Job seekers often ask “How much time should I spend each day on my job search?” There is no one right answer, but suffice to say the amount of time you spend making strategic efforts directly correlates to your results. If you put in the bare minimum, such as just enough to collect unemployment insurance, you should not be surprised to see minimal results.
Troubleshooting Tuesday: Are You Spending Your Time on the Wrong Things?
The old saying “Time is money” may seem irrelevant to job seekers. After all, you’re not getting paid to look for work. Yet time out of work equals lost income, so how you spend your job search time has great financial impact. Today on Troubleshooting Tuesday, a look at whether you’re spending your time on tasks with the greatest benefit to your job search success.
Troubleshooting Tuesday: Why Aren’t You Making Progress?
Troubleshooting your job search is a sure fire way to figure out what is working, and fix what is not. But what if you’ve addressed your networking, resume, interviewing skills and more, but are not making the progress you would like? It could be your job search is stalling around how you focus your efforts. Use these questions to figure out if you need a different focus:
Troubleshooting Tuesday: Stalling After Interviews
Interviewing is the most important phase of a job search. Few people get hired without a successful interview. Yet it’s also a place where many job seekers get stuck. On Troubleshooting Tuesday, we are moving through each phase of the job search, tackling and fixing common sticking points. If you are generating job leads, and being invited in for interviews, but not getting called for second interviews or job offers, it’s time for a deeper look at what it takes to interview successfully. This week we’ll focus on preparation for interviews. Other Troubleshooting Tuesdays will help refine communication skills and other aspects of interviewing.
Is Networking Your Problem?
Are you struggling to find job leads? If so, it’s possible you are not doing enough networking. Many job seekers rely too much on advertised jobs and not enough on networking. Recruiters are relying less and less on job boards and other traditional sources to advertise job openings. The hidden job market, often discovered through networking, is a stronger way to uncover opportunities.
Is Your Job Search Target Unrealistic?
If you are finding it difficult to locate any open positions at all in your targeted area, it may be that you have picked too small a target. Job searchers today are particularly challenged because there are many job areas that have greatly diminished due to changes in the market and economy. If you are targeting such an area, it’s time to widen your target.
Troubleshooting Your Job Search
Job seekers sometimes say to me “I’m doing everything, and nothing is working.” The truth is, there are things every job seeker can do to improve their job search. But often job seekers don’t see beyond what they know about job searching. What they don’t know could change their strategy and execution. With that in mind, I’m kicking off “Troubleshooting Tuesday”, a series designed to help job seekers locate and fix the trouble spots in their job search. Today, I’ll go over some common trouble areas and raise some questions for rethinking your future job search efforts. In the weeks that come, we’ll tackle each area in depth.
Unemployed Need Not Apply: The Numbers Behind the Claim
There’s been a lot of discussion about the claim that some recruiters and hiring managers are only interested in people who are already employed. This report, circulated on CNN and other major news sources, raised the specter of discrimination against the unemployed. But a recent poll should go a long way to putting minds at ease.
Big Things Ahead at Jobfully
Big things are happening at Jobfully as we launch a beta version of our full product and take the next big step in helping people find fulfilling work.
Beating Unemployment Stats with Techniques that Work
The monthly release of unemployment figures leaves some job seekers feeling the blues. One approach to digesting these job figures is to not get caught up in the up-and-downs and focus instead on what is working. Every day people are getting hired and starting new jobs. For the job seeker the question becomes, “How can I be one of the people who gets hired?” A recent panel of job seekers who had found work revealed five actions that the newly hired felt led them to success. Here is a summary of techniques that worked and how you can implement them:
Built up visibility in a small community. To do this, join local professional groups, participate in online groups and attend local meetings and conferences. Make yourself known in your industry or field so that when jobs open up, people think of you.