The Jobs Are Out There

In this first month of 2013 the United States economy is still showing some mixed signals about recovery from our recession that began at the end of 2007. One of the recurring themes in my book is that the future of your personal economy can be different from that of our national economy. Jobs are available. The challenge is overcoming the barriers that separate you from them.

Job search takes commitment, time, effort, and creativity. Another theme I emphasize is that it also requires a reasonable and flexible plan. If you randomly go through the unconnected activities that so many people think is how you are supposed to look for a job, you might be lucky and stumble on an opportunity. But more likely you will just burn up time and money and remain unemployed.

I share a four step process in my book that gives you a road map for building an effective job search plan, and organizing the activities that will lead to a new job:

• Identify honestly what skills and traits you can offer a prospective employer.
• Focus on a small number of job areas that interest you and align with your skills and personality traits.
• Make initial contact with companies that are compatible with the intersection of your skills and interests.
• Be prepared to market yourself credibly in a face-to-face interview, and "close the sale."

My book goes into extensive detail about each of these process steps, but if you are looking for a new job now please keep these realities in mind:

• Companies that are laying off in one area may be hiring in another.
• Your skills and experience are a solution to a problem some companies needs solved.
• Tens of thousands of people in the U.S. workforce have given up looking for work. This is tragic but it means you have less competition.
• There are signs of slow recovery in housing and other depressed industries, and 
• The Dow Jones Transportation Index is up sharply in the last two months of 2012 which means companies are shipping more products.

Accept that discouragement is a normal part of the landscape of job search. Be prepared to confront it and focus on the positive. After my own job loss I kept replaying the same thought to myself, "If I give up I will never find a new job. If I give up then someone else who keeps persevering will get the job I could have had. If I just keep looking, I will find something; it's just a matter of time."

Give yourself time to plan and execute your job search, but don't assume you have time to wait. There is someone out there who is hungrier than you for that job, and they won't be quitting.

Hungry to Succeed

I was teaching a technical course at Walt Disney World a couple years ago. I shared a lunchtime with some Disney workers, who are called "cast members" at Disney, not employees. Three of these cast members were from India. Our discussion focused on technology and I said that I was disturbed that so many American students know how to use technology but do not know how it works. I mentioned that American enrollment in engineering and science peaked almost 20 years ago and most of the students now in these curricula were non-American. Then one of the Indian cast members quietly said, "That's because they are not hungry."

I believe she is right. All three of them concurred that they had spent 12-15 hours a day in their school studies. The competition is fierce in India. Social advancement is predicated on education, and these three were not unusual. They were representative of the simple fact that they are indeed hungry and willing to work to reach their goals.

In job search the same hungry drive is required. The best way to feed this hunger is to plan, execute, and evaluate your search.

Plan each day the night before. You will not have time to do this in the morning as you try to get yourself or your family started on their day's activities. Write down your plan for the day in a little notebook or your smart phone. Don't think you can keep it in your head. Sloppy planning makes for sloppier execution.

Execute your plan. Have tangible, measurable milestones: you did or did not make those phone calls; you did or did not revise your resume; you did or did not go into a business to introduce yourself to one of the managers. If you cannot measure your activities, you will not be able to manage those activities. If you cannot complete your day's plan, add those remaining items into your nighttime planning session. Be realistic: make sure you have the time and capacity to actually achieve what is on your plan. Successfully executing 3 items on your plan is much more important than have 30 unachievable items on it.

Evaluate your results. Are you meeting the goals of your plan? Are you trending in the right direction? Are you getting demonstrated interest from the companies you are contacting?  If you cannot answer Yes to all of these, then you need to ruthlessly examine what you doing and change it. Do not continue doing the same things and wishing for different results - it won't happen. Wishing is not a plan and hoping is not a strategy. You should not only be willing to change your plan, you should insist on doing so if you have gone 2 weeks without any positive feedback. Digging a deeper trench where you don't find anything of value is not progress...it's a rut.

Excuse My Excuses

Years ago I received a favorable email about an article on my technical website. The article was an encouragement and warning to stay up to date on new technology so that one's skills do not atrophy. But the reader ended his note saying, "But some of us don't have time to pursue this learning outside our work day. Some of us have families and children." I cannot print the slash and burn words that went through my mind, but I calmly replied to him that I had two children under the age of 8, and after they went to bed the rest of the evening was available for anything I chose to invest with my attention. He was free to choose TV; I chose C++ programming and software architecture. It's about choices, but I will not support anyone's right to make excuses.

This little vignette has everything to do with job security and job search. Every decision has consequences both intended and unintended. There are 8,760 hours in each year this Earth travels around the Sun. How are you choosing to spend the hours of your life?

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics published (http://www.bls.gov/news.release/atus.nr0.htm) in June 2012 that Americans over the age of 15 spend roughly 3 hours each day watching television. That's 1/8th of each 24 hour day, or a stunning 1/5th of each waking day. And this does not include the time watching Hulu on your iPhone, or your computer time on Facebook.

The top-line (the income line) of this is that you and I and everyone has a fixed amount of time in each day. Some of us have unavoidable obligations that eat into our available time. But are you using the remaining time productively to enhance your current and future job options?

• Listen to audio books while you drive
• Always carry a relevant magazine or book in your vehicle or briefcase for idle moments in the dentist's office, waiting for a friend to show at lunch, etc.
• Don't visit Facebook or tweet all day
• Read a book on current ideas in your job area
• Turn off the TV one hour a day (the TV cannot give you a job)

The ancient Greek philosopher, Socrates, said, "The unexamined live is not worth living." Think carefully about your 8,760 hours each year, and start eliminating even an hour a day of waste. It will pay dividends for many years.

Resolutions for a New Year

No one wakes on New Year's Day and says, "My goal this year is to get laid off!" But this could happen to any of us. So a good Resolution might be to prepare yourself - just in case.

Here is a little rubric I use to help people organize their thinking to prepare for the unwanted eventuality of a layoff:

1. Make yourself positive: Above all, don't whine about what you don't like at work. Don't build yourself up by putting others down. Don't talk about yourself, talk about the value of the team.

2. Make yourself valuable: Don't be a clock watcher. Volunteer for new assignments. Observe the successful people in your organization and emulate what they do. If you cannot figure out why they are succeeding, ask them - they may be happy to talk about what they have learned to be more valuable employees.

3. Make yourself the "go to" person: Helping others is real job security. Aim to be one of the best in your job position and share your knowledge liberally with others. They will be the best marketing investment you ever make.

4. Learn more skills for your current job: If you can do five things for your employer but someone else can only do one or two, you are in a much better position to survive a layoff.

5. Learn skills in a new job area: Is there something you would like to learn that would improve your current job? For example, some computer programmers try to learn about project management or requirements specification. Neither is directly part of programming, but these new skills make them better programmers and more valuable employees.

6. Learn something to amaze your employer: Think outside your job box a bit. Add a "deal sweetner" to your skill set. Join Toastmasters and become comfortable speaking in public. Learn Spanish and this could be a tipping factor in almost any job. Study introductory accounting or budgeting and your knowledge of tracking money will open doors everywhere.