How Age 40+ Job Seekers Destroy Their Own Job Search (and what you can do instead)

When you've been a career coach and a recruiter as long as I have, you'll see many age 40+ job seekers who's job searches are failing.

Failing candidates over 40 aren't getting interviews when qualified, the interviews the do get are low quality, they fail to advance, and someone else always seems to get the offer when they're a finalist.

I've also seen some age 40+ job seekers whose searches are successful - They're getting high quality interviews, advancing often, and getting offers.

So it's easy for me to see common issues of age 40+ job seekers when their searches are failing. It's also easy to see the job seekers over 40 who do the opposite, and enjoy successful, fast job searches with far better results.

These are some common issues I see in all failing job searches of age 40+ job seekers (and what you can do instead):

• Random Applications, Hoping To Get Lucky:?Applying to a high number of jobs online, doing more of what's not working, and hoping you get lucky is a recipe for job search failure. Instead, you could do what successful job seekers in their 40s. 50s and 60s do - They focus their search, send fewer but highly targeted resumes, invest more time into researching and heavily customizing each resume for the individual hiring manager's needs, and they use better quality information than job descriptions, company websites and Google searches.
• Relying On Online Applications And Recruiters:?Online job applications give horrible odds of success, based on studies published by 2 of the largest job boards. 3rd party recruiters take 20-30% of your salary as their placement fees from the employer, making you more expensive and reducing your ability to negotiate salary. Internal recruiters' jobs are to get all resumes into their resume screening databases (ATSs), recommend a small number of candidates for the lowest quality interviews, and to keep you from contacting hiring managers directly. Successful job seekers over 40 find more effective and higher odds ways to get to hiring managers and secure the highest quality interviews.
• Underselling Themselves In Resumes And Interviews:?Age 40+ job seekers who fail rely on professional resume writers, career coaches and outplacement advisors who have been trained and tested to write average resumes with the goal of appearing qualified (making their resumes look average and often conflict with Applicant Tracking Systems). Successful age 40, 50 and 60 job seekers learn that qualified appears average to employers, so they learn how to sell themselves more effectively in their resumes and interviews.
• Failing To Plan, Planning To Fail:?Age 40+ job seekers who don't plan their job search, struggle (a plan is more than a list, a call back calendar, or a description of their target job). Successful senior job seekers create a step-by-step, day-by-day plan of what they need to do to land their next job by a defined date.
• Ineffective Utilization Of Networking:?Failing job seekers over 40, call and email their contacts to ask what's available, try to have their contacts get their resume to hiring managers, and use LinkedIn to scale their network. Successful senior job seekers use much more effective strategies to better utilize their network, and more effective sources than LinkedIn to massively scale their network.

Good thing that you can implement all of these more effective strategies, that will make your age 40+ job search far more successful, if you just learned what you need to change. Even if you were an average or under performer, no matter what your job level, or job function all of these strategy changes will get you more interviews, better quality interviews, help you advance more often, and get more offers more quickly.

I help people solve the most difficult job search problems, including job search acceleration, getting past ATSs, ageism, remote positions, product/job function/career/industry/ geographic change, unemployment, "bouncy" recent career path, job search turnaround, seeking raise/promotion, industry in decline/consolidation, long term gaps, family leave, or other of the most challenging job search issues.

Join me for my next free Resume Webinar (enroll at https://x.resumewebinar.com/register for no charge) and learn how to accelerate your job search, so you can find your next job faster in 2023.

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