The Job Coach Looks at Searching the Reader’s Digest Way

Job searching according to the Reader’s Digest is to keep on doing the things that are not getting you a job only do them better. Better resume’, better networking, better interviewing.

Do you see a pattern here? Let us break this down. Ask yourself, who reads your resume? Answer computers. Oh yes multilevel marketing people sort of read them as well. If your main tool to get work is to rely on your resume you are engaged in what I call job lotto. It is all about who is lucky. The Job Coach Says you can improve your luck by rewriting your resume’ using keyword techniques. Yes you can improve your luck. Better networking, let me see, I have just completed a long day in my cube and the phone rings with a person I do not know asking me if I would give them an appointment to talk about my job and how I got it. Or you go to a chamber of commerce networking meeting and meet with all the nice insurance sales people, real estate people and banking people looking for new customers. Yeah that’s going to be real productive. Better interviewing skills with people that have no idea what your skills are or how to do the job you are interviewing for.

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There was an obligatory listing of social sites on the internet thus demonstrating that the Reader’s Digest is clueless about how to use the new sites. There is one thing that I noticed. Most of the experts interviewed have a vested interest in the status quo. That’s right they make their living using the old way.

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How about a new way to find work? How about you get to have control of the process?

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The first thing that will help in the process is to change your thinking. Tom Peters has long discussed how the world of work is changing. He likes to put Mr. Happy Face on the idea and call the changes “cool”. The first thing I have to say is being out of work is not cool. It does not feel cool and certainly it is stressful and uncomfortable. That said, it does not change the facts that the old way of getting work is gone gone gone. Today the average job length is three and a half years. That means you and I will be out of a job at least 4 times in the next ten years.

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The theory guy is Tom Peters as he has been writing about how the world of work is changing. Well it has changed. Now what. Tom gives you the what and not the how. There is one book I would recommend as a place to start, “What Color is Your Parachute the Workbook”. Richard Bolles is the opposite of Tom Peters as he has worked for 25 years on the how of getting a new job. He helps you to learn who you are and where to look for work.

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Stress is sometimes defined as being in a situation where you have no control over your life. If that is true then the best way to go through a change in employment is to be in control over the process.