Finding a job

So many jobs are to be found in what is referred to as the hidden job market, rather than advertised vacancies. Indeed, looking for a job is often about who you know rather than what you know.  However, what are you to do if you have been unemployed for some time and are out of touch with many contacts that you used to have? It can be difficult to go out and about to renew contacts and make new ones if you have no money for going out, other than saving the bus fare to go to the job centre to meet with your adviser and sign on, because if you don’t then you get no money anyway. Plus, it is so easy for every minute to be taken up with looking for and applying for jobs, which in itself becomes a job!!

The Job Centre expects that if you are unemployed you treat looking for a job as a full time job in itself, and this includes making contacts.

Some job hunting advice says that a full business day should be put into looking for a job …. that can well be 8 hours each day, certainly the more time given to it, the more chance there is of being successful sooner. If you are registered at the jobcentre, you will have a record of your job searching activities that you have to keep, but even if not, it is still helpful to track your job searching activity by keeping a record.

When setting off on your job hunt, the first thing to do is to identify your experience and skill set, even if you just desperately need to get any job to pay the bills, you still need to know what you can do and what you have absolutely no experience or ability for. Then prepare your CV or resume, your basic one needs to be generic and then from this you adapt it for each vacancy that you apply for. However, this generic one will be the standard one that you use to put on job boards, and it may well be searched by employers, as well as you uploading it to advertised vacancies.

Prospective employers know within the first moments of seeing a CV if they are interested in reading the rest of it or not, and many now use scanning software to look for the key words that they want to see to assess applicants’ suitability.

There is some debate about the ideal length of a CV /resume, but one page can do you a disservice and not look good, anything over two pages and you run the risk of most of it not even being read, two pages is ideal. There is no need to be anxious about writing your CV/resume as there are so many resources such as examples and templates online to help you.

Let friends and family know that you are job hunting and follow the best social media pages and groups for job hunters, this is especially useful if indeed you are out of touch with people. If you are reading this, then you can make new contacts online:

Try my own page ….https://www.facebook.com/LookingForAJobWhenYouAreOver50?ref=hl

Take the time that you are unemployed to make yourself more employable …it is true that there have been huge cuts in the budgets for adult education and retraining but many excellent and recognised providers have free online courses

http://www.openculture.com/freeonlinecourses

https://alison.com/

http://oedb.org/open/

http://freevideolectures.com/

http://www.free-ed.net/free%2Ded/

http://www.open.edu/openlearn/

https://www.vision2learn.com/default.aspx

 Also, remember to take a break …. Yes, you need to look for a job, but it will do you no favours to look too desperate and become a job hunting bore, after all quite likely many people that you speak to and know or meet are also in the same position. Have things to talk about  , take advantage of free entertainment, read books, watch the television , use  the internet for things like music and fun social networking , have things to talk about and stay in the loop …you will seem much more interesting and ultimately  employable

Valerie Hedges

http://www.careershifters.org/start-here