The biggest mistake I've seen in 5+ years

I've been helping job seekers land offers for over 5 years.

Here is one of the biggest mistakes I've seen:

Lack of commitment to a PROCESS.

Before you read this one and get defensive ("Of course I'm dedicated to my job search, how dare he question my effort?!"), let me clarify.

Most job seekers still have an antiquated thought process regarding the job search. Everyone jumps at the opportunity to update their resume, which was almost all you needed to land interviews 10 years ago.

Times have changed. Giving your resume a facelift is not enough.

I've led a comprehensive job search program since 2019, both with a career-advising agency and with my own organization, Career Elevator. Over these past 5+ years, I've worked with over 1000 different job seekers across these two platforms.

You might be shocked to know how many people start their journey with great effort and enthusiasm and then fade away shortly after their resume rewrite is done.

Right when it's time to commit to a process of cold outreach, connecting and networking, many disappear.

I'll shout this from the mountaintops:

A GREAT RESUME IS SIMPLY NOT ENOUGH ANYMORE!

Read posts from recruiters on LinkedIn. They're getting 500 applicants per job to review. Do you think they have time to look at all 500?

Nope.

Many are adding filters to cut the pool in half before they even start.

That means that the resume you paid someone to optimize for you? It's in the trash before you ever had a chance.

This is harsh, but it's reality.

In this market, you've got to be creative. You've got to stand out.

And in order to stand out, you've got to commit to a process.

Over the past 5 years, the networking piece of the puzzle is by far the most common place where I see job seekers fall off the horse.

"I tried to email people like you said but nobody replied."

"How many people have we emailed so far?"

"20."

Why is it that job seekers will apply to 1000 jobs but give up cold outreach after 20 emails?

As a coach, part of my job is to push consistency and accountability, which is why I recently developed a networking strategy checklist for my clients and added a networking checkpoint call to my program.

I found that no matter how excited job seekers were to implement our networking & outreach strategy, many were either giving up after poor response rate or "forgetting" to implement the process for every role.

Look, being a great networker is HARD.

It's hard to keep pushing when your self-confidence is being battered by ignored emails.

But all it takes is ONE positive connection to lead to an offer.

And sometimes, getting to that ONE correct person may take 500 emails. It may take 1000.

The only way to ensure success with a proven strategy is to trust and adopt it with full conviction, consistency and effort.

If you want to land an offer in 2024 or 2025, you've got to admit that the process is different now.

Commit to change.

Want your own copy of the networking checklist or the 1:1 call with me to plan your networking strategy? Click here to learn more or schedule a call with me to discuss.