I recently got a disheartening email from a job seeker we’ll call “Ted in California.”
Ted’s tale of unemployment woe was a familiar one. Yet, if you dig below the surface, as I’ll do in this article, you’ll find opportunities to fix a failed job search.
“”My county is experiencing a 12.5% reported unemployment rate, which means the real unemployment rate is between 18% and 20%.”
Computing the “real” unemployment rate is like computing the wind chill — why look for more ways to make yourself miserable?
Here’s another way to look at those numbers: 20% unemployment means 80% employment. Eight of 10 people who want a job, have a job.
What other money-paying endeavor offers an 80% success rate? Think of those 8-in-10 odds to boost your confidence level.
“Most companies are not hiring and attrition is being covered internally. I have investigated about 40 companies and none would even consider taking a paper application.”
What’s stopping Ted from investigating another 40 companies?
Nothing.
And who said you had to submit a paper application?
Nobody.
Who said that he had to send in an application. Why not a letter?
Do you see my point? Both of these roadblocks exist only in Ted’s mind.
Meanwhile, Ted, how are you following up with the 40 companies you did survey?
Here’s a startling fact.
I’ve not an unsuccessful job seeker who could tell me how they plan to follow up with employers after the first contact. They hear “No” once from a hiring manager and never call or write to them again (email doesn’t count).
Put another way, failure to follow up with hiring managers means failure to get hired.
Understand this: “No” from an employer today does not mean “No” tomorrow, nor does it mean, “Never contact us again.” If you leave your follow-up entirely to chance, as most unsuccessful job seekers do, you will be as unsuccessful as most job seekers are.
Moreover, there is no such thing as a hiring freeze. Positions open up every day as employees quit, die, retire, or get fired. So if you’ve contacted 40 employers this week and none have openings, it’s statistically improbable that they will still have no openings next week or next month.
With web sites like JibberJobber.com offering free software to help manage your job leads, there is simply no excuse for not contacting hiring managers every few weeks and giving them another reason to hire you.
How?
Give employers another piece of information that shows you understand their business and can make a contribution. Just set up a Google Alert (www.Google.com/alerts) on a relevant topic and you’ll have new tidbits to share every day.
While ordinary job seekers can claim to be diligent, self-motivated, and attentive to detail, when you follow up with employers, you’ll prove it. And this makes you extraordinary.
“I heard so many horror stories about people like myself losing their jobs after 10 or 20 years, and there is absolutely nothing out there.”
Sorry, but you need to save the sob stories for your spouse. They won’t make you more employable.
Every complaint you make about a failed job search labels you as damaged goods. Which prevents people from referring you to potential employers, because who wants to recommend damaged goods? This is the brutal reality.
So, go ahead and feel sorry for yourself. Punch a pillow. Yell at the wall. But do so in private. When you walk out the door or pick up the phone, you must project an air of confidence to the public.
How to feel confident? Remember that, unless you’ve been unemployed your entire life, you’ve solved this problem before. You’ve been hired once, and you’re worth hiring again. There’s a job out there with your name on it. It may not be advertised, or in the city or industry you have in mind, but it is out there.
“The reason I am writing is that I have done everything and more. I cannot find a company that could utilize my skills.”
You haven’t done everything possible to find a job.
Otherwise, you’d be working.
Seriously.
Just look at http://www.ZaleTabakman.ca and you you’ll find hundreds of tactics Ted could connect with employers, none of which he mentioned using. Check out the 77 ways for example.
Finally, I would suggest that Ted — and you — should stop trying to “find a company that could utilize my skills.” That’s what ordinary job seekers do.
Instead,
-
- find companies with problems to solve. (Hint: There are many).
- Then, research these companies to learn about their problems.
- Talk to people who work there, ask how you could help them do their jobs better, and
- offer your proposed solutions.
This is what successful networking boils down to, from the employer’s viewpoint. They hire only those people who get on their radar and demonstrate that they can solve problems.
The more smart networking conversations you start having, the faster you can get on an employer’s radar — and get hired.
And today’s job hunting habit?
Never ever blame somebody else or anything else for you not being successful.
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This job hunting post was adapted from content provided to by my good friends Kevin Donlin and David Perry, co-creators of the Guerrilla Job Search System.
Finding a job is hard, most people don’t know how to do it, and the results are months of needless waiting.
I recommend that you check The Guerrilla Job Search System to get a job and stop waiting.
Click here to understand how the Guerrilla Job Search System can shorten your job search significantly.
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