How effective is online contract (IT) job searches?

[Scruff]

If you have been with the same employer for 6 years, I would suggest that your CV should not be more than 1 to 1/5 pages long.

Your CV is your "door opening mechanism" and it needs to stand out from the others and is your advertisement. Only use 1 font. Only use black print. Stick to a font which doesn't have serifs (arial and coruier for example). Put your qualifications in your headline next to your name. Use bullet points only highlighting your skills. Leave off any school related "qualifications", since you are not a school leaver. (If your name is Tombisana, consider shortening it to something like Tombi on your CV, unless your friends and colleagues (PWC?) only call you Tombisana).

When replying on this forum, grammar and spelling mistakes are sloppy and they will be picked up by the Spelling and Grammar Police. If you are in such a hurry, consider that those replying to you have taken time from surfing the internet (erm, working), Ebay challenges etc to reply to you, using better English. If English isn't your first language, put your replies through a word processor, and provided you have the dictionary set to UK English, it should highlight glaring spelling and grammar mistakes.

If you wish, PM me your details and I will make the effort to assist you with a constructive review of your CV?

[SueEllen]

If you have had only one employer for the past 6 years you need to split your role into projects on your CV.

If you have not done different projects over the past 6 years then you are a bit stuffed.

[Earl Purple]

Yes, I think the system is dated and flawed.

Many of the agencies on the job boards do "apply by numbers". They send large numbers of CVs into portals and hope for the best something will come out of it. They don't run through the CVs to check for their quality. They have no contact with the actual personnel at the company to where they are applying.

If you are not getting any interviews, either you are applying to the wrong jobs or your CV is flawed. It is very typical to hear no response whatsoever after applying for a job.

It is also the case that most agencies are clueless. We have more knowledge than they do about what the employer might want, as we have worked hands-on in these very companies and they only have experience of being an agency.

It is in their interests to just place as many candidates as they can, and take the cash whilst the candidates do all the work.

I have no idea why companies continue to use them, to be honest.

From your own perspective though, you probably want to amend the CV. I did so several times on one occasion.