Ask the Recruiter

I have been seeing a lot of LinkedIn profile photos lately. Thousands, actually. I've been looking for candidates for Patch.com as a contract recruiter, so I have upgraded my LinkedIn account and have been running a lot of searches.

While looking at so many teeny tiny mug shots, I came across a blog post by a man named Hung Lee, who lists five things to avoid when selecting a LinkedIn profile photo. (I'm including six LinkedIn profile shots in this column that I didn't think worked well.)

Lee rightly surmises that anyone who reads his post must already have a LinkedIn profile. If you don't, I suggest you get busy. It has become increasingly apparent to me that, if you want to get found, you have to be where people are looking. ...

An annual salary survey of salaries in local broadcast markets contains some good news, but not for everyone.

The RTDNA/Hofstra University annual survey, written by Bob Papper, professor and chair of the Department of Journalism, Media Studies, and Public Relations at Hofstra University, showed that local television news salaries rose 2.5 percent and local radio news salaries held the line in 2009. A year earlier, local TV salaries dropped 4.4 percent and local radio was down 1.8 percent.

Statistically, then, we are not back to 2007 levels, but the direction looks better. ...

Poynter's Colleen Eddy and I hosted a live chat about finding ways to make yourself in demand to potential employers -- even in a job market that is in flux.

You can revisit this link at any time to replay the chat.

Every recruiter, every editor, every hiring director is different. This makes it impossible to tell job-seekers what the most important part of their package is. It is different in every case.

But this I can tell you: Hiring managers facing piles of applications find ways to streamline the work and to quickly cut down the stack. Lousy cover letters help them do that.

A lousy cover letter can send your application to the circular file before anyone even looks at your resume or work samples. It is critical to keep your application on top of the desk -- or in the inbox -- if you are to get a shot at that job.

Here are six things to avoid if you want to survive the first cut:

1. Boring letters make hiring managers think your work will be boring, too. As they plow through all those applications, they are praying that someone will write something interesting. Cut to the chase in your opening paragraph -- not the second one -- and make a case for why you should get an interview.

Read on for five more things to avoid in your cover letter.