How to job hunt from your current job?
Are you tired of going to several job sites every day and having to search each one separately? Do you dread submitting your resume & cover letter OVER and OVER for every single job you apply to? Do you hate having to keep track of which jobs from which sites you applied to? Now there's a new service called MyJobHunter that solves all that and gets you more interviews!
A lot of people worry that they can't get another job because they don't have time to find one. This is why hunting for a job from your cube is totally standard. It used to be that people stayed in their jobs 40 years, and a job hunt was an earth-shattering event, and there was no Internet. In that environment, telling people to keep the job hunt out of the office was fine.
Today, people switch jobs every two years between the age of 18 and 32. Which means that most job hunts do not have a start and finish time -- they are continuous. And this is smart, because so much of job hunting is being aware of the market (i.e. surfing at work) and networking (long lunch, anyone?).
In today's environment, job hunting from the job you have is totally mainstream. Here are tips on how to do it right:
Don't feel guilty.
Many employers may not like it, but expect that you will look for a job while you have a job. Your boss probably did it. And if they didn't, why not? Try not to quit your job before you have another job. Statistics show that people who are employed are more likely to get hired by someone else. Make sure you continue to get your work done well at your current job no matter what. You owe that to your employer.
Schedule interviews at the beginning or the end of the day.
The goal is to interrupt your current job as little as possible while you're looking for a new job. In terms of schedule, this means an interview before you'd typically need to be at work or an interview at the end of the day. Less disruption means fewer inquiries about your intentions.
Don't dress up for interviews if you can help it.
If you need to dress up for an interview, be prepared to give an explanation. It's awkward to tell your current boss that you are looking to leave. If you have an interview, you can leave early from work simply by saying, "I have personal plans," which would be true. But if you have personal plans and you look like you're dressed up, people will ask.
Don't do phone interviews from your cube.
Your voice will sound insane--like you're running from the FBI or hiding an illicit phone call from a parent. As soon as there is a hushed voice in a cube, the rest of the offices hushes to try to hear. A potential employer will respect you for saying that you cannot do the interview immediately but they can schedule a time-at lunch perhaps?--when you can leave the office to do the interview.
The most important thing to remember is that what you're doing is in the range of normal and fair. If you sound unsure of yourself during your job hunt, you won't land a job. So the first thing to get sure about is the fact that you should be hunting from your current job.
Penelope Trunk the author of the book Brazen Careerist: The New Rules for Success. She is a career columnist at the Boston Globe. Her syndicated column has run in more than 200 publications. Earlier, she was a software executive, and then she founded three companies. She has been through an IPO, an acquisition and a bankruptcy. Before that she played professional beach volleyball.
Find your new career faster than before!
Find your new career faster than before!
Are you tired of going to several job sites every day and having to search each one separately? Do you dread submitting your resume & cover letter OVER and OVER for every single job you apply to? Do you hate having to keep track of which jobs from which sites you applied to? Now there's a new service called MyJobHunter that solves all that and gets you more interviews!
First, MyJobHunter instantly searches all major job sites for jobs matching your criteria. Next, you'll review a list of job matches and put check marks next to the ones you like. Then, press a single button and your resume is sent to ALL the jobs you selected. You can even tell it to search and apply to job matches after you've logged off. Simplify your job search and beat your competition to the jobs at MyJobHunter.com.
