No one else to blame!

There is a beautiful track sung by the gifted artist 'Madison Cunningham’ that goes by this title. I suggest you listen to it, but that's got nothing to do with what comes next. It matches the track in spirit, but that's where the contextuality ends.

The world is a stranger place in 2020, with many predicting it would be long before it gets back to old ways. What concerns me is how most job seekers were already archaic, and have now been pushed to the stone age in terms of how they approach the task of marketing and selling themselves.

I've been fortunate to interview for hundreds of open roles across the last 5 years, and I must admit that it is still not easy to fill in entry-level roles with quality candidates. All this, while millions in this country battle unemployment and blame anyone from their college, to the government, and the market condition for being jobless. Wouldn't it be better to work on controllable factors before we lament about the uncontrollable ones?

I do not claim to be an expert on anything, and most thoughts below are based on my own limited experience. I still believe that most job seekers can do themselves a huge favor if they self assess on the below-mentioned pointers:

1) The Job Hunt: Your patience, perseverance, and hunger at work are aptly demonstrated in your hunger to find the same job. There is no dearth of people who are quick to dismiss a job portal as useless, and their network as hollow without pushing the envelope. Some elementary mistakes include:

• Not working on your CV/Resume: A clumsy document says a lot about an applicant. Work on it. If you're not confident, hire a professional to do it for you.
• Not keeping your profile updated: LinkedIn frequently reminds us to congratulate people on their work anniversaries. What's disappointing though is that most of these are for people who have not updated their profiles since eternity. In some cases, I get reminders for are people who worked with me 5 years ago in a start-up that shut shop in 2016. But they're still working there! Interestingly, the same people are quick to blame the platform for being ineffective.
• Being childishly credulous: While it is despicable for some people to take advantage of these job seekers to push their own agenda and popularity, such things are fueled by our stupidity. People willing to review profiles for open positions in lieu of comments and likes on their posts need not be touched even with a 'ten-foot pole.'
• Not worrying about the competition: Why dump your CV on a recruiter and wait endlessly? Don't forget that there are hundreds of other applicants who would have applied for the same role. Differentiate and seek attention professionally. There are multiple ways to find the right contact at an organization and ask for a referral or contact the recruiter and attract his attention to your application. LinkedIn itself is a wonderful platform for doing so even for job roles that you might have discovered elsewhere. Sadly, not many people make use of it.

2) The Interview: So it worked. You made it through round one. The competition is reduced to less than 1% of the initial applicants and it's only your game to lose from here on.

• Not doing your homework on the company and the interviewer: It's painful to see people walk in like headless chickens. It cannot hurt to know the arena and the opponent before the all crucial interaction. Some basic preparation in this regard can ensure that you're able to distinguish yourself from the crowd and hold an intelligent and informed conversation with the recruiter.
• Not being presentable: Walk in and present yourself as you'd do on your first date! No one is interested in your 'just out of bed' look. Period.
• Not speaking the truth: Don't lie. An interviewer isn't naive, some of them just choose to not argue over inconvenient details. Quit your job due to a prolonged illness/wedding/death in the family? Dropped out of college due to financial issues? You'd be surprised to hear the number of times this is repeated in interviews, to the point that the select few who are saying the truth are also viewed with suspicion.
• Not paying attention: There are enough people on LinkedIn and elsewhere who are concerned about the recruiters/hiring managers not sharing feedback with the rejected candidates. I agree that constructive feedback should be shared. Unfortunately, the bulk of candidates are just not paying enough attention to the subtle cues (both verbal and non-verbal) during the interview. It is not difficult to figure out what went wrong, but way too much onus is laid on the interviewer to spoon-feed the candidates, which in turn is also counterproductive to the whole culture of self-evaluation/assessment.
• Not being aware of the world around you: Another big problem, and more so for people straight out of college is not being conscious of the world around them. So many times in an interview with a fresher, you'd want to talk to them and understand how they perceive the world around them. Being informed and logically opinionated gives you a real edge that is grossly underestimated.
• Not being flexible/open to change: I remember an interview where I felt confident about my chances and walked in over-confident. While everything else went fine, I noticed that I come across as inflexible in some ideas/strategies discussed during the interview. By the time I could introspect this, it was too late. The hiring manager had formed an opinion of me, and he was clearly not interested to work with someone rigid and inflexible. It was a lesson learned the hard way! It is good to back up your opinion with facts and examples, but stay open to alternate views and thoughts at all times. No one wants an unreasonable/rigid/inflexible resource in the middle and senior management these days.

Those were a few controllable factors that I wish everyone paid attention to. While this is not an exhaustive summary of what might work, and there is no one size fits all; I hope this could of help to someone trying to get back on their feet in these times.

Best of luck!

-Anant Sharma