Best Practice Self-Assessments for Job Search & Reemployment Planning

Guest blog post by Kirk Kuhn, author of Time On Target--Launch Your Life Like a Titan II ICBM and STEADCONSULTANTS CEO. 
© 2017 by Kirk Kuhn. Written exclusively for Career Action Resources Blog. 

We’re in the fat times now for the job seeker. The current labor market is starving for employees, and some companies will hire anything that breathes. It might take a minute, but it won’t last, because I promise you lean times follow fat times, and the economy will tank. 

So as a seasoned and ruthless job interviewer, I want to lay out some thoughts for you. A well-known fact of job search is it’s an art and a science. What isn’t so well known is it’s show business. When you get to a job interview, it’s show time, and you’re the show. It’s you acting and you putting on the play. You’re the director, script writer, creative designer. You arrange the stage. When you get an interview, you’re forced to get on that stage, step into your spotlight, and do a song and dance about yourself on key and on time.

Most job seekers fail to understand this complicated fact. They don’t understand it’s their play and their dialogue, and they have to learn their lines and dance moves. Your show has to be an award winner or else you get poor reviews, and you don’t get the job offer. I find it absolutely amazing how many people think their next job is going to last, and they disregard the critical need to learn how to be self-directed job seekers who understand they will be looking for jobs for the rest of their working lives. There is a new order in the labor market. Those who are skilled actors in the art and science of job search and interviewing will have an immensely easier time navigating the 21st century labor market.  

Job search is a comedy drama. In my 30 years in the field of human resources and workforce development, I have seen some seriously funny and unfunny stuff when it comes to my fellow humans when I’m the interviewer. It’s like watching people drive a car with a 5-speed for the first time. It’s funny stuff until they plow into a barn or strip out the clutch, and that’s how people act when in a job interview. Over the years, I’ve interviewed a slew of job seekers and booed 9 out of 10 of them because their act wasn’t together. As an interviewer, I’m the audience, the critic, the guy who boos and brings down the curtain on your hopes. When you do it right and you’re the 1 out of 10, it’s because I love your show, and I’m standing and applauding you because I’m offering you the job. You’re the act I’ve been looking for, and I want to see a lot more of it.

Interviewers don’t have a lot of patience though and are natural critics. That’s what they get paid to do. They get paid to judge your performance and make critical decisions about your life because if you don’t get a job offer, that’s a serious impact on you. Interviewers seem nice, and as people they probably are, but as interviewers they’re meat eaters, and they’ll have you for lunch. So if you’re not prepared to give it your all when you get up on that stage, be prepared to have your lunch eaten.

#jobs #jobsearch

Although your services can guide job hunters and the unemployed, you can't job search for them. Offer the following tips to help job seekers help themselves:

1. Be proactive in your job search. Don't apply for job after job online. Don't sit around waiting for employers to call. Target the jobs you want and try to make a personal contact with organizations, either through networking or by reaching out to employers--even if no jobs are advertised.
2. Stay involved and motivated. If you are unemployed, spend as much time as possible in your job hunt. Try to maintain a positive attitude. Expect rejection--it is part of the job search process. Don't take rejection personally, and keep going.
3. Know your best skills and how they can help employers. By understanding what you can offer employers and communicating it to them, you are more likely to be hired.

Need more help for your job seekers? Your Employment Search (YES) by Career Action Resources covers 5 key aspects of today's job hunt and results in a tailored employment search strategy. With the job-search skills they learn from YES, your job hunters will learn how to get the job they want.

Workforce Development Professionals: Request Complimentary YES Review Sample

YES Ordering Information

Two big workforce development events are happening this fall, and Career Action Resources will be part of them:

• We will be sending 600 samples of our Your Employment Search (YES) guide for all attendees of the AlabamaWorks 2017 Workforce Conference, Sept. 12-13, 2017, in downtown Montgomery, Alabama.
• We are shipping 850 samples of our Layoff-to-Employment Action Planner, Second Edition, for all attendees of the Florida Workforce Professional Development Summit, Oct. 23-25, 2017, in Orlando.

We regularly ship samples of our best-practice career/job search planners—LEAP and YES—to workforce and career services events across the U.S. These samples are not catalogs or abbreviated versions of our products. Our samples are full products, so administrators, managers, and staff of workforce, employment, reemployment, and career programs can evaluate them for use with their job seekers, dislocated workers, unemployed individuals, UI claimants, youth, transitioning workers, veterans, students, and other populations, especially those in WIOA programs.

We stamp these tools with the word “SAMPLE” and tuck an informative flyer inside that highlights key features and benefits to program participants and staff. The samples usually are included in registration bags.

In addition, through a sponsorship fee, our participation supports these conferences, which are attended by thousands of workforce development and career services professionals.

Not attending one of these upcoming events and interested in reviewing LEAP and YES? No worries! If you are a workforce development or career services professional who assists job hunters and the unemployed, request your complimentary LEAP and YES samples now, and we will send them to you via First Class Mail.

#wkdev #WIOA