You Only Need To Do These Five Things

To Succeed In Your Job Hunt

by Jack Kelly at forbes.com

When you’re in between jobs, it's an overwhelming experience. There’s an overflow of too much well-intentioned advice. Everyone’s telling you what you must absolutely do to succeed in the pursuit of a new job. Your parents offer stale advice that’s 30 years old. Colleagues—who moved jobs two years ago—give unsolicited guidance, but have no idea how out of touch they are with the current Covid-19 job market. All sorts of so-called experts come out of the woodwork and weigh in—for a hefty price tag, of course.

    Allow me to simplify the process, Marie Kondo-style. Here are the core basics of what you need to do in the job hunt—without all of the drama and fanfare.
 

"Yes, ageism is real," said Ron Visconti in a recent career guidance webinar geared at applicants aged 50 and older. Visconti, the founder and executive director of Phase2Careers, a nonprofit organization assisting workers over age 40, knows a thing or two about ageism in the workplace. He has worked with small and large organizations, both public and private, on recruitment and career transition issues. 

Whether you’re looking to get back to work or to earn extra cash as a side hustle, now’s the time to pounce on part-time seasonal jobs.

    According to ManpowerGroup’s new Employment Outlook Survey, employers across all sectors plan to increase their hiring in the fourth quarter. Online retail, in particular, is surging — up 44.5 percent since the second quarter of 2020.

    Seasonal jobs also allow you to try a job on for size while earning a steady paycheck, gaining new skills, building contacts and, in some cases, enjoying paid company benefits.

As recruitment processes have gone completely digital since the pandemic began, hiring professionals have been placing greater emphasis on certain job-search tools over others, according to new data from TopResume.

    In a survey of more than 300 hiring managers, recruiters, and HR professionals, TopResume asked participants how their hiring preferences have changed since the COVID-19 crisis began. The survey revealed that recruiters care more about cover letters and thank-you notes now than they did before the coronavirus transformed the job market.

    With widespread unemployment driving higher volumes of applications to nearly every open role, it may come as a surprise that recruiters are sparing a few minutes to review cover letters.
 

We had a football coach in high school who used to say, “Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.”  That certainly could apply to today’s job search.

    Don’t lament that colleague or acquaintance who landed a job through luck.  True, some people do fall backwards into special circumstances. Usually though, what you’re calling luck, is actually the result of a lot of preparation.

    More than once (or even twice) we’ve stressed the importance of preparing for a job interview – and, odds are, that you haven’t heard that just from us.  Despite the current virtual nature of the job interview, that hasn’t changed.  But why not apply that same kind of preparation to everything you do in your job search?

    Rather than banging out a resume, search for resume tips and templates that may, with possibly only a few modifications, make your bland resume into one that stands out and gets remembered.  The same holds true for cover letters.  The same holds true for your LinkedIn profile.  Do a little bit of research to see what people who are successful through LinkedIn are doing.

    It should not come as a shock that networking is a critical component of any job search. Aside from the obvious, many networking tenets still hold true virtual or not.

    How do you prepare for a networking event?  How about starting with who will be attending?  Are these your kind of people?  That is, are the attendees at this event people who can help you in your search?

    In addition to knowing who those people are, have you determined up front what you want to get out of this event.  “Well, duh!  I want a job.”  OK, but how are the people at this event going to help you to get one?  Are they from your industry?  If you’re changing careers, can they provide an entree for you? Can they themselves do the hiring?  Do they know people who can help you get a foot in the door?  Do they know people who know people?

    It’s all part of the preparation.