Finding the right summer job is a full-time job

The school year is now in full swing, and you are most likely juggling classes, fall jobs and other school activities and not thinking about your 2011 summer job search, summer internships, interviews and resume preparation. In most cases, this is true for students at the beginning of every school year. However, if I was to survey summer job seekers from the previous summer, my feeling is they would change one word in this statement. Instead of “thinking” about their summer job preparation activities, they would have already been “working” on them.

Finding the right summer job opportunity is a full-time job. Here are two tips to finding a summer job on Martha’s Vineyard:

1. Don’t limit your search to the big job boards. Although they make job searching easier, they can be very expensive for employers to use. A small company may pay several hundred dollars per job posting and most island businesses don’t have the budget for that. For example, MarthasVineyardWorks.com only charges $29 for a 60 day posting.

2. If you come across a position you are interested in, try contacting the company. Most people submit their resume and wait to hear from the employer. You can distinguish yourself from the competition and reinforce your interest in a position just by reaching out.

Most employers will start recruiting for next soon, so stay tuned! If you have not signed up for MarthasVineyardWorks.com, do it now. I'll send you Job Alerts as employers post jobs on the site.

What did I miss? What other tips can you add to this?