One Word Kills Your Job Hunt
By Jacey Eckhart
A job hunt requires way too many words, doesn’t it? Write a bunch of words into bullet points on your resume. Have words ready to introduce yourself brilliantly to people. Networking should really be pronounced as networding. In all those words, there is only one guaranteed to kill your job hunt right away: something.
The minute I hear Next Door clients or my students start a sentence with “something,” I know they aren’t anywhere near getting a job.
Me: What kind of job are you looking for?
Them: Something that works with people or data but I don’t want to do anything like I was doing before but I don’t mind the analysis part of that so I could do that again and I could go back to school but I don’t know what I would major in and then again I could be a yoga instructor.
Me: Whaa???
Something announces to everyone that you are not ready. If you are young and at the beginning of your career, it can mean you don’t have enough data yet. You might be having trouble seeing what you do well compared to your peers. You might not know enough about what is out there.
If you are over 35, something can mean you feel stuck in the direction you have taken. While you aren’t getting fired, you aren’t getting loved on at work, either. You might be having trouble deciding whether or not you are on the wrong path.
If you are nearing 50, something often means that you have come to a crossroads. That you are done with one part of your work life, or that you have had enough. It can also mean that your soul is ready for something else, a capstone project for your work life.
As a job and transition coach, the word something is fabulous to me. It indicates that a client or a student is at the beginning of the process and that there is a lot of good, insightful work to be done. Getting the right job, the right work, is a process. A job hunt is a wide circle that narrows as you move from anything, to something, to this thing.
When I hear clients answer what kind of work are you looking for? with the name of an industry or a company or a department or (hallelujah!) a job title, I know they are ready. The Next Door is in front of them, and all they have to do is knock.
