Unemployed? 3 Reasons to Never Have a Job Search Routine
J.T. O'Donnell
Founder & CEO, Work It DAILY | Board of Directors, McCoy | Career & Professional Development | Job Search | HR & Recruiting | Employer Branding | Recruitment Marketing | Talent Management | Executive Coaching
A recent article by Deepak Choprah challenges people to become more conscious in life by removing "routine" from their daily lives. He provides three reasons why routine isn't good. As I read them, I thought, "This is 100% true for job search." More importantly, it could be why the long-term unemployed struggle to get hired.
According to Dr. Choprah, routine causes the following:
#1 - "Routine activity conditions the brain to follow old, familiar neural circuits. Over time, new input has a harder and harder time registering, because the course of least resistance is to follow the same ingrained patterns."
Job Search Translation: You fail to notice mistakes, typos, and other things you are doing that negatively impact your search.
Example: A job seeker who has been out of work for four years recently sent me her resume to review for a job she landed an interview for. The first sentence had a typo! She never noticed and admitted she'd sent it out at least 50 times in the last month.
#2 - "Routine dulls the mind by making you go on automatic pilot. Hours can be filled keeping busy without actually thinking."
Job Search Translation: Your attitude becomes lazy. With 93% of communication being non-verbal, you are unconsciously sending a message of apathy as a result.
Example: A job seeker I know who has been out of work for two years went to a job fair and had a conversation with a recruiter that seemed promising. The recruiter even gave him his card and told him to follow up by e-mail with a resume. The job seeker told me about it and said he was planning to send a thank-you note and resume to the recruiter as instructed. Then, he mentioned the event had happend seven days earlier. Hmm. No sense of urgency there! I doubt highly the recruiter will pursue him as a candidate.
#3 - "Routine makes you less active and more reactive. I ran across a nice phrase recently: the reactive rut. You find yourself in such a rut when your day is organized around e-mails, meetings, and a calendar of planned activity."
Job Search Translation: You stop doing the high-payoff activities that get you interviews (i.e. networking, proactive marketing of yourself), and fall into the rut of busy work that gets you nothing (i.e. tweaking your resume, applying blindly to jobs online).
Example: A new client of mine told me she was finally done revising her resume. When I asked how long she had been working on it, she told me three weeks! Even worse, in that time, she hadn't had a single 'live' conversation about her job search with with people in her field. To me, that's three weeks wasted. Especially, when it takes an average of four weeks to get through an interview process and get hired. Every day you waste adds days to your search.
If you want to read more of what I've written, check out my articles on Inc.com.
P.S. - First time reading my posts? Thanks for taking the time to stop by! Not only do I write for Linkedin, but I'm also founder of a popular career advice site,CAREEREALISM,and currently run the career coaching program,CareerHMO. I hope you'll check them both out!
If you enjoyed reading this article, you may also like:
CAREEREALISM’s Founder, J.T. O’Donnell is a nationally syndicated career expert and workplace consultant who helps American workers of all ages find greater professional satisfaction. Her book, CAREEREALISM: The Smart Approach to a Satisfying Career, outlines her highly successful career-coaching methodology. Purchase her e-book of CAREEREALISM for only $9.95 by clicking here !
Image Credit: Shutterstock
Warehouse Worker
9 年Nice insight to how routine impacts a job search.
Brings high-level organization and management skills to direct changes in programs and systems
9 年Thanks J.T. for sharing. I agree.
Quality Engineer at Ericsson
9 年Good points, J.T. Thanks!
Project Manager
9 年Thanks, J.T.! I agree that a person can very easily fall into the 'routine' of job searching. This often includes checking emails, searching the internet, playing with your resume/cover letters, checking your search engines. This is a comfortable routine even as you bemoan the lack of response from people! You are correct saying we are human, and humans love routine, and we will make a routine of anything we can! It's the comfort of the 'pain' we know vs. the 'pain' we don't know. It can be a struggle! Thanks for the reminder!
Not sure I completely agree with the article. Some good points, but one thing I've noticed about job seekers (and when I was in job search mode) is that they have lost a sense of routine once they are unemployed. I actually think routines if done correctly make you more active. You don't go to a gym and not have a routine....do you? you may need to review and change your routine, but some type of structure to your job search I believe is needed?