9 Mistakes To Avoid While Looking For A Job | Calibr
From finding one’s job monotonous to feeling underappreciated, there are a lot of reasons why people start looking for a new job.
On the one hand, there are freshers with no experience, looking for job opportunities. On the other hand, there are people like me, with a few years of work experience, looking for a better opportunity. For us, the reasons range from being underappreciated, low salary to finding the job monotonous.
Regardless of the category you belong to, there is one thing that connects everyone trying to find job opportunities — mistakes. So, to help you not make them or make as less as possible, here is a list of ten things you should avoid doing while in looking of a job.
Don’t just relying on job portals
With the advent of technology, we started depending largely on job portals to find a job in recent years. I don’t mean to say one shouldn’t rely on job portals at all, but that we should change and update ourselves with the changing times. Instead of being dependent entirely on job portals, it is important to try other ways of finding a job.
This includes networking to connect with people from your area of interest/expertise, attend relevant meetups, and interact with people. Of course, you can’t ask someone randomly for a job when you first meet them, networking doesn’t yield fruits overnight. But it will really be helpful in the longer run.
Apart from job portals, employees, these days are also on the lookout for prospective employees on social media platforms. So, being active on platforms like LinkedIn, staying connected with the right kind of people and updating your profile becomes crucial to finding a new job.
At the same time, as these social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter are also used to do background checks, you should make sure the content you share is appropriate and doesn’t backfire in the future.
Resume, the game changer while looking for a new job
A common mistake most people in search of opportunities do is trying to create one resume that fits all kinds of vacancies. While creating a resume each time is time-consuming and not suggested, make the necessary edits/changes to suit the company’s expectations.
Instead of just concentrating on what you want in the job, let the resume be about what you can offer the employer, and why you are someone important to their vision and mission.
Do not try to tell everything about you in the resume and make it very long. It needs to be short and precise. Considering that most employers only glance through your resume for the first time, it needs to be good enough with the necessary highlights to impress them.
An ideal resume is one or two pages long, which doesn’t tell everything about you, but what an employer would want to know to choose you. At the same time, you must be very careful and make sure there are no spelling or grammar errors in the resume.
Lying doesn’t work
Contradictory to what your friends and family suggest at times, be very honest about who you are in your resume. This doesn’t imply that you list out all your negative attributes and what you think are your misgivings. But, do not pretend to know things that you don’t have a clue about or talk about some things you never accomplished.
Though it might make you look good from the eyes of an employee initially, it is more than embarrassing when they find out about it. And if you happen to be recruited, you have to keep looking over your shoulder all the time hoping they don’t find out.
Keep in mind that you are held responsible and accountable for all that you write in your resume.
Presenting yourself for the interview
Once you clear the first round of screening, comes the interesting part — interview. For the personal interview, it is very crucial to be either on time or be a few minutes earlier. It will definitely earn brownie points with your prospective employer, and convince them that you are dependable.
If the interview happens over a video call, make sure you are dressed up professionally (though it’s a video call) to show them you are serious about the job.
Knowing the organization
Do a thorough research about the organization you are applying for, know about their competitors, trends and key issues in the industry. Being clueless about the company makes a very bad first impression on the employer and they might come to the conclusion that you are not interested in the job.
At the same time, it is okay to not know the answer to all the questions they have. You can be honest and say you don’t know the answer and ask them for an answer. Additionally, you can also ask them questions in return to make the interview more interesting.
How professional is your mail id
If you created your mail id when you were young, there are high chances it doesn’t sound professional. So, it is better to use that as your personal id and create a new mail id that sounds professional. Because even your mail id says a lot about you and make the employer decide whether to take your application seriously or not.
Following up
Once the interview is over, most employers conclude by saying they will get back to you. After a week or so, it is good to send a follow-up or a thank you mail which again reinstates the fact that you are serious about that job. However, this doesn’t mean constantly mailing and nagging them. Be patient even if there is no reply.
Though I have tried to cover mistakes that people very often do, I understand that the list is not exhaustive. This is just to help you get a glimpse of the job market and the nuances involved in it.
To conclude, though you could be in a desperate need of a job, do not apply for all openings you come across. Try to keep the number of companies to 10 at the maximum, so that you have enough time to research about the company and attend interviews. Besides, if you apply for a lot of companies, when they call you, you can’t figure out which role they are calling you for. And more than one interview in a day is not very doable.
Originally published at Calibr
