Making smart career moves
Naveed Malik
Recruitment Consultant / Career Counselor / Motivational Speaker & Trainer(30,000 linkedin connections)
When you are starting career you must focus on getting job immediately in order to avoid gap on your CV. If you keep waiting that a perfect job will come your way right away please mark my words it would happen for less than one percent lucky people. The rest will have to make their way through thick and thin.
So you have to be ready for taking risks, to avoid gap on your CV you can start off with internships (Paid or Unpaid) if not a job. You have to keep your options open, you have to target your particular core strength area and must have an alternate strategy in place too. It's important to have a second option which would always keep you targeted and you will be focused on work. You need to keep eye on jobs offered/available in market. Subscribe to active job boards which would increase the chances of your resume visibility. Further make job hunt your hobby till you get a dream job.
You need to start off with scratch so don't get in a fix that you would only except a particular position/role (it may not happen), you don't need to set your benchmark keeping in view another persons success story. Remember that you have to make your own success story. Many success stories never happen only because they are not yours & you cannot copy one.
It's not essential that what would have happened with your university seniors would also happen to you. Like the first salary they were offered, the level of job they got offered at first go. The market might have changed in due course, recession period might also effect the salary levels, joblessness also takes its toll. So devise your strategy as per prevalent circumstances. Be realistic rather then being optimistic or idealistic while demanding salary.
You need to be competitive as with every passing day competition is increasing and rightly so because the number of universities has increased, the education has also become competitive as well as the number of students graduating every six months has increased substantially and it is survival of fittest. Ten years back it would have been easier to find a job in comparison with today likewise ten years later it would be a different story altogether.
It's important for job seekers to have a strong CV to compete with others, the earlier you devise a strong CV the better it serves your career. Secondly job seekers must develop interview skills, interview skills are very important and play key role in getting you a job and reach your destiny, the earlier you learn these skills the better it is for your career. The job seekers must also learn the art of negotiation as negotiation plays key role in your career and life. The job interviews often require the skill of negotiation and those who are good at negotiation end up with a better offer for themselves. The rest keep complaining that they were hired at less then market value of the job.
Flexibility is the key to success in modern days as those who are rigid find it difficult to match the challenges of job as everything doesn't goes planned. I would suggest the job seekers to be formal in dressing and approach, formal approach always works for interviewers. Fancy email id's, fancy dresses, fancy hairstyles, fancy shoes do no good and leave bad impression on the employers.
In case you are jobless you should go for the first job offer that you feel like doing meanwhile keep applying for your dream job. We all search for dream jobs but our expectations of dream jobs are never fulfilled as one job is offer makes you attracted to the next level job and onwards hence the destiny keeps changing.
I also ask people to keep updating their work knowledge as the education received ten years back gets obsolete if the new trends are not discovered and adopted. So to be attractive for the employers you need to be aware of new trends relevant to your field. Likewise the technology has also developed manyfolds we could benefit from use of modern technoogy too.
GOOD LUCK