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If You Can't Find a Job, It's Your Fault
(Note: I myself followed the advice given as closely as possible, dotted every I and crossed every T... and tinkering with my CV once upon a time was like painting the Forth bridge. So what gives? Can anyone shed any light on it?)
Career Coach for Immigrant Professionals & International Students H-1B OPT | Irvine Realtor
(If you're one of those people who loves to blame the government, the President, the economy, your country, your school, your lack of experience, your excess of experience, your culture, your race, your major, your age, or your language skills, and enjoy being a finger-pointing victim, please leave now. This post is not for you. )
If you're truly committed to finding a job you love, have been working overtime from morning til night submitting CV after CV, dressing up to the nines to goon interviews, telling everyone and their moms that you're looking for a job, but STILL aren't getting your results, this post is for you.
I totally understand what you're going through.
• You may have been the top in your school.
• You may have been the best and the brightest in your home country.
• You may have envisioned yourself becoming successful in your career since you were 5.
But when it comes to your job hunt, you have nothing to show for it.
You know that you don't lack in the effort department, you've tried your best at your college and did the best you could with what you have. You submit about 10 CVs a day and spend 5 hours starting in front a rotation of Monster, Indeed, Linkedin, and even Craigslist.
And yet you may see people who are not as smart as you, not as hardworking as you, and don't produce nearly as good as you, get your dream job.
What's going on here?
There are few things as frustrating as being talented but never being able to convince the hiring manager that you should be hired.
It's not so much that it's your fault, than it's the fact that you simply don't know HOW to find a job.
Can I get an amen here?
If you knew how to find a job, you would have passed over this article for the thousands of others online.
And yet here you are, looking to see what's the issue.
The only issue is that your way of finding a job is not working.
As Einstein says, the definition of insanity is somebody who keeps doing the same thing and expects to get a different result.
You can be an insane person who gets results, or you can be an insane person who doesn't.
Which do you choose?
In my experience I've seen 3 major areas that job hunters are sorely lacking in.
If you are sick of not getting a job and want to change your situation, I'm going to do some online predictions here and go out on a limb and say that these are the 3 challenges that you are going through right now:
Did you think I was going to mention something about CVs first?
Let's stop for a moment.
Why do you submit CVs online in the first place?
What are you hoping for?
For someone to give you an interview, right?
But do you realise that if you apply for jobs online, anybody in the world with an internet connection is your competition?
Why would you put yourself through this?
40 years ago there was no internet, but everyone was getting jobs, right?
So is the internet to blame?
No, unless you're one of those people I mentioned in the first paragraph, in that case please go away.
The fact is that it's EASY to press a button to submit CVs.
I'm sure I can even get a programmer to do that everyday for the next 50 years.
But it's not the fastest way.
The FASTEST way to getting an interview is to find the hiring manager (or any C-level execs) who have the DECISION MAKING POWER TO HIRE YOU!
It may seem obvious, but it scares a lot of people.
• You may think.. well who am I to talk to the CEO?
• What if they reject me?
• What if I get ignored?
• What if I am blacklisted on the company?
• What if I get escorted off the company premises?
• While these are all valid, legitimate fears, the truth is that until you give it a shot, everything you say is speculation.
I've heard of somebody who desired a job so much and who was smart enough to figure out this early on.He went to join a kickboxing gym where many CEOs go to in San Francisco, fought a match with his future boss, and got the job.
Does it sound crazy? Yes.
Did it work? HELL YES.
So I'm not saying that you have to fight your boss to get a job, but the fact is many people are not willing to do something that WORKS but is difficult. In that case, you may have to reexamine how badly you actually want the job or if you're ok with your parents taking care of you for the rest of your life.
Yes, you may risk rejection, but we're not talking you need to impress 100 people here..you only need to get 1 yes.
and guess what..if you have a Linkedin account, you know exactly where to find your potential boss. Chances are that he/she is already on here, you just didn't take the initiative to shoot them an e-mail message yet.
So which would you rather choose..submitting 100 CVs, or making 10 genuine connections with people who have the ability to hire you?
This shit really makes me angry. As somebody who used to practice 1st date conversations, I can never understand people who care so little for their future job that they think it's an improv game.
Once you get past the hurdle of getting an interview, this is an area where many people get stuck as well.
You may be amazing at what you do.
You may be the best in the world.
But if you can't convince the hiring manager that you are, then you'll just be unemployed.
Understand that what you say is just important as who you are here.
And here is where I have a lot of sympathy for my core client group, my skilled immigrants who are PhD's, Masters degree candidates, my international students who major in the most difficult subjects, yet don't understand how they can present themselves because they're in a different environment.
If I ask you, "Why should I hire you?", what would you say?
Take out a piece of paper and write down your answer.
Look at it, and ask yourself--are you fully, 100% convinced that you are presenting your BEST self in what you just wrote?
Chances are, most people haven't given a thought about HOW they present themselves.
They feel that if they work hard at what they do, people would just..KNOW.
Then why does Coca Cola spend money on advertising?
Why haven't people flocked to you with job offers?
Shouldn't you just be able to graduate and get flooded with offers?
Here's the thing: interviewing well is not the same as being somebody who is extroverted or loud or funny.
I get a lot of people who say that they think people who are loud or sociable are the ones who get the job, and they may have an initial edge, but it's like an episode in the Drake & Josh Show, where the wildly flamboyant, sociable Drake came back laughing with the driving instructor who said she had a great time with him, fail the driver's license test--but Josh, the boring, dependable one who actually passed the test because he followed the rules and was a good driver.
You don't need to be Drake to get the job. You need to fit what the company is looking for, and too many times you don't even know what the company is looking for, AND you think you can wing it--so is it a surprise that you don't have the job?
And the thing is--it's something that you MAY be able to improve with time, but at the cost of what? At the cost of a potential job.
Here's where you need someone else to tell you how you're doing. Because you're probably doing your best, but you have no idea how to improve. Here's where it's helpful to have another person's take on your interviewing skills.
3. You Have No Idea How to Job Hunt
Right now would you say that you have a very clear idea and proven system that you're following to get your job?
Chances are either you don't have one, or your plan isn't working.
The interesting thing with careers is that while you'll gladly fork over $26,000 a year to pay tuition to a university, you'll pay thousands of dollars for a luxury handbag, you'll pay a big chunk of your income to spend on your car, but when it comes to your career--are you winging it without anyone's help?
• Would you compete for the Olympics without a coach?
• Would you let a doctor without medical school education near your body?
• Would you let an accountant without a college degree near your business?
Because either way, you pay.
You're paying for every day when you DON'T have a job.
You pay every day, financially, energetically, and emotionally when you don't get what you want.
How much is it costing you to NOT have the job that you want, and to NOT have a proven plan of action?
The choice is yours.
You can Google all day, you can read all the books in the library, but there's a reason why you are here where you are right now.
It's because you have no idea what you're doing.
Or your method is not working.
You can try to do it on your own, you can go to your career center, your professors, your friends and family, but chances are if you knew how to do it YOU WOULD HAVE DONE IT ALREADY??
Do you see this?
If you keep doing the same thing you have been doing you will always get the same results. Period.
I had a discovery call with someone who didn't have a job 8 months ago, she decided not to work with me, and then 8 months later she called me again because she felt that previously I was too expensive--but guess what?
She just lost out on 8 months of income, and had she had a financial analyst position she wanted at that time, she would have earned $32,000, which is much less than the rate I was charging back then.
So think about how much is it costing you to go it alone?
Some people are ok with being out of a job for a year, and if you're one of those people, great, congratulations, you were wise enough financially to have a cushion when times are hard.
But if you are really sick and tired of not having the job you want, the only person you can blame is yourself, and if it's just a matter of not knowing how, there's always help, but only if you decide to make the decision to reach out and get the help you need to land your dream job.
Otherwise, with the same actions, you'll always get the same results.
So what's it going to be?
More of the same?
Or time for a change?
The choice is always yours.