Five Tips for an Effective Job Search

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Five Tips for an Effective Job Search

You may find yourself looking for a new job for a number of reasons.

Perhaps you are no longer satisfied in your current role and want a change. You may have just finished studies and are seeking a position in your chosen field, or you have no choice but to look for a new job due to your position being made redundant.

Whatever the reason, developing your job search skills and having a structured job search strategy can alleviate a lot of time and frustration and land you the job you want much faster.

Here are our five top tips for an effective job search:

1) Be Clear on Your Target Role

Before diving into your job search, it is important to identify what you really want to do. Are you wanting to stay in the same industry but progress your career or do you want to change career paths entirely?

It is important to be clear on the type of position, companies, and industry you will be targeting so you can focus your job search, tailor your application documents and apply for jobs with confidence.

2) Tailor Your Application Documents

We cannot emphasise enough the importance of tailoring your application documents to the role/s you are targeting.

Jobseekers often make the mistake of using one resume for a variety of roles and become frustrated when they don’t hear anything back or are rejected.

When a hiring or HR manager has hundreds of applications to screen for one role, they will only focus on applications that are the best fit and clearly meet the requirements of the role as outlined in the job ad or position description.

3) Adopt a Proactive Job Search

When it comes to looking for work, there are two types of job search approaches – reactive and proactive.

Most jobseekers employ a reactive job search, meaning they look for work passively. They apply only to positions they see advertised online on job boards or on company websites.

The problem with a reactive job search is that you are often going up against hundreds of other applicants, so the competition is fierce. Another issue is that only a small percentage of positions are formally advertised online. The majority of jobs are informally ‘advertised’ and filled via what is known as the ‘hidden’ job market.

Given a large percentage of jobs are filled without being formally advertised, jobseekers can no longer rely on advertised positions alone to find work.

This is why adopting a proactive job search is so important. A proactive job search involves identifying opportunities before they are advertised and allows you to tap into the hidden job market.

4) Leverage Your Network

It has been proven time and time again that networking is one of the most successful methods to finding work.

Job seeker research and surveys consistently reveal that the majority of workers learn about job vacancies through their friends and professional connections. Networking is also a key tool to accessing the hidden job market.

Many job seekers don’t realise the power of networking and fail to let their network know that they need help finding work. The more people you tell, the greater your chances are of connecting to the right people and finding your next opportunity.

5) Optimise Your LinkedIn Profile

A well-branded and keyword optimised LinkedIn profile will help amplify your brand, increase networking opportunities and enhance your visibility so you can stand out and attract more attention from potential employers.

To ensure you rank highly and can be found easily on LinkedIn searches, it is essential that you complete, in detail, several key sections of your profile. Equally important is embedding relevant keywords into as many sections of your profile that individuals might use to search for professionals with your skills and experience.