You are in a job search… you send out hundreds of letters, make dozens of phone calls, and get no response or rejection letters. You go on interviews. You get rejected. How do you deal with it? The short answer is: don’t take it personally.
You may be rejected for reasons totally out of your control – they have an internal candidate, they are hiring a relative of the boss, they changed the requirements since you answered the ad, they decided they needed a younger, older, taller, shorter person.
The job search process is a numbers game. It is a marathon, not a sprint. It takes time, perseverance, and dogged determination. Expect rejection. Make a poster with the word NO 199 times and one “YES”. Expect a “no” more often than a “yes.” Each time you get a “NO” cross it off the poster. You are one more “no” closer to “YES”!
Unemployment is at a low which means there are fewer openings with more people looking….
Here are some concrete ways for you to take control of your job search:
1.Make a plan and stick to it.
2.Set aside several hours a day to work on your job search.
3.Meet as many people as you can to build your network
4.Write directly to companies to get information meetings, interviews, get career advice, and learn about industry trends.
5.Try something new – go to a meet-up, a networking event, a social event that you have not attended before.
6.Follow up with each and every person you talk to, meet, read about, are introduced to. Keep following up every 4 to 6 weeks.
7.Read voraciously in your field and contact people whom you read about for their career advice. Use those articles in your follow yup to others.
If you keep doing the same thing – such as answering ads online–and keep getting the same results, it is time to try something different.
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GEFFEN C A R E E R S