Success! Job Search Efforts That Paid Off –
I don’t have children, but I think I know how proud parents feel when their kids achieve their goals and soar past milestones on their way to bigger dreams.
Recently several of my clients have had some pretty noteworthy successes. After a long, difficult trudge through our region’s devastated job market over the past two quarters, they have built new opportunities for themselves to get back on track with work that is in line with their life plan. On the surface, each is showing the results of very smart and often hard work. Their efforts required a great deal of thinking, planning and extra effort to ramp up their job searches to produce the obvious results: they now are all working. Pretty exciting, very cool, and definitely worthy of celebration – There is more to celebrate, though.
In each case, these folks have followed some very basic concepts that are at the root of my coaching, teaching, and preaching. The most exciting part is not just that they are now employed, but each has a clear plan for what it will take to move forward, whether that is to maintain or build their value with this particular organization, or out in the broader scope of the job market, should their organizations change or hit tough times. Each of the people that hit their target (“Plan A”), as well as the ones that accepted less than their optimal target, (“Plan B” or “Plan C”), have kept their eye on the ball. They all have planned and measured out what it will take to build their value where they have landed or move forward toward their targets as the market improves.
There is nothing to be taken for granted in this market and it is unlikely things will change for quite a while. These folks are living proof that there are jobs- that you can take a controlled approach, you can influence your own situation favorably, that you can look forward to better things by keeping your eye on the ball. None of their work was random, none based on “luck”. It was planning, discipline, endless preparation and a commitment to getting forward. They might say it wasn’t pretty. But the rewards are pretty fun!
Well done!
Own your glory! Let others know what things made a difference in your job search.
Great news in times like these! Encouragement to keep persevering. Congratulations all!
This is great (and encouraging) news — but we always knew your methods work. 🙂 Congrats all!
When I was unemployed and working with Sherri, the hard work I adopted was a mentality that NOTHING else mattered until I found a job. I worked extremely hard to stay connected to people, following commitments, and initiating stuff strategically.
It required a lot of contact with Sherri, such that she could stay current on my activities and steer me along the way.
The biggest and hardest thing for me was letting go of comforts found in orderly structure and routines. My job search needed to be nimble and responsive to opportunities that arose. So, I had to get comfortable with quite a bit of chaos, which is why Sherri is so important to my career success. Without her external vision into my activities, that chaos might blind me from making smart choices.
Kudos to Sherri for keeping me focused, disciplined and motivated to keep on going despite the hard work and sacrifice I needed to make during my most recent search.
Additionally, I have a lot of thanks to grant the many others who have helped me throughout, meaning my network of friends and colleagues, including many in Sherri’s networking group. Hip hip hurray!!
I’m starting my second week at a 2-month Microsoft contract, and I want to say Sherri and her networking group are directly responsible for my getting back into the technical writing business 4 years ago. I didn’t quite know how to get started (or where to find the end of the ball of string.) Sherri’s seminars, her private assistance, and, especially, the support of the group, got me out of a large, bottomless hole. Thank you, all.