Fears may start to set in once you’ve realized that your liberal arts degree may not be worth more than the piece of paper on which it was printed.  When job hunting becomes a headache, you may wish that you had chosen a more practical, specialized degree.

Concern may linger over the heads of you English, history, psychology, and other liberal arts majors, but don’t panic. Your degree has equipped you with certain skills that can be quite useful. Follow these tips to market your degree, and get a job.

Find an internship that has nothing to do with your degree: Bulk up your resume by taking an internship at a finance company or a local bank. Future employers need to see that the general education you learned in college can be applied to practical job skills. Additionally, having that real-world experience shows that you are mature and ready to take future jobs seriously.

Broaden your education: Take a few specialized classes outside your major that are beyond the required electives. For instance, if you’re a liberal arts major with a knack for numbers, take business calculus or an economics class.

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As a recent college graduate, I can tell you that the whole finding-a-job process is difficult, exhausting, and discouraging. You can cruise websites like Monster.com, read your local classified ads, and network to your heart’s content, but you still might not find the right job, even though you have spent hours searching. Luckily, a new website takes a lot of the legwork out of this process for you. Let me introduce you to YourEmployment.com.

YourEmployment.com is a free website that lists more than 500,000 jobs from more than 20,000 websites and job boards. YourEmployment.com has full time, part time, internships, and temporary positions available while also offering resources that you might need in order to make yourself a better candidate for jobs, such as information about pursuing a higher education.

Employers also use this website to list jobs that they currently have available. Employers either list directly on YourEmployment.com or the website searches it’s network of websites to find listings that are applicable and relevant for job-searchers.

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During a job interview, recruiters expect interviewees to ask questions. While it’s important to find out the information you need, the questions you ask are also revealing. Interviewers will use the questions you ask to determine how much candidates want the position.

The best questions to ask when you are interviewing for a job are open-ended and show that you’re eager to contribute. The worst can imply that you are looking to avoid work, self-interested, unprepared or engaged in illegal activities. A bad question can be a red flag to a potential employer.

Here are 15 example questions to avoid:

1. How many days off will I get?

2. What does this company do?

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During every job interview, after your potential employer has asked about your educational background, your interest in the company and your related experience, the conversation shifts. He or she will want to know if you have any questions to ask. This is not a moment you should dread, but you should be prepared. Don’t ask anything just fill the silence. The worst questions can make you look selfish or like you haven’t done your research.

The key to asking good questions during a job interview is to show that you have your future employer’s interests at heart. Here’s a list of five great questions to ask, from Forbes.

Questions to ask:

1. How would you describe the ideal candidate?

Not only does will this question show that you want to know how you can contribute to the company, it will also give you an idea of how good your prospects are for getting the job.

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Just graduated with no way to pay off that rather pricey degree? The job search can be tough and stressful, but job hunting goes beyond the wanted ads. Here are some helpful tips that will boost your chances of getting that job:

1. Be flexible: Be willing to work for a smaller company rather than a large company and be ready to except a lower salary than expected. Also, finding that perfect job may mean relocating. Keep an open mind to moving.

2. Spend some time on your resume: Though we’d like to think that putting together our resumes is as easy as googling “resume templates,” it’s just not that simple. Be sure to have several people look at your resume and be sure to tailor it to the position you are applying for. Use strong action verbs also to add energy to your profile.

3. Take advantage of your school’s career services: All colleges have some sort of job placement office, and most of them have connections with large local companies. Call your school and make an appointment. Feel free to ask them questions about your resume, cover letter and the much-dreaded interview.

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It’s a scary time for college graduates. Although the economy has improved recently, we are still in a recession and jobs are hard to come by.

In looking at industries, retail lost 45,000 jobs, finance lost 42,000 jobs, and manufacturing lost 207,000 jobs, signalling the largest one-month decline in over 25 years.  Many college seniors are therefore considering graduate school, simply because there are not enough jobs.

Is there any hope?

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Even more bad news for the college class of 2010: Western employers are planning to handle 36.8 percent fewer college graduates next year than this year. In the Southeast, employers are planning to cut back by 9.9 percent, and by 3.2 percent in the Midwest.

There is a little silver lining to these sad figures: In the Northeast, employers plan on hiring 5.6 percent more college graduates than they did last year. Nationwide, 43 percent of employers are planning on maintaining their 2009 hiring levels.

“Traditionally, employers tend to be conservative about their college hiring when the economy is in flux,” said Marilyn Mackes, executive director of The National Association of Colleges and Employers.

However, the economy is expected to pick back up in the spring, so hopefully employers will be hiring more graduates then. To make themselves more appealing to future employers, students should try to make themselves stand out from the crowd.

Those with these recession-proof majors might fare better than others.

Via The Denver Business Journal