Looking for a job? Read this.
Looking for a new job and changing careers can be stressful, especially if you’ve been out of work. All that stress can hurt your health, so here are some practical tips that can help.
1. Write down your money plan: When your finances change dramatically, it can be helpful to write down your income and major expenses, such as such as rent/mortgage, utilities, food and transportation. Also record your non-essential spending such as clothes and recreation. Include your partner if you have one. Personal budgeting tools are available online. Seeing how you might work out your budget after a job change can give you peace of mind.
2. Stay connected: Networking can help you find people who are either hiring or know people who are.
- Join professional organizations related to your line of work. People you meet may have direct links to hiring managers in your field.
- Take a class related to your job. You can network with classmates and the instructor. The class also can help you improve your skills.
- Visit with leaders in your professional area: Let them know you’re seeking employment and you’d like to draw upon their expertise for areas you might develop. You don’t have to ask about openings. If they happen to have an opening they feel you’d be a good fit for, they’ll likely let you know.
- Volunteer for an organization that can use your skills. Volunteering has a number of mental health benefits. Volunteers have lower mortality rates and lower rates of depression later in life. Older volunteers receive even greater benefits, and volunteering about 100 hours per year appears to yield the greatest health outcomes.
- Join a job search group: Many can be found online. Sharing experiences with other job hunters reinforces that you’re not alone and provides emotional support. And you can share search tips and leads. The exchanges can be a boost for your mental health.
3. Take care of yourself. You can enhance your mental health with these simple steps:
- Get enough sleep
- Maintain a good diet
- Exercise regularly
4. Measure your progress: Keep track of the jobs you apply for, the follow-up emails and calls, the interviews you’re invited to and the results. Looking back at your tracking will show that you are making progress toward your end goal. Give yourself small rewards for reaching milestones, such as submitting a certain number of applications, getting call backs or interviews.
Remember, every “Sorry, good luck” from a prospective employer takes you a step closer to “Yes, you’re hired!”
Dr. Nick Pryomski is a family medicine physician at Aurora Health Center in Racine, WI.
Related Posts
Comments
4 Comments
About the Author
Nick Pryomski, MD, is a family medicine physician at Aurora Health Center in Racine, WI.
“Remember, every “Sorry, good luck” from a prospective employer takes you a step closer to “Yes, you’re hired!””
What a load of horse hocky. Sorry, no, that’s simply not true. Just because one or ten or a hundred million potential employers rejected you does not mean that someone else is going to hire you. That’s just an obvious logical fallacy. There is no such thing as “progress” in a job search. Either you get hired or you don’t, and as long as you don’t, you just keep doing the same things over and over and over again. Looking at all the places you’ve applied, etc. is only going to be demoralizing when you think of all the work, and expectations and hopes that every single one of those applications represented. I don’t often agree with Obama, but job searching is time to look forward, not backward.
Good luck finding substantial employment after age 45.
Age discrimination is alive and well…..
Who is ghost writing for Dr. Nick??? The only medical portion of this article that should be attributed to him is the #3. Take care of yourself section. The rest has nothing to do with medical care!!!!!
If you keep getting rejected the clear choice is to change something about what you have been doing to get a different outcome. Examine your interview style and answers to key questions, are you hitting on the attributes the employer is looking for? Are you coming off corporate centric or self centric? The better advise if you are getting interviews but not getting hired is to do some mock interviews with anyone who might be able to give you some advice and then follow it. Sometimes it really is you and not them! The sooner we face those facts the sooner they can be overcome.
I can tell you this isn’t great news to hear. I went from 2010 to 2017 with finding no work. Went back to school, graduated in 2014 earlier than the rest of the class, got two early interviews and then it dried up.
Nothing.
Found the methods of interviewing and how you dress changed dramatically. Didn’t matter. The well was dry for another 2.5 years before WalMart.
Too many are looking for that perfect candidate and no longer willing to “take a stab” at finding that diamond in the rough. Very few companies are willing to train from the ground up anymore. Yes, that’s how old I am.
It gets tougher as you get older. Many HRs know how to get around loopholes and many other candidates know how to exploit others.
Connections are the only things that can help you now.