Link: Good time for job hunters - tvnz.co.nz.
Everyone is saying it is a good time to look so here a few pieces of advice for job hunting at this time of year:
New Year is a time for thinking about your place in the world. For a lot of us it's a time when we make decisions on what we should improve upon in our lives in the next year and call them "resolutions". I think resolutions suck. Mostly because they require a lot of time to put the planning into place to achieve them, but normally very little time is spent on this important aspect. Which tends to doom them to failure.
When it comes to career resolutions, New Year can spur a lot of people into action to try and find a new job. This can mean dusting off the CV or resume and adding the few tidbits that you feel you have put into your work since the last time you looked for a job and then sending it out to various companies and/or recruiters.. If you are thinking of doing this then I have some advice that I think can really help you with this process, and perhaps will give you more satisfying results than resolutions normally do.
1. Ask yourself three times, "what do I really want in my work?". Knowing yourself can save you from employers who don't have that in mind from you, and it can also save you from going after opportunities that can't provide it. Why three times? By the third time you will have hopefully come up with an answer that is both inspiring and practical. Almost always the first answer tends to involve as little work as possible (there is nothing wrong with dreaming!).
2. Read your resume and ask yourself, "would I want to meet the person that this resume describes?". Forget about asking if they would employ you from your resume. A resume is to attract people to meet you, not hire you. If there is any doubt write again, but read the next hint first.
3. Read your resume and think about your answer to question 1. Now ask yourself, "does my resume reflect a person that an employer would want to meet for the job I want to do?". If not, have another rewrite and position yourself for that kind of job. Also remember this ploy works for individual jobs you are going after if that is the stage you find yourself. By the way don't throw out your other resume, keep multiple copies, remember it's cool to customize. But, don't do this rewrite without reading the next hint.
4. Read your resume and ask yourself, "does my resume from top downwards continually grab someone and want them to read more?". This is a really difficult one because you have to know the reader and it really lends itself to customizing on a job-by-job basis. However, I find that too many people assume that an employer is reading your CV in total. This is rarely the case. Employers usually have multiple resumes to read in the first instance so they read by the "negative feedback" method. This means they read down your CV looking for pointers that fit what they are looking for in a person and for a particular job. If they get too many negative feedbacks they move to the next resume. Sounds tough? Of course it is, but in a time-strapped society this is just a reality. Hell, 99% of the people who started reading this article haven't got this far.
5. Now, conduct your search with your answer to question 1 in mind, but be open to opportunities. While the dream job is out there it may not be in a job description and being advertised for right now. Look out for companies, opportunities, and most importantly hiring managers who you feel will provide a platform for you to achieve your goal. You'll have to be discerning to find this out, and you'll definitely have to ask tough questions of people.
Personally, I think that one of the important keys is to find out if you achieving your goal, would help a prospective employer achieve theirs. For example, if you are a Recruiter and your goal is to become a Pinnacle Society Member then this goal is certainly going to match with most sales targets for any executive search firm your join. But if your goal is to become the world's greatest semiconductor executive search consultant then you'll hardly find that matching with a job at an IT recruitment firm.
6. This shouldn't really be the last question but you have to ask
it, "have I really done all I could to achieve my goal within my
current environment?". This is a tough question, it forces you to be
honest with yourself. If the answer is "No", then rededicate yourself
to finding out both why and how you can. Changing jobs isn't always the
answer to a loss of enthusiasm or interest. In the hot job market we
currently live in it can actually be an easier way than to face the
real issues within ourselves. But that unfortunately won't make you
stronger. Don't forget this step, whether you change jobs or not you
will be a better and more confident person for thinking about it.
