There’s No Magic Bullet for the Job Hunt

Don’t you wish you could close your eyes, spin around, open them again and learn that you’ve been hired for your dream job? We all do, but it definitely doesn’t work that way. There is no magic bullet, no one answer to the “How do I get a job?” question. Unless you are very, very lucky and land a job quickly, or you give up hope and drop out (in which case you should seek counseling help right away), if you want to get a job you just have to keep going. Dropping out will get you nowhere.

Finding a new job after a layoff in a down economy takes hard work, ingenuity and persistence. You are competing with a vast sea of other laid-off professionals for a compressed bank of job openings. Seems depressing, doesn’t it? It could be, but with the right approach you can overcome the odds.

It is important to maintain a high level of energy and attention in order to achieve your goal in the shortest time possible. Eat healthy foods and exercise, take fresh air breaks, call a job search buddy, listen to music that inspires you and stay as positive as you can. Stay as organized as you can by establishing files and maintaining a calendar and expense records. Your attitude will pervade every meeting, letter, hand shake and phone call—so maintaining a realistically optimistic outlook should be part of your job search strategy.

Set aside up to six core hours a day for your job hunting activities. Overdo it and you could burn out. The secret lies not in the number of resumes you send out each day but rather in developing and following a strategy that fits today’s job market. That means using your connections, targeting companies, doing research, ferreting out the hidden jobs that never get listed, and staying current.

The job hunt process doesn’t have to cost you much. Email and electronic applications have reduced the expenses formerly associated with sending resumes. You can find low cost ways to network with local business leaders and peers in your field and conduct informational interviews. You can also network online and by phone. Friends and family may be able to help through people they know.

You could decide to go back to school and learn a new set of skills either to enhance your career chances in your previous line of work or to give you a shot at a new field where jobs are predicted to be more plentiful.

No, there’s no magic bullet, but to use a sports metaphor, you can’t win the game if you’re not in it.