Helpful Tips for Finding Your Dream Job

Self-Assessment

First, it’s important to thoroughly assess your personal values, interests, strengths, and personality so that you can best match your individual characteristic to a career that offers opportunities to learn and grow in ways that are important to you.  For those having difficulty assessing their own personality, skills, and values, there are career assessments that can help with the process. 

Career Exploration

Doing sufficient research on career options will help you identify potential opportunities and assess those options that are best for you based on your personal values, strengths, and interests. Networking with professionals in the field, doing informational interviews, and perhaps participating in a job shadow or even an internship may help to further solidify your interest in a particular career field. 

Decision Making

You may find yourself with several interests and feel totally confused and undecided.  If so, you may want to do more research to develop a better understanding of your choices.  Once you decide, you will need to explore the qualifications and requirements for the job.  You may find that you are qualified already or you may find that you will need to further your education by taking a class or committing yourself to completing a professional degree or certification program. Once you research the training and qualifications required, you will have a better understanding of what’s required to make your decision a reality. 

Plan of Action

 Creating a plan of action makes your career decision real. Whether it be searching for a job or an educational program, you can begin to establish a plan that makes your dream possible. Creating specific targeted objectives to help you reach your goals is the best way to achieve success.

 The Journey

Although changing careers can often be scary, once you begin the process it can be exhilarating to find yourself in control of making your dreams a reality.  A career that meets your unique personal traits and characteristics will lead on a new journey that will help you grow personally in new and exciting ways.  As the Chinese philosopher Confucius once said, “Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life.” 

Since networking is still considered the #1 strategy in finding a job, it’s no wonder that social networking has taken off so quickly in being another way of finding and connecting with potential job sources.

If you haven’t done so already, you will want to check out LinkedIn, a social networking site for professionals.  LinkedIn provides an opportunity for professionals to connect and communicate with individuals who are currently working in their particular field of interest. LinkedIn also offers a chance to connect with people who know people you know in your network.

In today’s economy it is extremely important to use a number of different strategies when conducting a job search. Networking, reviewing online sites and classified ads, and prospecting with companies you’d like to work for are all effective strategies to uncover both advertised and unadvertised jobs that exist in the current job market.

Job Fair Success Strategies

How job seekers approach a job fair can greatly affect the outcome.  Maintaining a positive attitude and creating a professional image can help job candidates develop an aura of confidence that’s not possessed by the majority of the competition. Although attending job fairs is only a very small part of any job search strategy, there are few opportunities available where job seekers get to meet individual employers prior to obtaining an actual job interview.  It is therefore essential that serious job candidates thoroughly prepare themselves prior to attending a job fair.  Listed below are 8 job fair strategies that will not only increase a candidate’s likelihood of success, but will also make them much more comfortable with the whole job fair process. 

8 Keys to Job Fair Success:

1.       Do your research.

2.       Dress professionally and create a favorable first impression.

3.       Be prepared and develop a plan.

4.       Bring lots of resumes.

5.        Meet and greet employers.

6.        Practice and prepare questions for the interviewer.

7.        Be prepared to network.

8.        Don’t forget to follow up.

Even with approximately 14 million people currently looking for work and the average time now is six months to even find a job, there has been some reported turnaround recently in the following industries:

If you are currently unemployed, it’s important to remain  flexible in your job search and take the time necessary to research job vacancies as well as industries that are hiring.  Motivation is a key factor in keeping the job search going.  Although it’s difficult not to let the current economy affect your job search, individuals who stay positive and believe they are going to find a job - achieve the best results.

This week I have been reviewing the top 4 strategies for finding a new career. Of all four, this strategy is definitely the most important.  If we don’t take action in what we hope to accomplish, we will never achieve the results that we are looking for.

Once we’ve done a complete self-assessment, reviewed career options, and made some decisions on careers we’d like to pursue, it’s time to take some action.  This consists of looking for prospective jobs and/or employers, sending out cover letters and resumes, and beginning to do some networking with people currently working in the field. 

Once you send out your resume and cover letter, be sure to follow up with employers. If you are called in for an interview, take some time to research the employer’s website prior to the interview.  In the interview, be prepared to ask thoughtful questions based on your research.

In this competitive job market, making a professional impression is an absolute must if you hope to get hired.  This begins by sending a well developed resume and cover letter that’s targeted to the position and the employer to which you are applying. 

Follow up is also important since it lets the employer know that you really are interested and it will also hopefully encourage the employer to take out your resume and review it for a second time.  The interview is a time to wow the employer by doing your research  and taking the time to be well prepared for questions the employer might ask as well as having some questions of your own based on your knowledge of the position and the employer.