evening, to industry-specific Q&A speaker panels, our events are dedicated to help job hunters in so many areas of your career journey. We’ve boiled down our target audience into the 4 groups we especially focus on and advise:

1. General job hunters in the SF Bay Area
   2. Workforce of the Future- those ages 15-25
   3. Veterans who are job hunting
   4. Women job hunting in Science,Technology, and Finance careers

New volunteers are welcome

Our agenda tailored towards job search and skill expansion is more robust compared to previous years. We are extremely grateful when new volunteers provide their expertise to The Job Forum. Everyone loves a hard-fought and well-earned success story on the job front. Former job hunters who came to our nonprofit organization for help in the past are great candidates to direct their advice to our target audience job hunters. As a participant on a panel, moderator or a host (Master of Ceremonies) at our workshops, you’ll have a chance to share your job search expertise with job seekers or craft relevant questions for our guest panelists.

Once a job hunter now a volunteer

Many of the tricks of the trade in today’s work climate come from people like our own volunteer, Ismail Bugdayli. At the annual dinner he shared the details that In April, he landed a sales executive role and thanked The Job Forum for giving him so many tools and strategies learned at job search events. While speaking at the annual dinner, Ismail provided a mindset he embraced, “Ask lots of real questions about what the person you are speaking with has experienced themselves and ask them what they think it is like to do the job or be in the company or work in the field.” You can call this a full circle effect! We look forward to cheering on more volunteers who want to give back.

Calling on all hiring managers! Currently The Job Forum has more than 100 member panelists and many more volunteers who repeatedly help out on career and industry panels.

Perhaps you will want to join us as a member and volunteer 3 times a year at zoom events to help job hunters? This year our Thursday special events have covered such industries as biotechnology, marketing, finance, techniology and roles in corporate philanthrpy . Your leadership, content about job roles and functions and your company knowledge has a big impact on our job seekers who are already putting tremendous effort into their job searches. Real progress begins for them with more networking opportunities, warm Linkedin connections which evolve into informational and job interviews. Whether you work in HR, Operations, Product Management, Finance, Customer Success or another job role not listed, we’d love your advice and guidance for job hunters at our Job Forum events. We hope you sign up to become panelist with us!

Diverse and productive

The Job Forum is broader, deeper, and more diverse than a decade ago. Since we went virtual back in 2020, there have been a total of 373 events!  Our organization is a group of effective, positive, generous, high skilled, dynamic managers,who are encouraging, advising, and making a real difference to the economy of the SF Bay Area and to the job hunters who may have no Bay Area network or not enough of an industry network and yet they find one at The Job Fourm.

We celebrate the success of The Job Forum with you today and hope to see you contributing with us over Zoom soon. New volunteers please offer to volunteer here. https://thejobforum.org/volunteer

Thank you to our sponsors

Thank you to the Toy Soldier Restaurant and Johnny Methany for sponsoring our annual dinner for the organization at the restaurant (California & Comfort Cuisine on Belden Place) in their delightful “SpeakEasy” space upstairs. If you want to host an event of your own with them, contact johnny@bluelightsf.com

Thank you to Linkedin for your community support of The Job Forum.

Thank you to the SF Chamber of Commerce for sponsoring The Job Forum for 70 years so far. Thank you to The Miranda Lux Foundation for support of the Workforce of the Future program for job search and career readiiness for 15-25 year olds via The Job Forum.

By Jason Slamovich

The Job Forum & UC Berkeley Extension linked up to orchestrate a wonderful event for job hunters called “Careers in Biosciences.” Nine bio and life science professional experts took the “virtual” Zoom stage with a wealth of knowledge about the biotechnology sector. The Bay Area is home to so many leaders in bio sciences and the opportunities for job hunters are plentiful.

We were extremely pleased to have experts such as Eric Bennett of Frontier Bio, Angela Kane of Bio-Rad, Antinea Chair of Cellares, Amanda Santana of Vir, Kenny Wong of XCures, Yoshiko Stowell of AmyriaAD, Michelle Parekh of Stryker Neurovascular, Ted Snelgrove of FormaPath and Pamela Ronald of the Ronald Lab at UC Davis.

During the months of May, June, and July, The Job Forum organized career-focused events on many of the Bay Area’s leading job industries. This event for those interested in life sciences and bio tech was co-hosted by the UC Berkeley Extension, a continuing education institution that offers many courses in science, mathematics, and biotechnology. Volunteers who contribute from the Berkeley Extension side include Heather Mason, Erin Gunther, Sarah Benzuly-Narinelli, Luis Valencia, and Amy Geotina. Job seekers were thrilled to discover that this continuing education branch of UC Berkeley offers very flexible live and in-person programs.

After an introduction and description of their work led by The Job Forum Director of Special Events, Bill Pollak, and Executive Director Janet Beach, job seekers entered the breakout rooms for in-depth job search advice and Q&A discussion with industry managers. This is where the real magic happens as participants learn about the importance of informational interviews and how to obtain these, how to succeed in networking and in which bio tech associations and meet ups, and which critical career skills will be seen as particularly valuable, and which are examples of job roles that allow one to “break in” to bio tech. Those who made up the Job Forum lineup of volunteers, helping to optimize the useful content and process in the breakout rooms included Kathy Mark, Tina Choi, Valerie Dow, Tom Toy, Randeep Kullar, and Kathy Knudson.

Bio tech is welcoming across many career functions

One of the life sciences expert panelists pointed out that “85-95% of bioscience professionals today don’t possess a PhD.” So the point was made that there are many opportunities for job hunters, including for those from other non science industries and not from the bio tech industries.  Another point is that continuing education courses are very instrumental for anyone looking to balance coursework with industry experience in the pursuit of a new job or field. The industry experts spoke about their respective companies, hiring opportunities, and openness to connect over Linkedin with event job hunters.  Regulatory affairs was highlighted as a particularly sought after area that might be a good place to start for job hunters new to the industry. Computer engineers from tech are most welcome at bio companies. A very important and widely-emphasized theme was to keep learning in order to “stay competitive” in today’s job market. Luckily the The Job Forum as well as the UC Berkeley Extension are built around advancing the skills and mindset needed to be a strong job seeker and share a perspective that one must keep coming to events to make those needed career connections.

While surfing around in several of the breakout rooms, we compiled a handful of cardinal tips to make a splash in the Bioscience field:

1. Generate a list of your desired companies and look to set up informational interviews with anyone in your Linkedin contacts who may work there.
2. Look into how the careers developed among people in the industry (including the folks from The Job Forum event on May 11,2023).
3. Check company websites for internships, especially if you’re new in the field or taking those continuing learning courses.
   4. Research biotech company options across the whole Bay Area where new Biotechnology and Life Science companies are popping up all over on the map. (Bio tech in the SF Bay Area is certainly in South San Francisco and Menlo Park and Palo Alto and now many more locations)
   5. Compile projects, work experience, and extra curricular projects into a portfolio document to use in both interviews or networking with industry connections.We appreciate those who were able to make it, as it was a hugely successful event. If you were unable to attend, we hope to see you at a future Job Forum event. Be sure to visit the website of UC Berkeley Extension to discover relevant coursework that may boost your career in the Bioscience field.

The next Job Forum Bio Sciences event will be Aug 17, 2023. (https://biosciences.eventbright.com)

The Job Forum was honored to have Pamela Ronald; who is not only a distinguished professor at UC Davis but also an investigator at the Innovative Genomics Institute of UC Berkeley as well as Director of Grass Genetics of the Joint Bioenergy Institute. Dr. Pamela Ronald is also the daughter of the innovative man, Robert Ronald, who founded The Job Forum organization back in 1952 as a new immigrant to the USA. His format for meetings to help job hunters is a time tested one we at The Job Forum still use today. Thank you to Pamela Ronald and her founding father.

One of the most common complaints we hear from frustrated job seekers is that they spend tons of time applying to jobs, but never hear anything back, which then became the term GHOSTING!

If you’re not getting the response you want in your job search – but have no idea what you’re doing wrong-it’s time to go back to the basics and make sure you’re not making the following classic mistakes:

Have You actually Targeted an Employer

Your Resume and Cover Letter Aren’t targeted to the Employer

You’re wasting the top third of your Resume

Your RESUME is too long

You Don’t take LinkedIn Seriously

Your Social media presence scares employers away.

Come to The Job Forum on Tuesdays for 1 to 1 advising, on Wednesday evening on zoom for the group Job Forum where you get your own time to ask your most burning questions, or to special Thursday Job Forum Zoom events which are speaker panels with Q&A with experts, organized by industry or job role (sign up on Eventbrite). Come to The Job Forum to discuss how to avoid more mistakes that waste your job search efforts!

1. Have You Targeted an Employer

You may think that because you’re submitting application after application online, you’re conducting an effective job search. Not true! Blindly applying to any and every position that you come across doesn’t usually yield good results.

The most effective way to find the right job for you is to target your ideal employers- the companies that interest you, align with your passion, and need your skills. Once you develop a list of dream companies, you should tailor your resume or applications specifically to those organizations, which will give you a much better chance of getting noticed and landing the job.

2. Your Resume and Cover Letter Aren’t targeted to the Employer

Even if you have a targeted job-search strategy, a generic resume and cover letter can quickly stall your efforts. One glance at your resume will tell an employer if you wrote it specifically for the company or if you created a one size-fits-all document that you emailed to every business on your list.

Your search will be much more successful when you customize your cover letter and resume to specifically address the company’s business problems and your capacity to solve them.

3. You’re wasting the top third of your Resume

Because so many resumes are read online, through applicant tracking systems, or on mobile devices, the top third of your resume is prime marketing real estate. If a hiring manager doesn’t immediately see a compelling message in that portion, they will swipe to the next resume – meaning, as Heidi Klum would say on Project Runway, “You’re out.”

We tell job hunters to think of their resume as a newspaper, you want all your pertinent experience to be above the FOLD.

4. Your RESUME is too long

When I see a resume that’s multiple pages long, it usually indicates that the job seeker hasn’t tailored his or her resume to the specific job- and instead, included everything but the kitchen sink.

While you may think a longer resume allows you to show off more of your qualifications, in reality, it usually causes your reader to get bored, become confused about why you applied to the job, and then toss it aside.

A resume is not your whole life story. You simply want to provide enough applicable information to score an interview. To do that, lay out the most relevant aspects of your experience that you’re qualified for that particular job. By doing that, you should be able to keep it to one page or two, at the very most, if you have lots of meaty content that’s relevant to the job.

A good rule of thumb is not to go back more than 10 years of work history.

“When I led the project to automate time cards, we were able to reduce payroll processing time by 20%, saving the company $15,000 per quarter.

Now that’s a powerful accomplishment.

5. You Don’t take LinkedIn Seriously

Imagine that you’re in charge of hiring a candidate for an important position, and you’ve narrowed it down to two strong applicants. You look up both on LinkedIn. One has a profile packed with accomplishments, a great personal story, tons of connections, and samples of her work. The other has a couple of connections, no photo, and little to no content.

Who would you choose?

Companies are increasingly using LinkedIn as a component in their hiring practices,- meaning that your profile is often the first-place employers go to check you out.

6. Your Social media presence scares employers away.

Hiring is a big risk for employers, so they aim to gather as much evidence as possible to either validate their choice or eliminate the bad applicants.

The latest statistics indicate a whopping majority-93%- of hiring managers go online to research a candidate before they offer him or her a job. Worse, 55%, have changed their minds about a candidate after getting a negative impression of him or her from social media.

So, clean up your social media. Comb through all your social profiles and ensure you’re comfortable with your privacy settings- i.e. what potential employers can see.

Remove anything that could be perceived as offensive, including badmouthing former employers. No company wants to hire a problem child.

These tips are serious for you to follow if you are being ghosted in your job search.

If you don’t pay close attention to these details, you could be losing opportunities to snag your perfect job. Nail the basics, and you’ll be on your way to a dream career.

 Come to The Job Forum and discuss more details with Job Forum volunteers who are hiring managers at SF Bay Area companies who will problem solve with you and share how to improve your job search and avoid wasting time on common job search mistakes.

By Cindy Fassler, Job Forum volunteer, career coach and executive recruiter

Contact | Cindy Fassler