A Logical Approach to Finding a New Job
Don’t send out your resume on a hope and a prayer, blindly
mailing it to 100 companies you think might be right. You get a response, an
interview, maybe even an offer. But this approach to career search is a little
like buying a lottery ticket. What are the chances of being a winner?
If you want to avoid the crossed fingers approach to finding a job, working with
a career professional is probably a better solution.
There’s a process for finding a new job:
• analyze your interests and skills,
• identify your preferred working style,
• design focused research,
• find organizations and people to contact for informational interviews, and
• write a cover letter and resume to reflect the needs of the job under
consideration.
If you’re thinking of working with a career advisor, see be sure you get asked
about the following:
• your financial goals
• your personal goals
• your professional goals
• your geographic preferences
• personal challenges you might be facing: a divorce, need to get child through
college, elderly parent
• professional obstacles that could include gaps in your resume, more than one
termination, not knowing what you want to do
This information will help you and an advisor identify the right kinds of jobs
and the right companies to work for. The more you know about yourself and your
abilities, the better you’ll be at “selling” yourself in your cover letter,
resume and interviews.
It may make sense for you to work with a career counselor rather than family or
friends when you’re looking for a new job. Spouses and other family members can
be threatened by career change, particularly one involving a primary
breadwinner, so they might not be the most objective sources of feedback.
Paying for a career advisor might seem like it’s a lot of money to spend,
especially if you’ve been out of work for a while. But think of it as an
investment rather than a cost. If you can find a higher level position or
negotiate a better salary because you worked with a professional, wouldn’t it be
worth it? That’s what a good career professional can do for you. (Free and low
cost opportunities are also available in most larger cities through state funded
and operated career resource centers. They may be worth looking into.)
Jan Cannon, MBA, PhD, has over 10 years of experience helping clients to
find work that they enjoy through career coaching and resume preparation. She
was an online expert with CIO.com and jobfindtoday.com and currently provides
online content to the Career Connection of the Boston Herald (
http://print.jobfind.com ).
Jan speaks to groups and leads workshops on making career choices, networking,
finding jobs, and staying motivated. She teaches courses on entrepreneurship
for those interested in starting their own businesses. Jan has Myers Briggs™
MBTI™ and FirstStepFastTrack™ certifications and offers Inscape™ DiSC
assessments.
Jan's book on senior job search will be published by Capital Press in
April 2005.
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