Quick Tip – How to Find Out Who Will Be Hiring

Follow the money – Issue #53

This tip is not only useful for those of you in the Tech industry. Many types of businesses raise money to expand operations, which often includes opening new locations and hiring additional employees.

“The early bird gets the worm,” so the sooner you can set yourself up to be considered for one of these new positions, the better. But, how do you find out about these roles before a hiring manager has even posted them?

The reality is that 80% of jobs are always locked up in the “hidden job market.” So, it isn’t just these pending positions that are difficult to discover. Many of the best jobs are never posted where you’ll see them; therefore, you need a different strategy than waiting and applying later.

A better approach to networking

Sometimes, a hidden job can find you. However, this only happens when you’ve been active with your network and keeping your online presence fresh. People have to know that you exist, what your expertise is, and see your name often enough to have you in mind if something interesting comes up. Trusted friends need to know that you might be open to a new opportunity.

If you have a list of specific companies where you’d like to work, stay close to your connections there. Make time for lunch and coffee to catch up with people. Attend events that these companies of interest host.

For example, I spoke at a meet-up at Airbnb once and connected with several employees there. If I had been interested in working there, it would have been a fantastic way to find my “Inside Champion.”

On the flip side, when I hosted a meet-up at Yahoo, several people came up to me after I spoke and asked if we were hiring. These types of events provide a rare chance to find out about upcoming positions that haven’t even been posted yet. It’s easy to be the first person to apply when no one else knows about the role!

Follow the money

You can also get ahead of the crowd by tracking which companies have raised a recent round of funding. What do companies do when they now have millions of dollars freshly deposited in the bank? They start hiring aggressively. What happens when they hire more employees and teams begin to grow? They add new layers of management, which means even more jobs.

You can find out which companies have recently raised funding on Crunchbase. For example, over 300 startups had a funding round just this week! One hundred ten startups have raised seed rounds greater than $5M already this year. One startup, Harmony in Cupertino, CA, raised an $18M Seed round! You can be sure that they are hiring.

AngelList has a dedicated jobs section, but it’s another excellent resource for tracking startups of interest. There are almost 5M companies listed, but you can sort and filter to get down to a manageable list (e.g., by location, funding state, money raised, market, etc.). You can also browse recent deals to see who has recently raised more funding.

Once you have a list of exciting companies that just raised money, then it’s time to work your connections to talk to someone and see if they are hiring. If you want things to move more quickly, reach out directly to people in the company. But, as you probably know, coming in cold like that is harder than getting a warm intro.

It is more challenging to find out when local businesses are getting ready to expand and hire since they don’t typically raise money from investors and angels. So, there is no easily-accessible database of that type of info at your fingertips (e.g., new business loans).

So, what do you do? Well, join your local chamber of commerce, attend the events, and get to know people. My chamber of commerce has mixers you can participate in as a non-member. I’ve found that people enjoy sharing inside knowledge (e.g., “Did you hear that Anna’s Bakery is planning a new location across town?”). So, you’ll be one of the first to know and can reach out to business owners to see if they will be hiring.

I’ve also joined local meet-ups to meet other entrepreneurs and business owners. Again, it’s a great way to get inside information about new businesses and companies that will be expanding and hiring.

Finally, you might be surprised by how much you can learn when you join a local gym or CrossFit box. Several people at my gym are business owners, investors, real estate agents, loan officers, etc. Guess what? They know when businesses will be expanding and hiring. We talk about that more than you would think. If I were looking for a new job, I’d know exactly where to apply and be ahead of the game.

Sorry, this “quick tip” became a little longer than usual. Hopefully, though, it’s given you some ideas for uncovering new opportunities before anyone else knows about them!

If you have other clever strategies, feel free to share them in the comments. Thanks!