The Job Search Process
Self-Assessment
Self-assessment is the first step in the job search process. You will not be in a position to prepare a resume, send it to prospective employers or go to interviews until you have some basic understanding of what kind of job you want. You should give considerable thought to the type of work that you would like to do. Such tasks require substantial preparation and a realistic appraisal of your abilities.
How to Conduct a Self-Assessment
The objective of self-assessment is to help you take inventory of the values, skills, and interests that you currently possess. The following exercise should help you determine what it is you want to do, what is important to you, and what you feel you can do well. Once you have established these priorities, you can begin investigating potential career options.
- Understand Your Personal Traits
The personal traits that describe me are: (Include all of the words that describe you.) - Identify Your Personal Values
Working conditions (physical and philosophical) that are important to me : (List working conditions that would have to exist for you to accept a position.) - Identify Your Skill Base
The general skills I possess are: ( List the skills that underlie tasks your are able to complete.)
The specific skills I possess are: ( List more technical or specific skills that you possess and indicate your level of expertise.)
Skills I would like to use on the job include: ( List skills that you hope to use on the job, and indicate how often you'd like to use them.)
Some skills that I'll need to acquire for the jobs I'm considering include: ( Write down skills listed in job advertisements or job descriptions that you don't currently possess.)
I believe I can obtain these skills by: ( Describe how you plan to acquire these skills.) - Calculate Your Economic Need
My estimated minimum annual salary requirement is: (Write the salary you have calculated based on your budget.) - Explore Your Long-term Goals
My long-term plans include: ( Describe how the positions you are considering will help you to obtain your long-term goals.)
Ten Hottest Transferable Skills
Budget Management
Get your hot little hands on any budget you can find, no matter how small, and take responsibility for it. Manage how funds are dispensed, keep control of the budget, learn what fiscal control is all about.
Coping with Deadline Pressure
Search for opportunities to demonstrate that you can produce good work when it is required by external deadlines. Prove to yourself and anyone else that you can function on someone else's schedule, even when that time frame is notably hurried.
Interviewing
Learn how to acquire information from other people by questioning them directly. Start by interviewing the neighbors, your friends, and other people easily available. It doesn't matter what you ask them, but imagine you are a newspaper reporter who needs the information for a story. Discover the fine art of helping a person to feel comfortable in your presence, even though you are asking difficult and even touchy questions.
Negotiating/Arbitrating
Discover and cultivate the fine art of dealing openly and effectively with people in ambiguous situations. Learn how to bring warring factions together, resolve differences between groups or individuals, and make demands on behalf of one constituency to those in positions of power.
Organizing/Managing/Coordinating
Take charge of any event that is within your grasp. It doesn't matter what you organize - a church supper, a parade in honor of your town's 200 th birthday - as long as you have responsibility for bringing together people, resources, and events. If nothing else, the headaches of organizing events or managing projects teach you how to delegate tasks to others.
Public Relations
Accept a role in which you must meet or relate to the public. Greet visitors, answer phone complaints, give talks to community groups, sell ads to business people, explain programs to prospective clients, or even collect taxes.
Speaking
Take a leadership role in any organization, so that you are forced to talk publicly, prepare remarks, get across ideas, and even motivate people without feeling self-conscious. Good public speaking is little more than the art of dramatized conversation, but it must be practiced so you can discover your own personal style.
Supervising
Take responsibility for the work of others in a situation in which some accountability is called for. Have direct contact with the work of others; expose yourself to the difficulty of giving orders, delegating tasks, taking guff, understanding the other person's viewpoint. Here is where listening can become a real skill.
Teaching /Instructing
Refine your ability to explain things to other people. Since most teaching does not take place in the classroom but in ordinary everyday exchanges between people, you should become familiar and comfortable with passing information and understanding to others. Any position of leadership or responsibility gives you many chances to teach ideas and methods to others.
Writing
Go public with your writing skills. There is nothing quite so energizing as seeing your own words in print; exhilarating if they look good to you, and a spur to improvement if they look awful. Practice putting pen to paper. Write letters to the editors of every publication you read routinely. Write a newsletter, however informal, for a club or organization to which you belong.
Source: Howard Figler, The Complete Job Search Handbook: Presenting the Skills You Need to Get Any Job and Have a Good Time Doing It. 1979
Network Development: Identifying Potential Resource People
Your network will consist of individuals you want to contact for career-related information not for a job. This list will include family, friends, current and previous co-workers, current and former classmates, social acquaintances and those you have met in professional organizations, volunteer organizations, church and civic groups.
Rules you need to follow when networking:
- Ask contact for information, not jobs. Remember your purpose for meeting with these individuals is to gain career-related information.
- Be sure you are asking the contact for something they can provide. Don't make them feel awkward by requesting something they can not provide. It is appropriate to ask your contacts to critique your resume, suggest organizations in which you should become involved, refer to other individuals in the field, etc.
- Make it clear at the beginning why you want to meet. You should have a specific reason for requesting their advice and expertise.
- You must be willing to share relevant information about yourself with the contact. It is crucial they know who you are and have a good understanding of your background. You will want to keep them informed of any changes in your circumstances.
- When you meet with your contacts, focus on them, not your needs. You are meeting with these people because they are in a practice area of interest to you, the firms you want to join, have interests and values similar to yours, etc. You want to learn from their experiences, let them do the talking.
- Give them feedback. Let them know how you have used their advice, keep them informed.
- Keep track of your contacts. Develop a system to record information on your contacts, summary of your meeting, and further developments.
- Remember it takes time to develop relationships, this is an ongoing process.
