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Feature Article

How to Keep Your Job Search on Track

Keeping your job search focused can be a challenge. You've probably heard the cliche that finding a full time job is a full time job. While it's a cliche, it's extremely good advice, but it's not always easy to follow.

When you lose a job, you typically go from having your time and work environment structured for you largely by your employer, to having to take full responsibility for managing your time and your job search.

These 5 tips will help you to keep your job search on track:

1. Develop a Plan

Determining some plan and guidelines around your job search will keep you more focused. Being focused will help prevent you from wasting time, and a focused job seeker makes a much stronger impression on an employer than a job seeker who appears to lack focus.

Determine:

• What type of jobs you are seeking
• What pay range is acceptable to you
• Where you are willing to work. Are you willing to commute or relocate? If so how far will you commute and under what circumstances are you willing to relocate? How will you develop job leads?
• Where will you seek support?

2. Determine What Works and Do It

It's very easy to keep yourself busy for seven or eight hours a day working on job search-related tasks. However, the fact that you are busy doesn't necessarily mean that you are being productive and using your time effectively. You will no doubt discover that some of the job search strategies that really work typically take a little extra effort and may even require you to push beyond your comfort zone.

For example:

• Networking for unadvertised job opportunities instead of applying only to advertised jobs
• Writing specific resumes and cover letters for each job instead of sending generic resumes and cover letters
• Preparing answers to the most difficult interview questions instead of glossing over them and hoping the employer won't ask

All of these job search strategies require a little extra from you. It's that little extra that puts you ahead of the competition. So, don't be content with what easy; require more of yourself. Do what works even if it forces you to push beyond your job search comfort zone.

3. Be Wary of Low Return Drains on Your Time

There is plenty of busy work that can occupy your job search time. Tasks like mass mailing resumes to every company in town or spending days on end searching for job leads on every job site you find can cause you to feel like you're actively job searching. Although you may be busy, ask yourself whether you're spending the majority of your time working on tasks that are very likely to produce the results you are seeking.

Conducting an effective job search requires more than just putting in time at job search tasks. You must choose those tasks wisely. Spend your time on tasks that are likely to produce results and ensure you are being productive, not just busy.

4. Develop a Schedule

It's important to make a serious time commitment to your job search. As anyone who works from home will tell you, interruptions abound, and finding blocks of uninterrupted time to focus on the task at hand can be a challenge.

Create a work schedule for yourself to block off specific time that you will dedicate to your job search. It may be effective to simply follow the work schedule from your previous job; your life and other obligations are probably already set up to accommodate those hours. Look for a quiet space where you can work. Don't expect yourself to job search effectively with your laptop in front of the television.

If your house is too full of distractions, consider finding a place outside of your home. Either your local library or your employment resource center can become your office away from home where you can focus on your job search without constant interruptions.

5. Give Yourself a Break

One of the real benefits of creating a schedule for your job search is that in addition to scheduling the times when you will job search, you are also scheduling time when you can take a break. Some people become so overwhelmed by the fact that they are out of work, they feel completely guilty if they are not thinking about their job search 24 hours a day.

You need breaks and personal time in order to come back to your job search each day refreshed and ready to do your best work. Once you've put in a full day of job searching, don't feel guilty about enjoying a good book or your favorite television show. You may need to seek out more inexpensive entertainment options, but don't neglect yourself and your need for personal time while you are job searching.