How to clinch a dream job after years out of the job market. We tell the success story of an American expat who moved from Madrid to the US.

It's tough enough to find a top job, but imagine how hard it would be if you had worked in another continent for the past 15 years and all your networking contacts were there.
That was Kathy Whitlock's situation about a year ago, when she decided to relocate from Madrid back to the US. After working in Europe for so long, the sales-and-marketing executive worried that her search would drag on.
"I panicked," she says. "I had absolutely no network in the states, and I had no idea what employers would think of someone who had been out of the country for so long."
Whitlock was director of sales and marketing for Warner Bros. Movie World Madrid, a large theme park outside the city, when two events made her opt to leave. First, operations at the theme park were being turned over from a US-based company to a Madrid-based company, and she would be working with new management. Perhaps more importantly, her mother, in Virginia, had started treatment for cancer. As often as she could on weekends, Whitlock would fly from Spain to her parents' home in Richmond, Virginia, to help, but she felt she wasn't doing enough.
"I would get there Friday night and leave Monday morning, and I couldn't do much," she says. "I thought, 'this is ridiculous, she is the only mother I have.' "
Whitlock resigned at the end of November and returned to the US before Christmas. To get a running start on her job hunt, she began laying the groundwork before she left Madrid.

Kathy Whitlock was a sales and marketing director in Madrid

Her first concern was her CV, which was written in the European style including details such as citizenship and age. American employers are used to accomplishment-oriented marketing CVs, so Whitlock hired a New York-based resume-writer - who charges between USD 400 and 750 (EUR 327 and EUR 615) for executive resumes - to help revamp her presentation. She told the resume writer about her fears of not being able to easily find a new role in the US and was advised to get a coach/agent who arranges networking interviews for clients.
Whitlock signed up with a job-search coach and agent based in Greenwich who charges USD 15,000-20,000 (EUR 12-16,000) for her services, which include identifying 15-20 target companies and then cold-calling the hiring managers to arrange networking or informational interviews for client job seekers.
Meanwhile, Whitlock did what networking she could on her own. One of her European contacts made a call to Gary Bassell, chairman and chief executive officer of The Bravo Group, an advertising agency based in New York that focuses on the Hispanic market.
Bassell had recently taken the helm of the company and was seeking new recruits who could help transform what he calls "old school" Hispanic marketing and advertising to new ways of reaching members of this consumer group. To find these professionals, "we have to rely on our network, since headhunters don't necessarily know what is new- and old-school thinking," he says.

Whitlock started a job in Miami earlier this year

Bassell contacted Whitlock in January just as she was planning a trip to New York to meet people at companies her coach had contacted.
"The chemistry with him was right," Whitlock says about their meeting. Bassell in turn liked her diverse background, which included travel for clients in Africa and the Middle East, as well as experience in the entertainment industry through the theme park. Whitlock also speaks fluent Spanish and French.
Whitlock was offered a job as a vice president and managing director of the agency in its Miami office. She asked her coach if she should continue to interview, but her coach advised her to accept the job if she liked the opportunity.
She started her new position in February, relocating to Miami to head Bravo's account with wireless company Cingular Wireless.
Noting that her job search took far less than the six or seven months she had expected, Whitlock said her new resume "was worth every penny." And although she didn't land her job through her coach, she says she was pleased with the agent's work on her behalf.
Whitlock's marketing background didn't hurt, either. She approached her search with the same urgency she would bring to a marketing campaign. "I dedicated myself body and soul to this and didn't do anything else," she says. "I really did test myself to get a job."

August 2005
Subject: expat life; job-hunting